Zoe LOVES the Park {Pics}
This morning was peaceful… my whole day has gone smoothly which has been awesome! I got up this morning to get the kids off to school and once they got on the bus, I finished one of my assignments, cleaned up around the house, started washing clothes, took a shower and got dressed, woke Zoe up and dressed her then we headed out to have lunch at Captain D’s. When we left, Zoe said, “Park, Mama… PARK!!” It wasn’t even noon yet and the weather was nice and breezy so I took my spoiled rotten toddler to the park to play.
Of course, I went picture crazy…
Cross Country: Are There NO Inside Sports?
Ingredients for chaos and insanity:
- Husband working long term out of town: CHECK!
- Son playing football – 4 hours of practice per week and game days that start BEFORE 8am: CHECK!
- TWO daughters who participate in Cross Country running for school: CHECK!
- A two year old and four year old who do NOT like attending these events: CHECK!
- Me… and my contempt for heat, sweat, and early morning activities: CHECK!
I dread the day one of my kids tell me they hate me. I may look back to the Saturdays of this fall and strangle one of them. *kidding, of course* I love my kids… and they better be GLAD I do because if it weren’t for that undying, unfailing, unconditional love, I would NEVER have signed them up for all of this LOL! :)
That being said, as hot and sticky as I may be by the time we make it home and as badly as my head may hurt from wrestling with an ornery toddler (and as consistently as I try to convince them to take up gymnastics instead…), somewhere deeeeeeeep in my heart, I truly enjoy watching them strive for perfection in the things that they are passionate about!
Last weekend, we got off to a late start and ended up getting to the Cross Country races right when Talia should have been running to the starting line; however, we got there as her race was ending because they were 25 minutes ahead of schedule. I fought tears and lost to them as she started crying and said, “I promised Daddy I would have a medal for every race while he was gone!” At the moment, it was the end of the world and I felt terrible, but she quickly recovered (thank goodness!) and we had a great time cheering Briyana on to finish her 1-mile race.
I’m so proud of my kids :)
They are driven… and their father and I will duke it out for eternity as to who they get that from LOL
Our Journey Begins Again
Over the years, we’ve had some really high ups and some really low downs… all of which, I believe have prepared us for the true appreciation we have for just “being” here. Having too much is a distraction. Having too little is a distraction. It often takes experiencing both in order to understand the blessing of comfort – that place right smack dab in the middle. That place is where I want to be. It’s a place of haves instead of have nots… but it’s not a place so high that it robs you of a humble character.
On the 10th, we got the call Barry had been waiting for over the prior week — the call to tell him it was time for him to start a new career path. Within 3 hours we were all packed and on the highway headed toward my mom’s house in Hattiesburg to take the kids because I would then have to drive Barry over 3 hours to the company he now works for to meet his ride to the port… at 2am! We spent some time with each other, spent some time with the kids, and went to meet Kylan and Kaleb at Walmart so he could spend some time with them before he left town.
Barry playing basketball in the Walmart parking lot with the boys :)
Barry with Kylan and Kaleb’s little brother, KJ
Barry, Kylan, and Kaleb
When we got back to my mom’s, we sat in the living room so he could soak up his last few moments with the kids before we headed out to hit the road.
Avalyn wasn’t happy at ALL about Daddy leaving…
I couldn’t really blame her, considering the next day was her 5th birthday.
Zoe wanted Daddy to pick her up…
… and so of course, he did …
10:00pm rolled around all too quickly and it was time to leave. Daddy got his work clothes on and started giving away random hugs and kisses and issuing out laughs and tickles before the goodbyes came.
Saturday will mark two weeks that have passed since I dropped my husband off to meet his ride to the port which would take him out to work for four weeks. Away from us. As I said in my last post, it has been rough but it’s what we have to do – it’s the sacrifice we have to make as a family in order to get to where we’re going… in order for me to get through law school. I’m so proud of him, but at the same time, I miss him terribly.
I can finally breathe. For the last two months, I have worked from the time I woke up until anywhere from 3 to 5 in the morning on web, blog, and graphic design projects, completing a total of 51 projects since mid-July. In addition to all of that, I’m also in school – a Theology major and as you all know I have five children. I kept asking God when I would get a break… when I would be able to concentrate solely on school because there was no possible way I would make it through the way things were going. Struggling to still not make our ends meet was taking away from the quality of education I was receiving as well as the quality of the work I was turning in. I was getting discouraged, knowing something was going to have to change. Then all of a sudden, my husband got a new job and everything is changing.
I’m still finishing up work that I have contracted, but once these projects are over, by the end of next week I will be able to decide when and if I want to accept a project. I won’t have to accept a $600 job for half the price because I need the money, working myself into the ground for a waitress’ salary. I can enjoy my kids and support them in what’s going on in their lives… be involved in what’s happening at their school… and maybe even actually get some SLEEP! Words don’t do justice to describe how grateful I am for my husband — and to God for making him my husband :) I’m married to a go-getter who won’t rest without success.
Football Season is BACK!
Fall sports are normally a “Daddy” thing, but this year since Barry is away working for all but one week out of each month, it’s all on me which is going to make for a very interesting few weeks. I’ve got Briyana and Talia running for the Cross Country team and Tre playing football. Luckily, their practices are not all on the same day (Tre’s are for 2 hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays; the girls are only for 30 minutes on Wednesdays) but to counter that luck, their games/competitions are all on Saturdays… and all in the morning. A couple of things you may not realize about me: I’m not a morning person and I HATE the heat. The fact that we have to be up, dressed, and OUT of the house by 9am to go sit out in the Louisiana sun for hours on end pretty much goes against everything I believe in LOL But since I kinda like these kids, I do it anyway :)
Tre’s practice jersey is #9, but this year he got #54 on his game jersey…
because that was Barry’s number when he played for the Giants :)
Tre has his Daddy’s stance down to a “T” :)
Tre plays linebacker and running back. He’s versatile, talented, and attentive… just like Barry. His coach said last week that he has a gift and told him to always keep his head on right because he’s going to be an awesome football player one day. Their first game of the season is this Saturday and shhhhhhh… don’t tell anybody, but I can’t WAIT!
Happy {5th} Birthday, Avalyn!
A little more than five years ago, 9/11 developed a much different meaning to me than to the rest of the nation. It was 3:05pm when Avalyn La’Nae Robertson changed our lives simply by breathing.
Now, here she is in Kindergarten… growing up so quickly… so beautifully… Where does the time go??
We didn’t have a birthday party because that was the morning I dropped Barry off at the port at 2am. I made it back around 5am and only got about 5 hours of sleep before hopping up, doing a quick little give-her-the-presents-and-sing-happy-birthday thing for Avalyn, and hitting the road to make it back home before it got dark (I don’t drive when it’s dark if I can help it!)
Her big brother, Tre, is having his 9th birthday on Sunday and we’ll be having a nice birthday party to celebrate both of them when Daddy comes home in a couple of weeks!
Happy 5th Birthday, my precious 9/11 baby :)
Missing Daddy
I have been holding this in for over a week and I guess it’s time to finally make the “announcement” … Barry is gone. Okay, so maybe that’s a bit melodramatic. :) He’s working out of state and will be home for about a week out of each month. Today is the 12th day I haven’t been able to wake up next to him and it’s been pretty difficult to adjust.
Barry had only been gone for two days and it was already seeming like two months. Surprisingly enough, Ava and Talia have both been totally cool with it. Briyana, Tre, and Zoe: not so much. Briyana cried for the first few days. Tre started mentioning him as soon as we left Hattiesburg (his Pappaw Chris had his attention in the Playstation while we were there). Zoe walked around for almost a week with this confused look saying, “My daddy?” I guess it kinda helped me not cry because I was concentrating so much on comforting them. The 11th of this month was Avalyn’s 5th birthday — and the first day in a very long time that I haven’t spent with my husband. When they started school that Monday after I took him to the port, it was rough since he WAS working nights before so he was home with me all day. It was just me and Zoe, and you all know how serious she is about sleep… so for most of the day I was all alone!
I think the thing that sucks the most about this little “transition” is that during the last school year, we started doing “Date Day” when he was off work so every Thursday, we’d go out to eat and go see a movie at the theater. When school started back, we planned on starting that again this year since we put it on hold all summer because our finances would seriously have hated us if we tried to take all the kids every week LOL Add to that all the tears that are certainly coming when the kids realize Daddy is going to miss all of their track meets and football games and Wednesday lunches at school … and everything. I’m hoping I don’t absolutely lose my mind running around back and forth between practices and competitions… He’s been gone for long stretches before, of course. I mean, football kept him traveling in college and kept him completely away when he played professionally, but we were used to it then. It was always that way… and the kids were younger so they weren’t involved in anything that required scheduling and time commitment on my part. But now he’s been home for three years (except for the couple of months he was in Canada in 2008 when Avalyn cried herself to sleep every night for over a week after he left) and it’s not easy for any of us.
If you’ve noticed I haven’t been around much it’s because until the past couple of days, he had asked me not to mention him being gone or working a new job and since that was the only thing on my mind, I haven’t had much of a motivation to blog. I’ve written a few articles on my design blog, but personal posts… I just wasn’t feeling it. Between Briyana and Talia’s cross country practices on Wednesdays and races on Saturdays, Tre’s football practices on Tuesdays and Thursdays and games on Saturdays, our dryer being broken which results in quite frequent trips to the Washeteria, my web design business, school, and all the random duties that come with the motherhood territory, I’m at a loss for time when it comes to my blog. I’m going to get back into the swing of things within the next week because once I wrap up my current design projects, I won’t be accepting more than one per week from now on. For now, though… this is the extent of my update, but I’ll be back to my old bloggy self in no time :)
How Important is a Lifestyle of Evangelism to YOU?
This question is one that brings about feelings of confusion and disappointment in my heart/spirit:
How Important is a Lifestyle of Evangelism to YOU?
Five years ago, I had such a passion to share God’s Word. I spoke of Him everywhere I went; I included Him in all my encouragements… I involved Him in all of my greetings! I had a fire lit in my soul that gave me a great drive for a lifestyle of evangelism. I have come to realize my faith seems to be circumstantial. I hold on to God’s every promise, but with each of life’s monumental “surprises” bits and pieces of that have been torn away and left me habitually asking HOW I can evangelize — how I can share a testimony that just seems to keep getting worse? How can I continue to tell people about the wonderful God I serve when I keep getting slammed on my face, finding no cushion between myself and the ground? I don’t feel that I can shout about God’s goodness out of my admittedly bitter heart. I don’t feel that I’m really qualified…
I give God the glory every time a blessing comes my way, but the thing that leaves me feeling empty is what comes next: the “blessings” are short-lived and we always end up worse off in the end than in the beginning. I feel lost and seeking guidance that never clearly comes. My husband was brought in by the NY Giants in 2006 and broke his hand in practice ONE DAY before contracts were signed. He finally was signed to the NFL (Giants, again) after two years of training following college only to be injured (severe patellar tendinitis) and released. As a result, we owed over $28,000 to agents/attorneys, $19,000 to the IRS, $6,000 to New Jersey, $3,000 to Louisiana, various other rather large debts including my van that was eventually repossessed and in the end were left with less money than we started with, a fraction of the money from his contract, and more debt than we could handle.
After that, he signed a Canadian Football League contract and found that his knee was in fact not up to par yet… then we begged the question of why prayer hadn’t healed an injury with what was supposed to be a 10-week recovery time… 8 months later!? Over the last three years, I’ve had the constant reminder that if he had never signed a contract, we wouldn’t be struggling so badly financially all this time. I guess my bitterness and confusion comes from the question of why God doesn’t protect us from things like this. We pray constantly to God that if something is outside of His will – if something will turn out badly for us, please close the door, Lord. PLEASE protect us from the dangers we can’t see; yet, time and time again… that doesn’t happen. We step out on faith as we are always told we should, trusting that God will make a way… and then, He doesn’t. The thing that hurts my heart is all the disappointments my husband has seen through all of that… knowing he had more talent, drive, ambition, ability, determination, and beast in him than more than half of the guys who are in the league but the opportunities kept falling through. I can relate. As many talents as I possess, the opportunities … well, circumstances… We kept leaning on Psalm 37:4 — that if we would delight in the Lord, He would give us the desires of our hearts. Unfortunately, things just always had a way of not working out.
I keep telling myself all of this is part of God’s will and that when He finally delivers us for good, it’s going to be an AMAZING testimony of Him pulling us out of the dirt and allowing us to give Him glory after ALLLLLLL of these obstacles we’ve faced. As time goes on, though, I feel like I’m making more excuses for the lack of favor that we see to the point where it honestly feels like what I am holding on to is not faith anymore but a fantasy. I am at this place in my heart where I’m asking if what I believe is what I believe because I truly believe it… or if I believe what I believe because I just need/want to believe it so badly so that I feel like I’m not alone in all of this? Five years ago, I felt like I had the answer to that question, unshakably. Now, not so much… and I’m here, still waiting for an answer. Who am I to question God, right? I suppose I now feel like if I don’t question God, my faith will never be complete. If I can’t live in expectation of the Almighty showing up in my moment of need, what good is faith to me? I’m holding on to the hope that He’ll touch my heart and give me rest and let me know undoubtedly that He’s there – that He’s here. When things happen to work out… is it divine intervention – a blessing? – or simply chance…
God, I really need to know :(
It’s not even about getting what we want or living how we want. It’s about spirituality — about that intimate relationship with God that we don’t feel anymore; well, I can’t speak for anyone else — that *I* don’t feel anymore. How can an omnipresent God feel so far away from me? There is this pang of guilt telling me that I shouldn’t publish this… that I shouldn’t think these things… should never say these things, but if I’m not honest about what I feel then how do I know that anyone is? How do I know that anyone who feels the way I want to feel about God really feels that way if I can’t express that I don’t? How can I know that they aren’t just hiding it because of that pang of guilt when they want to release it? I can’t hold it in because then it makes my testimony unbalanced. How can I proclaim something that I’m not allowed to question? How can I be sure of something I’ve never been allowed to doubt? How can I overcome a struggle that I never was able to acknowledge? So here it is. And here I am. And now, Lord, please show me… where are You? In Conformed to His Image, Kenneth Boa wrote, “Without a growing sense of desperation, we will not maintain our focus on God.” I can appreciate and agree with that… but seriously, how much more desperate and focused on Him can I possibly be?
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