Christmas Blessings

Christmas has come and gone, a new year waits just over the next sundown and I'm going over the last days, weeks and months in my foggy depths.  All I can see was good; it was very, very good. 

My parents are here visiting for two weeks, more than one of which has become memories.  Great memories, the kind that can live on when they fly back to New York.

We only planned a couple of things (other than the big birthday celebration last weekend) intentionally keeping it low key for everyone.  When they arrived at the airport it was amazing to see them.  I was incredibly grateful to grab them and hug them, not before my kids ran to be scooped up by the same arms that have held me at every age, however.  As soon as we arrived at home this song popped into my head and hasn't left.

 

It was a mildly warm July day, I stood outside, phone sandwiched between my ear and shoulder pacing around our patio table.  I watched my kids playing, shrieking and running as I listened to his voice, the words seemed far away.  They were almost unbelievable, I thought the tests would come back normal, but they didn't.  Indeed, my dad had prostate cancer.

I don't think I fully came to grips with it for awhile, maybe not until I saw him in flesh again last week.  He had cancer.   The rest of the summer was filled with phone calls updating on test results, scans and procedures.  Jokes about being injected with radioactive something or other the day of the bone scan and how I should look on the horizon to see if I could see him glowing from 2000 miles away.

The Dr's were positive and more importantly my Dad was positive too.  Certain that they could remove it and he would be cured.  My mom, I could tell even from afar, was an amazing assistant to him, supporting him. Even though she needed to have her own biopsy and lump removal in the middle of all of his tests, which, praise God, was cancer free. 

One day in early fall, my dad had his cancer removed.  My brother was there to be with my Mom and my kids kept me distracted.  I prayed.  It was what I could do; I was unable to get back there to hold his hand one more time or sing of God's faithfulness.  I prayed and sang with my children.  For the surgeons to work carefully and correctly, that God would let me have my dad for a bit longer.  That we still had more words to say to one another, that my kids needed more memories.  I prayed for comfort for all of us, whatever His will would be.

The process of healing began and the praises rang out towards the heavens and many weeks later one last phone call about one last test, the cancer is completely gone!  Hallelujah!  So I can sit now, between my dad and husband, crocheting on the couch and listen to them playfully taking jabs at one another and hear his footsteps on my floor.  I found myself this Christmas, kneeling humbly at the foot of the manger whispering to the only innocent babe, thank you, thank you for one more Christmas.

He's always been faithful to me. 

Love is...

...knowing even though you might be left bowing next to the Christmas tree, you will be swooped up into a great big hug again very soon.

...a collection of growing hand prints.

...Away in a manger. 

...knowing people are behind you.

...Gloria in Excelsis Deo!

"...a king was He, but no one placed a crown upon His head."

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders.  And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6

All Tucked In

I just tucked in my kids on what was the most wonderful Christmas.  The baby (I can still call my two year old baby right?) passed out quickly.  The sounds from Nathan's room still indicate the excitement and wonder winding down from the day. 

Last night he says to me as we are putting out (rice) milk and cookies for santa (carrots and apple for the reindeer), "Mommy, santa is just the best but not really because I know that God is the really best."  I couldn't have said it better.

Some photo memories of the last 24 hours...

Making Memories

I'm just gonna flat out say it, this time of year I especially miss my Mom, Dad, Sister and Bro and their families.  They live 2000 miles east of me and I miss them. 

Christmas time is still amazingly fun and joyous even when you are missing people, Jesus is after all the very best gift!  One of the things I do when I'm missing them is think of memories like making gingerbread houses and singing happy birthday to Jesus and making rolls and my Dad stoking the fire and my Mom baking and a gazillion Nutcracker performances! My memories are enough to cheer my heart!

Plus dare my heart shed a quiet tear for the past and no sooner do my present and future come running towards me bearing sunshine!

Just a few that have been captured on film, uh, I guess I mean on disk.

More Love

You know how sometimes there's a theme that keeps happening over and over in your life.  Well apparently that's going on here because today's sermon was on loving one another.  And God is really driving the nail in here...

This is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother's were righteous. Do not be surprised, my brothers, if the world hates you. 1 John 3:11-13

I know that we are saved not by works but by grace in faith and I feel that God is leading me towards something that I haven't quite figured out yet.  I truly do care about people and it is wonderful to have such an amazing teacher to show me how to love even if I'll never be perfect at it.

Ring The Bells

Ring the Bells, ring the bells.
Let the whole world know Christ was born in Bethlehem many years ago.

Born to die that man might live, came to earth new life to give,
Born of Mary, born so low many years ago.

God the Father gave His Son, Gave His own Beloved One
To this wicked, sinful earth to bring man kind His love new birth

Ring the bells, ring the bells,
Let the whole world know Christ the Savior lives today
As He did so long ago!

Perhaps,

the funniest thing my son did this year I forgot to blog about.

About a week before Christmas we wrapped his present to his sister, a princess phone (we've been inundated with princesses :) this year) and put it under the tree.

Because it was small or by chance she just knew it would be her very favorite gift, she'd been carrying the wrapped package around all week. I thought it was cute and she's not really into unwrapping (unless it's tissue paper) so it didn't bother me.

My son would feel compelled to very gently (perhaps the gentlest I've seen him be) and slowly remove the box from her tiny hands while saying in a sing-song voice, "No, no sweetie we have to wait till Christmas, it's a phone!

Merry Christmas!

Wishing all my blogging buddies the Merriest Christmas and a very happy and blessed 2009!

Christmas Wishes!

This Baby is the reason for the season!!!

May all your Christmas wishes come true!!!!

Can't get enough of my 4 year old at the moment...

Tonight at dinner my son says, "I love Mommy and Daddy and sister and God and Jesus and all the angels."

Daily I hear, "Is it Christmas today." So I'm making a paper chain with him tomorrow and we'll cut the links off until Christmas. Mental note for next year, need some sort of advent countdown!

Oh, and today I actually had to say, "Please do not lick the snow off of the truck." Of course followed by the obligatory (on his part - being 4 and all) "whhhhhhhyyyyyyyy." "Ah, because it's gross!"

Sunday

But just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.

I am not commanding you, but I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.

For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what he does not have.

Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. Then there will be equality, as it is written: "He who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little."

2 Corinthians 8:7-9,12-16 (NIV)

The emphasis in the above verses is mine. I have been reading and rereading these words since August and I was thrilled back then when I found these verses. They were just like water to quench my thirst. My desire to give is great it is just the direction the generosity takes that shifts.

When I first stumbled upon them, these words spoke to me as to what I want to do with my life - other than Mommy - I feel there is another purpose for me that has not yet become. One where I can use my deep feelings of giving and compassion on a daily basis, perhaps starting up a not for profit, for now my focus is my young children and if I still have a blog in the future we all may see how this plays out.

Now that this Christmas season is upon us I've decided to use my desire to give to those who are truly needy. Basically, I'm giving things that I would want to get which this year are not necessarily tangibles. Yeah, I'd love a new dishwasher, some really nice gloves for gardening and maybe a couple fruit trees for the backyard. But really, truly I LOVE giving and feel awkward receiving.

My husband on several Christmases has lavished me with gifts and while I do adore that he does this for me, honestly it makes me feel weird sitting there opening up gifts. It's just one of those uncomfortable moments all eyes watching and then at the end of it all a feeling of emptiness that lasts through a massive Christmas feast that would feed an entire village elsewhere in the world.

He does know this about me now, he asked before our wedding if I wanted a $5,000 ring or to go on a honeymoon for 10 days to Jamaica - ah, yeah I'd wear a bottle cap on my finger every day to go back to the warm water scuba diving fruit loving beautiful Jamaican people. But I've gotten off point slightly.

This Christmas season, I'm choosing NOT to get stressed out about the stuff and hoping that my plenty can provide for anothers need. How do you keep yourself charged and at peace this season? Care to share, leave me a comment or link up if you post.

iwantiwantiwantit!!!

I am going to preface this by saying: I am grateful for my husband, children and the many, many blessings we are given daily including the fact that my husband's Bell's Palsy is over 60% improved!!! Despite the gimmes, today was a fabulous gift of a day! More times than I can count out of the blue my son said, "Mommy, I love you." While coming over arms stretched out, he kept my bulging heart melting all day long.

I am trying - really trying here to give my children a spirit of giving. Maybe I'm trying too hard and not doing enough. Maybe we just went to too many stores today for all of our tolerance level, whatever the case I am tired of I want. For the record we bought nothing.

Maybe the fact that since Adam works at the mall and since we sold my car this week (bye bye car payment!) I drop him off in the mornings. Today I wanted to see if there was anything on my Christmas lists that I could have him buy on black Friday, you know since he'll have to go there to work and I can stay home by the fire with Grandma and the kids watching Wall*E or something!

We walked through plenty of stores this morning (carrying the baby in arms - hello - the carrier was in the car this time but I thought I would be quick!) including the Disney store which was the downfall for all of us. The baby girl quickly found phones just like Mommy's to play with and chew on and my wonderful boy having just seen the movie was ALL over everything Wall*E not to mention beloved Tow Mater.

I want this one and this one and this one... in utter desperation I told him to just calm down and that he didn't need every toy! He did mention however pleading his case that Wally and Eve (he says Eva) love each other very much and are best friends. I (this is where I get desperate) say, "Well maybe if you want them you can ask Santa for them." Now he's wanting to go talk to Santa today. I may have lied when I said he wasn't at the mall yet, I don't really know for sure but I was not going to lug the kids all the way down to find out. Huh, this from a boy who last week at the mention of Santa immediately stated he was not going to sit on his lap this year.

I know I'm planting seeds for giving, last year we started the tradition of giving away three of his toys to someone who needs them more. We will do this again after Thanksgiving and this year we've collected a shoebox full of things for a boy his age through Operation Christmas Child. We are dropping it off tomorrow but you have until Monday if you meant to do it! He's really enjoyed picking out toys for that little boy so I know that the seeds are there.

My frustration is also at our "material world" because really possessions are not what it is about.

Christmas after all is about Jesus, a baby in a manger, born to set us free!

On my plate

A month has past as a marble rolling down my driveway - all too quickly.

It's more a lack of time thing than a lack of things to say, I miss my writing outlet. But it has been a nice break. Happy New Year!

I totally wanted to blog about my son's first Christmas program performance - signing I love you to me during a practice he just about melted my heart and falling in the front row while singing, he brought me to hysterical tears.

And his first time really enjoying sledding, and arranging all the figures in the nativity scene to huddle and be "close to Jesus." I spoke last year of a tradition my Mom did with hiding Jesus for us to find on Christmas eve then singing "happy birthday" to Jesus. When I hid Jesus, my son was very concerned saying adamantly that "Jesus wants to be with his family."

Currently we are all on a yeast cleansing elimination diet. We are on day 8 (it feels like month 8) without ANY sugar or sweeteners, wheat, yeast, corn, dairy, soy, fruit or eggs. Since I have been struggling with thrush since my son was an infant we decided to get serious. We are eating more veggies than we ever have and surprisingly my son has eaten almost everything I have offered him. We are treating the protein of the meal more as a side dish and having seconds of grains and veggies instead. The first day was the worst day skipping my handful of carob chips in the afternoon I don't miss them anymore. I'm still fighting with a sweet tooth in the evenings and would love to puree some fruit to top amaranth or barley pancakes.

We are going through a "die off period" currently where the yeasts are dying off and releasing their toxins into our blood stream for our body to filter out. We are fatigued and a bit depressed. Last night I had night sweats - and comparatively we don't eat a lot of sugar. We don't ever have candy in the house (Halloween excepted) but sugar is hidden in EVERYTHING. Including the "all natural"- no nitrate sandwich meats. We do eat a lot of fruits (more so than veggies especially for snacks) so yeast also feed on those simple sugars. We should be able to add them back shortly but I feel like the most horrible Mom saying no to my son that he can't have an apple.

Since breakfast has been my hardest meal of the day (we can only have oatmeal once every four days) today I added eggs back into our diet without noticing any setbacks so that will at least add some texture to our baked goods and a nice snack.

Let's see, I hope to have some pictures to post shortly, and I'll share some recipes just for fun!. Oh and my daughter's five months old so I'll need to write about that soon too!

In our heart

Why is it that when I don't have time for blogging the most "blog worthy" stuff happens?

Last week my son and I heard the song that starts out with little kids singing happy birthday to Jesus on the radio. He got all excited that Christmas was Jesus' birthday and then he started singing the song "Happy Birthday to God" which I thought was adorable.

Later that same day he asked me "Mommy, where's God?" I was somewhat distracted at the time and replied with, "God is everywhere, he's always with us." That wasn't the answer he was looking for however because he asked me twice more. After starting to give the same answer for the third time I gave him my full attention, realizing I was almost missing a big opportunity here. I explained how God is in our hearts and we ask Jesus into our hearts. His resounding "okay" was enough for me to figure that he got whatever he needed out of this answer.

Then today we were talking about how even though Daddy is at work he is still part of our family. Just because he's not in the car with us, we are indeed still a family. My son joyfully exclaims from third row of the car "Daddy in my heart just like God!"

Yeah, he really is listening all the time!

Taking a break

from vacation pictures (I do have a few more to edit) to share some current stuff. I slept for 6 hours in a row last night! The scary thing is that I went to bed an hour and a half after my daughter fell asleep nursing at 9:30. She slept for 7.5 hours and I'm so not ready for that - I'm just now feeling like my supply has leveled out for the day. Think Dolly Parton but more on the scale of Angelina Jolie really (I could only wish.) Alas, I digress.

On Saturday we went to a local learning center that has environmental events once a month and this one was about "how to have a green Christmas." It was fun and free, we all made ornaments out of used items. I even made (a quite ugly) one out of little red and white legos. In theory I think it might be nice to have one ornament that it's okay to play with since I only glued some of them, the rest can be rearranged. We'll see how that works out.

I also was pointed to this website, Eartheasy.com. It has tons of great information, I've been reading off and on all day. They have some great information on how to have a green Christmas. Amongst tons of great ideas my favorite fact is, "Over a 30-day period, lighting 500 traditional holiday lights will cost you about $18.00 while the same number of LED lights costs only $0.19." Talk about savings.

We also made an oregami gift box which was fun. My son keeps asking me to make more out of magazine pages. Click on the link for directions. Just thought I'd share, hope all my 'puter friends are having a wonderful Christmas season!

Some Christmas Memories

I am determined that I will fit in some quality blogging time thank you! I have just finished going through my bloglines, I can't say I've read everything but it sounds like you all had a wonderful holiday!

Our Christmas was richly blessed with love. This is the first year ever that my husband and I didn't exchange any gifts. We gave each other our love (as sappy as it sounds) and it was more than enough. We also discussed - once we sell our house - the possibility of sponsoring a child in memory of the one we lost this year.

The best Christmas present was my parents and my husband's Mom putting away Christmas dinner and doing the dishes while we sat and watched our son play with his new trains for a very long time. It is so entertaining to watch him play and learn -and did I mention we were still in our pj's at this point (about 5pm) so it was a wonderfully comfortable and lazy Christmas full of love. There you have it!

The picture at the top was taken on Christmas Eve after church - a day we did actually get dressed!

Below Daddy's reading The Night Before Christmas also on Christmas Eve.

This train table was going to be one of my projects but I never got around to it. It is an old coffee table that we've had for about 7 or 8 years now and I was going to sand it and paint it like those cool train tables you can buy but I'm glad I didn't get around to it. Just having the trains set up on it is enough to keep him occupied for hours! I guess it's fitting since my brother, sister and I used to spend hours playing with these same trains as well.

I'm wishing you all a wonderful and happy New Year in case I don't get around to actually posting again this year! Many blessings to all my family, friends and new blogging friends too!

A Butterfly Christmas

I've finally uploaded pictures of our living room all decked out for Christmas.

Helping Daddy bring in the tree...

Playing with a little pewter nativity - I like how he trys to give tiny baby Jesus a hug.

The finished product (although the bottom third is changing daily) and I've tried so very many times in the last couple of weeks but the angel on top just wants to lean this year!

I usually do something more festive on the mantle but this year I thought I'd keep it simple.

Snow induced giddiness!

My son and I were listening to the radio and acting giddy while we were stuck in some traffic this afternoon. It was snowing and a few songs into our giddy spree "White Christmas" came one - one of my all time favorites - so the giddiness was taken up another notch (and the volume). In between verses I decided that even though it would be close to 5 o'clock by the time we got home we needed some snow play!

I like being the executive at my job so I can veto the semi intense dinner I had planned for one that came out of the freezer as soon as we walked in the door. Hurriedly and full of excitement we bundled up and got out he door. He even put on his hat all by his "delf"!

He's pointing saying "Dat way!!! Play! Kiks!" Boy was it fun and I had another opportunity to be grateful for the snowsuit I found on sale last year that was too big and only worn a few times. It now fits perfectly when it's really needed!!

After about an hour of playing with some friends down the street we headed home for some ovaltine, Christmas music, and to add the finishing touches to dinner.

I just LOVE this time of year, truly the most wonderful!!