Priorities check.

In prayerfully considered order, starting anew each morning, and keeping in touch with the promptings of the Holy Spirit throughout the day:

1. PRAYER

2. PERSON

3. PARTNER

4. PARENT

5. PROVIDER

"I have just enough time today to do what God needs me to do today." 

Family outing

On Saturday afternoon, we decided to take an impromptu trip to Galveston with the kids, and we had a blast! 

We met up for a while with our friends Peter and Kristin, who were spending the weekend on the island, and we walked around the Strand with them for a while. The Strand is sort of like the touristy downtown of Galveston. It's come a long way since it was devastated by Hurricane Ike in 2008. 

For some reason I was feeling super-confident in motherhood yesterday, because I barely batted an eye when I had to nurse Faith with just a blanket on the steps of a windy open square with dozens of people walking around and eating nearby. I also didn't bat an eye when I changed Gabriel's epic poopy diaper in a corner and then showed Gabriel how to throw it in the dog poop container. 

With Gabriel, I would never have dared to nurse or change a dirty diaper like that...out in The Open that is. I guess Baby #2 has seasoned me a bit. 

Isn't this a darling baby?! She is so alert and sweet--what a joy she is to us. 

My family :)

Family photo! Notice the Football Hold I'm doing with Faith. She loves being held like that. 

After we finished walking around the Strand, we dropped Peter and Kristin off at their hotel and went to our favorite restaurant in Galveston, The Spot. We didn't manage to score an ocean view table (because the place was packed), but we did get a nice little corner table near the exit, which proved to be a blessing when Faith woke up hungry and we had to make a quick getaway! 

After we made it out of The Spot, we ended up parking the van on the seawall by the beach so that I could feed my fussy (and actually constipated I think) Faith. Michael and Gabriel sat on the ledge and had some good father-son time. 

It felt great to get out with both kids and have a little adventure of an evening! 

Letter from the trenches

Young parenthood has been a roller coaster of emotional highs and lows, joys and challenges that have refined my soul just a little bit more. Of course, that's for me to (dare) hope and for God to judge. :) Despite it being so tough sometimes, I have had many older women smile and get that far-away look in their eyes when they talk about when they had babies and young children. Almost all of them have told me, in one form or another, that these are some of the best days of my life. 

On tough days, I wonder how they could have forgotten how infuriating it is to want just TWO MINUTES ALONE to pee without a toddler skipping around at your feet and trying to grab the plunger and extra toilet paper roll off the rack. 

On better days, I just respond with a smile, "I know." 

This past week the kids and I were stricken (Oh, what a perfect use of that word!) with a nasty cold that threw me headfirst into Mommy Survival Mode.  Taking care of a newborn and a young toddler by myself isn't exactly easy on the best of days; with Mommy running on empty and both kids battling a cold, it can be really, really rough.

During the worst of it, I felt like I was in a one-woman losing battle, huddled in the metaphorical trenches of motherhood. Hygiene went down the drain. As did a lot of cough drops. 

Even when I'm not sick, young parenthood is tough. I struggle every single day with parenting my sweet, adorable, illogical, emotional 23-month-old. I lose my temper with him far more often than I'd like to admit. I fight loneliness often as I clean up crumbs and throwup and dishes and diapers and muddy Crocs and spilled milk. I battle secret thoughts of ditching my house--alone!--to go get a pedicure, pick up a frappucino, buy a new book from Barnes and Noble, then find a breezy, shady tree by a lake for a little reading and a NAP. 

And yet in the midst of all this, God strings me lovingly along by sending me sweet moments to get me through and remind me that I'm where I'm supposed to be. He sends those kinds of moments that sparkle and shine forward into the beautiful memories held dear by our mothers and grandmothers.  

Memories like today, when I put on the radio and waltzed Faith to sleep after lunch in the living room, while Gabriel had the time of his life making a game out of chasing my dancing feet so he could catch them and give them kisses. 

Or every day, when Gabriel runs screaming and laughing at full-speed to the front door when he hears his Daddy coming home from work. 

Or when Gabriel "goes to work" with his Daddy, feeling so obviously important and needed as he rides on Michael's lap on the ZTR with his little blue Spiderman sunglasses and ear guards and camo pants. 

Or when we spend a lazy Sunday afternoon (and first cool afternoon of Faith's life!) drinking Cokes and watching the air show at nearby Ellington Field from our front yard. 

On tough days, I can sometimes hate making myself pick up my head from the trenches to admit that it's not all bad. That parenthood is one of the most wonderful and beautiful and fulfilling things I've ever done. It's easier to roll in the mud when you're down than to get up and start cleaning yourself off. 

As I finish this post, both kids are waking up from a nap. Both are hungry. Both are whiny. I didn't get a nap because I decided to finally get on my laptop and get this blog post out of my head. 

Oh well. 

After snacktime (and Second Lunch for Faith), I think I might take a walk in the park this afternoon. After all, it's a beautiful day. :)

I'll be back

I've had a few people ask me when Humble Handmaid is going to get back online. The answer is...as soon as I can!

Traveling, sickness, and general new baby craziness has put a damper on blogging. I have so many blog posts rolling around in my head right now...thoughts and reflections and questions and funny stories and ideas. And hopefully most of them will resurface once I can find a new routine of sorts and fit blogging back in to my life a little more. I miss it!

In the meantime, make sure to follow me on Facebook . I'm on Facebook a lot more now because I have an iPhone, and because I can play on my iPhone while I'm nursing all day (and all night sometimes).

Blessings on you and yours :)

My little pumpkin

Faith has a little cold right now, but is cheerful and smiley as ever. She is the most good-natured almost-six-week-old you've ever met.

It's been a tough last few days with her mommy being sick, but the good news is she blessed me by sleeping GREAT at night lately;)

Tupperware tantrums

Eating leftovers so much for the past month has made me realize I have a little problem in my home. Fighting almost daily with a grouchy husband who can't find the right Tupperware to pack his lunch got really old!

You know, I guess that when you are the only person in the house who can stand to venture into your Tupperware cabinet, it's time to make some changes.

And when your Tupperware collection is literally famous among friends and family for it's matter-of-a-fact disorder, it's time to make some changes.

I read a blog recently that had a great idea for taking charge of magically-multiplying, mismatched Tupperware. You use a sharpie to code each container and matching top with letters or numbers. You then make sure that you keep the tops stacked in numerical/alphabetical order to make it easy to find the top for a chosen container.

Last Thursday, I had a little down time while Michael took Gabriel outside to help load equipment onto the landscaping trailer. As soon as Gabe was out the door, I was taking out all of my Tupperware before I could even think, "a nap would be nicer..."

After I dumped every piece of Tupperware I had onto my kitchen table, it only took about 20min (with some interruptions!) to do all the number labeling and then return everything--newly organized--back to the cabinet.

What a great feeling! 20 minutes wasn't so bad. I procrastinated on this project like it was going to take me two hours!

Babies make me smile

Some of the people Faith got to meet this weekend...

Explosions

Right before dinner last night, Faith threw up what seemed like her body weight in milk. It just kept coming and coming and coming, warm but tickly as it trickled down my soaked shirt into my belly button.

The best part is that I barely batted an eye. I just stood there for a moment, plotted out my plan of action, then got to it.

I feel like I got lucky and happened to be standing in a scattered shower of Heavenly grace.

I love when that happens.

The picture is of Faith right after her emergency bath.

A sunshine of God's love

"A joyful heart is like a sunshine of God's love." -Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta

This is an amazingly happy baby. What did I do to deserve this? ;)

Well hello again, St. Therese

When I was in college, I hosted a girls' group at my apartment each Thursday night. We took turns presenting and then leading a discussion on different topics each week.

As I sat down this afternoon to pray and do some spiritual reading, I had the sudden urge to pray through journaling, so I picked up an old notebook I've been using for a few months now. The notebook happens to be one that I used briefly for my girls' group in college in the fall of 2007.

When I opened this notebook today to journal, I accidentally didn't open to one of the pages toward the end of the notebook; I opened to a long entry I had written to prepare for a girls' group presentation on St. Therese of Lisieux that I did  in honor of her feast day, Oct. 1. The journal entry was from Oct. 2, 2007--four years to the day today. I had copied out many quotes from Story of a Soul, and the page I opened to had a quote that spoke to my heart immediately:

"To remain a little child before God is to recognize our nothingness, to expect everything from God as a little child expects everything from its father; it is to be disquieted about nothing, and not to be set on gaining our living." 

When He wants to be, God is amazingly clear with me. And he loves to use goosebump-inducing coincidence to get my attention.

As you know from my previous post, I've been experiencing the frustration and discouragement of a little spiritual dryness lately, coupled with some anxiety about challenges I'm going through right now. Especially with a precious newborn in the house, the reminder to go before my God "as a little child" is well-timed for me!

I'd like to share some of the book quotes and personal reflections from that journal entry. I could type for hours about how each of these quotes applies to my spiritual life right now, but I'll show some restraint. :) I hope that one or more of these may speak to something going on in your lives!

"Dry prayer or distance from God is sometimes necessary in His will. Sometimes He can only work on us when we're "asleep." 

"Just as in nature all the seasons are arranged in such a way as to make the humblest daisy bloom on a set day, in the same way everything works out for the good of each soul." 

"All the flowers He has created are beautiful. How the splendor of the rose and the whiteness of the lily do not take away the perfume of the little violet or the delightful simplicity of the daisy. I understand that if all flowers wanted to be roses, nature would lose her springtime beauty, and the fields would no longer be decked out with little wild flowers. And so it is in the world of souls, Jesus' garden. He willed to create great souls comparable to the lilies and roses, but He has created smaller ones and these must be content to be daisies or violets destined to give joy to God's glances when He looks down at His feet. Perfection exists in doing His will, in being what He wills us to be." 

St. Therese is a wonderful friend and intercessor for us in Heaven. She is a special saint that I think I will study and also ask for assistance much more often from now on. Her writings and example remind me so much to put simplicity and trust back into my prayer. And I have a feeling she is particularly ready and eager to pray for me and for all of us here on earth.

After all, she always said that her dream was to "spend my heaven doing good on Earth." :)

St. Therese, pray for us!