OUR LIVES ARE MADE IN THESE SMALL HOURS, THESE LITTLE WONDERS, THESE TWISTS & TURNS OF FATE.




Monday, January 6, 2014

My Favorite Number

My favorite number is 14, so you can imagine my delight to be entering the year 2014.  It has always been my lucky number for as far back as I can remember and chances are if I ask you to pick a number between 1-20, you will probably win with 14 as your pick.  Cohen has figured it out, but so far he is the only kid to.  He is a sly one ;)

A lot has changed since the last time I blogged.  Yes, it has been almost a year.  Clearly I get the awesome blogger award.  :) Although I have started many drafts, they all seem a bit untimely now to actually publish, and I feel I have changed a lot over the last year so some of those views are not mine anymore.  So instead of catching up on the past, I decided to focus on the future, after all, that is where we are headed.  I think the BIGGEST change this last year is this....

 


Miss Anabella Marie joined our lives in March.  With her came a swarm of feelings, some unexpected, some traditional, but all changing me in profound ways.  You would think with the 5th kiddo, all would be same ole same ole. Not at all.  Everything is different.  Yea, changing a diaper, bathing, that's all the same.  But how they change you, and make their OWN little place in your heart, is so different.  Cohen was the first.  The scared, "how in the world did God think I was capable of being your mom?" trial and error, living for someone else kind of love.  Miayla was the little girl, sweet and cute and princess-y can't believe I actually have a girl love.  Sawyer was the slower love.  Everything was the same at first, but as he grew, in his differences, he made my love kinder, my heart softer, our world better. Then you have the bug, Kaia, who I adore because she is me.  Every little ounce of her, is a tiny, tiny Jeny.  I empathize with her on so many levels and I love her for loving me and seeing my struggle.  And then Belles.  Truth be told, Belle and I were kind of on the oust while she was chilling inside.  Something about that pregnancy was so different, kind of sad, kind of not ready, that my heart was just different.  Its hard to explain, but I am so thankful for two friends that knew the truth of my feelings and got me through it. The SECOND she took her first breath though, she truly did take mine away.  (cliché I know) She has been by my side since then.  She filled my heart with a love that I never knew was missing and I am eternally grateful to God that He knew what I needed and when I needed it, even though I didn't. 



So here we are, in 2014.  Thirty years old, with 5 babies and so much to be thankful for.  So I guess comes the typical resolution section.  Although I have many, one thing I have learned over the years and kids is to not bite off too much, so I am going to keep it simple with my motto for 2014 :

Do less from habit and more from intention.

And this is the focus of my intention


There is so much I do out of habit with them, all aspects of my life in general, that when you step back and think about it, how much of it is done out of genuine intent

Our parish priest also talked about that exact thing this weekend, which I thought was a small sign from God.  He spoke about how its so easy for us to get in this "go through the motions" of Catholicism and not live in a Christ-like way.  Do we practice the corporal works of mercy, do we help where we can, do we love completely?  Or do we go off of habit and let other organizations take care of this cause and that cause. Do we stand up, sit down, kneel at Mass without ever PRAYING at Mass?

Intention vs habit

For the curious cats out there, this is also why I nixed my FB account mid December.  I decided that I would try to reach out to a handful of close friends than know about 737 other "friends".  It was sooo easy to get into the habit of checking up on friends that I didn't call them.  I could see what Ash was doing that week, or what Mel was thinking about, that it took the friendship aspect out of it for me.  I wasn't trying to be a friend.  My curiosity was peaked about many people and their lives, but a sense of loss was going on in mine.  I NEEDED close, good friends.  I have been lacking that the last few years and I honestly think FB was some of the reason.  There was no intention, just habit. I was going through the motions of being a friend, but not actually being one.  Another reason I deactivated my FB was about the time I was thinking about all of the above.... some one made the comment that I couldn't get off facebook because I was "such a good mom".  I know she meant it as being a testimony to having lots of babies and being open to life and loving God, but it didn't settle well with me.  I decided to be a good mom, I would actually BE a good mom, whether or not the world could see it.  that if later down the road, I saw someone from my past and they knew nothing about my kids, they would learn from their character and know what kind of house they grew up in, not what was shown on social media.  Facebook is good for many reasons, don't get me wrong.  But for what I needed to do to live more out of intent and less out of habit was to say adios to it, so I did.   

And with saying adios to ole FB and 2013, I said hello to my favorite '14!  I am really excited and hopeful for life in 2014.  Six days into it and I've been trying harder than ever to do more from the bottom of my little heart than I have in a long time.  I've had some successful days, and some not so successful, but I am more at peace with myself now than I ever have been and that is an amazing feeling.  :)

God's peace to you and yours and here is to having a 2014 full of intention !

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