God's lesson to me from my toddler

Today was a rough day with my 2 year old. It seemed like she was being as defiant as she could on everything I asked her to do. And when I get upset and punishes her, she would apologize and say that she wants to listen and is going to do it. But then a minute later when I tell her to do something, she wouldn't do it.

It was like this the whole day.

I got really upset in the afternoon and I was crying out to God that I don't know why she was acting that way and why she says one thing and does another. And God responded immediately.

I heard Him say that you, Yu-Ting, are the same way.

That was an eye-opener for me...

I looked back for a couple of weeks and realized that that's what I've been doing. I've been SAYING that I need to sleep earlier, pray more, read the Bible more, etc. But I did not DO any of it. I didn't try to do it. I was TOO tired. And I was distracted by cleaning and organizing and decorating. And there is nothing wrong with doing that except God was not first in my life. He was basically last.

I was so ashamed. I confessed my sin and asked God for forgiveness. I was wondering what was wrong with this weekend. It was just really weird - something was not right. And the good LORD shined some light on it and brought it out in the open through my misbehaving toddler.

Oh, how Matthew 7:3-4 applies even for a toddler:

Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? ⁴How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?

I have no authority to tell her to listen to me when I didn't listen to my heavenly Father. And somehow she knew it. Or maybe the Holy Spirit enabled this so that I can see the plank in my own eyes. I am truly humbled. Wow.

Thank you LORD for revealing to me my sin. Thank you for using Abby to teach me. LORD, help me to change for real. Help me to set the priority and get my focus back on You and what You want me to do. And help me to stick to it. In Jesus' name, Amen.

I am now in the middle of scheduling my week so that I get good sleep at night and have time in the morning to read the Bible and also have time for craft business/ministry and cleaning and organizing. I pray that there will be significant changes this week.

Curtain for Abby - finished!

So I finally finished Abby's curtains yesterday. I haven't put them up yet. Will do it later this week - gotta go exchange the rod, it was too short. I will put a picture up when it's installed.

Abby's fever

Abby has been having a fever since yesterday. It went up to 101 so I'm guessing it's just teething fever. It has gone down to 99 as of half hour ago. From my experience of the last tooth that came out, she may have the 2 top front incisors coming out in the next few days. I can't imagine the pain that she's going through. But she is a tough little baby - God really blessed us so much with her.

(I finally started sewing her curtains today! Hope I'll get them done today.)

Curtains for Abby - update 2

Okay, I'm going to make Abby's curtains today. I've been slacking off. But I'm going to do it today. Really.

Daily Matters

I missed Bible Study today! Abby took a long nap this morning so we ended up going straight to Dan's office for lunch. The lunch was good. We had Pavone's Pizza (yum!) And Abby had a few Cheerios until she knocked the bowl off the table. Then we came back so Abby can eat her full lunch and take her afternoon nap. She took a long nap again! (I'm not complaining - more time for me.) When Dan got home he said that Abby's forehead seems warm, so we took her temperature. We found out that she was sleeping more today because she was having a little fever. It's a mild fever, so she's probably getting another tooth. Still... poor Abby!

Curtains for Abby update 1

Okay, so here is what I came up with: blue, yellow, and white flannel fabrics. I got these from the clearance section at Joann's a while back when I was still pregnant with Abby. I didn't know what I was going to do with these, but I bought them just in case. :)

Since her room is a baby blue color with white and tan accents, I decided to use all three of them together in vertical stripes. Hopefully it will come out good. So I'll sew them together... maybe tomorrow.

Curtains for Abby

Abby's room has light-filtering cellular blinds, but not room darkening. And it gets direct sunlight in the morning, so it makes it hard for her to take her morning nap. I've draped a blanket over her crib to cut some light off, but it's still pretty bright on a sunny day. So I've decided to make some curtains for her. I'm going to use the fabrics I already have in my fabric stash. It won't be anything fancy - just very simple curtains that I'm going to hang with clip rings on a rod. So now, I have to decide on a color...

I'll be posting pictures of my past and current art/craft projects soon. Stay tuned!!

Teething

Abby is crying a lot recently. She's teething. Poor baby. She's got the two lower central incisors (bottom front) out already. And now her gum where the upper central incisors (top front) are is swollen. She also has a low grade fever. I hope she gets those soon. It's hard to see her suffer. I guess it's just one of those growing pains.