Three Things on Thursday

1. This fall, I overcommitted myself. I went from doing nothing in the summer; Just play dates and shopping at Target to doing way. too. much. At the end of August, Silas started speech therapy once a week, about 25 minutes from where we live. I also started working, about 10 hours a week. In September, I started doing Bible Study every Wednesday morning, a small group every Wednesday night with Luke, and MOPS every Thursday morning. Somewhere in there I committed to helping with Children's Church every week, which isn't a lot of hours, but just something else on my plate. So not only was I busy, I was dragging my children all over the place too. The end result of trying to do this much has been, I have not done everything well and I have been flaky about some of my commitments. In January, I am doing less so that I can really enjoy what I do commit too.

2. During the last few months of being busy, I have also noticed that when I am overcommitted, I spending way less time with my children. (I know, that should have been pretty obvious to begin with. Sometimes I am a slow learner.) And then when I do have time with them, I am tired from all I am doing (and from my insomnia), that I feel like I am giving my children my leftovers. And I am not ok with that. I can hardly fathom that Silas will be in kindergarten next fall. Life speeds by and I am staying at home with my children so I can spend time with them and enjoy them. This fall I have allowed myself to by too busy doing "stuff." But even good things can take away time from what really things that are really important- like my family.

3. Christmas. My absolute favorite season of the year. I love everything about it! I love celebrating the birth of Jesus. I love the time with family. I love the music (and start listening to it, often, in October). I love snow. I love Christmas plays and musicals at church. I love all the cookies and candy. I love Christmas Eve church services. I love shopping to buy special gifts for family. I love traditions. I. LOVE. IT. ALL. Tomorrow is December 1st which is exciting. We are starting a new tradition in our family. I bought an Advent calendar that we are filling with special things for each day until Christmas. Some of the things do relate to the real meaning of Christmas- and some of them are just fun. Here is a picture of the one I bought. (And I was so happy to find a picture of it tonight on the internet because I was not feeling very committed to taking a picture of it myself to upload.)

It looks like it belongs in the game "Candyland." Silas calls it the candy house. If you know me, you know that I shop and buy, and then often return if I find something that I like better or if it's a better deal. So when I bought this house, that is sort of what I had in mind. Well, once we had it, it was ours. Silas loved it and there was not going back!

Tomorrow I will post the list of what we will be doing for the 25 days. The kids are excited and I am too!