So I'm trying to house clean the kitchen & living room and the children find a way to turn it into play (no pun intended). When I asked Lexi to take down the curtains yesterday, she thought they would be perfect for a stage and she & Audrey rigged this up.

So I sat on a little chair and watched them act out Cinderella. VERY entertaining, and I could barely keep the giggles on the inside when I saw the mean stepsister appear on stage.

Lexi was Cinderella

And now we're at the ball. Enter Prince Charming, then Cinderella arrives and they dance as the mean step-mother looks on.

Cinderella tries on the slipper

And they all lived happily ever after.

Later they were hanging out underneath the air conditioner when I took the vent off the cold air return to clean it. Lexi was hoping upon hope that this would turn into a secret passageway of some sorts (she reads too many mysteries), but since that wasn't the case, a clubhouse was next best.

Don't you just love when you start reading a book and it feels like it was written for you personally? My mom stopped in last Saturday and gave me a book - "Tender Mercy for a Mother's Soul" by Angela Thomas. She was like you have to read this book, and I'm thinking, yeah there are lots of books I need to read but when will I ever find the time. But we make time for the things that are important to us, don't we? I started reading on Sunday and I knew Mom was right, I did need to read this book. And I'm going to have to read it several times to soak in all the things I'm learning from it. I've been on survival mode alone for so long, and I'm seeing there is a better way, and it is possible to grow in Christ, even in the busyness of being a mom. 

A couple of excerpts:

This book is about caring for your soul in the season of motherhood. That's right - caring for your soul. Most of us haven't really thought about it lately, but the ache in your heart that will not go away is your soul crying out for attention. I know it sounds impossible. I know that your life is incredibly busy. I know that your children are the busiest children ever born. But it is imperative that we stop and find Jesus in all of this.

We cannot impart what we do not possess. If I am not crazy in love with Jesus, then how can I expect that my children ever will be?

Mothering is about giving. We give at every level of emotional, mental, and physical engery. We give until there is nothing left..... But to give and give without being replenished is to eventually become barren & dry. I have struggled mightily with my spiritual life since becoming a mother. Inconsistency gives way to frustration, and eventually the whole effort can seem hopeless. But this, my sisters, is the place where we must summon every ounce of courage we have left. This is the battle we must fight.....We must pray Psalm 23 for ourselves and ask the Lord to come and restore our souls......We cannot possibly love as we ought from the dryness of a barren desert.

We are designed to function poorly, to feel overwhelmed and alone apart from our relationship with Jesus. We are made to be lost without God. If you look to yourself or some worldly effort to fill your soul, then you are left empty because your soul was formed as God's dweling place.......There is depth to your soul, perhaps more than you can see right now. God wants to unveil so much more....Doing is not being. Surviving is not truly living. Your soul must be protected, attended to, and cared for.

Motherhood is an incredibly complicated endeavor. It has made us into remarkable women.....We are excellent at getting it all done, at least for a season. But somehow, in the scramble of details and production, we begin to expect that impressive accomplishment will fill our souls. When it doesn't, we turn to the people who are closest to us and desperately charge them with the assignment. Little by little, over the years, we can unwittingly turn our eyes from our Savior to ourselves, our circumstances, and our families. The changes are subtle, the turning is ever so slight, and years can go by before we recognize that the distance from us to God has become a canyon. When we have not stayed with God, when we do not abide in His presence daily, then we wander recklessly through life, holding our cup out to anyone and anything, doing bigger and better tricks, hoping that one of them, or some mysterious combination of all of them, will fill the empty place. Our season of motherhood can be radically transformed if we will bring the empty cup of our souls and hold it out to the life-giving water of Jesus. His presence is like a huge cup of java for the soul.

When my soul began to wake up, I realized that the way back to God was through prayer. I began praying intently for refreshment from God, and I encourage you to begin seeking our Father through prayer.....Pray until He comes. God always, always comes.

There is so much more I could share from the book, but I need to move along. If you feel like you are just surviving instead of LIVING, I recommend this book - it has been a tremendous blessing to me already!

P.S. Expect to see a lengthy post in the near future - we have been going & doing a LOT the last couple months.

Kinda late in the day to be posting this but still wanted to share it. I majorly flubbed it yesterday - I was a far-from-perfect Mom, far-from-perfect wife, far-from-perfect everything, and I went to bed wondering how God could possibly love someone like me. Sure, my head knows He does but my heart didn't feel it. Anyhow this reading was just what I needed. It's taken from the book Prayers and Peanut Butter by Barbara Classen:

The Gift

"This is the day the Lord hath made."

God brought a gift this morning at dawn. He wrapped it in tangerine and gold clouds, and tied it with birdsong and breezes. It was a new day, fresh and unspoiled. It was fragile, with dewy flowers and golden light spilling low on the floor of the woods just before sunrise. The only sounds came from the leaves whispering overhead and a bird pouring out a song from Eden.

He means for us to take special care of this gift. He wants it unspoiled by loud words or ugly actions. We must take care not to smudge it with black thoughts and attitudes. Especially, we must be careful not to break it with anger or shatter it with derogatory remarks.

By evening, though, how pitiful the gift looks. How marred, how battered, how beyond salvaging. We cry hot tears.

But we never need to ruin tomorrow just because today was bad. He loves us so much that He forgives again and the next morning at dawn a new gift is waiting. This one is wrapped in pink clouds with silver rain, and enveloped with fragrance of wild roses.

He has given us a clean new day and is letting us try again.