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I've been browsing other blogs, rather than writing my own. Such a social butterfly....
Well, since Sam is going to be at CLC's men's retreat this weekend, we did our Valentine's Day yesterday, impromptu. I'd been cleaning the kitchen, and still had the stove taken apart at about 7 PM, so Sam volunteered to take me out to dinner. We went to TGI Friday's, and both of us so completely enjoyed our meals that there was not a crumb left on our plates. That was after going to get burgers at Five Guy's for lunch. It was indeed a special day - eating out twice in the same day! One joy of being pregnant I've discovered is that food tastes exponentially delicious.
Tomorrow night, since the majority of the men in our church will be out, a bunch of us are going to play games, have pizza, and hang out and giggle, as only girls can.
Otherwise, this weekend I think I will just enjoy myself, doing odd projects and pretty much goofing off.

Girl's Night In

Tonight I should be figuring out what to do for food, since I'm hungry already and have no plan, and picking up a little bit. But I'm not at the moment, obviously.
Fortunately, the housekeeping schedule that I made up a couple of weeks ago has pretty much transformed my domestic life! I have a printed out Excel sheet with a list of everything to be done in a given day, broken down over the whole month. So far the house is cleaner than it has ever been, I believe! There are some things that are consistently skipped over, like sweeping, and putting away clothes, but even those will one day be crossed off.
The greatest comfort of this list is that if I skip something one day, I can either go back and tackle it the next, or just wait for the next time it comes around on the rotation and not sweat it.

Because the house has been in better shape than usual, it's been easy for me to invite a friend to come over and watch a girl movie while Sam will be out this evening. Yay!

The Beginnings of the Nursery

Since we have finally gotten the crib situation straightened out, I now feel free to share what we're doing with the baby room.

The room had until recently been "the farthest room," also known as "the guest room," in which were stored many, many boxes and odds and ends that had no home. Last weekend I went on a cleaning streak and found places for most of the homeless items, to clear out a corner in which we could assemble a crib if we managed to find and buy one.

Through the amazing community of craigslist.org, we found a crib and dresser set that is quite lovely, in very good shape, and really sturdy. Another bonus is that from all the research I did before buying any furniture, this crib hasn't been involved in any recalls. They're not technically a set, but close enough that we're happy with them. The drama associated with them was that we thought the couple was selling both pieces for a certain price, but they thought they were clear in saying they were each being sold for that certain price. It was truly a simple misunderstanding, and with some negotiation, we split the difference. Anyways, thanks be to God, we were able to get both these pieces, plus a barely-used mattress for $195!

The trick in decorating this room is that it is still going to be a guest room, so it can't be overrun with girly, pink baby colors and decor. I've found the bedding that I believe I want, called Cherry Blossom, and it's not ridiculously babyish. I like that it is red, pink, and white, with chocolate, rather than pink, pink, and more pink.

The room is now coming together with some order, and will be rearranged a bit more pretty soon. The white desk that is in the corner is covered with craft materials (not that I do anything with them, but I have plenty in case I ever want to), and soda and water bottles, because they have had a tendency to burst if we keep them in the garage lately. Eventually we will move the desk into the office where it belongs, freeing up a little more space.

I had one organizational epiphany last week, and after making a long and arduous trip to Ikea on Saturday, was able to execute it. Because a friend's daughter gave us a huge bag of baby girl clothes that had either never been worn or grown out of already, I realized that I needed to come up with a way to keep some semblance of order to this baby's paraphernalia, even before she comes on the scene, or I might just lose what remains of my mind.

The solution was to buy boxes to store clothes based on size, and have them easy to access and label. Ikea had these media (CD/DVD) cubes with zipper closures and pockets for labels for only $8 each so I picked up 5 of them. These are about a square foot in size, so they'll hold a fair amount of baby clothing. I like how sturdy they seem to be, and the zippers work well. They're labeled "0-3 months", "3-6 months" and so on. One box is not labeled and has blankets, bibs, etc., in it.

I figure that whatever size she's wearing at the time will go into the dresser/changing table drawers, until she outgrows it. Once we move on to the next size, the clothes that are too small get put into a bin with the right label (and/or gets passed on to Goodwill or the next baby in line), and the next one goes into the drawers. I figure this may be the way to organize kid clothes as time goes on.

This weekend we will have a friend's 14-year-old daughter staying with us, and she will stay in the room, so we have to make it guest-friendly this week. But with all the progress we've been making, it's not too far off!

The Urgency of Purity

What is David asking God to do?

Oh Lord, I am calling to you.
Please hurry!
Listen when I call to you for help!
Accept my prayer....
Take control of what I say, O Lord, and guard my lips.
Don't let me drift toward evil or take part in acts of wickedness.
Don't let me share in the delicacies of those who do wrong.
Let the godly strike me!
It will be a kindess!
If they correct me, it is soothing medicine.
Don't let me refuse it.
Psalm 141:1-5 (NLT)

There is an urgency to his prayer, but it's not just "save my life and kill my enemies!" David's prayer is to be pure, to live uprightly, to walk with integrity. And it's not an aside, it is the most urgent prayer of his life at this moment.

He recognizes the importance of the "sharpening iron" of the godly, and though it be painful, it is more desirable to be corrected, and to remain teachable, than to go on without guidance or rebuke if necessary.

May I remember that it's not really my circumstances that require intense prayer--it is my heart that requires this attention if I am truly going to follow Jesus.

A proverb 27.7

He who is full loathes honey,
but to the hungry even what is bitter tastes sweet.

A true proverb, I believe, is one that means something in a very literal sense, but also means something in a deeper, spiritual sense.

It wouldn't be surprising if Jesus had used this proverb at some point in relation to those who were righteous in their own eyes, compared to those who knew they were sinners. Even the hard truth of the Gospel is sweet to one who needs it.

I hope that I will never find myself so "full" that I can't even receive the benefit of the sweetness that God offers. I also hope that I will be one of those who is blessed because I am hungry, so that I can be satisfied.

What is your greatest spiritual enemy?

Yesterday after church Sam and I and my brother went to our friend's house with our respective drive-through lunches. I was the last to arrive, so I missed the earlier part of the conversation, but they posed this question to me, to answer while my mouth was full:

What is your greatest spiritual enemy? In other words, what is it in you that keeps you from being in the place spiritually that you want to be?

They said that among all of them it was complacency, paired with laziness. At the time, with just a minute to think, I said it was probably laziness for me as well. I just don't want to put forth the effort to spend time in the Word, pray, or go through the discipline of growing.

But throughout the rest of the day, I found that I didn't agree with my original answer. Laziness does definitely have a part in it, but I'm not a truly lazy person. Sure, I have my lazy days, and I would nearly always do something fun over something that resembles work, but for the most part I'm fairly productive. In fact, I tend to evaluate myself (too much) based on my productivity. It's a very American thing to do: 'She can't get along with anybody, but, boy can she work her tail off!'

The fact of the matter is that my greatest spiritual enemy is this: obsession with my own agenda.

My agenda does not have to be a schedule, it is simply 'what I want'. In fact, my agenda is often my lack of schedule. For example, I don't spend my first time in the morning with the Lord because I prefer to either sleep in, see what Sam wants to do, do the next thing on my list, or just hang out on the computer for a while until I find the motivation to do something I 'ought' to be doing. My life revolves around me and my family, more than around what the Holy Spirit might be speaking.

As I have been aware of this, I have seen so clearly how many times I have the opportunity to choose to pay attention to the quiet voice of the Lord over just doing whatever I want to do.

So this morning, though I slept in late - which I have needed to do, since I've been really exhausted and haven't slept well for the last several nights - I did get up and have something of a quiet time. Nothing outstanding, but still profitable, I believe. And I believe it was important for me to take the time to express this today.

My prayer is that I will pay attention to the times that I sense the Holy Spirit reminding me that I don't live for my own agenda, but His, and that I will respond instead of ignoring His words.

Unpacked!

I just unpacked our last box! It's about time, since we've been in this house since April '07!

In the below post, I mentioned that I'd found the missing china settings; it is only appropriate that I get them out of their boxes and display them as they ought to be. Oddly enough, there are a couple of pieces missing, and they have to be somewhere in our house.... or maybe they were mixed up with Christina's when we combined them for a shower a few years ago. Who knows; it's not like I've used them and need to have all the pieces any time soon.

This was my grand accomplishment for the day; setting up that last shelf with our pretty dishes. There is also a tea/coffee set on the bottom of the picture given to me by my grandmother. It's almost worth getting out the windex and cleaning the glass. .... It's a nice thought. Maybe after 9 PM tonight. :)

I do have to confess that there are 4 more boxes still, but they are full of photos, and that is where they live; they're not going to come out any time soon, so they totally don't count.

Once the crib saga has been resolved, if we do get to keep the furniture, I'll post a picture of it in the room. If not, then I'll wait until I get the furniture that we'll keep.