Beautiful mess.

 

Sunshine across warm floors....

 

There is something about sunshine falling across wooden floorboards that transforms me.

Lifts me right up out of the tyranny of self-inflicted schedules.

Into the beauty of living.

 

There's a portion of a verse that keeps speaking to my soul today:

"Mary treasured all these things, pondering them in her heart."

I get that.

The pondering of the heart.

Maybe that is the lifeblood that motherhood is made of.

 

I love that scripture included this verse.

In the tale of the Saviour's first days.

 

Our society today is all about fast.  All about keep-up with.

I guess I never have been one to fit in?

I am often all-in-my-head.

Often slower than the rest.

I get muddled easily, so I like to keep myself in the simple.

I am always always pondering in my heart...

The muddled ponderer.

 

Autumn is amazing to me.

The world is just set ablaze in glory.

I started the day full of self-defeat.

Exhausted from children waking in the deep of the night.

The time and space where our bodies recharge

becomes unpromised in motherhood.

Hitting the pillow never knowing if the rest will be available.

If tonight it is for the taking?

Or maybe next week.

When will I grasp that rest?  Wrestle it to the ground?

 

If a mother's heart never pondered and treasured,

a lonely, exhausting life it would be.

 

Standing at the kitchen window...

knowing that just a room away I have the most glorious schedule.

in pure Managers of Their Homes style.

Oh, it makes me smile.

That grid, lined up there...little rectangles and structured colors...

naming the stuff of our lives.

The fun and the not-so-fun-necessary stuff,

so that nothing gets missed.

So that in theory, somehow I keep this home all together. Running.

 

And mornings like this,

the rectangles run together and blurr and skip over each other.

Behind.

Behind.

Behind.

It whispers to me...why can't you ever stay ahead?

Why is it that you can MAKE a schedule so pretty,

and abandon it daily?

Self-defeat is sometimes my middle name.

 

I looked out the kitchen window as I poured sour milk from a sippy.

Thinking how I wished for clean.

For order.

For rest that comes in a package and doesn't eat up my rectangles.

Right there, outside my window-of-work.

beautiful, brilliant leaves falling like confetti.

Unlimited.

Beauty.

Just there.

How beautiful life is.

How beautiful this messy, unplannable, chaotic life of mine is.

The only tyrrant here?

Is me.

 

It sometimes takes a great deal of pondering to clear the self-defeat fog from my eyes.

God makes beautiful of messes.

The leaves we try to rake up in neat piles and send away on city trucks?

I love those messes.

I am sad when we rake up the mess of leaves God showered.

I love the way they announce movement on the sidewalks.

The way they sound as the wind whispers throught them.

A symphony for the soul.

What would life be like, all tidied up and perfect?

 

We left the mess today, the tyranny of the undone.

And we went right out there to the thick of beauty.

On a whim, when really we had other things beckoning.

I don't want my children to remember their youth with rectangles always.

But with chasing beauty,

and embracing messes.

And giving the mind space to ponder in the quiet,

away from the noise of self-defeat.

The noise of perfection.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fireflies.

I have been thinking a lot lately, about how God blesses us.
Last night, I saw fireflies flitting about in the backyard, and I just had to be out there flitting too.  I grabbed the sweet littleness of my 11 month old son, on the eve of his first birthday, and together we watched the ethereal delight of those amazing little insects that play and frolic during my favorite time of day:  dusk. 
Dusk is like a blurred painting, dimmed lights, colors foggy and surreal.  A dreamland.  The sky washed in pinks and blues, hues unmatched by any painter's pallette.
Sometimes we fight Him on it:  blessings.  We shake our heads and flat out refuse.  As if we really had a choice?  And maybe sometimes we DO.  We do have a choice.  Sometimes we miss out on those precious blessings because we thought that our way was better, we used our "free will" button and we missed out BIG.

My mind frolicking with the fireflies, husband runs outside and says, "Did you HEAR THAT?"  I watch him beeline for the a/c unit below our LR window.  I heard nothing strange, wonder what is the fretting...and then he announces, "Yup.  It's dead."

My mind is in a great place.  Hard for a heart to sieze up with worry when watching a firefly show.  Isn't that how it always is?  With our minds focused on beauty and Someone Bigger, it is much harder to get lost in worry.

I am learning this.  In every situation, I am learning to smile big and say, "I can't WAIT to see what you do with this one Lord!"  I fail consistantly.  My heart is naturally bent on anxiety.  On worry.  As a mother, it's what I do.  I worry.  As a stay-at-home-mother, I worry even more.  Worry about what tragic event will conspire to drown our finances and send me back into the workforce too soon.  Worry when things break, that our savings will dwindle.  That a medical bill will cause our demise or force us to forget an annual vacation.  My mind...it goes there in an instant...if my eyes are not set High Up.
How would the story of those complaining Israelites been different, had they invited God's blessing?  Had they rejoiced at their freedom, and been in watchful awe as Pharoah's army approached to slay them, walled up against the sea--just waiting for the FIREWORKS, the majesty, the rescue, the impending blessings.  It's easy for us to see it now--thousands of years removed, judging those Israelites as a bumble-headed brood of rotten attitudes.  But in the moment, those men and women HAD NO IDEA.  They saw impossible, they complained, they would RATHER HAVE THE MEDIOCRITY.

I want to see fireworks.  To see God so big, coming through...when all else fails and clearly He is all that is left.  Looking back, those are the moments in my life that are my FAVORITES.  Often, those are the moments that are also wrapped in incredible pain.  To be open to the richest blessings is often synonymous with trusting God through deep trials.

It was indeed, broken.  That ol' a/c unit, in all it's faded glory.  Heat wave pending, temperatures estimated to be triple digits, and it just quit.  At the exact same time as my feet were trampling grass, teaching my son to see miracles in bugs that self-light their little dancing bodies.  The night before the double birthday.  I tempered my fear.  It would creep in...oh no...what if...and I forcefully chose joy.  I almost have to stick myself face first into joy sometimes, smash my head right in there.  My fear showed to my sweet husband, who spent his evening calling HVAC contractors...and my mind kept sliding toward worry...how much would it cost....what would we give up....mind-please-stop.  change gears.  thank-you-Father-for-the-years-of-cold-air-on-stifling-hot-days, I will trust You still.  We can live without a/c....yes, we can totally live without a/c.  We have a glorious basement that needs cleaning, and it is always cool.  Maybe a birthday spent in the basement playing Wii is fabulous, indeed.    

Would you believe an HVAC contractor offered to show up the next morning at 7am?  During one of his busiest weeks?  He showed up ON TIME, muttered to me something like.."wow, this is an OOOOlllld unit!"   and then found the problem...a $40 part....fixed it fast...and the whole event was $110.  Over and done. 

What do we add to our lives when we worry?  We cannot see the future.  We cannot change it with worry.  Yet we try....

My little neighbor girl taught me how to catch fireflies.  It is amazingly easy.  You just reach out, and CATCH THEM!  Golden hope, right there for the grasping... but you cannot catch them if you are not focused.  If you see their light and then lose track.  It is an art of joyful, willful concentration.  Eyes fixed, anticipation building.

"and who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?" -words of Jesus (Matthew 6:27)
 
A link for you, to one of my favorite Bible study tools on the web:
http://biblestudytools.com/

Battle Gear



The book that launched the journey.

All in a day's work.

Homeschooling is completely a labor of love.  And every now and then it becomes very clear to me why God has called me to this path.  This winding, exhausting, exhilerating path.

The pages are turned, mother and son looking together through the pages of history.  We are studying the Vikings, explorers of old.  I am learning almost as much as my son.  And remembering.  Churning over the earth of my aged mind to uncover nuggets that were buried there.  I read aloud, share the text of the pages.  And it happens:  we bridge the gap.  The gap of the age old fight of whose God reigns.

Age six, and I am already handing him his battle gear.

I read on, realizing the words spilling out from my lips, they keep tumbling one over the other, awkwardly unstoppable now.  Knowing that it was going to occur at some point--some future sacred time and space.  But today?  There it is, messy history, words floating, ready-or-not, the account of how the Vikings believed in magic spells for healing.  How they buried their possesions with them --and even their slaves-- thinking that those items would follow them in to the afterlife.  I read on and on.  Unable to see my son's eyes, I focus on the page and just continue to read..waiting for the questions...hoping please for the questions....

 And then they come.

"Why did they think that, mom?" 

These are the times that I must be grounded in my own faith, and stand on it firmly.

But as much as I desire, I cannot pull my son onto my rock.  He must climb there for himself.

I explain the search for God throughout history.  That one thing rings true:  people through history have a God-sized space in their hearts and have searched.  How fear drove cultures to invent gods to answer questions and explain nature.  And I use what little words I have...oh where is my head today...to explain the difference between our real God and the make-believe gods.  And son replies,

"Well.  We think our God is real.  But the Vikings thought their gods were real.  So who's right?"

I look him in the eye, and know that all my head-knowledge of eye-witness gospel accounts, archaeological evidence, the way that our God outperformed the old testament pagan gods--I know that such apologetics comes with time and that, at age 6, the answer must be simple.  And that my concise answer does not suffice the mountain my son has ahead of him to climb.

The mountain of truth.  And I want to say,

"Welcome, son.  Your journey is just beginning!"

I never want him to follow Christ simply because his mother did.

I want him to follow because he knows TRUTH.

But in order to do so, I must let him wander out from the safety of my skirt.

And it hurts.

I imagine my son in a classroom surrounded by other students, uncovering this simple Viking book and hearing words of ancient beliefs spoken from a teacher who may or may not portray Jesus as truth, and the questions swirling around in his mind.  The questions that he may never have remembered to ask his mother after stepping foot off the school bus at the end of the weary day.  The book being returned to its home on the shelf, and the questions disappearing.  The questions that swirl up the dust of doubt and settle again and come back to haunt when they are unanswered.  And I am grateful.  Grateful that the introduction of the gap between our God and all the others was mine to introduce.  Grateful that I saw his reaction firsthand and know what to teach in the future.  Grateful that the mouth that taught him his first bible verse is the same mouth that honestly taught him that the world has many, many gods.  And that it's okay to ask questions.

And I will always answer.

And God is big enough for our doubts.

Deep Conversations.

My trio.

Conversations between brothers.  Deep into the night.

I hear the unmistakable stomp of little three-year-old-feet.  Accompanied by the tell-tale whine from the lungs they carry.  I am tucked in my room, working on lofty ideas, as I perk ears and listen to the story unfold.  Quinn's tiny three year old voice sobbing to his daddy, "I don't WANT to go to heaven!  [sob]  It's FAR!  I don't want to go all by myself! [sob]  Gabe said I have to believe in Jesus to go to heaven, and I DON'T!  Because I don't WANT to GO!"  Scared, crying.  I hear deep man chords, response jumpled together and words unintelligible.  And then the sounds of clomping feet back to bed.  Soothed.  Followed by methodical man steps that stop at my door. 

Leaning in the doorway, my husband questions if I've been listening to the discussions taking place in the room next door.  I hadn't been.  He alerts me that there are discussions happening in the boys' room.  Deep.  Profound.  I set aside my planner to eavesdrop.

.......................................................

Gabe:  "So, Quinn, in 97 years, remember that, and you'll go to heaven.  And for me, 94 years.  For Tennyson, 100 years.  Just believe in Jesus, and you'll go to heaven with me, and mom and dad, and Tennyson, and James and Marcea, and Pastor Dave..."

Quinn:  "I'm going to look around da room and see if dare's a clock.  And if dare's not a clock, I'll ask Jesus to bring us a clock. [quiet contemplation]...  Is dare a stove in heaven?  Oderwise we have to ask Jesus for one.  Or, ....we can't have pizza.  Can you make pizza wit-out a stobe?"

Gabe thinks over the pizza question:  "I don't think so..."


Quinn: "I think dere's not a stobe, because you have to bring your stuffed animals."


Gabe explains: "You can't bring those.  God's probably making them for us right now..."

[they discuss items that God is making for their special home in heaven.  I am smiling and scribbling all of this down on a piece of looseleaf paper which I silently snatched from my binder, not wanting to forget any of this...scribbling and smiling and careening my ear...]

Quinn: "I think I'll fall."

Gabe: "God will help us.  You won't fall."

Quinn "Is there going to be a bridge??"  [still wrapping his little mind around the concept of being in the sky, and logistically how this will work for him]

Gabe gets back to the point: "So, do you believe in God and Jesus?"

Quinn, now irritated: "Ya.  I TOLD you dat THREE times.  You can't ASK me dat!!  Da limit's two!!"

and then sweetly... "Gabe, if we don't go in the morning, we're not going to go."

Gabe, "Well, your going in 97 years...." 

.................................................................

Cheers to the start of a new SCHOOL season!

(Gabe, Quinn, and Tennyson at a park in the town of Westport

ready for their scavenger hunts!  Oct 2011)

A New School Year has begun here at our house!

We started school a bit early this year, in mid-August, hoping that it will give us more flexibility around the holidays.  I always like to be just a little bit ahead, in case things like...you know....AMAZING OCTOBER WEATHER hit!!  I have a homeschool friend who takes "nice days" instead of "snow days" in her homeschool.  When the snowstorms hit, she is hunkered down with her kids doing school while public and private institutions have the day off...but when the weather turns beautiful and their family is itching for some outdoor time--they have the freedom to ditch school lessons for the day and enjoy the sunshine!  I love this philosophy.  I also love to take school outside with us, enjoying God's creation while we learn about life.  That's what we did a few days this week...

The typical October chilly air was nowhere to be found!  Instead, we had a week of temperatures no lower than the mid 70's.  We took advantage of this, fitting in a field trip to the Madison Henry Vilas Zoo, and getting to a local park.  We got to enjoy the Sandhill Cranes who were also visiting the park.  Seems that every fall we see cranes at the park, just in time to wave goodbye to them as they venture to their winter destinations.

sandhill cranes at the park

At the park on this particular day we did a scavenger hunt.  We learned about tallies, and how useful they are for counting quickly by 5's.  I thnk the point really hit home for Gabe, who is very competitive, having an entire sheet full of little hash marks for the number of cars he counted while at the park.  He thought for sure he saw "the most" cars of anyone.  The face he gave me when I announced that we were going to COUNT up those random hash marks was PRICELESS!  He was thinking, "oh man--we have to COUNT these?!?  I thought I was just the winner!!"  I think his total of hash marks for cars ranged above 200!  I helped him circle little groups of 5...it took us quite awhile...and then I explained the system of tallies and how much easier it is to count up large quantities if we are organizing them into tallies as we go, counting by 5's and 10's. 

gabe finds an acorn

As I write this, the boys are at a birthday party...a pirate party!  I took their picture as they were ready to leave...and now I am off to pick them up!  Quiet time for momma is over. 



Shabbat

The Eve of my very first Shabbat.

I know that I promised an update on our homeschool year.  But I just have to take a minute to tell you that it is 11:00pm, and I have finished all of my chores with an hour to spare before the official start of my very first self-regulated Shabbat! 

Shabbat is the Jewish word for Sabbath, a day of rest and cessation from work.  It was the fourth commandment out of the ten that God gave to the Israelites.  Somehow in our fast-paced, modern world, we have distanced ourselves from honoring the Sabbath.  We feel as if we do not need one, or we do not have the luxury of taking one because of all that there is to do.  Modern teachers tell us that we live beneath a new covenant, no longer bound by the Mosaic covenant.  I know that this is true in many respects, but I also believe that the ten commandments were not just handed out to bind us.  They are GOOD for us!  We do not think twice about keeping our lips from lying, or honoring our parents.  But that Sabbath command is...just...well...idealistic!  So we go about our lives, in a tizzy.  Forgetting that God himself rested on the seventh day after creating the world, and that maybe...just maybe...there is something to it.

For the past couple of years I have attempted to make Sunday my "rest day."  However, I have never held myself to it!!  Sure, I would try to keep Sundays as simple as possible.  You know, easier meals and kicking back in sweatpants after church.  Here and there, if I was really behind on laundry I would sneak in a load.  Or if I was behind on paperwork or school prep, I would take time to work on those tasks, thinking that they really weren't "work" but were quiet activities.  So I guess you could say I was practicing a half-Shabbat!  However, a half Shabbat--one without set guidelines or any preplanning...is a Shabbat that is easily broken!  On those Sundays when I was desperate for rest and actually honored my no-work rules--I often woke up on Monday morning to mountains of mess.  Like a bad Shabbat hangover.  Or found myself standing in the kitchen on my blessed appointed rest day, wondering what take-out to find for supper since I was NOT going to cook!  These are not restful practices.  I was enjoying the small break, but definitely not honoring the Sabbath.  Honoring the Sabbath--now that takes forethought!

I listened to a recent podcast, although don't ask me which one because I honestly do not remember...about taking a Shabbat with INTENTION.  The Israelites had to plan ahead for their day of rest, in order to fully honor it.  Manna had to be collected on the sixth day, because otherwise there would be no manna to eat on the seventh.  So today I figured out what my Shabbat would look like, and what I needed to do to preserve that day as purely restful and honoring to God.

It is 11pm, one hour until my rest day--Sunday.  I just finished putting away the mountains of laundry, which required me to tiptoe into the boys' room while they were asleep.  Okay, I felt a little bit like the laundry fairy!  They will wake up to a fresh closet of folded, clean clothes.  My husband will not have to ask me in the morning which drying rack contains clean underwear!  I did a load of cloth diapers at 9pm, when normally I would have just thrown up my hands and gone to bed and saved it for Sunday--justifying laundry on Sunday as a necessary evil of cloth diapering.  Excuse queen.  There are now clean, folded diapers in the nursery.  I spent the bulk of the day cutting up some veggies that my in-laws blessed us with!  Since tomorrow is hands-off as far as meal prep, I knew that I had to make use of those fresh items TODAY, or risk them spoiling by Monday.  I looked at the pile of fresh, organically grown butternut squash, tomatoes, and an entire box of apples...and made butternut squash and apple soup, homemade salsa, and apple crisp.  Now tomorrow, instead of tripping over laundry baskets and making a frozen pizza, I will be enjoying my family over a cozy autumn meal that is already prepared.  Now, was this hard?  YES!!  It took every ounce of my energy and lots of help from my husband since I also have three little ones running around my feet all day.  But I resolved to enjoy the pleasure of hard work for one day, so that tomorrow I can truly, truly REST.

I have found that I desperately need my Shabbat.  It is silly and crazy-ridiculous of me to ever think that I am superhuman and do not need rest--that somehow the rule of resting one day out of seven does not apply to my busy life in this modern time.  Honestly, I believe we need to take a Sabbath rest more than ever before.  To shut off our brains for one day.  To listen for God.

This whole Shabbat thing is a work in progress for me.  But I can tell you with honesty, that I am really, really looking forward to tomorrow!  I can do six days of hard work knowing that one day of rest is coming.  And next week hopefully I will be ready for Shabbat much earlier than 11:59pm.  Baby steps.

Making time for cuddles.

Updates to our blog COMING SOON!

Well, it's a new school year around here!  That means high aspirations!  I am revamping our blog--check back soon to find out what's in store.... lots of fun ideas up my sleeve!  Now to find time to implement them :)  Happy September!