"Above all else, guard you heart, for it is the wellspring of life."   Proverbs 4:23

I am still struggling to find my balance. My days here are swinging back and forth from one extreme to the next like a pendulum strung from up high. Some days are just plain better than others, and some seem chaotic.

The days that are the worst are the days that I awake with a bleak attitude already on my heart. I sigh as my children begin to wander into my room at the crack of dawn like they always do. I  rise to the sound of the whining and begin to drag myself through my day with a bit of ...what?... contempt maybe, in my heart. My body tells me it is already tired as a reaction to my dark thoughts. I look at my children and home and all I see and think to myself is that this is my chore. My responsibility. And then I feel burdened by this chore. Not because it is a great burden to carry out, but because I have removed the joy from it with my own mind by labeling it a chore. I confess to the Lord that my heart has been impure.

"As water reflects a face, so a man's heart reflects the man." Proverbs 27:19

There are other days when I arise and I still think to myself, this will be hard. I remember that my children are struggling too and I ask for a little bit more grace, patience, and mercy for my day. Maybe it is because I am focused on their struggles instead of my own that causes those days to be more peaceful. On those days, I don't so much feel the tiring effects throughout, but it waits until the night comes. Then, as though I had stumbled upon my kryptonite, my strength fails and crawl into bed, thankful for the quiet.

There are days of joy and excitement as well. I regrettably admit that they are not so abundant.

"Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me."  Psalm 51:10

So, now that God has pointed out the impurity within my heart, I am focusing instead on letting him work to purify my heart. I am searching out the joy. For instance, we are together and God is here with us, through our joy and sorrow both. If for no other reason than that I know when I open my heart to His joy and grace it spills over onto those around me and makes all our lives better, I will purpose myself to search out whatever joy I can discover each day.

It is not an easy road. I know myself, and I am an easily frustrated person. My patience is thin and it is the most common place for me to be attacked. Yet, I know that if God has taken the time to point it out to me specifically with his scripture, then he is also ready to help me deal with it, and with Him on my side, we can do anything.

When I went to basic training, the first thing we were told was to get or choose a "battle buddy" and then never ever go anywhere without them. As my husband's unit was getting ready to deploy, one of the commanders stopped in the middle of his speach and said, "Raise your hand if you do not yet have a battle buddy." The gymnasium remained quiet and no one raised their hand. "That is the right answer." He said.

A battle buddy is such a simple concept. Someone to sit "in the trenches" with you. Someone to watch your back and someone to talk to. Someone to be there to help you up if you fall. It isn't just a soldier thing. We spouses need battle buddies, as well. Someone to call in an emergency, or maybe to invite over for dinner on those lonely nights during a husband's deployment to talk to and let the kids play.

In my own personal situation, my very nearest family is over 12 hours drive away. My "adopted" family, or a group of friends from a previous assignment that make me feel like family, are still 3 hours away. Much easier for visiting on lonely days, but not very practical in the event of an emergency. So, I have my battle buddy.

The battle buddy I have now I am convinced was brought to me by God himself. I walked into a PWOC (protestant women of the chapel) group this summer and joined a random group for bible study. I sat down next to this lovely lady who I soon found out I had much in common with. Homeschooling, gardening, slightly traditional values. You name it. As the conversations and idle chatter continued, we discovered that our husbands were both deploying at the same time. Hmm, what units are they in? They are in the SAME unit! And they KNOW each other! What are the odds? We even find out that I just joined the homeschool group that she is a member of. The following weekend, I walk into a new church we are looking into joining, and there she is. Standing in the hallway as I walk through the doors. She looks at me with surprise and I smile and thank the Lord for a familiar face and what I consider to be a sign of His hand at work.

Ya know, the truth of it is, we probably won't have to rely on each other very much. Maybe just check in on each other every so often. It is just knowing that she is here. Knowing that there is someone else in my situation, going through probably exactly what I am going through at the same time. It takes some of the stress out of my days and makes it all a little easier.

I am finding that Christians tend to have a concept very similiar to this, though they use so many different names. My last church called them "Community Life Groups". I have heard it generically refered to as getting in touch with a church family. Whatever you call it, it is about being connected. Having somebody there. And it really is a blessing. Everybody should have one. Whether your trench be made of dirt or the everyday attacks of the spiritual enemy. As my drill sergeant would have said, "If you don't have one, GET ONE!"

Where is your battle buddy?

I will be utterly honest. I don't know if my heart can take much more of this. It feels like it is on the verge of rupture.

During the summer, my dog went missing. He was my baby. I knew he was mine the moment I laid eyes on him. I answered an ad in the paper, and the moment I stepped out of the car, he came running across the yard straight for me with a big silly grin and his little puppy ears waiving a floppy hello. The gentleman that owned him was already calling him the shortened version of the name that I wanted to use. He was like my first child. He brought blessings to this family for almost 8 years. He is gone now. But my heart still aches.

We finally decided to go look around again at dogs. We spent a weekend checking out the local shelters and pounds. And we found Jack. I can't say that I fell in love with him like I did Benny, but my heart wasn't really open to that yet. I really liked him though. The kids loved him, and my dh was about completely enamored with him. I could not imagine a better fit for our family. We brought him home.

This is dh with Jack. The day after we brought him home, I even noticed that the birthday the shelter had listed for him is the same as dh's birthday.

Well, Jack is sick. I don't honestly know what is wrong with him and apparently, about $400 later, neither does the vet. He is miserable. Hacking up stomach acid, grunge running out of his nose, not eating or drinking anything and wheezing. I am spending my time forcing antibiotics and liquids down his throat. I thought he was improving yesterday morning after the vet visit where they pumped him full of fluids and a few medicines, but this morning I can't discern any signs of progress. It is discouraging.

I am doing all I know to do, including prayer. I hate to seem so shallow, but I don't know if we can afford more vet visits. So, that brings us back to the heart about to rupture. I guess I will just keep praying and praying. I believe in the power of many voices, though, so I am definitely not above asking you all for some added prayer for us and our puppy.

We have such a busy week this week with various get togethers and such. The kids may not like it, but we might have to pass on storytime at the library this week so that we can use that time for cleaning and school work. Last week ended on such a sour note. DS has been having some anger issues about daddy leaving. He was acting out quite a bit. I don't get frustrated or mad at dh very often, but I sure was this weekend. I asked him to PLEASE talk to ds some about him leaving, especially the fact that he isn't going because he wants to. I try to tell ds that, but it just isn't as believable coming from me, I guess. DH didn't do it though. He watched tv and played on his computer most of the weekend. I am trying to remember that he is feeling stressed out also. I am the one who has to deal with ds's resentment all day though. Makes it rough.

Yesterday I finally broke down and made another batch of laundry soap. I really needed some more. I had been hoping to make it back out to a friend's house soon, but there is just too much going on right now. I could use a good get together that I don't have to dress up for.  The kids got to help me make the laundry soap until they started fighting over something next to the stove. Then it was "Out of the kitchen".

Our last little tadpole has sprouted these tiny thread like little legs. We were all pretty excited. Today ds gets to write another little observation paper on him, or journal entry, whatever you want to call it. Frogs seems to have ballooned into the theme of our whole season of school. We are reading the Frog and Toad books for reading, we picked up lots of books about tadpoles from the library and bookstore. Counting books, non-fiction books, lift the flap type books for dd. It has been kind of fun.

Now that the weather is cooling I have been taking on some gardening projects. There are/were some beds of irises in the front that were overgrown and terrible looking that needed to all be uprooted and moved. So, when dh came home from work a few days ago, he drove into the driveway to find me sitting in front of the garage door with a huge sheet of cardboard covered with uprooted irises. I was pulling them apart and trimming them before putting the ones in good condition into paper bags and tossing the rest. I am hoping to get the the last bed later this week if I can find the time.

Right now, I have lots to do inside and NO motivation to do any of it. Not a good balance right there. I really need to get going though. Have a great day all.

Someone asked how I made the raised bed for the strawberries. Please remember that I do not do complicated, and I tried to work the dirt here in TX last year and had no end to back pain from the hassle. So, I picked up a copy of Mel Bartholomew's (spelling?) "Square Foot Gardening". That is basically all the beds are.

I mowed the grass short. Bought 3 of the 8foot long 8 by 2's at Lowes. Had them cut one in half for me. Screwed them together with wood screws into a box. Threw down some landscape fabric on my area. Threw the box on top. Filled it with a couple bags of peat moss, various compost, and a few little bags of vermiculite. Stir with shovel, water down and plant.

It wasn't the cheapest way I could have gone, but it was definitely the quickest and least back breaking. Also, it is almost NO maintenance. I don't really have to worry about weeds or grass coming through that much because of the landscape fabric underneath. It has also been convenient since we live in the city and it is easy to basically put wherever you want. We can also put quite a few different things in the boxes. We grow the strawberries in one and veggies in another. We have a small family though, me hubby and 2 littles.

Here is a pic of the veggie box earlier this year. Right now it doesn't look like this because I just ripped about everything out and replanted new seeds for fall.

Okay, I have had enough. Yesterday I took my son's history book and all its associated mess and threw it all onto the donate pile. It is bad enough when the kids don't really like the work, it is entirely another when I can barely convince myself to go pick it up and teach out of it. I DO NOT like that book. I will not use it for one more day. Thankfully, we already have a much more exciting curriculum sitting right here in the house waiting for us. I have been wanting to use it for a while but had decided to wait until next year when I planned to be done with the book I just tossed. Well, we are done with it now, so onward we go.

We also lost another tadpole yesterday. This one to much more natural causes. The cat got it. We walked in and his little guts were smeared all over my kitchen floor with a very nonchalant looking kitty. I could have kicked her. My poor son about burst into tears at the sight. Now we have one little lone tadpole who is being heavily guarded!

I used my burst of annoyed energy to purge a room yesterday afternoon though. The office/school room is looking great. Everything is cleaned out and functioning again.

I have a new picture of ds's strawberry patch. How many 6 year olds can say they have their own 8 by 4 foot strawberry patch? Here is the spring pic.

And here is the pick from a couple weeks ago.

By the way, YES, we are ALL really looking forward to strawberries next spring. We picked up a net to keep the birds out this year, I just have to build something to put it on. I also put lots of seeds in my own garden recently and am happily watching lots of sprouts come up. Fun, Fun.

Well, I have laundry to fold. Off I go.

A conversation with my 6 yr old in the dentist's office.

"Mommy I want to organize my crayons."

"Umm...what?"

"I want to organize my crayons." He shows me his little metal pencil case. "On this side," he points to a row of crayons, "I want the bright colored crayons. On this side," he points to the other row, " I want the dark colored crayons."

"Why?"

"So they are organized."

"...........Umm....okay. If they aren't bright they are called dull, and don't you know that 6 year olds aren't supposed to organize their crayons?"

"But I want to." I look around and notice that 2 different mothers, and one father with his teenage daughter are sitting around us laughing.

Ugh...I am sitting here slowly munching on a bowl of cereal. I do not normally like cereal in the morning. It leaves me unsatisfied and I get hungry way too soon in the afternoon. But today my stomach is upset. Could have been any number of things from nerves to the vitamins I took this morning. Not sure.

Yet, I have to agree with a friend of mine that Mondays are about the best days of the week. Then again, I guess that Monday wouldn't be the day it is if it weren't for the weekend that precedes it. I got up this morning rather slowly, but when I was finally moving I was very motivated to just get to work. The house and yard were quite a disaster. That is the good and yet bad thing about weekends. My husband is home and when he is around all I want to do is be with him, so I end up not doing much of anything around the house while he is home. Then come Monday it is actually a good thing that he heads off to work so that I actually get something done.

I know that I have said before that I feel like I am just waiting for something to happen, and I still am. I realized the other day that I was feeling more anxiety than usual and had to examine it a little further. There is just so much going on and there are a few details of my health that have been in question lately. Including a long standing problem I have had with my neck for ..oh, 8years now that has been causing me new grief. It all makes me think that something good must be on the way. Why? Because I feel like one of those little ducks in a shooting gallery. Or maybe that cartoon bear I once saw on tv that was bouncing around trying to dodge the bullets that were making ping pong machine sounds as they hit nearby trees. Either way, the distractions are coming hard and heavy at times. I am just trying to remember that they are just that. Distractions from whatever God might like to do in my life.

I know that there is a wonderful thing happening with a bible study I just joined. Believing God. How appropriate. Ya know, it is not easy to stand before God and peers and confess that you have deep seated trust issues with the Lord Almighty. But I am doing it, and He has been faithful to remind me of the many times that He has been there for me. You see, I learned somewhere as a little child that you can pray, but you shouldn't actually expect to get what you are praying for. God doesn't really heal people anymore, or get involved in a really personal way. It is his will after all, and it is a hit or miss thing for our desires and prayers to align with his will. Well, now I am working toward really believing him. Believing that He IS a personal, willing, and loving God. I just have to believe him.

Well, back to work. Have a wonderful day all.