Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done.
~C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer
~C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer
Church
The change in churches was the most positive thing we have done this year. We have settled on a church but not really involved as we would like just yet, which is mostly due to my husband's job and the crunch we have due to changing our errand day to Wednesday because of the Home Study Center. We love the church. It was not an easy choice when comparing the ones we had been visiting, but this one had been at the top of our list. We told our friends from our former church about it, who wanted to leave also, and they fell in love with it at their very first visit. So, we started going there with them, in our minds, to settle them in, and of course, we got settled in also. The only thing I see as a downside for me personally is I am not on Facebook, which is how most the active members communicate with each other and events are organized.
The Home Study Center
The Princess' piano lesson has been on Thursday since we started over eight years ago, until we enrolled her at the Home Study Center. Then it had to be changed to Wednesday and that was not much of a problem until we had chosen our church, which has services on that night and we have only made it to a couple of them.
The science program has turned out to be a point of some discomfort for me. I am not sure if I am just looking for things that are disappointing or if these are justified issues, but my scales have seem to weigh the inconveniences more heavily than the benefits since October. There are many factors, most that I have mentioned in early posts, that make me wonder if we would consider it all for next year. Perhaps one of the nags I feel is that in the beginning before we enrolled we were told that spring expedition was included in the tuition fees, yet since she was accepted we hear more often how the tuition does not cover all the costs of the expedition so they have various fund raisers that are impractical for us with the distance and that they are also trying to raise money to build another building, mostly to expand their current high school STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) program.
Husband's Job
I discussed this in a recent post, but I am not sure I could ever fully explain how his work schedule, particularly this year has affected us as a family. I am thankful he has a job and that he enjoys what he does, but...the other guy in our city just got himself kicked out of another customer's place last Friday, who never wants to see him again, because he did not fix the problem and made it even worse as he has done with them in the past also. So, I guess he will be again be rewarded with staying home when they call for service and my husband will get the wonderful opportunity to work more hours away from home to actually fix the problem, make the customer happy, and be stuck in the field and overlooked for promotions because he does his job so well where he is. You would think the company would rather guys like him do the field training with guys like that.
If I screamed "enough of this madness" would anyone hear it?
My husband has this saying that he can handle one bad of three areas in his life as long as the other two are good. The three are family, church/spiritual, and work. The trouble is that when the one gone bad dominates, as he allowed it, then it can taint the other two as well. I am hoping my Lord is making way for some positive changes with my husband's job this year.
My Kindle
I received my Kindle Fire HD for Christmas a year ago ever since I have taken the thing with me everywhere. I wish I could say I read books on it and I might yet, but mostly I use it as my Bible, notebook planner, and calculator as well as for email and for games. It is just so versatile and handy. Too handy, perhaps. I mean I can even watch Netflix on it if I want to, but I like the larger screens for movies.
What I like about our church is that we have free Wi-Fi and use the one Bible app "live," that is the church can upload the Bible verses that will be covered in the sermon when I am in that app. Pretty convenient!
The Princess' Attitude
Because of how much my husband was away for work, I was in this quandary of being a practically single mother impractically because when my husband was home, as infrequent and unpredictable as that had been, I suddenly had to shift to be wife and one of two parents even though he was too tired and burned out to be husband and father much of the time. During this time our little Princess developed into what we call the γινώσκω (pronounced ghin-OS-ko) stage, which is Greek for "I know." She knows so very much and she can do such amazing things (that we have yet to see her do) and whatever it is she has it worse or can do it better than anyone else...except for listening. It seems to me that her wirings from ear to brain and brain to mouth are in need of major overhauls!
There have been some very big changes in the Princess in the last year. Even though she begged me to paint her room pink four years ago (I cannot believe it was that long ago) and she still loved pink clothes the best then, the child has expanded choice of colors and now shuns pink, except for mauve and darker pinks. Her favorite color is in the teal to turquoise range, but she also likes greens, browns, and purples, all of which look lovely on her with her long, straight brown hair. Yes, she is by far pickier about her clothes than she was and tends to like to dress modestly on the sceen/punk side at times, but not into black and she still is into modesty. I think she is getting her ideas from the Claudia character on Warehouse 13, which is not too far out for me.
Expectations
I wish the most influential changes I had experienced in 2013 had been something more along the lines of spiritual enlightenment, miracles, healings, and such things as that and I have those expectations still. Maybe 2014...?
~ My Lord, thank you for this time to look back and be appreciative for change. I am praying that You will guiding the changes for us in this next year. ~
