Have a good relationship with God even when you don't have one with your father

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Joanna Weaver is one of my favorite authors. She is the author of five books and the four I have read continue to change my life in such a drastic way. Before I started a bible study on her book Lazarus Awakening, I was not really sure what I believed. I was confused, but most of all I was hurt. While my life has not been as hard as others and I have not went through anything near what she has, I was still struggling with the way my life had played out and the way the people in my life affected my view of God.

I was adopted when I was really young. My Birth mother was only 16 and she had no way to support or take care of me. She put me up for adoption and signed away her rights willingly. My birth father on the other hand was 17 and had gone to jail. He refused to sign away his rights and eventually when I was almost a year old and he was still in jail, the courts terminated his parental rights. I was adopted by my family where both parents worked full time and I normally bounced back and forth from one grandparents house to another until they could come pick me up. My adoptive father took alot of convincing to ever spend time with me. He would have much rather been off with his hobbies then spend time with us. Once my sister was born, this just got worse. When I turned 19 my birth mother found me on facebook of all places. While I did my best to keep a distance from her, I could  not help but wonder what happened to my birth father. About 6 months after my birth mother finding me, he found me as well. I guess it is not that hard once you have a first name and a birth date. Well the things I began to find out about him through a quick background check just discouraged me from ever wanting a relationship with him. He had been in and out of jail for armed robberies and other felonies and misdemeanors. Not someone who I wanted around me.

About two weeks after my birth father finding me I found out I was pregnant. Now I had a choice to make, keep the baby, or choose adoption. This just lead me to wondering why and how they ever could have given me up. After many discussions with both of them I decided to keep the baby. I ended all contact with my birth father having decided that contact with him was not only wrong for me but wrong for my child as well.

After my son was born I felt very alone. I was arguing my my then boyfriend. We were living in his parents house after having been kicked out by my adoptive parents when they found out I was pregnant. I was 20, with a 3 month old and no family. None of my friends knew what I was going through as they were off living it up in college. My boyfriends mom then suggested a moms group that ran out of her church.

For the first time I began to feel like I had people around to support me. three months later I was invited to a bible study, and there I was given a copy of the book they were studying, Lazarus Awakening by Joanna Weaver. Two days later I found out that my boyfriend had been sleeping with someone else before my baby was born. I was crushed. The next week at bible study I decided that only God could fulfill me. I kept trying to create a relationship with him and just kept struggling.
I had to many questions. I could not understand how or why he would want to be my father, why he would want to spend time with me, how he could ever hurt me. The book immediately made me realize why I had been having such a hard time connecting with God.

I want to share with you what I read that day, maybe some of this will reside with you.

"Neglectful father: This dad is far to busy (or just to selfish) to be concerned with you. He's got bigger, more important business to attend to than your insignificant needs. While he may be present in your life, he's largely unaccounted for. You have to take care of yourself.
But your true father says:'Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow away in barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?' (Matthew 6:26)."

You see I was taking the relationship that I had with my adoptive father and seeing that as how my relationship with my father was going to be. I was believing in my own mind that God was to busy for me. That God had more important things to do then to attend to my insignificant needs.

I was not taking my problems to God I was not getting down on my knees and asking God for support. Because he is to busy and my problems are not significant enough for him to care about right? But that is not what God says at all. He says even the problems of birds are big enough for him to take care of.

You see God wants us to be able to come to him when we are having a hard time and when we are not. He wants us to feel loved and supported and important. So now I go to God first. I am able to get through the good and the bad with him by my side.

I appreciate everything God has put in my life. He takes care of every need we have. He is the perfect shoulder to cry on and the best person to laugh with. He is the only thing I need to fulfill me. Every last one of my needs, my feeling, my wants, and my dreams are more important to him than they are to anyone else in my life.

So what view of your earthly father are you passing to your view of our real Father?

 

 

Favorite part of my apartment

If you look at pinterests home section you are bound to come across a photo wall at some point. They keep becoming more and more popular. However when it comes to putting one up in your own home it can be quite a challange to make it not only look right but incorperate everything you want into it.
I had been looking at photo walls for a very long time. One thing I noticed, none of them had shelves, none of them had candles, and none of them were anything close to what I was looking for.



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I did not want to have a bunch of the same sized frames on a wall. While it deffinitly makes it easy for the wall to flow I wanted shelves and collage frames and as many pictures as I could get up because this was going to be the only place in our apartment I was putting pictures up on the wall. It had to be just right and having everything the same size just was not going to work.




I then decided that the best way to make the things I wanted to be up on the wall work together was to play with them untill I was happy with how they looked. This took several days of adjusting. I layed them out on the floor until I was happy with how they looked. One trick that I found to make everything come together  the best was to be sure that each picture frame atleast lined up with one other frame. This gave the wall a flow. It made everything seem to fit together when it should not be able to work together.

Once I figured this part out it came time to put it up on the wall. You need to figure out where on the wall you want the photos to go. Do you want them to be over top of something or in the middle of the wall or off to a side of the wall. I put ours up right over our couch.

Now comes the fun part. You can look all over the internet to find ways to put these things up. You could measure the distance to where the nail goes. You do this with tape and a ruler. Or you can use paper cute to the shape of the picture frames.

How ever you decide to do it do not use the tooth paste method. It was way to messy.

What is your favorite part of your house?



Is breast really best for every baby?

 

Now before I get started I want to assure you, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with breast feeding. I know it is the recommended way to feed your newborn. I  decided against it and I am so glad I did. Now before you get your panties in a bunch, remember, formula feeding is not going to kill my baby (who is now a healthy happy 3year old.)

There is so much pressure to breastfeed now that only of the ladies in my moms group was telling us that she felt forced into it. Now, I am very stubborn, in the hospital I made it clear that I was not going to breast feed. Even after my son had problems with the first two formulas I did not give into the nurses. I made it clear that I did not want to hear it before I was admitted, and I had a nurse kicked off my service for badgering me about it. There are many reasons I felt so strongly about it.

Many "professionals" tell you that in order to bond with your baby you need to breast feed.
 Now considering our baby was not planned, and my fiance was not at all excited to be a dad, this picture sure looks like we are pretty darn attached to me.

 

Now my reasons for not breastfeeding could be considered selfish. I did not want to deal with the cracked nipples. I was already recovering from a c-section, not to mention ripping open my stitched a month later. I happen to have very sensitive nipples. I also have very large breasts. Before monkey man I was a DDD. I did not want the extra stress on my back. I also did not want to have to struggle with covering up my baby every time they had to eat and trying to get my breast exposed while not having it exposed.

 

One of the main reasons I wanted to formula feed was so that my fiance could feed while I was doing my school work. Now many of you could say but pumping was always a option so that he could feed. When you pump it takes twice as long to feed. You take the time you are pumping and the time you are feeding. Just not a option for me.

 

I also loved that he could feed himself while I got things done.

 

That same lady from my mothers group has a problem leaving her 6 month old with anyone while she goes out because her daughter will not take a bottle. All she wants is the breast. Her baby has become so attached that she will only sleep a hour at a time even during the night because she uses the breast not just for food but as a soother as well. This has left the mother exhausted and has a negative reaction every time the baby cries or wants to be held. This time around it has not been a happy motherhood for her. She has been told she does not have post partum depression she is just overly exhausted and to try to get some sleep. Well easy for the doctor to say get some sleep when he is not a pacifier/food source.

 

Now what good is breastfeeding when the mother is miserable? When she is in pain? When no one can help take over the feeding?

 

Now another mother in my moms group got a bad breast infection while her twins were 3 months old. Talk about painful. Again the babies would not take anything other than a breast so she had to continue breast feeding with a infection while on heavy antibiotics.

 

Others in our group have had many babies not receive enough breast milk and had to switch to formula after their babies were hospitalized for dehydration. They not only felt guilty that they were not making enough milk to keep their babies hydrated, they felt guilty that their babies now had to be on formula.

 

Now why would someone feel guilty that their baby had to be on formula? Formula is still healthy for your baby. Formula is still giving your baby the nourishment it needs. Formula helps babies gain weight easier than breastfeeding. Formula allows others to be able to feed your baby. Formula makes it easy for baby to be away from mom for a few hours to give her a break. Formula is richer then breast milk making it easier for babies to sleep through the night. Formula also has a more balanced amount of vitamins that does not rely on your diet and makes it so that babies do not end up needing supplements.

 

Now again I am not saying that breast feeding is bad or that formula feeding is for everyone. I just feel like mothers should not be punished, looked down upon, or made to feel guilty about formula feeding. Mothers know what is best for their child. I know I would have never made it through breast feeding. I could have never delt with any of the problems that could have came from breast feeding.

 

What is your opinion? Were you a mom who felt pressured into breast feeding? Did you have problems from breast feeding? I would love to hear your story.

What do you mean you didnt have time to wash the sheets??!!!

Amazing Fiance has been harping on me about how I have poor time management skills. I think men just do not know what all us stay at home mommies have to do in the day. They do not realize that moms, specially moms of toddler boys, take 45minutes to do something that would normally take 15 minutes to do. Not getting around to wash the bed sheets that had been peed on in the middle of the night shortly after monkey boy crawled into bed with us was the reason this was brought up again yesterday in our house. it went something like this:
AF:" what do you mean you didn't wash the sheets today? What do you do all day that you couldn't take the 5minutes to put the sheets into the washer?"
Me: "well it has been a busy day!"
AF:" so busy you couldn't wash the sheets? All you do all day is sit on the couch how could you not have time to wash the sheets?"

Well lets take you back to the start of my day:

I was up at 7am got monkey man up made breakfast and got him eating. Ran into the bathroom got my make up on and got dressed. Went and got monkey boys clothes from his room plus the extra set of clothes that I had to get together since he had spilled water all over himself at preschool on Friday and no longer had a change of clothes. Got those put into a bag and labeled with his name. Went and got monkey man cleaned up dressed for the day and brushed his teeth. Spent 5 minutes looking for his rabbit because heaven forbid we leave the house without it.

Took 10 minutes to get monkey man to walk down to the garage and finally buckled into the car seat. Backed out of the garage and started driving to preschool and saw a sign reminding me it is earth day. Smack my self upside the head and head to home depot because I forgot to buy a flower for monkey man to plant at school.

Get to school and now have no where to park because it is 3 minutes till he needs to be in class. Walk the quarter mile from the far parking lot to the office stopping every 5 steps so that monkey man can look at something else.

Finally I make it to the office. It is 8:49am and we are officially 4 minutes late. I take monkey man into the office for his health check so that he can get his name tag. We get our name tag and start to head to his class when he realizes rabbit didn't get his health check. We go back and rabbit is checked. Finally we head to class.

I spend the next 2 hours helping kids plant flowers for earth day. I am tired and realize I still haven't had coffee this morning. I go to Starbucks and wait in line behind 10 cars. twenty minutes later I am on my way back to monkey mans school for their earth day performance. Get to the school and am able to park right in front of the school. I walk in and still have 10 minutes till their performance. I start to check my emails and the assistant teacher in monkey mans class comes out and finds me. "monkey man just threw up everywhere." "Are you sure it was him he has never thrown up in his life and has been his normal self all day." As we walk back to the class I see monkey man sitting on the carpet covered in vomit.

Spend the next 15 minutes getting monkey man cleaned up and changed into the extra clothes that I had just brought that morning and clean up any vomit on the floor. Leave the room and realize the earth day performance is over.

We climb into the car and drive to Von's to pick up some pull ups and ginger ale in case this is the stomach flu. Pray that this is not the stomach flu on the way back to the apartment. Get back to the apartment and carry monkey man inside and realize he is starting to feel a little warm but not enough to be a fever and is very pale.

Once I get monkey man settled, changed into a pull up just in case, I put on his shows get him tucked into the couch with his rabbit and blanket and head to the kitchen to get him some ginger ale. Open the ginger ale and it explodes everywhere. Spend 5 minutes wiping up the kitchen and finally get monkey man some to drink. I take his clothes into the laundry room and get them started because they are really starting to stink.

Just as I am starting the laundry I hear monkey man throw up again. I run out hopping that it is on the towel I put in front of him or in the trash in front of him but have no such luck. Get him all cleaned up and washed off and realize he if really warm now. Look for a thermometer for 10 minutes and finally find one in a box we still haven't unpacked. Realize it doesn't work anymore and toss it. Find and give monkey man some children's Tylenol. Head back and clean up the couch and carpet.

Get monkey man settled back down and get him an new blanket. Go to the laundry and switch the clothes over and put the newly puked on clothes and blanket in the washer. Check on monkey man and he begs me to cuddle him. By now it is 2pm.

Cuddle monkey man for a half hour and then get back up to get dinner figured out. Monkey man starts complaining that his tummy hurts again. Get him some more ginger ale and gather more towels just in case. Sit with him again till his tummy settles a little and feel that he is still warm. Head to the bathroom and get a wet wash cloth and start wiping him down while he is crying.

Spend the next hour holding and singing to him in hopes that he will fall asleep. It is 3:30pm.
I get a phone call that wakes monkey man up again. It is a lady at my table group for my moms group saying that she cant make it tomorrow and wont be able to bring the table gift. Hang up the phone and start to see if i have anything around the apartment that I could take as a table gift and just quick drop off. I don't find anything. I call my mom and she agrees to go to target and pick some stuff up to make purse kits for the woman. While we are talking monkey man throws up again and this time he has stuff coming out both ends.

While I get him cleaned up yet again he finally is starting to cool down and perk up a little bit. I get the laundry switched over yet again and go back to cuddling my poor sick boy. It is now almost 5pm.
My mom comes over and we get the kits put together and she leaves while monkey man is sleeping.
I realize I still haven't got anything together for dinner but before I can get to it monkey man is back awake and wanting to cuddle.

Before I know it it is 6:30pm and AF is home. The house is not cleaned up, the sheets have not been washed, and I did not think of anything for dinner. Luckily, AF does not say anything and we get threw the night and get monkey man to bed in our bed. We watch a movie on the couch and when it is over we head to bed. It is 11:00pm. I pick up monkey man to put him in his bed and the bed is soaked, he is soaked, and the blankets are you guessed it soaked. So with both the normal and extra set of sheets peed on including some pillows and both blankets the world came crashing down.

So, I am doing some research on creating a daily schedule and I am hoping that I will have that done in the next few days as long as monkey man starts feeling better. Do you have a daily routine? What are the things you try to make sure to get to during the day? What is a normal day in your life?

Our crazy wonderful life

When I decided to start blogging a few weeks ago I went back and forth on what I would have on here. My amazing fiance is a very private person and would never imagine having me doing this( we will see how this goes over once he finds out). So what have I decided I want on here? Well to be honest I really haven't decided. I know I will share the different crafts I do and that I will do some family updates every now and then. I also think I will share some of what I have been learning in my bible study at church which is called Praying with Power and Purpose. I will also share our apartment life, and my journey to become organized. (something I need to get on top of.)

So now that I have a base for what I am going to be posting on I think I need to let you all get to know us some. We are two 23 year olds who live in a apartment in a small southern California town with our soon to be three year old son (where does time go?) who we will call monkey boy. We are getting married in November and so wedding plans are well underway. More on that in a future post. Amazing fiance is a iron worker who works for his parents structural steel company. He works many hours and rarely gets a day off. He is truly a amazing man and I still don't know how I got to be so lucky. We have been together for 7 years now. I am a Sahm who is starting to work from home as a virtual assistant. I also have a phlebotomy certification.

So now that you know a little about us and our crazy life I hope you will continue to come back and learn more.

When I am on my computer so is monkey boy.