My day...

Well, I said I would update the blog tonight, so here I am. But, I don't know where to start, so I will start at the very beginning of the day. (Anyone else singing "let's start at the very beginning"? :) )

Katie Jo and I were going to go shopping to get her khaki pants and a black shirt and some khaki pants for me. These are for our pictures on Thursday. I don't think I realized how hard this was going to be. I believe I was a little tense and that leaked over into my children. I was unsettled this morning and knew I wanted things different, but I couldn't figure out what. Low and behold, once we are all starting to get ready to go our separate ways (the boys were going to play at church) all the children decided to have meltdowns about something. The tension that was building exploded, and I didn't even know tension was building! I am ashamed to say that there are times I just am walking through the day and thinking mainly about what I am needing to do. When, in reality, I have a husband and children to care for! Needless to say, after about 45 min of getting all the different episodes dealt with, our plans changed. I even had to join in and go to my room to cry! I think it had been building up.

It is hard to buy clothes to wear for pictures that may be our only family pictures with Janie Beth outside of the hospital. I want to be coordinating Christmas outfits for all of us and having pictures done at JC Penney's or something, not finding black shirts for everyone to wear because that looks so good for maternity pics, and it does! I have seen many. But, this wasn't my plan. Once again I am sucked into the MY plan!! You would think that I would learn, but obviously I don't learn very quickly. :) I am thankful that God is so patient with me!!

The kids and I ended up going to Wal-Mart and got Katie Jo and Eli's clothes squared away and did some grocery shopping. This wore me out!! The kids were wonderful at helping unload the car and put up the groceries. They had all recovered from their morning. Josiah was kind enough to ask me why my face was red in Wal-Mart. :) Granted, this is 15 min or so after I had been crying, so that didn't boost my confidence much. ha, ha!! I know I looked lovely since I had on a red shirt also!

Then, my day turned around for me. Can you imagine what would cause that? GOD!?! I didn't get my lazy self out of bed this morning early enough to have much God time before the kids got up, so during naptime was my first true time with Him. I had prayer this morning, but opening the Bible does wonders!! I read various passages, and I felt His loving arms envelope me. I had peace again. He tells me in Proverbs 3:5 to "trust in Him and lean not on my own understanding, but in all my ways acknowledge Him." This is a very hard thing to put into practice, but it has an amazing result when you do!! I don't understand much at all about our journey right now, but God does, and He knows exactly what is going on. I began writing my prayers out a few months ago, again. I go in phases of doing this. I stay focused much better when there are so many things to distract me. This was another big difference between this morning and this afternoon. This morning I just prayed and thought in my head. This afternoon I wrote my prayer. Granted, I started it with I don't know what to say or what I need right now, so please have the Holy Spirit intercede for me. And He did!!! My God is so faithful!!

Katie Jo decided not to sleep today for naptime so I didn't get as much me time this afternoon, but having that God time made all the difference. I have put up my new Bible verses on my kitchen cabinets. Now, I have to make myself read them before I open them. :) This doesn't always work out. But, they are there if I need them, just like God.

I now have to shop tomorrow for myself since I didn't today. This lead to another struggle within me. Joey was going to watch the kids and let me go by myself, but all I could picture was me losing it in the dressing room and not having anyone with me. So, the kids are napping at Poppa's and Joey is coming with me. I have avoided buying maternity clothes. I cannot explain the emotion I feel when thinking about it. But, it is a task I have not wanted to conquer. God often times has us come face to face with the tasks we don't want to conquer! How would we grow if He didn't?
We plan to get an ornament as well. I want one of a couple with the wife pregnant. I plan to have Janie Beth written across the stomach and the year on it. I also still want to find the perfect blanket for her. Once again, we will take the mall by storm. It is amazing how busy it is in the middle of the week right now!

I thank you for sticking with me if you are still reading now. :) If I had to categorize this day, it would fall into difficult, but I couldn't really place a finger on why. It was just hard today. This is all getting more real as we get closer to Janie Beth's birthday, and that makes it harder.

I have some other things I want to "talk" about, but I need to head to the bed because I still have to write in Janie Beth's journal.

I love you all!! Thank you for your prayers!!!