Trust

Posted by Jenny

Feb 20

Trust

Trust has been the talk of our house­hold lately. It’s not the first, nor the last time it’ll come up. Trust level’s change and those involved change.

J and I have been mar­ried for almost 15 years and we’re deal­ing with trust issues that are not marriage-breaking but still some­thing that needs to be addressed. I’m a firm believer in “fine tun­ing” a mar­riage as you go along. How else do you know you’re meet­ing the needs of your part­ner? You have to take those moments…drown out the busy life you’ve created…look into each oth­ers eyes and ask, “How are we doing?” It’s healthy.

Grem­lin is learn­ing about trust with friends. He’s had the same best bud since 1st grade. Inseparable…until a cute lit­tle 4th grader entered the pic­ture. Grem­lin came home destroyed…“He broke up our friendship…OVER A GIRL!” It was hard not to smile. I explained to him that it was a typ­i­cal thing that both boys and girls go through and his bud will come back. I also explained it wouldn’t be the last time and it might be him next time.

Old­man has turned 13 and is learning…again…the deceit­ful­ness of cer­tain ads online. The adult indus­try is work­ing very hard to make the clean mind very much dirty. As much as we, as par­ents, try hard to pro­tect and edu­cate, God made our boys with rag­ing hor­mones and we’re fight­ing against strong forces. Teens always want more priv­i­leges, and we’re teach­ing Old­man that it only comes with more respon­si­bil­i­ties. And trust.

Trust is a lot like love. We are made to give and receive both. Why let oth­ers who have dis­ap­pointed you steal your abil­ity to con­nect to those that won’t?

“The best way to find out if you can trust some­body is to trust them.” ~Earnest Hemingway

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Reflections

Posted by Jenny

Dec 27

Reflection

Typ­i­cal of Octo­ber — Decem­ber, my world (along with every­one else’s) went willy-nilly real fast. For me it involved unex­pected surg­eries, hurt, and love…all that required heal­ing time. ;)  Life doesn’t flow with­out the good and bad…there is a sea­son for all whether we are ready for them or not.

Christ­mas was extra spe­cial for me for no rea­son I can put my fin­ger on, but I’m appre­ci­at­ing it all the same. I guess with being a mis­sion­ary kid, I’m always a lit­tle extra excited for the holiday’s I get to spend with my fam­ily. I feel like I beat “big brother” and won the war. Silly, unless you’ve been there, I guess.

Hulk­man was kind enough to share his duty as gift-passer-outer with Grem­lin which was eas­ier for all in the long run. Hulk­man never seems to get the To and From right so it ends up being like musi­cal presents every year.

It was also so very spe­cial to see Old­man wait­ing on his presents like a young man, instead of a hyper kiddo. He’s chang­ing. I’m so very proud of him. It’s been a hard year for him and he’s come out a champion!

J and I have once again looked at our­selves and gagged. Sexy, eh? How have we gone from a 25-year-old hot­tie to a 40-year-old ol’ fart? Time to knock that crap off and get a grip! Already get­ting started on that which feels good (dang it)!

J’s try­ing to get me to come up with some Res­o­lu­tions, but I’m just not that kind of per­son. He is. I have wishes and hopes…that’s as far as I can go on that front. ;)

It’s amaz­ing how many of us brink on the dawn of a new year with such hope and desire, but then quickly won­der what hap­pened. I don’t care if we start believ­ing at the first of a year or in the middle…it takes more than hope, desire and belief to accom­plish anything.

Remind me of that by Jan­u­ary 15th, ok? ;)

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The art of being grateful

Posted by Jenny

Oct 4

Grate­ful­ness requires you to step back from the  every­day mad­ness and eval­u­ate your­self.  Am I too self­ish to be grate­ful in a way that’s pleas­ing to my Cre­ator AND myself? Do I notice the bless­ings in my life or the neg­a­tive things/people/circumstances that are “out to get me”? When my fam­ily and friends look at me do they see gratefulness?

I bet not.

I’m not happy with my level of grate­ful­ness so why should my Heav­enly Father and fam­ily be pleased.

I have been read­ing Ann Voskamp’s One Thou­sand Gifts. Her blog is over­whelm­ing to my lit­tle shal­low self so I knew her book would put me on my keester. It’s tak­ing me for­ever to get through it because each page requires so much thought to soak it all in.

Her points are so…pointed. I think I’ve wrapped my head {and heart} around it, then my chil­dren and hus­band come home and put me to the test. I could do this so much eas­ier if I didn’t have to answer to them. But I sup­pose that defeats it all, doesn’t it?

I am grate­ful for those 3 bless­ings. I’m so blessed to have a hus­band that makes me laugh hys­ter­i­cally, which is my life­line. I’m blessed to spend so much time with Old­man before he turns com­pletely teenager-y on me and bored with me. I’m blessed by a Grem­lin who is a wise-ass like his mother and a lover like his father.

It’s that time of the year when I start to reflect on my bless­ings. This time last year, I wrote a note on Face­book where I talked about ver­bal­iz­ing those bless­ing. It’s like stak­ing your claim to what is truly yours.

Time to start speak­ing up again.

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