Calm and Bright

It has been quiet here, hasn't it? I don't really have any explanation, exactly. But it has been good. I feel ready for the flurry of feasting and giving and receiving of the next few days. All our extended family celebrations will be happening before Monday, so Christmas Eve and Day are all ours, for worship, and simple food. Scattering glittery oats on the lawn for Santa's reindeer, rising early, curling ribbon and muffin crumbs, and two boys impossibly taller than last year. For once I feel ready to drink in all its messy glory.

This year feels different. We did the dinner party, and it was fun and busy and festive, and then I just. . . stopped. The days since have been quiet. I had a visit from a dear friend, and Joshua had a school program. Sam stood up so straight to sing in church, and we caroled on the coldest night yet. But mostly it has been reading The Long Winter aloud to the boys, opening a new door in The Advent Book each evening, drawing Christmas trees and reindeer over and over, and playing a CD changer full of holiday music on the stereo next to the tree.

I let go of many things. We were so inundated with homemade treats from others that I have not baked very much, and for the first year, we have not sent Christmas cards. I imagine myself writing some letters in January to dear ones. We said no to several events; if we were trying to decide and it seemed like a bit too much, we said no.

And just now that feels just right. To know that I would not have traded one peaceful hour for our own greetings to be winging into others' mailboxes, or to purchase one more "perfect" gift, or to turn out Martha-worthy trays of confections. Our kids are still young, and their boundless delight in the small ceremonies and celebrations of home is a luxury I am reveling in.

We have many traditions that are the bones of our Christmases, but the character and shape of them is different every year. Every year we discover a new tone to our celebration, and perhaps this is uniquely appropriate for a holiday that is not a day at all, but a Person. May we, may you, as we savor Christmas, meet Jesus in some fresh way. Let us make Him room, as the hymn says, let heav'n and nature sing.

A Feast Before Us

I am not crazy about "Christian book stores." Not because of the books, for I love books, but all the "stuff." (And I won't go on here, because there is a big old soapbox of self-righteousness calling me, and I'm keeping my feet on the ground today.) But one time, in one of those stores, I saw a poster that depicted the Bridegroom's banquet that awaits us in heaven, a table with places set, stretching as far as the eye could see and beyond. I loved that.

Last night and today, I have felt like a guest at a feasting table, each rich and fragrant dish that passes a blessing heaped on my plate. Holidays and calendars are so good for marking our time, looking back to the last time or two we hung an ornament on the tree, or set out the silver. And I cannot deny that, while there have been times of need, moments of loneliness in these last two years, we have traveled a way I could never have imagined. At last, a career that my husband loves, a home that is beautiful to us, boys blooming with health and good-naturedness, a church home. In letting go of some things, some people, my hands were opened to welcome others.

And for this moment, I am so glad to sit at this table.

To Make Ready

Every year of our married life I have filled the shallow pottery circle with water, and snips from the yard, magnolia, nandina and evergreen, fitted the candles in place. Sometimes joyfully and expectantly, sometimes in sorrow and uncertainty, through the dim sleeplessness of new parenthood and the glad noise of small ones. And we have drawn around this circle.

Likewise my heart has been in different states by this Advent wreath. Absent and distracted or worried. Longing beyond the lighting and reading to bedtime for little ones and a few moments of peace before I am sleeping too. But, somehow, always making this circle of light part of our Christmas preparation.

This year, as the cut stems drink and the wicks stand ready, I, too, am longing. To drink more fully of Advent, to experience a season of preparation for Jesus. A slow dawning in my heart, again, of what it means that God poured His divine self into a human vessel, a man who laughed and wept and taught, who made friends and loved and was betrayed. But Who, Himself, was faithful to the cross, To the tomb. And now, to the Throne. Breath held, candle lit, as an old story is told and retold in our own four-flame circle, I want to see the wonder in our faces, to be made ready to come and adore Him.

St. Nick of Time

I cringe at puns, I really do. And yet, occasionally, I cannot resist them.

Here it is the Advent calendar inspired by the wonderful Teresa McFayden. I LOVED doing this project. My total cash outlay was $3, for an adhesive magnetic strip to make my magnet numbers. I had the cookie sheet, and the paint, glitter, paper, and trinkets were all from my craft room. Ribbons and glue and mateless earrings, bottle caps and wooden stars and stickers and ink.

I finished the last several markers today, and after this picture was taken, all the magnets were removed so the boys can start taking turns tomorrow, adding them one by one.

My favorite thing about this project was that I felt so free with it, like I could just have a good time making each little piece. It will be out for a short time, it can be homespun and crazy and glittery and a little too much. And now it is ready, ready for the first of December tomorrow.

Good night, and twenty five more sleeps until Christmas!

Dry Run Dessert, Take One

We are having a little winter supper here in a couple of weeks for John's coworkers. (I am resisting the term dinner party because it sounds oddly grand for what I am hoping will be a festive but relaxed gathering.) And so it is a winter supper with a lovely salad, a choice of soups, and these little lovelies.

I am testing my recipes this week so all my plans and shopping lists are in place well in advance. I am serving a chicken tortilla soup that is less a recipe than an always evolving Southwestern stew. The potato soup I am serving tastes amazing, as my family could attest after Monday night, but did not prove very photogenic on a dark, rainy evening.

And now these cakes. I'll make them the day before, and the ganache the day of the party. Dessert plates dusted with powdered sugar, cups of decaf all around, Christmas tree lights twinkling off of silver. . . aahhhh.

Greenville Glitterati

The paper trees have been put on hold for the moment so I can steam ahead on the Advent Calendar. It is trucking along, life is good, boys were just taken to the dentist by their daddy and I have glitter under my fingernails. It is a gloriously sunny day, washed clean by yesterday's rain. Two embroidery projects down, one to go for gifts, and then another tea towel for me if time and crunchy neck and shoulders permit. Seems like the camera spends more time slung around my neck than snug in my bag, the boys have caught the bug and are cutting and gluing and pasting at every turn, and my papercrafting desk looks like a very pretty, sticky bomb went off.

I've learned, in my life of creative pursuits, that it always seems to be this way, a flood of ideas and energy and inspiration that has my fingertips tingling.

Or three months of evenings spent on the couch, eating Cheetos and watching House reruns.

Creative energy is always a gift of grace for me, and I've learned, learned slowly and with trial and error, to take it in, to clear the calendar, to let the house be a little dirty and get my hands more than a little dirty. It is feast or famine, and when the feast comes, best to pull up to the table, spread the napkin, and dig in.

God gives us so many gifts of fellowship with Him, ways to peek into His God-ness. To me this most precious one is the curiosity, industry and spark to make beauty, to enjoy process and product. To feel a faint shadow of perhaps what He felt, when jewels of stars slipped through His fingers into the velvet night, when He said it was good.

Make

I hope everyone had a Thanksgiving full of good food, the people you love and enjoy, and a heart full of gratitude. It feels like we had it all-- extended family time, a lovely dinner, and lots of hanging out, just the four of us.

Now, a confession: I LOVE Christmas. I love the preparation, physical and spiritual, the candles and readings of Advent, and the decoration of the house. I love the hushed and holy, but I love the bright and glittery too. I love the fleeting wonder of Santa in my boys' eyes, and I love giving presents.

Each year, we thoroughly enjoy Thanksgiving and the autumn season. (Yes, I am another indignant blogger who does not appreciate lit trees in Hobby Lobby the day after Labor Day, when I am there to buy floss to embroider maple leaves on a dish towel.) But after Thanksgiving, all bets are off. Like, the day after Thanksgiving. We enjoy a Christmas season around here! The kid in me just can't wait, and the mom in me thinks that with all the time that goes into the trimming and feasting, we might as well enjoy it for a few weeks.

And like most of us who play with paper and glue and thread and such, a chilly, rainy day turns our thoughts to crafting. I made the little tree above in non-traditional colors from directions here It will look perfect in our pale blue and cream bedroom. And I've had the paints out this morning to make one of these. My goal is to have it finished by Saturday, so we can start adding the numbers.

We have Advent booklets from our church, one for John and me and one geared more toward the kids. When the rain stops, I'll be clipping evergreen to trim our Advent wreath to make ready for Sunday.

Suffice it to say that it will be looking a lot like Christmas around the blog--- I have plans for a couple of kids' book reviews, and maybe a recipe or two. Blessings to you!

Edited to add: I've tried a few times to fix the abrupt text size change that occurs for no reason toward the end of the post, but with no luck. Formatting, not my gift. Many apologies!

Waking Up and the Power of Touch

I am feeling grateful in this week of gratitude that the ghastly cold that lasted way too long, (over your seven to ten days pal!), has packed up and moved out and I am left with that wonderful sense you have when illness has left, like all your windows have been washed.

I've been feeling better for a few days, but reaching out for work in my hands rather than burrowing into the place in my head where writing happens. That is the gift for me of embroidery, of papercrafting, even of cooking if the recipe is familiar and the ingredients certain, is that I am drawn out of my head and into a peaceful place that is more restful than sleep, as the work emerges beneath my hands. As I've written before, these things slow me down in good ways.

And the sense of touch does not lie-- things can be tarted up to look good from a distance, but the hand gives them away. Luxuriously good hand cream has a definite feel between the fingers, the smoothness of cotton pillowcases beneath the cheek, even the freshness of produce or bread tells its tale beneath our sensitive fingers. In the same way, I can feel the love knitted into the stitches of the scarf Rachel sent me today, the yarn that passed warm through her hands and needles and sent on to me communicates her care. As I run my hand over the stitches of the angel I am fashioning, I feel the many moments of silent worship that moved in and out with the red thread through the weave of the dishtowel.

Long before our children can make sense of our spoken words of cherishing and devotion, our gentle touch of loving, feeding, cleaning, soothing, whispers our love, bears them up in silken threads of nurture.

In this week when many of us will spend hours preparing food, laying a table, writing down our blessings and speaking them aloud, we will be communicating our love with the work of our hands.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Hold a hand of someone close to you, breathe a blessing and receive one.

Light for the Way

I came here to write a wonderful review of the book I just finished: Building the Christian Family You Never Had: A Practical Guide for Pioneer Parents. And it was wonderful, wonderful and searing and full of grace but hard truth too, hand in hand as they serve best.

But I can't do it. As someone with a painful childhood who has heard someone say, "I get it," and is feeling some creaky old doors in her heart come open, as someone who is sensing a new peace stealing around her shoulders, I can't write a glib few sentences.

I am feeling thankful, I am reading back through my notes and just breathing.

Congratulations Elizabeth!!!!!

Good morning, happy November, and even for moms of sleepy post-Halloween kids, Reece's peanut butter cups are not a breakfast food!

Today's post is a shout-out to Ms. Elizabeth Dillow, whose book, The Scrapbooker's Almanac , is being released today! Hooray Elizabeth! Her book gives scrapbookers tools and ideas to celebrate special days throughout the year, whether the usual red-letter days, or lesser known reasons to make and document a memory.

I love E's blog and her photography, and through a little blog community we are both a part of, I've had a chance to see her warm and generous spirit. I can't imagine the work that goes into a project like this, and I hope today tastes sweet indeed! So from the middle of my creative space, Miss E, I salute you!

Daily Delicious

There is a little something I try to do, that I have been neglecting lately. I've been bogged down, full of lists and plans and schedules that really do taste like so much paper and are about as satisfying. But today I am feeling inspired to get back to it-- a little something delicious everyday. Something out of the ordinary, out of the humdrum, something tasted or worn, experienced or created or listened to, that is not strictly necessary. Not a "have-to," but a "want-to." A little indulgent even. Because of my inability to drive, my Daily Delicious is by its nature frugal, since it has to be here at home, and simple, or it would be work!

If you've been needing a little more Delicious in your day, please allow me to share my recipe for a few days worth of inspiration.

--The tooth-rocking sweetness of homemade caramel apples, a once a year harvest treat, and more fun to make with little ones to unwrap the caramels. Drizzle with dark chocolate for more grown-up taste buds.

--Old rhinestones, cleaned gently to a sparkle, to be worn to a fancy work event tomorrow night, are even more fun tried on at midday. With a sweatshirt.

--A nap. Is there anything more delicious to a tired mommy than a few moments sleep, shades drawn, quiet house? An elusive pleasure worth seeking.

--The soundtrack to Chocolat, borrowed from the library, evocative and spirited by turns, takes me back to the essence of a delightful movie, picturing the cherry red of Vianne's cloak against the slates and putties of the village. (Oh, Netflix?)

Something I often reflect on after one of these little treats is that I don't really need much to feel refreshed, just a little inspiration in my head and heart. What are your favorite little luxuries?

Great Expectations, Adjusted

The bricks on the patio are wet and leaf-strewn. It is not all that chilly, but damp and dim-- the lamps are on now, at noon. I'm moving slowly today.

My sweet husband has a theory that most of the discontent in life comes from unmet expectations. We decide how something is going to go, it doesn't go that way, and we are mad/sad/disappointed. Our feelings about the happening may not have anything to do with its actual outcome, but only that our chalk mark for "good" wasn't met.

I think goals are great. I make lists-- things to do, things to read, things to buy, gift ideas, craft projects. I start the day with a general idea of how I want things to go, what I want to get accomplished, and I put a fair amount of energy into thinking through the best ordering of my time. All virtues. And as such, all can become idols. And like anything we worship other than our Creator, those good and worthy intentions can end up only echoing their, and our, emptiness.

There are days when my lists and plans are full of smart ideas that have nothing to do with what God is whispering to me about my family's needs, about my own needs. The kitchen floor getting washed before company comes is all well and good, unless that half hour is better spent snuggling Sam on the sofa, or reading aloud, or writing a letter to a friend.

This is one of those days. To dial back the expectations and go slowly. Or even be still. Breathe thankful prayers for the rain and prayers of hope and healing for the families driven from their homes by wildfires in California. To rest. To extend and receive the grace to just be.

Cousins, Bluegrass, Funnel Cake, Campfires and Cameos

Looking at the calendar back in July, the school schedule and fall events and special meetings at work and church, we saw a window of grace: a four-day weekend empty of command performances, ripe with possibility, in the middle of October. John put in for vacation and we were happy for that little island of peace coming, lapped on either side by waves of busyness.

Thinking back over it on this morning of odd, pink, fretful storm skies, I feel full and satisfied. The boys had their cousin over for a first "real" sleepover, we did some needed errands at an unhurried pace, we had lunch with my mom. We went to a fall festival in a park and ate fun food and heard music and played. Joshua kayaked for the first time and I bought handmade soap from a local artist. We saw people from work, from church, from school, and felt ourselves slowly but surely wrapped in the community we have been longing for since our move to this part of the county. We camped for a night and fished, roasted marshmallows and got rained on, a little, and bought apples at an orchard.

Not everything went perfectly. The autumn color I had hoped so much to capture was mostly the dusty yellow and brown of the drought that has gripped the Southeast, rather than the fire-kissed hues of frosty nights. It was quite a walk to the campsite for the kind of comfort camping we do. We had hoped to pick the apples, not just purchase them, but the rain and three busloads of schoolchildren altered our plans. The boys slept much better than we did, so were full of songs and silliness on the way home, with bleary parents still waiting at midday for a good cup of coffee. And, good heavens, the laundry!

It was a great weekend, funny in its imperfections, appalling in terms of nutrition, one which will require a few days to return our normal rhythms to us. And such a time out of time means that the first day back feels a bit thrown in the deep end, the plans and dates, joys and obligations of the next few weeks all come begging at once, and must be sorted out, dealt with, or sent to wait their turn.

But there is also the refreshment deep down to come back to this life and do it, and resolve to find odd moments in the day to let in cracks of light and air, to hear the banjo and feel the mist over the autumn fields, a thousand shades of brown and gold.

In My Skin

This is the dress I wore home from the hospital. I believe my sister chose it. It hangs on my bedroom mirror, and there were once little shoes that matched it, pale yellow and covered with lace.

Looking at it, there is a lump in my throat. It is so dainty and delicate, as was the pink baby who was dressed in it and carried home. And she was loved, I know that. But she was also delivered into a heritage of estrangement, resentment, simmering unspoken anger and pain and verbalized rage and disappointment. She learned that normal was a mental list of topics and people of which you never spoke, that emotional violence ran in families like eye color and wavy hair, that there were unwritten rules to dodge direct suffering, but no way to escape collateral damage. To escape being the collateral damage.

Many of us survive these childhoods, and arrive on the cusp of the world, fired with a deep-running vein of promise: everything will be different. It is actually a touch of grace when we realize that we have survived, but there is only One who knows all our broken places, Who speaks the language of our faulty "how life works" rule book, because He was there as it was written. Only He can rewrite it, trade a thousand lies for truths, truths that always begin, "My beloved. . . "

His loving course correction has even been with me, giving me a sister who can say, "You're not crazy, I was there too." Giving me my husband, who helps me to sing a new song, who tells me I AM different, not a recording of my parents' litany. Giving me friends who have their own war stories and continued peace talks. Books and art and music that remind me that becoming a new creation is not the work of a day, but a divine dance to the day of Christ Jesus.

Every day as I grapple with my short temper and impatience, my tendency to melancholy, as I fall and ask forgiveness and get back up, when I do, by grace, speak to my kids in gentleness and relate to them with integrity and peace, that little girl is being healed by her Father. As I raise my children, He is bringing me up. He is teaching me to forgive and be forgiven, to give grace as I drink deeply of it, to know that the hurt of my home of origin was born out of a deep need for Him.

That little dress is a reminder to me that I was always surrounded by loving hands, though sometimes they were invisible.



I am back in this space, counting on my day to day sensitivity to our family's needs to monitor my computer time and energy. Blessings to you as you read these words.

Blog Break

Hello everyone. I will be taking a little blog break as I evaluate my time on the Internet and how it impacts my day. I wish you all a lovely week.

Happy Birthday Rachel!

Today I want to celebrate my dear friend Rachel, on her birthday. I am confident that her husband a little boys are giving her a wonderful day, and I want to join with their love and good wishes.

If you read Rachel's blog, you get a pretty good glimpse of this woman I am so blessed to know. She loves God and wants to understand where and how He is working in her life. She seeks an ever-deeper and more true relationship with her husband, and she is crazy about her boys and about all this she asks the good but hard questions of herself, over and over. It has been a great privilege of my life to know her as a single woman, to be in her and Doug's wedding, to now share mommyhood and wifehood with her.

But mostly what I want you to know about this precious woman is that she loves me well. She is really good at rejoicing with me and mourning with me. She listens. She asks good questions. She laughs and makes me laugh. She danced with my tiny firstborn to U2 in the kitchen. She is a gift of God in my life that I get to keep discovering in different ways. We don't get to see each other often, we usually have to plan our phone dates with strategy and hope for napping kids, but she is there.

Bless you Rachel. You are a gift. Celebrate today.

Golden Afternoon

Well, the muscles are tired and I'll be ready for my pillow tonight, but the insides of the kitchen cabinets are looking spiffy. I am so happy that Sam had no way to record my moaning and groaning, and there is no video record of my paint stained gray-legging-ed self stuck out of a base cabinet. You'll just have to imagine. . .

Once I had scrubbed the paint from beneath fingernails and from forearms, I treated myself to a little more fall fluffing of the house. Our family room fireplace was on the home improvement list to be tended by a professional this summer, but we ran out of time and budget. In South Carolina, our fireside dreams will keep for another year, so I decorated the hearth. Then, later in the afternoon, I glanced over and saw the whole scene bathed in the golden light of autumn.

One of the things I love about this season is how it comes on inexorably; it will not be denied once it has begun. It was over 80 degrees today, but the quality of the light has changed, the brassy brightness of summer has mellowed. The sky is the deep, grand blue of October, not the soft wash of spring or the haze of summer.

One thing about painting cabinet insides or watching the measured pace of a turning season: these days are engendering a peace in me that has been long absent. The progress of brush or roller over wood, the nighttime chill a little sharper each week, the honey-flood of light across an afternoon floor, dusk a little sooner each evening. The last few days, I feel I've been drinking from a deep, cool well, refreshed when I did not know how parched I was. God is good.

Restlessness is a thief of this peace, and restlessness seems the disease of our modern times. Even if we are not always jumping, cricket-like, to the next new thing, we may feel as though we should be.

So it is good to work, to work hard and to want only rest, to be tired and in a posture to receive, to be still and know Who God is. And Whose child I am.

Up to My Elbows in Ivory Semigloss

With my usual zeal, I have tackled the inside of the kitchen cabinet painting project. (wooo hoooo) Very faint cheer. There will be a real post tomorrow or Wednesday, when I get all the paint off of me.

Whew!

SAM: "It doesn't take long, with a little boy's help!"

I still miss Joshua every day when he is at school. I suppose I have gotten used to it, to wondering what he is doing and who he is playing with, what books he is reading and hearing. Sometimes he shares a lot of vivid information from his day, which helps my imaginings.

But though I miss my big guy, though I sent him back to school reluctantly, I embrace the one on one time with Sam, which is flying by now that there is less than a year of it left. Time for him to be the main squeeze, time for his words to bubble out uninterrupted, corrected or echoed. He LOVES to help me, to dump flour into the mixer bowl, to touch the elastic and smooth bread dough with a finger, to toss clothes into the washer and hand up clothespins to hang them to dry.

The efficient side of me sometimes loses patience, sometimes forgets that I am a few fluttering calendar pages away from doing my day alone. My little helper will be about his own business, navigating the academic and social waters of kindergarten. He can't wait.

But I can. I can wait. I can answer a few more thousand questions. I can pause to get out the step stool and explain again what the yeast does, I can smile over the haphazardly set table and slow my steps to his. I can mark the passage of the day by snacktime, lunchtime, naptime. This Mommy will keep her little boy helper as long as she can.

Hidden Home Improvement

Today it is the real deal. No sun-drenched room makeovers, no recipe from scratch, and no deep spiritual insights.

I've been painting the inside of our kitchen cabinets.

Some of you know that our kitchen makeover, in two parts, was fourteen months ago. We painted the really dark wood cabinets a soft cream, and ripped out mud-brown carpet. My sweetie put down a charcoal and cream checkerboard ceramic tile floor, and we painted the walls a soft, barely there pale green. Barn red accessories, red floral window treatments my precious sister made for our last house, and a breakfast room light fixture purchased 90% off at Lowe's. Other lighting changes, a new countertop and a new stovetop are years down the road budget-wise, so we called our frugal, DIY kitchen makeover finished.

And I closed the cabinet doors on their dark and sad interiors.

Until lately. When it started to nag at me. I mean, I cleaned them well when we moved in, and I clean them now, but there is a level of UGH in old wood cabinets in an old house that even Mrs. Meyers cannot banish. And the paint is here-- we had lots left of the custom mixed paint from the outside of the cabinets. So, a free project, without the usual money guilt. No reason to not dive in.

Except for the Total Kitchen Upheaval emptying the cabinets means. Except for the ancient Contac paper clinging to some of the shelves. (A pox on Contac paper, except of course for the very handy for kids' crafts clear Contac paper.) Except that this is a most unglamorous project, not decorative in the least and utilitarian to the extreme.

But I am going ahead with it. I suspect in my housewifely soul that once it is done, once it is a memory and all the Contac goo is gone from beneath my fingernails, I will enjoy those clean, bright, smooth cabinet insides nearly as much as I love my newly redone living room.

And such a mindless project gives me lots of time to listen to music and talk to Sam, or if he is otherwise occupied, think. So perhaps the next post WILL be more philosophical, as in how sin is like old Contac paper, coming away in maddeningly small shreds, or decorative, like artfully arranged boxes of mac and cheese. . . on the laundry room floor. . .