A prayer for my daughter

Today I am 26 weeks pregnant. This pregnancy is flying by and I can't believe it is almost over, but I have a confession to make.

I have not enjoyed being pregnant. I'm almost embarrassed to say it out loud, but it is true. I have been very stressed out and emotional through most of it and I'm coming to realize that most of those emotions are out of fear and selfishness.

I am scared of losing myself, losing my relationship with my husband and not being the mom that I want to be.

Today, I was reading a blog post, that led to a blog post that led to another one (watch the video if you have time). Then I realized how blessed I actually am. Then I realized...I have not prayed for this child once in almost seven months--all because I have been so focused on me.

I googled some prayers for daughters. This first one is short, but it says:

The gifts I have are many,
not one of them deserved...
You, my friend, are always steadfast,
when chaos fills my world.

Then, You blessed me one more time,
and a daughter came to be.....
Oh! The depth of joy untold,
this gift from You to me!!!

I need to remember that this baby is a blessing--one that I've wanted for a long time too! My husband reminded me the other night that I am getting to experience something special that not many people get to experience. He said he was jealous that I get to have this built in bond with our child before she is even born. How selfish must I look to him to complain about being uncomfortable and scared of losing my identity?

This page also has pdfs of prayers for different family members including daughters. Some of the verses that he references really spoke to me. [disclaimer: I have no idea who Jesse Rich is nor do I know anything about his ministry. I have not poked around his site at all. I just read the prayer for daughters pdf].

One of the verses that he includes is:

Psalm 127:3-5

New International Version (NIV)

³ Children are a heritage from the LORD,
offspring a reward from him.
⁴ Like arrows in the hands of a warrior
are children born in one’s youth.
⁵ Blessed is the man
whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame
when they contend with their opponents in court.

Offspring are a reward from God and blessed is the man who has many of them. This baby was not entirely planned by us, but I'm trusting in God's timing and not ours. I'm trusting that finances will work out so that I can stay home at some point to raise our children. I'm trusting that my marriage will only get stronger as our family grows. I'm trusting God will all of my fears so that I can enjoy the last 13-15 weeks of this pregnancy.

Best Books of 2011

I had set a goal for myself to read 100 books in 2011. I knew it was a stretch goal, but I thought I'd see how close I could get. I ended up reading 40 books total this year and probably started, but did not finish another 15 or so. They were not finished either because they were due back at the library and I could not renew them or I just could not get into the book and decided not to force myself to finish it. That 40 does not count the fact that I re-read the entire Black Dagger Brotherhood Series.

Lots of online forums are asking what was the best book you read in 2011. I don't know if I can qualify one book as being the best because I read books from many different genres, but I will summarize a few of the books I enjoyed the most.

Here is my list of books read for the year.

The book that suprised me the most:
Soulless by Gail Carriger--I started this book really not liking it, but I continued to read it to give it a fair chance since so many of my friends and ended up really liking it. I read all four books in the series this year.

Best Non-Fiction:
Your Best Birth by Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein--Over the course of reading information online about birth options, I saw this book and the documentary they also made mentioned several times. I decided to read it and see what I thought. The main premise of their book is that no matter what type of birth you have, have the one you want. Reading this book was really the turning point from me being somewhat depressed about the pregnancy to realizing I can do it and have a really good birth. I highly recommend it.

Enjoyable Historical Fiction:
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
Tamar by Mal Peet
I am not a historical fiction reader and I was really suprised how much I liked all three of these books. The Book Thief is told from the point of view of a young girl from the age of 10-13 during WWII, The Other Boleyn Girl is about Anne Boleyn, and Tamar is told from the point of view of a young girl in the early 2000s and her grandfather during WWII. They are all three very different, but they were able to hold my attention.

I read several other really good books including several popular books for the year (The Hunger Games, Room and Robopocalypse), but these are some of the ones that stuck out for me during the last year.

Graduation Quilt

So where are all the crafting posts? Isn’t that a lot of what this blog is supposed to be about? I’ve been on a major self-improvement kick lately, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been sewing my little fingers off.

I’m making my first quilt ever! (Ok, I did quilt a table runner last year). It is for my sister-in-law who is graduating from high school next month and she just turned 18 last week. As a birthday/graduation present, I’m making her a blue and gold quilt in the colors of the university she’ll be going to.



I did not want it to be “in your face” blue and gold, so I went with some softer colors with varying shades of blues and some of the golds are almost a rust color. I bought the fabric on a Sunday (Sue from Quilter’s Market was super helpful and made an otherwise intimidating experience super fun!) and I pieced together the entire top except for the border within a week. All I need to buy is the batting and the backing and put the whole thing together and quilt it. The quilting should be an interesting experience.

Here is the pattern.

Things I’ve learned from my first quilt:

1. I am not that great at quilt math. I have so much extra fabric of the big squares and I almost did not have enough for the small squares. In fact, two of the small squares are actually smaller pieces sewn together to make up the square. I also have to go buy more of the smaller border because that totally did not work out.
2. Cutting (accurately) is really hard.
3. Rotary blades get dull very fast
4. My sewing machine and I enjoy good, quality time together
   

DIY: ice cream cake

My husband and I love ice cream in all of its forms, so it makes sense that for our birthdays, we have ice cream cake.

Beware: this cake does not actually contain any cake (but it could if you wanted it to).

This is the cake that I made for my husband’s birthday in March:


Ingredients/Supplies

• Ice Cream--approx 1.5 pints or whatever size the half-gallon comes in now; pick your favourite flavor


• something for the crust (ie: oreos, cookies of any kind, graham crackers, etc). I used almost an entire package of off brand mint oreo cookies.


• 9x9 pan or pyrex


• Optional: toppings (I used egg shaped Reeces candies since it was right before Easter), hot fudge, fruit (honestly all of it is optional...this is entirely a “throw in whatever sounds good at the moment” type of recipe)

Pull out the hot fudge and start to microwave it in 20 second increments until it is hot-ish.

If you can multitask, break the cookies on a cutting board with a rolling pin while you are microwaving. If you can’t multi-task, just warm the hot fudge after you’ve already crushed the cookies.

Put the cookies in a small bowl and coat with the hot fudge. It should be more cookie than fudge, but really, do what makes you feel good.

Take a spoon and press the cookie-fudge mixture into the bottom of the glass pan--don’t forget the corners. I think my “crust” was about an inch deep in the pan. Throw the entire pan in the freezer and then lick the spoon.

About 20-30 minutes before you plan to pull the pan out of the freezer, take the ice cream out and let it start to soften on the counter.

Pull out the pan and spoon the ice cream on top of the crust mixture. Fill until you’ve used up the ice cream or the pan is full--which ever comes first. Add your toppings to the top of the ice cream. Throw the entire thing back into the freezer and then be patient.

I was not patient, so I do not have many pictures of actual “steps”. Honestly, I’m happy I remembered to take any pictures at all. I was really jones-ing for some ice cream while I was making this.

In the past, I’ve done a graham cracker and melted butter crust that did not really turn out so well. I’ve also topped the cake in berries of all kind and it has been delish!

Summer Reads

Since I could not find a book club that meets when I’m not working, I decided to join the Seasonal Reading Challenge on Goodreads. Essentially, each season, there is a long list of “challenges” for participants to complete. The “challenges” vary in difficulty and number of points awarded for each. There is not much to win besides bragging rights and the ability to choose the next season’s challenges, but it is a lot of fun.

The summer tasks were just posted and here are a few of them:

• Sun, Sea and PIRATES! Read a book about pirates.


• The Long and the Short of It. Read a short book (100-200 pages) with a long title (5 or more words) or a long book (400 or more pages) with a short title (fewer than 5 words).


• What’s Next? Choose a 5-star book from your GR read shelf. Go to What Should I Read Next? and type in the title (DO NOT hit enter!). Choose the correct title from the list that appears below the box. If the title appears more than once, choose the one closest to the top. Choose a book from the generated list to read. Required: Include the title of the 5-star book you chose from your GR shelf when you post.


• In The Eurozone The Euro is used by 327 million Europeans, but not all European nations use this currency.

As you can see, the tasks can get pretty challenging to find books that fit the criteria.

Another one is:
Don't Stop Reading. Since school's out, it's a great time to read a good book. Read a book from The Ultimate Teen Reading List.

I perused the teen reading list and there seem to be a lot of good looking books on there and not all of them are for teens. After I looked over it, I felt that as a librarian and lover of books, I should write a post about the list so I can have it for future reference.

Here are a few of the books I am going to be reading for the Summer challenge:

• Pirates!


• The Art of Racing in the Rain


• The other Boleyn Girl


• Apple Pie


• The book Thief


• Soulless


• Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World


• Wicked Lovely


• The Bucolic Plague: How Two Manhattanites Became Gentlemen Farmers: An Unconventional Memoir


• My Little Red Book


• Am I Blue? Coming out from the Silence


• Jersey Tomatoes are the Best


• Room


• Library: An Unquiet History


• The Handmaid’s Tale


• The eyre Affair

Now that I type it out, it seems like a lot and that is not even half of the challenges! We’ll see how many I get through. I’m just thankful that I have the time and luxury to do all of this reading!

25. Long conversations with grandparents

I thought the 25th think I'm thankful for deserved it's own post...


I sat today looking at my cell phone debating whether I was going to call my grandmother. I had not talked to her in several months and I did not call her on mother’s day. I wanted to talk to her, but I also wanted to be able to give her my full attention. I thought that talking to her on my lunch might cause me to cut the conversation short and I would not be able to just relax and read my book.

Ann V. in One Thousand Gifts talks about being completely present in each moment and enjoying each moment. I started thinking that I would have to make my moments if I am going to have them. I cannot just sit and wait for life to happen to me, so I decided to call my grandmother and I was so glad that I did.

I hope it gave her as much of a blessing as it gave me to spend a half an hour talking to her. She talked about the different homes she’s lived in--both in Canada and here in Arizona. At the end, she apologized for “talking my head off” but I am so glad she did. The moments where my grandparents recount their history are few and far between and I’m learning to cherish them more and more.

I’m trying not to feel guilty for not calling her as often as I should. I’m trying to think positive thoughts about the things I do do for my family and not about the things I should do, but don’t. My husband says I’m too hard on myself, but I hold myself to a very high expectation and I get very disappointed when I fall short. I am not a fan of the saying “shoot for the moon and if you miss at least you land among the stars.”

We’ll see...I’m getting there. One moment at a time.

Eucharisteo

I was only going to post this once a week, but I realized I need to do it when the inspiration strikes. I'm still reading One Thousand Gifts and it is really hitting home for me.

14. doing something I’ve never done before (sewing machine related)
15. having a hard conversation
16. floating in the pool with a friend (yes, it is bathing suit weather here)
17. finding a comment on my blog
18. an understanding boss
19. humbling myself and asking for forgivness
20. sewing love into a quilt for my sister in law
21. sewing straight lines
22. the kind lady at the quilt store willing to stop and help me
23. having a running vehicle
24. my dad taking time to give me advice even though he was busy at work

One through 13: here