Food Month Purpose and Guidelines

Food Month is upon us! Eric surprised me for Mother's Day with a plane ticket home to see my dad the first week of July. I really don't want to be focusing on a fast while I am there, so I decided to not have a week break. So we went straight from clothes month to food month.

 Not going to lie... food month is by far the scariest, hardest month for me. I really, REALLY enjoy food... like a lot. I enjoy all kinds of healthy foods, but I also enjoy not so healthy food.

Purpose: To enjoy and appreciate the food that the Lord provides. To understand and appreciate what it would be like to only live off of things that I grow and my neighbors/community grow.

Guidelines: I will be living off the land. :) I will only be eating things that I grow in my garden or I can purchase from a local farmer or Amish.

Family Participation: Eric has decided to give up all sweets for the month. The kids are all giving up pizza and ice cream for the month. We had a "last supper" of pizza and ice cream on Sunday night!

Exceptions: There will be a few exceptions to the guidelines...
1. I will be allowed salt, pepper, vinegar and olive oil.
2. I will be allowed bread if I can find some that is made with no sugar and no white flour (this might mean no bread)
3. I will be allowed to eat things I have previously canned from my garden or local farms.

Challenges: What is not a challenge about this month? I don't have much actually producing in my garden yet, but I am hoping that it will be soon. I am heavily relying on local farmers for meat and produce, especially at the beginning of the month.

Fears: Everything about this month scares. I LOVE food. I eat food as a happy celebration. I eat food when I'm sad. I eat food when I'm bored. I pretty much have a very unhealthy relationship with food and I know this month is going to be eye opening and probably kick my booty.

So here is to the next 28 days of living off the land!

Thanks for joining me on the journey.

Oh the Excess...

So I finished the last week of clothing... Here are the highlights.

The kids had a long weekend that was warm for most of it (rained the rest). I was really wishing I had a swimsuit so we could have gone and done a water something, but we managed to make the best of it and have some fun family time hanging around the house.

We had Green Day at school. Jax and I spent the day helping at school, and thanks to a tip from my lovely friend, Gay Smith, and a little elbow grease and Dawn dishsoap… my green shirt was back in the lineup of clothing options.

I feel like I have lived in my red dress. I have worn it about 60% of the time. I have done a lot of things month in a dress I wouldn't typically have done. I lived a lot of life in that dress this month. It is debatable whether I will cherish it for years to come, or burn it in a ceremonial sacrifice. :)

Friday was our Run Club's 5K. I wore the same gray t-shirt and black running pants I have worn every Run Club practice. I managed to get through the crazy day of prep, survive running a 5K with the kids in 90 degree heat, and getting pegged by 120 water balloons all in that gray t-shirt and running pants. If it were any other month, I definitely would have picked something different to wear, something a little more sweat and water friendly... but I survived.

My baby sister surprised me and came in for the weekend! I managed to have clean clothes to pick her up from the airport and then wore the red dress to church on Sunday... again. But you know what, even though I wore the same red dress 4 Sundays in a row... not a single person noticed or mentioned it. Just goes to show, I think about what I am wearing WAY more than anyone else around me notices what I'm wearing.

I spent the entire last week going through all of my clothes. Friends... it made me ill... actually nasuous… the amount of excess I live in. I packed away my entire maternity wardrobe, threw away 4 things that were not wearable by anyone, and donated 127 items of my clothing (some still new with tags). I went with the method of purging from last month's fast: if I don't love it, use it (on a regular basis), or wouldn't buy it again then it went into the donation pile.

Y'all- there is still a solid 2 months of clothes I can wear without ever having to wear anything twice. It is too much. I just made it through an entire month on 7 articles of clothing (6 for a majority of it). Why on earth do I own so many clothes? And why, for the love of all things good, have I wasted soooo much money in this area of my life?

From this point on, there will be a monthly purge. And if any new clothing comes into this house, 2 things will leave. I learned clothes and the amount of them are not really important. It is more important about the work being done. (though I'm pretty sure I knew this, it was just made abundantly clear this month)The Lord has a lot of work for me to do here on earth, I'm pretty sure he doesn't care if I am doing it in running pants and a t-shirt or a dress.

Food month is next!

Thanks for joining me on the journey!

The Good, the Bad, and the Dirty...

It has been a busy week here. It's the "end of the school year season". That means we are still in Spring sports, but having ALL the end of the year concerts, ceremonies, and school activities. When you have 4 school aged children that means something every day.

The Good:
Y'all will be happy to know that since I was bummed about not having gray everyday for brain tumor awareness, the Lord so generously blessed me with a lot of gray hair shinning through for the month. I can't color anything until my month is up, so I am just looking in the mirror every morning and thinking, "There's my gray for the day. Glad I have I life to be living."  There's my shinning silver lining (pun totally intended) for the rest of this month. :)

Also.. I have been totally keeping up with getting laundry washed. Normally there is a TON to do, because for some reason all the million people that live in my house need to wear clothes (usually multiple outfits) daily... what's up with that?!?!? BUT- with my very limited options I'm doing at least a load daily... so staying on top of the keeping laundry clean (folding and putting away is a whole other story ;))

The Bad:
My shorts have been MIA since day 6. It's day 22. I had kids doing laundry and my shorts that I personally put in the wash, mysteriously disappeared. I assumed they got put in one of the kids rooms, but after rummaging through all of their stuff and locating nothing, I had decided to just brave through with the 6 articles of clothing... It has been hot! And I haven't had a comfortable option to lounge in or anything other than my one pair of running pants to work out in. I have 100% using this as an excuse and getting very few workouts in. (Lame... I know)

The Dirty:
So last week we had a band concert (gray dress) on Wednesday, I wore my gray shirt on Thursday and Jax threw up on me (but no fear... green shirt and red dress still clean) so I changed for National Junior Honor Society Induction (red dress) on Thursday evening. (Both to which I felt very underdressed)

Thursday night bedtime attire was the red dress which I woke up covered in leaking breast milk (because my kid finally slept more than 5 hours in a row!!!). So here it was, Friday morning and it was Field Day at the elementary school. Green shirt it is... except I manage to drop my breakfast all down the front of me before we left.  I had not washed anything yet from the previous 2 days.
So now my options are:
1- red dress with 2 huge milk leak marks on a very inappropriate place to head to the elementary school (or anywhere for that matter)
2- green shirt with food/oil all down the front of it
3- gray shirt that was thrown up on the day before... mark is less obvious than breakfast burrito, but smells like baby vomit

So we went with option number 3. Shorts were still MIA, running pants weren't clean, so jeans it was. So off to Field Day in a vomited on gray shirt and a pair of skinny jeans. I felt very glamourous.

Cute Baby that made the red dress no longer wearable. :)

The other MAJOR bummer with this debacle with the food... breakfast burrito to be exact... that was generously spilled down the front of my green shirt- it left not 1, but 2 big oil stains. Not wearable anywhere but around the house. The GREAT news that comes with this is that I started to have a little breakdown to my husband. It went a little something like this:
Me: "Now I'm down to 5 things Eric! 5!!!! How am I going to make it through a whole other week with only 5 articles of clothing?!?! 7 was hard enough!"
Eric: "Why do you only have 5?"
Me: "The green shirt is ruined and I still can't find my shorts."
Eric: "Oh I found your shorts. The kids put them with my stuff."

So after being slightly irritated the discovery of the shorts are just now being brought to my attention, I was doing a happy dance that I'm back up to 6 wearable (in public) articles of clothing.

So I may be down a shirt, but I'm up a pair of shorts again. Looks like my gray hair might not be the only silver lining this week. ;)

6 more days.

Thanks for joining me on the journey!

2 weeks in... 8 things.

So, it has been about 2 two weeks... 13 days to be exact... of wearing only 7 articles of clothing. I'm not sure hard is the right word, but definitely a challenge. Here are 8 of the highlights/challenges of the last 13 days...

1. I have slept in a sundress 5 times in the last 2 weeks. Not the most convenient or comfortable, but could definitely could be worse.

2. Evening walks and morning runs to school I have missed the convenience of flip-flops, a baseball cap and a sweatshirt or jacket.

3. About 3 days in I wore the same outfit for 24 hours straight... my husband was seriously questioning how this month was going to go.

4. I was picked to go on a canoeing field trip with 5th grade. It was 92 degrees that day, I did not have appropriate clothing for this outing. I sweat my booty off in my skinny jeans and looked like I was wearing a two tone gray shirt with the amount of sweat released from my over dressed body. 

5. Brayden has complimented me every time I wear the red sundress. I'm not sure what this means... either he is happy to occasionally see me in color? or he really dislikes the other things I have chosen for the month? Or maybe he is just a polite kid who knows I'm struggling with this month? Not sure which one, but I will take it while I can get it. 

6. One of the exceptions has taken place... pedicure. I was very curious how this would play out, and opinions of the council varied greatly on how this should be done. Ultimately, I decided to let the girls to pick my color and spend time with them. The were talking bright blues, greens and yellows before we got there so I was a tad nervous. When we got there, within 30 seconds they picked a mauve/pinkish color... something I would never pick, but they said, "This looks like something Marmee would totally wear, we think you should do this one." So we went with that. And as far as a relaxing experience... I wrestled a very wiggly baby the entire time, that continually pushed buttons on the massage chair, so I was definitely there for the girls. :) 

7. I obviously haven't been wearing gray everyday, but my beautiful friend (and council member) Missy pledged to wear gray every day for the first week (for brain tumor awareness). She sent me pics and even got boot camp in on it one day! Made me feel great!

8. It is UNREAL to me how much confidence a cardigan and a pair of earrings give me.  I seriously debated not going to my kids awards assembly because I only had my gray sundress clean and I did not like my physical appearance in that dress that day. I am not proud of this, and seriously dislike this insecurity I have.. but it is here and very real. 

Here is the thing I have noticed about my kids... they all see me and need me in different ways, none of those are related to my clothing.  This goes with everyone I guess, not just my kids. It is more about the "doing" than the "wearing". I already knew this, but I guess it has been overly emphasized to me over the last 2 weeks.

I have really been focusing my Bible study this month on Proverbs 31... verses 10-31 specifically. The Wife of Noble Character... gosh, she is so great. I struggle with this so much. I feel it clearly states the things to I should be striving toward, and even though I feel like I am completely falling short, it is so good! I have read it so many times in my adult life, yet there is something new I noticed while focusing on it this month (I love when God does this). All the verses 10-31 talk about the things she is, should be, does... none of these things talk about her outward appearance, except one, verse 30.

Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

So not only does the Lord NOT list physical appearance as one of the things that is important to focus on, but He goes out of His was to say THIS IS FLEETING.

Webster's definition:

fleet·ing

adjective lasting for a very short time.

Beauty is fleeting, last a short time, not important to the Lord. 

I am secure enough in my faith at this point in my life to know that my worth has zero to do with my outward appearance. But y'all, I'm going to be super honest here- I struggle- BIG TIME. I know... I KNOW... that true beauty is on the inside, and I truly believe it. I drill it into my children and emphasize it to myself, but I really struggle with being an insecure person because of my looks. I don't like this about myself, and my biggest struggle is how to help my girls find a good balance. To teach them to know your worth has nothing to do with your appearance, but at the same time not always feeling... well... ugly. I have never once looked at myself and thought I was beautiful. Not once. I know the Lord sees me as beautiful, He created me, so why can I not see myself that way? And how do I help my girls with this? This is really what the Lord has been laying on my heart this month... and I am a work in progress. 

Here is to surviving the next 2 weeks and learning lessons along the way (and not having to spend any time hanging out like this guy :) ).

Thanks for joining me on the journey!

adjective: fleeti

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Clothing Purpose and Guidelines

So this month is a hard one for me. It was a hard one last time, and I have a very strong feeling it will not be any easier this time around. But here we are, going to embrace the choices and lessons that come in the next 28 days...

Purpose: How important is my appearance? Do I put more emphasis on my outward appearance than was is on the inside? How do I view myself? How much do I have that I do not need or wear?

Guidelines: I have 8 articles of clothing (actually 7 clothing, 1 shoes) that I will be allowed to wear this month... that's it... 8. No accessories... jewelry, hats (why?!?!?), scarves, cardigans or jackets. I will be wearing my wedding ring, but no other jewelry. I seriously debated switching out a dress for a ball cap... these days I am in a hat about 70% of the time... no joke... but the sundress won out. Basic, daily make-up tinted moisturizer, sheer mineral powder, mascara, and lip balm. I will also not purchase any clothes/shoes/accessories for myself.

1- pair of skinny jeans
2-athletic shorts
3-running capris
4- gray "My Life is my Message" t-shirt
5- solid green t-shirt
6-long gray cotton dress
7-knee length red sundress
8- shoes (3 pair- running shoes, converse, and sandals)

In the final hour... literally 11:50pm last night the final decisions were being made and a last second switch from a fitted yellow shirt to a green t-shirt was made. Only time will tell if this was a wise decision. :)

Challenges: Aside from the obvious challenge of only have 7 articles of clothing for the month, here were they things I found challenging when trying to prepare for this month.
1- I'm nursing Jax still... this means everything that I wear this month has to be something I can nurse a baby in... in public. So no hiking a dress up over my head to nurse a baby. This, not surprisingly, eliminated a majority of my sundresses. This was both frustrating and eye opening for the summer to be right around the bend (where I tend to live in sundresses).
2- I don't fit in a lot of my clothes... like a LOT! I don't feel comfortable without layering up or adding accessories, so this will be a humbling experience for me.
3- It's May... that means it could be 50 degrees or 95 degrees... I did not choose a long sleeve anything or a swimsuit. I'm hoping this does not bite me in the booty.
4- I have a baby that likes to spit up on me... this could potentially be a smelly challenge.
5- I'm doing a workout program with a friend that requires daily workouts... I did not want every thing I choose to be workout clothes, but it appears this will be a lot of daily laundry or smelly Cassie.
6- May is brain tumor awareness month. As someone that lives with a brain tumor, I usually wear some form of gray everyday in May. I had to let this go. I chose a couple of gray things, but a lesson learned from last time was to put something with color in my wardrobe choice... it really does effect my attitude.

Fears: I prayed a lot about this month, and asked council for prayers and opinions. I really, REALLY struggle with self image and knew this would be a hard one for me. Not only with the guidelines set up, but just knowing that I'm going to have to learn lessons in an area of life I know is already a struggle. The council varied on what they thought I should do for my guidelines for the month, lots thinking with the challenges I had I should maybe go with 8 outfits or 18 articles... but ultimately (and unexpectedly) the Lord put on my heart the homeless, people in third world countries, and surprisingly the Amish. I thought if all of these people can live there lives and serve the Lord with 8ish articles of clothing... I can do it for a month. So that is where I landed with that.

Exceptions: I have 2 exceptions for the month. Both of these had varied council opinions, but it came down to people/relationship experiences over the need to stick to rules. 1- Eleni's birthday party. We usually dress according to theme in this house... it's a birthday tradition. If Eleni wants me to wear something Harry Potter for her party, I will. 2- Pedicure... I have a girls weekend with my daughters that has been planned for a while and the girls chose the activity of getting pedicures together. After discussing it with the girls and them saying it was important that we all partake, I've decided as to not let this be a "feel better about my appearance" choice, the girls will get to choose what I have done to my toes... and they are very excited about this (and I am a tad nervous ;) ).

I think that kind of lays it out for the month. If this is an area you struggle with, feel free to jump on the bandwagon in your own way! Let me know what you are doing and how I can be praying for you.

Thanks for joining me on this journey.

Last day of Purging!

Today is supposed to be the last day of this possessions fast... here is the thing... there is still so much to get rid of! I will admit, this past week I kind of fell off the purging wagon. I justified it by saying I was busy with other commitments and I had already donated above and beyond by goal (which by the way, I am well aware this is an excuse, not a justification... I was just trying to make myself feel better.) So, with this week being a rest week (clothing fast starts on May 7th), I am committing one full day to going through the 3 specific areas I intended to hit that I have yet to do. Beyond that... I know there is so much more to be done, but it will come slowly and with time, and I pray that the Lord continues to show me where our material possessions can be better utilized.

I had made a conscious decision at the beginning of this month not to purchase anything that I was not going to use immediately. I thought this was a simple task... this was not. Can I just tell you, I was made incredibly aware of how many times I buy things because "that's cute" or "I could maybe use that" or "that would be fun to do with the kids later"... I spend too much money on things that will probably be donated with tags still on it later. Target and Michaels are that hardest for me... but I managed to stay strong this month. I am hoping that I can continue with this trend even when I'm not focusing on possessions.

Left Michael's with only ribbon and tape runners!

Here are some things I learned:

1. My natural instinct is not always to give... I really don't like this about myself. There were still 2 separate occasions during this fast that I had the internal battle of, "give it to someone in need" and "sell it and make some money". Now don't get me wrong, I don't think there is anything wrong with selling your things, but my primary goal was to donate things that could bless others that we no longer had a need for. And yet, there were still times I hesitated. I pray the Lord changes my heart with this.

2. Remember how I said last blog that I thought I wasn't necessarily a bad steward of our money- that was a lie! Seriously... the more I went through this to give away, the more I was like "why do I have so many of these?" 8 unused backpacks... all in good condition (this is not counting the 4 that are currently being carried to and from school), 17 coloring books, gallon bags of markers, crayons, and colored pencils... don't even get me started on party supplies. I just buy so many things that are unnecessary.  I have been praying a lot that I am better with this as I move forward.

3.People before purging. I'm a list and goal kind of girl... if I have a task at hand, I want to accomplish that goal. There were 2 different days during this fast that I had plans to go through a certain area of purging, but there were real humans with real needs, so the purging took a backseat for the day. Those days I'm ok with... if I spend my day baking brownies and cooking lasagnas because I have sick friends, or sad friends, or friends that just need a night off... instead of going through a box of old Christmas stuff, I feel like the Lord gives it His stamp of approval.

4.Sorting things into piles in my basement, bedroom, kitchen... wherever... is not the same as actually donating things. I have multiple plies of "intentions" but until I actually deliver it to the recipient, it is still just too much stuff in my house!

5. This fasting experience is so different than the last time. I did expect it to be somewhat different, learning new things about myself and such. But just the completely different season of life that I am in makes this challenge so different! I have elementary and middle school kids that are involved in extra curricular activities and need help with homework and projects... and I have a baby (I know, it is still hard for me to believe this sometimes too). But it puts me in a whole new situation of my time being torn in every direction. My marriage and my husband's job are also in a very different place than they were 5 years ago, and sometimes that means he is gone for days or weeks at a time. I have discovered that this fast will be truly focusing daily on how to manage my time to balance the day to day needs of my family and my commitment to the Lord each month.

Picking up Daddy

6. I am so bad about blogging! My husband and I sat and talked about this for a long time last night. Sometimes I am bad about blogging because I have a hard time making the time to sit down and do it with... well... life (insert 5 adorable children here). And sometimes Satan is just really attacking. I pray the Lord gives me discernment when to share and when not to... and that the focus always stays on Him.

Some months are harder than others for one reason or another... time management was my arch nemesis this month.

Kids making deliveries in the rain...

Because sometimes mom needs a break!

Clothing month starts next week!

Thanks for joining me on the journey!

Purging and Pitching

There is a LOT of purging and pitching of things going on around here!

I have had well over 1,000 things leave my house (I stopped counting at 1,000)... and I still have so much to do! I'm not sure if it makes me super excited to be getting rid of so many things... or if it makes me super sad that we live in such excess that more than 1,000 things have exited my house and I am not having to go without anything.

Up to this point, I haven't gotten rid of many clothes. I've been praying that God would show me where they need to go, but so far, nothing has come across as a specific need. If anyone knows of a family or location that needs women's and children's clothes... please let me know!

In case you are looking for a place to donate your stuff, here are some of the places my stuff has been going...

-Planet Aid Clothing/Shoe Drop offs
-Vintage Values
-Headstart
-Friends
-Neighbors
-Veteran's Home
-Animal Shelter
-Teachers gifts
-Kindergarten crafts
-PSTO
-1st grade Treasure Boxes
-Pregnancy Assistance Center
-Foster Care
-Homeless Shelters
-Missionaries

I'm trying to make sure the majority of our things that I am donating are going where they have a purpose. It sometimes takes a little research to figure out where the best place for all this stuff should go.

I will say...this time around has been different. I still have hang ups (things that I know I don't need but I still hesitate to donate) but the lessons are very different. I realize that we do live in excess... extreme is an understatement... but 90% of the things leave are things that have had their time of use and now they are just taking up space. It's not that I was a bad steward of our money at the time, not always... but my lands... why in the world do I hang on to things that could be blessing others? It just takes up space and makes me frustrated with the clutter and disorganization in my home. I'm glad it is going!

I've had a hard time keeping up with the blog this time around  ... I'm going to try to be better about it and get a check in at least once a week. So if you see me, make sure you ask me if stuff is still leaving my house. Even though I'm well over the original goal, I plan to stay focused and continue to purge in the all the areas I have on my list to go through... kitchen and holiday décor along with all the clothes still need to be dealt with. If you stop by my house, I promise we haven't been robbed and ransacked... I'm just sorting and purging... there will be less piles of things being sorted next month. :)

Thanks for joining me on the journey!