My lack of posting of late is due to more than just being busy. It happened this afternoon that I was grumbling about the lack of efficiency with a certain project my daughter and I were involved in. It was slow going. So my husband says, “You know, I recently read something about that very thing.”

Oh great. He’s going to quote me. But just when you think it’s bad that your spouse is watching you, try having a handful of kids eyeing your every move. It is not just the Lord who is watching. (“Oh Lord, You have searched me and known me; You know my sitting down and my rising up.”) It is good to be a part of a first-rate family. You are never lonely.

Speaking of family, I love having my church family as well. I rarely leave a church dinner without the kitchen crew hunting me down to pawn off the leftovers. Just this morning, my husband returned from the men’s breakfast with a huge casserole. People stop me in the parking lot to hand over their goods. “Oh, honey, we can’t eat all this. You take it!” I try to make sure that my kids aren’t scraggly looking. No, I think it’s just because there’s so many of us. I hope.

Speaking of food, the little one is chunking up. He’s nine weeks now. Someone requested a picture, and I will happily oblige.
9 weeks

And just so you know that nobody goes hungry around here…

feeding baby

Speaking of working and eating, a nice reader, Danica, sent me this email regarding the discussion on allowances. I mentioned earlier that I was inclined against it, but that I really hadn’t given it much thought. She weighs in with her thoughts on the subject.

I’m the oldest of nine kids, and we learned to work at rather early age–right about the time my mom was tearing out her hair trying to keep up with the toddlers and babies! When young, we were given rewards for a week, or maybe a month, of faithfully accomplished chores–maybe got to pick out the movie for family night, or got to do errands with Daddy for an afternoon. But when questions of allowance and all the other kids we knew came up, my Dad replied that neither he nor Mom got paid for their contribution to the family effort; if we’d like to start paying Mom for our schooling, laundry, cooking, shopping, etc, then he might consider paying us for our [meager] efforts. (That quieted us down pretty quickly!) We knew early on that we were a family unit, all expected to pull weight, and in turn, all entitled to the pride of having a wonderful family.

One thing, though, that I think was really impacting for me: Since we got no allowance, and any money we earned was expected to be put in a savings account, my parents paid for our every expense. … I can’t begin to tell you how deeply secure that made me. Somehow that seemed like God to me–my earthly dad making sure I had all the money I needed every time I walked out the door. Because of that, we learned to be responsible (how we hated to think we would ever waste a penny of my dad’s hard-earned money!), but we also learned that Daddy would take care of us, no matter what.

Speaking of allowances, I wonder if we should grant one to the Bible society that sent me this in the mail.

shirt

It’s supposed to help me remember to pray. And send money. I don’t know what’s worse— these shirts or that my husband’s immediate and only reaction was, “Hey, we gotta send that to Purgatorio!”