a wife | chatting at the sky

yeah, what she said

July 25, 2008

I have enjoyed reading all of your comments about your houses and the ways you think about cleaning them. One comment struck me in particular, as I think she says so eloquently what I have been thinking about in my heart:

“When I started thinking of my chores around the house as less of a drudgery and more of a way to provide comfort, ease, health of environment, and pleasure to my family, my whole attitude changed toward those chores. I would LIKE to say that scrubbing toilets became an act of love, but it didn’t go quite that far. But I resented it less, and appreciated the home more, and appreciated more what our home provided for our family: shelter, a place for us to be together, to enjoy ourselves, to make memories. I think that viewing it as house KEEPING vs house CLEANING has helped transform our shelter into an abode, from a house into our home.”

Well said, Mercy Project. I think this is a major point of Cheryl Mendlesons’ book, the difference between keeping house and cleaning house. After all, I could technically hire someone to clean my toilets. But keeping can only be done by me. I am the keeper of my house, the one responsible for making it a safe little society for my family.

I really like that.

Filed Under a house-lover, a mother, a wife 32 Comments

housekeeping

July 22, 2008

What really does work to increase the feeling
of having a home and its comforts is housekeeping.

When I first read this in Cheryl Mendelson’s book Home Comforts: The Art and Science of Keeping House, I wasn’t sure I liked it. I love coming home, making home, being at home. But cleaning my home?

I had been pondering this concept for a few days, when the following happened: While helping me clean the windows, I heard one of my girls say I love this place as she scrubbed happily away. I think for her, especially being in a new place she is supposed to call home, taking care of it with her own little hands gave her a sense of belonging.

A sense of home.

The man thinks so too, although he explains it differently. Yes, I am married to one of those men who enjoys cleaning. Attention: I did not say he cleans. I said he enjoys cleaning. He is usually too busy hunting in the wild and bringing home the bacon to actually clean. But he recently spent some time at home alone and when I returned, the house was fresh: floors swept, counters wiped, things stacked in general neatness.

I looked at him when I walked in the door and this is what he said: “It’s been good to clean this afternoon. I feel like I’ve spent some time with the house and I’m getting to know it a bit.” I was so touched by his sentiment that I didn’t have the heart to correct him. Her, I said under my breath…you are getting to know HER a bit. I hope she wasn’t offended.

What about you? Do you find that the act of cleaning your house gives you a greater sense of home and comfort? I know that most people would say a clean house does this for them, but what about the actual act of cleaning it?

Filed Under a house-lover, a mother, a wife 45 Comments

bye, bye kid. hello man.

June 30, 2008

Saturday night I had 5 oreos, a bite of chocolate cake and 4 chicken nuggets for dinner. I bought coco puffs for the first time in my life and watched chic movies like 27 Dresses and Christy. I’ve stayed up way too late with Monica, Rachel and Phoebe and spent hours catching up on all those wonderful blogs I love so much.

But it was time to see the man again. When he is gone, I turn into a kid. During the day, I am mom and grown up for the most part. But once the kids go down, I am so kid. By myself without another grown up, I watch stupid things and read sporadically and flit from one meaningless project to another. I clean the kitchen obsessively but forget to take out the trash. I leave on every outdoor light and forget to turn them off in the morning. I sleep with my cell phone and eat too much chocolate. But I already mentioned that.

Needless to say, nine days is too long to go without him. And I couldn’t talk about it here because all the killers who read my blog would have come to get me. Well put your guns away, because He’s back now.

I will miss my girl nights with me and myself, but I will not miss the 47 pounds I won’t be gaining now that he’s returned.

Welcome back real food and reasonable bedtimes. And welcome back to The Man.

We have certainly missed you.

Filed Under a wife 34 Comments

In which I prove I have an addictive personality

May 28, 2008

Every now and then, my sister asks if we watch Deadliest Catch. If you’ve never seen it, it’s a show that comes on the Discovery Channel about crab fishing. Every time she asks, I say no. But what I’m really saying is: No, we don’t watch a show about fishing. An hour long show about fishing. An hour long show about cold, wet men who fish for crab from the deck of a cold, wet boat.

And I stood by that response. Until Big David won American Idol and Jim didn’t propose to Pam and I found myself show-less. So one night last week, we watched Deadliest Catch. And now we can’t stop. In fact, we spend nearly every commercial break discussing why:

It comes on every night, multiple times.
It has suspenseful music in the background that makes crabbing seem exciting and important.
We have all these cool new words and phrases to use like “picket hook” and “captain’s string” and “the crew is back at the rail”.
The bad words are bleeped out. Some sentences are just one long bleep.
Sometimes really dangerous things happen like someone gets hit in the head by a picket hook or the crane leaks hydraulic fluid all over the deck. Not to mention the hurricane force winds and the blinding rain…but that’s like, sissy stuff for these guys.

This show has all the makings of a good story: competition, the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat. It is fascinating to watch the way the captains handle failure and success. I keep telling myself I’ll stop watching as soon as we see them catch a full pot. And then we did. And we found ourselves wanting to see it again. It more than justifies the high cost of crab legs.

We also got into this:
the man: I bet people are smarter now that we have tv.
me: What do you mean?
the man: Because how would we ever know about stuff like this otherwise?
me: Yeah. How would we ever know? We are like, so smart.

And then we remembered about books. All the books. All the books that aren’t being read by us because we can learn it from the Discovery Channel.

Let’s be honest. I would never pick up a book about crab fishing. I didn’t think I’d ever watch a show about it either. But now I find myself with Deadliest Catch on my dvr and Bon Jovi’s “Wanted Dead or Alive” stuck in my head. That’s the very appropriate theme song. From the show about crabs that I can’t stop watching.

Filed Under a freak, a wife 34 Comments

my daily bread

February 3, 2008

Ever find yourself wishing you could eat a really big lunch and then not have to make dinner? Better yet, let’s make our huge breakfast be the only meal we have to eat all day. I do that sometimes, when it’s just me. I’ve yet to convince the rest of the fam what a good plan it is.

Don’t get me wrong. I really do like to eat. And I like to cook, too. I just don’t like to HAVE to eat. Or cook. It would be so much better if, on those days when we are tired and unmotivated, we could just eat once and have it last.

But we can’t. That’s just not how it works.

Sometimes I think the same way about time with the Lord. I wish on an exhausting, no-good day, I could pull out a 2 hour bible study I had back in ’98. Like a quiet-time filing cabinet that was stocked before I had kids. But that is me trying to be all checklist-y, as if time with the Lord were equivalent to cutting the tomato and roasting the chicken (as if I ever roast a chicken).

In my head, I used to be really great. That is, before I had kids. Even better before I got married. I was patient, sweet, organized and practically perfect in every way. I remember being so depressed those first few months of marriage. Who is this crazy, emotional, needy woman and what did she do with patient, sweet, amazing me? And I was sure my new husband was thinking the same thing. Until I realized there was really never such a thing as patient, sweet me and I had certainly never been amazing. At least not in the way I thought. It’s just now that I was married, there was someone always there to reflect the reality of my lack.

And to graciously remind me of my need for a Savior without saying a word. No more hiding. No more faking it.

And so, after a few more years of life under my belt, time with the Lord is looking different now than it used to. I think it is messy, desperate, sweet, frustrating. And sometimes it is dry, quiet, non-existent. But it is more real than it used to be. He is more real than He use to be. And that can’t be pulled out of a filing cabinet.

*sigh* Now I gotta go make dinner.

Filed Under a girl, a mess, a wife 17 Comments

our trip to the mountains

October 30, 2007

I am not a traveling person these days. I think I was at one time. On personality tests I always end up sounding a lot more spontaneous about things like than I really am. I think I just remember how I was at 19 and answer the questions accordingly. Back then, the idea of jumping in the car or on a plane and going somewhere fun was exhilarating. Not that I really ever did that. But I liked the idea of it. These days, the idea of it just gives me a headache. I think it is the having-three-kids thing.

With this in mind, we took a day trip to the mountains over the weekend. In a day. With three kids. There and back. In a day. To the mountains. Did I mention the three kids? Little ones?

For a lot of people like us who only live a few hours drive from the mountains, the trip is really no big deal. Even with kids. But for me, non-spontaneous-trip girl….it was kind of a deal. It wasn’t even technically spontaneous. We have talked about doing it for a while, but didn’t plan to do it for sure until a few days ahead. A few days. In my book, that qualifies as spontaneous.

I have to say, I am so glad we went. There were loose plans involving lunch at a place where The Man knows the owner, driving along the parkway, seeing the pretty leaves, playing at the park in Blowing Rock, getting ice cream and driving home. Turns out we got hungry on the way up so we ate at KFC instead. Not exactly quaint. But for the most part, our day was a delight. Beautiful weather, content kids (most of the time), really hot husband.

I enjoyed admiring him from across the park as he followed the baby around and I hung with the girls. I remember driving to the mountains with him the first month we started dating. With just the two of us, it hardly qualified as a trip…I remember wishing the drive was longer so I could just be with him.

Not so on this trip. Not that I didn’t enjoy being with him, but I certainly wasn’t wishing for the drive to be longer. A lot of change 8 years brings. The company may be different, but the scenery was the same. What a gift to be able to share with our kids their first autumn in the mountains.

Filed Under a mother, a wife 2 Comments

a glimpse of him

August 28, 2007

This is a picture of the books on his bedside table. Usually they are stacked higher than this. Most of the time there is at least one commentary in the mix. The one on the bottom is his journal. And in the morning when I make the bed after he has gone to work, I typically put some of them away, back on the shelf to minimize the clutter.

But not today. Today, I noticed them. Consequently, I noticed him.

He likes stories…stories about Jesus, stories about people he knows in real life. But put a fiction book in front of him and he breaks into a cold sweat. He would much rather read a text book than a novel. My dad is like that, too. I so don’t get that. But I have kind of grown to really love that about him. I’m not sure why.

So this is me, remembering just one of the many reasons why I fell in love with him.

Happy birthday, my love.

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