A Month of Thankfulness!

Tomorrow we start November and we are inching closer to Thanksgiving! I can't believe how quickly time seems to be going by this year. The twins will be 5 months old on November 7th, Stella is 18 months and Max is FOUR!

Something that I think is really important to Rob and I in our parenting is teaching our children to be grateful. There are SO MANY adults and kids today that have a HUGE sense of entitlement and it drives me bananas. Instead of being grateful for the blessings that we are given we are constantly on the hunt for more or unsatisfied, even when our every need is filled. We are not perfect and can definitely be guilty of this as well!

In an effort to remember just how blessed we are as a family, we are going to be celebrating November with a Month of Thankfulness and Gratefulness! We plan to show our appreciation for those around us with random acts of kindness and little things that just say THANK YOU!

Some ideas that I have for the month are...

1. Make treats and take them to the fire house down the street. These firefighters are the ones who responded to our scary 911 call with Max last year.
2. Send treats to Mommy and Daddy's coworkers.
3. Give a $5 gas card to someone.
4. Leave a $1 by the coffee machine at a gas station.
5. Donate our old clothes to friends and others.
6. Donate toys we don't play with anymore.
7. Turkey our neighbors with a surprise on their doorstep.
8. Visit the Oklahoma Food Bank and donate canned goods and $ for meals.
9. Pick up trash somewhere.
10. Take a treat to our LifeKids Director at church.
11. Give an offering at church.
12. Make dinner for friends.
13. Take old towels and treats to the local animal shelter.
14. Write a Thank You card to a friend.
15. Send a TS gift to someone just to say we love you.
16. Leave candy for the mailman.
17. Adopt a kid for Christmas.
18. Leave change on a vending machine.
19. Treat our sitter to a sonic drink.
20. Take a coffee to our MDO director.
21. Bring breakfast for our MDO teachers.
22. Leave nice notes on bathroom or dressing room mirrors for the ladies.
23. Make a military care package for a deployed soldier.
24. Take a dinner to a military wife.
25. Pay for the person behind us somewhere.
26. Pray for a friend.
27. Call our grandparents just to say Hi.
28. Tip the teenage boys who helped us take our groceries out.
29. Give a gift to our siblings!
30. Adopt a family for Christmas.

Other little things we want to do are be kind, smile at strangers, teach Max to open doors for ladies and the elderly, put carts back at stores, let someone cut in line, give more hugs, say Thank You to everyone, complain less, laugh more and pray often!

I don't know that we will get close to doing everything on our list but we are excited to show others that we are thankful for them!

Our month was inspired by this!
http://ticklestogiggles.blogspot.com/2010/05/my-birthday-was-awesome.html

Never Say Never

A lesson I REALLY need to learn.

I love looking back and seeing how God can bring things full circle. There are so many times when I have said "never will I" and  God has said "oh really?"

When I was young I never understood stay at home moms. My own mom worked full time and did an awesome job being a mom and working. I didn't really understand WHY you would go to college, get your degree and then "just" stay home with kids. It flat out didn't make sense to me.

me as a working mom

After Max was born I understood why there were women that chose to be stay at home moms. But I never wanted to be one. It took a few years of listening, prayer, job changes and pressing into God to desire it for myself. It's not always easy and it's a financial sacrifice to live on 1.5 incomes but I truly feel it's where HE wanted me. I quit my job when we just had Max. Little did we know that just a short 2 years later we would have not 1 more child but 3 more children. God was lining out HIS plan before we ever knew what was gonna hit us! Never say Never.

working as a stay at home mom

Twins, twins, oh my sweet twins. I cannot tell you how many times I made joking but cutting remarks about twins! I would laugh and say "If I ever have twins I am giving one away!" Of course I meant it as a joke! Because I never in a million years imagined we would have twins. Never say Never.

would you give one of these sweet things away? Me either!

School, school, blessed School. I have NEVER wanted to homeschool. I have lots of friends who do an awesome job at it. Not me. I have several friends who are organized and involved and love it and the whole time I am thinking "that is really great for them but never for me"

Funny story...Max is one of the kids who will have to wait until he is practically SIX before kindergarten because of the birthday cutoff in our town. SIX! He is a smart cookie and we did 2 days per week of Mothers Day Out last year and treated it like preschool. This year because we suddenly have four kids they will only be going on Thursdays so I can go work at the dance studio. We don't have the $$$ to put him in a private preschool and most of them are absurd schedules anyways. I have no desire to pack up 4 small children to drop him off for 2 hours and then turn around and do it again. No thank you!

ready for school last year

So I picked up a bunch of pre-k workbooks and some writing tools so that we could start some preschool work at home. So the other morning I asked him if he wanted to do some school? "I DON'T WANT TO GO TO SCHOOOOOOOOOL" Max is a homebody. He is very social and LOVES playing with other kids but he LOVES being at home. I reminded him we had school stuff at home. "HOMESCHOOL? YAY!" He yells. I busted out laughing. God loves to get me everytime. I would have the one kid who requests to be homeschooled.

can you believe this kid loves home?

No, I am not commiting to being a homeschooler. But we are going to do Preschool at Home this year. I just feel like Max is MORE than ready and needs to start doing SOME structured work in tracing, adding, sight words. My friend over at The Ruby Zebra is a GREAT homeschool mom so I plan to pick her brain a little since she did preschool last year with Ms.B. I stumbled across this preschool set up so that is what we are going to be doing for the year amongst lots of play and lots of babies! Max is pretty convinced he is a Rockstar and I love that it is very scripture focused so I think it will be a good match for some "school" with Mama and Max. If I only do preschool with all four of our kids that is still FOUR kids that can get good use out of some planning and directed activities.

Little stuff, Big Stuff.

I will  never...I would never...that's not for me. God can't, God won't, God would never. God CAN, God WILL, God MIGHT! Over time God can change your heart and your mind to new things! Never say Never!

Always,
Jesi~not ready to call myself a homeschooler~haha

Super Easy, Super Low Calorie Chicken Tortilla soup

OMG this is too die for and it makes a ton! It's hard to say how many servings there are because I haven't finished eating it yet! But my LARGE crockpot of deliciousness is completely full and the entire thing is just....drumroll please....

880 CALORIES.

No, not per serving, the ENTIRE CROCKPOT

I would gage this makes AT LEAST 10 bowls, I will update after I eat them over the next two days. But that means an entire bowl of this delish soup is just 88 calories, or less!

OK, here we go
Ingredients
16 ounces raw, boneless skinless chicken breast or tenders (I always buy tenders because I can stretch a $6 bag for 3-4 meals!) 360 Calories
2 boxes of 99% Fat Free Chicken Broth-120 Calories
1 Can Rotel-50 Calories
I can Corn-210 Calories
3 Small Bell Peppers-I used Red, Orange and Yellow-60 Cal
1 Large Green Zucchini-50 Calories
1 Small Onion-30 Calories
Season-I used Tastefully Simple Seasoned Salt, Garlic Garlic and Onion Onion plus Cumin, Chili Powder and a dash of Lemon Pepper and Ground Red Pepper. Season with what you have and what you like.

Place the raw, defrosted chicken in your crockpot. Add Chicken Broth, Rotel, Corn (DRAINED)
Cut Bell Pepper into strips, cut onion into slices or dice, cut zucchini into a large dice. Add all to the crockpot. Season with what you have on hand and what you like! I listed what I used above.
Cook on high for 4-5 hours or on low for 8-9 hours. You just want your chicken completely cooked and to shred easily. Cooking soup in your crockpot is pretty forgiving.
Shred chicken and leave in soup.
Serve with Chopped Avocado, Light Sour Cream, Reduced Fat Cheese or Strips of Corn Tortilla. Just be sure to add in the calories for your toppers. Enjoy!
Jesi

Ideas

Sometimes I wonder why God wired my brain in such an artsy fartsy way...I like to blame my dual personalities and moods on being a Gemini...but I don’t believe in horoscopes so that is out.

Then I like to ponder if it is related to my youth as an only child. After all, without the surrounding of rambunctious siblings I learned to play pretend, make up extravagant imaginary stories and entertain myself for hours.

And it never bothered me. Although I love the 7 brothers that have been gifted to me through my parent’s remarriages, I never minded it either way. Plunk me in a sibling circle or alone in my room and I could get along just fine.

I know that God hardwired my brain with every ounce of ideaism and creativity for His purpose and in case you are new here, I still have no idea what that means. But I’m learning.

It’s funny because our pastors wife said the same thing at the Beautiful Conference the other day...she is so creative that her mind can take her in a million directions, even very far down the path of just one idea before she even blinks again. For her it became a testimony of the power of her thoughts, when she had to learn to turn off the creativity when it started to spin into dark, negative thoughts about the what if’s in life.

For me, it has become a daily practice in discerning what is merely a passing thought or a little bling! wand touch on the head with an idea. Like last night, when I picked up cupcakes for Max’s birthday, and thought about how we don’t have any cupcake stores in Edmond or the OKC metro area (a la Sprinkles for you big city folks) and how I could start a business making cupcakes! Surely it would be successful, and minutes later I had named it, decorated my storefront and had a list running through my mind of all the cute cupcakes I could make and sell...I even dreamed about it last night!

My poor husband gets the bulk of these ideas thrown at him...the best thing is he thinks I could succeed at any of them. He just wants me to pick one and actually do it!

Where does this crazy brain come from? God. Why did he wire me to be so free flowing, creative, crazy, and dream oriented? Not sure yet.

But it’s sure fun to dream...and I’ll let you know when I open my cupcake store.
Always,
Jesi