Be Still

"Be still and know that I am God..." Psalm 46:10

How often are we still? Literally...still

I like to be busy. I can "be still" in the evenings after Natalie is in bed, but before then, go go go. Today threw me for a loop. I should have known something was wrong when Natalie woke up at 3 am crying. I went in to her room, she was burning hot. I thought about taking her temp, but decided to rock her and see if she'd go back to sleep. It worked like a charm. Then at 6:15 am, about an hour before her normal wake up time, the crying happens again, I go in, and seriously, her skin feels like it's on fire. Her temperature was 102.2

She clung on to me for dear life. I knew something was wrong, and I couldn't go in to work today. Besides a trip to the Dr. (diagnosis ear infection) and then the pharmacy, we have been home all day. From the moment she woke up this morning until about 2:30, she HAD to be in somebody's arms. And if you moved around too much, she would cry. I had to literally "Be Still". I held her all morning and most of the afternoon. Kris held her to give me bathroom breaks and quick makeup job before heading to the Dr. While holding her all morning/afternoon I looked around the house and saw this:

And this:

I thought to myself, "Why won't she let me put her in her crib to sleep so I can do some cleaning". Our house is literally trashed and needs some major attention. I then wanted to kick myself as I looked down and saw this:

My very sick little girl needed me to be still for her, she needed my undivided attention whether she was sleeping or awake and I was trying to put my house's needs above her needs. I am a Mother full of flaws and God is faithful, always forgiving me.

Why is it so hard for us to "Be Still"?

Cash

To my *few* faithful readers, I'm sorry it's been awhile. We have been swamped crazy busy between several picnics on the farm, family functions, family visiting, church, other obligations, etc. etc. I've had several different ideas I wanted to share, but for now, I'll give kuddos out to Dave Ramsey.

We pay cash for everything. Seriously everything. Now we have not been completely faithful to this, but we are trying. After a couple of set backs, we are back on board. We are not debt free (student loans, house, credit card) but we are on our way to being there. We stopped using the credit card a long time ago, and most recently, we bought a new to us Dodge Caravan with CASH.

Kris and I went through Dave's Financial Peace University and loved it. But, I must be transparent and will say we struggle with it. We are horrible at making budgets / sticking to budgets. We are horrible trying to use the "cash envelope" system (we do use cash, cash in the form of a debit card NOT a credit card), but it has changed our way of thinking.

Our latest big purchase, the minivan. I had an Alero that my parents generously gave to me when graduating college. Ever since Natalie was born (17 months ago) we talked about getting something bigger. It still beats me how such a little person takes up so much room. After lots of talk and no do, we sunk some money in to the Alero, got it as mechanically sound as it was going to be, and took the plunge and listed it on Craigslist. During our time taking the FPU classes, we were taught about buying and selling big purchases, cars, houses, etc. We priced the Alero a few hundred above what we would take to allow room for negotiating. Low and behold, we sold it for the asking price. 2 days later, a KILLER deal showed up on a minivan. We snagged it for $700 under KBB and paid $150 less than what we sold the Alero for. THAT is a Dave Ramsey Deal (and a God deal)!

All of that was done through craigslist which brings me to my next point. We LIVE off of craigslist. Seriously. If you want to follow Dave's plan, you'll become best friends with craigslist. Our house is furnished from it (including the house itself). Furniture, piano, baby furniture, baby toys, macbook, appliances, tools, animals, farm equipment, we've bought it all off of there. You can save so much off of buying used, and some of it is new! (and you can make money selling stuff. We bought a $50 love seat and a few years later sold it for $250) You have to know what to look for and what the going price is.

The key is to live within your means. We don't have a large income, but can provide for our family's needs. We don't have nice vehicles, nor expensive clothes, or go on huge vacations. But, our vehicles are paid for, we don't have looming payments, and when we do go on vacation, we have good memories of it, not memories of having to pay it off 1 year after we went on the trip.

I encourage you to read Dave Ramsey's book Total Money Makeover and look into the Financial Peace University.