Staying Sane While Traveling with Littles

Generally speaking, we don't take many trips with our family.  It's an undertaking to get everyone to the store to buy groceries so traveling several hours in the car doesn't seem real appealing to me or the hubs.  However, when we do travel it is almost always to visit my family who lives 4 hours away.  Since they can't get away to come visit us very often, we try to make it up there usually at least twice a year.  Traveling with two boys under two is no cake walk.  It takes pretty precise planning, optimal traveling conditions, and a bit of grace.

So how do we do it?  Well, here is a list of a few things that make these trips smooth.  I would caution that some of these we learned the hard way and won't work for everyone else.

1. Lists, lists, lists!  At least a few days ahead of time I make a HUGE list of what all needs to be taken on the trip.  This includes food to prepare meals we will make there, personal items for each family member (be sure to remember any special items your kids can't do without), and a to-do list to complete before the trip.

2. Decide on your optimal travel time.  For us this means leaving at night.  We dress the kids for bed and load them in the car about bedtime.  This usually ensures they are asleep within an hour and don't get too fussy.  It does NOT mean that they sleep the entire way there, though usually any waking results in falling back to sleep relatively quickly.

3. Pack in a way that will make sense when you get there.  For us, this means I pack all my toddlers items in one bag as he sleeps in his own room, and the babies things get put in mommy and daddy's bag (or his own if there isn't room).  All the food usually gets packed together or with any other misc items.  We also pack a "snack bag" that stays up near the front seats.

4. Remember to have fun in the midst of spilled drinks, fussy babies, and multiple stops, you can't control everything.  Just try to move on and know that if you can't laugh about it now....you'll be able to one day :)

The Llama Mama Speaks

My son's favorite book is Llama, Llama Red Pajama.  We read it every...single...day.  Sometimes more than once.  He loves the whole book (except the page that suggests that the mama llama might be gone, so we skip that one).  It really amazes me sometimes how much our everyday circumstances can be impacted by something to trivial as a children's book.  It amazes me that God can speak into our lives comforting words through simple writing and illustration...it doesn't have to be something intricate and complex for us to learn a lesson.  That blows my mind!

Anyway, this book has become the inspiration for my blog.  My favorite part of the book is near the end. The mama llama comes back to baby llama's room and says, "Baby llama don't you know, mama llama loves you so.  Mama llama's always near, even if she's not right here."  Wow.

Does that speak to anyone else?  It amazes me in two ways.  1) How shockingly accurate that thought represents how I feel about my own children and 2) how amazing it is that that is how God feels about us as well!  It's such a great feeling :).  This passage also reminds me to be patient.  God is always near, seeking to give me the desires of my heart, but in his own time.  I suppose one day I will have to thank my son for his immense love of this book and explain all the wonderful ways he has blessed my life!

Introductions...

So I have used this blog to convey my opinions, things God has been doing in my life, wonderful recipes I can't live without and other various things that pop into my head from time to time.  But lately I've noticed a glaring hole in my writing.

No one knows who the heck I am!

That's right, the horribly socially awkward person I am...I have never actually introduced myself.

Well...with several of my friends starting their own blogs recently, and seeing their wonderful introduction, I have decided that I should do a bit of update myself.  Apparently my new year, new me campaign is being forced upon my blog as well.  New layout, new title, and a new post to introduce this crazy person writing :)

Here I am!

My name is Brianah, I am a transplant to OK having spent my life in the Kansas City area from birth until age 22 when we moved here to be closer to my husbands family.  Here's a picture of us from December 2009 with our son Carter (in this picture he was 2 months old).

And less than a year after this picture was taken we added another little boy to our family...our son Henry!

And for reference, this is a more recent picture of Carter.

I plan to write more about my life, how we got where we are, and my goals for this blog...but you'll just have to wait a while for that one :)

New Year, New Me :)

I realize that it's March and that most people are giving up resolutions right now, not making them.  But I've always like to be different ;)

This past week month has been terribly frustrating for me.  God has been revealing things to me that I am NOT comfortable with and things that I have tried with all my might to rationalize away.  It's not working...is anyone surprised?  It's not the first time that God has pushed me out of my comfort zone.  There was a trip in high school that my church took to Myrtle Beach, SC...I wasn't planning on going as I had two jobs at the time.  Little did I know that God had a very different plan.  I think it may have only been a week or two before the trip that I felt so convicted to go that I quit one of my jobs and had to beg and plead to get off work at my other job.  My mom was unhappy, I was broke, and the wonderful leadership at our church helped me get everything together money-wise.  It wasn't a great trip for me...but it was a GREAT trip for God's glory in my life!  I was pushed that week...to befriend people I had been hesitant of, to step out of my comfort zone and speak to strangers, to learn so much about God's calling for me and about leadership, and most of all to realize God's nagging guidance about some portions of my life that were HORRIBLY out of whack and defiant.  It hurt...it was tough...it didn't stop hurting for almost 2 years!  Not what I thought I had signed up for in this Christianity thing.  But with the help of my youth minister, his wife, and some great friends I made it through.  The things I was being pushed to change didn't completely change for a while and it took some more major intervening from God, but when they did change...my life was so much better!  I met my husband and was able to feel God's leading in my life once again.  I was also so much more grown up spiritually for having gone through this tough time. 

So that brings us to 2005, but in 2011 there are some new challenges God has been weaving into my consciousness.  Not so say that there haven't been growth periods, pruning, and difficulties between then and now...but that's a whole string of posts for another time (or a book).  Though the things I'm dealing with now aren't as pressing as what I dealt with back then, they are still tough for me.  Is it ever easy to listen to God tell you that you've not been doing well and he has some major changes in store?

One thing he has convicted me about is my use of the computer.  I love reading other people's blogs.  Mostly on food, parenting, and living a Christian life.  I feel that it is very uplifting to me, most of the time, and helps give me ideas on how to be engaged with my family better.  But that's only true when I'm doing my main job which is caring for the family and lives that God has entrusted to me.

Titus 2:4-5 has been on my heart lately:
"Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children, ⁵ to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God."


My ministry right now, is my family and that's how it should be.  Though I know that...I've not been living that.  So, in an effort to change, I have made some decisions--with God's guidance and much prayer.  I am shutting down my Facebook page (not because it's evil, but because it is not uplifting to me the way it should be and it is a time waster for me) and I'm majorly scaling back on the number of blogs I read.  So that is my resolution for this time in my life.  To get my priorities in order and begin to prune all activities that aren't leading me toward my goal of being a Titus 2 woman!