little mommy watching/small boy prepping

   the other morning while cleaning up the kitchen i heard my little lady of one and a half quietly playing in the other room. i had the kitchen radio on, but really, i was listening to her. her little voice. she sounded so busy. i heard her quick foot steps down the hall and back again. then she'd be back in the room, close to where i was, just talking and talking in her sing-song young lady-like way. i kept at my kitchen work, still listening to her but starting to pay closer attention to the preacher on the radio. then i heard it.
   "daper? daper? daper?" was what her little voice kept repeating in question tone. oh no. she had recently started using the potty. she also has a habit of taking off her clothes and sometimes her diaper too. daper is diaper, in grace speak. my worst fear was that i'd peak around the corner and find her with no clothes on, and a poopy diaper half peeled off.
   quickly abandoning whatever kitchen work i was doing, i move for the dinning room where i hear her voice and stop dead in my tracks. my heart previously dropped heavily to my knees, it is now my knees that are week and my heart that soars. i stand there blinking back tears. my little lady of just twenty months of age playing with her doll baby who, might i add, isn't much smaller than she. doll baby flopped on top of the toy chest, her feet in the air and several of gracie's diapers on the chest and the surrounding floor. my daughter was changing her baby's diaper. in a mommy-like way, she was asking her baby, "nee' daper? 'come on."
   be. still. my. heart.
   i stood there and watched a little longer. watched as she struggled with the heavy doll baby trying to lift up it's hinney and putt on a new diap. grace started to pitch a fit.
   "grace?" i asked from the door way. "does your baby need a new diaper?" she turned and looked at me. big swirling blue eyes, ever so hopeful.
   "uh huh."
   "you want mommy to help you?" i asked.
   "uh huh."
   and their it was. me teaching my daughter the simple task of diapering a baby doll. her tiny hands helping to open and close the tape. her repeating my words of instruction. my trying to permanently sear each and every single second of the whole experience in my memory. my recalling that this little person was watching me. she would turn out a certain way because of me. she would maybe, diaper her own babies some day and then turn around and show her little ladies how to diaper their baby dolls.
   blinking back tears, doll baby diapered, i look into her tiny sweet face and say, "she's all fresh."
   "shoes? socks?"
   "does she need shoes and socks?" i ask my little grace.
   "uh huh," she replies with her eyes enlarging in excitement she runs her pitter-patter feet down the hall and into her room. "here 'ey are." i watch as she takes her shoes and socks from a cabinet in her room. the same cabinet that was once in my room. the same cabinet that was once in my mommy's room. she comes barreling back down the hall with a face full of delight and hands them to me. we sit for what seems like too short, but i know it was quite long, putting gracie's socks and sneakers on and off her doll baby's feet.
   my little lady. saying and doing as i say and do. in a voice that sings-songs much like mine. in ways that seems more familiar then strange. it makes me want to be me at my very best. who is that person that i wished i could be for her? the best version of me that only God Himself can turn me out to be and only by my stepping back and letting him have all of me. all of me.  letting Him have my little lady and making her what it is that He wants and needs her to be. impressing Him on her heart by letting Him be first impressed on mine.
   we play more with her baby doll. i get barretts and grace finds her comb and this doll baby is fresh with a new diaper, has had socks and shoes put on only to be taken off again and now it endures the brush strokes and barret application of a small toddler not yet able to do those things for herself. i sit and help and watch and say silent prayers to Maker of all that has breath, that she will one day be full of breath that praises the very same Maker.
   my small boy of four years and five months appears up the steps and wonders what we are doing. again, i am reminded that i need to be the best me possible, for him as well. for it is this small man child that will one day grow up and be attracted to someone someday, that they say reminds him most of me. and suddenly i want again to be my best me. i pray again for my decreasing and His increasing and the desire for this boy to know and love and trust the Creator of all the heavenly lights. i pray silently that i will help them both find and shine that light whereever they go.
   this calling of mommy. this job of sorts. it's by far, more then i expected and by far more then i ever hoped to receive, let alone deserve.  it's by far, my favorite job of all. by far, one of my favorite delights.

holy high jump start

   i'm on a roll. here is conffession number two. yesterdays post was true. i have a theory about starting off the day with sweets helping to curb the desire for them the rest of the day. i hold firmly to it. here's the kicker. it staired me down yesterday, while rereading sugar high jump start. that post and i stood in the center of town square, about 25 feet away from one another, hands at a ready. one to reach for more coffee, the other to push delete (no guns in the showdown of my mind).
   their was once a time i had coffee with the King every morning. it wasn't easy waking up before the kids, the husband, the chickens and yes, even the sun. i was coaxed out of bed before dawn by the lure of a small one cup coffee maker on my bedside table. the clock would scream its usual "GET UP! IT'S TIME! GET UP! SLEEP IS DONE!" and i trained myself to turn it off and press brew. the tiny one cup coffee maker would brew, purk a little and steam almost like an appolagy for the annoyance of the clock an would gently reminding me that i had a coffee date to wake up for.  every morning, for the longest time i would wake up like this and enjoy my first cup in the quiet of my prayer closet. sipping between repenting. sipping bewteen giving thanks. sipping between asking for help in this and in that, and for him or for her. sipping between sobbing for those who don't yet know the sweet fragrance of the love song that plays in the backround of coffee dates such as these.
   early morning coffee with my heavenly Father.
   so what happened you ask? obviously i'm not keeping this date as of late. no. i am not. i have been standing Him up. standing up the One who calls me beloved and blessed and desires nothing short of communion in spirit and to love on this broken child of His. one who needs desperately to be fixed of all the messy world-wounds, most of which i create myself. mind you, i am not totally negelecting my first Love but in the sugar high jump start post i am reminded that my tithing time away from my comfortable bed, tithing my percious sleep, has been lost and forgotten and even accepted in a cheeky post. 
   not okay. not acceptable.
   forgotten in sickness. forgotten in depression. lost in my selfishness. all of which are just the things that close communion with He who is the Creator of all that is seen and unseen, can heal me from and set me forever free from.
   a holy high jump start is by far a better way to start the day. is a better way to be best prepared for the day. of coarse i'm not saying that i won't still share cupcakes with my children first thing in the morning, but if i am so prepared, having been jump started by the Jumper Cables of the Universe, my children may in fact have two healthy breakfasts. instead of one infused with sugar and then a "make up breakfast" more on the healthy side.
   and while i'm confessings to an infinate void, i may as well bring up that whole "voyers who may get their super-mom capes in a bundle" comment. i must remind myself. this is a blog that i started for the sake of my own remembering. more so that with each passing second i won't be both trying to sear each and every precious moment of my family into my brain and grieving it's fleeting loss in my bad memory. not to have public followers. and doesn't that sound creepy anyway? to have followers. i am sure, every family goes through these wonderful family moments as well. they need not read mine but go and live them out with their own families. and so i will continue to post so that i can remember and whomever wants to come along, or not come along for the ride, either privately or publicly, may.
   excuse me, i have an alarm clock and small one cup coffee pot to go set up, for tomorrow i am having coffee with the King. a holy high jump start. 

sugar high jump start

   i have a theory. i am no scientist, phyissist or mathmatician. nor am i a lot of other things but i'm okay with my lacking in all of them. my theory will shock and astound most. if anyone of the few voyers out their reading this blog get their super mom capes in a bundle? too bad. here is my theory.
   starting your day off on the right foot means, to me and mine, your first step is fully loaded with sugar. seriously. i find it curbs the sweet tooth for a good part of the rest of the day.  (insert shock and gasping here, i am quiet fine with it, really.)
   if i'm perfectly honest, this theroy has been noticed in my lacking. early in the morning, sifting through the fogginess of sleep and first rays of sunshinine. awaiting my morning cup of joe, my son expecting a wonderfully made breakfast meal at this time would have to mean he is out of his mind. personally, my sweet tooth is at it's all time high first thing in the morning. low blood sugar? i can only assume. coffee is my first dessert of the day. no kidding. more sugar and cream and less coffee in my cup. this friendly combo of caffine and sugar is my jump start and i look forward to it from the time morning peels my eye lids open, until the first wonderful sip and savour.
    so while i'm in the land of forcing the wakfullness, sugar pulsing through my veins, eyes finally wide open, i spy things like cupcakes and cookies that me and small brood bake from scratch. butterscotch crimpets and kandy cakes, a few days past code that my husband brings home from the warehouse. smile scross my face, enthusiasm in my voice, i offer them to the kids who almost never turn them down. aaaand here is where my name for mother-of-the-year gets pulled form the ballot. i let my son wash it down with chocolate milk and my daughter? well she starts the day with warm tea. no! decafe! she is, after all, only 1 1/2.
   so their you have it. officially. my first real confession for my supposed blog of confessions. mostily i adore my job and each one of my confessions is in fact my recalling the sheer love and adoration of being wife and mommy. but this? it's truly a "confession" of sorts. although no secret, i have shared my theory with those with whom i run. (hahaah!)
   starting off the day this way is a total cop-out. a quick fix until i have my head screwed on tight and am actually able to fix the kiddos something that will do their growning bodies good. in wich case, they are standing on chairs at the counter ready, waiting and willing to partake in and enjoy the making of. (see post cooking show: audience of 2) and i am, since having had my sugary jump start, a little bit better off for it. and for them. the crazy finding in all this is that we don't spend our days in arguing over the next sweetie. through out the day we do well, nutritional speaking.  little do they know i deceptively sneek more veggies into their diet then they can see. thank you very much jessica seinfeld =) and so i dont think that starting off our day on a sugar infused treat and using the rest of the day for all the other wonderful good-for-you foods is so bad after all. i do in fact think it it curbs our desire for the sweeties.
   theory share? check! first confession? check-check!