Chaos
Where there is ruin, there is hope for a treasure. - Rumi
-
what have I done wrong?
Sometimes she makes this face – she calls it her cute face. Willow makes us chuckle. She makes us grin. Her turn of a phrase can send us rolling in the floor with laughter. And then there are moments like this . . . . Pre-dinner, Willow comes prancing into the kitchen with a smirk on her face. “Hey guys,” she says. “I just peed in the sink.”
-
reminded. again.
Some days I feel as if I am just about two steps away from some sort of mental breakdown. (Oh, and some days I kind of exaggerate.) I’m not exactly sure which is more true today though – the breakdown or the exaggeration. Our green car, a gem of a vehicle made in the memorable year 1993 and featuring both a dented side door and bullet hole stickers placed on said damaged door by my husband, is currently in the shop. And has been for over a week now. Which makes us a one car family with three drivers needing to be at distinctly separate locations at least three days…
-
Are we the only ones?
Are we the only family whose possessions fall out of our car every time we open the door? The only family where an underwear-wearing-only kid falls asleep on the sofa? The only family whose two-year-old son is neither potty-trained nor able to communicate in traditionally “normal” manners? The only family whose son associates every animal not with its proper name but by the noise that the animal makes? Are we the only family who can never locate matching socks and whose son seems to be always sporting seasonally inappropriate footwear? The only family that says “yes” when their child asks, “Can we make popsicles out of this pickle juice?” The…
-
why the bread was burned
I placed the bread in the oven. As I reached for the timer, I heard a sloshy noise and looked toward the hall. I saw my two-year-old son, soaking wet, standing in the hall making noises and pointing back towards the bathroom. I cautiously approached the scene. The sink’s stopper was pulled. The water was flowing over the edge. Otto had tried to clean up the mess himself with two towels. (I was mildly impressed.) Otto had overflowed the sink with water to wash his big-wheeled trucks. And his shirt. And his socks. And the floor. And somehow the mirror. But hey, he was prepared. I looked at his wee…
-
even at the week’s start . . .
I just feel so busy lately. So pressed for time. Stumbling to the bed every night, too tired to wash my face or to finish a chapter of my current novel. Neglecting e-mails and phone calls and forgetting friends’ birthdays and kids’ extra assignments. Not always seeing these little men for the wonders they actually are. Exhausted, yet endlessly feeling as if I somehow did not get enough done. As if I should somehow stay up later, do more, work harder. It has been a tiring season of life. Soccer. School. Preparing for a move. (And by preparing I mean, thinking that I should be preparing, trying to purge possessions…
-
so here it is.
The future rarely looks like the past. And change is the only constant. In some ways it seems as if our family has been rising and falling with the ebb and the flow of change for the last decade. Yes. Decade. Adoption. Vocational changes. Pastoring at a start-up church. Birth of baby. Quit teaching high school. Bi-vocational ministry. Adoption. Parents move far and far away. Birth of baby. Leave church and pastoring job. Mother passes away. Grieving. Birth of baby. New job. Relocation to another state. Kevin’s mom passes away. Marital crisis. Birth of baby. Recovery. Healing. It makes me weary just to type that insufficient collection that says…
-
dear humility: enough already.
Sometimes being a mother is a gig that is just so . . . . humbling. I mean, how many lessons in humility does one person need anyway? And can I tell you what? I think I’ve had enough already. Yeah. Enough already. Yesterday I stood in a waiting area with other moms and other kids to wait to register for that co-op I was worrying about the other day. (And guess what? We’re in! Three years on a waiting list! Hazah!) There were other children besides mine waiting as well. They were waiting patiently, with happy hearts shining through their sweet cherubic faces. And I promise, that has been…
-
Our Loud Return to the Library. (maybe our last. again.)
So. I avoided the library for the past five months or more. And that was pretty easy. But London Scout just won’t stop reading. And I can’t afford to buy a Judy Moody or a Magic Tree House book for her every two days. I paid the last fine (I think) and decided that yesterday would be the day Mr. Library and I tried to reacquaint ourselves with one another. Naturally I took all of our children. It was late in the afternoon. The kids behaved very well. Berg scanned the shelves for books about snakes, spiders and bats. Piper Finn played a game of giant checkers by herself. London…
-
Like Mother Like Daughter
As if we need further evidence that Piper Finnian Willow Lacey is my daughter indeed. But here it is just the same. I do not actually care for Oreo cookies. (gasp.) Not the traditional black and white numbers anyway. But ever since some genius in marketing over at the Oreo cookie factory brainstormed the idea of the Golden Oreo, I have been hooked. I could eat the entire bag. I try not to buy them when I will be alone. (I know my own weaknesses – okay?) My favorite part of the Oreo is the white cream center. I have long joked that there would be one simple way to know…
-
as the pendulum swings
If you have read this blog for any length of time then you already know a-plenty about me. You know that I love a list. And I have a fondness for schedule. Let me tell you this, I can plan the mess out of something. I make a mean routine. I am a first-rate organizer. I draw it up in colorful coordination. Little squares, circles, colors assigned to each child, a day per activity. If there was a thrown-down for planning, I could take you. But, uh, I have a little problem that no amount of planning seems to solve. I think you call it follow-through. I mean, ask me…
-
the little details
When the name “Mommy” is called in this house, the voice often originates from the bathroom. So it was yesterday. So it was. And the voice calmly calling for assistance was five-year-old Bergen. “Yes, son?” I entered the bathroom. “You politely requested my attention to your utmost needs, dear boy?” (I think that’s what I said.) He was standing in front of the toilet. Pants appropriately around his boy ankles. All appeared normal from this angle. Oh. But not entirely normal. His boxer shorts were not lowered. They were, in fact, still neatly at his waist. “Mom,” Bergen looked at me seriously. This was obviously not amusing to him. “I…
-
Date Night: From the Home Front
Last night was Date Night. No guns or alcohol this time. A rather low-budget evening. Carrabba’s for dinner. (Only because we had a gift card, thanks to Look Up’s annual Christmas party.) Mid-dinner, a text arrived from Riley, our evening’s official babysitter. It was a photo of Magnus, perched like royalty on an old chair in our sunroom. When we returned home, Riley gave us the evening’s breakdown . . . photojournalist-style. (I guess my parents never had that luxury with their babysitters -eh?) First, there was music. And costumes. And dancing. And then, as is so often the case, music led to art. (Apparently Berg was drawing drums. To…
-
thank you.
Someone (okay, my cousin Sherry) gave me what I think might be the greatest compliment to my blog the other day. She wrote . . . “Your post always remind me of Steel Magnolias…this scene in particular…because I remember being in the theater and watching the funeral scene and crying and then all of a sudden this scene happens and I cracked up……………That’s how your blog is for me, it’s so touching and deep and thought provoking and I cry a lot and then you say something adorable one of the kids said and I crack up…..laughter through tears…………..awwwww. . . . .” It’s probably my favorite because it’s really…
