Tempus Fugit

Do Not Squander Time 

That is The Stuff Life is Made Of 

is on the sign outside Twelve Oaks, the Wilkes plantation in the film Gone With The Wind.

Time really does fly and it never ceases to amaze me how precious some moments in our lives are and yet we so often find ourselves dashing around and not making the most of the time we have available.

We've just watched the latest episode of Dr Who which is of course about a Time Lord. He has the opportunity to visit and re-visit particular times and the people within those times.

It's also Easter Sunday and my eldest daughter is 5 in less than one month and my youngest has just had her first Easter while the middle one Sophie is 2 and is referring to Easter Babbits and is hugging the box the egg is in with no effort yet at getting into the egg.

Every Sunday I have a few precious moments alone, just thinking and spending time in prayer and considering what the day holds, before I have to get up and get ready and get each one of my 3 children ready. It's no mean feat getting 3 children under the age of 5 ready for church as many parents will be able to confirm and invariably we tend to run out of time. I could lose my rag and get stressed out about the fact that we are always running late and it really does wind me up. No amount of preparation appears to help either, which is most frustrating but I would rather have great and precious memories of fun with my children that we share together, rather than stressing about being late.

Lara and I sing and dance and laugh and Sophie is now at the age where she wants to join in and she does a kind of funny little wiggle.

The time that we are in now is so precious and fun memories can be made in this time here and now.

I think it's good to slow down and enjoy the moment before it rushes past.

There's a great Star Trek - Next Generation movie called Insurrection in which there is a world where it's possible to freeze a moment in time or slow it down so much that it gives you the opportunity to really enjoy and treasure the moment.

Which moments would you freeze or slow down to treasure?

It really is amazing to me how fast the time in my life has flown. Just as an example, here are 6 photographs each taken over the last 5 years as an example of how quick things and people change:

Lara - age 1

Lara - age 2

Lara - age 3 with Sophie - age approx 4 months

Lara - age 4 and Sophie - age 1 1/2

Me with Lara - age 4, Sophie - age 1 (nearly 2), Rebecca - age 3 months

Sophie - age 2

Thinking about the future

So I'm 16 and a bit weeks into another pregnancy. This makes it my 5th pregnancy in 5 years of marriage. It is kind of nerve wracking as I'm very aware of the possibilities of something going wrong but I do feel a sense of confidence and trust that this child will be born and will be healthy. So many people keep asking me if I'm going to find out what I am having and I say "No". The reactions I get to that are quite mixed. Some of the older women think that it's lovely that I am waiting until the bay is born to find out the sex and some of the younger women find me odd. To be honest though I've never found out the sex of the baby with any of my pregnancies and didn't feel short changed at all. I love surprises too much.

With our first, (Joshua James) I had a dream that I as going to have a little boy and when he was born it was special to see that he was indeed a little boy even though we never got to see him draw his first breath or get the privilege of being parents to him.

We never knew what our second and third children were as I had early miscarriages but we nicknamed them Randolph and Cuthbert respectively and occasionally joke that one day when we get to heaven we may meet two little boys who greet us saying "Why did you give us such silly names?" or maybe they will already know that they have crazy parents who deal with stuff by making light of it as a coping mechanism.

With our fourth (Lara Anjali) again I had a dream coupled with a very strong feeling that she was going to be a girl. We named her after our church worship pastor and had kind of expected her to be a girl but there still was something intensely special and beautiful about seeing her for the first time and finding out that she was a girl.

So, now for this baby. I already know that if she is a girl I may call her Kathleen India Serena although I'm not 100% certain of that yet but I'm struggling to find a boys name that I really really like. But, I do feel as if I may be having a little boy.

Everything Changes

It's literally been years since I last wrote on this blog. So much has changed, some of which I've wholeheartedly embraced, adapted to, or managed to cope with. Some of the change though has really shaken my world and it would be safe to say that I haven't always been entirely comfortable with some of the changes.

A quick run down of the changes since I last wrote are as follows:

Jan 2011 - I gave birth to my second daughter - Sophie.
Sep 2011 - I started working for an organisation (Christians Against Poverty) that I had wanted to work for and had supported financially for 10 years.
May 2012 - I won an election and now represent the ward of Clayton & Fairweather Green as a Councillor.
Sep 2012 - I gave birth to my third daughter - Rebecca.
Sep 2012 - My eldest daughter - Lara, started full time school.

Church - also during this period my church has undergone some changes with different worship leaders and Lead Pastors.

Change itself doesn't really bother me and for the most part I accept and welcome change especially as I often get itchy feet and hate routine. I think it's important to be prepared to change in order to be able to move quickly to adapt to better and more efficient ways of doing things.

I don't mind saying that I've done well to adapt to and deal well with all the changes above, all except the changes in my local church.

The changes in church made me realise that I had liked to be comfortable at church with a certain way of doing things and that despite saying I hate routine, the routine in church was something I loved and felt happy with.

It all seemed to happen while I wasn't looking so to speak. I was busy campaigning for election so not really getting to church as often except on Sunday evenings and before I knew it, the Senior Pastor was stepping to one side to focus on other things and allowing for other younger leaders to step up to the challenge of senior Church Leadership. The worship leader who I also loved was stepping down to pursue more solo work.

All of a sudden I felt my world getting shaken. Maybe I'd put too much faith in the church and the comfort of the way things had always been - that status quo. Now that changes had occurred I was feeling challenged, uncomfortable and unsure.

It wasn't until my daughter Rebecca was born and I had to face a new challenge, (that of having a child with Down Syndrome), when I realised the changes at church were a good thing. It's good to shake things up a little and reach further and deeper. It's good to pass leadership and responsibility on to others and it's good to have a new sense of dynamism and vision when changes happen. I have always loved and respected the leadership team at my church and when I was faced with Now What? types of challenge over the years I'd always felt that I had someone to turn to. But the way in which I felt so loved and supported when Rebecca was born went so much further. It taught me that God is so for me no matter what is coming up in my life to deal with and that he will always make sure the right people are in the right places doing the right things.

Everything changes except God!