For my first post-semester book, I chose one that I've had around for a couple months now called Take Your Best Shot by Austin Gutwein (yep, that's the founder of Hoops of Hope) and Todd Hillard. It's a young adult book, so it was a very relaxing, quick read that left me encouraged and motivated to do something to help someone. Gutwein and Hillard encourage teenagers to take their best shot at doing something substantial for someone else, all the while weaving in Gutwein's story of how Hoops of Hope came about.

The authors did a great job of emphasizing that although this was one way of helping others, there are many more ways out there for a person to use their interests and skills to advance the Kingdom of God. Each chapter ended with a short reflection on a passage of Scripture and some kind of “put this into practice” suggestion. I think that young adults will connect with the author and be inspired to seek out what God desires for them to do, whether that be big or small.

If you're looking for a book to give a young adult this Christmas season, this would be a great one to encourage generosity and obedience to God!

Things to Do over Christmas Break + January

1. Read Thomas Nelson Reviewers book and blog about it.
2. Finish reading Benson Hines' College Ministry ebook.
3. Scrapbook Aly's life thus far.
4. Order all books for next semester.
5. Clean the refrigerator.
6. Plan a Louisville, Wilmore, Dayton roadtrip.
7. Complete financial aid stuff for Asbury.
8. Write a thank you letter for scholarship (again).
9. Do Taxes (got my copy of turbo tax in the mail!)
10. Update facebook with pictures.
11. Plan out a month worth of blog posts.
12. Read lots of sleep and nursing books.
13. Work on my collegiate/young adult ministry idea files.
14. Read all of my google reader articles that are starred.
15. Reply to every starred email (sorry to those of you who haven't gotten replies yet...)
16. Re-create by browser bookmarks.
17. Re-create my computer working space (music, pics, folders, etc.)...still need to recover from old computer.
18. Backup my new laptop.
19. Rethink the purpose of my blog and proceed accordingly.

Several have asked how Aly's sleeping has been going these past few days.

Somehow Aly has begun to sleep through the night again (my definition of this is sleeping from bedtime until 4a (8-9 hours). Anytime after 4a I will feed her, after which she falls asleep immediately and sleeps another 2-3 hours.

I've been perusing several books (I won't get to read any of them closely until my classes are done in a couple weeks), but I'm really enjoying some of the Dr. Sears stuff. The book I've been looking at closest is The Baby Sleep Book. Although I don't like some of Sears' stuff, I do like others. Particularly, they say, "trust your own instincts and make your own decisions about what is best for your individual baby and you" (5). I love how they empower the parents to make decisions based on what works best for the family, instead of saying that one certain way works best for all families.

I think we decided she's too young/sensitive to let her cry it out right now (she's 7.5 months old now). I really think it was separation anxiety at its peak-- she's starting to ease up during the day from being very clingy, so maybe we're on the downhill? Last night was a rough one- she woke up at 1a and then at 4a, wanting to be asleep SO bad, but just very restless, tossing and turning. We gave her some teething tablets, and she went back to sleep after they kicked in.

So, all this to say, I think right now we're taking it night-by-night, knowing that some will be rough due to anxiety issues or not enough food during the day or teething, but as long as we're not noticing a pattern in the times she wakes up, it seems like it's okay and probably related to external circumstances instead of an unable to self-soothe issue. We've heard her cry a little in the middle of the night, but then within a minute or two, put herself back to sleep. Hopefully this means she's learning how to sleep, but other things are just getting in her way?

I'm going to post more of my reading after Christmas!

There's big happenings going on in the Malloy family.

1. We've started potty training with Asante. It's going great. He's taken well to the "just put underwear on and see what happens" method. I'm guessing he just doesn't want to pee on his new Elmo undies :).

2. Tonight we took away the pacifier. After an hour of crying, he fell asleep. We'll see what happens when he wakes up in the middle of the night looking for it. We haven't thrown away the pacifiers though. I'm not sure what we're waiting for, but I feel more secure knowing that they are there, just in case :).

3. Today was also day one of the weaning process for Aly. I think I have a 8-week plan (ish) to stop nursing...this will put her at about 10 months. WAY longer than I ever planned. Right now we're at a bottle a day. She doesn't like it, but she'll get used to it.

Anyway, lots of changes. We figured this would be the best time...I'll be done with school in a couple weeks, so will have the time and energy to devote to these energy-consuming parenting tasks. Pray for us for patience, and the kids for flexibility! They've been rock stars so far.

Well blog friends, I need your opinions-- especially you moms and dads out there who have experience with sleep and kids!

Here's our situation. What would you do?!

Aly: Aly had been sleeping through the night, 10-12 hours without waking up, from 7 weeks - 6 months. Then, all of a sudden, she started waking up to eat once per night, which was fine. She wasn't eating the recommended amount of ounces (only 20-24 oz instead of around 30 oz), so she was probably hungry. We talked to the doctor, and he agreed. She needed that extra feeding until she started eating more during the day. Well, she has gotten up to that point AND started to eat a lot more solids (little bit 3x per day). So, hunger is definitely not an issue anymore. However, she's still waking up 2, 3, sometimes 5 times per night. This has been coupled with her being very clingy to me, and stranger anxiety.

Asante: Has been working on giving up his nap, so on days he doesnt nap, he sleeps from 6p-5:30a. On days he does, 8:00/8:30p-6:00/6:30a.

Momma: I am working on classes from 8:30p-midnight/1:00a most nights.

Dad: Gets up in the middle of the night with Aly AND gets up early most days with Asante since I'm going to bed so late.

This, as you can imagine, makes for a rough time for all of us. Both of us can't nap during the day, because Asante hasn't been taking naps, AND Aly only naps 2-3x per day, for 20-30 minutes each time.

Here's what we've been doing: If Aly doesn't go back to sleep when we go in to soothe her, Jake brings her up to me and I nurse her- she falls asleep- and then sometimes sleeps until the morning. Sometimes Jake ends up sleeping downstairs with her on the couch. I don't want to create bad habits, but, we need to sleep in order to function during the day.

I'm pretty opposed to the Crying It Out method because of Aly's personality. She's incredibly sensitive, and I refuse to allow her to cry to the point of vomiting. We've been trying the "wait 10 minutes" thing, but it's not working.

So, parents and friends, I'm soliciting advice :). What would you do in our situation?

For one of my classes, I'm to read at least 500 pages of contemporary leadership material. So, for a portion of that, I decided to pick up It by Craig Groeschel (thanks JR.- it's actually you're old book!).

There are parts I really liked about it. And parts I really disliked. But, the prayer at the end that Craig leaves the reader with is excellent, and a prayer that I want to pray for myself and for my community. Here it is:

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.
May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression, and the exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.
May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, and starvation, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy.
And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.


Amen.

Jake substitute teaches for the local school district, and on MWF he teaches math at a private school in town, so he's unable to sub. On these days, however, they (the automated system) beckon him to come work. Surprisingly, or maybe not so surprisingly, the jobs that are left unfilled are almost all special education jobs. As I've watched the job list update, as soon as a non-special ed job comes up, it's gone within minutes. But the special ed job remains.

What does this say about society? And since a lot of substitute teachers are young people/those in college, what does this say about those entering the workforce, my peers?

I'm learning that my biggest leadership challenge will be my emotions.

Not letting them get the best of me.
Not letting them immobilize me.
Not letting them manifest as physical ailments.
Not letting them get me to lose hope.

This is what could take me out of the game later on. So I need my community to gently help me to see and work through things when those circumstances come.