It's going around

Since my post about motherhood's hardships the other day, I have read several other posts about the same topic. While it is good to know I am not alone in my feelings, I feel sad for all the moms out there who are struggling and feel alone.
It is horrible that our society sets unattainable standards for women and sets us up to fail no matter what we choose.
I think the pressure to do more, raise better kids, be a pta mom, put kids in sports, etc. is not just self inflicted but pushed on us by every corner of society. The bottom line is you can't do it all, you need help, you need time for you!
Today I hope you will join me in praying for all the moms out there, the moms just like me and you who struggle, who wonder if they can do more, who just can't do it all. Lets all join together and support one another. Moms do the hardest job on earth and it's time we give ourselves a little credit.

Happy 15th Birthday!

Happy 15th Birthday to my sweet baby girl!! I loved you more than you could ever know. The day you were born was one of the greatest days of my life. It changed me forever and so have you. Thank you for making me a mom!

Hit the nail on the head..

A friend of mine shared this story on twitter and man did is resonate. I don't know a mom alive who can't relate to this story on the Huffington Post(read it here). Glennon Melton is the woman who wrote it and she is writing about moms attacking one another for their choice to either stay at home or not to stay at home with their children. Her stance is that all moms should support one another because in actuality all of us no matter what we choose spend enough time beating ourselves up over our choice.

Moms who stay at home feel they are not doing a good enough job, feel guilty for not contributing, for not devoting 100% of their time playing with their kids and a million other things. While moms outside the home feel guilty for a whole other set of reasons.

In my own life I know this to be true. I spend way too much time, worrying, obsessing even over how i could be a better mom, how I need to clean more, how I need to clean less and on and on. Most of the time I feel totally inadequate and sometimes I even think my kids might be better off in daycare.

Please take a minute..

TO read and pray for this sweet baby and his family. This has to be the most amazing mother I have ever seen. I cannot even imagine having to do the things she must do each and every day. She has tremendous love, faith and strength. This sweet baby boy is a miracle and a fighter in every sense of the word. This is a beautiful story of the incredible power and strength of a mothers love.
I know that God has a special purpose for this sweet boy and his incredible mommy and I know that they could both use your prayers.

Praying For Tripp

THe mind of a 7 year old

Today on the way to pick my oldest up from school I was in the car with my four youngest boys some deep, big topics came up.
Somehow a conversation that started with one of them saying how lucky the other was to have some certain type of gum turned into a conversation about starving people, the corrupt rich and drinking water.
As we talked I was both impressed and saddened at the thoughts coming out of the minds of my boys ages 3, 5 and 7.
When discussing how many parts of the world don't have clean water to drink they begin asking "why can't we just go boil it for them? The way survivor man does? Why can we all go over there and dig wells?"
When discussing Africa and poverty, they asked " There diamonds in Africa, right?" Why can't we use the diamonds to pay for fixing their country?" "Why don't we all share our money?"

I wish I could explain to them why all these suggestions can't work, no I wish I could tell them that they can work, that they will work. I wish I could tell them all humans had kind hearts and innocent agendas.
Wouldn't the world be a better place if everyone had the mind of a seven year old?
I pray that my boys can always keep their hearts on God. That they strive to be good, to help, to make a difference.

New Year, new wall display.

New year, new wall display. I have to say I have been working on this project a long time. I saw something similar on Pinterest and I had an empty wall just begging for this project. The original person who did this used 9, 20x20 prints and put them in clipless frames. I decided to change it up a bit and use 12, 16x16 prints and put them on painted MDF, so they stood out from the wall a bit. It was hard deciding on the 12 pictures to use out of the thousands we have but my husband and I went through and picked our favorites and the gradually narrowed them down. I applied the grunge overlay mentioned in the original post found HERE and I love the way they look on the wall.
I will say square prints, especially large ones are hard to find and pricey. I ended up creating them as 18x84 posters in photoshop and cropping them at home.
I love displaying pictures in our home and this was a fun way to use special snapshots in an artful way.