Drivin', Drivin', Drivin'....

I'm still on the road today, taking the kids to MiMi and PaPa.

All of us contained in the 15 passenger van.

Driving.

For many hours.

Sprinkling crumbs and trash and debris on the floor of the van.

And squealing.

And asking, "How much longer?"

So enjoy your picnics and glasses of iced tea and bar-b-ques.

I'll be thinking of you.

If I can hear myself think....

Sunday Selah

He predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—

Ephesians 1:5

We said goodbye to him yesterday.

My best friend's father.

He fought a battle with lung cancer for almost two years, having not been a smoker.

We drove through the pine forests and winding hills of East Texas to the christian camp he and his wife have supported for many years. And under the cover of an open air pavillion, massive trees the backdrop, a group gathered to remember his life and to celebrate his home-going.

As various speakers told of his generosity and his golf game and his grandkids, I found myself reflecting on what made the man special to me.

And that is this:

He and his wife adopted my best friend when JK was just a few weeks old.

And he was such a daddy to her that JK carries several of his best traits. He was precise when it counted; JK is precise. You definitely want to make curtains with JK...they will hang perfectly, be the right length and do all the things they are supposed to. Purposeful precision, handed down from him to JK.

He was clear on what he felt was right and wrong. And JK is clear on her beliefs, just like her daddy.

Several years ago, JK's birth family made contact. I was the 'dummy' address, with all correspondence coming through me and I would dispense the letters and photos and info to JK. It was an interesting time, something I hadn't experienced before.

But what was most inspiring to me was this.

JK appreciated the info we received, was glad for the medical histories and found her birth family info interesting.

But at the end of the day, she never wrestled with her identity or her sense of personal history or connection.

She has always been clear on who she is and whose she is.

She is her daddy's girl.

He gave that to her, that environment of being loved and wanted and fully grafted in.

As JK said yesterday to me, "When my dad decided to adopt something, he went all in."

Whether that was supporting a christian camp or conducting environmental studies for an oil firm or defending his beliefs.

Or adopting JK.

He was all in.

And left his imprint.

And I thank him.

My life is infinitely more blessed because he and his wife made my JK their daughter.

It's a picture of our Father. When He decided to adopt us, He went all in. And when we fully accept that we are His, we are gifted with a deep knowledge of our identity in Him, of the true sense of family, of the abiding presence of His traits written across our spiritual DNA.

Welcome home, JK's daddy.

You will be missed. And we look forward to joining you.

At our Daddy's house.

Selah.

JPEG of the Week

~Blue and Blue~

~still one of my favorite pics~

The Bigger Lesson

While we were at dress rehearsal last week in preparation for the big dance recital, one of the families from our dance school got a very unexpected call.

Their house had been struck by lightning and was currently burning.

And just like that, the bigger lesson about why we gather together as people and why we develop relationships and why those connections are so important and precious became crystal clear.

Dance Recital became something transcendent beyond performance.

Families from the dance school kicked it into high gear, donating clothes, toys, household goods, money, time.

2 of 8 helped organize a bake sale.

People were incredibly generous.

And while we still hurt for the affected family and want to continue to circle around them, in the lives of the kids at the dance school, there was a powerful lesson learned through this situation.

Through their compassion and care and cookies, they learned that a small dance community can have a big heart.

A bigger lesson, indeed.

Dance Like Somebody's Watchin'...

Those of us with two left feet and a shred of self-consciousness buy into the adage of the song to dance like nobody's watching.

And then there are those who aren't all that interesting in dancing until they discover there is someone watching.

For 6 of 8, having best buddies Miss LP and AT in the audience proved to be her performance muse.

Literally...

From the evidence, I'm going to have to assume that 6 of 8 is something of a literalist...

Literally...

Hats

Random.

But funny...

Processing....

Love it or hate it, Lost came to an end last night.

It had more pre-game coverage than the SuperBowl and better commercials (if you're a Lostie, you had to love Target's take on Lost ads...brilliant.)

I'm still trying to process all the twists and turns, plot mechanizations and hidden messages.

But this much I think I have figured out.

Sunday Selah

Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.

II Tim. 4:2

So begins the graduation season.

Transition.

Change.

Milestone.

The beautiful announcements have been pouring into my mailbox, heralds of maturation and future and plans and accomplishment. Kids who I taught in preschool, now young adults. Babies of dear friends, now earning degrees. Foil accented pieces of parchment holding pictures and name cards, class mottos and dreams, secured in not one, but two envelopes.

I have several friends who are struggling with this change of season. They have devoted their youth to the raising of their children.

And now those children aren’t children anymore.

A season is coming to an end.

And change is on the horizon.

Our roles in our relationships are not static. They shift, adjust, morph, just like the lines on our faces.
But knowing these changes are coming is not the same thing as accepting it in the heart.

As those relationships begin their march toward peerage, there is a role, in season and out of season, that we do continue, something that doesn’t change no matter the announcement in the mailbox.

We can always speak the Word over one another.

In season and out of season.

When those precious kids are still living in our home. When they’re spreading their wings to fly.

May we always be prepared.

Selah.

JPEG of the Week

~Dancer Silhouette~

~backlight~

~green~

Real Educatin'

(1 of 8, circa late 90's)

Heatherlyn asked yesterday, "You have multiple children involved with dance? Do you homeschool them all then? It is very difficult to keep up with all the dance stuff AND all the school stuff if children attend a regular school from 9-4."

Agreed, Girl.

And it was actually this issue that led us on our homeschool journey.

Ready, Set, Dance!

It's the sweeps week of the dance season.

The days leading up to Recital.

Full dress rehearsals.

Pictures.

Cinco Sisters

This one headed to California yesterday, to see Da Boy.

Oops. I'm sorry, Nick. I meant 'The Man'.

We agreed to change his handle to something more, ah, manly.

Wicked Lil' Things

Oh, Honey.

You just don't even know what I'm about to do to you.

And you won't know whether to thank me or, um, not.

Master Teachers

These two.


My greatest teachers.


They traffic in perseverance.


Hope.

Joy.


They understand each other, these two.  They have both spent countless hours in therapy.  They both know the frustration of having to work around a physical challenge.  They both know that some folks see them as 'different'.

And they have both taught me that mother-love can be ferocious.  They have both taught me that I can be tough, that I can push them hard, that I can cry deeper and laugh more honestly than I ever knew possible.  And they have taught me that true health and wholeness is a function of character, not of physique.


Master teachers, they are.

I'm proud to be their student.

Sunday Selah

But your hearts must be fully committed to the LORD our God, to live by his decrees and obey his commands, as at this time.

I Kings 8:61

He's supposed to be at a soccer tournament this morning.
He's not.

And some folks in his world don't understand.

They may be wondering about his level of commitment, his duty to his team, his pledge for the season.

It's the tournament.

The final game.

The apex of the season.

But 3 of 8 has a higher obligation this morning.

One that he feels strongly about.

One that was scheduled months ago, long before the soccer season, and is the culmination of weeks of teaching and talking and preparing for.

A tournament game of its own, in a sense, for our church family.

A Sunday service entitled, appropriately enough, Commitment Sunday.

And so 3 of 8 had to make a commitment choice in kind.

I'm proud of him.

Our culture has become a little fuzzy on the whole church-going thing. All manner of extracurricular activities and events and meetings find themselves inked in on the Sunday morning calendar. Church has become the 'if we have time, if there's nothing else on the calendar, if we feel like it' Sunday event. And we sometimes find ourselves out-of-town at this competition or that event, juggling the choices. While I don't have a desire for a return to the Blue Laws of old, I do find it interesting when we sometimes have to explain that a church commitment is going to trump an extracurricular one. I always feel the emotional scramble to explain that in keeping a church commitment, I'm not judging anyone, I'm not saying we're somehow more righteous, I'm not saying that we even attempt perfect church attendance. I get very concerned to say what I'm not saying.

But perhaps my explanation needs to be as simple as this truth; we're trying to instill in ourselves and our kids to keep our commitments, even when it goes against the grain, even when others around us don't understand, even in a culture where our choice seems old-fashioned.

Commitment.

First to God.

Then to family.

And all the rest will fall where it should.

Selah.

JPEG of the Week

~7 of 8~

~moving pictures~

~as in, this was taken by 2 of 8 as we were driving somewhere~

~it's always a bit startling when a flash goes off from somewhere in the depths of the van as I am driving~

Uncharted Waters

4 of 8.

Almost twelve years old now.

Nine years in hearing aids. Miles into our journey.

And now embarking into new territory.

Cap It Off...

8 of 8.

In a pink swim cap.

(This sort of thing happens when you have five older sisters and they have a camera...)

Did I make you snort your morning cup of coffee?

Success!

Green Eggs and Ham

Can you believe how big this kid is getting?

It's this new special diet that we have him on.

Clone Wars

He's back at it.

Making more short films.

3 of 8.
And he's decided to clone himself.

Kind of reminds me of Calvin's Duplicator, a la Calvin and Hobbes fame from Bil Watterson.

And wait for the gag at the end...

Mystery Memory Card

Back a few weeks ago, we came across a random photo cd that held several treasures.

I'm back to obsessing on that find.

Sunday Selah

I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her.

Genesis 17:16

Believe it or not, it's not a holiday that was made up by the greeting card companies.

I know.

I was surprised too.

Mother's Day actual has a long history of celebration throughout many cultures of the world. And it came to this country via a petition of a petite woman with a huge palette of words in her artistic use.

Julia Ward Howe was the feisty native New Yorker who was an abolitionist in the years prior to the Civil War. She is best known for writing the poem The Battle Hymn of the Republic, that stirring anthem that has captured in rhyme the spiritual battle scenes of a righteous army. Much of the imagery is taken from Scripture and the melody from a church hymn became the soundtrack to the score. Julia Ward Howe became well known from this writing and went on to speak and write in other venues, promoting social justice and peace.

And along the way, she pursued the cause of Mother's Day.

It was for memory of a dear friend.

Anna Jarvis was a young mother living in the Appalachia region of the country in the era of the Civil War. She worked to promote improved sanitation throughout the area and during the Civil War worked for cleaner conditions for both the North and the South. After the war she also took it upon herself to try to create reconciliation for those who had battled against each other at the height of the war.

Anna Jarvis was doing what, at their best, mothers do their best. Creating order from chaos. Sweeping out the nest. Chasing away the spiderwebs. Making nice with the neighbors.

To make things a little cleaner and a little more conciliatory. Even in battle.

And Julie Ward Howe wanted a national day to honor that mother work.

We mothers today wade through the housework and bake cookies for the neighbors. But in the busy-ness of the duties in front of us, may we not forget the deeper things. May we continue to improve the sanitation of our own hearts and the hearts around us. May we promote the cause of a life cleansed by the Lord. And may we exhibit a life in which we promote peace to those around us.

Julia Ward Howe, battle poetess. Anna Jarvis, Appalachian activist.

The mothers of Mother's Day.

Reminding us again of the power and responsibility imbued by the Lord on women who would mother, not only children, but spiritual children as well.

Selah.

JPEG of the Week

~Party Partners~

~The Big Three Year Olds~

~Babies No More~

~well.....~

~maybe just a little longer....~

Ease Up

It's warming up here in my part of the country.
As is, hitting the 90's.

I'm not sure I'm ready for this yet.

Particularly when it comes to running.

More Faces

I keep telling myself that I need to do the twins' 3-year-old 'portraits'.

As in, groomed hair, ironed outfits, beautiful backdrop, soft light.

Faces

When you hand over the camera to your 13 year old, he doesn't feel honor-bound to have people pose in traditional ways...

Particularly when a couple of eight year olds are his main photographic subjects...

A Double Portion

Three years ago this week, we went from a family of six kids to a family of eight kids.

And I gave up the luxury of sleeping for many, many months.

I suppose it's time for me to stop calling the twins 'The Babies'.

Well, maybe next year.

After the twins were born, I began exploring the world of blogging and online scrapbooking. It was such a wonderful way to virtually connect with other people while spending a lot of time indoors, tandem nursing two little ones. Scrapblog was just getting started and one of my first projects was a little five page spread of some photographs of the pregnancy and the babies when they were itty-bitty.

So stroll down memory lane with me...

Game Changer

We are in the deep depths of Dance Competition Season.

Hence my late post this morning.

It's exhausting to sit in a dark performing arts center for hours and hours and hours over a weekend.

Sunday Selah

(I'm delighted to be speaking this evening to a group of women about The Noble Court: Ladies in Waiting. I wrote a Selah last year on May 17, 2009, about waiting, that place suspended between indecision and action...I thought I'd repost it today as I meditate anew on waiting on the Lord...)

I am still confident of this: 
       I will see the goodness of the LORD 
       in the land of the living.

  Wait for the LORD;
       be strong and take heart
       and wait for the LORD.

Psalm 27:13-14

We are a culture that hates to wait.


We bemoan a long wait in the line.

We complain about having to wait on the phone.

We despise waiting rooms and scoff at the term 'ladies in waiting.'

Waiting.

We don't like to be placed on a waiting list.

We don't want to have to wait something out.

And though we are often entered in this particular competition, very few of us enjoy playing the waiting game.

We are a mobile society, accustomed to zipping about. And waiting is all about staying in one place.

We find it frustrating.

And when we are in a season of spiritual waiting, it can be downright faith draining.

In the ancestral history of words, 'wait' finds its etymological DNA in an old French term meaning 'to watch.'

Watch. Wait.

Maybe that's the component we're missing when it comes to our modern waiting. Perhaps we're forgetting to watch.

To watch for what the Lord is doing while He has us in the waiting room. To watch for the smallest movement of His hand. To remember to pick up the magazines He keeps for us in the waiting room, that timeless periodical called the Word. Paying attention to our fellow waiting room patrons. Learning their stories. Watching their faces. Hearing with new ears the music piped into the waiting room, songs of remembrance, notes of praise. Watching the fidgeting of our hearts. Watching for signs of growth.


There are little signs around the spiritual waiting room, bits of profound graffiti printed on the walls:

 My soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.(Psalm 130:6)signed:  The Penitent Psalmist

Blessed is the man who listens to me,
       watching daily at my doors,
       waiting at my doorway.   For whoever finds me finds life
       and receives favor from the LORD.  (Prov. 8:34&35)
signed:  Wisdom

But as for me, I watch in hope for the LORD,
       I wait for God my Savior;
       my God will hear me. (Michah 7:7)
signed:  the prophet Micah

Watch.  Wait.


To be in the spiritual waiting room is not static. Not if we are watching.

Watch. Wait.


Selah.

JPEG of the Week

~Grandmommy~

~my paternal grandmother~

~Gardener Extraordinaire ~

~fisher-woman e'speciale~

~her prize flounder catch, circa early 1970's~

~I love this picture~