Conflicts Clarify

I'm in countdown mode to meet the newest member of our family, only ten weeks to go (more or less....probably more..).  I'm feeling pretty good still, even managed to clean out the barn and tromp through the brambly woods today to measure for upcoming fencing projects.  Emotionally I feel truly amazed and blessed; this baby will come after my 42nd birthday. When I am an old woman, I believe I will have zero regrets how I spent my young (and middle) womanhood.

The hardest part has not been the varicose veins, the heartburn, the putting up of my running shoes or of my size six jeans.  It's been learning how to graciously deal with views that contrast with mine.  I realize if I were a 42 year old having my first child after a good twenty years putting in a career, this baby would be celebrated more.  Instead I get comments about my age or sanity, or worse, chided for making the choice to have another baby.  These are the same folks who if I were to gain, say, a million dollars, would be whooping it up and throwing me a party (or at least sending me a card).  So I remind myself that my values are not the same as theirs.

And of course there are other issues that have been expressed: of Ruby (should have had the genetic testing done and avoided that "problem") and of my miscarriage (should have learned my lesson there and quit).  And gee, how will I ever send all of my children to Harvard or buy their first automobiles?  And oh, I'm *stealing* their childhood because they have more fun catching hens and climbing trees than (fill in your own blank regarding what a "real childhood" looks like).

Then there's the seemingly "we care" tact some folks take:  face it, these babies are making my body trashed, my retirement years in the tropics an impossibility, and my college degree a waste (never mind I've earned two more since having all of those children, but I digress).  And if that doesn't fly, how about how I'm ruining my husband's economic prosperity, because we know having these children are all about MY choosing to do so (what man would want so many children, right?).

There is the catty crowd, too, the cowards who will never say anything to my face but will fly to others  and make assertions that are not only untrue, but unkind.  As if I never hear about it.  And God forbid I would ever admit to the hardships, the trials, the broken dishes or even the snotty days because all I would ever get is something that sounds like I deserved it because I was too stupid to either only have (choose your proper number) children or that I dared to live differently.

But you know what?  I am beginning to be thankful for it all. 

According to BJ Palmer, "Conflicts clarify." I am learning to be thankful for the opportunities to ponder and clarify my own faith and values, to question and evaluate my own choices, to revisit why I am not only a mother, but a mother of many.  I am thankful for the insults, the insinuations, the finger counting in public, the whispered remarks and the scornful looks.  It has all been a testing ground to whether or not I will stand on my beliefs, or bend to the pressure of wanting to be liked/accepted/agreed with.  I am thankful for those who hate what I stand for, because they give me opportunity to have pity for and to love them anyway....while I still stand, ever strengthened by the trials.  I am thankful for hurtful words and actions because they remind me that my being offended, my pride, is my greatest enemy, and that meekness is my road to resting in the Lord.  After all, He is the one who allows the darts.  Do I trust Him to deal with them in His own time?  Or will I keep a froward heart, a sad regret for the words and deeds of others?  Sometimes, trials separate pragmatists and hypocrites from the faithful.

I used to lament that separation.  But now I think that separation is not necessarily a bad thing; in fact, it may be needful and good.  And, this is not *my* war regarding the blessing of motherhood and family, for I know the blessing of each and every child in our family.  I see them for the future they are, and I wonder how anyone can claim to love if even the most innocent among us are despised and unwanted or seen as a hindrance (truly, to what?).  I know I am living an amazing life, and I rejoice.  If my rejoicing causes others to deepen their disgust, then I will praise God even more.  It is His battle, not mine.

I am thankful for the support and love we do have, and we have plenty.  And I still have hope....that maybe my mommy-joy and our children's happy lives will someday bring about repentance, or an apology, or true love.  Then I will rejoice all the more for the work of God!

In the meantime, hear me clearly now.  Yes, I am, by God's grace, carrying my seventh child.  And, if the Lord wills, I will keep welcoming these precious ones until menopause comes or my ovaries fall out (that statement ought to give some fodder!).  When I am an old woman looking back on my life, any of the darts thrown by other people will look like rotted chicken bones and dust compared to the incalculable worth of the everlasting gems shown in the eyes and lives of my children, and their children, and their children....and I will rest in peace.

Pressing On,

Fear Not, Part 2: An Interview With Heather Bryant

My friend Heather Bryant made the time to come share her story with you all.  Here is a woman who lives out FEAR NOT in real, relevant, everyday ways.  May you be encouraged!


2 Chronicles 20:17 Ye shall not need to fight in this battle: set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the LORD with you, O Judah and Jerusalem: fear not, nor be dismayed; to morrow go out against them: for the LORD will be with you.

Right click to download this episode.

If you missed Fear Not (part one), you can listen to it here.

Blessings,

A Day in My Life, Part 3

If you missed it, you can catch part one here, and part two here.

Late Afternoon to Evening

I manage to put my feet up and knit two rows for my baby's blanket, while the children are cleaning up after lunch and finishing their music lessons and artwork.  This is how this blanket is progressing:  two rows at a time.  I am not an accomplished knitter.  I don't even consider myself a "good" knitter.  I have to completely pay attention to every stitch, and after two rows my mind starts to wander and I'm too inexperienced to zone out and just let my hands work.  But, even with two rows at a time...progress is made.  It is a good reminder to me, how forward motion or any change is accomplished:  by degrees, by steps, by plodding.  Sometimes it just takes two rows at a time.

I give a writing lesson to my friend's daughter, listening to her read her excellent writing, and then do a dictation.  I help her with her new composition's outline, and instruct her in some areas.  We use Classical Writing and love the program.  It combines very, very well with Spell to Write and Read and to the foundation we have from Institute for Excellence in Writing.   I count my blessings to have such rich curriculum helps, and I am slowly ("two rows at a time") finding and repairing the gaps I have in my own education.  

Our friends leave, and we go through the comical routine of what did they leave behind this time? (books, jackets, and even her toddler's peepee pants!).  We set them all by the mudroom door.  And yes, I plan to launder the pants!

I sit for a bit, catching up on some email and Twitter.  I peruse the book loaned by a friend, Goat Song, and besides sighing over such lovely writing, begin taking notes for what I'll need when my own goats kid in May and mark items in the Hoegger's catalog.  Plus the book has given me new words to look up.  Words like flehman response, and kulning.  I catch up on paperwork for the Kinder Goats Breeders Association, and make sure my files are in order, too.

I'm tired at this point, but hunger wins over and I begin to prepare for supper. I cut up the last of my winter squash, an interesting variety of pumpkin, and put it to bake for mash.  I find leftover steaks we cooked up and turn them into steak bites, coating them with flour and seasoning to fry up for our supper.  I ponder making gravy.  Salad is prepared, and I glance at the clock.  It is close to 6:00 already, and I invite the music teacher to stay for supper, not knowing how the meal will stretch but trusting God to multiply it all.  I leave everything ready to quickly assemble while music lessons finish up, lie down to read a book to my 7 year old, and finally give in to a twenty minute cat nap.

My day ends with supper, and I begin to reset my mind for the 'morrow.  I eye the starter on the counter and plan to make pizza dough for tomorrow.  I plan my bath (epson salts with lavender) and think about 

projects waiting for me.  Maybe tonight I will get some more cutting for my quilt done.  Or maybe I will read through the Shabby Chic library book to help me prepare for my big flea market trip in June. Or maybe I'll just look through my new Mollie Makes magazine, or begin putting words to my day for a blogpost.  I'll check in and tweet with my friends a bit, and finally, Lord willing (and kids don't start throwing up or an earthquake doesn't occur or....) I'll begin my fresh new day with a good night's sleep.

It's a blessed life I have, and I'm thankful.

A Day in My Life, Part 2

If you missed it, you can read Part 1 here.

Midday

I join my 5 and 7 year olds to help them with folding the small mountain of kitchen linens threatening to overtake our sofa.  We use mostly cloth napkins and dish towels rather than paper products, in reds, yellows, greens, and oranges.  Bright colors for all of the wee people here I suppose.

Once the drawers are full of linens, I begin doing some teaching with my 7 year old, and we are still working on proper pencil holding.  I regret not starting her with cursive first, and am thankful she wasn't further along in ball-n-stick than she was.  Her handwriting is becoming more and more fluid, and the death grip on her pencil is beginning to, finally, relax.  I think those loopy-loo's that always come so easily to my toddlers should have been an obvious hint to which style of handwriting they are better able to utilize, but I was too smitten with "how the schools do it" rather than really watching and listening to my own children.

I send the boys outside to go pump their legs with cross-country bike riding (it's all gravel and meadow and plenty of dirt), and to bring in any more eggs they can find in their coat pockets.  I also ask for the starter trays from the greenhouse because I'm moving much slower and figured I could plant seeds a bit at a time on my back porch instead.  But, really, I just needed them to go burn off some energy.

After unloading a few blue and brown eggs, my 5 year old boy clambers red-faced to the kitchen table.  And while he and my daughter are working and chittering with each other, I sit catching up on some reading, picking at curriculum, a magazine, a recipe.  The older kids are either picking at schoolwork or preparing for art lessons, and Ruby is banging away at the play kitchen.  When my little students finish up their math and spelling, I read to them from the Jesus Storybook Bible and the Christian Nature Reader and send them on their way to play.  Ruby runs after them in glee.

Our "maybe we can come" friends show up, and my 14 year old starts an art lesson with the youngest of the children, a collage of a butterfly's life from egg to flutter.  We've been using Atelier for years, and the results are always pleasant.  My smiling friend helps herself to a mug and picks a bag out of the tea drawer, mi case es her casa.  We chat, and unapologetically eat seriously delicious cinnamon rolls with our hot drinks.  And yes, we share those with the children, all twelve of them.  But the bowl of leftover frosting we keep for our own spoons.

The other children in time do art lessons as well, and it is interspersed with either outside play in the sunshine, or music lessons from the teacher that arrives during this time.  The whole house and yard is full of happy eating, painting, music making, outdoor mud splashing, and toddlers vrooming their cars and dolly strollers all over the wide planked wood floors.  Of course there are cries of hurts, bumps to kiss and peepee accidents to deal with, too.  Here is my 9 year old's painting, one of her most "happy days":  when she and I flew to California together for a quick family visit.

The sunshine is still beckoning me outside, so my friend and I go for a walk down the long woodsy dirt road.  A half hour later, we return to visit my dairy goats, and I peer into my garden.  The shallots are starting to come up already.  I've never grown shallots before.

My goat girls are so sweet, they love to snuggle.  Here are Smores and Dancer.  I had to keep them at arm's length to get this photo during our snow.  While my friend and I are in the musty barn, we talk about livestock of all kinds, fencing, dreams.  It is comfortable and warm in the stall, and the boys next door bleat for lovings too.  I glove up to pat my buck and also stroke my wether's growing beard, telling them both yes, they are *so* handsome.

Inside, the large stockpot of chicken soup is hot and as my friend and I correct the seasonings and cut bread slices, the children clean up art supplies and make room for eating.  The clanking of spoons and white porcelain bowls upon the table add to the scuffling of chairs, and all at once, silence.  We all give thanks, and eat.  The broth is completely satisfying, bits of chicken and rice deliciously warm and good for the soul, too.  It is 2:00 in the afternoon.

Blessings,

A Day in My Life, Part 1

Evening to Morning

T’wasn’t so long ago I was looking at someone’s blogsite and sighing over the fact that it looked like this writer was miles ahead further than me, headed where I wanted to go. But then I came across what her day was like and decided that not only was she living far differently than I, but that our visions differed in how to get to where we, seemingly, were similarly headed. It was a wonderful blessing to see her day! Not only did it give me some inspiration, it gave me added contentment in my own life and manners. My life is my own, my days are unique. So are yours, in their own beautiful way. Here’s a peek into one of mine.


As a note, I consider the start of my day the evening before. That is, my “day” begins at sundown and ends at sundown the next calendar date. It does a lot of good for me to consider it this way, so we start our journey at suppertime.


6pm.  My husband takes me out for a burger downtown in the renovated building that used to serve as a gasoline station. The locals here easily pay thrice as much as the nationwide dollar-a-burger across the street, but in return have choices such as garlic fries and gluten-free buns.  And taste.  The motto is "good grub is messy", and it is, the greasy napkins piling up on the formica.  So instead of supper with the family, my kids enjoy a pineapple pizza while my husband and I go on a date to eat, pick up our food from a coop order and choose a video for ourselves as well. Which, 48 hours later, we still have not watched.  But I digress.


Back home, while the children are already jammied up and engrossed in a video playing on the projector screen, I decide to sneak away to finish up the sweet little blackbird pincushion I had been working on, while half-listening to the audio of Family Writing.  That other half of me is not listening to anything at all; just quietly stitching deftly through layers of black wool.  I feel the baby inside roll and rumble, keeping me company.


I help my husband get the kids into their beds with kisses,  read three-quarters of a chapter about Photoshop, and head slowly back down the stairs.

There is almost always a kitchen chore or two (or three) to do before bed, and this evening I feed my Italian sourdough starter for upcoming pizza making (for two days later), and knead up the dough for cinnamon rolls with my French sourdough starter (for the next day).  I smell the sourdoughs up close and am satisfied with their scent of far away places, of century-old bakeries working in tandem with nature to create food.  I get two pounds of hulled walnuts to soaking, and eat the last of a brownie.  

I run a hot bath with Frankincense essential oil, mainly because it sounds exotic.  I soak, and read a bit of Living into Focus.  I love the subtitle, "Choosing What Matters in an Age of Distractions."  I would have bought that book just to have the title cover reminding me of what I really want to be about: intentionality.  And what I want to forgo: distractability.

I go to bed alone, fight with where pillows are going to support my growing baby-middle, and read a bit of Among English Hedgerows.  It's a little book published in 1899 I found in a musty used book store last summer in Eugene, Oregon.  As I'm reading, I'm remembering my childhood and thatched roofs, pulled market baskets, pubs.  I pull the lamp cord and turn the light out at 11pm.


That night, I wake at 3:30am.  My hips feel out of place, and what am I going to do, wake up my chiropractor husband for an adjustment? I lay there, waiting to go back to sleep, but I feel like an owl.  Finally I just talk with the Lord, and pray until I am all prayed out, and then I feel a bit guilty for that.  I mean, who ever runs out of things to pray on or pray for?  I just give thanks that He knows all things, and I figured that whatever reason He had me up to pray, His Holy Spirit accomplished, and besides, isn't just talking with Him prayer too?  I read a chapter from my kindle, and my last look at the clock is 5:30 on that morning.

I awake again at 7:45, almost two hours later than usual.  At this point, I'm thinking that blogging my day is going to be a big flop because none of it has been "typical".  I missed my quiet Bible reading.  I hear little feet stomping around upstairs so I dress, make the bed, get my adjustment, check emails and tweet as the rooster is crowing and the goats are hollering for fresh hay.  The mudroom door slams as the kids run outside and I shut the laptop cover.


I get the tea pot going and feed my Italian starter again.  While eggs are getting collected and watering pails filled, I shuffle in the kitchen making everyone Russian black rye sourdough toast with a fresh egg over easy that morning.  It is satisfying, listening to the children chatter like chickadees at breakfast, yolk dripping from chins.

Afterwards, I check the slow of sourdough. On the right is the promise of baking to come.  On the left I have rolled out sourdough cinnamon rolls ready to rise and bake, hopefully in time to share with a friend who may, or may not, depending, be coming over.  I think, "If she comes, she'll need a roll today with her tea."  I drain the soaked walnuts, put them into the dehydrator, and steep my pomegranate green tea while overseeing the rest of the morning chores for the children.

In the midst of this, my seven year old gingerly admits to opening up my Japanese crayons--the ones I had brought out to share with her to begin with--and to drawing directly on my art book with them.  I find myself peeved.  I quietly send her to her room to have five minutes to drink my tea and ask the Lord what He would have me do.  Is this really something to be peeved about?  Is being peeved a sin?  Isn't being offended impossible for those that love His law?  Doesn't "peeved" lead to "peevishness"?  Doesn't that sound like an entrance to becoming--or confirming--an odious woman?  I'm peeved with myself now, for being peeved.


While I'm pondering and peeving, I look my nine year old standing above me in the eye and say squarely, "Do not even ask me one.more.time. when our friends are coming.   I said I would tell you when I knew.  If I'm told."  


I have just enough time to note the sunshine streaming through the firs outside onto the kitchen garden.  I leave half my tea untouched while I go to speak with my seven year old.  It is 10am.