Finish Something.

That's my pep talk to myself today. 

After suffering with a 48 hour Bubonic Plague-like vomit virus, my house looks like a bomb went off. My dining room table has a halfway finished basket of clothes on top of it, approximately 13 items of clothing that happened to get folded yesterday, along with two opened and spilled boxes of PlayDoh supplies. (Thanks to my pushed-to-the-last-minute Mother's Day craft.)

My breakfast nook table isn't any better. Gulp. There are four semi-eaten, quickly congealing bowls of oatmeal perched atop it along with the other half of our Mother's Day project. My sink is overflowing, my countertops are barely visible and there is a pile of towels waiting to be washed that's as tall as I am. There are more clothes in the washer, more in the dryer and even more in the dirty laundry hampers. 

My poor husband, bless his heart, walked through our living room last night and declared it a disaster zone. We worked to pick up most of the insanity, but in a mere two hours this morning (Thanks in large part to very early wake times from ALL THREE of the kids.) our task appears to have been done in vain. 

There are toys and train tracks and tiny scraps of paper EVERYWHERE. Yay for patterned cutting scissors! (NOT.) There is not a single area of my house that is tidy. Clutter is like visual noise to me and the current state of things is driving me crazy and making me itch. It's overwhelming and over stimulating and I just threw up in my mouth a little. 

I wish was able to handle messes and piles and stacks of things, I really do. It's humbling because I realize that there are times God uses chaos to teach me to relax and rely on Him for contentment instead of seeking peace from a well vacuumed rug and neatly stacked bookshelves. SO I UNDERSTAND THE POOL OF HYPOCRISY I AM CURRENTLY STANDING KNEE DEEP IN. 

And it'd be easy for me to run around, putting out tiny fires of clutter all day and not really accomplish anything by 6pm tonight. I could huff and puff through my rooms, flitting from one incomplete chore to the next, starting all sorts of tasks but not finishing any them. But, if I really want to make progress, if I really want to get things done, I need to FINISH SOMETHING. Anything. 

Empty the dishwasher. Put the stacks of clothes away. Take out the recycling. File the mail. Clear off the breakfast nook table and wipe it down. Put the cast iron pans back into the oven for storage. Take out the bathroom trash and replace the liner. (Or, if you're like me- use an empty WalMart bag.::wink::) These are all chores that are waiting for me plus about 392 more. 

 I can walk into a room and see at least 7 chores like these that have been started and have been left incomplete. And, when things happen like 48 straight hours of projectile vomiting, your house is going to get turned upside down like mine is now. But when the dust settles and you are successfully digesting food again, you'll have your work cut out for you like I do today. But before you get flustered and frustrated and overwhelmed with all the things that need to be done, look around at what's almost done and FINISH SOMETHING. 

You'll feel like you've accomplishes something (AND YOU HAVE!) and that will push you on to finishing more and more and more. My motto for today will be to Finish Something, so that as I walk and work and worry about all the things I have to take care of today I'll remember that progress, no matter how small it may be, is still progress. 

Thanks for stopping by, y'all. 

Now I've got to go make up for the half hour I lost writing all this. I'll start in the kitchen! ('Cause that's where the coffee is.) ~Katie. 

PMS is A Liar.

I don't hate my husband's job, but PMS can make me feel like I do. 

 My husband has a fantastic job as a Project Manager (Way to go on your recent promotion, Boo!) with a nationally based HVAC company. He works hard. REALLY HARD. Like he-doesn't-see-the-kids-for-days-at-a-time some weeks kinda busy. It can really stink sometimes. However, the flip side is that, on some other weeks, he's able to hide at his desk answering phone calls and emails while listening to the screeches and screams and school noise work from home most days so our breakfasts and lunches and prenap time snuggles get to include him some, too. 

And y'all, most weeks I'm fine with his hectic schedule. I can roll with the punches and dig in deep to do the afternoons and evenings and suppers and bathtub water fights and teeth flossing and Bible reading and all the rest of our seemingly endless nighttime routine by myself. (How many times do I have to keep going into bedrooms before I turn into a zombie?? I do not know, but the current count is approximately 73.) I can survive it, mostly, with a can-do attitude and a few extra cups of coffee and not grumble too much. Bless.

BUT THERE IS ONE WEEK(ish) A MONTH WHEN I CAN NOT EVEN DEAL. Every late night is a personal attack. Every interrupted meal is a targeted insult. Every phone call from a job site wounds. The chip on my shoulder grows larger and my resentments build. I become moody and temperamental and extremely self centered. Gulp.

And it's not just my husband working late. PMS makes me believe that my kids are villains and my house is one step away from being declared a hazardous waste zone. I clean and scrub and still never feel like I accomplish anything. My pants are too tight and my fuse is too short. I storm through the days feeling irritable and vulnerable. I bark orders and pick fights over trivial things like forgotten coffee cups and misplaced marker caps and towels that don't get hung back on their hooks. I'm a 100% hot mess. And it ain't pretty, I'll admit it.

I can feel myself over reacting, and in the deepest part of my heart I know I'm wrong to do it, but the bigger, louder voice spoken by my hormones is sometimes too strong to withstand. So I snap! I harangue the kids and hassle my husband and hate myself while doing it. It's a vicious cycle of self pity and victimization and irritation and lost tempers and guilty consciences. 

Hormones are a beast, y'all. I've changed my lifestyle and eating habits and started taking some supplements that have helped me tackle these mood wrecking monsters TREMENDOUSLY. I feel better now than I ever have, but I still have to work to keep my guard up. PMS may try to convince me that I hate my life, but I've been given far too many blessings to allow myself to believe it. 

My husband is gearing up to face some long, tough days in the next week or so and it'll come just around the same time that I'll be looking to fight some long, tough days of my own. I'll survive by straight up coasting through some days, loosening the reigns of my clean freak/control freak nature, making tons of skinny chocolate and brewing loads of coffee. And I'll make myself go back and re-read this post to remind me that the world doesn't revolve around my monthly calendar.

PMS can make me feel like a victim BUT PMS IS A BIG, FAT LIAR. So there.

When I Burned A Lasagna For Jesus

It's true confession time, y'all. I was peeling potatoes just now for our church's Friend's Day potluck tomorrow afternoon (SHAMELESS PLUG, if you're in or around Gulf Breeze, Florida tomorrow morning around 9:30 and want to join us you definitely should. Our pew is huge and we would LOVE to shuffle down for you. My crew stations up in the back and we are the rowdiest bunch of kids and constantly shushing adults in the entire place. Come as you are- because you'll fit right in with me and my husband and our rowdy hoodlums.) when I remembered back about a decade ago when I brought one of my first casserole dishes to a Dinner-on-the-Grounds. 

It was a badly burned lasagna.  

I was a newlywed so y'all can cut me a little slack. I shopped and chopped and assembled my sweet little pasta dish and then somehow after what was probably like 2.5 hours in a 550° oven, it came out looking like one of those "This is your brain on drugs." commercials. Bless my heart, I was so crestfallen. I may have cried. Nothing takes the wind out of a new wife's sails faster than a charred casserole dish. True story. It's depressing.

I was broken hearted, but we were running behind so I shoved it into my Corningware insulated carrier and dashed out the door. We made it to the building and I placed my humble offering at the verrrrrrrrry end of the serving table while I prayed no one would see and connect me to the disasterous dish I was setting down. 

Bible class and worship ended and the meal began. I made my way through the line and when I finally got to my dish I saw that there had been a few brave, sweet souls that had taken a few scoops of my charcoaled cheese extravaganza. I breathed a little sigh of relief, and found a seat to eat...right next to someone with a blackened scoop of my lasagna on their plate. Criminals under interrogation have sweated less than I did through that meal. My victim did take one small bite and then just sort of pushed the rest to the edge of his plate. (I couldn't blame him. I took some, but it was more out of guilt and obligation. And it really was terrible.) 

As everybody cleaned up, I collected my nearly full pan of untouched lasagna and smuggled it out of that fellowship hall. I was the 007 of church potlucks that day, y'all. The next time a Dinner-on-the-Grounds rolled around, I tried again and was much more successful. Thank heavens. 

THANK HEAVENS.

Looking back, I'm glad I took a chance and burned that lasagna. I'm glad I took that leap out of my comfort zone and tried to do something that was new and hard for me. It took work, and loads more mistakes happened between then and now, but I believe who I am today is because of the effort I started to put forth back then. 

So if you're intimidated by something, let me encourage you with my humble and rocky and awful tasting beginnings. Go ahead! Burn a lasagna of your own! Bring a disgusting looking dish to a potluck. Sew some pathetic looking napkins. Plant tomatoes that die in a month. Paint your bedroom a horrible shade of green. Read a book with a terrible ending. Cut your hair. Cut your kid's hair. Cut up your credit cards. 

Just take a leap. Take a chance. TRY SOMETHING NEW. You'll look back at yourself in a decade or so and laugh and be an even better version of yourself. You'll absolutely screw things up but you'll be happier because of it. I promise. Or maybe that's just me. But I don't think so. ::wink::

Thanks for stopping by y'all, Katie. 

The Hamster Wheel

Because OH MY MERCY am I the only one who feels like they're trapped inside a rotating wheel of activity and insanity and laundry that's never ending?? 

My life is a hamster wheel. 

I wake up, jump on and start spinning. I keep the same routine with the same people in the same places every.single.day. 

My kids emerge from their rooms each morning bright eyed and optimistic for the start of a fresh new day. (Or NOT. There have been days that I've straight up sent my four year old back into her bed because I do not have the brain cells avaliable to battle first-thing-in-the-morning-meltdowns-for-no-reason. HOW IS IT POSSIBLE THAT YOU FEEL THE NEED TO OPEN YOUR EYES AND IMMEDIATELY BURST INTO TEARS?? Please, tell me. These are answers I need to know. There will come a day when she will be a teenager who will want to sleep late and I WILL THEN REJOICE WITH THE ANGELS because my Josie is not a morning person. Bless.) 

We sit on the same couch and read from the same Bible and pray in the same way. We eat breakfast in the same kitchen and play with the same toys. Their squabbles are over the same situations (because there can only be one coveted train car in a mounding pile of railroad pieces) and the skirmishes occur in the same settings. There is a superior seat at our breakfast nook table and woe be unto the two kidlets who are unable to sit there during a meal. It's like the throne of McReynolds Manor and if you're not fortunate enough to reside on it you're nothing but a peasant and will have to kiss the ring and bow before that meal's reigning occupant. Sometimes, I hate that spot and no one sits in it. 

Our days continue on, with colorful interjections throughout OF COURSE, but mostly staying within that same hamster wheel of daily life. Breakfast is fixed, lessons are taught, messes are cleaned, laundry is rotated. The same toilet in the same bathroom gets disgusting (TWO YOUNG BOYS, y'all) so the same swishing and swiping happen before it's again compromised by bad aim and blind eyes.

 I sing the same songs to put one down for a nap and drink the same life giving afternoon coffee while watching the same episode of Wild Kratts with the same two bigger kids. (I have learned some stuff about the honey badger and the peregrine falcon. ASK ME ANYTHING.) We play the same games and build the same towers and put together the same puzzles. 

Then supper is fixed in the same kitchen and bites are bargained for with the same enthusiasm and dessert is the same prize for a meal well eaten. Shout out to three animal crackers for being the bribe my kids will willingly work for while eating the delicious and home cooked meal I prepare for them nightly. It feels so good to play second fiddle to a Sam's Club bear filled with bland, vanilla flavored cookies. 

I floss the same teeth and read more from the same Bible and pray with the same people before bedtimes. There are more of the same snuggles and songs and one-more-big-kisses given before we turn off the same lights and close the same doors for the (hopefully) last time that same day. 

And then, that day ends and another begins and the wheel starts all over again. The monotony of the life phase that I'm in can be exhausting, but there's part of me that's grateful for this hamster wheel running season I'm in. 

The wheel is work. 

The wheel is activity. 

The wheel is exercise and strength and growth. 

With each day that comes, I get a new opportunity to become stronger in my weaknesses. I get fresh chances to continue to work on the parts of myself that need attention. My impatience and short tempter and pride are all brought into check daily within this hamster wheel life that I'm living. I may lose my cool and become boastful and bark orders at the kids or my husband one day, but, BECAUSE OF THE WHEEL, I get to pick myself up, examine my flaws, and strengthen my resolve to do better before I jump back on the it the following morning. 

They're still going to fight. My husband will always have jobs and work obligations that unexpectedly keep him at the office late. They will spill the same chocolate milk and fight over the same Ninja Turtle umbrella while I work on refining those same character flaws that are triggered in these repetitious situations. 

I'm grateful for the continuing opportunities to grow and change and be better that this life is giving me. Living these same days over and over and over may feel monotonous at times (because they do), but it's through the diligent, consistent, constant effort that is afforded me during this monotony that I am able to face my sin and see my flaws and target my shortcomings with clarity that only repeating the same mistakes over and over and over again can give me. I'm able to really get down, dig out my sinfulness and work hard to eliminate it. I get so many repeat chances to do better because there is always going to be another opportunity to work on that same weak spot.

I get stronger everyday I run on my hamster wheel and I'm not anywhere close to being ready to jump off. I'm going to lace up my running shoes, y'all. (Figuratively, of course. I don't run. My cardio consists of taking my garbage cans to the road every week. Please don't judge.)

"Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God." -Hebrews 12:1-3

"Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win." -Paul, 1 Corinthians 9:24

I'm Not Cool Anymore. (not even a little)

I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I'm an early thirty-something homeschooling Mom with three rowdy kids up in mah house. I haven't watched cable television in YEARS. (Downton Abbey doesn't count because it's PBS. Obviously.) THERE WAS NO iPhone AROUND the last time I carried a purse that wasn't filled with diapers, wipes, stale animal crackers and 37 random broken crayons.

I went to the mall about month ago to buy jeans and left feeling like I'd visited another planet. SOMEONE ACTUALLY CALLED ME MA'AM. I've been immersed in growing babies and birthing babies and nursing babies and teaching babies so much lately that a lot of pop culture has passed me by. It's left me realizing there's a lot nowadays that I'm too old for. 

1- Trampolines. 

I had three not-at-all-tiny babies in three short years. Things have happened. Gravity is not my compadre anymore. Boom. Motherhood.

2- Less than three cups of coffee. 

I have a lot to do everyday. Jesus and coffee help me get it done. 

3- Sleeveless shirts. 

Awkward. Next.

4- Jump Roping. 

(See No. 1)

5- Movies that start after 9:30pm. 

Unless you want to watch me nap.

6- Technology. 

I own a MacBook Pro (I'm currently typing on it. Hypocrite, I know.) and I can operate approximately 1.7% of the things on it. My friend Cindy thinks I'm pathetic, and I probably am. WHAT IS THIS 'CLOUD' THEY SPEAK OF??

7- Spaghetti O's. 

I tried some of those last year and y'all- GROSS. What was 8 year old Katie thinking? Now Funyun's and chocolate milk out the jug- THAT IS A DIFFERENT STORY ALL TOGETHER. Manna from heaven.

8- Gossip. 

Seriously, nothing tears people apart and ruins friendships and isolates women faster than talking about other people. We are better than this y'all. DROP THE HABIT. I clung to it in my insecure 20's. I'm beginning my 30's with confidence in myself without dragging others down AND IT FEELS AWESOME.

9- Cheap cream cheese. 

We live on one income and I'm a master at budgeting. I can scrimp and save and stretch our grocery dollars like nobody's business. I am a store brand believer, but DO NOT EVER THINK FOR A SECOND that I'm not gonna buy Philly. Treat yo' self, y'all. 

10- Sun damage. 

A couple of summers ago I bought a gigantic, gaudy red sun hat. That thing has an SPF of 50, a 27" brim and I wear it EVERYWHERE. It's ugly and I don't.even.care. 

11- Jumping jacks. 

(See No. 1 and 4)

12- Giving up my Birkenstocks. 

Part of my newfound confidence is proudly wearing my decades old Birks with everything. Florida only gets like 2 months of too-cold-for-flip-flops weather and my Birks have never let me down. Hooray for rocking feet that look like baked potatoes! 

13- Hip slang.

Because what on Earth does 'on fleek' mean?? Why should my eyebrows aspire to attain this description? Someone, help me. I'm lost. I'm thisclose to opening a permanent Urban Dictonary tab on my Safari browser- IF I ONLY KNEW HOW. (see No. 6)

Y'all, I'm sure that I'll think of other things to add to this list but for now, HERE SHE IS. I'm officially uncool, unhip and completely out of sync. I'm about two weeks from perming my hair, teasing my bangs into a curly donut forehead crown, throwing on a denim jumper (hold on- I think those are back in style now. WHAT IS HAPPENING TO THE WORLD??!) and completely transitioning to the stereotypical homeschool Mom persona. 

Or maybe not. ::wink::

Whatever I decide, thanks for stopping by y'all. I'm gonna go pour myself some more coffee and get ready to start my day. I won't hit my 3 cup minimum today by just sitting around here typing. Be blessed and bless someone else! 

Defenseless.

I heard it before I saw it- and I knew it was going to be bad.

I was in my room when the noise of the crash reached my ears and I immediately knew who the culprit was: my oldest, Luke. 

When I turned the corner into my dining room, I saw just exactly what I feared I would: 5,723 seed needs scattered on the floor, an empty bead box amid them and a petrified little boy staring up at me with fear in his eyes. "I-I-I-I'm so sorry, Momma. I was just tryin' to put it back on that shelf and I dropped it. Please don't be mad with me, I'm sooooooorry." 

AND HE SHOULD BE SORRY.

You see, I'd only just told him that he wasn't supposed to be carrying that box around. I'd only just reminded him that there were drawers in our school supply bookcase that were off limits to him.(For the like 47th time. Grrr.) I'd only just shooed him out of that room and away to play with other things because I'd only just finished vacuuming in between and behind and around and underneath every single one of my dining room chairs in preparation for his sister Josie's 4th birthday party. Because there ain't no cleaning like the cleaning you do before your Mom comes to visit. AmIright??

I walked away, into my bedroom to put clothes away when I heard the scattering crash and knew exactly what it meant: a mess. A large, wildly scattered, enormously aggravating task was going to await me in the one room that had just been freshly cleaned. WHY DOES IT ALWAYS HAPPEN IN THE CLEAN ROOMS?? Mopping my kitchen is the No. 1 surefire way to guarantee that someone will spill milk or apple juice or an my entire 3lb. can of coffee onto the floor. And also y'all, those tiny seed beads can really travel. I'm pretty sure I found a few in my front ditch like a week after this happened. 

I stood there, in my formerly cleaned up, straightened up, everything-has-finally-been-put-back-in-it's-place dining room and my ears were ROARING. I felt my blood pressure rising by the second and my mind raced. I wanted to scream. Cry. Pout. Collapse. I'd been working on school in the mornings all that week and birthday party preparations during all the afternoons. I'd become busy and bothered and burned out. Seeing those teeny, tiny beads spread out like my last shred of fortitude, I knew this was it. The end. The nail on the coffin of my patience. The last chapter in the book titled: The Day I Shaved My Own Head In Despair. 

Only, it wasn't. I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream. And shout. And pout and shake and wallow in a big ol' pool of self pity. I wanted to yell. To scream. To holler at Luke for making a gigantic mess in my freshly cleaned room. But I didn't. Somehow, some way, some strange thing kept me together that afternoon. Kept me from falling apart and losing my temper and behaving in a way that I would have soon regretted. (Nothing is more humbling than having to ask your kids to forgive you for losing your temper. Trust me. I've done it before. Like 4,719 times.) 

Just that week, as I was finishing my daily Bible study in the date's corresponding chapter in Proverbs, I'd run across a verse that cut me to the quick. It punched me in the face and stuck out to me because I'm guilty. And ashamed. And defenseless. I've fallen in love with it and it's become a sort of "Mom-tra" that I've started clinging to. 

"Like a city that is broken into and without walls is a woman who has no control over her spirit." -Solomon, Proverbs 25:28 (gender changes mine, obviously.) 

I surveyed the mess and got to work. Out came the vacuum and dust pan and tiny broom that my kids love using. Luke and I talked, and instead of over reacting I was able to address the situation calmly and without losing my temper. (This may have been the first time that's happened y'all because I can sometimes have a flair for the dramatics. SHOCKING, I KNOW.) We worked together and the mess was cleaned up much quicker than I'd anticipated. We came away from the situation with cool heads, tear free faces and new lessons learned. 

That verse has taught me so much about how losing control of my spirit- my temper, my frustrations, my anger and my patience- about how allowing those to reign unconquered within myself is actually breaking me down and exposing me to attack. When I lose my temper and raise my voice at the kids, it becomes easier and easier to let it happen again. And again. And again. My fuse gets shorter, my patience thinner and my walls are weakened every time I snap. The more I yell, the harder I fall until one day, there will be nothing left to stop my anger and I'll be consumed by it. I'll be sitting around screaming "SERENITY NOW!" at the top of my lungs like a lunatic.

Controlling my spirit and asking God to abide with me as I navigate trying times helps me to rebuild my defenses. Taking time to begin my day in prayer and study and casting myself down before His throne allows me to let Him provide the brick and mortar that will be a wall and shield for me instead of trying to do it on my own. When He builds my walls they are hard to tear down. When I do, they crumble immediately. 

And when I think about it that way, the answer is simple. I need Him. 

I need Him every.single.day. 

Or I'm defenseless. 

It's Official. I Am Jessie Spano.

Y'all. I really am.  

For all the people and all the pets and all the lesson plans and all the dishes and all the laundry and all the urine soaked clothes (BECAUSE POTTY TRAINING NEVER ENDS, y'all.) and all the things that need my attention every.single.day- there really isn't enough time for me to successfully and completely take care of them all. There just isn't. 

A friend asked me yesterday if everything was OK because she hadn't heard from me in a while. I met up with another friend at the park just last week for the first time in MONTHS. I have had plans to take the kids to story time at our local library since 2014. I am becoming a professional plan maker/canceler. It's almost a gift.

It's funny, this season of life I'm in. I'm the busiest I can ever remember being, but I accomplish almost nothing of consequence at the end of every day. (Unless you count keeping all three kids and the dog and the cat alive for 18+ hours. Which, on some days, I DO.) There are lesson plans that get pushed back and towels that get tumbled for the fourteenth time and there is currently a basket of socks sitting on the floor of my bedroom that have been there since LAST Tuesday. 
Sorry, Mom. I know I was raised better. 

I've heard the adage quoted to Moms like me who are feeling stretched too thin: "Just remember, God won't give you more than you can handle." ::cue my respectful and internal eye roll:: I know what they are saying, and I can appreciate the loving place they are coming from, because I too believe that God will never crush me helplessly beneath the stresses of my life. What I have to take issue with is the presumptive place a phrase like that puts me in. It's almost saying that by being overwhelmed and overworked and overtired, I'm discounting my faith or that it's not strong enough to carry me through. 

Ummm. NO. 

When people remind me that 'God won't give me more than I can handle', it can feel as if my faith is cheapened. As if to say that if I'd have a stronger faith, then everything would come up roses and I'd never burn supper or forget to pay the water bill or have three kids turn a sofa, four pillows and a dog bed into a trampoline-gym-set-bonanzaville. And y'all, this is where I have see a difference within that phrase. While I agree that God will never give me more than I can handle, I do believe He will sometimes give me more than I think I can. Do you see the difference there? 

I think that's the sometimes unseen benefit of the humility motherhood gives me. When the days are easy and the laundry gets folded while it's still warm and the kids act like angels- I BEGIN TO BELIEVE I CAN DO IT ON MY OWN. I get my act together, I vacuum my floors and scrub my toilets and teach my lessons and go to bed feeling rather smug and self satisfied. Accomplishing tasks and having a freshly mopped kitchen floor are nice and all, but when I allow completing them to take my focus off of my total dependence on Jesus- that's where the trouble starts. 

When the days are hard and the dishwasher is backlogged because I forgot to turn it on the night before (groan) and the towels sour for the second day in a row and the kids act like rabid wolverines- I BEGIN TO REALIZE I CAN NOT DO IT ON MY OWN. I fall to my knees, crawl into my closet, close the door and pray for mercy. I plead for patience and strength and forgiveness and can even still go to bed feeling drained and incomplete. Falling apart, losing my temper and having to face the emptiness that can reside at the core of my being is sometimes just what I need to remember how much I really require Jesus to complete me. 

So, during this Jessie Spano season I'm in- I'll still work hard, but I'll rest assured knowing that even on the days that I feel like a failure, there's still a blessing to be found within them. (And I'll try to get the kids to story time at our library sometime before 2017.)