Mosaic Momma

The presents have been opened and played with. Some have been broken already and others are slated for return. The ham has been devoured. The button up pants have been replaced with drawstring "comfy" pants with extra room. The family is drowsy on the couch watching a movie. We are all sated with the afterglow of Christmas. I don't know why I doubted that I would get here -- to contentment and joy. This week was not good for me. While in my soul I knew "the reason for the season" and I fervently believe in letting "every heart prepare Him room," I honestly struggled to feel it my heart and mind. Last Friday was the worst. I found myself banging pots and pans around and being generally grumpy with my children and my husband. No one could do anything right. I couldn't do anything right. Everything everyone did annoyed me. The entire "Duck Dynasty" Phil Robertson debacle reallly annoyed me. And I didn't know why. ...

There is something kind of amazing about friends coming together to help one another out. I had a wonderful opportunity to see this in action this weekend. On a recent trip to Tanzania to work with Character 101 on various educational projects, I got my hands on some hand-crafted bags made from Kitenge fabric -- which is indigenous to Tanzania and East Africa. It was a dream come true for me. About two years ago, I had the idea of buying bags from local artisans and then reselling them here in the U.S. as a revenue source for this non-profit. I figured that the purchase of bags over here helping students to get books over there was a marriage made in heaven. However, at that time, we couldn't find what I was looking for and there was too much start-up activity with the organization to think about trying to chart that territory on our own. So, we shelved the idea (pun intended). However, a few weeks ago, I believe that God orchestrated a divine appointment with ...

Today I'm grateful for pants. Pants for my six-year-old to be precise. We have two boys and two girls. We have one income. My husband and I just returned from Tanzania a few weeks ago and every bit of extra money we could leave there, we left. We got back and apparently, we ran out of pants for the boys. Both boys have grown, it went from shorts weather to pants weather in the last two weeks, additional holes have been ripped in the knees of most of our jeans, or the pants gremlin came while we were gone. Because of the aforementioned trip, I did not make a big deal of it. There were a couple of pairs that I found and were using. When you know that kids on the other side of the world have only one set of clothes, this is not a crisis. Until it kinda became one. On Saturday night, our three eldest children performed in one of two performances of the children's musicals on the weekend. Once again, the pants issue was...well, an issue. The pair that I had fis...

So far, so good with our "Self on the Shelf" Giving Elves that I started this year (albeit a bit late in the month). I forgot to put them out on Sunday, and figured that they needed a "day of rest" and thankfully, the kids bought it. I have had a lot of moments of wracking my brain right before bed for the next day's tableau or worse, bolting out of bed just as I was headed towards Dreamville. A couple of mornings, my jet lag has come in handy -- giving me ample time to plot and photograph something for that morning. We seem to have picked up steam too and the kids actually are looking forward to each morning to see what the Giving Elves, Joy and Noel are up to. Here are the latest ones we have done (see previous posts for the inaugural and second day tableaus.) You can follow each day's tableau on my Mosaic Momma FB page . Give your time and energy to help clean up around the house or someone else's house. Spread Christmas joy an...