Our weekend...

God answers so many prayers for me and I am so unworthy that it always, always blows my mind how good he is to me and my family.

We have been struggling a bit this year more than ever, actually, even though we've been long sufferers of financial issues as I will share about some other time. It's actually a HUGE part of my testimony that God is indeed great and I have it on my blog "to do" list to share more about our financial woes and wonders.

But this year, for whatever reason has been even more challenging. It seems the more we try and cut back, the tighter everything gets. How is that? When we first moved to Clay almost 6 years ago, I'd just left the bank to follow God's call to become a teacher. That cut my salary by 3/4! (yes, I once made the big bucks! Hard to believe my little thrift-store shopping self ever had such a much higher standard of living) and we still had a car payment, cable bill, two phone bills and so many other things that we thought were "needs". Now we have no car payments, no cable and only a cell phone. I sew a lot of our clothes, I cook and clean frugally and have cut out so much from our "spending plan" (I've always hated the word budget because for us no two months are ever the same so it's hard to create a "budget") and still from week to week it's such a stretch! And then when something unexpected comes along like a trip to the ER or an outrageous cell phone bill (thank you, my lovely text-crazy daughter!) it blows us out of the water.

Nonetheless, even in today's economy, (are we in a recession or not? All the republicans still keep saying it's media hype but I gotta tell ya, if we're not in one, it certainly feels that way!) there are things I am indeed grateful for:

1. My husband still has his job. His overtime may have been cut out but so many at his company have been laid off indefinitely. Thank you, Lord that not only does he have seniority, he also has the skills that keep him in demand and right now I'm tahnkful that he's even getting a full 40 hours!

2. I have a job. And not just any job but a job that I love. A job that I'm good at and a job where I'm appreciated. I don't make much money right now but it will get better when my hours increase and God has even worked it out for me to continue to do what I love (homeschool my girls) while I help contribute to our family's income.

3. We have health insurance. Even though I sometimes complain about what it doesn't cover, I am glad to be able to whip that card out when I need to when so many people do not have that small luxury.

4. We do (or we did, lol) have some small savings in 401k and we still have Jeff's pension which is very, very good.

So we're not completely desolate. I hated having to pull money out of savings to keep us going but I'm glad it was there for us to do so. And getting back to what my post was originally supposed to be about--the check came just in the nick of time for us to pay some bills and take a little much needed mini break for some good family time.

Friday, we went to Atlant to Six Flags for homeschool day. It was dope, dude! (like my Randy Jackson impression!) I was a little apprehensive about going because even though it was such a good deal (for $24.50 you got admission, lunch and a return ticket) I'd heard it's always so crowded on homeschool day. It wasn't. I've been when the lines were MUCH longer. The weather was good and we spent the whole day with some good friends (the Nielsens) and had a blast!

I am still coming to terms with the fact tha tmy children are growing up fast and are no longer my babies. And also that it's not in the cards for us to have more children. I am missing my mommy-of-a-small-child days and though I'm thankful for friends who are willing to share their little ones for a few minutes at a time and for my job that allows me to be around little ones, I'm still struggling with the increasing awareness I have of my children's shortening childhood. So I try to comfort myself by looking for joy in the smallest of places, trying to embrace the positive things about having older kids. Like the fact that I didn't have to push that stroller around all those hills at Six Flags (sorry, Donna!) I didn't have to worry about changing diapers or running to the potty every five minutes (except for myself!) and having kids who are big enough to ride the big rides! Well, sort of...

Brooke is still a big weinie! We weren't able to get her on any coasters that went upside down (maybe next year) but we did get her on the Scream Machine, Wyle Coyote and the Dahlonega Mine Train. Kayti was my daredevil! She rode all those, plus the Georgia Scorcher, Goliath, the Ninja, Batman, Superman and the Mindbender! It's funny how when you think you know your kids and then they wind up being the opposite of what you expect. I would have expected Brooke to be the daredevil and Kayti to be the weinie! But whatever...

The weather was outstanding, too. It was overcast most of the morning but it never rained and there was a nice breeze, even when the sun did come out later in the day. No problem, we just hopped on the Splash Water Falls and got cooled off quickly!

We'd planned to get up early the next morning and head for Nashville (for Brooke's dance competition) and go canoeing but Nashville had so much rain the last few weeks and the water levels on the river was too high for a canoe trip. We'll have to make that up another time. So we just took our time going up there, galivanting, stopping when we saw something interesting. We had lunch at the Rainforest cafe (big mistake--$75 for hamburgers? Are you kidding me? I don't remember the one in Disney's Animal Kingdom costing that much!) and then we walked around the mall--the one they tore down Opryland to build. It still blows my mind that Opryland is no longer there. That was a HUGE part of my childhood and I miss it terribly. But even though I'm not much for shopping we still had a good time walking around the mall before going to the hotel for some rest and pool time.

The team did great at competition the next day--hi gold on everything and we had a nice ride home, even though Jeff came down with some kind of sinus infection that was making him nauseous causing me to have to drive the whole way.

So not a bad Mother's Day. I can't think of a better way to spend it unless my own mom had been with us. And like I said, I do realize that we are tremendously blessed.

Blessings,