Reorganization

The first time I had a baby, my life turned completely upside down. It was literally as if I had one life before he was born and a new one started when I brought him home. I quit my job to stay home with him (although that was not our original plan) and, due to the fact that I really didn't know what I was doing, I basically sat on the couch and got to know my baby for a couple of months. Then I slowly started trying to figure out how to be a mom, run a house, live on one paycheck, and still pay attention to my wonderful hubby. God knew what He was doing when He gave me two and a half years to get some experience with one baby before He sent Brenna. There was a pretty high learning curve after Brenna, too. Not only was I going from one kid to two, I was adding on a baby who is what we affectionately call "high maintenance."
So while I was getting ready for little Jack to be born, I expected there to be a good bit of shuffling schedules and re-thinking of routines. But this time instead of being overwhelmed by it dreading it, I'm actually looking forward to it. I can't wait to get a fresh perspective on how we do things and what's working and what won't work for now. I've gotten a little more at ease about speaking up about what I can do and what I can't do. I had to give up a couple of "jobs" at the church when Brenna was born and it was really upsetting for me. I felt guilty about it and, unfortunately, that gave other people the idea that I should feel guilty about it. But since I realized that God made me a mother and that His priorities for me now may be different and since I started repeating that to myself everyday:), I've discovered a whole realm of ways to serve from home or with my kids that I hadn't even thought of before. For example, I recently started making the bread for communion and it is such a blessing for me. I love to bake, but it's something I tend to do for others - to cheer them up, to impress them (this is a real problem for me sometimes), even occasionally to bribe them:) But this is something just between Christ and I. And I might have never thought to volunteer until I realized that I needed to move from being in the "outfront" kinds of service to being more behind the scenes.
A lot of things need reorganizing around here, frankly. Pregnancy is always a rough time for me and towards the end I'm pretty much in survival mode. So now that I've freed up all of that time I was spending throwing up, I have time to get things back in shape around here - or rather in a new shape. Our family has grown and changed so it's my job to figure out the best way to roll with it. More laundry, needing to nurse when I should be cooking supper, taking three kids to the grocery store...It may sound irrational, but I sure am having fun:)