The Difference with Merry Men and Working Women

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/a> Silly Blogger won't let me add captions, but above includes our family trips to A Hot spring in Canada, another day at a rec center in Canada, and some other random ones :-) Last weekend we went snowboarding. Turned out it was very eventful, as my husband crashed and suffered a 3rd degree ac separation in his shoulder. It was really a huge bummer as he is off from work now until it heals. Its nice having him home, but not with that!! I have a mounting list of goals to accomplish and I'm not sure that they'll ever all get finished (Christmas cards for one). Almost every waking second is another moment of goals I'm trying to make happen. I wake up, walk down the stairs and before I can reach for my coffee (black now, mind you), I have to drink a glass of water. Why? Because I'm determined to get into a bikini when I go to Hawaii with my husband. Followed by that glass of water, is the strategies of how I will stretch my calories out over the course of the day. I make my husbands breakfast, goal of being a good wife. Wake the kids up for morning devotions, goal of making sure they are spiritually fed. Do devotions, prayer and then start school, home school goal; consistency. After everybody is lined up for the day, fed and maybe the dishes are in the dishwasher (goal of keeping a clean house), I am up to pray and dress for a run, back to The God thing and weight loss. The rest of the day doesn't change much, unless of course work calls. Then i need to go in because of (goal of paying bills and getting out of debt). On and on it goes until i have almost driven myself berserk with ambition. All my calories are logged, school corrected, meals made, kitchen cleaned, miles ran, hours worked, etc etc etc. It never ends, I am never ahead, but I often fall behind. New goals always replace the old as they are checked off on my tablet of goals to accomplish for the day. Somehow deep down inside, these goals drive me. Meanwhile, my husband, asleep on the chair, accomplished his first few goals of the day. He did math with the kids. He took some pictures, cleaned snow off a vehicle, and did whatever man things he needed to do. I could think of a zillion goals for him to work on, but those would not be graciously accepted and I might be accused of nagging. I wonder how he can sleep when all these goals are in need of accomplishing. He might even read a comic book before he heads out to do the next man thing, which I am considerably ignorant of. I ask him what he is thinking and he tells me "nothing, why?" These differences greatly confuse and frustrate my goals because for some reason I think every one should be like me, driven, without being able to stop and and smell the roses. Perhaps "Miss Driven" needs to be another one of my widely written about personalities along with Miss Belly Fat ;-) Luke 10:40 amp "But Martha [overly occupied and too busy] was distracted with much serving; and she came up to Him and said, Lord, is it nothing to You that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me [to lend a hand and do her part along with me]! 41 But the Lord replied to her by saying, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things; 42 There is need of only one or but [a]a few things. Mary has chosen the good portion [[b]that which is to her advantage], which shall not be taken away from her."

Frozen Days

Avalanche Area - Snowshoeing up Flatiron

Saphira and i

ElastaWoman

Me soaked in sweat, but loving it!!

ElastaWoman and i

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Looking for the Yurt on top the mtn!

Finally got the heat going!

Boarding Down!

Miss Moonbeamer and Mist's little boy

Art Dog's Buck

Brothers Bonding

Our Family Christmas Pic

80's Dance with AlliCat, Archer and Saphira

Archer and Saphira posing 80's Style (looking like me and my hubby)

How Archer Gets My Deer to the Truck

Hunting was hard this year, but Archer helped me find one

Girls Day Out - Eikhardts

Girls Day Out - Starbucks

Miss Moonbeam

Husband and Deer

How i Decorated for Christmas

Many things we cannot change.... a mom fighting for her life on a breathing machine, a man fighting cancer, another man struggling to find contentment and peace. Some things we can.... our attitudes and the way we respond to situations. Every day, the way we respond determines the course of our lives. We can let the pressure break us, go the way of the easy response, or we can fight for the futures better outcome. This is my story. I've been a girl picking up and fighting forces that can be fought and equally hard, letting go of fights that are not my battles. Sometimes resting and trusting and not fighting are the most painstaking. These turmoils surround me daily, and its hard knowing when to fast and pray and when to just trust God and leave things in His capable hands.
   Its been a busy busy fall. My husband has been working full time at the airport, trying to get hunting in and welding every weekend in his garage. By the grace of God he got a deer last day of the season.
    He asked if we could go work on tearing down a building at the old property in Yaak this past weekend. There were a lot of groans..namely from me, but we changed attitudes in a hurry and packed up. Turned out it was a wonderful wonderful weekend. On Saturday we worked on that shed and then went over to spend some time with our old friends for an amazing Mexican fiesta. We got to sleep in their romantic cabin in the snowy woods. It was idyllic with fresh snow and a warm fire burning in the wood stove. It was just what my husband needed. In the morning, after an amazing big breakfast, my girlfriend, daughter and I embarked on an adventure snowshoeing up a mountain and snowboarding down. We'd both been under different stresses, and the outing was a needed one. Every time I instigate things like this, I often wonder what I was thinking. I would later find myself crawling up the steep face of an unforgiving snow covered beast, clawing every inch of the way as my daughter and girlfriend patiently take a few steps trying not to roll their eyes - lol. "Well it gives us some entertainment" they laugh. I can never figure out why I resort to crawling, when the people behind me aren't all that winded, but I guess I just have to accept that I am what I am. I'm still proud I don't give up until I'm at the top :-) I wasn't the only entertainment of the day. Some guy wanted to take our pics for the paper... because i'm sure climbing to the top of a mountain is a great feat and we are cool chicks. Actually it was his SECOND time up. I was also proud when we figured out how to get the heater going in the tarps stuck to the tree that was supposed to be a "yurt". Anyhow, it was a needed reprieve.
   I've lost about 13 lbs on my quest to wear a bikini in Hawaii this winter. As you know from reading my blog, I've been trying to get there for a few years now and it will soon be happening. Also been having fun with Zumba. The kids are all doing well. Archer is working at the hospital and spent a lot of time hunting. He has a good hiking buddy who stole all our hearts by storm. Artdog's been helping his dad in the shop and was proud to have gotten the biggest buck in our family this year after all his hard hunting. Super Catman busy busy in school and play. He loves playing Frisbee with home school kids on Fridays. Miss Moonbeam is her usual bossy busy cute self :-)
    All in all i must stop blogging because Miss Moonbeam is sitting here demanding to be cuddled  ;-)

Good Days

Our First Fall Here....




Super Catman's Homeschool Volcano Project

 

Priest Lake Dinner Together



The 50 lb Hubbard Squash we were given...as you can see it was quite celebrated.



The Son Who Makes Me Laugh (Daily)  Art Dog ..... at his finest



How My Boys Celebrate Being Given Long Underware (Thanks Matthew (Kind Eyes!)



Shopping with Bhama!



Our Kids with Their Grandparents from MN at Copper Falls



Inlaws visiting - all of us



The Most Recent Pets Which We Have Acquired




Harvest Night Party - Miss Moonbeam and Super Catman

 

Mc Family Time - Shopping Day with The InLaws

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Art Dog Learns Welding with Dad



Our Date Last Month - We flew to Priest Lake and ate at Cavanaughs.



I Was Shocked to Discover Miss Moonbeam Decided The Dog Must Be Bungeed and Drug Around The House.  I Couldn't Resist a Quick Shot Before Freeing Our Pup!

   Finding a warm fluffy sleeveless jacket with my hospital logo on it at the second hand store was just one more reason to remind me that God loves me.   I'd have never spent the money on that, and I'm ALWAYS COLD working night shifts.  This was JUST PERFECT.  Come to think of it, I can't count the times "just perfect" things have found their way to into my house.  A month ago, it was a nice mattress and bed frame with drawers and shelves.  I'd been desperate to find something like that for Super Catman.  All in all, good things come :-)
   Not to say there hasn't been challenges, most of which I'm not at liberty to share, but even in them, God is Faithful.  When yesterdays terrors threaten to disrupt my life, I have to remember, once again, those were yesterdays and today is fresh and new.  Ghosts can't live in the light.

     I've stepped into a different life.  Instead of snow on the ground and dread of the coming winter, I have this goofy expectation of good things to come.  Earlier this week I was out harvesting lettuce in my garden.  Life is SO MUCH EASIER now than it was living in the Yaak.  Every day I am surrounded by new reminders that I can finally breathe easier.  Some of the fun things I've been doing includes running with the neighbor lady, taking Zumba classes and more outings seeing friends, shopping, etc..  Gone is the constant fight to feed the kids balanced meals when I can only get to town once a week.  Now when I run out of milk, I have it again the next day.  I get giddy just imagining NOT having to pack groceries on ice spikes up our mountain in the Yaak come winter.  My garage and freezers are full of produce people have GIVEN me.  Never before have I EVER lived in such land abundant with so much harvested that neighbors willingly share so much surplus.  For the first time as long as I can remember I haven't felt stressed out over groceries.
Instead of the dread of isolation, there are all kinds of things I'm excited about doing this winter.  By far the most exciting of which is that I bought tickets for my man and I to go to Hawaii!!  Its been a long time coming and it seems like a fairy tale for it to actually be happening.  I guess you could say I'm finally getting my honeymoon for my 40th birthday, and I'm still in honeymoon phase with our new place :-)

  

 
Ps 34:12 Whoever of you loves life

and desires to see many good days,

13 keep your tongue from evil

and your lips from telling lies.

14 Turn from evil and do good;

seek peace and pursue it.