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Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

Decisions, decisions, decisions. Some are life-altering, some are inconsequential and most are somewhere in between. How many decisions have you made today?
When to get up? How many times to hit the snooze button? What clothes to wear? Whether to get dressed at all? Sometimes we don’t even realize the decisions we’ve made.  Sometimes we feel out of control of our lives, but all we need to do is take back some of these decisions we haven’t been actively making.

 

What are some decisions you need to quit making while on auto-pilot?

There are 5 steps to making a decision:

  • Presented with a choice
  • Make the decision
  • Evaluate
  • The aftermath
  • Move on

Some decisions are quick and you don’t even realize you are moving through the steps.

1. Alarm goes off- you have a choice to make.
2. Do you turn it off and get up or hit snooze?
3. Evaluate – did you make the right choice? Or do you have regrets?
4. The aftermath – Your day is off to a good start at the time you’ve planned OR you hit snooze too many times and now you’re 15 minutes, 30 minutes, an hour behind?
5. Move on – are you wallowing in the mess you’ve made or are you making the best of it and doing the next right thing?

Some decisions are much more complicated and each step will take some time. Hours, days, weeks…

What job to take? Will you work? Where to live? How many kids to have?

Faced with a choice

There are daily choices we have to make. There are bigger life-altering decisions we have to make. Sometimes it’s clear we have a choice to make and sometimes we have been on auto-pilot for so long we don’t realize there are choices we can make.

If you’ve been on auto-pilot or in “survival mode” for so long you are oblivious to the choices you’re not making, this is your nudge to take a look at the things you can take control of. You may be surprised at how actively making a few decisions gives you new energy for life.

If you are a momma who understands just how daunting some of the daily decisions are, please know you are not alone. Know you don’t have to stay in this hard place, but you do have to take steps to get out (baby steps count). I would recommend finding a friend to cheer you on and pray with you.

If you’ve been in survival mode for so long you don’t know who to reach out to, you can reach out to me. How can I pray for you? What small steps or accomplishments can I celebrate with you? Did you put on your cleanest pair of dirty pants instead of staying in jammies? Amazing!

Make a choice

I was just told that George Washington has made more decisions since being on the coin than when he was alive (coin flip). Some decisions can be made with a coin flip, even if it’s just showing you which choice you really want. Some choices are a little more challenging.

If you assign an option to heads and an option to tails, then flip the coin you’ve made a choice. Now you probably don’t want to make major life decisions this way. However, sometimes the coinflip can help you realize which option you actually want.

If you land on heads but realize you really wanted tails, well then you’ve still made a decision. You now know which one you actually want. I learned this trick from Valerie Young.

For more in-depth, large decisions other methods may be necessary. Our pros and cons are shaped by our world view and moral standards, as Christians, this means we should be relying on the Bible and prayer. Does the Bible tell us which job to take? Or which house to buy? No, but it can help us set the priorities that help us determine which job or house will fit our lives the best.

Evaluate

Now that the decision has been made, was it the right one? They say hindsight is 20/20. How will you decide if you made the right decision? Do you go back to your pros and cons list?

The Aftermath

If you made a good decision, this is the easy part. CELEBRATE!

Unfortunately, if your decision was not right this is when it starts to get tough. I would encourage you to take a breath. Say a prayer.

Who else was affected?

Are you the only one affected by this decision? Unfortunately, you generally aren’t, so identify those other people.

Make amends

It is so important to acknowledge how people have been affected by our choices and then apologize or otherwise make it right.

Assess

How did things go wrong? What do you need to do to make it right?

Move on

There is always another decision to make, so we have to move on. Don’t let the last decision determine the next. Make sure you are doing the next right thing.

You are not allowed to wallow in the misery which was created by the last decision 🙂 I said so LOL

I always use the analogy of the potty training toddler who decides to poop their pants, remembers “oh yeah I’m not in diapers anymore.” and then hides so they aren’t found out. They’ve already made the mess, but instead of going to mom or dad for help they just sit in it. What does that do? It makes the mess bigger and possibly more painful. Don’t be a poopy pants toddler. Acknowledge what you’ve done, clean up the mess (get help if you need it), and be more conscious of your future decisions.

That’s what making good choices comes down to. You have to be conscious of the choices you’re making. Each choice you make has to be held to a standard. As a Christian, my standard is the Bible. However, some decisions are beyond what is actually in the Bible, but the standards for life are there.

I have recently made some life changes (and continue to take steps to make more) because I realized I am not the mom or wife I planned on being. Some things by Biblical standards and some just my own standards. We are all flawed humans on a journey. Make sure to offer grace and mercy to all of the others on this journey with you.

Meet Melinda!

Melinda is a Christian, a wife, and a mom of 6. She has a blended family. She's a recovering perfectionist who is far from perfect, but it makes her that much more grateful for God's grace and mercy in her life.

4 tips to avoid stress, guilt, and overwhelm this Christmas season

4 tips to avoid stress, guilt, and overwhelm this Christmas season

One blessed momma, that’s me! However, that doesn’t mean I’m never one stressed-out momma, one-guilt-filled momma, or one overwhelmed momma. As we’ve just come through one holiday and are headed towards a jampacked holiday season, the stressed-out, guilt-filled, overwhelmed parts of me are threatening to take over. 

Long-term stress prevention and management can reduce your chance of developing additional disorders such as heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure, and depression. Several studies have found that cannabis can assist people cope with stress. However, cannabis’s anti-stress and anti-anxiety qualities may be most effective when microdosed. Because cannabinoids have biphasic effects, substances like THC can reduce anxiety in low dosages while increasing anxiety in greater ones. To learn more see this ne post about the Process for Getting a Medical Marijuana Card in Oklahoma.

Several studies have found that cannabis can assist people cope with stress. However, cannabis’s anti-stress and anti-anxiety qualities may be most effective when microdosed. Because cannabinoids have biphasic effects, substances like THC can reduce anxiety in low dosages while increasing anxiety in greater ones.

This year will be different than most. Covid-19 is the uninvited guest in every aspect of our lives. As we plan our holiday celebrations do we leave behind all of our usual parties? Do we say, “better safe than sorry”? Or do we take hold of our lives and refuse to live in fear? Carrying on as though nothing has changed.

This is a very hot topic in all circles of friends and family and politics. Since it is everywhere we look, it is also affecting our motherhood. But isn’t there always something that could be affecting our motherhood? Sometimes it is coming from outside sources and sometimes it is from within our own family.

Here are four things I plan to use to leave the stress, guilt, and overwhelm behind as we finish out 2020.

1. Prayer and Supplication

“do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” ‭‭Philippians‬ ‭4:6

Suppli… what? Supplication. Maybe you’re smarter than me, but I realized as I was writing this that I didn’t really know what supplication meant. So I’ll define it here in case you’re in the same boat as me.

Supplication – the action of asking or begging for something earnestly or humbly.

If we take everything to God in humble prayer, and then leave it there, do not play tug-of-war with him, he will take care of the rest.

I have found that if I pour all of my jumbled up messy thoughts out to God, for me in the method of prayer journaling, I am then able to actually think more clearly and make better judgments.

One example, is when my friend Julia‘s baby was in the NICU, I have a lot of guilt and mental fog around mommas with difficult pregnancies/miscarriages/preterm births. (Something I should totally give over to God, I’m a work in progress.)

I knew Julia was hurting and needed to be surrounded by the love of God and friends, but all I could see was my guilt. Finally, I sat down and prayed and wrote and prayed. Once it was all out I could pray for Julia and Nora and ask God to help me find things she needed as I was shopping. I was able to get things that later she told me she didn’t even know she needed yet. Was that me? Nope! It was definitely God working through me.

As you think of the upcoming holidays, don’t do what your jumbled up, stressed out, overwhelmed self thinks. Give all of that to God and then ask for direction. Most importantly, pay attention to his direction. Philippians 4:6 starts out “do not be anxious about anything.“ Anytime you find your anxiety rising use natural treatments, there are medical marijuana in Las Vegas to start a natural treatment that has proven benefits to help with anxiety.

2. Gratitude

Philippians 4:6-7 continues Paul’s directions, with thanksgiving. That prayer you just prayed, did it include thanksgiving to God? What has God done in your life? Are you giving credit where credit is due? When we do things for our children do we not expect and even demand their p’s and q’s? Their please and thank you? We should be training them to say please and thank you, but are we modeling gratefulness to our heavenly father for them?

This direction comes with a promise in verse seven, “and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” What a wonderful blessing that peace is. I would love to hear about a time that prayer led you to a peace that you know could only come from God.

3. Plan

This year will be different for everyone. You aren’t going to be able to pull last year’s plans and just replicate unless of course, you are a homebody who is used to social distancing and staying away from everyone else.

Maybe this is the year to simplify and get back to the basics of what Christmas is really about? Get back to the central idea and make sure our plans focus there. As you plan, remember to expect the unexpected as Julia told us. God even tells us in James 4:13 that we shouldn’t say tomorrow I will do this or that because we are not promised tomorrow. Instead, we should say “if the Lord wills, we will do this or that.”

I would suggest that if you have prayed it all out and really listened to God‘s direction, more of your plans (than not) will pan out. This is from me. Not God. 🙂

Scroll down to download this free printable.

4. Grace

Finally, remember Grace. This is one thing I am beginning to learn from both of the ladies who are blogging with me. Mollie did a great job discussing grace here. Julia and I were once walking buddies, back when she only had one precious girl to haul around. One thing that sticks with me (three years later) is her advice to offer myself the same grace in making health changes as I am offered from God in my walk with Christ. This was an epiphany for me. If you don’t give yourself grace, you are more likely to give up altogether. You’ll give into the stress, guilt, and overwhelm.

We can pray, we can show gratitude, and we can plan, but we are all flawed humans. This means we will always need grace! Thankfully we were created by God who is full of mercy and grace. So give yourself some too. And don’t forget to give grace to those around you. We’re all on this flawed human journey together.

May this Christmas season find you leaving the guilt, stress, and overwhelm behind. Don’t forget to pray and then quiet your mind and listen for God’s direction.

I am one blessed Momma!

The top picture is of my 3 oldest decorating our Christmas tree back in 2011. Going to a tree farm to cut down our own tree and then decorating it is one of our favorites. It’s a tradition we won’t be giving up. What are you holding onto this year?

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Christmas Priority Planner

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Meet Melinda!

Melinda is a Christian, a wife, and a mom of 6. She has a blended family. She's a recovering perfectionist who is far from perfect, but it makes her that much more grateful for God's grace and mercy in her life.

Work heartily, as for the Lord

Work heartily, as for the Lord

Colossians 3:23 Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men

This is the idea I like to put forward when I am encouraging my children to work. Unfortunately, I don’t always remember it myself.

My husband and I come from a long line of farmers/ranchers and entrepreneurs, this means lots of independent hardworking people. This brings a lot of characteristics that we also want to instill into our children.

Some people believe children should be children, there is plenty of time for chores and learning to work later in life.

Others believe that you should be teaching them to do chores from the very beginning. This tends to be where we fall in. Because we are entrepreneurs and self-employed our children are not only learning how to wash dishes and laundry and mow the yard, but they are also learning how to build, how to edit websites, how to work with electricity and plumbing.

Let them work when they want to…

When they are little, they are begging to go to work with daddy. They love getting out of the house and learning how to use power tools. As momma, this can make me nervous, but I trust their daddy.

As they reach their teens, they decide that the work isn’t so fun. It’s too much like work. We haven’t found the trick to making sure they don’t get sick of “constantly working”, if any of you have found the secret, please share

They have learned a work ethic

However, as our older boys have gone out and experienced working with others they have received high praise for their work ethic. We’ve discovered they would much rather work for someone other than mom and dad.

Our oldest started working at a local Dickey’s at the age of 16. The managers constantly praised his hard work and initiative. He is now in the Air Force and has actually thanked us for making him learn things. Most of the guys would come to him to iron, because he knew how. He was pursued for a special job because of the electrical knowledge he received working with dad.

The now 16-year-old is in his second year of a masonry vo-tech program as part of his high school. The teacher puts him in a leadership role, even though there are other boys in the class with seniority, because of his work ethic.

Last spring he was able to participate in the local home builders show. It wasn’t just his Masonry class that was there, the carpentry and horticulture classes also participated. Both teachers complimented him because he took the initiative to help them set up their displays and he was told that he did better work than some of their 3rd years. (The vo-tech is a 3-year program).

The work ethic and working knowledge come from working with dad (and grandpas).

Are you modeling a good work ethic?

One of the hardest parts of teaching our children is making sure our actions are teaching them the same thing as our words. That phrase “easier said than done” is all too true sometimes.

Even as adults, especially when we don’t like our boss or the work in front of us, it is so easy to forget who we are representing! If we allow others to know we are Christians (as we should be) but don’t act in a way that glorifies Him, we are doing our Lord an injustice. 

You may not agree with the way we have chosen to raise our children. The only way to instill a good work ethic may not be to start your kids working (with age appropriate tasks) from the time they are walking.

Our second reason for being entrepreneurs and bringing our children along with us is to spend time with them. Being our own bosses means that, to an extent, we can create our schedules. We can bring our kids to work when it works for us. And sometimes when it doesn’t.

We have chosen to spend Saturdays helping dad finish a job so that we can be together as a family. So that it takes a few hours rather than all day. Then we can go play in the afternoon.

Recently we helped dad finish a job so that we could all go to a birthday party in the afternoon. Dad would have missed out on all the fun had he not had help.

How helpful were the 5-year-old and the 3-year-old at shoveling stone, not very. However, they had fun. They got to use shovels and were shown that when you work together the work gets done faster. They are learning about safety and to be aware of their surroundings. They are learning to help out when only one job is left, we all work as a team. We had a goal, and we met that goal.

I am one blessed momma!

What path have you chosen? Do your kids have chores? Are you teaching them a trade? Why or why not? Please be respectful of all, even if they have a different opinion than you. This space is for encouraging and uplifting.

Meet Melinda!

Melinda is a Christian, a wife, and a mom of 6. She has a blended family. She's a recovering perfectionist who is far from perfect, but it makes her that much more grateful for God's grace and mercy in her life.

Quality Time

Quality Time

There is a bad stigma around middle children – always ignored, never get any one:one time, everyone else is spoiled because they were the first or the baby etc. Being a middle child myself, I try to make sure mine doesn’t have any of those complaints. I may go too far at times.

We are a blended family with what some call two sets of kids.

I have my older kids – 19, 16, and 15.  My younger kids are 7, 5, and 3. The 3-yr-old is the only girl I carried in my belly and who lives at our home full time. Which probably means she is spoiled rotten. The 7-yr-old is the first child my husband and I had together, the only one I spent months begging God to give me a baby. He can act like the baby of the family or he quickly steps up to play the “oldest” role when his 3 older siblings aren’t around.

The 5-yr-old is a middle child through and through. He is perfectly happy playing by himself and that is where you will find him most of the time. Building something, working out the design all on his own and don’t you dare try to help him build or try to stop him before he’s ready.

He’s the quietest of them all, but when you get him all by himself and there’s no building happening he talks and talks and talks. He will tell you all about the latest Wild Kratt’s episode he watched, or his dream, or tell you a grand story.

One of my favorite times with him was just recently when he was up sick in the middle of the night. He had to tell me all about whales. This was while he was sitting on the bathroom floor feeling sick.

It was 2:30 in the morning. The middle of the night. All I wanted to do was sleep, but he wanted to talk, about whales. Mom did you know…. and he would spout off another fact.

It was tempting to tell him to hush it was time for sleep, especially as we moved to the couch. I thank God I had the patience to listen and just let him talk. It’s when I have that patience to sit and listen that I get a glimpse of who my children really are.

One of my favorite quotes is “Children are not a distraction from the more important work. They are the most important work.” Dr. John Trainer

In Mark 10:14, a much wiser man, Jesus, takes time to spend with the children. He even chastises his disciples for trying to keep them away. Spending time with our children is beneficial to them, but I think sometimes we forget how beneficial it is to us as well. In verse 14 Jesus tells them that we must receive the Kingdom of God like a child. Spending time with our children reminds us just what that means.

Spending one on one time with our children is so important! It makes them feel valued and loved. I haven’t been the best at finding this time with each of my kids and it is something I’m working on doing more often. I am one blessed momma!

How do you make sure you spend one on one time with your child(ren)?

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Let the little children come to me

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Meet Melinda!

Melinda is a Christian, a wife, and a mom of 6. She has a blended family. She's a recovering perfectionist who is far from perfect, but it makes her that much more grateful for God's grace and mercy in her life.