By 11:15, he is totally zonked out. I kiss him, put him in his crib, and tiptoe into the kitchen, where I kiss my husband Donnie goodnight as he passes me on his way to bed.

All boys tucked in? Check! My time has arrived!

I switch out the laundry, get something to drink, and sit down to check email.

Twenty minutes pass. I hear a familiar little baby whine that quickly grows into “Waah…waaaaah….WAAAAH!”

Donnie goes in to the nursery to do his back-patting magic. It doesn’t work. He tries his cradle-hold and swaying magic. It isn’t so magical tonight. That means just one thing: Mama Time.

I lay down in our bed for Nursing Session 2. Soon, Jonah is out cold again. Donnie picks him up to carry him to bed, and says what no parent wants to hear at midnight.

“His diaper leaked.”

So we double-team and change him as quickly as we can, trying hard to adhere to the excellent advice we learned when our oldest was an infant: always keep nighttime different from daytime. Don’t interact with a baby any more than necessary when you’re trying to get him to sleep. Keep the lights dim, your voices low, and try not to speak unless you have to.

Jonah is wide-awake and works hard to lure us into playing with him. He grins, laughs, throws out some Mamas and Dadas. It is hard to keep a straight face.

At this point, the only thing that might work is for me to become the human pacifier again. So we lay down in my dark, quiet bedroom. He nurses, but by this point, the well is running a little dry. He fusses; I pass him off to dad. Jonah’s cries grow angrier, so I schlep off to the kitchen to make him a bottle.

Four ounces of warm formula later, his heavy eyelids close. He sighs and I feel him start to relax in my arms.

Then my nose begins to tickle.

“No! Not a sneeze! Not now!” I think as the tickle magnifies and Jonah goes totally limp in my arms.

I reach up to pinch my nose, but I’m a second too late. “Ah—CHOO!!!”

Dozing Donnie bolts upright and exclaims, “What was that?” And Jonah sits up, too.

“I sneezed.” I can’t help giggling.

“Oh. I thought something crashed into the house,” Donnie mumbles as he falls back onto his pillow.

I lay down with a wide-awake again Jonah, his Royal Cuteness tucked between me and his drowsy father. It is so dark in our room, lit only by the faintest golden glow from the bathroom nightlight. Jonah’s pale face reflects the glow like a tiny, perfect moon, and his eyes are wide, black circles staring up at me, trying to engage me again. I can’t help but smile, and he starts chatting.

He sounds like the little night owl he is, his voice echoing loudly through the still house.

“Hoo. OOOH. Oooh. HOO. Oooooooooooooooh.”

That gets no reaction, so he flops over onto his back and switches it up.

“Da. Dada. DaaaaDAH! DUH-dah. DehDehDehDeh….DAD.”

I’m stifling giggles and wondering how Donnie is sleeping through this.

Then Jonah runs through it all again at a whisper. “Daah…dah dah…duh-da. Dada.”

His chit-chat goes on and on, and I am pretty firmly convinced that the child is just not going to sleep tonight.

“Hoooo Dat! Oh HOO Dat!” He is hollering like the world’s littlest New Orleans Saints Fan.

I manage to swallow my laughter and lay still and quiet. I recall reading that a sleeping infant will match his breathing to his mother’s. So I start breathing heavily, rhythmically, as though asleep. I don’t know if that works, or if Jonah’s just run out of things to say, but I can see the little black circles of his eyes melt into crescents as his blinks become longer…and longer.

Carried off to his crib, he doesn’t make a peep.

Finally, he sleeps.

Until 3:45, when he ralphs on my shoulder, and we start it all over again.

Camping is SO totally NOT on my summer to-do list, nor shall it ever be. And no, this is not an early Top Ten Tuesday post…it’s Sunday’s Covington News column!

Finally, school is out for summer! But whoever called these the “Lazy Days of Summer” didn’t take a peek at my to-do list.

As you probably already know, we’re a homeschooling family. That means that we have the freedom to take breaks throughout the year as we see fit. We could take our longest annual break in fall or winter if we wanted to.

If it were up to me, that’s exactly what we would do. I am not a fan of summer’s heat and humidity, so I’d much rather have a big chunk of time off when the weather is cooler.

However, my sons prefer to keep their schedules similar to their friends who attend traditional schools. It does make sense that they get to spend more time with their friends this way. So for the next eight weeks, we are on summer break, too.

I love how the term “summer break” conjures up long, lazy days, sipping a cold drink by the pool. But for the most part, this summer will be a busy one. Not only do I have a newly mobile infant to keep me on my toes, I have eight-zillion-and-one things to accomplish around this house. And since I just walk around in circles without a list to guide me, I made Kari’s Top Ten List of Things to Do This Summer.

1. Remodel both bathrooms. We are finally going to fix these blasted bathrooms we’ve lived with for over three years. The tile is atrocious, the floors are bowing, and the fixtures are original from the 1960s. We haven’t been able to use the shower in the master bath for years because it leaks underneath the house. There was no easy way to fix it—everything has to be gutted. I am truly thrilled about this. But please remind me how happy I was today when I’m complaining about the dust and chaos of living with a big remodeling project.

2. Paint the dining room and the kitchen cabinets. It’s a goal that depends largely on the hubby’s cooperation, and since he’s the one renovating the bathrooms, this is probably pushing it. But I still hope that by September, I’m enjoying a green dining room and bright white kitchen cabinets.

3. Declutter the entire house. Baby Jonah is eight months old, but I am still catching up on the backlog that didn’t get dealt with during my pregnancy. In this small house stuffed with messy males, it only takes a few weeks of inattention for the clutter to pile up. So, you can imagine the impact eight months of bedrest had on my home.

4. Sort through all our homeschooling resources and get organized for next school year. I am such a geek—this is pure fun for me!

5. Use the grill more often. Not only is barbecued food delicious, but it allows me to delegate a big chunk of the cooking to the hubs.

6. Read more and watch less TV—not just me, but the entire family.

7. Make time for my girlfriends every week. Unless you have also spent the past 36 weeks teaching a 6th grader and 2nd grader separate lessons while simultaneously juggling a cranky baby, you can’t imagine how much I need some time away from my responsibilities. Look out, girls—I’m coming out to play this summer!

8. Let the boys play with water guns, sprinklers and water balloons more often. The fun is worth the mess. Repeat that with me: “The fun is worth the mess.” That shall be my summertime mantra.

9. Add another week or two to the end of our summer vacation, just because we can. This is one of the most decadently delicious aspects of homeschooling, when we’re still playing in August while all our schooled friends are back at their desks.

10. Relax. Ironically, this seems the most daunting item on my list. But I’m determined to make the time to kick back beside that pool with my icy cold drink, relax and enjoy my life. Because this summer of 2010 is a precious gift that will never come again.

I think that the fattening of America is due largely to the fact that we’re a food-obsessed society.

I saw a commercial for a new TV network called The Cooking Channel. Its target market is a “hipper crowd interested in the grass roots of food culture.” There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with that. But did we really need another food-centric TV channel? At a time that most Americans should focus on eating less, isn’t it strange that we keep creating new ways of cementing ourselves to this preoccupation with food?

I admit that I love to cook. This passion has dampened somewhat during this life stage of catering to the preferences of my children. But I still enjoy trying new recipes, and shopping for different and exotic foods when I have the opportunity to do so.

We went to Trader Joe’s while in Atlanta last week. If you’re not familiar with Trader Joe’s, it’s a small grocery store that carries an ever-changing stock of reasonably-priced gourmet, natural and organic foods.

We came home with lots of goodies, including organic sourdough bread, sweet potato chips, raw agave nectar, pumpkin butter, and my newfound favorite, dark chocolate covered freeze-dried edamame.

Yes, I bought chocolate covered soybeans. And they are better than you can imagine.

Trader Joe’s has such an interesting variety of food that if I’d have been there without my husband and kids, I could’ve and would’ve spent a whole lot more time and money than I did. I left with a mental list of items I want to try next time.

There are a dozen grocery stores within a short drive from my house, but I still made time while in the city to buy things I can’t get close to home. The majority of the world’s population would consider that strange behavior.

And in a way, I agree. It’s too much focus on food, particularly when I recall a book I read called “Never Say Diet” that proposed a radical idea. Instead of making food more appealing, we should view it as simply fuel for the body. Most diets encourage us to jazz up our meals to make eating more pleasurable. This author’s approach is that boring is better because it reduces the temptation to overeat.

She makes a good point. Do most of us have any problem linking food with pleasure? If it doesn’t taste good—even if it’s good for us—we don’t want it. And if it does taste good—even if it is horrible for our bodies—we can’t get enough.

Would I have driven to Trader Joe’s if I hadn’t already been in the neighborhood for another appointment? Probably not, because I’m a tightwad. But I know lots of people who would.

And I think that’s one area where we’ve gotten it wrong. We’ve turned food into something bigger than it was ever created to be, and in the process, have become bigger than we were created to be. I think food was meant to be enjoyed, but I don’t think we were meant to plan our lives around our next ten meals.

We recently studied the story of Moses in our homeschool lessons, and I asked my boys how long they thought an average American would eat manna before complaining about it. We agreed that by dinnertime the first day, we’d have been whining, “What? Plain manna, again?”

Food was falling from the sky, like magic, and the people complained, wanting something different, something better. Funny how similar that is to life in America today.

Most food advertisements link their product to feelings we all long to experience: fun, contentment, love, celebration. But at the end of the day, it’s just food—an inanimate object unable to provide more than fleeting satisfaction as it glides over our taste buds and straight to our hips.

If we can divorce ourselves from this food obsession, perhaps that would make an impact on the fight against obesity. Perhaps not, but it’s a thought worth pondering.

“A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.” ~Tenneva Jordan

It’s time for my annual Mother’s Day Public Service Announcement, to remind you that next Sunday belongs to Mom. This year, I’m thinking about gracious giving.

Daily, in a dozen different ways, Mom gives up her share of the pie. And in most cases, she never says a word about it. And her family never notices.

Because of that, I get upset when I hear about people neglecting their poor wives and moms on Mother’s Day. Is it too much to give Mom the honor she’s due, for just one day?

I only have to glance around at my friends and family to see mothers at various stages of sacrifice.

Jen is pregnant and suffering through hormone-induced headaches. She sucks it up and waits them out instead of taking medication to relieve the pain. She went to the movies last weekend. Between rushing to the bathroom with morning sickness and dozing from pregnancy exhaustion, she missed the entire film.

My friend Tasha just delivered her first baby and is living that hellish boot-camp indoctrination into the realities of newborn sleep deprivation. It’s an exhaustion that cannot be put into words—it can only be lived. But it sure does prepare a woman for all the sleepless nights ahead, which, according to my grandmother, never end because a mom never stops worrying about her children.

Liz’s kids are in school now, and she has struggled with a desire to go back to college and finish her degree. She wants to do it; everyone says that she should. But going back to school means that her kids will have to give up some of their extracurricular activities. And with a husband who works out of town more often than not, she can’t count on him to be there for the kids. She just called to say that she’s going to wait a few more years—she loves her kids too much to ask them to give up anything for her dreams.

My own mom has put her happy golden years in Florida on hold to take care of her ailing mother here in Georgia. She hasn’t been home for more than a couple of days over the past few years, but she doesn’t hesitate to say that it’s all worth it. Her eyes mist over as she recalls all the ways her mother has been there for her, and insists that this is the least she can do in return.

And it’s not just these big things that moms give up. It’s tons of little things, like that pie. Most mornings I’m nursing Jonah with my dry tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth and my own stomach grumbling with hunger. But he has to eat first, and I have to get all the kids ready before I take care of my own needs. It’s second nature now—with this third child, I am totally used to being at the bottom of the priority list. And that is how it should be.

It’s not that we moms feel like tortured martyrs or anything—well, not most of the time. Every mom I know would willingly give up everything they’ve given, and more, if it is what’s best for the family. Every mother I know is doing that now.

But when May rolls around, if you took the time to ask, most moms—if they’re honest—will admit that they’d love just one day out of 365 to not automatically put themselves last.

Making that happen is going to look different in each family. Maybe it means letting mom sleep in while dad takes the kids out of the house. Maybe it’s brunch at her favorite restaurant, or the whole family worshiping in church together.

Maybe it’s as simple as going to Dollar Tree, buying a fifty-cent card and mailing it.

Whatever it is, please try to make it happen. Let her know you love her and appreciate all the things she’s given up for you. I have yet to meet a mother who doesn’t deserve it.

Above: Zach with Molly and Tonya, the day we got Molly

Below: Eli meeting Molly for the first time (The boys look SO young!!)

It took a while, but he finally caved.

We often call our house the Apted Zoo. Dad the Zookeeper had long refused to add aquatic creatures to our menagerie of pets. But for years now, the kids have begged for a fish named Tonya to honor our sweet dog that died in 2007. I’d promised them that someday, it would happen.

He’s a stubborn one, that zookeeper. It took nearly three years and the failing health of another dog to convince him to let the Easter Bunny leave a couple of female betta fish for the boys. You never saw two happier kids than mine this past Easter. Zach promptly named his fish Tonya, and Eli named his Mary, after Jesus’ mother.

Until Mary and Tonya 2 came on the scene, we were strictly a dog and cat family. At one time we had three dogs and two cats. Then Tonya passed away, and unfortunately, last week our sweet chocolate Lab, Molly died too.

You might remember my column from four years ago, when the unsinkable Molly Brown came to us. She was a rescue dog, and we never could understand why someone had abandoned her. She was almost no trouble at all; obedient and sweet as Labrador Retrievers are.

She was sunny and bumbling, klutzy and beautiful. Someone had trained her well. She would not take a bite of her food until you told her it was OK. She had the loudest, scariest bark. It boomed so loudly the windows seemed to vibrate in its wake. Of course, nothing else about her was scary. But that bark was fearsome.

When Tonya died, Molly looked for her, for days, and lay in Tonya’s special spot. It was enough to break your heart.

After Molly came, we rescued another pup named Annie. She’s a part-Lab mutt, and she and Molly were instant BFFs. They looked so much alike. But Molly was 75 pounds and brown, Annie half Molly’s weight, and black. Molly seemed to enjoy mothering little Annie. Now Annie is our only dog, and she misses her mentor.

Molly was just a really good dog; a faithful, pleasant soul in the background of life. She loved pleasing us, burying and digging up her favorite bone, loping around the yard with the boys. About the craziest thing she ever did was break out of the fence one day and chase after the geese in a nearby lake.

I hope God had a big lake full of geese and ducks waiting for Molly when she got to heaven.

Molly had always been healthy, but suddenly, everything hit her at once. She became severely diabetic, had a tumor appear on her leg, and began to suffer from hip dysplasia. There was no way we could afford all the expensive treatments she needed to maintain her quality of life, and since we didn’t know exactly how old she was, chances are good that no matter how much we spent, she’d soon succumb to something age-related. No rescue groups were able to take her. So the only humane option was euthanasia.

Donnie took Molly to the vet one last time and my valiant, kind-hearted sons insisted on going with him. Zach had held Tonya as she breathed her last, and I was amazed and proud that he was brave enough to face such sadness again. I’ve only experienced euthanasia once, and found it devastating. I am such a coward compared to my sons.

Zach and Molly had a special connection, and I think that was it—that faithful spirit willing to stay with you always, til the end.

There were lots of tears that night as we mourned our loss. When it was time to feed the fish, Eli had a request.

“Mom, I want to call my fish Molly now.”

Of course, I knew that Molly’s time was short when I got the fish, but I wasn’t going to suggest Eli name her that when our dog was still with us. But when he chose the name Mary on Easter morning, I smiled inside.

“Did you know that Molly is actually an old-fashioned nickname for Mary?”

He grinned. “No, I didn’t. That’s cool, Mom.”

Tonya and Molly together again, in the fishbowl, and in heaven.

Spring seems to bring out the joy in us all. Christians celebrate a risen savior. Jews remember God’s faithfulness at Passover. Others simply celebrate the return of warm weather and the growing season.

It’s easy to understand how people throughout the ages have considered spring a miracle. Even in this age of knowledge and sophistication, most of us feel a sense of awe and reverence when the barren trees finally bud and the dead grass softens into a plush green carpet. The lovely birds have flown back to us, and their serenade draw us outdoors to soak up the sunshine that glows so warmly again.

We’ve decided to give gardening another try this summer, so we bought some flower and vegetable seeds and started them in little pots. It was amazing to hold those teensy, plain little seeds and realize the life hidden within them. It doesn’t seem possible that such a puny little thing, when buried, can become something a thousand times bigger and make more seeds of its own to continue on forever. Yet, it does. A little water, sunshine and loving care, and life takes over, expanding into what it was designed to be.

I believe that all of us are given at our creation a seed of something wonderful. And I do mean everyone; none are excluded. We must tread this dirty, tainted earth, trapped inside bodies that fail us, surrounded by weary people who often drag us down. But we all carry within a seed of something special. It should be our life’s mission to be brave enough to plant it, tend it, and let it grow.

We’ve been watching this season of American Idol, enjoying the progress these young contestants make each week, cheering them to use their gifts to the fullest. Sometimes we get to witness the moment that assurance overrides nervousness and the singer finally believes that he or she truly has what it takes to win. It’s beautiful to see a tiny bud of confidence bloom before our very eyes.

I think that’s why people enjoy shows like American Idol. We love to see ordinary people get discovered and watch the seed within them blossom. I think we were created to enjoy witnessing that.

It’s taken most of my life to be able to apply this truth to myself. I know my immediate family always believed in me, but constant beating down from others left me with a lingering self-doubt that I still battle more often than I care to admit. I hope my sons can grasp the truth of who they are while they are young, so they’ll have more time to do all they can with what they’ve got.

I can see some of the seeds tucked inside each of my sons. Zachary has a sensitive, compassionate spirit. He notices things about people that others dismiss, and is helpful and kind-hearted. He is a loyal and faithful friend.

Eli is quick-witted, verbally gifted, creative and dramatic. His imagination runs overtime, as does his energy. He wants to understand everything—now!—and is relentless in his pursuit of knowledge.

It’s too early to tell what’s hiding inside Jonah, but he is a happy, curious little cuddle-bug. I can’t wait to watch his personality fully emerge and discover who he was created to be.

All kids need to understand that they were created for greatness. I honestly believe that if more children understood that they, too, carry a seed of something wonderful, they wouldn’t turn to drugs or other destructive behaviors.

As parents, we’re the gardeners entrusted with our children’s souls, and what we find inside them might surprise us. It could be very different from what we’d have chosen for them ourselves.

Regardless, it’s our job to uncover, plant and nurture the seeds they were born with. If we do it right, one day we’ll feel much like we do today during this glorious change of seasons. We will sit back and marvel over the beauty that blossoms to bless the world.

There’s something sad about him growing up, a different kind of sadness than I’ve felt with my firstborn, Zach. My oldest son has always been an old soul, my serious child, wise beyond his years. It is heartrending that he, too, is growing at lightning speed. But something about him maturing just feels right, as if his body is finally catching up to where his mind has always been.

For heaven’s sake, Zach is only 12 but spent a few hours Tuesday night looking at apartments online, deciding where he wants to live when he moves out. So far, the Lofts at Porterdale Mill top his list. You should’ve seen him looking through online photos and asking his father about the merits of stained concrete versus hardwood flooring.

I sincerely hope that says more about Zach’s confidence in the future than about any parental failings that may have fueled his desire to get the heck out of Dodge as soon as possible.

When I took him for a haircut Thursday night, Zach spent the entire time trying to talk our friend into hiring him as a summer go-fer at her salon. He also has an employment gig lined up at a friend’s Volkswagen shop for when he turns 16. That boy is seriously planning for his future.

Eli, however, is the complete opposite. He came out of the womb laid-back and smiling. He is lighthearted, silly, impulsive and one of the happiest people I know. Planning six years ahead would never occur to him—he rarely has a plan for the next minute.

He proves that daily when it’s time to put on his shoes.

He has a bin under his bed designated for his shoes. It is bright orange so he cannot miss it. Yet Eli’s shoes rarely end up inside the bin. We often find one shoe under the coffee table and the other beside the toilet.

I don’t know how he does it, but that child can take a room from spotless to disaster area in sixty seconds flat. Most of his messes involve Legos. He is a Lego architect, constantly crafting elaborate vehicles, buildings and Bioncle figures. He also expresses his creativity in drawing and storytelling. The margins of his workbooks are filled with caricatures and doodles. And he talks all day long, about dreams he’s had or inventions he’s thought of, or how he would change the ending of the cartoon he just saw.

It’s probably a good thing he’s homeschooled, because all of that doodling and talking would no doubt keep him in trouble at school. And his inquisitiveness would drive any other teacher mad. He is his mother’s son, fascinated by etymology, asking thing such as, “Why are they called spiders, Mama?” and “Where did they get the words they use for numbers? Who decided that 4 would be called four?”

His vocabulary is beyond his years, and since he was first able to talk, people have been amused by the words he uses. His favorite pizza isn’t “yummy”—it is “extremely delicious” or “fantastic!” When his second-grade spelling lesson asks him to write a sentence using the word “went”, one expects something like, “We went to the zoo.” Eli asks for help spelling, “I went for a walk beneath the drizzling rainclouds.

He is a natural-born entertainer, the court jester of the family. Our baby Jonah is his biggest fan. Jonah’s face lights up any time Eli enters the room. He happily watches Eli do the most mundane things, such as unloading the dishwasher, because Eli chats, sings and dances his way through the chore. I hope he never loses this ability to turn the smallest tasks into something fun.

Adolescence and adulthood have a way of tarnishing the joy of ones’ youth. And I think that is the sadness I feel as my middle son moves from the little boy stage of life into the big-kid years. I don’t want anything to ever quell the lighthearted spirit he was born with.

Eli, thank you for blessing my life with your enthusiasm, curiosity and love. May the light of your happiness shine this brightly, always, wherever God leads you.

The past five months have reminded me that the differences between men and women are rarely more evident than when there’s a new baby in the house. Let’s look at a few examples of these different approaches to parenting.

Wet diaper

Mom: Changes it right away to prevent diaper rash.

Dad: Feels to see if it’s squishy. If not, it can probably last another hour or two. Doesn’t that “8 to 14 pounds” on the package signify how much the diaper can hold? If it’s not within that weight range, Daddy ain’t changing it yet.

Dirty diaper

Mom: Changes it right away to prevent diaper rash

Dad (if mom is home): Pretends not to notice the odor—or if that’s impossible, passes baby off to mom with a pleading grin and a promise to do the dishes later.

Dad (if mom isn’t home): Changes diaper at lightning speed while holding breath and trying not to gag. Makes sure to give Mom a graphically detailed account of the experience when she gets home.

Feeding

Mom: Breastfeeds or gives a bottle, enjoying the time of nurturing and wishing the baby would stay small forever.

Dad: Tries to teach baby to hold her own bottle pretty much fresh from the womb. After all, holding baby with one hand and the bottle in the other leaves Dad unable to use the remote control.

Spit-Up

Mom: Uses ever-present shoulder accessory, the burp cloth, to wipe up the mess and carefully clean off baby’s hands and face.

Dad: Grabs whatever fabric is handy—his wife’s Snuggie, grandma’s embroidered silk handkerchief, baby’s hat—and blots the mess off of his clothes before swiping it under baby’s chin.

Playtime

Mom: Presents baby with an assortment of stimulating, age-appropriate toys. She holds him in her lap, and talks gently to further his language development. She puts him in his Exersaucer or bouncy seat just long enough to fold the laundry or go to the bathroom. She nuzzles his neck after engaging him in a good game of “This Little Piggy” or “Pat-a-cake”.

Dad (if the game is on): Rotates baby from station to station, from the walker to the bouncer to the play mat, leaving her in each spot until the volume of her wailing drowns out the TV.

Dad (if nothing is on TV):  Tosses baby into the air, dangles baby from her feet, swinging her upside down like a pendulum while walking around and making robotic, mechanical noises. Baby loves it, and despite knowing baby is safe with Dad, all Mom can envision is a soft, downy skull knocking into the floor or ceiling.

Bathtime

Mom: bathes baby nightly. Those little neck folds and fists trap an awful lot of drool and spit up by the end of the day, and Mom can’t wait to give baby a good cleaning. Nothing is sweeter than nuzzling velvety baby skin that smells sweetly of baby soap and lotion. And nothing calms baby before bedtime like warm water, so reminiscent of his fetal home just a few months before.

Dad: “Didn’t we just bathe her last night?” He swears he notices no off-odor around the baby’s neck or her fists when she shoves them into his mouth. If she looks clean, isn’t that good enough? But even he can’t resist how precious the baby is after the bath, all snuggled in his arms, her smiling face peeking out of a plush, hooded towel.

Baby Crying at 3:00am

Mom: Rouses at the first peep, but pauses, hoping that Dad might wake up and handle it.

Dad: Sleeps straight through all but the loudest screams. If not, he fakes sleep until Mom gets up to handle it.

I hear that these scenarios play out at most of our friends’ homes, too. Fathers often push kids to persevere and try new things, while mothers tend to stress nurturing. Though we laugh at the differences between us, each parent brings something to the table that helps create well-rounded kids. And that’s a good thing to remember the next time the other parent is driving you crazy.

We missed celebrating Mardi Gras last week. I was getting over a wicked case of food poisoning and not up to celebrating anything besides staying out of the bathroom.

You don’t hear of a lot of people commemorating Fat Tuesday around here, unlike when we lived along the Gulf Coast. Down there it’s a huge celebration with parades and parties.

But one of my favorite things about homeschooling is teaching cultural awareness through observing different traditions. My kids ask all year when it will be time to make Mardi Gras King Cake again. Baking it takes half a day, but it’s worth it. I use rich brioche dough filled with butter, cinnamon and brown sugar, topped with vanilla glaze and the traditional green, purple and gold sugar sprinkles.

It’s a million times better than anything you can buy, so I think we’ll be having our Fat Tuesday a week late. Obviously, we aren’t giving up sugar for Lent. But I’m not sure what to sacrifice instead.

I never really heard of this Lenten season of penance when I was growing up, but I like that my kids are learning about it now. There is something powerful in observing a season of selflessness as we lead up to Easter. But the burning question is: what to give up?

I know someone who is denying herself junk food, sweets, meat, complaining, gossip and procrastinating. I wouldn’t say this to her, but it kind of makes me wonder what exactly she did all year that she now feels the need to atone for.

Perhaps she’s just more spiritually mature than I’ll ever think of being. I’d struggle to give up one of those things, much less all of them, for 40 whole days.

We should join her in giving up junk food and sweets. But then we couldn’t have our King Cake, or that amazing chocolate I bought half-price the day after Valentine’s. I know that giving up meat is a tradition during Lent, but I’m still lactating and need my protein.

Complaining and gossiping—what a happier world it would be if we all gave those up, even for just a day. A friend and I challenged each other to give up complaining for a week once. It was a very eye-opening experience, and one that I am considering again for Lent. I’m sure my family and friends would be ever so grateful if I did.

I absolutely need to give up procrastination, but I’ll need a few more days to think about that. If you could’ve seen how long I goofed off on Facebook before writing this column you’d know how serious that issue is for me.

Speaking of, I know someone who is giving up Facebook for Lent. The fact that I find that inconceivable probably means it’s something I should strongly consider.

I heard a pastor comment that we often label ourselves as being in bondage to something when perhaps all we’re really dealing with is a bad habit. They say you can break a bad habit, or acquire a good one, by doing it for 30 days consecutively.

My problem is the same as most people’s—it’s the “sticking to it for 30 days” that’s the tough part. I do well for a few days, then I forget what it is that I’m supposed to be doing. But the Lenten season is a good time to at least take a shot at self improvement.

Some suggest viewing Lent as a positive time of adding good things, instead of giving things up. I’d like to introduce one family night a week with no electronic entertainment, just quality time together. No TV, no Xbox, no—gulp!—computer. It sounds so fun to just play games, read and play together.

Hopefully I can get my technologically-addicted husband on board. Donnie says he’s already had to give up a lot, including six furlough days at work. So when I asked what he’s giving up for Lent he replied, “Giving things up.”

Think I’ll be able to convince him that a screen-free evening is adding something good to life instead of taking something away? Wish me luck.

We had to bid farewell to a friend a couple of weeks ago. Rita Scheu was a kind lady, a good neighbor, a loving mom and wife. She bravely battled breast cancer for several years before it spread beyond the point of healing.

Rita’s doctor recommended that she go to hospice last November, but she wanted to have one last Christmas at home with her family. She told no one of the doctor’s suggestion, and had her beautiful holiday at home. Three weeks later, she was gone.

I hate that I didn’t know her better.

It’s always interesting to hear how people are eulogized. It seemed that everyone at the memorial service had similar things to say about Rita: she was a loyal friend and a loving mother. She always reached out to people with a smile, and remained positive even when she was in great pain.

A young teen stood up, sobbing as he talked about how Rita spent time with him and helped him through a difficult family situation. Many mentioned the food she made for them, how she loved trying new recipes and how everything she made was delicious.

She began making soap as a way to heal her daughter’s skin problems. This little act of motherly love grew into her writing a book on the process and hosting a Yahoo group of over 1700 members worldwide. People all over the world are benefitting from the healing properties of her soap because she freely shared her knowledge with them.

Rita’s eulogy was a beautiful patchwork of simply patterned squares. She didn’t do anything particularly extravagant in her short lifetime. She didn’t amass great riches or rule a nation. She just lived a simple life of helping others, of being God’s hands of blessing to the people who crossed her path.

So many of us who live equally simple lives get so burdened in our day-to-day activities; we wonder if anything we do truly counts in the grand scheme of life. We rarely stop to ponder how the chores we do or the words we say impact those closest to us. Life feels like a mundane repetition of what we did yesterday, and the day before and the years before that. It can feel like a cycle that we’ll be repeating forever, a thankless repeating of the same actions, words and deeds.

Sometimes I feel exactly like a fat little hamster running on an exercise wheel, with no idea how to stop it or how to hop off.

And the world will tell us that what we’re doing doesn’t really matter. If you ask a woman what she does, if she works outside the home she usually mentions that job first. If you ask an at-home mom what she does, she usually says, “Oh, I’m just a mom” or uses some other phrase that diminishes the importance of her daily life.

I walked out of my church after Rita’s memorial service thinking about how it’s the little things that are now her legacy. Even if she had been rich in the ways the world defines wealth, at the end of the day, at the end of a life, what matters to people—and what they remember most—are the little acts of kindness.

It matters when you look your children in the eye and truly listen while they talk to you. It matters that you take the time to cook for a new mother or an elderly neighbor, or make your husband’s favorite meal once a week. It matters when you stop folding laundry long enough to throw a Frisbee with your kids, or play along on a video game when there are a thousand other things to do. It matters when you pause to call a hurting friend, or send an encouraging email.

It matters.

How beautiful it was to go to Rita’s service and see someone remembered simply for her love. Indeed, that is no small thing.