The Motherhood Journey Newsletter - Week18

“ Therefore now, O Lord, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.” ⁴ And the Lord said, “Do you do well to be angry?” Jonah 4:3-4

Hello sweet Mummas,

Welcome to this week mummas! I missed chatting with you last week. We had appointments in my usual ‘email writing time’ and then lots of sickness. But we are bacckkk! Sending you love in whatever situation you may be in right now - a moment of mummy joy…. or overwhelming noise. We are in it together! The Lord has got us here for a reason, He has given us our specific children and He knows we can smash this thing - ONLY if we do it with Him. And He likes it that way. Let’s stop for a minute, breathe and welcome His good presence to guide us.

He is so good. And all we need!

Real Life in the motherhood journey:

A little glimpse from our week!

Alongside sickness, we have celebrated our two youngest birthdays!! Florence has turned one and her big brother Kai has turned 3. Very special times of family visiting, celebrations, honouring their lives and fevers in bed haha. It is alot of work organising and celebrating birthdays AND an honour to do as the mumma of the house. What a gift! We tried our gluten free journey and stopped. Challenged by the foundations of the WHY and realising whats most important to us is eating whole foods, in nourishing ways. And Gluten free wasnt doing that for us. We will see if that ever pops up again in our journey!
Enjoy these pics from our last two weeks…..

Get some ideas!

Funnily enough after sharing my ‘cleaning routine’ podcast I found i needed to step up even further in how i manage my home. The Lord is calling me into a season to bring my home in order in MANY different ways. Building up better systems in my home is really exciting to me, needed and can be daunting. I found this system from a mumma who inspires me. Hopefully it can give you some inspo. I have tweaked it to my needs and added realistic ‘time’ it will take so even if the list looks long. it truely is manageable.

Daily tasks:
- Make bed {2 mins}
- Wipe down bathrooms (sink area and toilet) {5 mins}
- One load of Laundry washed (AM) and put away (PM) {2 mins AM, 10-15mins PM}
- Whole house pick up (Me- kitchen and dinning {continual after each activity and as i go. lets say 30mins over the day}. Kids - bedroom, loungeroom and deck in chore time before dinner).
- Close Kitchen before bed {30 mins}
- Sweep {10 mins}

total = 1.5 hour roughly spread over a 16 hour day!

Weekly:
I will choose one activity to do each afternoon before dinner prep when kids are having outside time. Will take around 20-30 mins to do.
- Monday: Dust and Shelves
- Tuesday: Rubbish out and Stove
- Wednesday: Windows and Mirros
- Thursday: Deep clean bathroom (shower ect)
- Friday: Properly clean kitchen
- Saturday: Outside work or extra job
- Sunday: Rest.

NOTE * This is another mummas tried and true method. I am just considering implelemting it and starting this week. I in no way currently clean this much and dont know how managable this is for me. It is simply for inspiration to take what you want from it. What I like about it is how organised it is, so it takes the work out of me thinking. Even if i miss days cause we are out I know the general house will stay clean.

Walking in His truth:
This weeks encourgaenment comes from the book of Jonah! Its a good read - only two pages. I read it alongside my 6 year old and was impacted in many ways. Of Gods fiery love, relentless kindness, desire for all to be saved, humour and also willingness for us to learn.

I found todays bible verse humorous in God saying, ‘does it do well for you to be angry?’ I kinda got a mum nudge of seeing how He could kindly but truthfully be saying this same thing to me in my every day.

In this story Jonah is frustrated that God took him all the way to Nineveh to get the people to repent while knowing He was going to save them anyway because of His great love. He gets upset at God and says he should just die. Then while sitting in the dessert he wants to die cause he is so hot and the Lord says he created a plant to grow over his head to save him from his discomfort. He then gets a worm to eat it up and Jonah once again grumbles like a baby and God teaches Him a lesson about how much he deeply cares for HIS people.

What I like about this story is ONE - Gods grace on us being overly dramatic and pitiful in the way we see our lives and struggles. He is there, willing to talk and to assist. AND SECOND - He isnt going to leave us there. He is okay for us to struggle (like Jonahs plant being taken away) and for us to come out of our own blindness and see the bigger picture of who God is and what He is doing.

Take heart mummas from Jonah and from God’s kind little nudge, “do you do well to be angry?”. Let’s continually choose to not grumble at each challenge, each bit of spilt milk. INSTEAD let’s see God greater plan for His people. How relentless His love is towards YOUR children for them to grow beyond tantrums, and fussing. That He desires to save them, to know them and to free them. This is our good work.

Love always
Ellie from - The Motherhood Journey x

p.s Im always here for a chat! My heart is to go deeper with you mummas in these emails. So if anything stands out to you or you wana chat more, shoot me back a reply! I love journeying alongside you.