Lost

I'm asking God to help me find my way. I'm lost. I know He's going to help me. I know it will be soon.

Releasing

I am releasing all of this anger and frustration, and moving into peace. I am getting rid of all these emotions, and all the crap that's around. I am moving past this. I am releasing.

I am a free woman. I'm free, unrestricted, unrestrained, and open to God. God is restoring me and restoring my family. It's happening now, and will continue to happen until we are whole.

I am claiming my freedom, and my family's freedom. We are all released.

My New House

We found it. It's beautiful. It's my hope. It's the future. It means it will be over. At some point all of this negativity will be in the past.

It has a large side yard. I saw one of my girls getting married there. I saw laughter. I saw a writing room.

Gratitude.

My kids are safe.

I am safe.

My husband is safe.

We have food.

We have a beautiful house.

I have amazing friends.

Whenever I am need of help God supports me, or sends someone to.

All my needs are met.

I am loved.

 

 

 

10:14

I have one bag of trash, or items that haven't been used for one year but can't be fixed.

I have one bag of clothes. Clothes that have either not been worn for one year, do not belong to me (and I don't see myself giving them back), with the exclusion of items that belonged to my mother (I'm not ready to go there yet.)

 

Visions

 

I am continuing to focus on my vision for the future. Today I am going to remove at least five trash bags of things that don't fit with my vision of my life, and my house. I went to my retreat, and it was good. It was quiet. I had this amazing vision of my mother there, while I was doing a guided meditation. It was wonderful to see her, and to get comfort from her. She supported me with her words, and let me know she believed that I was strong, and could make it through all this. She told me I was a storyteller. I felt so much love from her, but was desperately sad when the meditation was over. She told me she would come back, it would be all right.

I need to refocus. So…today I will be getting rid of things I haven't used in a year.

I'll check back in an hour and let you know how much I've accomplished.

Gratitude

I think I need to focus more on gratitude. Today has been a bit rough. The Bachelor provided a bit of relief, and television is finally getting back to normal after the writer's strike…but I still have been going back between crying and knowing that everything will be ok. So gratitude…

 

1. I have a wonderfully soft bed, that in a few minutes I will be sleeping in.
   
2. I have plenty of money in my account, and my bills have all been paid.
   
3. I am leaving for the retreat tomorrow, and I don't have to drive.
   
4. Criminal Minds was actually a new episode tonight.
   
5. I have acupuncture tomorrow.
   
6. I am meeting a new friend to talk about writing a book in a couple of weeks.
   
7. August only has to do physical therapy every other week. It's been a long journey, with all of his therapies and now it is coming to end.
   
8. My husband is a wonderful man, who bought me lots of magazines to do my collage with at the retreat.
   
9. I have the money for a lawyer, that is way better than needing a lawyer and having no way of getting one.
   
10. Henry is not in our home.
    
11. Our kids are safe.
    
12. I have new curtains, they are blue, my favorite color.
    
13. I talked to Melissa this morning, and we are driving together to the retreat. We are going to stop by the coach store, I will be looking but I think Melissa will be buying.
    

    
     

    
     

    It's hard to write this stuff right now. I'm going to work on it. I'll do it at the retreat. I'll take pictures of the labyrinth (#14). I'll be surrounded by my friends (#15). It's starting to get easier.
    

    
     

    
     

Time to let go…

And watch a bit of trashy TV. So here comes the Bachelor: London Calling. When you want trashy, look no further. I often pull my 14 year old daughter in to watch with me, to show her how not to behave when she is older.

This year seems to be more disturbing than usual, but I am in need of something completely pointless.

The woman's retreat starts tomorrow, and I am looking forward to it, but don't feel as connected as I usually do.

I want to focus on the positives. I will have a couple days away from everyone. I can sleep. I can just sit and do nothing. I could write. I will be on the beach, and walking a labyrinth. I am hoping for some rest and healing.

Uncluttering

I've been reading this book. It's All Too Much, by Peter Walsh. So you've probably guessed that I have some issues with clutter. The book is pretty amazing so far. It talks about the underlying root of clutter, and it mostly has to do with fear. For me the fear is losing moments. My fear became greater after my mother passed away when I was 23. Letting go of her things was difficult, and the situation was made worse by my father quickly moving on, and selling our home within two years of her death. There was so much that she had been holding onto, and I wasn't quite ready to throw it all away. I made the mistake of taking into my own home the items my father was willing to part with and would have thrown away without a thought. When he was packing, getting ready to move out and into his new wife's home, he threw away my piano music. I had played on and off since I was seven. My mother had given me the piano when she died, but we didn't have room in our small townhouse. My father was going to hold it for a while. I was devastated that he threw away the music. I couldn't understand why he would have done that. That one event caused me to have a lot more clutter, as the loss was so deep that my fear grew with it.

It's taken me years to get over these things. Some I am not over. Other times I get caught up in throwing things away that could be useful to others, might need to be fixed (just a little), need new batteries, might be used later, etc… I get hung up on recycling. I get hung up on throwing things away in the dump, taking up space, when really someone else could probably use it. Some of these thoughts are valid, I know. I mean it's good to recycle. Giving things away and donating are wonderful. I think it's an odd form of perfectionism for me. Being the perfect person able to recycle every item I can, donated all things that work to appropriate places, clean all clothes before I give them away (sounds a little simple, but as you know if you been reading we are a household of 7—that's a lot of laundry, without even adding cleaning stuff to give it away), finding new batteries before I give things away, cleaning the dirty items that could be used before I give them away…you get the idea.

I have purged my house, and purged again, but I still have work to do. So I bought the book. I had seen him speak on Oprah before. He said something that was truly profound to me. He was talking about items that you have in your house that you aren't using. You are either holding on to something because it's about the past--or letting it go, or the future, being prepared. Either way, you are not in the present. I am sure I have heard something similar before, but it was the right timing for me. I thought about that, where these things really more important that what was happening to me right now. I purged. I got used to purging. Now I am ready to really get down to the bottom of it all though, and dig deeper.

I bought the audio of the book, put it on my mp3 player, and have been listening to it the past couple of days. I have a job to do. It's to come up with the vision of my life, and my house. Then I am supposed to go through each room, and do the same thing.

I am going to start with the vision for my life. This will probably mostly contain just words, a collection of ideas, in no particular order. In other words, I'm going to brainstorm. So let's get on with it.

The word that is most often used to describe me is bohemian. That's my first word as well. Let's look up the definition.

Bo·he·mi·an
     /boʊˈhimiən/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[boh-hee-mee-uhn] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation

–noun

1.	a native or inhabitant of Bohemia.

 

2.	(usually lowercase) a person, as an artist or writer, who lives and acts free of regard for conventional rules and practices.

 

3.	the Czech language, esp. as spoken in Bohemia.

 

4.

a Gypsy.

–adjective

5.	of or pertaining to Bohemia, its people, or their language.

 

6.	(usually lowercase) pertaining to or characteristic of the unconventional life of a bohemian.

 

7.	living a wandering or vagabond life, as a Gypsy.

 

[Origin: 1570–80; Bohemi(a) + -an]

 

You know I'm feeling a bit silly, and uneducated. I didn't realize that Bohemia was actually a place. Which is bringing me to another definition… I mean it makes sense that it's a place, I mean the word would have to come from somewhere…. Well don't you just learn something new every day… Bohemia, courtesy of Wikipedia. Here is Bohemianism. I'm getting a little caught up in this. I love looking sh*t up though. I've a bit of nut like that. I could go on there are several other links I went on to read, but I am really digressing.

Another word… Spiritual. Peace. Colorful. I want order, but not rigidity. I guess I am talking about my home though, and not my vision for my life. Things for my life. I want to write, play with the kids, maybe have another baby. I want a lot of peace and balance. I want an amazing relationship with my husband, I already have one, but if it could get even better that would be wonderful. I want more for myself in terms of a life separate from children. I would like to be bringing in my own money, through writing would be awesome.

I will continue this tomorrow. I have actually gotten sleepy, which I didn't think would happen for sometime. I took a nap this afternoon, which ended up being much longer than I had been planning, but I am going off on a different tangent as well.

Good night, sweet dreams.

 

 

 

Untraceable

http://imdb.com/title/tt0880578/

So my movie outing was good. There were more people there than I imagined would be. There were many previews which I enjoy. Our small town has gone to digital movies, so you no longer hear the film in the background. I kind of miss that.

The movie hasn't been getting the best of reviews, but I enjoyed it. It had a few silly moments in it, and it was kind of gross but I had a good time. I did feel a little gross afterward, considering the concept. I tend to be a little naive about what's on the Internet , I want to believe that there are only good things. This movie talked about a lot of the bad, and the potential for what could be on there next. I know there is disturbing stuff on the Internet. I watched A Mighty Heart the other day, and afterwards I knew the possibility existed that I could watch his death on the Internet. I contemplated this for several minutes, and ultimately decided that I would not watch it. I think it's natural to be curious, but to take it beyond that is another thing. I also didn't want to support it, and I felt if I watched I would be supporting the terrorists. It also makes me scared about what my kids might have seen on the Internet. I'm pretty good about watching where they go, and the computer is kept in a central location, but it's still scary.

I like Diane Lane, I saw her talk about this movie on the Today show, she had really short hair. I prefer her with longer hair, like in the movie, as if she's going to listen to me. She's a good actress though.

Our family watched a German movie called The Tunnel (Tunnel, Der http://imdb.com/title/tt0251447/ ) It was wonderful to hear German again. I ended up being exhausted from the events early in the evening, and missed the end of it. Omar really enjoyed it though, which says a lot since it was a drama, and they don't usually hold his attention as well.

We are having some trouble with one of our children, that is impacting the whole family. It came to a head last night, and the issue was confronted. I'm not sure what's going to happen with it. We could use your prayers or positive thoughts. I don't know what we are going to do. I went to sleep wishing I could hear from my father. A few years ago I would have never imagined myself thinking that, but there I was lying in bed, hoping he would call tomorrow and take us out to dinner. Sure enough he did. He asked if I could sew a button on for him. He arrived a half our early, bringing a trunk full of groceries. He has done that for the past few weeks, arrive unexpectedly bearing food. I feel like I finally have dad. Not because of the groceries, but just him being around and saying nice things. It's different. It actually gives me a bit of anxiety, I can feel it in my hand, like when I was fourteen and having panic attacks. I don't know if it's because I'm scared that it's too good to be true, or I'm just not used to it. There's been a lot going on to be anxious about though, so it could be many things. The wonderful thing is I have a dad, who loves me, and I can feel that now.

I found out that he's pretty spiritual today. We talked about being psychic...he even talked about an article he read about seeing spirits. He said that he's been having that happen to him a lot the past year. He believes it is either my mom, or his mother. I never knew he believed in that. It's kind of cool, that we could actually talk about that together. It was cool to sew his button on too.

Today

So far today, I have exercised, for like a half hour. That's pretty awesome. I'm catching up on tv, but I really should be writing. I am going to blog about my writing. I am planning the February 1 launch date of serial novel. I'm excited and very nervous. I want to have reader involvement. I don't know how often to do it though. I am hearing a lot about once a week, but that doesn't seem a whole lot. I want to keep their interest. Any suggestions?

i am going to look on some of the popular blogs, and see what they do.

Creative Dream Game

So I am going to play this game today, called the Creative Dream Game, Sark...not sure of her first name... This is her website

http://www.planetsark.com/index.htm

I got these cards at a retreat I went to, I won them at a raffle. So I randomly picked a card, and I got "micromovements". The idea of the card is that I recognize a dream, and write down something that will take between 5 seconds and 5 minutes to accomplish toward that dream.

So, my dream: hmmm...I'm stuck right now. I will come back.



Instead I will talk about Church today. It was an amazing experience. Today was white stone day. This was my first experience doing this, but it's a Unity thing that's been going on a long time. You are given a white stone when you come in, and a pen as well. On the white stone you will write your name, the name that God is going to give you for the next year. Reverand Carolyn, talked about how not to doubt it, that you will hear it during the meditation and to trust what you hear. Sometimes it won't make sense, but it is real, and its meaning will be revealed if you don't understand.

I heard mine loud and clear, and it was frustrating because it was a word that I would have not choosen myself. I kept hearing her voice saying to trust it, and after the word revealed itself to me several times I wrote it down. Omar was sitting to my right and he wrote down his as well. I don't want to tell the world what our words were, because I only want to share that with a few, but I will say that they made up something together...which was really amazing. The whole experience was wonderful.

Things have been more peaceful at home. Our room mate has decided to move out, which is all right. I am trying to think of how to now re-arrange the rooms. If you have any suggestions let me know :)

Gonna try this youtube thing

Now don't hold it against me if some crazy people show up on here with some crazy talk...I have no idea what's going to come up.

This one had the tag adoption and mental illness. Not that they necessarily go together... Although with my adoption, I have been experiencing some mental illness, or is it that I had a mental illness which caused me to adopt, creating a vicious cycle.

Watch the latest videos on YouTube.com

This one was tagged with muslims...hmmm... I was hoping that I would get little mosque on the prairie, a show that my husband loves to watch...shot in the dark i know, it will be interesting to see what actually shows up...

Watch the latest videos on YouTube.com

Diapers

A couple of months ago my youngest was finally out of diapers. It was then that I realized I had spent the last eight years changing diapers. That's a really long time. I think I am ready for a break.

Santa's Blog

This is a little late, I know...but it's so cool!

http://clauschronicles.blogspot.com/

The Most Amazing Christmas Ever part 2

The next day my eldest daughter had a concert at school. My father came and took us out to dinner before the contest. There's a lot of history there, and for reasons I don't want to explain, I was just starting to trust my father again. There were a lot of reasons there not to ask for money, and to not explain everything that had been going on. I thought it was wonderful he was taking us out to dinner and accepted that from him with no issue. Six children out to dinner takes a lot of energy. We had done this restaurant a few times, so it went a little easier, but by the end of the meal I realized the three youngest would not be able to sit through the concert. I decided to take them home, and Omar and my father continued on to the concert.

My husband called me about thirty minutes later, excited. "Your father just gave us $200 for Christmas." He went on to say that my father wanted it only to be used for Christmas gifts, which was fine with me. Food had been taken care of, church was taking care of some of the gifts, and now we could buy a few ourselves. I didn't know what to say, except continuing to say thank you to God.

I wanted to thank my father, but I was overwhelmed by his generousity and a little scared by it as well. I waited a few days, and then called him.

His generousity continued, "I'd like to come down there and take you out to get some groceries. I'll just push the cart and pay, you pick out what you need."

I couldn't believe it. It was coming just in time. I was hesitant to get very much, but when my father came down to take me to the store, he told me he wanted me to get whatever I would normally get. My father even put in special treats that we normally wouldn't spend the money on. Orange juice, honey, and candy weren't usually present in our shopping cart. It was a fantastic trip, it took a few aisles to get comfortable with picking out what I wanted, but by the end I had over $500 worth of groceries. This was helping us out so much. Some of the food would go into next month, helping to lighten our grocery bill.

Our blessings continued, the next day we went to Church, and received the gifts for the kids from them. It had become a church project, with several people participating. Someone even gave Omar and I $50, with explicit instructions that it be used for a date night. Later that day my father gave us another $200 for Christmas presents. Our Christmas was going to be like every other that came before. It was such a miracle.

Christmas was fantastic. Dare I say the most amazing Christmas ever. Just when I thought there was no hope, everything turned around. I truly believe God worked through all those people to let Omar and I know we are not alone, and that He truly does see everything. He knows, and we are taken care of.