tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24546638179404227362024-03-13T11:51:15.556-07:00Us Plus FourCraig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.comBlogger411125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-38029240339526837682012-12-30T23:03:00.000-08:002012-12-31T00:10:17.392-08:00A NEW Home<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: large;">We have a new bloggy home.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">Come on over</span><br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-7612332657993655722012-12-09T20:57:00.000-08:002012-12-10T17:58:56.011-08:00Eight Dollars<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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"That's at least eight dollars." Jack arches his brow, pokes at a lump in my hand.<br />
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There, like a freshly hatched egg, a tangle of coins and bills, a snarl, curled, rumpled, pressed and softened, the money, he had hunted it out of the four corners of his drawer.<br />
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"That's at least eight dollars," he says again, voice resplendent. I unfurl my fingers, count it with my eyes: a five, two ones, change. Lucy peeks around Jack's shoulder. "For Lucy's pants," he adds, "that she wrecked." She gazes at my face. He holds his eyebrows in that perfect arc.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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I trace the crumpled bills, the linen-y green crushed around dimes and nickels, a penny, a quarter. I pull my eyes from the small heap in my palm, and there, Jack, face radiant, eyes splendorous blue.<br />
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In that split second of lucent blue, I see it. And then again in the shrug of his weightless shoulders when I say, "But don't you want to buy something with this?" Hope, hope unbending, the confidence of a man, all his boyish features hung on blink-less sacrifice. Love.<br />
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And so I look into his azure eyes and nod before he scampers off, Lucy in tow, adventure wild around their ankles. What could I do? I took the money. I tucked it away and memorized the resplendent resolve of his sacrifice.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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Gratitude:<br />
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3834. "Mom," Lucy trills, "can alligators run faster than people?"<br />
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3835. "I want to jump into your arms, Daddy," she chimes.<br />
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3836. Craig finally solves the mystery: our dishwasher is leaking.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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3837. He rearranges the kitchen, tears up floor boards, peels back linoleum, opens the bowels of the dishwasher and does triage on the leak.<br />
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3838. He rearranges our world to hopefully salvage the soggy subfloor.<br />
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3839. "I tooted, big one toot," Myra reports. "I want to SEE big one toot."<br />
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3840. "Thank-you that Daddy's tall enough to put the star on the tree," Jane prays after we dress the tree.<br />
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3841. "I really like that one star," Myra narrates.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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3842. We snuff out all the lights and then illuminate the tree. "OOooooooh. Do it again, ok?" she says.<br />
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3843. "I taked this off my foot," she hands me a small brown bead. "It's a mole," she asseses.<br />
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3844. Picture, printed pictures, yay! Thanks, Rosie.<br />
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3845. Strawberry, raspberry tart.<br />
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3846. "It might be illegal for Myra to be a pirate," Jane oversees, "because you never hear about pirates in America. I mean it might have been ok a long time ago when Indians lived here, but not now."<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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3847. "Where's HOLA?" Myra queries. "I want to do HOLA." Spanish. "When you're four you can do Spanish," I answer. "I'm FOUR," she says. "Mommy, I'm FOUR."<br />
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3848. Books, glorious book-finds. A whole stack of art and history, literature, science.<br />
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3849. When the kitchen goes sideways, Craig takes a day off and I end up getting to see my mom.<br />
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3850. "Mommy, make me safe," Lucy calls as she gallops into the kitchen and interrupts a game of tag to hug my legs.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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3851. Craig's mom drops by with pears for the kids.<br />
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3852. We carol at a nursing home in town. Amid the ancient tunes and well worn faces, Christmas becomes real.<br />
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3853. I gift shop with Jane. She gives strong opinions about what people will like. We take up the art of gift giving.<br />
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3854. Joey gobbles up leftover sweet-taders, lunges at the spoon for more.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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3855. I ask Myra to listen <i>carefully</i>, "I want you to go find some --," I pause. "CANDY," she nods. "Socks," I say.<br />
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3856. "Jane, can I scrub my hair myself?" Myra asks as we suit up for baths. "Yeeeessss," Jane concedes. "Your breath stinks," she adds.<br />
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3857. When I tuck Lucy in I find a length of toilet paper folded in to a kleenex in her bed. "I got toilet paper too," Myra calls from the bottom bunk, "in my tummy."<br />
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3858. A Christmas card, a family Christmas card.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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3859. The kids and I arrive on time to two events this week and almost on time to a third.<br />
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3860. Craig continues to anchor our family in confidence and character. I rest easy that he makes our burdens light.<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Photo from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose</a>.</span></div>
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-20643043661767631492012-12-02T20:34:00.000-08:002012-12-03T13:08:45.665-08:00Pluck<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Wouldn't it be funny if the antichrist came to our house, " Lucy wrests the back door open, trots in from the henhouse, "and couldn't find anybody 'cause Jesus had snatched us up?" She grins, see-saws a buff egg in each hand.<br />
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She clomps a navy rain boot from each foot, lobs it onto a black tray masquerading as shoe mat. An egg cradled in each palm, her center of gravity recaptured, she presses one egg to her cheek. "Warm. Mom, it's still warm."</div>
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Myra bucks through the door. Lucy bobbles over the lip of the sunroom, "Myra, noooo. Watch out." </div>
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Lucy sidles past the lawyer desk, then stops, snuffles the egg, sniffs it again, whiffs and snuffs. "If you smell eggs they smell like chickens," she chirps. Trifle-sniff-snuff. "This one smells like poopy," she adds. Then gentle between fingertips, she delivers it to Craig. </div>
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All pluck and good cheer she trit-trots after Myra.</div>
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Trit-trot, trit-trot. Expectant, sanguine, the afternoon trails behind her in a wake.</div>
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3817. "Do you need one and a half cloves of butter for that?" Jack oversees the apple crisp recipe.</div>
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3818. I explain that women wear brassieres. "You wear unders on your ---," Lucy trails off, speechless. </div>
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3819. The Tuesday-girls decide to all take personality tests and compare.</div>
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3820. "She cried a little bit, not very loud, so I sang <i>Jesus Loves Me</i>. And she said, MY LEG HURT. so I rubbed her leg." Jane says when I ask if Myra woke up in the night.</div>
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3821. "How-yoo-ya. How-yoo-ya. How-yoo-ya," Myra belts out in Christmas bliss.</div>
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3822. I get to go running with Cerissa and my Dad on vacation, always a pleasure.</div>
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3823. A dear friend calls and we spur each other on in the promise-land of motherhood.</div>
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3824. "I'm really trying to think of it as a high and holy calling, not just a mundane task," she says, and I tuck it away like a banner to pull out later.</div>
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3825. The girls and I paint our fingernails and toes, 80 in all.</div>
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3826. We celebrate Thanksgiving with Craig's side of the family. Buoyant cheer, merrymaking, and joy, peace, kindness, sweet potatoes and blackberry pie. Unmerited grace.</div>
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3827. Running shoes. I find my favorite running shoes on a special sale. Love!</div>
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3828. I skip-de-doo past the arms of more sale racks and head straight home.</div>
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3829. "Even when I give you bad news I'm still building trust," Lucy concludes on telling the truth.</div>
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3830. PENPAL letters.</div>
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3831. Crockpot chickpeas.</div>
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3832. Crockpot black beans.</div>
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3833. As the tides of morality ebb and flow in this country, our Savior ever remains the same. Constant. Sure. Purity himself.</div>
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-84549960831566169742012-11-28T10:01:00.001-08:002012-11-28T10:01:50.286-08:00Ocean<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Mommy, I think I might know why this is such a rain storm," Lucy tweedles from the very back seat of the suburban.<br />
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Like a burst bag of M & M's on hardwood floor, rain droplets pummel the windshield, wipers feeble antennae in the deluge.<br />
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"The clouds maybe are exploding," she trills.<br />
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The squeak-squeak of wipers and the willowy curve of the road ahead, the children giddy, on we drive straightway to the ocean.<br />
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"What if God dressed up like you, and played tag," Jack grins to Jane, the corner of his mouth a toing-ing spring. "And then," Jack says, "He disappeared when you tried to touch Him?" He shakes his head as if a tree full of apples. They titter and guffaw.<br />
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"Mom, do you know what number infinium is?" Lucy chortles, grown-up knowledge all big inside of her. "Means it goes on forever," she lilts.<br />
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<i>Forever</i>. <i>Infinium</i>. I gather the moments like agates in the sand and tuck them in next to infinium.<br />
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3802. Voilent bluster of a storm, trees down, power out, we sleep a night in the crisp sheets of a fancy hotel, then to the beach house, to family.<br />
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3802. We walk the long salty beach.<br />
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3803. Rain and hail pelt our faces. We slosh our boots through puddles.<br />
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3804. Myra capsizes in the waves. Grandad carries her home.<br />
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3805. We line our pockets with agates.<br />
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3806. Air hockey, Banana Grams, Canasta, Gobblet, radio theatre, <i>The Silver Chair, The Horse And His Boy</i>, tall and fat mugs of coffee, pots of soup, late night pecan pie.<br />
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3807. Bowls of chocolates.<br />
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3808. The children gambol and hurrah with cousins, every staircase another winding adventure from which to leap.<br />
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3809. We visit the Newport Aquarium and the gaggle of us on field trip together.<br />
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3809. We slip into the hot tub, the children in bed. We chat and laugh and weave the bonds of friendship.<br />
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3810. Next day, we bring the ship-ful of children, all cheer and clamor, in the hot tub too.<br />
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3810. Thanksgiving dinner. 21 of us and a table long, long enough to seat this ocean of family, we eat together, high tide of loyalty and love thick at our elbows.<br />
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3811. A gull devours a crab out on the front drive. The children blink their amazement. "I wonder if gulls just don't have a way of cooking their food," Jack wonders.<br />
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3812. "Your spirit," Lucy announces, "how you feed your spirit is read your Bible. How you feed your tummy is eat regular food."<br />
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3813. "I'm thankful for Uncle James and Aunt Janey's hospitality," Jane says as we circle up for nightly prayer. Me too, and for the whole promenade of family gathered together.<br />
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3814. Craig drives the whole long trip to the ocean and back.<br />
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3815. "I love Joe's fit," Myra narrates on the way home.<br />
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3815. "Should I sit in the backseat for a little while," I offer later. Jane grins. "Then you can do damage control," she chirps, "'cause the kids don't necessarily always obey <i>me</i>, but they always obey <i>you</i>."<br />
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3816. Obey.<i> Lord help me always obey You</i>.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-91556250567414561532012-11-18T22:23:00.000-08:002012-11-18T22:35:56.060-08:00Dinner<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Courtesy of <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose Photo</a>.</td></tr>
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"My act of service," Jane says, "was taking care of extra bowls at lunch." She leans on an elbow, spoon slack in a pool of black beans. "And my words of love," she says, "are for Momma." She tucks her chin, "I love that you make us obey you."<br />
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I watch the shy top of her eyes, an easy smile slung across her face. "Jane, I'm so proud of you. Why do you say that?" I hold her eyes like a bird in my hand that lilting ribbon of a smile slack and serious.<br />
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She rounds her eyes, arches her eyebrows. "So that we can learn to obey authorities," she says, "like God and Daddy and the people that are over you." She plucks her spoon and scoops up shining pebbles of beans. She presses them to the roof of her mouth like chocolate.<br />
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I let the moment flutter, a ribbon in the wind, watch her carry on as if she'd traced the simple A B C of penmanship. The day wound up into a tight bobbin of a night, I catch my breath at the clarity.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3789. Tuesday-girls iron out Thanksgiving plans.<br />
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3790. A checker-plaid button-down -- rosy red and iced teal.<br />
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3791. "Mom," Lucy announces, "we can pick our nose. We just can't eat the thing that is in our nose."<br />
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3792. I find another friend loves God's word. We visit while my children build block towers for her baby boy to topple.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Courtesy of <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose Photo</a>.</td></tr>
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3793. Olivia comes to dinner. I am blessed by her laugh, her earnest questions, the lull of conversation a gentle breeze through the leaves of the house, her presence pleasure. Friendship encircles us.<br />
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3794. A migraine -- pain explosion. "Lord help me through the pain," I pray. Hours later I arise weak and well. In the kitchen, to the gentle shush of crayons on paper, Lucy sings again and again, "Not my will but Your will. Not my will but Your will. Not my will but Your will." Her words the ticking clock at my back, wash me with strength.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Courtesy of <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose Photo</a>.</td></tr>
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3795. A red sweater, soft, so soft.<br />
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3796. I visit with Mom, the low-tide of the headache washes out. I fall again to bed and rest.<br />
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3797. Sophie and dinner, the exchange of friendship and faith, we wash it down with apples and cinnamon, coffee and boardgames. The 16 years difference in our age melts to level ground, peers, and the lovely, lovely result: friends.<br />
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3798. Craig takes Jane to the annual Turkey Shoot.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;">Courtesy of <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose Photo</a>.<br />
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3799. "Mom, I have some information you may want to know," Jane announces earlier this week. "Myra coughed and it made a noise like puke."<br />
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3800. Pictures from <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Rosie</a>.<br />
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3800. Dinner on the farm.<br />
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3801. Craig continues the gentle and unending tug of leadership that first drew me to him.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Courtesy of <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">Urban Rose Photo</a>.</td></tr>
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-52627143900069082922012-11-11T23:33:00.000-08:002012-11-12T00:07:51.654-08:00Home<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"That's the way it always is: older people know more because they've done more and seen more," I say shaking my head over blooming scoops of brown sugar atop the kids' oatmeal.<br />
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I smooth a mound of coffee in the espresso basket, press it down with the tamper. Jane rinses egg batter from a white cereal bowl, the overspray a wake at my elbow. "Unless they've wasted their life," I add, "then they don't know as much."<br />
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Jane snaps the faucet hose back in place, quells the spindrift. She wads her hands into the hand towel. "They always know more," she says and brushes the towel up to her elbow.<br />
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I swivel the tamper in the espresso basket, shimmy off excess grounds until the coffee packs into a circular brick. "What do you mean?" I scrape the scoop along the shiny rim and loose coffee flutters to the sink.<br />
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"The older generation," she says and secures the white sackcloth towel back to the oven door, "knows more because they don't have as much stuff, and they aren't spoiled." She nods as if listing the ingredients for the eggs and oatmeal she just made.<br />
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<i>Less stuff. Less spoiled</i>. A feather of a thought, I turn this over in my mind. She clips off to clear the dishes and rally rouge bits egg and crumbs.<br />
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My wide river of a day and the current eddies. <i>Less stuff. Less spoiled</i>. Yes. The election, another incremental change in our world, I realize afresh: this world is not my home. I pray to be worthy of the challenges ahead.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3763. "Do you think chickens in Mexico speak Spanish to each other," Jack wants to know.<br />
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3764. "I hope we get lots of ads for our guy," Jane says of the election, "not that that gets people to vote."<br />
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3765. "We didn't call any of our babies Goliath," Lucy says, "'cause he's a very wicked guy."<br />
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3766. "It's election day today," I announce. Across the room, Jack widens his eyes, then bows his head to pray.<br />
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3767. Tuesday-girls at Mom's we pray for our nation over quinoa salad and salted chocolate.<br />
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3768. The cousins make a book club with our kids. Circled around the speaker phone they read to each other and make up discussion questions.<br />
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3769. "You know what this apple pie is to celebrate?" I announce Wednesday morn as I peel and chop apples, "That even though Obama won, God is still in control." Jack bounds into the kitchen. "Really?" he says. "Really."<br />
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3770. I visit the night away with a dear friend. We even hop coffee shops when the first one closes before we are done.<br />
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3771. "Toot in the bathroom, not at the table," I warn Jack. "I find that pretty funny," he guffaws.<br />
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3772. Mom and I morn the election over coffee and pastry. Even in our astonished disbelief, the Lord is the path beneath our feet, the breath in our lungs, and the destination in front of us.<br />
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3773. Craig's mom drops in to say hi.<br />
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3774. "Lucy poked it out with a pencil," Jack says of his missing tooth. "We were playing."<br />
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3775. "Why aren't you leading in being joyful? The Bible says you HAVE to be joyful." I grouse to Craig. "Be JOYFUL," he commands. And what can I say? I submit. And JOY comes! Who knew.<br />
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3776. Saturday, the sky blue tang, we roust the crew and trounce to the local cupcake shop. Salted caramel cupcake. Who knew I would be 34 before I had the best cupcake of my life.<br />
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3777. We play games and eat popcorn all evening. Everyone practices being a good sport. Even the grown-ups.<br />
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3778. "It sounded almost like a violin," Jane says to Joey's coos in the bedroom.<br />
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3779. A treat for me: new eye make-up.<br />
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3780. "Why do you think adults have longer ears than kids?" Lucy wants to know. "'Cause ears never quit growing, "I say. "My ears are longer than Joey's and Myra's," she nods, "but Emma has longer ears than all the children in our family, and Ellin has the biggest of the bigger-ear-people. Logan has pretty big ears too."<br />
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3781. We run into our very first neighbors from our very first house and have lunch to catch up, the friendship still fresh.<br />
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3782. "Big girls get unda-wears on," Myra announces in the bathroom.<br />
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3783. "Daddy said he's gonna start running," I tell Jane. "I didn't know any boys liked it," she says.<br />
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3784. "Jesus my only way. Jesus wuv me," Myra says.<br />
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3785. "In Heaven we won't have to brush our teeth," Lucy whispers to Jack after they get ready for bed.<br />
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3786. "I a big girl," Myra chimes, "but Daddy's da boss."<br />
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3787. "You can have some of my lollipops anytime you want," Jane bursts when I tuck her into bed.<br />
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3788. A week of quiet before Thanksgiving, preparation, I greet it - eager.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-31532211421851910452012-11-05T00:28:00.001-08:002012-11-05T00:28:49.194-08:00Reformation Day<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"It's Reformation Day. Happy Reformation Day everybody!" Bluster and cheer, my words trumpet up the stairs and scatter across the oak floor. Jane and Lu poke their heads around the top stair.<br />
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I jetty up the wooden steps, each footfall a hollow thump. "Hey, Happy Reformation Day!" The unlikely marriage of loud and cheerful the children stare, then grin.<br />
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"What's that mean?" Jane jaunts, "that the house smells like bleach?" Teehee, we titter and sniggle.<br />
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Later, apportioned at the north end of the old black couch, knees snaggled up, Bible propped on top, Jane unravels more of Revelation. I dump moppy pools from breakfast bowls, scrape oatmeal off with my fingernails, squirt blue Dawn in the frying pan, suds off oil.<br />
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"I want to tell you something I just noticed here," Jane lilts and traces the page's face. "God," she pokes a word I can't see, "like a fake god, isn't capitalized."<br />
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I lean back from the sink and face her directly, memorize her all folded up like a ladder there on the couch. "Yup." I lean back, slide another square white bowl into the dishwasher, "It's true."<br />
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So I slog more dishes from sink to washer, suited up in the fatigues of motherhood. Reformation Day, fake gods, capitalization, here, on the front lines we wage the war of knowledge. I mostly just watch, put the props in place, bear wittiness -- watch the holy unfold.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3744. "Mommy, you drippy-drippy," Myra pats my wet running jersey.<br />
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3745. "Mom," Lucy shakes off a polka-dot cupcake liner, "I might wash this off when I'm done and put it on for a hat."<br />
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3746. Tuesday-girls. Sisters-in-law gather at Mom's. Prayer, we link arms afresh, and I realize how alone I've felt.<br />
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3747. We pray before school. "Jesus, please speak to us and help us to think about you all day," Lucy prays.<br />
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3748. "No, we're not going to play with that today," I pluck the screeching recorder out of Myra's hands. Jane wrinkles her chin. "That is the best I have see you handle that," she nods.<br />
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3749. Winter chili, cheddar, popcorn, peach crisp, apple pie, round-robin conversation and laughs: another Reformation Day comes and goes.<br />
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3750. I tell Jack that people steal crocodile eggs and hatch them in zoos. "Yeah, people do weird things these days," he says.<br />
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3751. Mom and I finally unroll enough skeins of conversation to catch up. I trace her footsteps half around the globe and memorize her clear eyes and rainless voice, the gentle lull of listening.<br />
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3752. Rotisserie chicken, sweet potato fries, cranberry salad, chuckles, chortles, fractures of laughter, Christmas music, conversation like the circle of a ferris wheel, almond cake: friends, Jesus, thank-you for friends.<br />
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3753. A sorely needed night on the farm we unspool the evening in conversation and winter soup, a spread of which I brought nothing to except myself: the gift of family, I drink it in.<br />
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3754. "I peed in my bed," Myra confesses. "What?" I blink. "Yeah, I peed," she nods. "What?" I persist. "You still loving me," she grins.<br />
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3755. "I tooted," Myra announces at the table, "Bless you!"<br />
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3756. A Christmas sweater! O glory, a Christmas sweater that I plan to wear all season. Let the celebration begin.<br />
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3757. We trundle out of the car this morning. "I don't go to church to learn about Jesus," Jane tells Lucy. "I learn about Jesus every day. I go to church to teach others about Jesus."<br />
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3758. "I didn't look, but your judgement is always good," Jane says when I ask if she wants more garbanzos in her bowl.<br />
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3759. "Jesus, help us to know you and love you more every day," Lucy prays.<br />
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3760. "Want to scratch my pillow and make a funny noise?" Jack offers.<br />
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3761. "Mommy, your coat's on backwards," Myra persists, her green stretch pants inside out and backwards.<br />
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3761. Craig brings home ten pounds of apples and his old easy smile.<br />
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3762. I remind myself how what a prize I have in him.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-77694458073346920962012-10-28T23:17:00.000-07:002012-10-29T09:27:24.092-07:00Special<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"There was someone at the pool," Lucy says, "who was wearing a swimsuit that wasn't very private." She sidles up under my elbow. I pull my eyes from the computer and see her nod in time with the words. She tilts her head.<br />
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There at my elbow, warm hands, she strokes my arm. "That's because no one taught them to be private," I say, "and cover up their special places." Her eyes round plums, she blinks at me, stares. She mimics the flat line of my eyebrows.<br />
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"Probably it won't be as special for when they get married," she concludes and watches the arc of my eyebrows to see if she's right. A small exchange, the landscape of the face communicating all.<br />
<br />
"Yep." We blink our eyes in agreement. "That's true."<br />
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So simple.<br />
<br />
We map the world according to what is special.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
<br />
3727. We endure the pukin' flu. Miraculously only three of seven get it.<br />
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3728. "My tummy actually hurts a little too," Lucy warns, "but not that much," she adds and pulls through strong and healthy.<br />
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3729. "Ahhh, no," Myra trots into the kitchen, "Daddy don't want coffee. I'll have it though."<br />
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3730. "I have been wearing my jammies all day," Jack observes. "How'd it feel?" I ask. "WARM."<br />
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3731. "So what do you want to be when you grow up?" I smile to Myra. "Fine." she says.<br />
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3732. "Jude's FUNNY," she narrates about her cousin, "and KIND."<br />
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3733. "Do REAL monkeys open their own bananas?" Lucy wants to know.<br />
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3734. A seminar, a crusade, an old fashioned revival, my Mom returns safe and fresh from a tiny village in the countryside of Kenya.<br />
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3735. I marvel at the tsunami of encouragement and friendship I found missing while she was gone.<br />
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3736. Lucy speculates that if you do bad things and are really, REALLY sorry and you are a JEW, Jesus will let you into heaven. I tell her that's not true. "But if you are a Jew and you love Jesus, He will," she says. "Then you are messianic." Thanks Chuck Missler.<br />
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3737. My dad compliments my outfit so I wear it two days in a row.<br />
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3738. Friday night, I dislodge my temporary crown, our dentist out of town. Over the phone, he tells me how to cement it back.<br />
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3739. Sister-in-law invites the kids and me over for Sunday pizza while Craig works.<br />
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3740. I knit another 20 rounds on my hexagonal blanket.<br />
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3741. <a href="http://octoberbabymovie.net/">October Baby</a>.<br />
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3742. Coffee ice cream in little glass bowls scooped full.<br />
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3743. Another week, five children, a wonderful husband, and a Savior to hold me.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-16603534535279845722012-10-21T23:44:00.000-07:002012-10-22T00:11:02.911-07:00Names<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Why do you think the people in line were calling each other names?" Jane queries, knitting sprawled on her lap in the backseat.<br />
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I shift the car to park. The night cold and moist, we hesitate for a moment. "I don't know. I didn't really notice," I say. "What were they calling each other?"<br />
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"Well," she see-saws, "things like <i>fatty</i> and, and -- um, like <i>I-don't-like-you</i>." She gropes for an approximation.<br />
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I glance at the house, porch light incandescent, the evening sky obsidian. "Some people think that's ok," I pause. The words lop out like a pile of logs. "I think it's disrespectful to God," I add, "'cause He made us."<br />
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"Oh." We let this set for examination. She knits to the end of the row. I make a note in my journal.<br />
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And then, as if on cue, she winds scarf and yarn down into a ball, spears it with the knitting needles. I tug a bag from the passenger seat, socks and leggings a lump at the bottom. We trundle into the oatmeal and cinnamon breath of home, a little more knowledge added to the collection.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3709. "There's a little thing in Pastor Will's class that when you put money in, it makes it go up into Africa," Lucy tells me.<br />
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3710. "Everything in the Bible is REAL," she says.<br />
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3711. "It's hard to break colored pencils," she confesses later, "but I can break crayons."<br />
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3712. My mother sends updates from Kenya each day. I am humbled, down-on-my-knees awestruck by the power and love of Jesus to save. Thousands come to the Crusade. More than a thousand turn to Jesus.<br />
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3713. A sister-in-law joins me for laundry and coffee. We look over her beautiful photos and share art and life.<br />
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3714. A new friend comes for granola and tea. I am blessed by the sweetness of her love for the Bible, the reverence, the joy.<br />
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3715. My dad parses out what he's learning while Mom's away in Kenya and shares it with me.<br />
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3716. I worry all week over a doctor appointment that goes well.<br />
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3717. I dread visiting the dentist to have a crown re-done. Suddenly it's over, and I'm grateful for the good care.<br />
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3718. Jack scrambles to clear his breakfast dishes when I mention it need to be done.<br />
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3719. "Boogers, boogers," Myra croons at my elbow, "I like boogers."<br />
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3720. We attend a birthday party of where friends feel like family.<br />
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3721. Craig's mom drops by to say hi.<br />
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3722. My dad calls for tips on pie making.<br />
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3723. Jane and I take a date. I try to be more fun.<br />
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3724. We enjoy Sunday lunch with new friends.<br />
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3725. "So you think that this trouble would all go away if I just tried to be more fun?" I clatter down the stairs and poke my head around the corner. Craig nods. I grin. Ok.<br />
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3726. Another week skitters to motion, and I get to start by being more fun.<br />
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<a href="http://www.aholyexperience.com/" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img height="83" src="http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff162/annvoskamp/multitudesonmondaysbutton2-1.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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<span style="text-align: left;">***We just received word that the youngest son of a dear friend in Kenya has died of Malaria. Please join us in prayer for them.</span></div>
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-71051721508798894952012-10-14T22:54:00.002-07:002012-10-14T22:54:56.245-07:00Carrots<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Want me to wash TWO carrots," Jack lopes into the kitchen, "in case you want one on our date?" Smudgy fingers, he holds up two tail ends of carrots, soil smirched on knees and elbows, smutched across his forehead. Carrot harvest.<br />
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"Sure."<br />
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He scrubs the little nubs with an old vegetable brush. He swipes them dry, holds them up. "Look, it looks like a cross." He palms them, shoves the orange jewels down to the bottom of his pocket. Then we leave, and the pocket swallows his whole hand while he digs them out.<br />
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"Here ya, go Mom." He rubs a piece of lint off the tangerine root.<br />
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I crunch the coral sugar root, candy down my throat. "Mmm. I can't believe how good these are. Thanks, Jack."<br />
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We sail off. "What I did," he says, "is I sneaked some coupons for ice cream in my wallet in case we might want some."<br />
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I smile. We gaze out our respective windows, me the windshield, he the backseat window. "Oh. Thanks." Matter-of-fact, we let he moment unroll as if these things didn't need a lot of fuss.<br />
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"Mommy, how much are the drinks at Starbucks?"<br />
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"A lot." I prop my arms over the steering wheel, marvel at the quiet between each sentence, at the simple cadence of conversation.<br />
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"How much?" I can feel the arch of his eyebrows behind me.<br />
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"Some of them four dollars," I say.<br />
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"Oh," he nods, "I've got seven dollars. And forty cents. And a couple of pennies."<br />
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We let that rest as if the matter were settled. Seven dollars. Forty cents. A couple of pennies. Enough.<br />
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And so it is, the boy heart rises to be like his father and provide.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3672. "Lets have a drawing contest and see who can draw the best bee's nest," Jack tolls.<br />
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3673. "You peed in them? Again? Your pants? Go. get. them. I want to see the pee." I frown and watch Myra trot down the hall. "When you say that," Jane shakes her head, "what scares me is that she runs to her room, not the washer."<br />
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3674. "Mom, I need to show you something in here that I think is poopy," Lucy calls from the bedroom.<br />
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3675. "I like Joe's toes," Myra says and squeezes a baby toe.<br />
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3676. "How 'bout every Saturday is Organization Day," Jane offers.<br />
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3677. Myra wipes her face with the kitchen rag. "Ma," she says, "I'm, getting the boogers out a my eye."<br />
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3678. We eat heirloom tomato salad, fresh mozzarella, and blackberry pie at Mom's. We sip coffee and pray for her trip to Kenya, the crusade, the people.<br />
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3679. Almond chocolate bark.<br />
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3680. Our children learn the first question you ask when you meet a new kid: Is you mom home so my mom can meet her?<br />
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3681. We continue to study Revelation: the title deed of the earth, the scroll, the Lamb as He had been slain, Ruth, Boaz, the kinsman redeemer. "This is sort of weird," Janie says, "how it all fits together piece to piece to piece."<br />
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3682. "I don't really like clothes," Lucy confesses. "I just like going naked."<br />
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3683. Jane interrupts homework. "Mommy, would you turn Pandora on 'cause Jack's singing is -- annoying. Unfortunately his singing is not as good as the people on Pandora."<br />
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3684. "I got faster at math," she says. "Yesterday I could only do one of these problems in one breath. Now I can do one and a half."<br />
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3685. "This one's my dagger," Myra says and stabs the air with a teal blue 19 gauge knitting needle.<br />
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3686. "Joey kind a poops like animals," Jack nods, "'cause he poops wherever he is." He pokes Joe's baby belly. "But when he's older he won't."<br />
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3687. "Our family does not want crumbs on the floor," I punctuate with a frown. Lucy widens her eyes. "But the Devil does?" she says. "My clean up my mess," Myra adds.<br />
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3688. A neighbor brings over hand-me-down shoes for Myra.<br />
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3689. Pizza pie, a rainbow of salads, peach pie, laughter to make your cheeks ache.<br />
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3690. Finally, we completely organize all the kids' drawers. "Thank-you that we have enough clothes that we could even make a mess," Jane prays. "I know that in some countries that would not be possible."<br />
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3691. The kids reflect on Shakespeare's <i>Twelfth Night</i>. "I think you shouldn't dress up like a boy," Jane says. "You shouldn't fight if you don't know what end of a sword you are using," Lucy adds. "I think you shouldn't steal stuff unless you ask," Jack says.<br />
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3692. "I was gonna sword fight with knotting needles with Jack," Jane confesses, "and thought, <i>I probably should be working</i>."<br />
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3693. We have our Thursday Writer's Workshop. "The word combination that you want to be a sentence isn't a sentence because it doesn't have a verb," Jane says.<br />
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3694. We circle up for the vice-presidential debate.<br />
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3695. "I understood very little," Jane comments on the debate, "but I could tell just by the way he was talking, he is very confident."<br />
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3696. "Mom, "Lucy croons, "can I pick Joe up into my arms and hold him up and when I feel like I'm gonna drop him, put him back on the ground?"<br />
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3697. "I love you bigger than the sky," I tell Myra. "I love you bigger than a mouse," she replies, "really big one mouse."<br />
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3698. Jack explains the fall of man, "Like this is half of the lie: Your eyes will be opened and you will be like God. Your eyes will be opened but not like God."<br />
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3699. "You already spilled two times" I tell Myra. "One, two. Two times." Her face lights up, "Hold my horses, mom?"<br />
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3700. Lucy slaps our hefty dinner table. "If everybody helped," she says, "we probably could tip this table over."<br />
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3701. "Hey Jack," I overhear in the kitchen, "can you help me with the milk? Thanks. That was a test. You got an A+ on it."<br />
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3702. Burgers and Canasta with Pete and Rosie.<br />
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3703. "Hey Momma, wanna get up? I made you eggs," Jane greets me this morning.<br />
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3704. "Sorry. Forgive me pinch you?" Myra says to Lucy.<br />
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3705. I finish grades for progress reports.<br />
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3706. My mother safely lands in Nairobi, Kenya with the Spring of Hope team. Now en route to Adiedo, I pray of the coming seminar and crusade.<br />
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3707. I reflect on God's provision through my husband and swell with gratitude for his hard work.<br />
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3708. I ruminate on the obvious: There <i>is</i> enough time in each day for the things Jesus wants me to do. I just have to determine what those are.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-31808007020567438892012-10-08T00:11:00.000-07:002012-10-08T08:33:16.319-07:00Lu<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Do you think there is a spoon inside of you that stirs everything you eat?" Lucy asks. Tall in the booster seat, her wide-set eyes blink-blink in the rearview mirror.<br />
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"No, I think your stomach just sort of squishes it all together." I press on the break. We ease like a sigh up to the corner. I squint into the sun, the heavy air orange with dust particulate. I swing wide; we zip off.<br />
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"I want to marry someone from Africa," she announces. She stares out the passenger window. Her eyes follow oncoming traffic, a blue four-door, a yellow jeep, another white suburban.<br />
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"Why is that?"<br />
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""Cause, I know they are not in our family." We pass under a grid of power lines, enormous gray turrets laced together over wheat fields now stubble. "And maybe one of them is named Craig. And maybe I will change my name to Bethany. And then there will be two Craig and Bethanys." She nods her head, wrinkles her chin and forehead in tandem. "Yeah."<br />
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I watch her mimic the grown-up tilt of her head. "You're sweet, Lucy."<br />
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The wheat fields pendulate by, snarled yellow, radiant brown, more golden stubble, then blooming soil.<br />
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"Why does it look like we are lost?" she chirps. "I better eat a piece of chocolate. I don't think I can finish all this chocolate."<br />
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She chatters. We glide along. Broad strokes of turns swoop like wings. Silence idles and purrs.<br />
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"Do you think there is little bones in your lips?" she says.<br />
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"No. Do you?"<br />
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"Yeah," she nods, does that dip of chin, "'cause God put bones all over our body." Blink-blink, those wide-set eyes.<br />
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Open fields wind into the trellis grid of shops and stores, street lights, a symphony of traffic. I clatter over a curb and park mostly straight.<br />
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"Come on." I lug her door open, the wind a gambol across our faces, tendrils of hair blown every direction at once.<br />
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"I know how to make a baby," she blurts while I unbuckle her seatbelt. "You have to take a little of the mommy and a little of the daddy." She slides onto the footboard, hops down. "So if the daddy is dead, you can't have another baby."<br />
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"Here, let's hold hands." And then we skip, hand in hand, tra-la-la, the snap of the wind rosy on our cheeks: to the baby store.<br />
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I unwrap each baby. She vacillates dollies from hand to hand, pats their back sides, squeezes their heads, flops them over her shoulder.<br />
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"Ooo, this one is really cute. I like this one."<br />
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I reassemble the packaging. We pay for baby, climb in the car.<br />
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"Do you think her name should be Violet?" her voice soft like a kiss. "How 'bout we call her Lu, little baby Lu." As we trace the roads home, I memorize the soft unfolding of her voice. "It's Lu Anna. And her very last name is Little Baby."<br />
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Lu Anna Little Baby. Silence settles, a down comforter of a hush tucked up under our chins.<br />
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She buckles her baby into Joey's carseat, and we rest, love tucked up under our chins.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3637. Rosie blogs about <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/?p=3796">our photo shoot</a>.<br />
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3638. Furnace fixed.<br />
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3639. Chimney swept.<br />
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3640.We continue reading Corrie ten Boom and stumble across: <i>How should a Christian act when evil was in power?</i> "Just keep persevering," Jane says. "If I die, I die. And if I don't die, I don't die," Jack says. "That's so true," Janie adds, "the only safe place is to be where God wants you."<br />
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3641. "The people who built the tower of Babel," Janie says, "were trying to say: I'm gonna disobey You and still get to live with You."<br />
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3642. "The Tower of Bable was probably a ziggurat," I tell her. "A cigarette?" she says.<br />
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3643. "Do they milk horses?" Jack wants to know. "Have you ever sawn a horse with horns?"<br />
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3644. "What's your baby's name?" I ask Myra. "Myra's Baby," she says.<br />
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3645. "Mommy, I smack a spider," she says, fly swatter sidled up to her cheek.<br />
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3646. "I wish I could smell this verse and taste it," Jane says. "That would mean that I could memorize it faster."<br />
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3647. "What is that?" Jack comments on my chicken dinner. "What it is," Jane says, "is something from the hands of Mommy that is really good."<br />
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3648. "God is REAL in our dreams," Lucy tells me. "One person is always REAL, and it is God."<br />
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3649. "You gotta love people even if you don't like them," she adds.<br />
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3650. We read the story of Jonah and the children add commentary: God never gives up. He can do anything. He's stronger than anything. He loves all people.<br />
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3651. We ask what they noticed about Jonah: He disobeys. He wants to do things that are easy.<br />
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3652. "I want to be a mom like you," Lu says.<br />
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3653. I ask Lu about her bad dreams and how she hasn't come and got me in the middle of the night for a while. "Yeah," she says, "'cause I know that God loves us. And I know he is taking care of us."<br />
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3654. "I found a little green thing that I think is a worm egg," Jack says. "And I put it in a bucket and put worms in it so that if it pops out they can nurse it."<br />
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3655. "I don't know that they nurse when they pop out of the egg," Jane questions, "but maybe."<br />
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3656. Myra bounds up and kisses my leg.<br />
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3657. Jane explains her journal. "Jesus cares about the churches. I didn't know that. I thought he was just like, huh. But He's like you're doing a <i>good</i> job. Try to do better."<br />
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3658. The kids unroll pillows and blankets, snacks and puzzles to watch the presidential debate. Myra climbs on my lap to kiss Joey.<br />
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3659. I ask Myra her baby's name again. "Mine," she says.<br />
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3660. Lucy falls off the step stool. Jack rushes over to hug her.<br />
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3661. I check on Joe and find baby Lu propped on his belly.<br />
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3662. "I hope God lets Great-Grammie stay alive until she's one-thousand," Lucy says.<br />
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3663. "Mommy, I like your mouf," Myra says. "I like your cheeks. I like this one cheek." She traces my face when I tuck her in.<br />
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3664. Groceries. Trader Joes, Costco, even little extras like coconut oil, fancy cheese and dark chocolate.<br />
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3665. Another gallery opening. I show the kids how great paintings will move your eye over the whole canvas through the use of color, shape, and pattern. They laugh and point out the path.<br />
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3666. Craig saves the day as Myra *<i>almost</i>* makes it to the galley bathroom in time. A dear friend tells me her replacement outfit is <i>adorable</i>.<br />
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3667. I stop to consider: in one week my momma will be in Kenya. I feel the weight of this.<br />
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3668. We trounce to the farm with cousins and siblings. Bbq burgers, homemade buns, cranberry salad, potstickers, garden bounty, family encircles the farm table. The laughter sounds like a bubbling brook.<br />
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3669. The children fold up all their clothes and trade in for winter duds.<br />
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3670. A quote from T. Keller, "True joy is not found by controlling your environment but by controlling your allegiances."<br />
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3671. And A.W. Tozer, "The only thing you need to be ashamed of is sin."<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-50370202178898359802012-09-30T23:09:00.001-07:002012-09-30T23:10:16.257-07:00Journal<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Here, let me see," I hold my hand out to Jane. She nabs her journal, jaunts around the coffee table. I shimmy out of the deep black couch, see-saw Joe's drowsy head in the crook of my arm. She flops the notebook open, thrusts it toward me.<br />
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"Joseph loved his father," I read.<br />
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She points to the looping gray. "If you love, you have a good result," she says and pokes the sentence next to O for Observation.<br />
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"That's true." I nod, sway Joe at the corner of my elbow. He nuzzles close.<br />
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Jane lowers the tatter cornered journal. Myra cockles from the bedroom, but that notebook between us, that bass note of a notebook humming, reverberating, we let the moment elongate and stretch. I nod again, the perpetual motion a sway of newborn comfort.<br />
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"Almost anything," Jane finally says, "if you love, you have a good result." She dips her head, "If you love and you don't keep any secrets, you have a good result." She nods in that grown-up way. I furrow my brow, and we bob our heads.<br />
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"Huh," I say. "That's true."<br />
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<i>Love, and have no secrets</i>. The moment skitters back to motion and we carry on, the secret inside: Love, no secrets.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3609. "We all have different ways we hug you," Lucy says as I make the rounds to hug each child.<br />
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3610. "I want to hug Momma more," Jane announces.<br />
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3611. And, "Jack," she says, "stop fighting against Mother. You'll never win."<br />
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3612. I stumble upon another quote, "The impatient Christian is a weapon in Satan's hand." ~C. Missler.<br />
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3613. "Orangoutangs are the most intelligent animal," I say, "I didn't know that." The children look at each other. "Even more than chickens?!" Jane says.<br />
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3614. Myra spits at the dinner table. When we frown and gasp. She panics and licks it up.<br />
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3615. Creamy soup with rice and lemon, we share it at Mom's.<br />
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3616. We carry on in Revelation. Even the children want to know about it.<br />
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3617. Jack crunches an apple and reads to Joey. Joe studies his face, watches Jack's mouth.<br />
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3618. "You guys don't get elephant skin, I don't think," Lu remarks. "I got elephant skin. Like Uncle Dan."<br />
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3619. Baby melons on the counter, love from the farm, we eat them, juice dripped down our chins and on the floor.<br />
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3620. The phone rings during dinner. "I'm not going to answer that," I say. "Mom, toll free," Myra shouts.<br />
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3621. The kids and I have Writer's Workshop.<br />
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3622. Pesto chicken, crockpot special, invented from what we had.<br />
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3623. Jane reads her Bible, a dolly slung up on her shoulder.<br />
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3624. Lucy tries to rehydrate a black marker on the way to Grandad and Grammie's. I bust up laughing at her jet black lips.<br />
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3625. We make celebration of the August and September birthdays with a party, swirling bliss of children and adults, a carnival of family.<br />
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3626. Virtue. We name our favorite things about the birthday girls and boy this past year and replay before our eyes, virtue. <i>Whatever is good, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable -- if anything is excellent or praiseworthy think about such things.</i> And so we do.<br />
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3627. New clothes for fall, a birthday gift, the felicity of feeling pretty.<br />
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3627. "I stepped in some bear poop in the orchard," Janie announces, "and it had plum pits in it."<br />
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3628. We pick 12 gallons of plums in the snarled old orchard.<br />
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3629. We can plums late into the night, the first five gallons a grid of purply red quart jars.<br />
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3630. Craig and I pause to crunch rice krispy bars and stare at the old hand-me-down bin still half full of plums. "Ya know," Craig blurts between bites, "that is a <i>lot</i> of plums." He sets me to giggles. We shake our heads, smiles wide, laughs full.<br />
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3631. Myra blisses out over piles of plums. One here, a handful there, it's hard to say how many she ate. And so contrite when everything turned terribly stinky and messy, she hopped in the bath and covered herself head to toe in conditioner.<br />
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3632. Jack confesses to growing his fingernails long to try to grow claws.<br />
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3633. The children awake from Sunday naps. "Change into dirty clothes and you can dig worms," I say, "as long as you fill in the holes." They whoop and holler and, rapturous, tumble out the back door.<br />
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3634. Myra bites off little bits of plum and stuffs them in her dolly's mouth.<br />
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3635. "Are you trying to make it look like actually you?" Jack asks as I process a photo.<br />
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3636. Actually me. Another good week.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-26961319737721415172012-09-24T00:11:00.000-07:002012-09-24T00:11:48.187-07:00Lucy<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Do you know what is my favorite part?" Lucy scritch-scratches colors on a sheet of paper. She peels the cerulean blue a bit more.<br />
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"What?" I say.<br />
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"The part that is burning that God made for the Devil," she says. Sprawled tummy-down on the rug, a shoebox of crayons sidled up next to her, Lu rubs blues and reds into the lumpy soft paper, a smudge of yellow, a swipe of orange.<br />
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"Hell?" I frown. Settled into the old black couch, Joe under an arm, feet propped on the coffee table, I watch Lucy.<br />
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"Yeah." She scruffs out more flaxen yellow, scarlet, tangerine. They warble and twist, a collision of hues. I wonder about her bad dreams, the scary people that say they will cut off her toes, the ones that chase her until she wakes up and comes to me in the middle of the night -- to pray.<br />
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"I hope Great-Grampa turns to Jesus before we all go dead," she blurts. "Because when we die, Jesus will check our hearts to see if we love God, and if we don't, we are on the Devil's team."<br />
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I watch her stroke more blue onto that paper. "Yep." I wonder if she's remembering how I had said Hell is made for the Devil and his angels.<br />
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She pauses, glances at me from the corner of her eye. "Can you not be loud for a minute?"<br />
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Lost in my thoughts, I draw Joe a little closer, gaze at Lu. She tucks her chin, squeezes shut her eyes. Seconds unroll.<br />
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"Ok. You can be loud now. I was praying for someone to turn to God." She smooths on more cerulean. "For Great-Grampa." She bobbles her head, raises her brows, "Maybe God is talking to Great-Grampa. Right. Now."<br />
<br />
I nod, picture Grampa back in Montana, middle of the morning, that big library of a house.<br />
<br />
The soft rustle of crayons on paper on carpet lulls with each stroke. Shush-shush. Lucy holds the crayon all wrong, brushes on more apricot and golden sand yellow. Shush-shush-shush. She cocks her head, chews her lip.<br />
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"Do you think I should cut out this part that is God and hug him?" She jab a corner of the paper.<br />
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<i>Hug him.</i> "Sure."<br />
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"Or the Bible?" she says and pokes another corner. She looks up, contemplates out the picture window, the miles of green, staccatos of orange zinnia, an old gray fence.<br />
<br />
"You might hug the Bible," I say.<br />
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"Yeah." She nods, brushes her finger over the crayon wax. "Buh-Buh-Bible," she says and fiddles on more cerise.<br />
<br />
Bible, God, Hell, it all weaves together. And so we talk theology and try to figure out how to hug God.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3586. "Is there anything else I can do to please you now that I cleared the table?" Jane rings in the new week.<br />
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3587. "When you're done do you want to study the grasshopper?" Jack asks at breakfast.<br />
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3588. "My next grasshopper I want to call Grass Gordon," Jack chatters. "They're real eaters. They're mostly eating all the time. Lucy, what's 1 + 2? I need you to know 'cause that's how many grasshoppers we have."<br />
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3589. "I just like to feed them and hold them and take care of them," he says.<br />
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3590. "I have slepten with one of the grasshoppers," he confesses. "I just put him under the covers. That's how much I like them."<br />
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3591. Craig takes an afternoon golfing with my dad.<br />
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3592. A grasshopper escapes in the house. "I was just trying to hold him," Lucy explains.<br />
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3593. "Mom, are you an optimist or a pessimist?" Jack asks.<br />
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3594. "Wobber, wobber, I see the wobber," Myra shouts at a cat in the garden,"by the 'matoes."<br />
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3595. Tuesday at Mom's. The weekly rhythm. Taco soup and cheddar cheese, prayer. A fermata. We miss the girls that can't come.<br />
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3596. "Mommy, wanna know what we do?" Lucy asks. "We tell the truth, that's what we do."<br />
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3597. Lucy watches me put on mascara, "What does <i>that</i> do? Make your eyes smell good?"<br />
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3598. "Ugh. Myra spilled my coffee," I grouse. "Well, that will take the pee smell out of the house," Jane consoles.<br />
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3599. We gather in prayer for a dear friend in unending pain, a medical mystery. Craig prays. The children watch and copy, make paper airplane notes, and carry in their hearts the image of their father on bended knee.<br />
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3600. We enjoy the treat of family pictures. Up in the woods amongst vintage furniture, antique trunks, couches, an old pick-up truck, quilts, glassy pond, love unfurls, the life of our party. Rose captures the love.<br />
<br />
3601. We carpool on the mini-roadtrip to our photo shoot. Chit-chat, pizza, Pepsi, and every seat of the suburban filled.<br />
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3602. Buckets in hand we plod home from the plum orchard, laden.<br />
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3603. Dinner on the farm topped off with swatsbin pie all anise sweet.<br />
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3604. I practice more lessons on patience -- poorly. I compare notes with Mom. We zero in on the antidote: prayer. Pray for more patience. So simple. And since love is patient, it's really like praying for love.<br />
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3605. "Laugh," Myra commands. "Mom, laugh. Ha-ha-ha," she demonstrates, "Mom laugh. Watch me." Joe stops nursing to watch the spectacle.<br />
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3606. Craig's brother brings over fresh deer sausage to share with us.<br />
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3607. "Since my grasshopper wasn't even moving at nap time today, that probably means he was napping," Lucy fills me in. "My little child, my grasshopper child," she says.<br />
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3608. My little child. I pray to nourish my little children this week. And I pray to bless and serve my husband.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-14872715956695240342012-09-16T22:57:00.000-07:002012-09-16T22:57:41.263-07:00Mighty<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Jane come here, I caught a grasshopper," Jack bellows down the lane.<br />
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Jane, feet jammed into Lucy's black flip-flops, toes curled over the front, heel off the back, breaks into a run.<br />
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"It sounds like popcorn when it hops," he whoops and holds an old cookie bucket above his head. "It sounds like popcorn!"<br />
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Jane lopes up to the clear pail. Puffing for breath, she leans her face down, peers around an old cookie label. Eye to eye with the hopper, "Wow."<br />
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"I might draw it when I get home." he says.<br />
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We nod, trot home.<br />
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Mighty, he names the grasshopper Mighty and gives him a fresh handful of grass every morning. The little pail migrates from table to coffee table, kitchen counter, bedroom dresser.<br />
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"Mom, I think grasshoppers have only one big jumping leg," he announces as I nestle onto the old black couch and gather Joe up to nurse.<br />
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"Here, let me see." I hold the old cookie bucket above my head. Huh, Mighty's only got one back leg.<br />
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"Mom, wanna hold my grasshopper?" he blusters. "It's actually kind of fun having a grasshopper." He plops a rust-red footstool next to the couch. Elbows on his knees, he raises his eyebrows, "Mighty was the only name I really wanted." He nods, tilts his head.<br />
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"Is he mighty?" I say.<br />
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"Yeah, like I am mighty." He flexes his arms for me, then taps the lid. "I made three little breathing holes for him. I just used a pencil." He holds the bucket up to his face. "He's actually kind of fun to hold," he offers again.<br />
<br />
I smile. Craig ambles into the living room. "What do you have to say for yourself?" he jaunts.<br />
<br />
"Are you talking about Mighty?" Jack twists sideways on the stool. "Looks like Mighty's eating. I'll set him down." Little boy settles Mighty on a stack of books atop the coffee table, "He can still eat when I'm holding him," Jack adds, "but," he shrugs and pops up off the stool, bends down face to face with Mighty. "He's trying to climb the wall. He usually gets up a little way and then he falls."<br />
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We furrow our brows and watch little Mighty.<br />
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Nod and shrug, shrug and nod, Jack fills the night with commentary. Mostly I gaze at his blue eyes. Matter-of-fact and blinking in time with each detail, I watch him memorize the little hopper.<br />
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Memory. We memorize what we love.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3552. Jane helps me make lunch. "I hear them out there," she nods to Jack, Lu, and Myra out on the back lawn, "and I think, 'Oh, no, now what mischief are they into?'"<br />
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3553. Lucy canters inside. "Wanna know what that SHOT noise out there was?" she says and holds up a ziploc bag. "I popped this bag."<br />
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3554. My cousin comes to dinner. We make egg salad sandwiches together, sip coffee, and visit the night away in long strings of conversation. Craig and I tell her our love story and sigh at how it's still so good.<br />
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3555. Lucy scuffs out to wave at Craig, grass fragments already snarled in her pigtails.<br />
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3556. Salad and prayer and the hot afternoon sun, we linger around Mom's kitchen table.<br />
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3557. Dear friends and I wade another few chapters deeper in Revelation. We marvel at how it ripples all through the rest of the Bible.<br />
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3558. We forget Myra's blankie at Dad and Mom's. When we drive back, Dad fires it through the open window like a rocket. The children chortle.<br />
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3559. Myra squishes my face between her hands, kisses the top of my nose. "Mom, I love you hair," she says.<br />
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3560. Myra peels an orange herself and carries it dripping out to wave at Craig.<br />
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3561. Jack rambles around the house, his giraffe pillow-pet on a leash at his side.<br />
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3562. "Jesus, thank-you Daddy funny. Amen," Myra prays.<br />
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3563. I stir flour into bread. "Did you put the EAST in," Jack asks.<br />
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3564. We take an afternoon walk, "Stop, stop," Myra insists. "My bawtum stuck." She tries to explain and rearranges her unders.<br />
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3565. Egg salad, cucumber salad, green leaf cranberry salad, basil tomatoes, and little smokies, Dad and Mom join us for dinner.<br />
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3566. Jane props a baby doll in her lap while she eats breakfast.<br />
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3567. She writes a paragraph on how she loves her toy pony so much that the pony seems REAL.<br />
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3568. Burgers, brownies, tag, hide-n-seek, and miles of conversation, friends come for dinner.<br />
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3569. "Guess who is my favorite," Lucy says as we clean up lunch. "Jesus?" I say. "God," she answers, "'Cause he made Jesus alive again, so I think he is the strongest."<br />
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3570. Jane finishes her schoolwork before the whole day has wasted away. "I finally realized: there's no way around it," she says, "you have to do your schoolwork. Playing hooky doesn't really work."<br />
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3571. We take a trip to the county fair with dear friends, a whole troop of kids between us. We land home the middle of the afternoon and nap. Oh bliss.<br />
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3572. We read more <i>Tales of the Kingdom</i>. I try to explain how Jesus gives us each different gifts, special things we are good at. "I know what mine is," Janie says, "READING." I explain that Jesus's gifts are much bigger and sweeter even than reading and at the same time marvel at what a gift it is to be so rich in reading.<br />
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3573. Mom and I pray for revival in this land starting the only place revivals can start: our own hearts.<br />
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3574. Craig and the kids pick two buckets of yellow plums on the farm.<br />
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3575. We harvest sweet corn and carrots from the garden.<br />
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3576. I start <i>Pursuit of God</i> by A.W. Tozer.<br />
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3577. An answer to prayer: I find an earring I lost pressed into the rug by my bed.<br />
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3578. Craig's mom sends home a hand knitted blue blanket for Joey.<br />
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3579. A fresh pack of moleskin journals, black this time.<br />
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3580. Myra keeps calling Jack's grasshopper, Froggy.<br />
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3581. I hear a quote by C. Missler. "The secret to a happy life is to learn to delight in duty... Work is a form of prayer."<br />
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3582. Lucy lingers in the kitchen as I spread peanut butter for sandwiches. "You're nice," she blurts.<br />
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3583. She runs her fingers over my shoulders as she skips in from outside.<br />
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3584. I force myself to slow down and look into the eyes of each of our children, memorize that infinitesimal pause before they speak.<br />
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3585. I remember again how much I enjoy them. We dillydally and lallygag, saunter and dawdle, let gladness grow up between us. Mighty. We memorize it.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-58923364860718492152012-09-09T23:07:00.000-07:002012-09-09T23:07:25.818-07:00Secrets<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"You could pray that I don't have any bad dreams any more." Lucy lulls. She sits in the backseat, seatbelt squared across her torso.<br />
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I click the key off and rest my wrists on the steering wheel. "That's a great idea, Lucy." I fumble for a rumpled brown journal<br />
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"Wanna hear about one of the best dreams that I've had," she lilts.<br />
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"Yeah." I pop the cap off my pen. Scribble about her bad dreams.<br />
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"That Jesus is holding me in his arms," she says. Her words sway. My breath matches time to the rhythm. "He just holded me in his arms all night," she says, "and protected me." I hold still, feel His arms there with us, trace the glasslike surface of her dream.<br />
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"He does that," I blurt, the words like pebbles in my mouth.<br />
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"He can hear you even if you pray quietly." She looks out the window. A pyrex dish of chocolate chips lies empty at her knee. Smudges on her forehead and eyelid match chocolate blots in the bowl. "One time I prayed quietly to myself when Jack was praying at night," she carries on.<br />
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I nod. Secrets float by like dandelion umbrellas. We let them drift and glide. They hang in the air like a breath of wind. "Jesus always hears us," I breathe. We share the words, then grab hands and skip into the bookshop for the rest of our date.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3520. "Mommy," Myra chirps from the jog stroller shoehorned in next to baby brother, "I kiss Joe."<br />
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3521. We load up the whole herd of bikes and take a family bike ride at the park.<br />
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3522. The night gets hectic and Lucy walks around with a stethoscope in her ears.<br />
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3523. New earrings, silver arc, blue green dew drop suspended midair.<br />
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3524. Splitting headache ebbs and vanishes.<br />
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3525. I delve into Revelation with two friends. We let the awe of it wash over us.<br />
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3526. Tuesday at Mom's, coconut curry chicken, prayer, friendship, the sweetness of letting my guard flutter down like a discarded scarf.<br />
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3527. "Myra pooped in the big one potty," Myra trumpets from the bathroom. "I wipe self!" she says.<br />
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3528. I come across an old chip of terra cotta, the words <i>worth it</i> scrawled over the front.<br />
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3529. Joey squirms under Myra's hug.<br />
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3530. "There's slobber on you." Jane pats my shoulder.<br />
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3531. The circus of us rolls to motion as we prepare brats and salad and set the table for dinner.<br />
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3532. The children practice using checklists and set the hearth with folders and books for school.<br />
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3533. "The plum is kind of soft," Lucy confesses at plum picking, "because I had it in my pocket. Aw Mom, I squished a plum in my pocket." Jane squints, frowns and adds, "Mom, there's a squished plum in Lucy's pocket that she can't get out."<br />
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3534. "One of our best presidents," Jane says as we drive home from the farm, "is the guy that died the year I was born." I think back. "Ronald Reagan?" I say. "Yeah. He had a lot of money but was respectful and tried to use it for good."<br />
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3535. "A good thing to do," Janie tells me, "is to be respectful and try to get into authority and then guide people to Jesus."<br />
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3536. We pick more blackberries and yellow plums on the farm.<br />
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3537. We feast on stew and corn on the cob, fresh chopped cucumbers and peppers, fist-sized tomatoes, and blackberry crisp.<br />
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3538. We play tag in the car coming home from blackberry picking. I join in just to thumb my nose at a sour attitude inside of me.<br />
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3539. Craig does reconstructive surgery when Lu busts a lamp over our bed.<br />
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3540. We watch a documentary on butterflies. "Do caterpillars really turn into butterflies for REALS?" Lucy wants to know. I nod. "For REALS?" she squeals again. "Yeah!"<br />
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3541. As the movie wraps up, Jane adds matter-of-fact, "They must not believe in God 'cause they're not saying anything about him," as if God's design were obvious.<br />
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3542. After an enthusiastic conclusion to plum picking, Craig makes a discovery, "We have established that I should not have salad and plums for a meal."<br />
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3543. Craig takes Jane on a date during naps. Jack nuzzles up to my elbow. "We could play a game if you want," he says. And then offers, "Want me to make you a palm tree?"<br />
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3545. Craig brings home heavy whipping cream for ice cream. "I like that kind of milk," Lucy says.<br />
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3546. "Me and Thad and Jack like boogers," she confesses when I scold Myra for eating them.<br />
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3547. I unwrap and put away a whole set of glass serving dishes with snap on lids. They clank into perfect stacks and leave the cupboard as quickly as they are put away.<br />
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3548. I replay the spun out frustrations of the week for my mom to listen, and she tells me true: persevere, keep on, do not give up, press ahead. So I do.<br />
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3549. <i>Tales of the Kingdom</i>.<br />
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3550. A whole Sunday evening to linger with my dear, dear cousin encircling each other in prayer and love and dinner and a stroll in the garden. Perfection.<br />
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3551. That bedrock peace that strings one day to the next.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-91089092024928912972012-09-02T22:45:00.000-07:002012-09-02T22:45:08.996-07:00Harvest<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Do you think God's worried about if you're happy?" I ask.<br />
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Jane perches on the hearth arms breath away. Joe bobbles his legs there on the ottoman. He slaps his thighs, waves and wobbles. I lunge for a wet wipe, flick a rumpled half-sheet of paper from his eager hands. I scoop his feet up by the ankles. He grins.<br />
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Jane watches, plucks up the paper and smoothes it flat. "He's worried about if it's good in the <i>end</i>," she says, "not if it's fun now." She cocks her head. Hair knotted up and speared with hair sticks, a cockle of curls blooms out the side and frames her face. "Like in school," she adds, "sometimes it's not fun learning, but it's fun knowing how to do stuff."<br />
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I picture the hours bend over that floppy blue reading book, unyielding rigid hours that unfurled in wings wide as the horizon.<br />
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Such wings. And such practice. It's true: those who persevere are the ones we say are blessed.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3487. "Look," Myra exclaims, dolly perched up on her feet, "my baby flying."<br />
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3488. I find an old pleather recorder case with a whole deck of Crazy 8's inside. Myra doles the cards out like money. Later I find two cards and an old straw on Joe.<br />
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3489. Mom and Jane disappear downstairs to quilt together.<br />
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3490. I find Joe fast asleep with arms sprawled wide.<br />
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3491. Kitchen apron and latex gloves, a whole river of lye and a sewer snake, Craig unclogs our kitchen sink. I overflow with love for him.<br />
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3492. We barbecue with friends up north. In the dusty air and setting sun, tables sag with brats and salads and chips and brownies. We pause in all the riches to really see each other.<br />
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3493. I go to eat bbq leftovers and see the words <i>Love you!</i> scrawled on the ziplock bag.<br />
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3494. Jack, breathless from the run inside, bursts with, "Mom, Mom, I'll show you what we are doing for Lucy's monkey bar lessons."<br />
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3495. I spy Myra, toothpaste in hand. "You weren't gonna just eat that right out of there were ya?" She nods, "Yeah."<br />
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3496. "Momma," Jane chirps, "you're just fun to be with and to visit with."<br />
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3497. Lucy gets in trouble then comments, "I'm just sad because you told me that Lady Macbeth made Macbeth want to kill the king."<br />
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3498. Mom and Dad come for dinner. We share fried eggs and brownies, garden bounty, cucumbers, black grapes, and an evening, the best part.<br />
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3499. We swim for a whole afternoon out in the country. The pool feels like it is on the edge of the world.<br />
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3500. We play Canasta late into the night with my little brother and his spunky wife.<br />
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3501. I pray for Joey when I tuck him in. I cup his face. He hugs my arm.<br />
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3502. All the monkey bar training and Jane pulls a muscle in her stomach. "Jesus, please help Jane not feel that way," Jack prays, "because I love her a lot. We love you. Amen."<br />
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3503. Friday night, a week of hard work, and we celebrate: salted brown butter rice crispy treats.<br />
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3504. An amphitheater of children surround me as we brown butter and melt marshmallows.<br />
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3505. Jane cuddles with Craig. "Daddy, I love you," she whispers.<br />
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3506. I eat the first two squares of a Godiva chocolate bar.<br />
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3507. The children gobble up cinnamon clove zucchini bread fresh from the garden.<br />
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3508. Cerissa and I talk school and weave the excitement of another new year.<br />
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3509. Not even two weeks in and Libby makes mothering a newborn and toddler look simple and easy, the work of an artist.<br />
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3510. Craig labors half a day over more grilled pineapple salsa.<br />
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3511. A dear friend goes in and out of surgery and all looks good.<br />
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3512. Joe loves to nurse, rolls his eyes in satisfaction.<br />
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3513. Salmon and lemon zucchini bread down on the farm, the cadence of family in each week.<br />
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3514. The children pick a bucket full of cherry tomatoes.<br />
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3515. I tuck Myra in for her nap and fall asleep myself.<br />
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3516. Extended family filter in and out on the farm, the afternoon a revolving door of familiarity.<br />
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3517. We study the family homework for Sunday church. "God loves it when you do good to others," Jane comments.<br />
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3518. My brother tells me that 1 Peter and 2 Peter were written to the persecute church and are still beloved by persecuted christians all over the world. I begin to re-read them with a new lens.<br />
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3519. Another Sunday night and I remind myself: be faithful with what I have been given. Be faithful.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-59391870673385575142012-08-26T23:38:00.000-07:002012-08-26T23:38:51.376-07:00Trust<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"What do you like about the book so far?" A bag bulged with blue swimsuits rests on the passenger seat. In a hollow of the afternoon Jane and I set out to return swimsuits. A receipt in my wallet secures a school book for us to pick up.<br />
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"Hmm," she says. I wait. The yellow air of late summer swirls past the car heavy with wheat dust and forest fire smoke. A chapter and a half in, I wonder what she thinks of <i>The Hiding Place</i>. "Hmm, I think," she nods, "I like how they are so trusting in God."<br />
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I nod, sip my black coffee. <i>Trusting in God,</i> I trace the wideness of her remark. Holland 1937, immanent invasion, occupation. Hitler. Concentration camps.<br />
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"I didn't expect you to say that," I finally say, "but I think that's what I like about it too." A hundred and fifty pages deeper in the story, I eddie at my bookmark. <i>Trusting God</i>, it still encircles the story.<br />
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We lull. The skein of conversation runs slack. I ease into the far left lane and round the corner. Autumn golden at the edge of the day, I pluck sunglasses off the top of my head, slide them on.<br />
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"One of the things I liked about William Tell," Jane tugs the thread of conversation, loops it through another story, another hero, "is how Walter was so trusting in God to let his dad shoot the apple off his head."<br />
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<i>The Apple and the Arrow</i>, I nod again. A feat of trust. Courage encircles injustice. We map this strange anatomy, memorize its bones, muscles. We let it sit between us, a spectacle, a masterpiece.<br />
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Our words slow, the golden air enfolds around us. Strands of words slow and turn, weave and interlace. I hold them light, reins that lead with the slightest touch.<br />
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Gratitude:<br />
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3458. Lucy trots out of the sun room. "This would be a good picture: letting God go first on something," she says.<br />
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3459. A new nephew, Maxwell Jesse, arrives safely in this world. Eight pounds, one ounce, and a whole chorus of Hallelujah and amen.<br />
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3460. We celebrate Craig's dad's birthday with pie: pizza pie, peach pie, and blackberry pie.<br />
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3461. I find Jack asleep in bed with blue work gloves on.<br />
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3462. The kids roost at the head of our bed to watch Craig mow the lawn out a tiny window in the bedroom. When I go to bed a find an old red stool next to my pillow.<br />
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3463. "Bluey has sticky hands," Myra comments on her blankie.<br />
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3464. I eat Calamata pasta salad at Mom's. We ruminated on being prompt, how it's like a muscle and grows with use.<br />
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3465. <i>Macbeth</i>.<br />
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3466. Peanut flour.<br />
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3467. "I'm gonna have hotdogs tonight," Janie says. "'Cause I'm sitting by Grandad tonight, and he really likes that I have mustard just like him."<br />
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3468. Hamburgers and pineapple salsa outback with Dad and Mom on the coattails of summer.<br />
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3469. I ask Jane to make peace in the car while children squabble and posture, poke and prod. "That's gonna be hard," she says. Still, I exhort her, press on anyway. "Yep," she finally says, "that's the way we are in our family."<br />
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3470. Lamb chops and garden beans, tortellini and couscous, brownies, ice cream, strawberries and a wide open prairie walk: dear friends graft us into their family for a night.<br />
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3471. My dad's company invites us to the annual staff picnic. We spin the afternoon long in swimming and fellowship, barbecue from the local butcher, salads and sweets, pie and cookies, and a window into the lives behind their work.<br />
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3472. My youngest brother joins us for a night of cards. We laugh and laugh, humor effortless and unrolling at every turn.<br />
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3473. Furrowed brow and half-skip, Lucy jumps off the diving board for the very first time. "Jesus, thank-you that I was able to jump off the diving board," she says. "And I pray that I will be able to do a belly-flop. Amen."<br />
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3474. "Wow, it feels kind of weird to be organized," Jane comments on school the new year.<br />
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3475. "I have three blackberries," she sing-songs, homework finally finished up at the blackberry patch, "I'm gonna see if Great-Grammie wants them."<br />
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3476. We find Great-Grammie making zucchini bars, red carton of raisins in hand, her face a beacon of love.<br />
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3477. We scrape past thorny limbs of branches to pick buckets of blackberries down on the farm.<br />
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3478. "Dad, do you think Great-Grampa can fly 'cause he's in heaven?" Jack asks as we head home. "I think so," Craig tells him. "'Cause in the Bible," Janie adds, "it says something to the effect that our body will be like Jesus's, and he can fly." She shrugs. Jack nods. "Nothing is impossible for God," he says.<br />
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3479. Farm fresh honey.<br />
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3480. Corn on the cob.<br />
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3481. Jane finishes <i>The Apple and the Arrow</i>.<br />
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3482. My cousins, identical twins who played the flower girls in our wedding, head to college this week, just minutes from our house.<br />
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3483. I find a little rocking chair wedged in the pantry door when I tell the kids to get out a fresh pack of gum.<br />
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3484. Again and again I rein in the impulse to be too harsh on the kids this past full, full to bursting week.<br />
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3485. I encounter James 1:12, <i>Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him</i>. I think on how steadfastness is a marker of love. Simple but true.<br />
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3486. As life bursts up against my rough edges, I think on James and face the challenges as if I were made for that moment.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-75318583864087991452012-08-19T23:54:00.000-07:002012-08-19T23:54:46.520-07:00The Ledger<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Who were you talking to when I came out here?" Suited up in pink sunflower jammies, Lucy starts at my voice. I spy her perched at the top of the basement stairs.<br />
"The Lord," she drawls and tucks her chin. We let the word roll out like a marble across the floor.<br />
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"What were you saying?" I step around our three tiered fruit basket, and the room opens up. Hardwood floors, an old beast of a desk shackled down with paper piles, the kitchen three steps away, and us, we meet.<br />
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She drops a shoulder, teeter-totters her head. "Please help me not be scared down here," she points down the stairs. A prayer. A tether to hold. She forgot baby Katherine downstairs in the dark.<br />
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"Good for you, Lucy."<br />
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"Mom, I'm trying to bless Joe." Lucy rifles through a tiny bank ledger no bigger than an envelope. She traces the empty lines with her index finger.<br />
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"What?" I frown at the booklet.<br />
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"I'm trying to bless, Joe." In red letters I read, <i>The Bank of Baker,</i> on the front of her book. She opens it to the middle, bends it back and forward.<br />
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"What do you mean?" I say.<br />
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"I'm trying to find money for him," she says, "'cause I know it would bless him." She clips a sharpie pen on the front half of the booklet and hands it to me. "Can you write I LOVE JOE in here for me," she says.<br />
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"What's that?" I flex the booklet, turn it over.<br />
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"My little booklet," she says.<br />
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"What's it for?"<br />
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"Stuff I'm thankful for." She pokes the cover, "I want you to write I LIKE THAT HE SMILES too." She cocks her head, blinks, "And I want you to write, I LIKE THAT HE ALMOST LAUGHS."<br />
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And so it is, in the book that's supposed to measure out our money, I write the things she loves about her little brother.<br />
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*****<br />
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At bedtime, plopped like anchors around the room, we gather for prayer.<br />
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"Thank-you for George, Emmanuel, and Regina," Lucy tolls. "I pray they will wake up refreshed and healthy and have enough food to eat," she swells like surf. "And I pray all the people who know you, will know you more." She billows like a sail, her drawl slow and full. I nod in time to the words. "And," she says, "I pray you will help me to swing better. Amen"<br />
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The seesaw and sway of prayer gently rocks us to harbor.<br />
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"I love you," I whisper to Jack, his arms a tangle around my neck.<br />
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"I love you too." He jaunts back. "Will you whisper a prayer in my ear like you sometimes do?"<br />
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"Jesus thank-you for this boy you are growing into a man," I say, "I pray you will fill him with your Spirit. We love you. Amen." I break tether to go, smooth still his tawny arms.<br />
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I step around that great shoulder of a bunk bed. "And your hair smells good," he calls after me, a canzonette set to the wind.<br />
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3436. Myra props herself in Craig's brown recliner, Jane's old Bible upside down in her lap, "Momma, read Bible, you," she says. "You're reading your Bible like me?" I ask. "Yeah," she grins like a shoelace untied.<br />
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3437. Jane learns to make bread.<br />
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3438. The kids shine a mag-light into the bread maker to watch.<br />
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3439. Jack tries the bread. "Jane, you're a good cook," he decides.<br />
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3440. "It's just a pain to waste food," Lucy comments at dinner. Jane shakes her head. "I remember those days when I would never get full," she says.<br />
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3441. The Tuesday Girls gather again over at Mom's. We eat pineapple basil bleu salad and pray out on the lawn.<br />
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3442. I go to slip my flip flops on, and find Lucy's lined up next to mine.<br />
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3443. Myra frowns at birds in the garden, "Oh, no, BIRDS!" she shouts, "Jack SHOOT GUN."<br />
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3444. We talk about the consequences of lying. Lucy nods. "And trust," she says, "you break trust."<br />
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3445. "When God gets here," she tells me, "I'm gonna hug him."<br />
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3446. I push through a hard day, and it turns out to be a good day. Patience gives way to peace.<br />
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3447. Lucy puts on work gloves to fold laundry.<br />
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3448. We make fun at another barbecue with families from church.<br />
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3449. "Are you alright, Myra?" Jane chimes to her sis, wilted on the floor. "You learned a lesson that you don't hang on the dishwasher."<br />
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3450. "See Joe? See?" Myra points to the rows of pine trees as we walk home from the pool, her and Joe wedged together in the stroller.<br />
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3451. Myra traces my eyelashes when I tuck her in.<br />
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3452. <i>The Hiding Place</i> by Corrie ten Boom.<br />
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3453. <i>Life of Fred Math</i>.<br />
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3454. "I like your singing," I answer to Lucy's morning aria, and she plants a kiss right on my hip.<br />
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3455. Craig pokes fun of my morning antics. "She's is on a rampage," he chortles, "Quick, hide the men and children." I laugh myself to tears.<br />
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3456. Jane and I putter in the kitchen. I ask if she wants to listen to one of our favorite Bible commentators. "Yeah," she says, "He isn't like <i>I'll come back to that because it's HARD;</i> or <i>we don't want to do THAT. </i>He's like<i> OK, let's do it NOW."</i><br />
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3457. Yes, let's do it now. Another week, and we step into the challenge.<br />
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-61766655399611076702012-08-12T23:39:00.000-07:002012-08-13T07:54:39.094-07:00Diligence<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Daddy knows <i>practically</i> everything," I say and shake out a fitted sheet. I try to fold it. It wags and flaps, folds itself into a rumpled ball. </div>
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"Daddy <i>knows</i> everything," Jane adds and licks a blob of blackberry jelly off the edge of her sandwich, "except what he doesn't know." Reclined at the table, she licks a smudge of jelly off her finger.</div>
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"Yeah," Jack nods. He chatters with sandwich wadded in his cheek, "Like Daddy probably knows how many worms are in the <i>whole</i> world."</div>
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We nod and carry on.</div>
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"I went and checked on the bird," Lucy joins, "and his eyes were aiten out." She arches her eyebrows. I add a washcloth to the stack of towels. A sparrow split into our window yesterday, the sky-blue reflection a perfect match. "And there were ants on it," she adds. "I think the ants ate his eyes. I hope he went in heaven."</div>
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We nod, carry on.</div>
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We clatter the dishes to the kitchen, load the dishwasher, wipe the tables. </div>
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"Momma, no pressure," Janie says, "but I could bring up some leggos if you want to play with them."</div>
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Play. "Sure." We scatter and bluster leggos over the black tabletop. We build an olympic swimming pool and pretend athletes dive and race.</div>
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Myra pees in her little potty. We cheer and gambol. I award a tiny chocolate chip, and she gives everyone a teeny tiny bite.</div>
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Friends return home, now five years gone in Europe. We encircle our dining room. Round scoops of peanut butter ice cream and melted chocolate sauce, roasted pecans, a harvest of children, we ebb and flow, trace the silhouette of friendship. </div>
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"What did you like about each one," I catch Jane's eye as we wipe the counters and scuffle silverware and bowls away.</div>
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"Hmm," she tilts her head, squints, "I don't know, but I liked how their boys were so kind."</div>
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So kind. We nod again, share the slow curve a smile. </div>
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We weave the day down to a tail end. Children plop into bed, a museum of pillows and stuffed animals, blankets of all sizes. They wait for prayer. </div>
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"Me, me," Myra calls from her bed, "self."</div>
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"You want to pray yourself?"</div>
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"Yeah." We close our eyes. We wait. And wait. We peek at her squinted shut eyes, hands folded and burrowed into her forehead. "Jesus," she says. "Jesus." We listen. "Died for me," she plods, "Amen."</div>
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"Amen." We wind the day down to a single thread: amen.</div>
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3412. Joe turns four months.</div>
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3413. Myra eats a grape in 20 tiny bites. "There choco in there," she says.</div>
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3414. Apple hand sanitizer, I buy it for Lucy on a date. "Mom," she tells me, "I real quick before it ran out, added water to my hand sanitizer."</div>
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3415. Jane gets in trouble and explains, "I know why I didn't do it: 'cause I wasn't strong."</div>
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3416. Myra hugs me. "You 'pecial," she says.</div>
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3417. I ask Jane how she likes her <a href="http://www.gwnews.com/newsflash/about.php">World Magazine</a>. "It was saying," she tells me, "that when the government prints more money, they are actually stealing from you."</div>
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3418. I read in a book about the Amish: You're only as rich as the things you can live without. I describe it to the kids. "Yeah," Jane says, "So don't tell Daddy if you really want something because he would probably buy it for you."</div>
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3419. "Momma, you pretty," Myra says.</div>
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3420. "Momma, you funny arms," she adds.</div>
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3421. We throw a baby shower for Libby over at Mom's. We shout surprise then linger under the big tree out front. I let down my guard and let it flap in the wind. We continue to entwine prayer week to week.</div>
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3422. We barbecue burgers and lick ice cream comes and round out the summer with Mom and Dad.</div>
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3423. Our niece babysits while Craig and I attend a conference together.</div>
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3424. She sticks to our daily schedule and delights our kids. They are calm and happy when we return. I see she has been a good leader. </div>
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3425. We lunch with a cadre of Craig's volunteers. Conversation carries the day and we mingle over ideas like how discipline and creativity are interdependent.</div>
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3426. Godiva Chocolate Pearls.</div>
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3427. We join the staff of my dad's office at a local bistro. Over a burger that drips to my elbows, I take note of the rapport they have one for another and glean wisdom from their experience.</div>
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3428. I ask Jack how we could make the night wonderful. "We could bring cucumbers," he says, to Gramma's house, "so she doesn't have to pick any out of her garden. Maybe we should bring two."</div>
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3429. We eat dinner down on the farm with Ma and Pa and all the kids and cousins. Between food and conversation, the lingering between wheat fields, a bike ride, we leave full to the brim.</div>
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3430. <i>If anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things</i>. I ask Janie what the verse means. "If you think about things that are evil," she says, "you will start to love evil even though you are reading your Bible."</div>
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3431. Jack scares the birds out of the garden with his cap gun.</div>
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3432. Joe spots me from across the room and splits a smile.</div>
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3433. "God won't do what ya want sometimes," Lucy tells me, "even though you ask him. It's 'cause he does stuff that is way better."</div>
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3434. "Hard days are the best," Gabby Douglas says, "because that's where champions are made. If you push through the hard days, you get through anything." </div>
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3435. Diligence. The wreath of champions. I gather the reins for another day and pray for diligence, faithfulness in the small that I may one day be worthy of more. </div>
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Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-88259160927264714452012-08-06T01:23:00.000-07:002012-08-06T16:26:02.370-07:00Normal<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Momma, that's a verse I wish I had memorized first." Jane leans an elbow on the dryer, flaps a tattered paper as if it were a wing.<br />
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I negotiate coffee in one hand, saturated diaper in the other. "Uh, here," I flop the dipe on the top of the washer, pluck up the streamer-thin paper. "Why is that?"</div>
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"Because," she says, "it would probably be deeper in my mind by now, and I like that verse."</div>
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I uncurl the paper, pull it flat between my fingers. "That's true. That's good. Ok, why don't you say it."</div>
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She tilts her head, "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds," she totters her head back and forth, stands on one foot, "because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish it's work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."</div>
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<i>Not lacking anything</i>. I force myself to slow, slow down. A whole rushing river of a day -- we pause. <i>Trials. Joy. </i>I listen to the hymn of her voice.</div>
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"If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God," she continues, "who gives generously to all without finding fault." She grins. I hold on to her gaze. <i>Without finding fault. Perseverance</i>. I match cadence with the words. </div>
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A full deep breath and a silent boom lowers. The day blitzes on. </div>
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Perseverance, the crown jewel. I hold on tight.</div>
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*****</div>
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"More, more, more," Myra chimes.</div>
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I glance up from our dinner prayer. I wrinkle my forehead, "You want to thank Jesus for more?"</div>
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"Yeah," she nods, punctuates with wide eyes and long blink.</div>
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"What do you want to thank Jesus for?"</div>
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She shuffles her shoulders, garbles, "Tus."</div>
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I blink, try to iron the word out in my mind, "Tus?"</div>
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"Tus."</div>
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I turn it over a couple more times, "Us?"</div>
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"Yeah, TUS."</div>
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"Jesus, thank-you for US. Amen."</div>
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*****</div>
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"That sunflower is so BIG," Jack tussles over the lawn, a yipping puppy at my heels.</div>
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"Yeah, that sunflower IS big. When they're big, they're big," Janie says.</div>
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"When they're big they're big," I chuckle.</div>
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"I though it was sort of funny I had to clarify that." She giggles. Jack slaps his knee, shakes his head.</div>
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"So how's it been, Jane?" For the afternoon, we leap-frog from summer sale to summer sale, stock up on kids' clothes. Jane and I, we swing our arms, hold hands. We weave conversation as we go.</div>
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"It's been," she pauses. I peer at her in the rearview mirror, "<i>good</i>." I smile, wait, let the words work their way out. "It's been -- normal," she finally says. "But it's good. I really like the normal."</div>
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She nods. We let silence wash in, warm and soft.</div>
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The normal, me too. Perseverance, it makes a way for normal to be good.</div>
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Gratitude:</div>
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3383. I show the kids <a href="http://urbanrosephoto.com/blog/">Auntie Rosie's blog</a>. "Yeah, that looks like her," Jane says. "It looks like how she would do it."</div>
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3384. Lucy tries to persuade Jack, "Jack, it's nice to let ladies go first, you know."</div>
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3385. We backyard-picnic with families from our church, the ones we do life with. We compare notes and spur each other on. We rise to this grand occasion of raising children and leading our family.</div>
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3386. I tell Myra she's a crack-up. "No, you crack-up," she pounces back.</div>
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3387. We take a long afternoon with salad and lawn chairs. Rose, Lib, Mom, and I linger in the shade of a big tree at Mom's. </div>
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3388. Rockie blows bubbles in the pool, then demonstrates how her daddy does push-ups.</div>
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3389. "Jane, I'll tell you my best present at my party," Jack smiles, "my best present every year: people <i>coming</i> to my party."</div>
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3390. "Mommy," he says to me on his birthday, "maybe we can go to coffee together when we go on a date. I want to go to that place that has mints." And we do.</div>
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3391. Myra holds my face between her hands, kisses me on the lips.</div>
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3392. Jack turns 6.</div>
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3393. Lucy scrubs cucumbers at the kitchen sink. I interrupt the work to make coffee. "I just was being sweet 'cause I wanted to," she says.</div>
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3394. Joe smiles wide, splits the morning open. "Don't you like it when they look at you like, <i>you are so AWESOME</i>?" Jane asks and smiles at me as I beam at Joe. </div>
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3395. Myra kisses my toes while I nurse baby Joe.</div>
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3396. Lucy wraps up the evening, "Thank-you that Jane gots the baby that she wants. And thank-you that we won't obey the Devil. Amen."</div>
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3397. I sip coffee with Mom and exchange whole spools of conversation. We marvel at how pride motivates almost every bad decision. </div>
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3398. Toenail polish, cherry red.</div>
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3399. A new shirt, stripes and modern.</div>
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3400. We celebrate Jack with the big family barbecue. After a round-robin exhortation, Jack meets the eye of each guest and thanks them.</div>
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3401. Myra poops and pees in the toilet. Cerissa and I potty train Zeke and Myra side by side. Oh, how much lighter the work.</div>
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3402. Jane comments on Gramma, "She's one of those people that can read your mind before you even think it."</div>
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3403. Lucy punctuates the birthday season. "I like it that God's at my birthday every time." </div>
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3404. "He knows everything you do. He knows everything you do. He knows <i>everything</i> you do..." Lucy sings Jesus-songs while she delivers fresh folded laundry.</div>
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3405. Joe hums while he nurses.</div>
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3406. I serve mismatched burritos and sandwiches, rotisserie chicken, black rice salad, a mosaic of leftovers and almost-meals. "Mom, you make dinner so well," Lucy says.</div>
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3407. We explain the passover to the children. "The <i>lamb</i> saved them," Janie exclaims, "and Jesus is sometimes called the <i>Lamb</i> of God. It all just sort of fits together like a puzzle."</div>
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3408. Jack prays before bed, "Help Great-Grampa turn to you. And thank-you that Great-Grampa never tells lies."</div>
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3409. We zip to church Sunday morning. "Mom, is it hard to stay in the lines when you are driving?" he says from the back seat.</div>
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3410. We talk about how sometimes bad people prosper, how sometimes doing wicked things can get you ahead for a while. But in the end you always lose. As we sit on the edge of my bed, Jane nods, "It's like, you may be ahead on points, but you're gonna get pinned here in a couple of minutes." </div>
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3411. Pinned. When you're pinned being ahead doesn't matter. Every moment matters. I'm grateful and sobered.</div>
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</div>Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-27945546314122393842012-07-29T23:57:00.000-07:002012-08-01T11:58:01.274-07:00Conversation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"What you do, Jack," pajama clad and sprawled on a sleeping bag, Jane lilts in sing-song, "is listen and collect ideas." She scoops her knees up and hugs them to her chest. "Then," she says, "pretend like you are a grown-up and try to participate." Conversation, it's simple really: listen, pretend, and try.<br />
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"Yeah, that's it," I say. "Listen and collect ideas, then pretend and try. I think you'll be good at it."</div>
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The four older children, flopped like a field of overripe wheat, are a patchwork of sleeping bags and tired limbs. The snag of their dry feet on soft polyester lulls in the background.</div>
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They fidget and settle. I hug each one and press my face into the warm softness of neck. I whisper each a special prayer, one last flutter of wind as they slip into sleep.<br />
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Gratitude:</div>
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3354. "Wuv you," Myra whispers in my ear.</div>
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3355. We traipse across the road to Auntie Cerissa's and play the morning away through the playhouse, over the bikes, 'round and 'round the mulberry bush with tag and good ol' shenanigans. All the while Ceris and I visit and visit.<br />
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3356. Couscous salad with mint and feta and sweet onion.</div>
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3357. Sisters-in-law, Mom, and I circle up in the front yard. We pray and linger, sip ice water. The children amble and gallop the afternoon long.</div>
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3358. "Mom, can I clean off our door?" Lucy asks. "'Cause it has oatmeal on it. Yeah, the bathroom door."<br />
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3359. We eat meat and potatoes down on the farm, a whole spread Craig's mom materializes. The children blaze a trail through mile-high raspberries and wander the garden.</div>
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3360. We return home, a whole farmer's market in the back of the car.</div>
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3361. "One time I thought my johnny-jump-up plant might have been dying," Lucy tells me, "when actually it was having babies."<br />
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3362. "Jesus," Lucy prays, "thank-you for dying on the cross and taking away all the bad things we have done."</div>
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3363. "Well, Jesus died for that," I tell one of the kids when they get in trouble for being mean. "It doesn't matter if it feels like enough. It is. He paid for it."</div>
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3364. "You've worried about more things in the last hour," Craig tells me, "than I have in," he shakes his head, "the last <i>year</i>."<br />
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3365. "Momma, you're just fun to talk to," Jane announces. "That's why we want to keep talking to you."</div>
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3366. I ask Jane what she wants to get Logan for his birthday and she answers, "I don't know. But, one thing I do know is most kids like things from the Dollar Store."<br />
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3367. We pack for a weekend vacation. I grow grumpy with every detail that goes wrong. "Momma, I don't mean to be disrespectful," Jane treads lightly, "but the way you're talking isn't very nice. I was just standing over here and thinking, <i>Maybe she doesn't know</i>."</div>
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3368. I humble myself to apologize and everyone leans in a little closer.<br />
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3369. "She looked for the longest chapter she could find: Mark 14." Craig tells me when I say Jane can read ONE more chapter before naps.</div>
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3370. We have a backyard barbecue with a dear family of four and linger until the night is cool. Italian sausage, baked beans, raw carrots, and fresh vanilla ice cream, even the seven children let the night slip by like water between their toes.<br />
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3371. All the children loaded up for a trip to the lake and Jane comments, "That little patient baby is sitting there grabbing his leg and trying to pick it up."</div>
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3372. We settle into a weekend with my brother's extended family. Hours and hours in the water, on the boat, tubing, water skiing, lounging, or swimming. Their generosity is a banner of love.<br />
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3373. A new pair of sunglasses.<br />
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3374. For the first time in more than a decade my Dad and I get to go on a run together. What a highlight. As we run along lakeside, I hardly notice the view for all the conversation. A father's love, there is nothing like it.</div>
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3375. I turn 34.<br />
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3376. We have the traditional round-robin birthday roast with my extended family. 'Round and 'round and 'round we go, they bury me in an ocean of encouragement.</div>
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3377. Gifts given with great love.<br />
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3378. When we finally arrive home, Jack makes dinner for the kids: melted cheese sandwiches.</div>
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3379. He puts his arms around Jane and Myra. "I'm sitting by two of my kids that I love," he says. "I'm sitting by two of my good girls."</div>
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3380. Jane showers off the girls, then steals away to read.<br />
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3381. Cousins. After a whole weekend with cousins we find our friendships deeper and fuller than ever expected, durable, fun, and so, so good.</div>
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3382. I see it again, my husband's steady hand and steady heart. Steady and unflappable, he comes alongside me again and again. </div>
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**Special thanks to my momma for taking most of the pics for me.**</div>
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</div>Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-43127254332188633832012-07-23T00:17:00.000-07:002012-07-23T00:19:45.782-07:00Sighting Day<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"So what has God been teaching you lately, Jane?" Starbucks, a cacophony around us, I toss out questions. Today Janie turns eight. I study her face.<br />
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With a green straw, she sculpts a bluff of whip cream on a pink Italian soda. She cocks her head, peers up and to the right, past me, past the black sunshade on the floor-to-ceiling windows. She blinks, smiles just only at the corner of her mouth. "To be kind," she finally says, "to others, when they are in the wrong." She licks whip cream off the end of her straw.<br />
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"Yes," I say and nod. I sip my creamy black americano, "yes."<br />
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"And when I am in the wrong," she wrinkles her forehead, leans back in her chair, "to not just make it look like the other person is wrong. You actually have to confess." She jabs her straw through the drift of cream and quaffs raspberry soda.<br />
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I let the "kind" comment settle in around me. <i>You actually have to confess.</i> Confess, yes this is true. Confession leads to intimacy. I turn this over and over as we volley conversation between soda and coffee, lemon bread and cream cheese danish -- confession leads to intimacy, like now, here, at Starbucks.<br />
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Then it's Sunday and we're all a-skitter to church, all six of us jabbed and lobbed into the suburban, Craig already off early before us. I wheel 'round the corner onto a four-lane oneway street.<br />
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"Jack," Lulie chimes from the back-back seat, "God can run faster than you."<br />
<br />
"God," Jack retorts, "can run faster than <i>anyone</i>."<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
"Or, or, OR," Lulie tolls, pealing over Jack before he can finish, "God can make YOU run as fast as HIM."<br />
<br />
"Yeah. God's the only magic man in the world," Jack replies.<br />
<br />
"Yeah."<br />
<br />
Magic man. Confession, magic. And so it is, I watch for signs of confession and magic, of God. I tremble at how many times we see Him.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Gratitude:<br />
<br />
3331. "Mom look! Mom, LOOK," Myra holds up an unpopped popcorn kernel, "a roly-poly."<br />
<br />
3332. "Hi, sweetie," I whisper in Myra's ear. And "Hi, sweetie," she whispers back.<br />
<br />
3333. "Mom, I am so annoying at that rabbit," Lucy tells me before we catch him. "Aren't you so annoying at that rabbit?"<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
3334. Jane scrubs the kitchen sink and waits to see if I will notice.<br />
<br />
3335. The kids fill our wading pool and then let it warm in the sun all morning. "This is about how warm Grammie's pool was but five times warmer," Janie gushes.<br />
<br />
3336. We scamper down to the neighborhood pool with cousins and laugh and splash and visit the night away.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
3337. Jane turns eight.<br />
<br />
3338. Family from both sides gathers for a big birthday barbecue. We celebrate these past eight years with Jane, the treasure that she is, and the huge heritage of a good, good family.<br />
<br />
3339. Lucy helps me pick out an outfit for the day then comments, "Do you think your tummy's getting back to normal even though it's still sort of big?"<br />
<br />
3340. We finally catch the rabbit in our trap. Craig releases him down by the golf course.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
3341. I roast eight pounds of carrots on the grill.<br />
<br />
3342. Dear friends invite us for a barbecue. We eat a whole mountain of chicken drumsticks seasoned and turned to golden perfection and visit long into the night.<br />
<br />
3343. Jane receives a winter nightgown, red plaid socked away in the closest for the dead of winter.<br />
<br />
3344. Jack and Jane train for the <a href="http://www.spokenyarun.org/">SpoKenya Run</a>.<br />
<br />
3345. Jane makes the cut and we run the race together. We practice pacing and endurance, grow our muscle memory of what pacing and endurance <i>feel</i> like.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
3346. Jack and the rest of the crew cheer big at the finish line. Then we all eat drippy ice cream cones together.<br />
<br />
3347. Toasted pecans, cooled, two dark chocolate chips piggybacked on top.<br />
<br />
3348. We experience the obvious collaboration between leftover cheesecake and toasted pecans.<br />
<br />
3349. We share lunch with friends at our favorite burrito place.<br />
<br />
3350. Jane comments after church, "It's really obvious who did the family homework when kids try to answer questions during class."<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
3351. I enjoy more conversation and advice from my mom, the fun of talking, the continual exchange of ideas, the invaluable: years of experience ahead of me.<br />
<br />
3352. Baby Joe grows pudgier each day. He gives me long I-love-you blinks when we gaze at each other.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
3353. Craig takes the whole bunch of us to lunch after <a href="http://www.spokenyarun.org/">SpoKenya Run</a>. We push little cafe tables together in a group and encircle them with our family. We nourish ourselves on piquant food and good memories. The moments pass while we notice each one.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<a href="http://www.aholyexperience.com/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img height="83" src="http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff162/annvoskamp/multitudesonmondaysbutton2-1.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
</div>Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-30956436605111956882012-07-16T00:11:00.000-07:002012-07-16T00:12:20.717-07:00Contribution<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
"Why do I have to contribute to our family?" Jack trots by the kitchen, a bale of laundry in his arms.<br />
<br />
Over the sink, I shake water off a head of romaine, deposit the leafy clump on the cutting board. "Because it honors God," I say and cut up lettuce wings into to crinkly green streamers.<br />
<br />
"Oh," he disappears 'round the corner a wadded sock sloughed off the bundle.<br />
<br />
I rotate the bannerol of lettuce, chop it into green squares. "Did you know when I do something for you, I'm actually doing it for God?" He peeks around the corner. "But it turns out good for you," I say.<br />
<br />
"Oh." Eyebrows up, he nods then disappears 'round the corner with a hop.<br />
<br />
I sweep the lettuce off my bendy white cutting board into a clear salad bowl. <i>Ok then, onward</i>. A little knowledge here a little understanding there. I scatter the seeds.<br />
<br />
I speckle the salad with cranberries and pecans, crumble the feta, toss it all with rosemary dressing. The morning moves on, the kaleidoscope of moments flit by.<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
Gratitude:<br />
<br />
3304. "Daddy's getting old," Lucy proudly announces, "that why he has wrinkly skin."<br />
<br />
3305. "Jack, with his very gentle hands, didn't realize how strong he was pushing Lucy, and ERRR," Janie shares.<br />
<br />
3306. I peek out of the kitchen and see Lucy trying to teach Joe to suck his thumb.<br />
<br />
3307. Myra plays trains with Joe while I make dinner.<br />
<br />
3308. Egg salad with bacon and corn salsa.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3309. Homemade ice cream with Thomas Jefferson's recipe, egg yolks, vanilla bean, whipping cream, and all.<br />
<br />
3310. "I think the devil is stinky," Lucy philosophizes, "'cause he doesn't wear deodorant."<br />
<br />
3311. "I think camping's gonna be hard but fun, like cooking," Jane anticipates.<br />
<br />
3312. Craig takes Jane and Jack to Family Camp with my brother and his boys and another family we love. The men teach the kids about fear, how fear is the antithesis of faith.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3313. Trader Joe's Unexpected Cheddar.<br />
<br />
3314. A salad made entirely of berries and jicama.<br />
<br />
3314. Speculoo Cookie Butter.<br />
<br />
3315. "Momma," Lucy asks, "why when God talks inside of you ya can't hear him?"<br />
<br />
3316. "Myra looks like such a little mother," Jane comments as Myra lilts by with her pistol and stroller.<br />
<br />
3317. Orange pop.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3318. A baggie of raspberries from Logan.<br />
<br />
3319. Grumbling, rumbling thunder and the storm that came with it.<br />
<br />
3320. Lucy's assessment, "When I saw that rain this morning when I was in bed it looked like the clouds were EXPLODING."<br />
<br />
3321. We spot a bunny in the garden and solve the puzzle of what has been eating our plants.<br />
<br />
3322. "Jesus help us to catch the bunny tonight 'cause I know you can do anything," Jack prays. And Jane follows, "Jesus please help us catch the bunny and relocate it. And make it have a good home somewhere else. Amen"<br />
<br />
3323. <a href="http://www.katheats.com/favorite-foods/overnightoats">Overnight Oats</a>.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3324. Lucy fetches scissors and takes out trash when I clean out my art studio. I find an old friendship bracelet I made when I was ten. I give it to her. She likes it.<br />
<br />
3325. Coconut milk, coconut oil.<br />
<br />
3326. A manilla envelope from my cousin comes in the mail.<br />
<br />
3327. I dye five shirts on my stove top, two violet, three teal. The result is perfect.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3328. I exchange prayer requests with my mom.<br />
<br />
3329. The kids pine over learning to read as I devour more books.<br />
<br />
3330. Summer waxes long as July envelops us like quicksand.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<a href="http://www.aholyexperience.com/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img height="83" src="http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff162/annvoskamp/multitudesonmondaysbutton2-1.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
</div>Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-6831116651868548352012-07-08T23:53:00.000-07:002012-07-09T06:23:28.423-07:00Voice<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
"I like being down here just me and you." Jack nuzzles my shoulder. I had sneaked downstairs to escape the heat, nurse the baby. Jack had creaked down the wooden stairs a few minutes later.<br />
<br />
I flop my magazine down on the green couch next to us. "Me too," I say and kiss the top of his red mop of hair.<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
"'Cause it's kinda like a date," he says, "except we're not driving anywhere."<br />
<br />
"Yep."<br />
<br />
"Or getting out treats." He leans his five-year-old cheek on my arm, legs slung to the side as if I were a giant bean bag.<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
"Just being together is a treat," I say.<br />
<br />
"We're getting out the treat of our love." He pats my arm.<br />
<br />
"Yep."<br />
<br />
He leans his cheek on my shoulder, then wipes a pool of baby spit off, rubs it on his shorts. "You smell all sweaty and good," he says.<br />
<br />
I rest my cheek on his head, "Thanks." I fumble my magazine back open.<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
He points at words he can spell, pokes <i>the</i> and <i>god</i> and asks what <i>w-r-i-t-e</i> means. He tugs Joe's foot, strokes his toes. He checks between each toe and pulls out fuzzies. "I don't think you even washed this part of his foot since he was born," he says, wipes the fuzzies on the couch.<br />
<br />
I stop trying to keep my place in the article and just listen to his voice.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Gratitude:<br />
<br />
3282. Jane reads her Bible and comments, "There's a lot of God talking in this part, that's why I like Matthew."<br />
<br />
3283. Lucy plops down beside me and announces, "Fake teeth hurt."<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3284. I burn a cookie sheet of pecans. "Other people might think they're disgusting," Janie comforts, "but we'll eat 'em."<br />
<br />
3285. "What are the Smiths' last name," Jack wants to know.<br />
<br />
3286. We attend an old time barbecue for the 4th of July with family and neighbors complete with a whole table of salads and field games for the kids.<br />
<br />
3287. A dear friend brings her children to play and we catch up on a whole year of talking while the children shyly pal around.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4oIR0rs36_o/T_pxrE_WZ0I/AAAAAAAADmo/mMf1K8Sk0DM/s1600/Sunday-7156.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4oIR0rs36_o/T_pxrE_WZ0I/AAAAAAAADmo/mMf1K8Sk0DM/s320/Sunday-7156.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
3288. Jack takes a spill on our chain link fence, a puncture wound, blood everywhere, and despite terrible bruising, handles it like a man. I love that boy. And he's making a wonderful recovery.<br />
<br />
3289. "You want your teeth as white as snow," Lucy warns.<br />
<br />
3290. I tuck Myra into bed. "Where Blue are?" she says asking for her blankie.<br />
<br />
3291. We take a day on the farm -- cowboy beans, crisp green salad, fresh strawberries on ice cream, visiting around the dinner table.<br />
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3292. Jack and Jane go fishing with Craig and his brother. They hardly catch a thing, but the kids play in the water and brothers visit and time stands still for a few hours.<br />
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3293. We gather with a small group of friends, eat barbecued hot dogs and more green salad, strawberry salsa, lemonade, let the strain of the week weave light and easy as we talk.<br />
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3294. I take Lucy on a date, "Black bears can punch ya in the nose," she tells me.<br />
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3295. She scoops a tiny bite of ice cream with a flat paddle spoon, "Mine tastes like red raspberries," she says, "when it's actually PINK raspberries."<br />
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3296. Myra calls, "WOOSY!" when she looks for Lucy.<br />
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3297. Lucy finishes a lollipop and holds up the stick, "I want to use this as a sword!" she says.<br />
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3298. Myra poops in the blue kiddie pool out back. "At first we thought it was just dirt," Jane tells me. Everyone bails out. We hose Myra down and march everyone to the shower. "Myra was laying down in the pool before we found out," Jane tells me later. Surprisingly, I don't freak out.<br />
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3299. I devour two novels, a biography, and miscellaneous magazine articles like a tall slices of chocolate ganache. The children watch the spectacle and keep asking what's happening in my books.<br />
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3300. Craig comments, "I think worry is a comfort mechanism for you, Bethany."<br />
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3301. I think on this and wonder if I can replace the worry with strength and courage.<br />
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3302. Craig decides to speak on fear at family camp. "Faith has to replace fear," he says. "Faith, it's where you <i>know</i> God is in control of all things. At some point you just have to completely surrender and give it to God."<br />
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3303. I feel the weight of his words and know this is what I need.<br />
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<br /></div>Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2454663817940422736.post-52643436857458418422012-07-01T23:20:00.000-07:002012-07-01T23:20:42.401-07:00Resolve<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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"Why does God LET us lie?" Jane snaps her head from side to side. She frowns and wrinkles her brow, eyes puffy and red.<div>
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I sit next to her, planted on the edge of my bed. "Because," I say, and she stares into my eyes, "if he controlled us and MADE it so we couldn't lie, we wouldn't be able to <i>love</i>." She holds my gaze, her face all splotches and swollen. "We can only love if we CHOOSE not to lie. Love happens when we <i>choose</i>." I tuck my chin and smile into her blue oceans of eyes. She blinks. I sigh.</div>
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"Momma,"she says, "will you forgive me for lying?"<br /><div>
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I let our gaze hold, long like a bass note. I sigh. "Yeah. Jane, I forgive you." I put my arm around her then pull her back to arm's length. "I forgive you completely," I say and before she looks away, "I can do that because Jesus forgave <i>my</i> sins. All of them. Completely."</div>
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"Oh," she says and we pause as if the moment were a comma.</div>
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"Kinda makes you see how even good people are wicked inside and need Jesus to forgive their sins, huh?"</div>
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"Yeah," she sags her shoulders, "even I need Jesus to forgive me."</div>
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"Even you need Jesus to forgive your sins, and I need Jesus to forgive mine."</div>
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I encircle her in my arms. She rests her head on my shoulder, my cheek on her curly mop. And for the longest time we just we sit and let that soak in.</div>
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*****</div>
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Later we all bunch up on the little black couch. I nurse Joe. They perch on the arms and take turns squeezed in next to me. Myra, a shifting sea of knees and elbows, washes up around Joe and me like high tide.</div>
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"Did you know I think you're great?" I say and grin at Jack balanced on the sofa arm.</div>
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"Did you know I think your eyes are pretty?" he spikes back, chin tucked and eyes bright.</div>
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"Your shirt is pretty," Lulie adds and pokes a black flower on my tummy.</div>
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"You're pretty all over, Momma," Jane slides off the kitchen bench all tall and shoulders square.</div>
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"I think your eyes are pretty," Jack chimes again at my elbow.</div>
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"I love you," Jane adds, "I don't love you 'cause you're pretty. I love you cause you're you." She smiles. We all do and let the moment roll by like leaves falling in autumn as if there were a thousand more to come.</div>
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3267. "Mommy," Lucy peals, "I have practiced swimming so much I can BARELY swim."</div>
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3268. Myra nuzzles my shoulder while I nurse Joe. "Can I nurse 'im?" she asks.</div>
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3269. "Daddy, thanks for working so hard," Jane greets Craig when he gets home. He catches her eye across the room. "Aw, I love to work hard to take care of you guys," he says.</div>
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3270. "I watered some worms," Lucy announces, "so they will grow longer and we can use them we we go fishing."</div>
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3271. "Everyday is beautiful," Jane tells me, "'cause it's a day that the Lord has made."</div>
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3272. Craig works long hours all week and my mom stops by to help me cut the backing for a quilt I started eight years ago.</div>
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3273. She listens while I tell her again and again all I love about each of the children, and I glean the fields of her wisdom.</div>
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3274. Two ferns that look like wings.</div>
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3275. Drop in company between Rose Show events from Craig's mom.</div>
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3276. Jane practices the writing process. She writes about worms and colors and bike rides -- starts to memorize the moves.</div>
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3277. Lucy trounces in from out back. "There's a yellow ant on me," she says, "It already fell off. Do you think they can bite?"</div>
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3278. I begin to rise early and start a new morning routine.</div>
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3279. Bean soup with corn salsa and parmesan. </div>
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3280. The kids and I make a picnic with Jimmy John's day old bread and whole milk Greek yogurt.</div>
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3281. Lulie tries to play Uno with Myra. "When I win, Myra, we're gonna stop this game."</div>
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3281. I see again how the key to discipline is resolve, and then marvel at how these sweet children sense even the slightest waver in steadfast resolve. </div>
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</div>Craig and Bethanyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12779997485604319727noreply@blogger.com4