I have stopped myself about five different times today and thought, "That would be great for my blog," but then something new happens anp *poof* that idea is gone.

I guess I could explain my little banner up top?

One personal challenge just wasn't enough for me this month. Classic over achiever that I am, or I should say wannabe over achiever, big plans that don't always make it.

So I added a second challenge for myself. Or a second idea still evolving I suppose. I want my blog to have more me in it. And I realize how silly that sounds, it's a blog I write, about my life...how much more me does it need? I wanted to put some more color. A different glimpse of who I am...and so now you have the banners.

I am not sure they will always be pictures from the day, but they are pictures I have taken and cropped into these little banners. they all tell a story. I might not always tell the whole thing, but know that each picture is solidly matched to the day.

Today's banner shows what I purchased at CVS and Walgreens. I have been hanging out on some blogs of some amazing women who know how to put a deal together. Who scan sale adds and coupons and find ways to save thousands of dollars a year.

And I have to say, it's thrilling to know that you are saving money and stocking your household goods.

I was raised in a house that had plenty. I guess we were either solidly middle-class, or possibly slightly upper middle-class. We always had nice things, my dad always had a new car and cars always outnumbered drivers. I never saw my parents struggle with a monthly budget, or even appear to have one. I never saw them save for a minor purchase. If they wanted or needed it, they bought it. They worked really hard and lots of long hours to get there, but Sunday cupons were never anything more than the pages between the comics.

I always sensed my dad even had a slight dislike for coupons. Like they would be beneath him. To the point that he didn't even like to use the old school gift certificates. Remeber the paper ones?

So here I am, a grown-up in my own right, with my own family, and my own bills. Money and budgets operate much differently in my house. There is only one income to start. We choose to have a few less extras in order to have me here with the kids. There are a few more of those too. I was one of one. This house is filled with the squeals of three...and we still can't say there won't be more.

I have come to not just use the coupons but to love them. To find delight in stretching our budget by watching the adds and making the coupon matches. It's not only rewarding, but it's a heck of a lot of fun.

So up in that banner there is what I bought to day for, essentially, free.

I matched some coupons, used a rebate, and earned store credit, and spent some credit.

Good times.

I understand that there are still two days until October but it seems strange to start a new project like Blog-A-Day midweek, and I am so excited about a silly title like Blogtober that I just couldn't wait.

October is probably one of the more interesting, if not unwise, months to start such a project but it just seems right.

Two weeks from today is my youngest daughters first birthday, and two weeks from Wednesday marks the anniversary of her death.

And while I tend to keep posts about her confined to my other blog, I am sure there will be a lot of overlap.

I miss her more and more everyday, and I wonder how her birthday will change me?

Somehow I feel like this month is going to bring some sort of rebirth for me. I am not sure why I feel that but I do. I feel like my family is growing and evolving and this month marks some further changes.

Maybe it's just this season... everything is changing, the air is turning crisper and soon we'll be spending chilly evenings snuggled up with movies and popcorn, warming ourselves with yummy cups of hot cocoa.

This season is also the same one that my courtship with my husband began and the season we welcomed three of our four babies.

I guess the fall just has it's own magic around here.

Some things to look forward to this month:

*Thoughts on homeschooling and parenting my children. The unique joys and struggles that come from spending so much time getting to know and mold my babies.

*Adventures in couponing and bargain seeking. I swear it's like a drug, the rush that comes from saving more than I spend or getting something free. (Check out the links under "saving money" off to the side)

*Random angst and silliness, often all at the same time.

It's difficult when time and prudence interfere with writing.

Right now I am watching my daughter and youngest son play with toy money and baby Star Wars figures... It's so sweet and sweet has been painfully lacking in kid interactions this past week.

I have had to remind myself everyday that Home Schooling them is the best choice for them. It's what God has called me to do with them. Because honestly...the ease of dropping them off somewhere seems pretty tempting at times.

I would miss so much if I did that though, so much of watching and being a part of them discovering new things. of helping God mold them into who He has created them to be.

In some ways I have welcomed the struggles with schooling as they have forced me to focus on something else, besides my personal tumult.

I have been in a really ugly place the last few months.

I have felt abandoned and alone at nearly every turn. I have felt confused and misunderstood. I have felt like a burden and a failure. I have pressed into God and felt...nothing.

I have wept before him and searched for His comfort.

And over all, through all, I have felt...nothing.

To go from a place where I could almost physically feel God, to standing in a desert, has been terrifying.

I know I am not alone. I know I am walking through the valley of the shadow of death. Of abandonment. Of isolation.

I am like the child learning to ride her bike. God has let go to see if I can peddle without feeling Him right there. I have crashed and scraped my knee. I have cried. I have sat there and refused to get up.

But I want to soar. I want to ride this bike and finish this race. I want to succeed at the life God is laying before me.

So I need to get up, dust myself off , tighten the straps on my helmet and get back on that bike.

Knowing God is right there with me...even when I can't feel Him or hear Him.

I don't relish this attempt. I know there is a good likely hood I'll be bruised again. That my scraped up knees will continue to sting as I stretch and bend them. I also know they will heal and soon the fall will be a memory and there will be healing.

19When the owners of the slave girl realized that their hope of making money was gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them into the marketplace to face the authorities. 20They brought them before the magistrates and said, "These men are Jews, and are throwing our city into an uproar 21by advocating customs unlawful for us Romans to accept or practice."

22The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten. 23After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. 24Upon receiving such orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks.

11 years ago when my husband and I made the choice to have children, we knew that raising children on one salary, a teacher's salary no less, was going to require some budgeting.

We haven't always been good at that, nor has it always been pleasant. We adjusted from bi-weekly paychecks to once a month pay check. Just one. We have struggled and we have prospered at different times.

Added into all the creative budgeting are our beautiful summers. Time to recharge and reconnect after an overly full academic year. Time to enjoy the California sunshine. Two months free of papers to grade, lessons to plan, and...well...pay.

People tend to shudder when they realize my husband draw no check in the summer, and truth be told I have more than once myself.

We have tried different versions of budgets, and many have failed miserably. My husband has often worked during the summers to bridge the monetary gap, but that option isn't always available and rarely reliable.

God has done a lot in me in this area. Finances seemed to be my biggest area of struggle. The place I am the weakest. I feel such a burden to "do the right thing" that I often wrestle ultimate control right out of the hands of the Maker of the Universe.

I mean, it's one thing to ask God for healing or patience but money seems so immediate. so essential. I have babies to feed. I have a home to run. I need money to do that. So I ask God to provide, to teach me to see His plan and to wait on His provision...and then the cupboards appear to go bare and I panic and start to plan and crunch numbers again.

Clearly this is an area where I need to be proactive yet my heart and faith need to not be bound by fear.

It is subtle. In a way indefinable. Yet I know there is a change in me...and I see that change reflected in my bank statements as well. My spiritual change has some obvious physical results.

Today is a day where I really struggle with the point, the idea, and the reason to blog in the first place. It's hard when I know so many of the people I really love and care about will be reading because it leads me to a need to censor so as not to put anyone else's "stuff" out there.

That's why my blog has been so quiet. I have some big stuff going on in my heart and in my head, but it's stuff that could either be construed as gossip or passive aggressive if I wrote about it. And in my deepest heart of hearts, I don't want to be either of those things...even when it's easy to be.

I have been looking a lot at who I am. I have been doing it in light of some negative messages that I have gotten lately. More of the ugly tapes I have played for years and felt like I finally managed to, at the very least, mute. I knew they weren't destroyed but I hoped they had been edited sufficiently... But then from an unexpected and influential source...blam! Same ugly messages.

So I have been doing a good bit of self examination...and examination of relationships I have.

In some ways I welcome these opportunities because they force me to look at myself critically and that is always really good. Even when it is painful. I spent a lot of time in my life feeling like a failure who had to justify her shortcomings... now I know I am just a regular old person who screws up and needs to own that. When I am wrong, or when I have given out the perception to someone that they are undervalued by me I want to own that. Even though it hurts and it's hard to admit.

So I have been doing a lot of evaluating. Sometimes when you do that though you realize you place a lot of value on certain things that others just don't. And that's kind of hard.

To all my less -than-three girls... I value each and every one of you. It's obvious that I spend lots more time with some, or one, of you more than the others. But each and everyone of you are special and amazing and I feel absolutely honored to have each of you in my life... To have shared such the most life changing moments in my life with you. To watch each of you continue on or find the path God has laid before you excites me more than you will ever know. I pray for you all everyday...

My youngest son is spending his second night in his "big boy bed" tonight. He loves the bed though he insists "I still yittle, I just has a big boy bed."

I looked at him sleeping there yesterday and thought he looked so small, yet...not. Not anymore.

I was away for a week and in that week he went and grew up on me. His speech pattens are different and his face looks more boyish now, and less like a baby. I missed so much in that week. Yet what I missed was almost unidentifiable to anyone but his daddy and I.

I am so grateful that I am home with my kids everyday. that I see every little thing and can note the minor changes in just a week.

I have had people tell me I am "lucky" to be able to stay home, and while I am truly blessed beyond measure, there is no luck in this decision.

Way back, what feels like a million years ago, my then-fiance and I were sitting in a booth in our favorite Mexican restaurant and I said "I just want you to know, I won't put my kids in daycare." I think he agreed without fulling understanding what that meant, but he did agree and it became a tenet of our marriage from the beginning. I am so grateful.

Everyday I am grateful to have a husband who is so passionately in favor of me being the 24 hour on-call mother to our kids. The one who kisses all the boo-boos. The one who gets to deal with all the attitudes. The one who has memorized everything from Blue's Clues to Spongebob. The one who has at one point or another had just about every kind of oozy, drippy, runny, or lumpy kid secretion on me or my clothes. The one who's been embarrassed in the grocery store and filled with pride at the playground.

It hasn't always been easy, cheep, or lucrative to be here. To be home when bills piled up, or stresses did. It hasn't even always been affordable. And we do without a lot of the extras...but we never want for anything of import. God always provides. Often He even provides a little...or a lot...extra.

I don't really know the point of this blog and I certainly hope it doesn't sound all mom-against-mom. I think most parents want to do the best they can. Gosh, I hope they do anyway.

I guess, I don't know, I guess I just wanted to put it out there. Most really amazing things don't come easy or by accident. They require a lot of effort and determination. This is no different.

I wish every mother could and would stay home with her children. It's blessings times one million. I know there are mothers that can't, and I want to support them anyway I can, but sadly, I also know there are mothers that just wont, and that is heartbreaking.