thanksgiving 101~

One of the things I am passionate about is the return to Biblial womanhood. Women in our generation (and our mothers and for some, our grandmothers) were fed the lie that Biblical womanhood was not our highest and most noble calling, that there was greater honor, value, and even meaning in finding our worth outside the home. (Even in other ministries sometimes...shhh!) This lie has led to more heartbreak and breakdown within the family structure than anything else I believe. I think the huge increase in psychological as well as physical childhood problems, the breakdown of marriage, the absence of true fatherhood and spiritual leadership within the home, increased violence, teen pregnancy, abortion...you name it...can be ultimately traced back to women abandoning their God-given calling to be a wife and mother first. I think one of the enemy's greatest successes was the feminist movement, and want so badly for women to know that they've been led to believe a bunh of lies....but that is for another time.

Anyway, all that to say, my heart is passionate for women and moms to be able to know their value and worth is found best in the role God created them for, and to be able to pour their lives into their homes as their priority one ministry, and rest in the knowledge that it is GOOD! That when they are able to embrace the Biblical role of women and be fulfilled in that, that it is okay! For me, that in itself has been a huge process. Our culture is so steeped in you have to have it all, do it all, or you better at least look like you are having it all and doing it all perfectly, that it was literally a ripping away process for me that has taken a good nine years probably. Not that I've arrived by any means, but only in the last year or so have I been able to stay at home on a daily basis and like it. I spent the early years of my children's life dragging them all over creation because I could not be content in my home. I cried out to the Lord to change me as I knew in my spirit that I was not walking in His best for me and that was affecting my family and my children. Oh how thankful I am that He covers us in His grace and sees the desires of our hearts and sees our intentions and our hearts. That He covered us in His grace...that He covers my children as their mother grows up right along with them :o)

Whew....I should totally change the name of the post! What I started out wanting to say was that one of the things I am intentionally doing with my girls is mentoring them and training them up to, by the grace of God, be able to walk in their high calling as women with joy, success, and knowledge. What that looks like around here right now, is that one of Anna's official jobs during job time is just "my helper." She does laundry with me, as I'm teaching her at the age of 9 how to handle laundry for a large family. Her other jobs are to check her brothers' and sister's jobs and show them what still needs to be done, to clean off the table, choose a picture for the little ones to color during Bible time, copy it and set them out on the table along with the crayons, help take care of Haven if he needs something while I'm busy, and pretty much just be my assistant. She's being mentored/trained in mothering, along with learning to be a wife and homemaker so that can be a blessing to her husband and her children one day. And be able to do it well and enjoy it! She's learning to multi-task :o) Anyway, totally off topic again....

What I'm trying to say is....on Thanksgiving she and Moriah helped Mom in the kitchen all day! It was actually lots of fun. My family all comes here on Thanksgiving and we prepare most of the food. So we spent the day cleaning up and cooking. Two days prior, we had cleaned up, the day before we made 6 pies (chess, chocolate chess, buttermilk, 2 pumpkin, and apple), and Thanksgiving day we cooked the turkey along with mashed potatos (all my children helped with this as they absolutely love to cut potatos!), green beans, sweet potato casserole, sweet tea, cranberry sauce, a veggie tray, fruit salad, and cream cheese dip. The rest of my family brought punch, corn, and rolls, so we had a Thanksgiving feast and a sweet time was had by everyone.

I feel like I'm going to need to follow this up with some explanation and clarification in the near future...hopefully my computer will cooperate. Right now I've got tons of things I want to say while I have the chance...we'll see how long my sweeties will allow naptime to go :o)