What's With Kids & Cereal?

What's up with kids & cereal? They are always sneaking into the pantry for cereal. At nite for dinner what do they want? Cereal. I don't get it.

Soooo, anyway, I had a good time yesterday over at the Nesting Place Blog. What fun visiting the "imperfect" homes of everyone over there. I loved one ladies porch, she had drapes on her porch, I LOVE it. If I wasn't poor now I would have gone out yesterday to find something. Gorgeous. Another site had me in tears. I was sobbing like a little girl. It was about her daughter, it took me back to my baby girl shown here almost dying. Well, she did die several times. They were just able to bring her back. One time she was already blue. After all that, I learned to see beauty in people differently. Life is beauty. My little Amber cat is so beautiful to me. Have you ever known someone who was so beautiful on the outside & the more you got to know them they became uglier & uglier. The same for someone not great looking on the outside & they were so beautiful on the inside that as you knew them more they became beautiful to you. I remember a girl named Angela in middle school. When I met her, I felt a little sorry for her. She was soooo tall. She had a big face. It was very angular and very unsoft. I could tell when I met her that she was very gentle & kind. She became a good friend at school. She was not pretty at all. A good while into the year I remember looking over at Angela in class and thinking how pretty she was. Her eyes were pretty. Everything about her was so pretty & beautiful to me. I remember thinking, how could I have ever thought she was ugly. There were a lot of babies/kids in the hospital with us, after Amber, they all just looked beautiful to me. To quote Forrest Gump, that's all I have to say about that.

I am fighting with my husband. I hate that. We are both under stress. My Bishop who just resigned the church may be getting divorced. They have declared bankruptcy, I would be willing to bet it was the financial stress hurting that marriage. Because I know their story & if they could survive all they have gone through in past..... financial stress is a real killer. The worst. We will avoid each other for another day or so & then it will be better. We know it is the finances eating at us, so we just let it die.

I got a post yesterday from someone who really hit home some things. Then this morning as I was having my blessed morning coffee I came across Creflo Dollar preaching about God's blessings. He said a lot of the same things in the poster's comments. He is really an annointed preacher, I love listening to him. He said a lot of the things my pastor has been talking about concerning why your prayers may not be answered. Things that can prohibit God from blessing you. Unforgiveness, strife, not following God's will for your life, not following Him & seeking Him and His kingdom, an unpure heart, etc. I really struggle with this. I do have a lot of anger, resentment and bitterness in my heart. When I ask God to show me my sin, this is basically all I get. Well, I know already I need to work on these things. I have been trying for MONTHS to rid myself of these things. I don't have any unforgiveness that I am aware of, I have forgiven a child molester for pete's sake, so I don't think it's that. I gave him to God. I don't have any "BIG" outward telling sin in my life. I don't smoke, no drugs, I drink 2 or 3 times a year so no drinking, I have never cheated on anybody, I don't lust after other men, most people think I am full of crap about that but I don't, I am faithful mentally to my hubby too, I dress modestly, you get it. I am a goody goody. So my sin or bad acts are inward. I am seeking God, I have been saved since I was a little girl, I desire God in my life daily. I desire to be used by God and know him personally, I study the word everyday, I have read the Bible twice front to back, I pray everyday more than once, I am emersed in seeking God. I go to church 2 times a week, sing in the choir. Blah, blah, blah. So narrowing it down in my little mind, I guess we are back to my big problem of anger, resentment and bitterness. I am almost never happy. I am stressed to the max! I don't like being this way. I have begged God to heal me. So I have begun to take baby steps again. Creflo said this morning that we must be walking in love, basically to be under the blessings of God. He is right. I was focusing hard on walking in love a couple of months ago but then things got even more dire I guess I lost that. So I must begin again. My family was really responding to my efforts so I must do it again. I am wondering though if there is a grading curve on this whole walking in love and becoming less stressed. My point being..... I have a husband who is great, don't get me wrong, but he does as he pleases around the home. He doesn't clean or do laundry. He cleans once a month maybe. He comes home and does not consider what I may need to do, he just goes about his business leaving me trapped with the baby. A source of anger and resentment leading to bitterness. I discuss this with him to no avail. So I can't change that. I have 4 kids. I don't care how good your kids are four kids is a lot especially when one of them is the most frustrating whiny baby I have ever known in my life. More stress. There is always someone talking in my house. It is never quiet. Someone wants your attention constantly, someone always needs something. There is no calm & quiet. They fight, they chase after each other loudy through the home. They baby almost never stops making noise and getting into things. So with just these two factors alone I am behind the curve say comparing my ability to walk in love and not be stressed and resentful with a woman who is married to a wonderful man who helps around the house and they have no kids or one or two kids. So by being married to a guy who's not very sensitive concerning my needs for him to participate in the household chores and having made the choice to have a big family make me LESS succeptable to receiving blessings from God because the more kids and the less helpful the hubby is causes you anger and resentfulness leading to bitterness. Get my point. So are people who have less aggrivation in their life more blessed? I am still confused. I want to change, but I have to also change my lifestyle to do that. I cannot change my husband. I cannot change how many kids I have. My kids are good kids too, they aren't unruly or anything. But there is a lot of us & it's going to be crazy a lot. They all play sports too. There is almost always never time for me to work out downstairs or do what I want to do, causing resentment leading to bitterness. How do I change that? I find this to be an interesting question, does having issues with a spouse and dealing with a large family & extreme financial stress cause you to lose your blessings? Surely God sees what is going on in our lives and gives a grading curve so to speak to honor that. I want to live in victory, doesn't that count? How am I not resentful when I want to go downstairs & work out so badly but no one will watch the baby for the time I need to lose weight. If I don't work out atleast 3 times prefer 4 a week, 30 min on the treadmill and then 30 to 45 min on the workout machines I will not lose weight. No one will let me have this. This is a big resentment. My extremely critical financial circumstances are stressful and lead to anger. Cooking dinner and cleaning and laundry is a lot for six people, he won't help. He helps cook dinner sometimes, the rest is a no go. This leads to anger and resentment. Bitterness. I hate to be that way. Something has to give, I guess I will be thinking how to make my life better to rid myself of the things that cause my anger, resentment and bitterness. All I can do. Still curious if having a more supportive spouse and less kids makes one more able to stay in God's will and be blessed.