Turning a corner. Literally and Figuratively.

My weight has been an issue for a great deal of my life. I also realize now that I have carried some baggage in in my life that has turned into actual baggage on my thighs, hips and stomach.  Sadly, I found a few pictures from college the other day and remembered what I have remembered many times before. I wasn't that big. I remember hearing all the time, "You'd be pretty if you lost a bit of weight." I still hear that statement in my head quite often when I look in a mirror. I remember when it was said to me the first time and several times after that.
Even at times in my life when I look in a mirror and see a smart, funny, beautiful and confident woman, that voice creeps in and I have to say, "Well, I could be." 
It saddens me that I have carried that voice and that label. Especially this week when I found these old pictures from 15-17 years ago, when I was in college. I looked at this girl and saw a pretty girl. I wasn't a size 0, but I was a lot smaller than I am today. Why did I believe that the voice was true? 

I also happened to look at our wedding picture on our wall. I looked gorgeous on my wedding day, even if I do say so myself. I know that part of it was the happiness that I felt and that it was bursting from my heart.  I see pictures of me after I gave birth to our children and I see such happiness and it's beautiful.

Now, I'm at a place where being someone's definition of beautiful isn't my goal. Looking better would be a bonus, but mostly, I want to be healthy. I want to chase these kids around without being winded. I want to do this before I turn 40...It gets harder as you get older and at 35, I better get moving. For real.

I want to feel good about myself. I feel good about myself in so many parts of my life, except for my physical ability and yes, appearance. I want to look healthy and be healthy. (So, honestly, there's some vanity involved.)

So, I've begun walking again. I've watched my food, but until I get the needed exercise, that I even crave right now, I'm not going to reach a healthier place.

So, I'm turning a corner. Mostly the one at the end of my driveway as I walk up a steep hill. Once or twice a day.

We'll see, we'll hope.

The move! July 7, 2011

I haven't had much time to post. The kids are currently on opposite nap schedules. That has left little time to do things like write. I mostly just clean up one little toddler tornado after another...

But, Ian has some respiratory congestion, so he didn't sleep very well last night. That left Dustin going to church and I stayed home with the kids. The are both a bit snotnosed...literally.

So, since they are both content and not very active. I thought I'd take time to show you part one.

THE MOVE

Here is our house going through the intersection at the top of Mill Hill in Jamestown, ND. It was pretty crazy to watch. I went to town early, just to watch this.

Here is the house headed out of town.

This is going around a corner.

I get a kick out of this picture. It is the house driving into our driveway.  OUR DRIVEWAY! We almost have a house.

And here we are, backing the house into place on the site we sit right now.  We moved in the following weekend, even though we didn't have everything painted, still don't. But after living with my inlaw for close to a month and having most of our possessions in the shop (Some are still there.) It was time to make it ours.

Hopefully, I can get the progress pictures updated sooner rather than later.

I'm home!

Greetings Everyone! (If any of you actually still read this?)

I'm back and even better, I'm home. I'm in my new home! There's still lots to do. The walls from moving still aren't all fixed, we have to wait for the manufacturer, but we have painted everything that is currently possible to paint.
We've hung up a few pictures, but there are many more that we haven't gotten homes for yet.  There's stuff that is still missing and I'm waiting to open a box and get surprised and excited because "I finally found (Insert item here)!" I'm also realizing that if I haven't noticed something is gone, in six months, I should just get rid of it. In moving, we are still bringing more to Goodwill and giving to friends. It's been a learning experience and also a bit liberating. We have moved into a house that is about 2 times as big as the one we were in and we don't want to fill it to the gills like the old one was. We are trying to as the questions, "1)Do I/we need it? 2) Do I/We love it?
It is interesting asking yourself those questions. I think I have been learning that I define myself by stuff, but that stuff is not who I am. I also realize that there is an interesting connection with how I feel inside and how I live with my things. I have felt so overwhelmed and chaotic inside and I think my home was reflecting that. It was chaotic, not comfortable, cluttered, filled with unimportant things or at least the unimportant things were blocking my view of the things I cherished.
I'm still feeling the chaos inside, but watching the house unpack and making an effort to not have chaos, also seems to make me feel calmer inside. I wonder if I keep on this path, will my life somehow be transformed?  If I organize the outside, will my inside follow? I think Dustin made me realize something the other day. We had someone coming out, so we both got up and picked up and cleaned house. When it was done, it felt wonderful. After the company left, in a few minutes, we had the house picked up again and Dustin asked me, "Why don't we think we deserve this all the time?" I didn't have an answer. Why didn't we deserve to live in less chaos? Why don't we deserve to always be able to throw a quick meal together and sit at the dining room table? Why don't we deserve to enjoy our surroundings that we live in all the time? We realized, we do deserve it and it really didn't take that long when we both chipped in and I've been able to keep it up fairly well. I take 15 minutes a day to either vaccuum, dust, clean a counter, go through a box and put it away. Dustin comes home and he does a quick pass picking up odds and ends or throws in a load of laundry. It's been amazing to me and we are more calm. I can even more effectively teach the kids to pick up or every morning, Ian and I make his bed together after he's dressed for the day.
 Has God blessed with me with a resurrection of a smaller type in my life? I have been acutely aware of death and resurrection lately and looking for hope in the darkest of times. In the midst of what I have been struggling with, I've been able to say, "Wait, you believe in a God of new life, this is not hopeless, you are not hopeless."
I know that a messy house is really nothing when there are people really suffering with illness and death. I'm not trying to lessen the glory and wonder and awe of what God has done through his son.  But I also realize lately, whether it is dealing with a family illness or even little things like dusting, it can be used to drag us down back into the ways of the Old Adam and the Old Eve instead of the children of new life that we are.
When I let self criticism of "You'll never be good enough?" "You'll never have this place good enough?" "What will people think of you?"  When all those voices come in, that's not the voice of God, that's not the voice of a redeemed person. We need those little resurrections...Those daily reminders that we are children of God and blessed and the cross is all we need.
So, these little things that have been wearing down on me and my family, and a few of the bigger things that I am not comfortable sharing with the world wide web. These things do not have the final say.
So, there's what I learned about Jesus after I got the house cleaned. Go figure?
Until next time...When I post moving pictures of the house.

On a break....WE ARE MOVING!

We are in the process of moving. Only five miles! We are moving a modular home onto the main farm. Currently, we are homeless! Living with my inlaws because the house has been delayed by rain. 4 TIMES!
So, until we are home, I will be offline.
Pictures and more adventures to come.
Cinda

A Few Moments to Write, A Few Moments to Myself

I'll be completely honest, I have my children in front of a DVR'ed "Word World" (Which Ian thinks is one of the best shows ever and since it doesn't drive me nuts, I agree)
I just got home and needed to relax a bit and since I haven't told anyone that I'm alive via blog since May 5th, I figure I should.
There are posts that I have started and need to finish and edit, but those aren't in my mind right now. It has been a long couple weeks, and a long month in general. It has been raining, which during seeding makes a farmer downright scared. It was such a wet winter and spring never seemed to come. Now it is the middle of may and we only have a little over 70 acres of corn in and need to get 130 more in over the next couple days. It won't take long to get it in, but the ground must be dry enough to get it there. I run the planter we use for corn, so I haven't had a lot of time in the field, unfortunately. I don't mind the job, it's kinda relaxing and time to myself as long as everything works like it is supposed to.
The kids went to my mom and dad's for a week so we could keep seeding, the weather just didn't cooperate. So, when we got rained out again on Friday, we headed up north and stayed for the weekend. It was a good weekend, relaxing with MOm and Dad. Ended a little tense at my home church and a rather uncomfortable vote, which seems to be dragging some things on, but also causing so much pain. I see a church tearing itself apart and it made it hard. On the flip side, their interim is a fabulous preacher! A very uplifiting sermon for me to hear, so that was a blessing.
Today was wet from the inch of rain over the weekend, so I worked in town at a funeral for the funeral home. Ran errands after, dogfood (check), milk (check), ring into the jeweler (check). I came home and found good and not so good news. Our gravel roads are awful, so moving our new house in is not going to happen in the next week as we hoped. It's too wet to even get the septic tank delivered. 
The good news. Because of a standstill on fieldwork, I got to use the hired man to help me mow. (Thank you CG!) 
It's good to be home with the kids. I'm hoping to just cuddle up with them for the evening and when they go to bed, hopefully take a shower and work on packing.
But, it was nice to have a couple minutes to just decompress.

So long since I posted, and so many blogs to write!

I apologize for the mack of blogging lately. I haven't had the time I've wanted. I've got quite a few posts started, but they aren't ready yet, but I will try to finish one in the next days and post it.
So much has happened, so I have things to write about, but I haven't had the usual amount of time to write. Ian's 2nd Birthday. Ella's first Easter dress.  Our dishwasher breaking...AGAIN! The wet and cold spring has made it impossible to get in the fields, so that creates a new level of anxiety. Synod assembly is coming, and while I have to go, I also realize that I will be thinking about the corn that I should be planting while I'm there. And I'm trying to figure out the Yuma, (which is a portable, durable farm computer, that is supposed to help with maps, production and keeping track of it all). If I can't get the think to work with the computer at home, I'll be mad. Hopefully can call Trimble customer service today or tomorrow and get that rolling.
And the new house is not coming fast enough for me. But the dirt work will be started next Wednesday, assuming the weather stays favorable.
So, there's why I haven't written, why I've started posts, but they aren't up yet. They will come. But it seems silly to write about life right now when it is more important that I engage full in living it.
Hope to be back sooner, rather than later.

Bunching of the Babies!

For some reason, I have had a few random conversations with strangers and a few acquaintances about why I have my children soooo close together. I get told a lot, "It must be so exhausting." And if you have read my last blog posts and facebook posts, you would have a good idea that exhaustion sometimes comes into play.  Others will say, "it must be wonderful to have them so close together, they'll play together."  Yes, that is a possibility too.
Either way, I have children that are less than two years apart, about 16 months to be exact. And as my little boy is going to be 2 in less than a week now, I have been in amazement at watching them grow up.  Especially now that they are starting to interact more and want to make the other one laugh and they are even starting to watch out for one another. If Ella starts to cry, Ian will come get me in the other room if I don't get there right away and say, "Ella crying." and then run to her and make sure that I am right behind him. There are also the new moments of jealousy, when Ella is getting her bottle and Ian wants a story. Or if Ian is being cuddled and Ella in her jumper starts to fuss in a way that definitely says, "you should be holding me."
But, to answer the question. Why do I have two so close. I'm getting older! That's the short answer. I'm 35 and by 40 I plan to be done and we thought we'd want more than two. I don't regret it, but I also think I need a break before we do this again, if we do it again. I always thought I wanted four, but I love us as a foursome right now, so that's where we'll be for awhile.
I love my bunch. They will be the best of friends and the worst of enemies. They will compete and support. I love them. It doesn't get any better for us than this. I know we are biased, but we should be, we feel like we have the smartest, most wonderful, most beautiful kids in the world. Every parent should feel that way.