A Week of New Things

This week at the Pafford house has proved to be full of changes and new things.


Sunday offered a very nice surprise with some snow.  I didn't exactly win best mom of the year on that day.  The snow was large fluffy flakes, but the ground was so warm that it didn't stick.  We expected snow all day.  I told Joseph that he needed to take a good nap and then we would go play in the snow.  About 30 minutes after he went to sleep the snow stopped and everything started to dry-up.  Joseph woke up from his nap expecting to play in the snow but when he woke up it not only wasn't snowing, but it was all gone!!  Joseph cried and was upset.  He wasn't mad at me for making him nap, but just mad that there was no snow.  


On Monday Kurt started his internship at a homeless shelter.  He's closing in on his last few months of school!  Unfortunately for us as a family, that means Kurt has to be away a lot!  He works his regular job 8-5 and then works at the shelter from 5-10.  Joseph misses having Kurt around in the evenings, but this has forced us to purposely plan family time during the weekend which is a habit we will probably keep.  Kurt even got to take Joseph to McDonald's for breakfast Friday morning.  Each time I'm wishing that Kurt was here in the evenings, I am reminded of the verse Ecclesiastes 3:1 - There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven.  This is just a small nugget of time in our lives.  This is where God has us now, so we need to enjoy it and learn what we can from it.


On Wednesday Joseph had Pajama Day at school.  He has wanted to wear pajamas to school for a long time so this was a big ordeal!  He left school on Tuesday asking me if he could put his pajamas on when he got home so he didn't have to change in the morning.  I rolled with it!  So when we got home, he changed in his pajamas and we had an omelet for dinner.  He loved his day in pajamas!


On Thursday I joined a new gym...Snap Fitness.  I decided that the fast past, busy atmosphere of 24-hr fitness was just not my thing.  I also think a change will be good since I've been just making monthly donations to the gym for the last 6 months or so!!  So I worked out Friday morning and it felt great!  I'm praying that I stay motivated.


One last change in our household:  We dropped our cable bill!!!  We've really tried to cut back and buckle down.  We decided to cut the cable.  Joseph wasn't too upset to lose all his disney and nickjr shows.  We swapped our $90 cable bill (by the time you added all our extras) for $18 Netflix and Hulu-plus.  As I type, I'm watching plain-jane TV.   Did you know that TV with just an antenna has Qubo and Ion.  Two cool channels I didn't know were free! 


Well that's all from the Pafford home.  One day I'll learn how to easily add my pictures.

Pafford Family Day/Movie Night

We spend the morning clearing out Joseph's closet of boxes of too small Joseph clothes from birth till now. In the midst of that, we compiled a car load of things to bring to good will that were not clothes. We also came across the 'missing' (until he got older) tub of army men. Well, Joseph is older and he got a kick out of playing with them today!! I love to watch him play!

Late afternoon we went to the park where we let Joseph ride in cirlce after cirlce after circle on his power wheels motorcycle. Go Joseph, Go!

My attempt for a first ever Pafford Movie Night Homemade Pizza....fail! Or so I thought. I realized my last rolling pin gave in a long time ago and I never bought a new one...that created a problem for rolling out the dough. At that point I wasn't sure it would even work right, so we turned the unure pizza dough into cheesy bread and off to Wal-Mart i went.

The end result was not bad at all!! The cheesy bread was decent and the Chicken, Bacon, Ranch Pizza from Wal-Mart wasn't bad either!! Yumm-O

Oh, the movie we watched was G-Force. Joseph bought it for Kurt for Christmas. It was alright. We laughed a lot!! Fun, cherishable family time!!

What does _________ mean? - a conversation with my little man

On the way home from school today...


Joseph:  Why are we stopped at the red light so long?
Mommy: I'm not sure, but it looks like there's an accident over there.
Joseph:  Oh, okay.  What does 'not sure' mean?
Mommy: It means, I might know, but I'm not for sure.
Joseph:  Why won't the light turn green?
Mommy:  Remember Joseph, I said I think there's an accident there where the lights are flashing.
Joseph:  What does 'flashing' mean?
Mommy: Flashing is when a light goes on and off really quickly.
Joseph: Okay.  So if a police car's lights are flashing, then we might go to jail.
Mommy:  No, Joseph, not necessarily.  I don't think we'll ever go to jail.
Joseph:  What does 'not ness-ary' mean?
Mommy:  <as I 1/2 listen to questioning at this point> Oh, Joseph, I don't know.
Joseph: You don't know what you just said?
Mommy: <as I now realize, I should be paying more attention> Sorry Joseph, 'not necessarily' means that it might not always be true or might not always happen.
Joseph:  Is that like a lie?
Mommy:........<silently beating my head against the steering wheel asking myself why I can't just talk in 3 or 4 letter 'little kid' words>....this was the conversation for the 15 minute ride home from school...so thankful it wasn't a 30 minute ride!!!


I love my curious Joseph, but some words are really hard to explain!!!  Joseph's poor Kindergarten teacher next year!!!! :-)

Not to be cliche, but...

Not to be cliche, but it's a new year and that means a lot of new things for us.  This past year has flown by and I, personally, have been like a butterfly floating from one great idea or tangent to another.   I have had very little focus in my life and I've been going thru the motions of roles I'm supposed to have and things I'm supposed to do.  So here I sit, no farther along in my long list of goals as I was a year ago (or maybe 2 years ago).  Now, don't get me wrong, there have been plenty of wonderful things that have happened in the last year, but as far as my personal goals....they've been a stagnant puddle of water collecting all sorts of nasty organisms unknown.


So what's new, you ask....Well, Kurt and I have decided to focus on commitment and contentment.  We are committing to weight loss and healthy living.  We are committed to our debt reduction plan.  We are committed to spending time with the Lord as a family and individually.  We are to be content in where we are and not try to get too far ahead of where God wants us.  We are to be content with each accomplishment, no matter how small.  One way to remind ourselves of this contentment, is the phrase, "All I need, I have in Christ".


So here's to the Pafford's new year!