Only Love in 2015

How exactly is one supposed to seriously contemplate life-changing resolutions when they never have more than 10 minutes of semi-uninterrupted time to sit down and think upon such things? (I mean seriously, it's like this unwritten rule in the universe that I can not just sit for more than 7 3/4 minutes at a time before someone in my household needs something from me.) Every year as the 365th day approaches I tell myself I'm going to carve out some time to actually put on paper the goals I have for the upcoming year - things I want to change and do differently. Items I want to cross off the bucket list I have yet to get on paper. And then comes January 1st and as much as I try to keep track of these goals in my head I find myself losing sight of the things I want to accomplish. Then, before I know it another year has passed and I find myself stagnate in all areas of my life. Not this year though. So here I sit, committing myself to putting my 2015 goals in writing so they are out there and I can hold myself accountable to them. (And you can too if you so choose! I love having accountability partners.)

1. Stop bullying myself (and in turn bullying others, especially my family.)

This year I am going to stop listening to the self-loathing, self-depreciating bully in my head that is constantly whispering to me reasons why I am not good enough, pretty enough, skinny enough, smart enough, business-minded enough, creative enough, WHATEVER enough. The voice that gets me so low at times for all my "failures" that I self-sabotage any positive progress I may have made. That voice that gets me so angry at myself that I then channel that anger toward my precious girls and husband for the tiniest of reasons. I'm done that with that voice. In 2015 I am going to start believing what I know to be true in my heart of hearts. I am not perfect, but I am enough. 

2. Stop Yelling

This one is very intwined with #1 but I feel like it needs it's own number because I am serious about this one probably the most of any other. I don't want to go to bed one more night hating myself for the way I talked to my family and wondering how much damage I have done to them and hoping, praying even, that my girls don't grow up and look back and remember a mom who yelled ALL THE TIME. And while I am at it - I'm going to add cursing in here as well. It's a bad habit and a bad example that I am in danger of passing on to my girls who deserve better. And I am going to be completely honest yall, I have no idea how I'm going to overcome this yelling thing as I feel like its sometimes the only way I get heard. But, fortunately, I know someone who knows just what I need to accomplish this and I plan on hitting my knees daily - hourly even if needed - to redirect my yelling to productive conversations and activities.

3. Be Present More

Life is short. I, unfortunately, am not getting any younger and I want to experience life while I have it. My family and friends deserve my undivided attention. My phone and Facebook news feed do not. This one - while so easy in concept - is going to be hard for me. But I am committed to spending less time on my phone and more time with my family.

4. Take Care of Me

I am committed to getting me healthy in 2015. Physically, mentally and spiritually. I am going to carve out time each day to exercise my mind, my body and most importantly my heart. 

5. Get to Church

No more excuses. So what if it is one of the only days I have to sleep in. I am committing to getting my family where they need to be on Sunday - worshiping with our chuch family and connecting with other families with like struggles. 

6. Grow my Business

This one has its own set of goals but for the sake of my overall goals I had to mention it here.

7. Be an Example

It's one of the things that scares me most - the fact that, good or bad, the girls are learning from my example. While there are some things I am proud they are learning there is oh so much I am not proud of. I am very lucky to have a mother who sets a great example. I want to be that for my girls.

8. Today Only Love

I read a blog post at handsfreemama.com and I loved her mantra: Today Only Love and decided I needed it in my life as well. I realize to accomplish these goals I have to take it one day at a time and so when I feel the need to react to the bully in my mind or give in to my frustration with my girls or my husband this is going to be my guide. In all I do and say in 2015 I want to do it only in love. Not in frustration, irritation, anger - just plain 'ol love. If what comes out of my mouth is an overflow of my heart then I need to work on my heart for sure. I'm ready and I hope you will join me along the way.

Parenting for Dummies 101

Forget the child birth classes. That’s the easy part. What’s really needed are lessons on parenting. Through the excitement of pregnancy and the joy of seeing and holding your child for the very first time no one ever sits you down and smacks you in the face with the cold hard reality that parenting is by far the hardest job you will ever do.

On Sunday as I was rocking my three year old about 20 minutes into a good 30-minute cry fest she was having because she was not getting to go swimming with her sister due to her choices of misbehaving and not minding the previous evening, I was whispering things to her like, “This hurts me more than it hurts you” and “This is for your own good,” - phrases I heard repeatedly growing up. I remember thinking to myself then (as she was probably thinking to herself on Sunday): “how is it even possible that this spanking with a belt [or insert other punishment here] is hurting you more than it’s hurting me?” And now, I get it. I totally get it. As she cried and said over and over, “Please let me go swimming” my heart physically hurt. Everything in me wanted to give in and just let her go. She loves swimming. I could even picture her cute, tiny self in her new floatie trying to kick herself around the pool with neck out-stretched for maximum velocity with the biggest grin of joy on her face. But the bigger part of me knew that she needed this lesson. But more than that, I needed this lesson.

I struggle with follow thru at times. In fact, if I had a quarter for every time I said, “Next time you’re getting a spanking/grounded/sent to your room/mouth washed out with soap” I could probably retire early. Chalk it up to feeling guilty for being at work for the majority of their wake time, or not wanting to deal with the ensuing fit/crying/whatever else “inconvenience” that following through with discipline might impose on my only downtime. Whatever the cause, more often than not, I choose easy. Only it’s not really easy. Because now I have a couple of girls on my hand who smirk in the face of my empty threats and think that they rule the roost. It’s time to get serious. And it’s hard to undo. So while minuscule on the scale of discipline (and perhaps laughable to some seasoned parenting vets) I needed to see that I could, in fact, follow through with a threat and that she would be ok in spite of the wailing and that she would still love me when it was all said and done. Needless to say, we both survived.

I owe it to my girls to be a woman of my word in all aspects of my life, but especially where discipline is concerned. It’s a goal for this summer (along with getting my almost 6 year old to eat something other than pancakes and chicken nuggets). I owe them the experience of consequences for behaviors because the only thing worse than bratty children are bratty adults. And they deserve better than that.

I'm a Loser

Yesterday morning as I rushed down the freeway to make it to work on time (as I do most mornings) a car – whose inhabitant’s time was apparently more important than mine – cut me off as I was exiting the freeway. In my tardy-induced irritation, I promptly laid on my horn to show my discord. The woman driving the other car returned the honk and I responded with the one-fingered wave. Yep, that one. The woman’s response was to shoot me the L for loser sign. My first reaction was even more anger and irritation (and possibly another one-fingered wave if I'm being totally honest here) and then it hit me like a lead balloon. You know what? She was right. I was a loser. I drove the rest of the way to work humiliated that I had let Satan get the better of me, with his distraction of me running late, and win in this situation. I could have just as easily made the choice to let it go, as I do most mornings. Then I started thinking about the impression I made on that woman. I wondered what she would have thought if she knew I was a faithful, church-going proclaimed follower of Christ. I certainly was not following Christ in that situation.


It reminded of a time in college – back when the WWJD movement was big – and I proudly sported a gold ID bracelet inscribed with the letters. As is customary in the fall in Texas, Saturday was spent watching football. I remember being at Kyle Field with my friends and sitting rear-to-rear, packed like sardines into the bleachers that once inhabited the end zone. As a student at A&M you really are only given about an 8 - 10-inch span of bleacher - just enough to plant two feet as students don’t sit during the game. And what’s almost as narrow as the bleacher span is the space between bleacher rows. You literally have to sit with your knees diagonal to have any kind of leg room. This particular Saturday there was a larger than average guy sitting in front of me and every time he moved he bumped my knees. I leaned over to my friends and stated something to the effect of, “If this guy’s a** hanging off the back of his seat bumps my legs one more time I’m going to shove my foot up his a**.” To which my friend jokingly responded, “Now, Lisa, is that what Jesus would have said?” We all laughed. In fact, it became a running joke with us. He’d catch me doing or saying something I probably shouldn’t have and would say, “Would Jesus do/say that?” The reality, though, is that there is nothing funny about that. It’s hypocritical even. I claim to be a Christian, but my actions don’t back me up a lot of the time. Ouch. That makes me a loser (and Satan a winner).

Honestly, it’s something I struggle with daily and Satan certainly likes to use the distraction of time – or lack thereof - to trip me up. I find that the times when I am most irritated at home or in the car are the times when I am running late or feeling pressed for time. Thing is, I just need to be a better time-manager. Instead of spending 30 minutes with my nose stuck in my iPhone seeing who’s done what on Facebook when I get home, I should get the girls clothes ready for the next day so perhaps I can avoid the daily rush to be on time. Or – better yet – I should spend some time meditating on His word. Because I know, from experience, that when I take the time to read and study His word, the right choices come easier. And the scoreboard with Satan becomes less one-sided.

Satan may have won this round but I am grateful for the woman who opened my eyes to the fact that I was indeed acting like a loser. And I don’t want any more of that. Little did she know her gesture was just what I needed to stop and do some self-reflection (and I did not like what I saw). I was so bothered by it, in fact, that it was all I could think of yesterday – to the point that I felt like I need to share the experience with you just to get it off my chest. Our God does indeed work in mysterious ways.

We have a plaque hanging in our living room with an excerpt from a scripture found in Joshua 24:15. The scripture reads: “But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” I love the phrase from the verse that states, “choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve” because it brings to focus for me the fact that we have a choice in how we act and respond in situations. And I intend to quit letting Satan win. I know I won’t be successful all of the time, but am thankful to serve a God whose mercies are new every morning (can I get an Amen!) and who loves me in spite of me. I know Jesus does not expect perfection, but he does expect, and certainly deserves, a better effort. And that's wht I intend to do. And I hope you will hold me accountable; because sometimes you really do need to hear: “Now, Lisa, is that what Jesus would have done?”

Bring on the Flushed Face!

Those who know me know I have a flair for the dramatics. Not in an excessively, overreacting all the time sort of way, but I am one who likes to entertain. I am the funniest person I know after all.

It is well known that I have dreams to perform on Broadway. Granted, I do nothing to achieve these dreams, but they are dreams all the same. This morning as I was showering I was reminded of the time during my freshman year in college when I auditioned for the theater department’s production of Godspell. And I had to chuckle and wonder “who was that person?” I mean, aside from a church musical in my tween years, I had never even set foot on a stage. Nor did I have any vocal training. And dance training? Well, those close to me know how laughable that is. But none of that mattered because I had a decided early on that I had a dream to perform on stage. And I needed to cross that off my bucket list. So I went to the audition having no idea what awaited me, having never auditioned for anything before. And I think that was a good thing, because had I any idea what the next two hours would bring I probably would have never shown up. And then I would not be where I am today. OK, maybe I would be exactly where I am today, but it makes for a good story.

There were a couple of hundred people at the audition and I knew only one of them – a girl Tiffany, a theater major, whom I met at Fish Camp (Whoop!) that summer. We went to the audition together. We were given a number and were divided into groups of about 10. And then the audition started. For my group, the first part was dancing. They took us to a room and taught us a short dance. While I have zero dance training I was thankful for the year I spent on drill team in high school because I was at least somewhat familiar with the technical dance terms they were using - most of them anyway. I don’t remember now how much time they spent teaching us – maybe 20 minutes – but once we learned the dance we had to go on stage as a group to perform in front of the judges (director?! Or whoever it is that selects the cast for a show). What I would give now to have a video tape of this!

From there we went to another room backstage and had to act out a parable. I forget what parable we acted out – maybe the Good Samaritan - or even what my part in it was, but thinking back on this, even now, brings a bit of a flush to my face.

And then it was back to the main auditorium for the singing. Oh, the singing. They gave us some music from the show and then one by one we had to go front and center onto the stage and sing while a piano accompanist played along. I can’t read music and at that time I had never even heard of, much less seen the musical Godspell. You can imagine the outcome as the pianist starts and I have no idea what the song is supposed to sound like. I think after 3 or 4 restarts I finally got through it. Again, my face flushes just thinking about this now.

Of course, the next day my name was missing from the call back list. I’m sure I was a little disappointed. Or maybe I was relieved. Whatever I felt, I specifically remember being proud of myself for trying. And also thankful that I had my first audition behind me because, apparently, there would be more as I would still have to cross this goal off the list.

As I was thinking about all of this and feeling my face starting to get hot I began to wonder why, after all these years, I feel embarrassment from this story. Yes, I probably resembled someone out of an American Idol reject segment. (Thank God YouTube and such did not exist back then.) And I’m sure there were some people there who laughed at me. But who cares? I tried. So often as adults we let the fear of being humiliated, or even a little embarrassed, keep us from doing things we’d secretly like to do – and sometime things we’ve always wanted to do. Why are we so afraid to put ourselves out there and look silly? Who do we think is watching? And, more importantly, why do we care?

I’m going to challenge myself to stop caring. Not about the important stuff – but about what people think. Because, honestly, I should really only be concerned about what one person thinks. And He loves me no matter what. Life’s too short to not follow your dreams.

No, this does not mean I’m going to pursue a Broadway career. Not that I’d turn it down if it fell in my lap. I crossed performing on stage off my list in my 20s. (Wait. Let me rephrase that: I have since performed in a few community theater productions, thus achieving my goal.) But, I’m definitely going to open myself up to new things and not let fear stop me. Because the only true failure is in failing to try. Here’s to more red-faced memories!

Family Pics

We had some family pics taken in November by a wonderful photographer - Jessica Adkins with Aravaggio Photography. She took our pics last summer and we fell in love with her work! Now I recommend her to everyone I know. Which is how we got this free photo session. She rocks. Here are some of the pics from our session.

Toddler Nightmares

I woke up early this morning to Mags thrashing about and talking in her sleep. Specifically she was saying: "Nooooo. No Pasta! Noooo Pasta! Noooooo Fish sticks! No Fish sticks." I have to say I got tickled - even in the wee hours of the morning. Poor girl is apparently having nightmares about dinnertime fare and the lack of choices that abound in the Krenek household for her. I have to admit, she does eat a lot of pasta and fish sticks. Not because I am thrilled with the nutritional value in each, it's just that they are two of the THREE things I can get her to eat. The other is chicken.

What I don't understand is that at school she allegedly (and I say allegedly because I have not witnessed this consumption, it's just reported on her progress sheet every day) dines on things such as "BBQ Sandwiches" and "Burritos" and "Turkey Sandwiches" so my rational mind leads me to think that I should rotate those into her dinnertime menus at home. So I do and she WONT TOUCH THEM! Perhaps I should inquire into how they are presenting such fare to make it so appealing.

Anyhoo, I'm off to try to figure out some different dinner options for the tot lest we have more nightmares this evening!

Love to all!

It's time to Catch Up

My lack of posting is not for lack of things going on around the Krenek household. It's more of a lack of motivation on my part. Sad, but true. Especially when I have such a darling subject to write about. If only the darling subject did not have the energy of a thousand suns. Momma is tired. But I would not have it any other way!

MagB turned 2 on June 26th and we celebrated on Saturday with a party in her honor. I can not believe she is already 2 - a bona fide toddler. We are amazed every day at the things she can do and how well she is talking. She says things that I have no idea where she has picked up. For instance just this weekend I told her to eat some of the corn on her plate and she replied: "No Way!"Now don't get me wrong, the child hears - and says - the word no. A lot. But the "no way" was a new one. And she has recently started repeating everything. This. Could be bad. Just sayin'.

Anyway, on to the birthday festivities. We had a small party with mostly family. We had a great time. Here are some pics of the big day.

The cake. So cute; however next time I will ask for full disclosure of the price before placing an order. Apparently the food colorings used to mix the frosting for this beaut were made with crushed precious jewels from the byzantine period. There is no other explanation for what this thing cost. If I may quote the legendary George Banks, "A cake, Franck, is made of flour and water. My first car didn't cost that much." Well said, Mr. Banks. Well said. It did taste fantastic though, so there's that.

Mags preparing to blow out the candles. Though, much like last year, she wanted no part in this particular birthday ritual.

The opening of the presents

Playing with the loot.

And eventually all great parties must come to an end.

Later that evening - taking a dip in the new pool.

A few weekends ago, Michael went out of town so Maggie and I headed to Mimi & Papa's for the weekend. All the cousins came over on Saturday and a good time was had by all playing in the water.
Before you get too impressed by this next picture and the extraordinary dexterity and skill that a two year old must possess to have maneuvered herself down a slip and slide at such a young age, I have to confess that Mags would not even get near the thing until the water was turned OFF. Yes, only then would she walk down to the end and lay herself down for a "swim." But then again, she is my child and we all know how brave I am in the water!

On Sunday before church I found Maggie playing on Mimi's plant stand. She had completely closed herself in the bottom cage but by the time I got my camera to snap a pic she was on her way out.

This, ladies and gents, is a pout that can only be perfected over years - two to be exact. It's the perfect "Are you sure I can't do whatever it is you just told me I couldn't do" look. It almost works every time. Almost.

In May, Laurie's oldest, Brady, celebrated his 6th birthday with a party at Texas Tumblers - a cool little joint that had bounce houses, trampolines, spring floors and foam pits. Maggie had a blast.

And last but not least - in adult news - I went on a girls' trip to DC in May to visit my dear friend Kylie who moved to Alexandria, Va. last summer. My friends Sharon and Amanda joined me for the weekend of fun which I must say was much tamer than our "Barnyard Girls Gone Wild" weekend two years ago. I'm quite sure the town of Clayton, Oklahoma is still talking about the city girls who swept through town and left many a Crown Royal bag of life savings dwindled. (Um, no, we will not marry you, even if you do have a brick house and a fridge that works.) But that's a story for another day, and another blog for that matter. So, back to DC. We had a lot of fun seeing the sights and just visiting. Kylie's house is awesome and, as always, she was the hostess with mostess. I can't wait to go back for a visit - and not just so I can get my hands on some more of that tahani free hummus at Trader Joes which rocked my world. I miss my friend!

Kylie, Sharon and Amanda on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with the Washington Monument in the background.

Kylie, me and Amanda at the Einstein monument.

It's been a long post so I'll close for now and promise to update more often. Hope you all have a great holiday weekend!