I had the opportunity to attend a homeschool conference this past weekend, by the Maxwell family, from www.titus2.com. One of the biggest things I came away with was examining how I spend my “discretionary time”. That is the time in between all the ‘major’ things throughout my day. The time we have between dinner and bedtime. The time between picking Jesse up from school and sitting down for dinner. In the morning after Jesse leaves for school, but before I start school with Joshua. It’s amazing how much “free time” I really have throughout my day.

They challenged us to chart how we use the hours in our day. Some of the common areas are: sleep, school, work, church/ministry related activities, television, computer, and quality time with the children…the differs for each individual person and family, but you’d probably be surprised how little time you actually spend with your children. Not just in the same room or house with them, but quality time with communication.

Next they challenged us to evaluate how the use of our time effects our children’s hearts (or you and your spouse’s hearts if you don’t have children). When you are sitting in front of a television or a computer (um, like I am right now), are you building relationship with anyone? Are you cultivating your appetite for the Lord? Are you allowing moral sewage to seep into your heart, your mind, and your family thinking you’re just relaxing in front of the TV? How often do we complain about not having enough hours in the day? Yet how often do we choose to plop in front of the computer for an hour or in front of the TV for two or three hours after the kids go to bed? I’ve mentioned many times how I’d love to read more and have more time for ‘my projects’ like sewing, or exercising. Yet, when I look at how much time I waste throughout my day, I’m challenged to make a proactive change in order to do what is best for my family, especially my children and my relationship with my husband. It’s SO nice and easy and convenient to turn the TV on for the boys when Jesse gets home from school and Owen goes down for a nap. But how would their behavior toward eachother and toward me change if instead of turning on the TV or computer, I sat down and played a few games with them or read them a book? After the games, I would need to start supper. That would be the perfect time for them to color, do puzzles, playdoh, play outside, help me in the kitchen, or continue playing games together. I don’t want to raise children who are only content if they are being “entertained” yet I already see an appetite for that in each of them. That scares and disappoints me. I can change that very quickly by making a few difficult decisions and comitting to stick with it.

I challenge you to a FULL ’screen fast’ for the next seven days. That means NO television, NO video games, and NO computer. I am going to set the timer for ten minutes each morning while Joshua does his math work so I can check my email, but I will turn the computer off as soon as the timer goes off. This is important because of communication with our foster agency and my duties as Nursery Director at church. No facebook, no blogging, no games for the kids (even educational ones), and no computer for my husband once he gets home from work. As a homeschooling family, I often feel like Josh is ‘out of the loop’ in regards to our school work because he is gone all day. We are going to take advantage of our evening time after dinner. This will be the time in which Josh reads the Bible to the boys and gives them the opportunity to tell him what they’re doing in school. Once the boys are in bed, I’ll finish up my housework, and we’ll have the rest of the night to read, talk, or whatever. Imagine that; COMMUNICATION! I’m really looking forward to seeing the difference in my children, my marriage, and my family as this week progresses. I’m going to journal a little everyday so I can write a post on the results next week. If you accept this challenge, please comment on next week’s post so I can hear the results you experienced in your home! Good luck!

~audrey

Thursdays are always a doozey for me. I leave my house around 8:45am and typically don’t return until 8:00pm. Between Bible study, errands, appointments, picking up Jesse from school, worship team practice…yada, yada, yada, Thursdays are LONG! Today went quite smoothly…until I picked Jesse up from school. You see, Jesse is still adjusting to waking up at 6:30am and spending seven hours a day in school. By the the time I pick him up at 2:30pm, he’s tired, whiney, and hard to please. Today we went straight from picking Jesse up to a friend’s house who has been out of town for a month. This is when things started to slowly spiral downhill into something resembling a snowball from…you-know-where. Owen skipped his afternoon nap and Jesse was getting frustrated because he’s younger and less mature than Joshua and the other little boy. As a result of his lack of patience, he was getting left out of some of the activities. Owen was whining about being hungry and clearly exhausted, but by this time, there would be no point in taking him home and putting him in bed because we had to be at church within the hour. We hung in there until 5:40 and then we left to drive thru McDonald’s and head to church. Owen fell asleep in the car and stayed that way for about 30 minutes as we ate our greasy, chemically altered, faux chicken sandwiches. Practice began at 6:30 and I instructed the boys to play in the nursery nicely and practice would be over in about an hour. They niether played in the nursery NOR played nicely! Owen continued to whine and fuss and demand that I hold him, which he requests by saying, “MOMMY, KA’MERE!!” That is how he has always let me know he wants me to hold him. Well it’s pretty hard to hold a 35lb. two year old in one arm, a microphone in the other, and still hit the right notes! Jesse was frustrated that Joshua kept running away from him, and Joshua just wanted someone to play hide-and-seek, or tag, or whatever it was he was trying to do. All of this escalated into an all out civil war of disastrous proportions. At one point, I sent Jesse to sit down. He was very angry and tired and frustrated and I could hear him with my mommy ears. I leaned over to the girl standing next to me on stage and said, “I can hear Jesse screaming at the top of his lungs. You can’t hear him over the drums and the rest of the music, but if they stop playing, this is going to be VERY embarassing!” I had finally had it after about 45 minutes. I casually walked over to our worship leader, with Owen hanging off my hip and said (with a large plastic smile), “I think I should go so I can put the boys to bed.” I knew it was in the best interest of all parties involved to request a silent ride home…brush your teeth, use the bathroom, wash your hands, and GET IN BED! By this point, they were afraid…very afraid. hehehe

Bedtime went off without a hitch. I’m planning for a FANTASTIC FRIDAY!

His mercies are new every morning!

goodnight.

~audrey

I just realized, I don’t think I’ve posted anything about the squirrels that have been terrorizing my attic, roof, and my sleeping habits for the last month!!!  It all started while Josh was continuing work on the addition onto the back of our house.  Not exactly sure what he was thinking, but he left some major holes open that lead right into our attic.  The holes were safe from weather elements, but clearly not from squirrels.  I began hearing squirrels in our attic right above the master bedroom.  My dear hubby insisted that I was either hearing things, or I was simply hearing them running around on the roof.  However, he was finally present one night as the squirrel began gnawing away at who knows what right above our bed!  That weekend, he closed up all holes from our construction project.  A few days went by and we thought we had conquered the squirrel problem.  Boy were we wrong.  I began taking the squirrel invasion very personally.  I mean, come on!  I pictured President Obama having a sit down talk with my neighborhood squirrels.  It went something like this:

“Look guys, you have every right to be in the Wilkerson’s attic.  Every squirrel deserves to birth their babies into a cozy corner in someone’s attic.  It doesn’t matter that you aren’t welcome, you haven’t purchased space in their attic, and you’re destroying their home in the process.  As an American squirrel, it is your right to occupy attic space.  Go for it fellas!”            

Somehow they found a new way in.  I began hearing them above the laundry room, above the boys room, and even above the living room!  Of course Josh read online that squirrels usually have babies in August and September!!  LOVELY!

I began posting things on facebook, hoping for some good advice…or at least a good BB gun we could borrow!!  Last Friday, when I brought the boys to my parent’s house, my dad gave me his .22 caliber pellet gun with a brand new cansiter of pellets.  I was SO excited!!  On Saturday, Josh climbed up into the attic as soon as we heard the gnawing and scampering.  He sat patiently, waiting for a good target.  He fired a few times, pretty convinced that he had at least hit it once, but obviously not a fatal injury because it ran off.  Later that day…still more scampering in the attic.   By that time, Josh had gone to run errands and I was NOT about to climb into the hot attic with a loaded gun that I hadn’t the slightest idea how to use!

I have stood patiently in the front and back yards many days, hoping to see where in the world it is that they’re still getting in!  Never any luck. 

Yesterday, I was fired up.  I heard those darn squirrels above my kitchen and I knew they were on the roof so I RAN out the back door in hopes of seeing how they keep getting into my attic.  There were two squirrels, right there, staring at me!  They didn’t even budge!  These things are clearly way too domesticated.  They were bobbing their tales up and down and making strange noises.  I couldn’t tell if the noises were being made to each other or directed at me?  Eventually they ran to the other side of the house…right to the corner of the roof above my master bedroom.  I had a feeling that was where they built their nest, and momma squirrel was now guarding her territory.  I stood there for a long time and the squirrel never moved.  She kept her perch right there above my bedroom.  Suddenly, I became empowered.  I looked that squirrel right in the eye and ran into the house to grab a handful of pellets and the gun.  Much to my surprise, the squirrel was right where I had left it.  I loaded the first pellet and began pumping the gun.  Hmm, I wonder how many times I’m supposed to do this?  I pumped and pumped and pumped until the handle would hardly close…probably about 15 times in all.  That’s probably enough!  I aimed steady as I closed one eye, looked through the cheap scope thingy, waited, waited, and then POP!  Just like that, the squirrel was gone in an instant.  I’m 99% sure I hit it.  FIRST SHOT…IN MY LIFE!!  I was SO excited!  I ran to the side of the house and jumped up into the boys’ tree house to see if I could spot the injured squirrel.  Sure enough, it was still on the side of my roof.  Probably a bit stunned!  I sat there, reloaded the gun, in case it wanted more, and waited.  Some how while I waited, the squirrel moved and I could no longer see it.  Without even thinking, I ran around to the front of the house.  I didn’t even think before doing this.  It probably wasn’t the best idea to run through my front yard, sweating, holding what looked like a rifle!  But, hey, I wasn’t thinking clearly at this point.  I was a hunter!  I went back to the backyard and stood for a little while longer.  One of the boys came out back at one point and I quietly told him to get back inside and stay there.  I can only imagine what he was thinking as he saw Mommy in his treehouse with a gun pointing at the roof?! 

I looked all around, through the trees, trying to spot a squirrel.  Nothing.  BUT, I did hear squirrel noises and the occasional nuts or acorns hitting the ground around me.  For a brief moment, I was a bit paranoid.  As if there were squirrels up there in the trees aiming at me with their cheeks full of nutty ammunition.  I felt a bit like Matthew McConaughey in Failure to Launch when he got bit by a cute little chipmunk and then attacked by a sweet dolphin…as if all of nature was involved in a plot against him!  Stupid, I know. 

I finally went back inside.  I was so invigorated by my sudden take action attitude and accomplishment.  I even called my Daddy and left him a message on his cell phone.  I’m sure he smiled as he listened to me explain how I put his gun to good use.  Only in the south! 

It has now been 24 hours and we have yet to hear another squirrel.  It just started raining, or I would go sit out back and just watch and listen for a little bit.  I hope the other neighborhood Obama squirrels take note and stay off my property…or they will end up with a pellet in their butt just like their buddy who chose to shack up in my attic for the last month.

I hope you enjoyed my squirrel adventure.  If any squirrels return to the Wilkerson home, I will be opening my back yard as a free shooting range.  I wonder if that would be okay with my sweet elderly neighbors…or the three cops that live down the street… 

…probably not. 

~audrey