Wednesday 7 May 2014

Blogging through the Alphabet {B is for Beruhigen, busy, and the blessing of my Beth, and biggest boy}

Ben and Me

"B"


OK, so I had to be REALLY creative here, to make my day fit my blog post for this week. So, I bring to you an educational post, wherein you learn a German word, to suit my blog post.

Is that somehow wrong?

Not sure.

These first two words are somewhat of an enigma, in one sense. Almost polar opposites, well, at least for me.

B, is for beruhigen and busy.

"What," you may ask "does BERUHIGEN mean?"

Unless you are a German scholar, you will not know what it means.  

It means "calm".

Today, I had a calm day, when it shouldn't have been, because I had a crisis, on a busy day. A crisis when you have a LOT to do, is generally not a calming experience, but for me, unusually, it was.

I can't take the credit for it - it was a definite Spirit-filled moment. 

I was busily doing jobs in the lounge, when a child came through, with a look and tone of urgency, telling me to come NOW.

I went, hearing the sound of rushing water as I went.

Ohhhhhhh yes. RUSHING, GUSHING, HIGH-PRESSURE water.

I immediately realised that something under the sink had exploded and water was exiting at a great speed. I thankfully knew where the stop-cock was, threw (pretty literally) the saucepans out of the cupboard where it is, and turned it off. The whole thing probably took less than 60 seconds, but there was a lot of water. Also, providentially, there were a lot of towels waiting to be washed, so they got put to a secondary use! 

Next was to look in the cupboard. Do you know how much you can FIT in a cupboard under the sink? A lot, let me tell you.  Most of it was at least damp, in some way or form, if not soaking. 

I was supposed to be supervising school work, working on a crochet project that is being given as a gift and the deadline is looming, and sorting out a computer issue. Also, lots of laundry was to be done today, and the dishwasher WAS running.  Those latter two things cannot be done WITHOUT water, and the former things cannot be done whilst I was clearing up an ENORMOUS mess.

It's not in my nature to be particularly calm and accepting of such situations.  I don't get easily stressed, in one sense, but my plans being thrown, and not being able to do "what I was supposed to do", bothers me. 

Today was out of the ordinary. I calmly managed the situation, without worrying about wasn't being done elsewhere. THIS is what was happening, so THIS is what I needed to be doing.

The day didn't get better. The plumber came, and it turns out the whole of the tap had just fallen apart underneath. Only solution? New tap. My KITCHEN tap - no tap, no washing up. Robert is busy on a Wednesday, and the plumber had another job he needed to go to, so I needed to do it. Normally, that would also have bothered me, again thinking about what I *should* have been doing. However, the tap was needed, and I was available to get it. So off we all (yes, with all 8 children) toddled off to the Screwfix shop to get a new tap. A monoblock, mixer tap (yes, of course I knew that before....*aherm*). Just being in that shop was an experience - Argos, for home improvers. (ie go in, look at a catalogue, write down your number, go to a till, pay, and wait for your item - I became "the kitchen tap" when it arrived, as in "are you the kitchen tap?". Yes, me, the kitchen tap).  By the time we got home, it was late in the afternoon. The children were certainly educated in the art of tidying up a huge mess, and getting school work done in an unconventional manner, at a strange time of day.

It was a strangely busy day, and it was all crammed into a short space of time, yet I got things done.

God was so good, in giving me the calm I needed to handle my day. It would have been such a different atmosphere in this house, had I panicked, and stressed about my upside-down day. It would have affected everyone else, and that would just not have been a good thing. I also learnt that you can be busy, have more on your plate than you wanted, and yet still get it all done! With God's peace and strength, you can do so much.

Beth was a joy today - she cleaned out my entire fridge, wiping out everything, and reorganising the food that went back in.  She did SUCH a great job, and it was a wonderful thing to open up the fridge, and survey the tidiness that met my eyes. Having such a helpful daughter is a blessing, indeed.

I am now ending my day, with my biggest boy being a blessing to his mother - he is doing my ironing! First time to do it like this, and a good job he's doing! He knew I had other things to do, and that the ironing also needed to be done tonight, so he's doing it.  I can't quite believe I have a son old enough to be doing a capable job of ironing, but here I am, and there he is.




So, my B's -  beruhigen in my chaos, my busy day, and the blessing of my oldest two children.




1 comment :

  1. Awesome job! I can't imagine trying to do that myself! Kudos!!! Helpful children are a blessing! I have one who cleaned out the fridge last week.

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