I know what the calendar says but...
Can you believe it's September? This is the month, in my childhood, that a "nip" returned to the air, the leaves started changing colors, and on many nights, you could smell the smoke of a wood burning fire throughout the neighborhood.
For my children on the other hand, this will be the month the rain tree blooms, and yellow flowers "snow" on our driveway. A month that may mark the decent of the temperatures from the mid nineties to the lower nineties. A month that marks the middle of hurricane season....you get the idea. They have a drastically different childhood, but I'm sure they will remember it just as fondly as I remember mine.
They spent this afternoon playing outside with 2 friends from up the street. They have really taken to playing in the water, an activity that occupied my childhood, but that they never seem to have taken too, largely because our water pressure issues mean they can't run water outside while I run it inside. AND, there's that, "it's hot enough to fry an egg on our non-existent sidewalks" issue too. But lately, they have really embraced the water guns Scott got for his birthday and have gone to town soaking each other and anything else that will come within range. Today they turned on the hose and sprayed it down the slide to make a water slide. I just love that they are really enjoying the outdoors in a whole new way. And with a little careful planning, we can do it more often...I just have to holler outside every time I need to wash my hands, LOL.
They played the same way yesterday with those same kids and then our neighbors from across the street. TJ ended up giving the little boy our Little Tykes ride-on tractor. My first reaction was one of those "you did WHAT???" sort of things which thankfully I did not voice. I really struggle with remembering our possessions are not really ours anyway. I just think, "does he know that cost me almost $40 secondhand?" But of course he doesn't, and even if he did, I bought it years ago, they have plenty of outdoor ride-on toys, and the wheel axle on the back of the tractor is bent anyway from my friend's son (we'll just call him Great Dane) sitting on it when he should not have. But that's a WHOLE different blog! Back to the tractor, I realized there was no reason TJ couldn't give it to them, so I just admonished him to ask first next time. Well today I overheard Mimi plotting to go take it back (she thought those kids had taken it without permission) and when I told her we gave it to them, she got quite despondent...I guess that apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and we have some work to do.
I'm blessed that we are the "kool-aid house", as my stricter rules about what houses my kids can go to mean that the neighborhood comes to us and the other parents don't seem to care at all. I need to work on making that a positive thing even as the kids are eating me out of house and home, or opening the house door every other minute while Sari is napping where she dropped right in front of said door, or asking to use my towels again to dry off the tree so the children who are stranded up the wet trunk can safely shimmy down. I really wouldn't have it any other way, but I need to remember that when it's stressing me out. And I probably need to hit Big Lots for some cheap towels :-).
And I was totally blessed today when God revealed that He had Paul write 2 Corinthians just for me because I would need to hear a message today about a subject that had been weighing on my heart. I had great talk with Eugene afterward and at least I feel like I have some resolution and a new topic or two for prayer.
obm
For my children on the other hand, this will be the month the rain tree blooms, and yellow flowers "snow" on our driveway. A month that may mark the decent of the temperatures from the mid nineties to the lower nineties. A month that marks the middle of hurricane season....you get the idea. They have a drastically different childhood, but I'm sure they will remember it just as fondly as I remember mine.
They spent this afternoon playing outside with 2 friends from up the street. They have really taken to playing in the water, an activity that occupied my childhood, but that they never seem to have taken too, largely because our water pressure issues mean they can't run water outside while I run it inside. AND, there's that, "it's hot enough to fry an egg on our non-existent sidewalks" issue too. But lately, they have really embraced the water guns Scott got for his birthday and have gone to town soaking each other and anything else that will come within range. Today they turned on the hose and sprayed it down the slide to make a water slide. I just love that they are really enjoying the outdoors in a whole new way. And with a little careful planning, we can do it more often...I just have to holler outside every time I need to wash my hands, LOL.
They played the same way yesterday with those same kids and then our neighbors from across the street. TJ ended up giving the little boy our Little Tykes ride-on tractor. My first reaction was one of those "you did WHAT???" sort of things which thankfully I did not voice. I really struggle with remembering our possessions are not really ours anyway. I just think, "does he know that cost me almost $40 secondhand?" But of course he doesn't, and even if he did, I bought it years ago, they have plenty of outdoor ride-on toys, and the wheel axle on the back of the tractor is bent anyway from my friend's son (we'll just call him Great Dane) sitting on it when he should not have. But that's a WHOLE different blog! Back to the tractor, I realized there was no reason TJ couldn't give it to them, so I just admonished him to ask first next time. Well today I overheard Mimi plotting to go take it back (she thought those kids had taken it without permission) and when I told her we gave it to them, she got quite despondent...I guess that apple doesn't fall far from the tree, and we have some work to do.
I'm blessed that we are the "kool-aid house", as my stricter rules about what houses my kids can go to mean that the neighborhood comes to us and the other parents don't seem to care at all. I need to work on making that a positive thing even as the kids are eating me out of house and home, or opening the house door every other minute while Sari is napping where she dropped right in front of said door, or asking to use my towels again to dry off the tree so the children who are stranded up the wet trunk can safely shimmy down. I really wouldn't have it any other way, but I need to remember that when it's stressing me out. And I probably need to hit Big Lots for some cheap towels :-).
And I was totally blessed today when God revealed that He had Paul write 2 Corinthians just for me because I would need to hear a message today about a subject that had been weighing on my heart. I had great talk with Eugene afterward and at least I feel like I have some resolution and a new topic or two for prayer.
obm
Comments