HaddyGraceDesigns

I don't feel qualified to write about adoption, there are Mamas who have walked harder, longer roads than I have. My journey has been short, and fairly uncomplicated. We've gained the sweetest 2 year old you ever did meet.  Maxwell, Days after we were introduced to him. Jan 2014   However, I am going to write about a few of the feelings that I, as a mom encounter in the past 10 mo. these feelings completely blindsided me! I was in no way prepared for any of them. When our son was first placed with us, we embraced having an 18 mo. old, none verbal little boy in the house. The honey moon period lasted a few short weeks, in those honey moon weeks I felt like I really wanted this child to be mine, And then the hard things hit, Forcing me to face the fact that this baby boy had missed out on so much in his short life, forcing me to recognize that emotionally he was no where near 18 mo. Anger at his Birth parents, Why didn't they... why did they..... ...

Reality has come crashing in my friends, Cruel harsh reality!!   I always thought I'd be a cool Mom.. Wasn't that one art my of the reason to start our family when we were barely in our twenties?? So that we'd have energy to keep up with them, and have similar interests, and share clothes, and like the same movies, be able to have fun with their friends..   But something happens... When your firstborn stands taller than you, and turns into a teenager (I am not talking 13, I am talking when they become mouthy, and Mom knows nothing anymore,) You as a parent will suddenly become completely and 100% grown up. No matter how young of a parent you are, you become hopelessly mature,  you take things seriously, elections are serious, (you can't deny any longer that you are voting for people that will affect the world your children will be adults in.) The carefree young parent is history.. You can see the young adults your offspring are beco...

As if the Challenge of living on a budget isn't enough, us Moms we also have the Challenge of making healthy meal choices for our families. And Unless your grocery budget is 2-3 times the size of mine you are probably discovering how hard it is to buy healthy foods AND stay within budget. Cereal is expensive, but healthy cereal is even more expensive!! It's upsetting when I look at the ingredient list of something I have spend our hard earned money on and find ingredients of things that I don't recognize and can't pronounce. That's why Cereal is one of the items I have decided to eliminate from our grocery list.  However what to have on hand for a quick breakfast?? Granola to the rescue!!!! For my Birthday my sister gave me a small Jar of Chocolate Granola, It didn't look like much, but lets say I was pretty much HOOKED after the first bite! Here you go!! 3 cup rolled oats 1 cup chopped walnuts 1 cup rice crispies Mix together in a bowl. ...

These 5 beautiful faces! these are the faces that are on my mind when I go to bed and On my mind when I wake up! The smallest, Number 5, has recently been added to our family via adoption. These are the little people that have me constantly wondering if I am doing enough, If I am enjoying the journey enough, If I have enough attention to go around, If I read them enough stories, if we watch too much TV. But most of all... the greatest IF... the greatest question of all is this,,, Do I spend enough time with them??????     All you working Moms are probably laughing at me right now. But it's true!!  I too have to tell my kids,  'Not now',  'I don't have time',  'Wait a minute',  'Mommy's working',   Lets look at a few Character qualities we all want our children to develop: It doesn't hurt them at all to be told to "wait". Waiting creates the Character quality of:   patience, Waiting quietly becau...

There comes a time in motherhood where your world becomes pretty small. It revolves around these things: Naps Mealtimes School Sports/lessons/activities Bedtimes   And somewhere in there you need to make sure there is food in the house, clean clothes in the drawers/closets and that the home is fit for humans to live in.   And then at the end of the day you fall asleep on the couch out of exhaustion, you never get to watch your favorite shows to the end, so your always left wondering what's REALLY going on. After weeks and weeks of this I start missing my friendships, I start craving long UNINTERRUPTED conversations with kindred spirits that will lift me up and encourage me, Other moms who will tell me that my teens are normal and that theirs are acting the same way.   Other Moms that 'Get' Foster Care and the things I am struggling with in that area. Other Moms that will smile and let me go on and on about our foster son and how smart he is an...

The Monster Cookie,   The Favored of all cookies, and it's not just because of the miniature m&m's that these cookies are so loved by all. Their flavor is superior. End of story. Now these cookies aren't exactly fool proof. Maybe you have tried these cookies and they just haven't turned out right. The secret is in the Peanut butter.... Jiff Peanut butter, some other brands are too dry and your cookies will be dry lumps.       So here we go: 1.5 cups Jiff peanut butter 1/2 cup butter 1 cup white sugar 1 cup brown sugar 3 eggs Whip until light and creamy, add: 1tsp. vanilla extract 2tsp.baking soda 3.5 cups quick cooking oats (not rolled oats) 1 cup chocolate chips (milk or semi sweet) 1 cup mini m&m's   Dip 2 cookies and bake them, if they are too flat add 1/2 cup more oats and try again. You can never take oats out of a recipe that's why I always error on the side of 'not enough oats' When...

      Am I brave enough to decide to a screen free spring break week?? (this week is half days of school, next week is actual spring break for us)   That would mean no movies, no Netflix, no Ipad, no Ipod.   To be honest, I feel like my kiddos are getting way to much screen time lately.. the winter has been cruel, no friendly play outside snow days, it's been nasty blizzards with more snow than even I can walk in. That's my excuse for why my family has been getting so much screen time..     Last summer we enforced a no screen time rule and we loved it so much that when school started we modified it only a tad to no screen time on school nights... well that lasted until recently... recently even some school nights have been movie nights.   Here are the pros and cons for a screen free spring break: Pros: More 'together' time. More constructive play. More reading. They will sleep better.   Con...

    I don't know if there is a bigger ongoing Challenge that I have found in motherhood than the one of helping my family have healthy eating habits. It wasn't not so bad when the kiddos where all little and didn't know much about junk food. Enter School and classmate lunch envy (and they discover Dads junk food stash sooner or later any way) What I wasn't prepared for was their begging for Ramen Noodles, and Lunchables. I would've been able to understand their begging for delicious junk food like Doritos and Cheetos. I would've been able to relate to that!!  However as tempted as I am to buy those salty snacks that I crave and they beg for, when you consider the fact that one bag can cost close to 5$ and it takes my family of 6 less than 30 minutes to eat that 5$ bag of Doritos, That just isn't going to fit into our grocery budget at all... That's when I remembered the delicious seasoned pretzel snack my mom used ...

What does it mean to be a work at home mom?? Where is that fine balance between family and customers??   It means being able to carry on with Lego play while working online.   It means accidentally taking a sip of room temperature juice instead of a sip of twice warmed, lukewarm coffee. It means Majoring on the Majors, and minoring on the minors. Sometimes my fridge doesn't get cleaned for weeks (months).   It means knowing when to delegate. No one loves your children as much as you do. so no one is going to make the choices that you do in their lives. Your children will know when you 'aren't there'. your customers won't care if you didn't do it, as long as it gets done like they expect it.       It means knowing when to tell a customer "not now" (or "no"). Knowing that sometimes the timing for your family just isn't right for you to take that giant step forward for your business.   It means that...

Life gets pretty crazy around here at times.. I am sure you can relate.. And sometimes, sad to say, food is the last thing on Mom's mind. When you're trying your best just to get everyone where they are supposed to be at the right time, and hurry home in time for naps and switch the loads of laundry! Who has the time to plan and cook nutritious meals and mix up tasty, healthy snacks.. After a while a mom gets appalled at the amount of fast food garbage that has accumulated in the vehicle. I am ashamed to admit that my van even had a distinct smell of fast food.. That icky smell is what motivated me to make these nutritious cliff bars for my family again.. These bars are the bars that you give the children when you are running out the door and THEN when the 'I AM HUNGRY' whine comes just as you are driving past McDonalds... (trust me, if your children are too young to do this yet, it'll start as soon as they are old enough to look out the window and recognize ...

What a surprised it was for us to learn that folks are VERY open with their opinion about foster care. In the 2 months that we have been foster parents I have heard so many excuses about why folks couldn't do it. It' like when they understand who our addition to the family is and what means they do one of 2 things. either completely ignore the child and pretend they didn't see an extra child. or they come up with an excuse why THEY could never do it.     Yes we can't save the world but the bible clearly teaches in James 1 26&27     Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.   Yes, it's probably out of your comfort zone.. I know it was out of my comfort zone for a long time! I didn't feel qualified, I make lots of mistakes with my biological children, We don't make enough money to support more chil...

I said something out loud tonight that I have thought quietly to myself probably a thousand times since I became a mother.....   I said, at 7:30pm, "You kids are going to bed, I AM TIRED OF BEING A PARENT NOW... "    I waited expecting the sky to start falling, and the earth to start shaking at my horrible confession that was supposed to be a private thought...   But a crazy thing happened, the world kept turning, And my offspring looked at me like I had lost my last marble,  and then they looked at Dad to see what he was going to do about Mom... Dad quietly got up and started getting pajamas ready....   And suddenly I realized how good it felt to be honest with my family... I admitted what I was thinking and they all then knew how I felt.... and by 8:00pm all were in bed and I could switch into wife mode and chill on the couch with my feet propped up...  sharing a few laughs with my husband over the day's events... ...

  Our Valentines Day Preparations...   You know that feeling of groping around in the dark trying to find the stairway after you fell asleep on the couch and its 1 am.??   You're desperately trying to find your bed!!  That happened to me the other night except in the middle of all that stumbling around in the dark I found a glowing skeleton hanging on the door!!!! I gasped in shock sure that I was hallucinating a scene from some crime show my husband had been watching...   Turns out that the Skeleton shirt that I found at a consignment store was glow in the dark!!! (I bought the shirt and added the felt heart for my son's Valentines day party at school.)  My advice.. stay away from crime scenes, Skeleton shirts, and falling asleep on the couch.   You will need all the sleep you can get to try and figure out  your middle scholar. read on.....     I love pinterest for Valentine's Day card ideas!!! There'...