February 4, 2014 By 7 Comments

Some Days

Some days are just slammed.  Like today.  We had a snow day yesterday with doctors appointments and a movie date with friends and a fun dinner.  Yesterday was one where not much was accomplished per se of my to-do list and then bam!  last night around 10:30 I jotted down my to-do list by light of my phone because I started to feel all anxious and smothered and as if the walls were closing in and the world coming to an end just right outside.  Please say some of you can relate to this kind of overwhelmingness?

So I hit the ground running at 4:30 this morning and don’t see a slowing point.  So much to do.  Orders that desperately need completing and Amon’s speech therapy and laundry and dishes and our house is crazy and ladies, some of whom I know and don’t know, are going to fill our house tonight.  And good Lord, if you could see our bathroom…insert mini throw up.  And I need to make up some sausage balls and this Buttery Cream Cheese Coffee Cake.  The world will be much better when that is baking in my oven.

I can feel my stress level rising as I type.  When I was going to therapy on a more regular basis, I remember I told my therapist that I literally have to talk myself off the total freak out ledge sometimes and remind myself to breath.  She said this was actually a good coping mechanism.  I may be doing that currently.  Breath.  Breath.  Breath.  Someone pass the paper bag.

 And then when I re-read all that I just typed, isn’t it all the stupidest stuff which I am getting all worked up over?!?!  Isn’t it all really super unimportant when you break it all down?!?!  Yes, embarrassingly so.  These things which I allow to come into my head and heart and then stress them out, are certainly not worth the anxiety.  I should be letting these things fall to the side.  If they get done, awesome, if not, no worries.  God wants my day to be so so much more than worry and anxiety and stressing over junk.  Who knows what all He has planned.  He wants my day to bring Him glory and letting my head run wild is certainly not bringing Him any glory at all.

Amon is snuggled in my lap and quite possible will be asleep by the time I finish typing and I’m rethinking how I am going to do today.  I get to choose where I let my mind go to.  I get the choice and it’s a battle everyday.  A hard battle.  But I’m going to work damn hard to reclaim this day and try and give God the glory He so deserves.  So my to-do list may look a little different than I’d planned by tonight and if you are one of the ladies coming to my house, maybe don’t look directly at our toilet.  But I will greet you with a smile, some yummy food and ready to enjoy a conversation with you.

Some days I desperately need to sit and re-think where my head and heart are headed.  Some days God just needs a moment to yank my heart back towards Him.  And some days you just need a picture of a storm trooper talking on his cell phone.

Here’s to a day which God has so much more planned for us, than we could have ever imagined.

Happy Tuesday.

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July 30, 2013 By 8 Comments

Anxious

The list is long…the things I am anxious about these days.  So very, very long.  If I listed it all out this would be more like a book rather than a blog post.  We are trying to milk the last of summer for everything it’s worth, but I’m battling keeping my joy real, rather than just faking it for my kids.  I’m battling finding my joy in this anxious part of life.  I’m not the best at quickly remembering I’m not made to carry worry or anxiety…I’m not the best at handing it over to God immediately.  It seems every time I’m in this type of season I run wild with trying to fix everything and find all the answers myself.  I just put all 4 Kelleys down for a nap or quiet time and I felt overwhelmed…covered up in my anxiousness.  I sat here for a moment and thought about all that is weighing so heavy on my heart right now, then I looked at my To-Do list and then I kind of wanted to curl up in the fetal position in the corner and rock myself.  Then God nailed my heart to the floor.

Philippians 4:6-7 (NIV)

6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

I’m kind of funny about scripture.  I always like to look at the one gazillion different versions.  I dig the NIV, but love the contemporary realness of The Message too.

Philippians 4:6-7 (The Message)

6-7 Don’t fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God’s wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It’s wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.

So now I’m thinking on these.  Trying to let them settle deep into my heart and penetrate those anxious feelings that will just about suffocate me if I let them.  But I get a choice.  A big choice.  I get to choose where I let my mind go and what I let fill my heart.  It’s not always easy…like most of life, but I am trying to dwell on the fact that God did not create me and my heart for anxious feelings and worry.  I’m letting Him in on all my concerns and giving Him the thanks and the props He so deserves and I’m anticipating His sense of wholeness…letting Him…His love and faithfulness and grace…fill me up to the tip top and then it completely spilling right over.

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April 24, 2013 By 25 Comments

How To Punch A Bad Morning In The Face

I had another post about adoption ready for today and then…I woke up.

I am totally one of those people who gets completely overwhelmed by the stupidest stuff…this morning I would have easily used another word in place of “stuff” 🙂 When I walked in the house after taking Harper to school, the anxiety and worry and the overwhelmingness just started to pour in.  Satan was really loving it and I just let him have his way.  There was a sink full of dishes, piles and piles of dirty clothes, someone had tracked dirty little foot prints all over the kitchen floor, Amon was eating leftover Mexican food that was covering the floor under our kitchen table, orders were staring me in the face, dinner needed to be planned, etc, etc, etc.  On top of that, parts of our life right now are just worrisome for me…so throw in a mind full of worry too.  Then it began to rain.  It was a nasty little storm and a small leak in our roof we’ve had, got worse and that leak is what pushed me over the “do the big ugly cry in your bedroom floor” edge.  I was done.  I was too overwhelmed and the worry was too much.

Then God was all like, “Who do you think you are pitching this ginormous fit?  And who do you think I am?”  My mind immediately raced back to a question someone had posted on my instagram feed this morning on a picture from last week.  I have a sparrow tattooed on one of my forearms and someone asked if there was a significance to it.  My mom was the queen of worry.  I always told her I wanted to be just like her, but I did not want any part of her worriness.  That sounds a bit bad, but she worried hard.  She loved the places in the Bible that talk about God caring for the birds of the air.  The last art piece I made her was a “His eye is on the Sparrow” canvas.  She worked really hard on letting God have her worries.

As I’m sitting there full of worry and crying my eyes out over very small and trivial things, God brought that verse racing back to my mind.  And I felt like a fool…a big, sinful fool.  I have a choice each day.  I can let Satan have his way and enjoy stressing me out and pushing me over all kinds of edges and pitching a fit or I can let all the worry go and let all those small things go and remember I am not made to carry any of that crap.  Do not worry…God cares even for the birds of the air…And how much more valuable I am than birds!  I love the exclamation mark at the end of the verse.  God’s all like…boom…I really mean this.

So I got up and made some choices.  First off, I wrote the scripture on our chalkboard because I wanted to visually see it.  Then I picked two things from the list of overwhelming things, I thought would make me feel a bit better.  I chose to sweep the floors and to start some laundry in the washing machine.  The boys separated the clothes for me, while I swept in the kitchen and dining room and spot cleaned the crazy foot prints off the kitchen floor.

Laura Kelley Fun Fact #231:  I only divide clothes in to two piles…adult clothes and kid clothes 🙂 I wash my colors and whites together.  Everything gets washed on cold.  And sometimes If I’m feeling extra snazzy I’ll wash all the towels together on hot.  My mom would be hanging her head in disappointment right now.

SIDE NOTE:  We should never be allowed a big house…ever.  It will be dirty and gross.  1300 sq. ft. is puh-lenty.

I also decided we would do breakfast for dinner.  Zero prep, easy and quick.

Then I sat down and thought of some people in my life who could use a little encouraging note.  One of the greatest things I learned from Mom’s death was even when you don’t know what to do for yourself, you can always do for others.  So I wrote a few encouraging notes, addressed and stamped them and placed them in our mailbox.  I was feeling so much better already.

Then I did something really good for me.  I put Amon down for a nap and got me and the boys a snack.

SIDE NOTE:  Please tell me someone out there knows if these snacks are really “good for you” snacks.  Please say they are because they are both highly delicious.

This might be the moment when some of you are thinking I sat down and played and enjoyed Huddy and Sol and soaked up their little boyness and reveled in being a mom.  Well, you would be wrong.  People tell me all the time, enjoy these days because they will be gone before you know it.  I know they will.  I pretty much hate Time all the time.  He is stealing all of my babies, but I have to keep myself sane sometimes too…can I get an amen?!?!  So after the snacks were dumped into bowls, I put on a movie and I made some art.

SIDE NOTE and Laura Kelley Fun Fact #67:  Hoodwinked is hilarious.  So so so funny and cute.  I did an entire study in college on different children’s books that delivered a twist on a classic kids story…like Cinderalla and The Big Bad Wolf and The Three Little Pigs.  I lived on the edge in my college years…really, I was kind of lame.  I so wish Hoodwinked had been out at this time.

Creating is my escape.  It is like a full therapy session, but for free.  It clears my head and puts my hands to work.  It is just good for me and at that point in the day, I needed something that was just good for me.  It probably sounds corny and stupid, but God totally speaks to my heart when I create.  It’s usually a really special time for me and Him.  So I created and let my boys watch a movie.

Now I’m just sitting here feeling much, much better.  And I still have loads and loads of laundry to do, the sink is still piled high with dishes, the leak in our roof is still leaking and so on and so on, but I’m good.  I’m loved by the Creator of the world and I’m blessed beyond my wildest dreams.  Worry and anxiety have no place with me today.  I totally punched my bad morning in the face.

Happy Wednesday.

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