At Dinner

   
On a whim, I typed “dinner out with Brian” on our merged calendars one Thursday night.

So we sat across from each other, next to the cozy fireplace in our town’s Famous Barbeque restaurant, I feverishly working to find meals for us that weren’t full of sugar, gluten, or dairy.  And were reasonably priced.  This barbecue restaurant wasn’t cooperating with my economically healthy food desires.

Brian humored me by going along with this food plan, but I was starting to sweat guilt that he wouldn’t get to enjoy his sweet ribs and coleslaw.

After my hundredth fretting question to him, he grabbed my hands and looked me straight in the eyes.  “This isn’t about the food.  It’s about being with you.”

What do you say to that except “oh?" And sigh in relief.

This is what God says to each of us, actually.  To you, specifically.

He’s not looking for anything from you. He truly wants to know you, to be with you.  Rest in that with me, yes?

Sounds of Childhood

I asked the Lord the other morning, during our breakfast prayer, to help us see the gifts He gives us throughout the day.  Gifts we wouldn't notice, or maybe not even consider as gifts.

The morning flurry followed, and soon Raleigh was playing the piano and Dawson was playing the violin and Timmy decided I needed to play Deep Blue Sea with him.

So we sat down and I began.  Timothy's voice interrupted me..."no, we can't play it until Dawsy stops his violin.  I want to be able to hear the fishies splash."

We played, and the fishies not only splashed but sang "fiddledeedee" and the butterfly and parrot flew away.

Tonight that same little boy came into my bedroom saying he couldn't sleep because the dinosaurs were being too loud.  His new comforter and sham have dinosaurs on them, and the sham he was trying to sleep on was apparently  full of non-tired dinosaurs.

These are my gifts, the sounds of childhood.  How easily I shut my ears to them, busy with tasks and thoughts and struggles.

But the sound of fishies splashing and dinosaurs playing are waiting, beckoning me to notice.

Snails, Cockroaches, and Fashion

I apologize this blog is not about Christmas.  Except that part of Christmas is reveling in the now.  This is my now.

Timothy is a snail-lover.   There is a rookery (I'm not sure what snail hatching areas are called) on the north side of our house.  The kids get snails for Timothy and keep them in a container in his room.  The other day they decided to play hide-and-seek with them.  Of course they got bored or distracted or something and this is where I found one while doing the laundry.

We celebrated Raleigh's tenth birthday last week.  We encourage the kids to get gifts for the birthday person.  Unfortunately Conner came up with an idea that still leaves me scratching my head.

Conner had seen Raleigh find great joy in catching a large cockroach when they were visiting family in Mississippi.  So he wanted to get him some for his tenth birthday.  My husband couched it in terms such as: "I want to encourage his heart of giving."

Now just last month my dear friend blogged on the adorable puppy they got their seven year-old for his birthday.  Not I.

I, on the other hand, possess cockroaches.  Two giant, will-get-four-times-the-size-cat-food-and-scrap-eating hissing cockroaches.

The only consolation is that the woman at the exotic pet store wouldn't sell the females because she's getting low.  I really hope she knows how to tell the difference.

A man at church asked how their mom felt about possessing cockroaches as pets.
Conner told him that I did admit their backs were a pretty combination of colors.

Our cats are gray and brown, the snails are gray and brown, and the cockroaches as well, though they mostly have black and brown.

I'm glad fashion has recently decided that gray and brown are good together.  Now a lot of my old clothes are getting a new lift as I pair different things together.  I felt like a wild rebel wearing my brown slacks with a gray and navy cardigan to church on Sunday.

Watch out, Mom, next it's going to be black and navy, though I hope I don't have any pets to match.

The Eight-Year-Old

I read something written in passing.   The author was making a completely different point, but something on the way struck me.  She said she loved ten year-olds; the way they act, think, look at life.

Ever since then I've been thinking of my children with that vocabulary: the three year-old, the eleven year-old, etc...

I remember to enjoy their stages that way.  I stop to appreciate what's going on inside them.  I consider that a stage means it will be over, often sooner than later, so I better enjoy.  Now.

I thought I'd record a little of their current stages, starting with my just-turned-eight year old.

 

Dawson is in second grade, is learning to play the violin and piano, mostly wears his Seahawks football uniform, loves building things, making things out of recyclables, finding out what makes people tick, and ticking them.

He's a great table setter and compost dumper.  He loves all things new.  If it's new, he's there to figure it out and use it until something newer comes along.  You can often find he and Raleigh together, though he loves all his siblings.

He thinks for himself and has a soft heart toward God.  I am deeply humbled and regularly flummoxed through the gift of being his mom.

Turn your head sideways and you can see a wolf howling at the moon, maybe???

I include a poem from his Pugga (Grandpa):

These days the trees release their leaves,
Then, standing bare and stark,
They prophecy of winter sky
And ice upon their bark.

But while the air is warm and fair
Let's laugh at winter's fear.
Let's jump and dash and twist and smash
In Seahawks football gear.

3 Things White

I'm liking printing off Ann Voskamp's Joy Dares each month.

Each day is a challenge to find three categories of things to be thankful for.
August first was three things white.

I like this because it forces me to be creative in my thankfulness, forces me to be intentional, too.

Three Things White

One
My brother calls in evening sunlight, slow pauses between exchanges as we communicate from Washington, USA to Papua New Guinea.  After a few minutes I realize he has something to say.  He tells me he proposed.  I say congratulations and back up....what did she say???



Her voice appears on the line and she says a laughing, joyful yes!  This girl I've prayed for the past twenty years.  She's here and I rejoice in God's faithful kindness, their story one of grace and heartache, healing and hope.  Both loving God, and in love with each other.

I look forward to early 2013, a new sister in a white dress.

Two
We ride our bikes, my boys and I, three minutes down to the Dairy Queen.  In the laundry mat next door the music blares "Eye of the Tiger" as we sit on the bench, all eight of us, and enjoy our ice cream cones.  I take my two year-old nephew to his home, just right there, too.

Never have I believed I would live near family.  Hoped, yes.  Believed, no.  Now, my sister and her family live just a ten minute walk.

I can see the whites of their eyes, live life and love them, closer than I ever dreamed.

Three
The kids visit a beautiful beach, clam with their granddaddy.  I stay behind. But Dawsy doesn't forget me.  He wraps me up a lovely shell complete with the sweetest letter.

The white shell, white paper, gift of a son and his thoughtfulness.

I am healthier and happier when I think of God's gifts, everywhere, if I just pause to see.

Puddles

May our Lord Jesus Christ himself

and God our Father,

who loved us

and by His grace gave us eternal encouragement

and good hope,

encourage your hearts

and strengthen you in every good deed and word.

1 Thessalonians 2.16,17

photos: cousins enjoying the puddles

There the angel of the LORD 

appeared to him in a flame of fire

out of a bush; he looked, and the bush

was blazing, yet it was not consumed.

Then Moses said, "I must turn aside

and look at this great sight."

Exodus 3:2-3

I'm dreading the day before the day's really begun,

so instead of marching right down to

the basement to begin our work

I propose a turn around the track.

No one argues with that, 

though getting all of us out there,

a mere thirty yards away is not without

its mishaps and crises.

Nothing is with five children ten and under.

I dread the moment that lost snake in the van

shows up while I'm zooming down I-5.

I still can't believe the cat 

survived a whole night in the freezer.

But we go on ahead, me weak and frail,

close to falling apart and yet,

the Spirit strengthening as I walk

towards the light.

We count the gourds on the plant growing wild

in the nearly dead garden.

We look at the red leaves and collect a few,

deciding we'll try to figure out what tree

it is.

We watch the funny chickens with their fluff 

growing wild.  Their friends the 

ducks are beautiful, and is that 

an egg?

No, we get a stick and find it is a snail.

We rehearse our Psalm...

"Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD,

Let us shout aloud to the rock our our salvation."

And we recite our Old Testament

books of the Bible.  Yes, 

we've just about got them all mastered.

Most of all, 

my heart has warmed.

My eyes have chosen to look

at the bushes burning,

and not at the sheep bleating.

Identity Crisis

What happens when you're the baby....

Of three amazing older brothers and a big sister just two years older?

It's all so cool, you just gotta enjoy prizes from both genders!

All Creatures Great and Small

Our children love creatures.  Once the weather warms up they seem to find no end to new pets, they continually find most of their entertainment and delight in them.

Here are some recent creatures we've enjoyed:

This is a Golden Crowned Kinglet.  It flew into our back window while half of the children were sick.  It was stunned so we brought it inside to nurse it.  Quickly it flew up to the ceiling and landed on the curtain rod.  Amazingly it hopped onto my wooden spoon and let me carry it outside.  They love pine trees, so it quickly found a place.  We had fun drawing it afterward.

Here is a baby Killdeer.  Conner walked the park for at least an hour looking for the nest.  (The mother and father birds were pretending to be injured so we knew it was somewhere.)  When Brian got home he helped them find it.  The mother nearly had a heart attack.

This is a Western Tanager.  A flock of males flew into our Rhododendron as we were eating breakfast on Mother's Day.  It was the best gift ever to watch those tropical-like birds move from tree to tree.  We always anticipate their visit here in the spring.

Here is a "cat house."  The cats were in heaven.

Trout from a fishing trip to Ice House Lake.

Dawson's Tiger Swallowtail Caterpillars he's observing for Science this month.

This amazing contraption I found on our doorstep one night.  It was made by our neighbor boy and left as a "playground" for the little snake we're keeping right now.  Snakes attract boys, and I enjoy pulling into our home finding out I cannot really pull in...there are too many bikes in the way!

Here are all the boys enjoying the snake.

Timmy dressed up during school.  Though we love creatures around here, our favorite are the highest order, the most intricately woven, purposed on the planet: people.  They fill our lives with joy and we find so much delight in being in relationships with others in this journey of life.

My neighbor's new born baby boy.

Another neighbor's surprise 85th birthday party.

It is beyond my ability to describe what a privilege and gift it is to have the opportunity to experience all God's creatures, both great and small.

Holy Moments

He's weak, I know.  Not yet fully healed from his sickness.

He stands looking at the flower bed.  I come to him, seek what he's seeking.

"Look.  Mommy."  I look.

Are you looking at the yellow tulip?  Are you looking at the purple bluebells?  Or the dried leaves left from the fall?  Maybe it's the spider hanging suspended, patiently waiting between the rhododendron and the camellia, food to come its way.

I never know.  He looks down and picks a dandelion.  Those plagues poking up all over the front yard, declaring to all passersby how I don't know how to keep a lawn just lawn.

But he doesn't condemn.  He scrutinizes the yellow seeds, still soft.  Begins tearing them apart.  Awed.  Then, with sun beaming warm on our matching sandy brown hair, he leans into me. Puts his head on my thigh.
Rests.

Rests long until sleep overtakes.  I sit silently.  Watch the spider sway and the golden beetles scuttle.  It's quiet.  Only birds and a neighbor a couple houses down clipping branches, radio playing low.

Watching his body, white skin, bare feet, little arms curled up, eyelashes dark and full.

I could be like the beetle, there is so much I need to do.  Laundry to move around, lunch to make, floors to clean, school to teach.  But I sit and bask in the holy moment.

Never again will my two year-old sleep on my leg in this way.  Time, the enemy and friend, challenge my senses, I knowing I must take mental pictures for to get my camera would take the moment from me.

My neighbor walks by and smiles quiet.  Sees the holy and doesn't intrude.

As my feet begin to fall asleep with the babe, telling me the moment's near done, I pray for him.

This time I don't pray he will love God or serve God powerfully on the mission field (though I do pray that sometimes).  This time I pray that he too will have holy moments.  Will embrace the holy moments God gives to him.

That he will not move so quickly through life, so caught up in the now and urgent, that he misses the quiet hallowed gifts.  Sacred always.

When the New Meets the Normal

My neighbor's standing in our laundry room, also known as the room of chaos.  I'm  looking at the quilt thrown over loads of clothing, waiting for me to attempt yet again to scrub the blue paint off of it.  She's smiling at me and then I hear her say, "I sure wish you could be reincarnated as one of your children." 

My brain moves from quilts to what the time frame for being reincarnated is believed to be.  Would it actually be possible for me to be reincarnated as one of my children since they are already born?  Could I die and become them at birth and go back in time? 

And just as I try to give a smile of kindness she explains herself...."Your children are having such a wonderful childhood, it would be nice for others to have it, too."

Oh, good.  No deep talk on my ignorance of reincarnation!  But then the self-talk changes its tone.  "If she only knew," I tell myself, "she'd never say that.  My mothering abilities are a poor excuse for one who calls herself a Christ-follower.  My children suffer for my sins and I'm not anything close to giving them a good childhood."

Stop.

This weekend marks a new year.  A time given us to reflect on who we've been and reconsider who we want to be.  But the shoes I've been trying to put on this past year are too big.  I slip around in them, bumping into things, falling down, and eventually giving up trying to wear them.

My children and I have been listening to a Christmas CD by Andrew Peterson.  It's titled Behold, the Lamb of God.  The first song starts,

Gather round ye children come,
Listen to the old, old story.
Of the power of death undone,
Of an infant borne of glory.
Son of God.  Son of Man.

The chorus:
So sing out with joy,
For the brave little boy
Who was God but
He made Himself nothing.
Well He gave up His pride
and He came here to die
Like a man.

And we've played it over and over and now my children burst out in the chorus together and I just want to stop and say, "do you really get it?"

In my heart I know I'm really asking the question to ME!

The music has guided my focus for the year.  It reminds me of where my mind should really be....
Beholding the Lamb of God.

I looked up the word Behold...such a common word in the Bible.  I think you can find it in all if not almost all the books of the Old Testament. Most of the New Testament as well, except the epistles.

Behold means to take note of.  It can also mean to submit oneself to.

Could it be common in my life this year...beholding my Savior in all things??? Beholding Him everywhere, each chapter, each unknown....

This is my focus for the year...to behold the things that God is doing in and around me.  To submit to the things God is asking of me.

Behold, the Lamb of God.  Behold, I am the Lord's servant, may it be to me as you have said.  Behold, I am making all things new!

This year I desire to behold God's work in me as good.  To look to Him and not at myself.  To wear the shoes He sets out for me gladly.  To see the words of a neighbor as gifts from my Savior and not as another reason to criticize myself.

Beholding Him in all things. 

Newness falling fresh on a life of normalcy.

Beholding each moment as a gift, a trust.

           ,................

I am undone.  Yes, Lord, Help me to Behold.