FLASHBACK... Christmas 2012

Though you may have read the story of our strange Christmas, somehow the photos never made it up.  Here you can relive a little Christmas in September with the highlights from our festivities...

These adorable outfits were lovingly made by Jeremy's mom...
They liked them so much they took their best pictures EVER!  It was a Christmas miracle!!!

Celebrating Christmas Eve with cousins... and crazy girls after Christmas lunch with Granny

 

Excitedly examining Jesus' gifts...

 

She's officially a rock star now with a pink guitar

After much debate and lengthy searching in the Target toy section, The Goose chose this Elmo phone as her gift for Sissy.

Showing off their favorite gifts from Christmas morning...
the long-awaited McKenna (American Girl of the Year) and Sissy's prized giant ball. 

All dressed-up for post-Christmas celebrating at Gamma's...

Thoughtful Thursdays: Learning Real Love

Ten years ago today, I was celebrating Singles Awareness Day (S.A.D.) as the unlucky RA on duty at P. College, for I clearly had no lovey-dovey plans to celebrate V-Day. Somehow, the few of us unlucky-in-love folks ended up eating “Chinese” food and renting the very romantic (read: terrible) Mel Gibson movie “Signs” (If you’ve never seen it, don’t. All I recall is something about aliens and crop circles… but I digress). I never liked Valentines Day (and yes, if you are a faithful blog reader you will note a pattern… I don’t like many holidays… some call me Scrooge, perhaps rightfully so, but I digress again). Little did I know that I actually spent that SAD day with the same person I am spending it with a decade later. You see, ours was not love at first sight. To tell the truth, I’m not sure when love came. Our story would never make the Hallmark cut...  I can’t even remember the first time we met, but someone may or may not have been dressed as Danny Ford at an awful 80s party… Our second Valentines brought our engagement, which also has no elaborate, sappy story to accompany the event… it was cold and raining… the sole of my shoe split so my feet were soaked and frigid… any well-made plans were more-or-less ruined... I’m not sure, but I think the first time I ever got flowers from this boy was when I was in labor with the Goose... Ours is not a romance novel...And I couldn’t be happier.

I have learned more about real love in the last decade than I ever imagined. At our wedding we heard those familiar words of 1 Corinthians 13:4-8:

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.

It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;

 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.

Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things endures all things.

LOVE NEVER ENDS.

And while I have learned much about this amazing love that God has for us, I fear that all too often I have failed at showing it… I have been impatient… arrogant… and quite irritable. Yes, I still have much to learn. Mine is but a poor reflection of this love.  Though I treasure these words and hope to learn from them, I have found our love to be a bit more like the love Paul describes in the third chapter of Colossians… This love of mutual submission (a word we all may be a bit too afraid of and offended by) that binds together, yet sometimes admonishes and has complaints… this love of learning to live together with those who are different and growing together as we learn to live like Christ... this love of forgiveness… THIS is REAL LOVE. Not a romance novel. Not a Hallmark card. This love is work… a constant choice to place another before my own selfish desires... to admit wrongs… to seek forgiveness… to learn patience… to grow together as we grow closer to God... And I wouldn’t trade that for roses and romance any day.

Thank you, Danny Ford, for your patience with my irritable impatience, and for joining me on the journey to live in real love. Here’s to many more decades of it.

young love... 2003

Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. ~Col.3:12-15



Thoughtful Thursdays: Thorns

The parable of the sower… you’ve probably heard it a time or two, or read it in a gospel or three (Matt. 13:1-23; Mark 4:1-19; Luke 8:4-15), but where do you put yourself in this story? Are you the sower of seed? Are you the seed in the good soil, producing much fruit for God? I imagine most of us identify with one of those productive and positive roles. Very few of us would like to admit that we might be seeds who have fallen in the rocks or amongst the weeds.

As I came across this familiar passage in my reading, I was struck by one verse:
And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. ~Mark 4:18

Even as I strive to live for Christ, I fear I find myself all too often in the thorns… distracted by the “cares of the world” and the tasks of my everyday life… desiring more… perhaps not more wealth or things, but certainly more comfort… drawn to jealousy of another’s success or calling. All these things and more creep in almost unseen, and as they grow, my growth slows. My faith may be present but left unchecked, these thorns of distraction and earthly desire keep me from living the life I am called to – a life of joyful service to God.

I think if we are honest, we find ourselves in the weeds a bit more often than we would like. Though we may skim over this parable thinking we have nothing else to learn, perhaps we should visit it again and ask God where we are in this story. What might the cares of our world be, and how are they distracting us? What is it we truly desire, and what petty desires might we have that are getting in our way? How are we deceived by wealth? And if we find ourselves in the weeds, maybe we need to ask the master gardener to pull up the thorns in our lives so that we can grow fully and fruitfully for Him.

Thoughtful Thursdays: We Wish You A Strange Christmas

How was your Christmas?
Get that question very often over the last three weeks? Over the course of these conversations we swap stories of families, travels, illness, chaos, exhaustion, & sometimes sadness (I have yet to hear a story of peace, quiet, and exuberance). While most folks answer, “Good! Busy… But Good.” My reply is simply, “Strange.”

This year, my mother got sick a week before Christmas and stayed sick… spending her Christmas morning in the ER finding out that she had pneumonia. Thankfully, my version of the “flulike virus” only lasted two days, leading up to a Christmas Eve rush like never before. We had four, no, five separate Christmas celebrations in 48 hours in order to accommodate schedules, children, the elderly, and infirm. It was strange… but strange isn’t always bad. My strange Christmas led me to ponder what a “normal” Christmas could or should be…

Every year Wes and I try to do less… less on the schedule… less hustle-and-bustle… less extravagance… less waste… less gifts… just less of everything except Jesus and family. Every year around January 2nd we sit down to a finally less messy house filled with much more than we deserve and ponder how we can try so hard to make things less complicated and stressful (ahh, the irony...) and somehow always end up so busy, crazy, overwhelmed, and tired.

This year during our post-holiday review, we came to the conclusion that there is no “normal” Christmas. Initially, our conclusion only applied to the stereotypical “normal” our society fools us into seeking… peaceful children in adorable, clean pajamas playing with their toys while mom and dad sit back and watch, sipping their coffee and smiling at the joy of it all… But now, I affirm this conclusion in a different way. There is no “normal” Christmas. There shouldn’t be. There is nothing normal about our Savior… not a “normal” birth… not a “normal” life… God the Son willingly took on lowly humanity… it was STRANGE. There is nothing normal about the gift he lavished upon us. AND there is nothing normal about our celebration of His birth, giving each other gifts and largely giving him nothing.

Yes, this year, our Christmas was strange for many reasons. Not only were the events which we couldn’t control strange, but we also did a few strange things on purpose… Like no mention of Santa (and certainly no elf on any shelf)... We have an advent buzzard to remind us of all the sin in the world and things that distract us from Jesus (but more on him another time)...  And, most importanly, the first person in our home to get a gift on Christmas morning was Jesus. We talked a lot this Advent about whose birth we celebrate and how we should and can give Jesus gifts on HIS birthday… it’s not very hard to do, He told us what he wanted (John13:34; Matt.22:37-29) and how to give it (Matt.25:34-40). And much to my surprise, neither girl so much as walked over to her own gifts before eagerly and joyfully examining everything Jesus got first. Strange… but wonderful.

As you settle back into the “normal” of your everyday life and routine, I urge you to ponder the strangeness of it all. How “normal” was your celebration? How would you change it? Could it be a little more strange this year? Don’t put it off until Advent rolls around again… think about it now. Christmas doesn’t have to be so “normal”… The coming of the Savior changed everything. It was certainly strange… but amazingly wonderful.

May your New Year bring about many wonderfully strange moments, may you share this strange grace with others, and may your next Christmas be far from “normal”… Strange even.

"Truly, I say to you, as you did it unto one of the least of these, you did it to me." ~ Matt.25:40

fall photo flashback...

Some of our fun on the farm this fall...

Halloween!

I'm not the biggest fan of Halloween... the ever-changing costume decision... the time spent making said costumes, which may or may not be willingly worn... the junk food... the chaos the day/night of... the weeks of incessant pleas for more candy... It isn't my favorite.  But, occasionally, it has it's bright spots...

This year, the Goose was a rainbow and Sissy was a little rain cloud...

The sweet little cloud was sometimes a ferocious storm and did NOT want to be stationary for photos of any kind, but overall she seemed to enjoy herself.  The clouds also added extra protection for her many toddler falls. 

As is our usual custom, we began the evening adventures with a quick stop at granny's house.  She had lovingly prepared both girls a stack of little butter cookies and an apple.  Such a sweet great-granny.  The Goose ate hers immediately (and helped Sissy out the next day).  Next, it was off to Gamma's for double treats... (Craig was still out working so he stopped by with his bag of candy too).  And of course, a few pictures! 

That's one silly goose!

Sissy decided she could help herself to the treats... Sneaky Sneaky!



We topped the evening off with some neighborhood trick-or-treating with our good friends Yoda, Princess Leia, and Chewbacca. (Sorry... too many kids & too dark for any good pics).  Then put two tired girls to bed remarkably close to their bedtime! 

It's still not my favorite holiday, but it didn't turn out too bad after all.

Nana's 90th!

We travelled to Mimi's house in October for Nana's 90th Birthday celebration!  I hope our girls will remember these special times with their great-grandparents and understand how lucky they are to have them. 

Ahhh!!!  Canibal!

Ruffle buns...

This was the best I could do... My girls do NOT make family photos easy!

Nana!  I did NOT know you could pat-a-cake with FEET!

Oh... you say that's and iPhone... I would like to eat it!

An upcoming artist... just like her Nana