Checking off Goals

In January one of my stated goals for the year was to run a 5K.  I made it public (so had to follow through with it) HERE.

I've said before that I believe you can make the time for what is most important to you. I've certainly learned a fair amount since I started "training" to do this 5k. I think it's only fair to say that I was (from 2003-2005) a college athlete. My main thing was soccer. However, I did run cross country for one semester because they needed runners and they said they would pay for my books if I ran. Sort of a no-brainer there. I loved soccer, I hated running. So running that distance wasn't as huge of a deal for me as it is for other people. There are so many amazing people who really work hard to run this distance. Honestly, I think they are better people than I am for the amount of effort they put into their running.

Beauty all along the rail trail.

This winter seemed to really drag on for me this year, and I felt like I really needed an outlet. Hence, the desire to run a 5K. Since it has been ten years since I have done really any physical activity other than have four babies (and I'm pretty sure having babies doesn't help you run a 5K) I needed to train.

The nice flat rail trail where I run.

I made a serious effort to get out and run two to three times per week. This was not easy. Often I would wait until hubby got home from work, I would drive five minutes to the rail trail near our house, and run one mile. I could usually get there and run and get back in about 30-40 minutes. As it got closer to the date of my 5k I tried to run either Saturday or Sunday and do a longer two or three mile run.

Quiet place to be at 6 am

I'm not a morning person. At all. The race I signed up for was the 5K River Run in Wrightsville, PA (about 45 minutes from my home), and the race started at 8:30. So I needed to be leaving my house by 7 at the latest. So my dear husband suggests that I start running in the morning before he goes to work. That meant some mornings I was up and at the trail by 6 am. Honestly, I found myself enjoying it. I enjoyed the fresh feeling of the morning, the empty trail, and waking up in that way. I also saw a lot of animals at the trail, and the kids always enjoyed hearing what I saw each day. Sometimes a deer, groundhogs, indigo buntings, cardinals, rabbits, and once a turtle. So I did my best to train, but those morning runs left me exhausted for the rest of the day. I would usually end up super grumpy and need a nap.

Snapping turtle I saw during one of my runs.

The night before the race my stomach felt weird. Hubby thought I was just nervous. OR, I had a touch of stomach bug. The morning of the race I was a little bit sick in my stomach, but went out anyway. I am probably the only person left on the planet who doesn't have a GPS, so I used PRINTED MAPQUEST DIRECTIONS (I'm so stuck in 2004), which took me to Wrightsville. The only problem was they took me to cross the Wrightsville Bridge, which of course was CLOSED so that the runners can run across. I quick call my hubby in a panic, and I won't mention the unholy words I said, but it was not nice. I quick drove to a Turkey Hill, asked for directions, and thankfully, they got me there. I had to park far away because I was late, literally ran from my car to pick up a race bib, literally ran to the bathroom, waited impatiently, and ran to the start line holding my t-shirt. There was nobody there that I knew to hold my shirt while I ran, so I stuck the shirt in a little cleft in a tree. And the race started a few minutes later. It was not exactly how I envisioned this all happening.

The race starts downhill (which is sweet), then flattens out for about one mile across the bridge.

The Wrightsville Bridge: Photo from Civil War Album

(If you have time, you really should read about the Burning of the Wrightsville Bridge).

A really pretty photo of the bridge: Photo from Amtrack Vacations (of all places!!)

 Once you cross the bridge you loop around a little side street and then run back across the bridge. Now is the hardest part. I felt really good up until about mile two. I really slowed down for about 3/4 of a mile. Then I started to slowly pick back up the pace. The last four blocks is UP the steep hill that we lovingly ran down at the beginning of the race. Somehow I felt really good running up those last four blocks, maybe it was old soccer training coming back to me. I had really wanted to run in under 30 minutes, but I wasn't able to make it in that time. My official time was 30:37, which was still almost three minutes faster than any of my practice runs. I don't think being sick really made any difference in my time, although I did feel awful after I ran and most of the weekend. Somehow the adrenaline or something was able to keep me from not feeling bad while I ran.

My mom and nephew were there to cheer me through the finish line. Thanks for your support!!

I definitely learned a lot from my training/running experience. One thing I learned is that I CAN make time to run. However, I made time to run (often) at the expense of my family. To me, it isn't really worth it. I was often really grumpy and really tired on the days I ran, which of course affected my family. That doesn't necessarily mean that I will never run again. I think I'd like to keep up with running once or twice a month, but not much more than that. I would love to eventually run with my husband, but this will be years down the road since at the point someone needs to stay with our little kids while the other is running. 

And kudos to all the super-fast people out there. The first runner of this race came in at 18:24 and was just fifteen years old. There are a lot of really dedicate runners out there and I think that's awesome.

Now I can check that off my goals for the year!

Time

One of my most frequently asked questions is: Where do you find the time to paint?

One of these days I fully intend to give you a "day in the life of Mama Hess", but for now this little snippet will have to do.

I love to paint. Truly. I love it. I make the time for what I love doing. I have two portions of the day which are devoted to my little painting business.

One part of the day is my girls nap/quiet time. This time is often interrupted with homework questions, so it's not as devoted as I would like to be. Baby Caroline usually starts her nap time between 1 and 1:30 pm. She usually gets up between 4 and 5 pm. She's an angel. I leave the older girls room between 1:30 and 2 pm. They are supposed to be in their room until 4 pm, but they usually end up coming downstairs to do homework around 3:30. This leaves me approximately 90 minutes to two hours to "work". But let's be honest, half the time I'm checking emails, wasting time on Facebook, and replying to messages about custom orders. If I'm lucky (or more purposeful) I get right to work on creating designs or sitting at my table to paint, spraying the clear finishing coat on painted signs, and adding hooks to the back of completed signs.

Caroline falling asleep in my arms.

The second portion of the day that is reserved for painting is in the evening after the girls are asleep at night. I like to start around 9 or 9:30 pm and depending on my work load will work anywhere from 11 pm to 2 am. And I will admit, there was a time when I got deeply involved in my work and lost all track of time. It was 4 am when I went to bed that night, I mean, morning. I typically leave my phone upstairs on silent during this time so that I'm not distracted by messages, Facebook, Instagram, and all those good things. I do not stay up that late every night. I always try to go to bed at a good time on Sunday nights, and on a rotating schedule of every-other night. I get too tired during the day if I stay up that late every night. I also will end up taking a short nap after I read to the older girls during their quiet time to make up for a really late night.

I almost always reserve Friday nights for a Redbox and wine time with my husband. Often he sits with me on week nights as I work and keeps me company until he needs to go to bed if I'm working late. He also washes all our dishes while I paint. Every night. He is a complete gem, and I wouldn't get as much work done if it weren't for him.

Time is something that is hard to come by. I really believe that you can make time for what is most important to you. It helps that I really love painting. It would certainly be harder if it were something I didn't enjoy. Also, I try to find ways to simplify the ordering process. This is not always possible but I recently spent a significant amount of time working out colors. I was having a bit of trouble getting colors right on signs which required me to go back and work on them again. I do that willingly because that is what people are paying me for. They want something that is going to fit just right in their home, and trust me, I totally understand!

I just finished my color chart yesterday.

I'm pretty excited about it. The only thing that I couldn't accurately represent was the stain colors that I offer. I would have liked to have stain samples on my paint sticks, but the paint stick absorbed the stain in such a way that I did not feel it was an accurate sample of what it looks like on the wood I typically use. That being said, I have done many signs in each of the colors I offer, so it is easy for me to pull up a photo with each of those stain colors.

Etsy offers this beautiful "Zoom" feature, so if you have trouble reading the color chart I would recommend visiting This Link, scrolling to the last photo and hitting zoom in the bottom right hand corner.

I hope that helps answer your time question. I thank you all so much for your orders. It has been so fun for me to create beautiful things to hang in your home. I'm honored.

For my Moms

As is typical, my Mother's Day post comes days after Mother's Day. Those of you who are on Facebook no doubt read countless posts about other people's mothers. Perhaps you posted something about your mom yourself. My Mother's Day post was about my sweet Caroline, in tears, over the fact that her doll baby wouldn't take a human pacifier.

 

She actually wiped her eyes with the bottom of her dress. It was hilarious yet so true to how many of us feel as moms at times, even if we don't express those feelings in the same way.

First of all, I must say, I have a great mom. What was really cool to me as I read through my news feed on Facebook on Sunday was how so many people feel that they have the best mom ever. True, not everyone did, in fact, some stories were heartbreaking, but for the most part, moms are doing a better job than they think they are.

My church's monthly newsletter asked several people to write one thing their mom taught them. I was one of the lucky people who got to write about their mother. I thought I would share with all of you dear people what I learned from my mother. (Also, I generally call her mother when I'm irritated with her - a fact that I didn't know until she pointed it out to me in my early 20s -from here on out I'll refer to her as "mom".)

My mom is good at many things, but not everything. She is human. She is beautiful, and funny, and strong. My mom started running 5ks at age 58. She is wonderful and inspiring. She is not perfect, but she tries hard.

Mom and me at BCF Group's Christmas dinner

 One thing my mom has taught me is how to have faith. There were many times growing up when I knew finances were tight. We did not have any money, in fact, I'm pretty sure we were in debt. My mom always believed that we would make it. I've mentioned before that I love to journal. I just looked back and read some journal entries from my time away at college. I was in Jackson, Mississippi, studying at Jackson State University, and my parents were separating. It was an emotional time, for sure. I would talk to my mom on the phone every couple of days. She had been telling me of how badly she needed money. I had written prayers out in this journal. I had only truly professed Christ about 9 months before this time. The prayers I had written seemed so incredibly bold. But I believed them. Several days from that original prayer, I wrote an answered prayer. (I know some disagree about playing the lottery, and I'm not exactly sure how this 50/50 game works, but please, bear with me here). My mom won $700 in this 50/50 at her job. It was a big deal. It was a building block in my own faith. 

Mom and baby me (1985 - we had cool hair)

 This lesson and several others have served me so well as I have gone through many different trials in my adult life. Financial hardships early in our marriage, emotional hardships with a difficult pregnancy, having the faith that God knows what He is doing through our foster care experience, and more. So thanks, mom, for showing me through your life, that God is faithful, He is good, and He knows our needs.

There are probably thousands of jokes about mothers-in-law. Here is one:

David is finally engaged and is excited to show off his new bride. "Ma," he says to his mother, "I'm going to bring home three girls and I want you to guess which one is my fiance." 

Twenty minutes later, David walks in the door with three girls behind him. "It's that one," said his mother without blinking an eye. 

"Holy cow," exclaimed David, "How did you know?" 

"I just don't like her," she replied.

So David Is finally engaged, and is excited to show off his new bride. “Ma”, he said to his Mother, “I’m going to bring home three girls and I want you to guess which one is my fiance.” Sure enough twenty minutes later, David walks in the door with three girls following behind him. “It’s that one”, said his mother, without blinking an eye. “Holy cow”, exclaimed David, “how in the world did you know it was her?” “I just don’t like her”, she replied.

Read more at:

So David Is finally engaged, and is excited to show off his new bride. “Ma”, he said to his Mother, “I’m going to bring home three girls and I want you to guess which one is my fiance.” Sure enough twenty minutes later, David walks in the door with three girls following behind him. “It’s that one”, said his mother, without blinking an eye. “Holy cow”, exclaimed David, “how in the world did you know it was her?” “I just don’t like her”, she replied.

Read more at:

I didn't have grandparents living in the same state growing up, so I had very limited experience with seeing my parents interact with their in-laws. I don't have a single memory of my dad interacting with my mom's parents. And I know that my mom still has a good relationship with my dad's mom, even though my parents are now divorced. 

I am so very grateful for my mother-in-law. Our relationship has certainly grown in the nearly ten years that Trent and I have been married. I really have to give her credit for that. Every Wednesday my mother-in-law feeds my family. She invites us to her home, and makes food for us. I'll be honest, when we were first married it sometimes felt like more of a burden than a blessing. I didn't necessarily want to spend an evening with my in-laws every week. I grew up in a family who talks a lot. Before, during and after we eat we talk. Trent's family reads the newspaper. It was an adjustment. And then we started having babies. And some days those Wednesdays were hard, because my babies like routines and schedules, and that often included an early bedtime. But we went, and they loved on our kids. And  my mother-in-law makes food and dessert and reads to my kids. They have tea parties, and she surprises them with little additions to her toy area (a new hat, clip on jewelry, etc.). 

Tea party

 I have come to cherish our talks after dinner, when the kids are sent to play and she cleans up some dishes and I wipe the table. Our whole family looks forward to Wednesday nights with the Hesses. We hold tightly to those days and skip out on extracurricular things (like AWANA, Bible School, and anything else that happens to meet on Wednesday nights). I know preparing food for our gang might not be her favorite thing to do (especially because it's pretty much guaranteed that at least one child won't eat whatever she prepares), but I do appreciate it. And let's be honest, not having to prepare food once a week is a HUGE blessing to me!

My mother-in-law, Maggie, Anne, Me, Abbey, and my sister-in-law Sarah on Easter.

So thanks, to both my moms. Great job raising Trent, Maw. Great job raising me, mom. I hope that I can continue to learn from both of you for years to come.

So David Is finally engaged, and is excited to show off his new bride. “Ma”, he said to his Mother, “I’m going to bring home three girls and I want you to guess which one is my fiance.” Sure enough twenty minutes later, David walks in the door with three girls following behind him. “It’s that one”, said his mother, without blinking an eye. “Holy cow”, exclaimed David, “how in the world did you know it was her?” “I just don’t like her”, she replied.

Read more at:

So David Is finally engaged, and is excited to show off his new bride. “Ma”, he said to his Mother, “I’m going to bring home three girls and I want you to guess which one is my fiance.” Sure enough twenty minutes later, David walks in the door with three girls following behind him. “It’s that one”, said his mother, without blinking an eye. “Holy cow”, exclaimed David, “how in the world did you know it was her?” “I just don’t like her”, she replied.

Read more 

Looking Back

I have a terrible memory. Seriously, ask my kids. They are constantly reminding me of things I said I would do, but forgot. And if I'm half asleep when talking to you, psshhh, forget it. I probably won't recall ever having a conversation with you.

My poor memory skills are probably why I love blogging so much. If it is written down then it must have actually happened (even if I can't remember it clearly). I also love to journal out those raw emotions. I am often embarrassed by what I write when emotional, but it is so healing in the moment to get them out in a safe place, and later to look back on them.

Monday mornings I give my two oldest girls a spelling pre-test. It is good for them to see growth in short-term way. It's hard for adults to see how they are growing in the moment, how much more challenging must it be for our 6 and 7 year old children? For the past two or three weeks Abbey (age 6) has gotten all of her spelling words right on the pre-test. Whenever this happens I "reward" them by not having them take the test on Friday. This Monday morning, however, Abbey missed one word. To say the girl was upset would be an understatement. Mind you, these are words that she has not studied, and she does not have access to the list ahead of time that she could peek at it. She was distraught over this one little word she missed (I told you she is a perfectionist).

To encourage her little heart I reminded her of how hard even the simplest words were for her in the beginning of the year. She grabbed her language arts binder (that is such a pain for me to put together, but man, today I was glad I did), and flipped to the very beginning. And she laughed. And laughed. And laughed. Oh, what joy that brought to my heart. She looked back to the beginning of the school year. The word was "are", she spelled it "R" on her pre-test, week 1 of the school year. And she laughed! It was very real to her, and showed her just how far she has come this year. I could have cried.

Yes, I'm teaching spelling, but I like to think it is so much more than that. I'm teaching these girls the value of looking back on life. We don't stay back there, we move forward. Yet there is value in looking back. To take a peek at what life was like less than a year ago is important.

Just the other night my dear husband and I were looking back. He had gone through times of self-doubt, of not knowing where he was going, what he wanted to do, where he wanted to go in life. And he prayed and prayed and prayed for direction, never feeling like he was going anywhere or being led. As we talked through the decisions he made he realized just how much the Lord was leading him, guiding him, and setting him on a path. It didn't feel like it at the time, yet when he took a moment to look back, he realized how all these little pieces that didn't seem like much (quitting one job to take a pizza delivery job) all fit together and created this beautiful picture.

Sometimes looking back can be painful. I think of our foster son and daughter on a regular basis. I know I have learned a lot from that experience. However, it is still painful in many ways to look back on that time. I'm sure that someday (maybe not on this side of Heaven) I will see how those months fit into my mosaic to create something whole and beautiful. Certainly I am changed because of that experience.

Isaiah 61:3 (New Living Translation) To all who mourn in Israel, he will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of despair. In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks that the LORD has planted for his own glory.

Portions of this verse pop into my head from time to time, but I'm not sure that I ever noticed those last three words. The beauty for ashes, the joy instead of mourning, the praise instead of despair, it's for HIS OWN GLORY. Not for us. Not for me. For Him. Wow. 

I'm just letting that sink in.

I will leave you with this: Gungor "Beautiful Things". Hands down one of my favorite songs. 

I encourage you to take a few minutes today, sit, and think. The weather here has been beautiful. Grab a cup of tea or coffee, watch the kids play in the yard, and look back and realize the beautiful things He has done for HIS OWN GLORY in your life.