Weekend Away

A couple of weeks ago, my sister came up and Brian and I were able to get away for a night.  We took Silas with us because of course he can't be away from Mama for more than a few hours:). We had such a refreshing time of relaxation, sleep, and lots and lots of uninterrupted talking.  

The kids at home seemed to have had a great time with Auntie Donna as well! Thank you, Donna!  We're extremely grateful. 

We actually ended up crossing the river to walk through the little river town of Madison, Indiana.  It was founded in 1809 and the buildings were old and quaint.  We enjoyed our brief visit of the town.  They had a GREAT bookstore.  No pictures, so I'll tell you about it:).  Wood shelves up to the ceiling, ladders, and a beautiful Steinway grand piano {drool}. Sigh. Someday.  Of course, I think we need a place big enough for it first. Ha!  It was an old fashioned bookstore, very clean and neat, and of course modern books:). We could have stayed there a long time, but Silas was getting fussy at that point!

The antique store was massive, too. That was fun to go through.

Snapshots of the town. So quaint and cute!

A stop for a coffee and a chai latte!

Check out this old, old movie theater showing Courageous!  And look at that box office! Too bad it was closed. I really, really wanted to go in!

We did a lot of driving around and looking at scenery. Because Silas was with us, it was a great way for him to nap and us to have lots of talking time!

Us!

And our adorable sidekick!

It was a very restful weekend. We didn't realize how poorly we have been sleeping due to loud neighbors until we were in a quiet cabin!  We had some great discussions. Set goals, dreamed dreams, made plans, had fun!  Love my hubs!

Intentionally Remembering

I mentioned in my last post that it is important to intentionally look back and remember.  Why is this so important? Simply put, it is very healthy to know where you are and where you want to go.

While in some cases it may be a bit uncomfortable or even somewhat discouraging to remember, it is the only way that you can make needed changes and move forward.

The flip side is that it is also encouraging.  There are blessings and changes that sometimes go unnoticed. This is just as dangerous.  God has blessed us above and beyond what we could ask or think.  The Bible is chalk full of instances where God reminds His children to remember. Remembering God's faithfulness in the past is the surest way of not falling into despondency over trials today.

We chose to remember by making an evening out of it.  I already told you that I put slips of paper with questions in a jar and we pulled them out and talked about that particular question and answer. This was both fun and serious and not only caused us to be once again reminded of God's faithfulness to us, but also helped us evaluate where we need to set goals to improve in this new year.

I will share with you some of the questions that we used to get our minds rolling.  This is most certainly not an exhaustive list and we had more than I am including, but it will hopefully get your minds turning so that you can come up with your own list.  So pull out a notebook jot down your thoughts as you intentionally look back on this past year.


1) What was one way I excelled as a spouse this year?

2) What was my biggest challenge in being a good spouse this year?

Use these questions to evaluate every relationship you have: Parent/Child/Employee/Employer/Neighbor/Church Member/Friend, etc.

(Special Note: The answer to the biggest challenge might be a good jumping off point for your goals for this new year!)

3) What is one thing I learned this year?

4) What one major goal did we accomplish this year?

5) What was my favorite book I read this year?

6) What are three direct answers to prayer this year?

(If you can't answer this question it might be that you have failed to ask God for answers. Or you might be so consumed with the answer coming in a specific way that you haven't even noticed the answer has been given just in a different way than you anticipated.  I highly encourage you to ask and let your faith be strengthened as you see God answer your prayers.)

7) What was my biggest time waster this year? (All I'll say is, ouch!)

8) What was our favorite family outing?

9) What is one funny moment that stands out?

10) What was Stefan/Olivia/Silas' biggest achievement this year? (Be sure and evaluate your children as individuals and not as a collective whole!)

11) What was one life changing event this year? (We had a lot! Baby, out-of-state move, seminary!)

12) What is one way I grew spiritually this year?

13) What is one way I grew intellectually this year?

14) What is one RAOK (Random Act Of Kindness) someone showed to you that you remember?

(Don't underestimate the value of a RAOK.  My answer to this was a kind man helping me out with my grocery cart when I was struggling with car seat, groceries, children, and cart. It was a simple act of kindness, but these things are vastly being lost in our society. We try to be intentional about looking outside of ourselves to the needs of others around us.  We want to do better about this and do better about teaching our kids to do this as well and these questions help!)

15) What is one RAOK I did for someone else? 

I could go on, but I'll stop here. Hopefully this is enough to get you all going. Throw in some fun, tailored-to-your family questions and you have a great jumping off point to spend an evening remembering.  It will strengthen your faith in God, it will help you evaluate where changes need to be made, and it will remind you of all the wonderful things God has given you.

For us, what always follows the night of remembering is a set aside time to set new goals.  We have already been talking a lot about it, but our official goal setting time is coming this weekend.  My sister is coming to babysit, and Brian and I are looking forward to some time alone to do just that!

This is certainly not a typical post for me, but I thought some of you might find it helpful so I thought I would share!

Bye Bye Christmas and other Random News

January is off and running and it seems like Christmas was ages ago.  We said goodbye to our tree and the only thing left of Christmas are the cards on our fridge, the new toys being played with, and the wonderful memories of a beautiful season spent together as a family. 

Sniff, sniff...

We enjoyed a simple New Years Eve. We first had dinner with friends, but since there were children involved it was an early affair and we were home with the kids in bed shortly past their normal bedtime. 

Brian and I then popped some popcorn and took some time to reflect on our year. While the beginning of a new year is certainly a good time for making new goals, we also like to take some time to look back and remember. I filled a jar with lots of questions that we randomly pulled out.  It made for a wonderful evening of fun, laughter, and serious reflection.   We remembered specific answers to prayer, funny moments, major accomplishments. We talked about how we had grown and changed. It was the perfect mix of serious and fun. If you haven't thought back on your year yet, I highly recommend it.  It is a good thing to remember.

I found Silas just chillin' on the couch.

We've been enjoying slowly working through Charlotte's Web.  Since Daddy has been home lately to listen in on the reading time he was able to capture the pictures.  As you can see, Olivia doesn't appear to be listening, but she is always sad when I put the book down.  Stefan loves it and has even read to me recounting stories about Wilbur, Charlotte, and Templeton.  It's been fun to see! We are nearing the end of our first chapter book read aloud. 

We had some snow the other day. It actually snowed most the day but no accumulation. I figured out that I needed to get excited over this, because we are not in the North and clearly this is probably all we're going to get so we had some Snowmen fun.

First we made puffy snowmen. (Equal parts shaving cream and glue)

We had snowmen pancakes. Stefan was thrilled about this, but I think he was feeling bad for the snowman because that night in Bible time he prayed for the snowman that he ate!  

We also read, among others, these 'snow' books:

When Winter Comes

The Snowy Day

The Biggest, Best Snowman

and

Juste un Petit Bout (in French, obviously)