So much running through my head

So when I got married and someone would ask me "how many children do you want?" the answer was always 3. Three is plenty, I would have even told you that after we had number 2. I wanted three children. Then we were surprised to find ourselves pregnant with number 3 oh about nine months before we planned to start trying. And then the number four popped into my mind. I think four is the perfect number of children for our family. Lately though I have been reading a lot on a "Biblical approach to family" and my mind is going crazy. I got this information from some very conservative Christian groups, not saying that that is bad or good I'm just telling you were the information comes from. These people believe in moms place is at home with her kids, homeschooling, and wives submitting to their husbands. And no birth control, your number of children is totally up to how God sees fit. Wow totally opposite the world right now! Here's where I stand on those- I LOVE being at home with my kids, I know some moms work and that is the fit for them so I don't want anyone to feel I'm judging their way of life on this, this is all just me trying to figure out where I see myself in my life with my family :) Everything is crazy combobulated in my mind so I doubt there is any room in my head to judge! I could never homeschool my kids- I don't have the patience, I am working on my patience but I don't have enough of it yet or do I see that happening in the near future and I think we live in a great small community with great teachers and I don't feel right now that I have a need for this. 3) I know submitting to my husband is the correct way to do things it is just way hard... so yeah working o that one too. That leaves us with #4 - Kjell and I were talking this over today if we started giving everything over to God as far as our next child..... we could possibly have TEN more kids. Here I am thinking I'm almost done and I could have 13 children. I just about passed out just thinking about it. I don't know what kind of jobs most of these women's husbands have but I can NOT get maternity insurance for less than 650 a month and am not on Kjell's plan since he is a teacher. I would never want money to stand in the way of having more children but it is just a thought I have had. My #2 concern is most drs try to limit your c-sections guessing my dr wouldn't appreciate me trying to have 10 more c-sections since no one within a 3 hour radius would be willing to preform a VBAC. #3 I don't want to drive an industrial sized van, could we ever go anywhere??

All of these minus the true health concern seem pretty petty but the main concern I have and where I wish God would just "write it on the wall" is I want to be a foster parent. I haven't convinced Kjell this is the way to go and I'm in no hurry. The advice I once got in one of my college classes ( I was a criminal justice major ) was to make sure as a foster parent your own kids are older than the foster ones so that your kids can help them do better things rather than the foster kids teaching your kids to do bad things. I want babies, I want toddlers I want young kids, so my question is where does God want me? I was seriously considering after my next pregnancy (which we have set for next summer lol we will see how God sees fit on that one) of having my tubes tied. I just don't know anymore. The "next duggers??" So just rambling and trying to sort things out.

Ask and you Shall recieve

Well I've been trying to get my office/scrapbooking room organized. It has kind of been the go to room for things that we don't know where they fit or belong in this house to end up in and yesterday I found all the stuff from my first job after college. Right out of college I worked with inner city young life in Kansas City, I was in intern so I had to write a ton of papers on what I did and who I interacted with. Then I found a letter that I have kept for the last almost ten years now. It was a letter written from a kid who I had worked with in California when I worked at a camp called MayMac the summer before my senior year of college. This kid was rough, YOUNG but rough, most would see him as a thug, gang banger, but he grabbed my heart from day one. Long story short we talked for several months and I encouraged him to find the right friends, and to ask himself (this was the time frame where the WWJD bracelets were really popular) What would Reesey Do? (that was what they called me, and honestly the kids wouldn't have known what Jesus would do because they didn't know Him) One day his e-mail no longer worked and I lost contact with him two years later I got an e-mail from him out of the blue telling me how he had changed his life, he had joined the football team, he had a B average and he said thanks for believing in him, besides my love letters from Kjell this was the best letter I have ever received in my life

The letter made me cry because lately I have felt really useless. I LOVE being able to stay at home home with the kids, but some days I feel like a big failure when Justus and Kiah fight for the 100th time in the day and I just LOSE it. I just don't always feel like I'm making an impact, at least not as large as the one I used to make when I was working with Young Life. So this morning during my devotions I asked God to use me today. We decided to go see my grandma this morning and I don't usually take my cell phone with me because I want to just spend time with her, and an hour later when I get to the car I have a message from one of the ladies I work with, they had been trying to get ahold of me, they had called every phone I had, come by the house and didn't know where I was ( I felt really loved ) for those of you who don't know I am the breast-feeding peer counselor for Meade, Gray, and Clark County. They had a new mom who needed someone to come out and help her she was at her wits end and in a lot of pain. My coworkers wanted to know if I could go. I said I'd see I rounded up a babysitter, it went something like this "can you babysit today" "yes when" "does now work?" and I hit the road and was flying out to see this new mom and that is when it hit me. I'd asked to used by God today and He was going to use me. I knew this probably wasn't exactly the way I had though of when I asked him to use me, because I had been thinking more in a "spiritual" sense but I knew God could use me in every situation He gave me. I knew my goal was to be an encouragement. When I got to this new mom's house I got to just get to know her and how she was doing and then I got to help her for the first time in SIX days experience breast feeding with no pain. When she was done she just sighed and I could just see relief wash through her. Then I got to hold the tiniest (ok all my kids where over 8 lbs so a 6 pound baby to me is something TINY) baby for awhile and just let this mom know she was doing a GREAT job. See this baby had the same problem that I had had when Kiah was born, something easy to fix but hard for a first time mom to get figured out on their own. I love being able to make an impact in someone's life. See a nurse 5 years ago gave me the gift by helping me out, and now I was able to help someone else out. Thank you God for letting me be used today, it was SOOOOO fun