Most of the time I am grateful for how far God has brought me and how much he changed me for better. 

But there are times, better said days and weeks, when I fall into a hole full of self-pity, “not-enough” feelings and “this is hard” thoughts.

I love being a mom and I’m thankful I get to be a mom. Doing life with kids is more fulfilling and joyous than I’ve ever dreamed of. Mom life requires more patience than your first 20 years of life together, more belly laughs than all the pasta ever eaten, the ability to squat to your kids eye level so they can show you how to sneeze (in your eyeballs) and you get the sloppiest kisses just when you were about to scream your lungs out. 

Being a mom is building me up and tearing me down. It’s making me feel like I’m flying but also keeps my feet grounded.

Let me explain..  

Last week Joshua said a new word: AUTO! It’s been years since he said a new word. I was thrilled and in the Ikea parking lot almost screaming of joy that my kid just said a new word. Of course I saw the people looking. But I wanted to let the whole world know that Joshua just said a new word. That was my flying moment. 

And the moment when I felt teared down this week was when I realised that I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to actually have a normal conversation with him. A conversation where he’ll answer back in full sentences. 

Joshua has so much to say and so much to recount. One of the saddest things is when he is trying to tell me something through sigh language or his own signs and I don’t understand him. If you could see the disappointment and sadness in his eyes.. It’s pure heartbreak.  

You got a glimpse into the rollercoaster of emotions that I go through.

Realising that I tend to complain to my husband, sometimes I feel the Holy Spirit reminding me to stop. To stop looking so much on the hard side of motherhood and come to the Lord with a grateful heart. With thankfulness in my heart and willingness to let the Lord shape me and make me a better version of myself each day. Doing the hard work when nobody is looking with a mind set on serving like I would serve Jesus doesn’t come flowing in when the road is so bumpy. 

I think that everyone is in a battle we know nothing about. Everyone is struggling in some area. You’ll never catch me saying that my battle is harder than yours simply because one of my kids has different needs.  Life is hard on most of the people and when we each get a new day, we get the chance to decide how we’re gonna spent it.

I can see how my days are so different when I choose to give thanks to the Lord. I discovered that counting my blessings is the key to thankful heart and attitude. I don’t tend to complain as much or to only see the empty side of the glass when my mind and heart are busy giving thanks to the Lord.  

So today again, I choose to be thankful, thankful for the new word my Joshua is able to say and I refuse to let the devil fill me with grief of what might not ever happen. 

What do you have to be thankful for? Did you count your blessings today?

love, Daria

Today I’m writing about why we decided to give our kids an allowance and how we do it.

I’ve searched the internet up and down and there was no method that I was all in for. There was always something that I didn’t like and didn’t want to add to our plan. So I made our own model and picked just the things that work for us and left everything behind.

If you are thinking of starting an allowance plan, I encourage you to add or take down the things that make the plan work best for you and your kiddos. 

We just want to help our kids get a sense of reality on how money works and that sometimes we have to wait and save a long time for what we want. 

We think that teaching kids about money its important because they’ll have to work with/for money when they grow up and teaching them young it’s better than regret it later.

You know how kids always want toys and everything they see at the store? Jason wanted soo many things and he was begging for so many toys all the time! That’s when I felt like we need to give him an allowance and help him understand a little bit on how money works.

He receives his allowance and doesn’t get toys or stuff when we go shopping. Since then he only receives toys on Easter, Christmas, children’s day and his birthday. But he can use his own money to buy toys. Everything else that he needs its more than covered!

Jason got his first allowance when he was about 5 or 6 years old. 

Here is our method:

We have 3 jars for him : money to spend jar, savings jar and tithe jar.

Jason was 6 years old – he got 6 euros /month  plus 25c for every chore that he wanted to do. 

Chores that we felt like he can do and are safe for his age. The amount he receives each month changes accordingly to his age. Now he is 9 years old so he gets 9 euros every month plus everything else he earns through chores. Now he receives 50c /chore because he is capable of doing chores very well and are more age appropriate.

(His age is the amount of money he gets every month regardless if he does chores or not.)

I wrote down every time he did chores and at the end of the month he gets all his money.

Together we then calculated 10% for the tithe jar, 10% for the savings jar and the rest went in the money to spend jar. 

We think its a great amount of money for him because that way he needs to think carefully what he really wants to buy, there’s no mountain of toys coming in every month and he learned to save his money for that special toy he wants so bad. 

These are the first toys he saved up for GraviTrax and Disney Rally. He still plays with them and is still happy with his purchase. He was so proud of himself for buying himself something.

I remember that 8 of our family members from Romania came to visit us and celebrate Jason’s birthday and he prepared a concert and asked money for the entrance ticket  :)) He is not joking around, he knows how to make money :)) 

He also receives from grandparents and other family members money now and then so he always gets excited to add to his jars. 

((Another thing that we realized is that he is a little entrepreneur. Having an allowance made him think how else could he earn money? He started asking to make a Limonade stand in summer in front of the house or hot chocolate stand in the winter. ))  

In the tithe jar goes the money that he’ll give at our church when its full. 

In the savings money jar goes the money that he’ll use in case he’s got an emergency We just think this is good habit for him to learn and keep it for when he is older. 

The way I explained this to him is: Jason, imagine you are 18 years old and have a car and your car breaks down. That’s when you go to your savings jar and pay for the reparations. That way you don’t get in debt and you are able to pay with your own money for your car.

The money to spend jar is just what it sounds like.. he can spend it on anything he likes but he still needs our approval because not everything is safe. But you’ll be surprised to see how he calculates how much money he needs for that wanted toy and doesn’t spend his money on junk toys! 

It’s incredible to see him think twice before making a purchase and takes much better care of the toys that he already has. 

Can I just tell you how much easier it is to not get overwhelmed with the amount of toys that would normally come in on the regular? It’s the best!! 

He doesn’t do a lot of chores/ month. Some months he does none! So he also doesn’t buy that many toys :)) that’s a win win situation, right? :))

Do you give your kids an allowance? If yes, would you please tell me your plan in the comments?

Would love to see your point of view!

Have a great day!!

XO Daria

I did not believe a thing the doctors were saying. I kept telling the doctors, that Joshua would just need to come home and be with his family – get used to life out of womb. And that maybe he is just a quiet, sweet baby.

They told us that we needed to go with him to a genetic consultation and gave us an appointment approx. 4 months after his birth. It was a cold December day, and we took Joshua to that special clinic.

Everything felt to me so cold and I just wanted to be at home with my boy. I have had enough from doctors and everyone telling me, that my boy was suspected on Prader Willi Syndrome. I did not want to believe it. I could see all the symptoms, but still waited on God to do his magic on Joshua.
I always trusted in him and he always got me through anything, life brought into my way so far.

And I knew, that if I would just believe it with all my heart and pray with all my heart, then it´s like done. Then Joshua would be a normal and healthy boy.
So to me there was no way Joshua had PWS (Prader Willi Syndrome).

We went home and read on the internet way too much and way too many extreme case stories of PWS. We were already in shock after seeing that Joshua had almost every symptom of this (for us) terrifying syndrome.

Dark months settled in and dark thoughts and depression were my companions.

I am and will always be so thankful to anyone who prayed for us during that time – when I couldn’t pray and when I had no strength to say a word to God. It made such a difference and I know that God heard your prayers!

Another 4-5 months passed by and we received THE call. A doctor called and said „I´m sorry, the results came back positive: Joshua has Prader Willi Syndrome “. I felt like God disappointed me. He let me down. He didn’t step in like I thought he was going to. How could he do this to me? How could he let this happen to me, to my baby? For a long time after that, my heart was hardened, and I was so careful with trusting God. I mean, he disappointed me big time already. I was not going to trust him so easily again.

Broken hearted, scared and without hope on the horizon, HE still loved me. He still had hope for me. He still saw value in me. He still looked at me and called me precious – even if I felt like I could no longer trust him or give him my heart. I fully intended to protect myself by building walls around me, so no one could reach my heart again. I desperately wanted to be so safe, that nothing could ever hurt me again.

I have no idea how and when, but God was slowly and surely tearing down the walls, that I was trying to put up and showed me who He is. That is who my God is. His love is unconditional, and He made me get up without fear of the future! He gave me strength each day. He held me in His arms and didn’t let go until I was done crying each time. He was there all along, even if I didn’t always feel him. He was there, when I sang my heart out to Him, praising Him and He worked miracles in my heart. He healed my bleeding heart and turned my life around.

He made a new path for me to walk on. He was the light in my darkness.

I was mourning the boy I thought I was going to have, the life I thought we were going to spent together. The plans I had for us were all gone. Somedays I still mourn, but differently. Those hard days when I’ve been trying too much, to keep things together by myself, are the days when I long after a normal life. I don’t know, if this will ever change, but I’m just being honest with how it is and was.

You might read these last lines and think „Girl, you have the sweetest boy, why did you want someone else?“. Like most people, I didn’t think for a second, that my baby would be severely disabled and that our life would change so much from his birth on. I dreamed of going home with- him and do all the things I used to do with Jason, with Joshua, too.

Now don’t get me wrong: I would never want to exchange my Joshua. God gave me another perfect boy! But I felt like he was broken in the beginning and I did ask God to heal him and „repair“ him. I definitely was not blind, and I could see that he was not thriving and so many things just didn´t add up.

Somewhere along the way, I realized that there was no reason to ask God to repair my Joshua. If God made him this way, I was going to love him and be by his side for as long as he needs me. My definition of a “perfect child” wasn´t God´s definition as well.

See, I had my plans about how our life should look like and how things are supposed to work out, but I am pretty sure, God laughed out loud, when he heard my tiny plans. Because I am more than sure, that His plans are an infinite time better and bigger. By the way, I believe, that his plans work for our good, even if it feels like the end of the world. I am done doing plans, about what I want. I live for Him and I trust Him that He knows what he’s doing.

It’s hard to humble myself sometimes, as I am a very stubborn woman and have very strong opinions, but it’s the best feeling ever, to know that I am in His hands and that I am doing what He calls me to do. There is such a joy and fulfillment in doing, what He calls you to do!

Love, 

Daria

I want to start by telling a little part of my story, about when Joshua was born and I´m gonna do my best to keep it short- ish

It all started while I was pregnant with Joshua. The doctor told me, that I had a little too much amniotic fluid, but there is no need to worry. He said, that there are many potential reasons for this, but without any testing, there would be no certainty as to why or what. 

(The picture below was taken 9 days before Joshua’s birth)

The time came and Joshua was born. He was as fast as a rocket. In 19 minutes he made a flash appearance and didn’t really cry. He just made a little bit of noise. 

He was a tiny baby, who looked like only 33 weeks old. It seemed like he was just too young to be born already. His feet and hands, his nose and mouth were blue and his ears were flat and „glued“ to his head.

The first day flew by without Joshua crying or giving signals that he was hungry. I tried to latch him, but without any success. The nurses were very kind and were ready to help with anything. But nothing worked and we tried to give him the bottle. He was still not sucking and not crying. 

You know how some babies are so tired to suck in the beginning that and they take a bottle and they’re good? Joshua was not like that. He was floppy, not crying, not really moving a lot and was sleeping most of the time. 

On the 2nd day, one of the nurses couldn’t really tell just from looking at him if he was breathing or not. So she put a monitor (pulsoxymeter) to be sure, he was getting enough oxygen. And he was not… So after a couple of days we were transferred to a different section of the hospital for a closer observation. Joshua was getting worse each day. His monitor kept giving us alarms, that he would not receive enough oxygen and I kept blowing air in his face,because I did not want him being taken to NICU. 

One very late night the doctor and the nurses came in our room and told us, that he needs to go to NICU, because Joshua was getting worse and they were not able anymore to help him there.

That was my nightmare coming true.  I had this feeling, that they are taking my baby away. And I knew that Joshua needed help, but I couldn’t escape the pain in my heart I was facing. 

At NICU he received a feeding tube and was put in a warm bed 24/7, because he couldn’t keep his body temperature by himself and therefore  was always freezing. 

And to my surprise, he was the „biggest“ kid on that NICU. And he never fussed or cried about anything. I learned fast how to feed him through that feeding tube and anything else, that was needed to do, because I wanted to take him home as fast as possible.

The day he was brought to NICU, I had to leave the hospital since I myself was doing physically well. So they could no longer let me stay. That means that I had to sleep at home.

So I drove back home. Alone, without Joshua. It felt like I was in a movie and all the bad things were happening to me. It was heartbreaking to go home without my baby. My elderly neighbor was on the street when I arrived. When she saw me she started crying with me. I’ll never forget her.

We never imagine something like that happening to us, right? 

Well – it did. And it felt like the whole world was moving on, but me. I didn’t know how to continue with my life or how to put one foot in front of the other.

One of the things, that was also hard to understand, was why is my husband accepting everything so easily and why isn’t he heartbroken like me?

I was even mad at him, because it felt like he was not taking things as serious as I thought he needed to. But we processed things very different. While I got very emotional, he took a step back to calmly look at everything going on, so he could get the bigger picture. 

It took me a while to understand that. 

Now, I wanted to point this out, because I hear from so many mamas in the same situation as we were and many of them go through the same things as we did. 

One of the spouses always has a harder time accepting everything and is more emotional than the other. I’ve been there, too and if I could tell myself something back then it would be: just try to be as understanding as you can and give each other grace every day because we all need it so much. Don’t think that your spouse doesn’t care as much as you do just because he/she doesn’t process things like you do or that he/she is not that emotional as you are. 

Part 2 coming soon! 

Hi!  I’m Daria, the heart behind this blog. 

I’m pretty loud and very bad at jokes, but I keep trying.  My husband thinks I should stop 

I was born and raised in Romania (beautiful country) and after getting married,  I moved to Germany.

I’m  living in a small city/village with my husband and best friend Marco and our two littles, Jason + Joshua – my adventurous,  heart melting boys who never stop saying my name.

I am a stay at home mom and I’m loving it!  

After our son Joshua was born with Prader Willi Syndrome, a rare genetic disorder, I felt more and more called to share our journey, the milestones and the failures, the heart breaking times, the celebrations and the ordinary stuff we go through. 

I aim to inspire, encourage and when possible amuse you and let God do the rest. Also, I want to use my mom-lifestyle blog as my little place where I can openly share my journey through motherhood, my faith, my favorite stuff and places. 

So pour yourself a cup of coffee, 

I hope you enjoy and stay a while!

XX