Grace had an a-plus baby boy the beginning of the month, our first grandson. He was born on a Sunday morning into a room filled with prayers and scripture, to the beautiful waiting arms of his mommy and daddy. I spoke to Grace shortly afterwards, right after church, and heard her sweet voice saying, “I have a little son!” I was holding the phone in my hand, and I was smiling.
My daughter is a mother, and she is in her glory.
A weight lifted off of me. I realized then how much the anticipation and healthy concern I had for the event had been heavy on my soul. Waiting and hoping and praying and helping, a mother there to support her darling but only able to do just so much. Now it was over, and she was safely on the other side of pregnancy and child birth. God held her in His hands and she was brought through. A tiny son was born.
He was 6 lbs and 6 oz, and 20” long.
His name is Rorric Paul.
We call him Rory.
He now weighs 8 pounds, and at his check up the other day, his doctor said he was an A-plus baby.
As I go about my many many daily activities I say to myself, “Rory is an A-plus baby, an A-plus baby is he.” I smile and smile. OF COURSE our precious Grace and her very smart husband Brogan would produce such an offspring! I can’t wait to have conversations with him. I wonder what he’ll say!
Rich and I just had a lovely little conversation about the things we see and do that make us feel most alive and glad to be alive in this big full glorious feast of a world….
Flowers some beautiful soul brought to work (Starbucks) to make people happy.
Babies and children
Music
Healers
Belief in Jesus and His practices
Growing things
Food
biology
Nature-birds, collections, observing
Beautiful books
Motion (in nature -like the wind for instance-or people-like dance and sports) participant AND observing
The arts
Fashion- make up, clothes, body art, doing my nails or doing someone’s nails for them, etc
page from my journal with my own happy drawing -I LOVE new pens and markers
Fishing
Boating
Trail riding (3 or 4 wheeler)
Swimming in a pool with lots of happy people
BBQ with family
Ford Cobra-drive with top down with you, stopping to get coffee
Picking flowers for you from a field of flowers
Hunt-but not to shoot anything, just to see nature
Hiking, to see a beautiful view
We saw a rainbow last weekend.I’ve always loved picking wild flowers, even as a little girl. Makes my heart sing.Some beautiful soul brought daisies to Bible Study. Wasn’t that nice?
Rich and I had just half an hour for our little talk because as usual, it was brought to our attention that there was “nothing to eat” in the house so he told the girls (Sarah and her friend) to give us a little time and then he would take them to Dunkin to get anything-anything their hearts desired- that they wanted off the menu.
“What does *a little time* mean??” Sarah asked suspiciously. “Half an hour?” “Oh okay” …….
We set the timer so as to not frustrate them.
Before it went off we weren’t able to come up with one of our most favorite life affirming activities as a couple but I will take the liberty to share it anyway:
Kissing and hugging and making babies. (The making babies part is over now, though, we already made them). Now we just make love and our children are making the babies.
Of course lists like these are never ending, really. The truth is, life is a continual feast. what makes us happy to be alive? We are just getting started.
…..I read a thing on instagram this morning that said the opposite of depression was expression. I’m not depressed but I used to be. And I do happen to wholeheartedly agree that the opposite of *most of what ails us* IS expression through creativity. Just think about what the first verse in the Bible is; “In the beginning, God created.” That’s our God for you. Creating things and saying they are good.
It’s just after 8 in the morning here. The air conditioning is humming, and I have a scrumptious roly poly grandbaby in bed with me. I gave her a big bottle of milk after changing her diaper and putting her in my bed. She’s sound asleep now and will probably sleep for a while, I’m guessing, based on her Daddy’s report of her being a little fussy in the night.
So I’m going to get up, take some Tylenol for this headache, dress in something colorful, put some happy music on…….
……and start expressing and creating a day of beauty just for me.
Ideas-
Scrapbook page of clippings with some paintings and pretty words, notebook page with verses written in cursive handwriting, play the piano, clear the table and make a lovely arrangement in the very center, open the doors and windows to air the house, pick flowers, bake a cake for later, write someone a note, dance to music, sing, do some chalkboard art, sew, repair something, light candles, make a toy, turn a cartwheel, do the chores artistically, photograph some bugs, play with cats, smile, laugh, clap my hands. “Rejoice and be glad in the day God has made.”
Today I was tired most of the day. But very content. Rich had the day off and Grace and Brogan are here from PA. Grace has a big pregnant tummy and looks healthy and glowy. Brittnee texted me that Lucy’s check up went well but they both cried over the shots which I found very charming. Lucy has almost doubled her birth weight. I slept until almost nine this morning and when I got up Grace was making homemade biscuits and sausage gravy. Seth immediately asked me to contact Peg about when he could go to church for community service (he and Sarah had no school). Rich made me coffee and started wrestling Seth. Grace didn’t know where anything was in the kitchen so that became my purpose, and then Sarah started asking me things too so naturally my brain short circuited. I waved my white flag and took my coffee into my room to watch Crazy Lamp Lady, which is a “thrift to flip for a profit” show that I like. I was pleased to solve a mystery that I had of a small clay figurine I found a while ago which she said was a Story teller doll. They are collectible figurines of mothers with different numbers of children hanging off them ready to listen to a story. So now I know how to list mine!
Grace and Brogan left at 1 this afternoon to go visit Jacob and Brittnee and Lucy and they are still there now. David went to visit Natalie. When I saw what was happening I said ”Rich it’s just going to be you and me and Sarah this afternoon what are we going to do?” And he said “Figure out how to get rid of Sarah?“. Ha ha ha ….We took her to lunch with us instead. It was a grand ol’ time. Sarah’s a good sport to be spending so much time with her parents now that the older ones are often doing their own things.
But like I said I’ve been tired all day. Headache and sleepy. I took advil and that helped for a while. I remember when I was in my twenties I used to have insomnia often and I absolutely love that I’m a good sleeper now. I slept so heavy last night. With vivid dreams.
It’s 9pm now and I just pulled a homemade banana oat quick bread from the oven and am waiting for the brownies to finish baking. Tomorrow I am having any old child or my husband do the shopping for the Easter feast which will be a shrimp platter, deli platter, cheese tray, roast beef, and two roasted chickens along with boiled baby potatoes and green beans.
Me and my Sarah I tried an espresso tonic today; yum!Story teller dollDried flower display from a shop Brownies and banana bread Brittnee and LucyBrittnee sent me this photo of Grace feeding Lucy a bottle.
It’s a rainy day, a steady thick drizzle. I just mixed up a cake from scratch and put it in the oven. I used the last two cups of white sugar so David just left for the grocery store. He is going to visit his girlfriend tomorrow and wants to bake cookies for her so he wanted to make sure to get sugar. He’s not sure what kind he’s making yet. I have some candy for him to give to her, too. I have a candle lit and made a cup of coffee. The house is quietly waiting for its children to come back home. They will all be here this weekend except for Caleb the college boy. It’s Easter weekend and Rich’s 50th birthday on Sunday and we are looking forward to lots of family togetherness. Music, talking, cooking, cuddles.
Speaking of cuddles I got to go and visit Lucy this morning for a couple hours.
I want to always take care of her with gentleness and love. I am beyond thankful for this sweet little baby, our first grandchild.
After I left I visited a local farm for some eggs and frozen meat. We no longer keep chickens or ducks and although we miss having them I am always very appreciative that we have many opportunities to buy them from the farm or different stands in the neighborhood.
Turkey, chicken, and duck eggs
Speaking of eggs, I started putting together the kids Easter baskets this morning. I haven’t ever kept a consistent tradition for Easter because sometimes we are vacationing, but because I’m at Goodwill at least once a week to find things for my eBay shop, I kept my eyes open this year for baskets and was able to find some nice wicker ones. Each one of them is slightly different, which I find charming. I lined each one with a sheet of tissue paper and am filling them with different little things. Unfortunately I miscounted one of the matching gifts, I’m one short, and so now Brittnee’s trying to get me to go back to Target with her.
Also thanks to thrifting, I’ve collected Easter decor through the years and it’s been delightful to put things out here and there;
birds nest gathered from outside
These are the little ways to make a life sing.
Happy Easter my loves ❤️
“I do what my heart tells me to do. I surround myself with beautiful things.” Hilde Leiaghat
“Beautiful homes bring up beautiful people.” Elena salgueiro
“Jesus Christ is our strength and guidance here.” Sister Julienne
“We touch other people’s lives simply by existing.”
PS, he’s back with the sugar and decided to make the Doubletree cookie recipe (oats, walnuts, & chocolate chip).
Destination- a little therapy room, often smelling thickly of the prior client’s cannabis, fifty minutes away, to be arrived at by speeding along highways and byways. -a little therapy room that would hold the wonders of the world, and magic, and solace, and finally….someone who would completely stand by my side to validate and strengthen me.
How did God get me to that little room, you wonder? Gather around and lend me your ears, or rather, eyes , to read this account, all true.
We begin this journey many years ago, when I was still very naive, and homeschooling a large number of young children who all belonged to me. It was a very snowy February day and I had just gone out on the porch to take clothes off the line when a van came around the icy corner, slid quietly off the road and turned upside down into the steam at the end of our property. The children and I rushed to rescue, and I met a beautiful young mom and her three children- two preschoolers and a baby wet from the waters of the ice cold stream. The young mom and I formed a lifelong connection that day.
Years pass.
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I had been scammed on the interNET. (Funny, I would later describe the feeling —-like I was caught in a NET underwater drowning but never actually drowning, to my therapist, regarding this time). I had met in the net, a kind and most attentive member of my family tree. He had seen me appear in his family matches on ancestry DNA. Little by little, I become friends with him, he was a cousin, and an older person to look up to and chat with. Unfortunately he was person who eventually tore my entire NAIVE heart to pieces as I slowly came to realize he was in fact a wolf in sheep’s clothing. I’m not making this up and neither is Grimm’s fairy tales. The wolf exists!!In fact, it’s worse worse worse than I can even explain! This experience is why I am now forever kindred spirits with Jemima Puddle Duck. I guess she is (WAS) my “spirit animal.” Also, in her case it was a Fox. Sometimes they are also spiders or snakes. On the outside though they look like regular old nice people/sheep.
Anyway, I had to block this person from all my online accounts.
Months pass.
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For a time, I was understandably hyper vigilant about social media and I came to notice a new name pop up on my instagram—- an account which kept visiting my stories. I could see that they were looking at everything I posted. I got upset and confronted this person, certain it was the abuser from my past using an alias.
Days pass.
**********
I finally got the truth out of that person and was totally shocked to discover it was someone the young mom from the stream knew. So I reached out to her for clarification. In this way, she found out about my very personal and private battle with a toxic family member. In turn, I also discovered that she was recovering from abuse, too. Sadly, most of us are. Anyway, we decided to get together for a visit. During that visit, she gave me the name of her therapist and told me to call her. I was very hesitant about therapy because I had tried it before and it was not helpful and in fact made me feel worse. But I took another leap of faith. (It was my one millionth leap of faith). I reluctantly and unenergetically leaped myself into contact with the therapist. It was scary. I had no hope. Not even a shred. I was just doing what my friend gently suggested.
I’ll never forget where I was when I had my first phone consultation with her (my friend’s therapist). It was springtime and I was standing in the green grass down by the chicken coop wandering around sobbing through her questions and trying to articulate the best I could through the hot heart aching pain of uttering words and communicating and indescribable almost impossible to bear/bare story. My naked soul. As vulnerable as nakedness typically is for us non-nudists.
********
(((As an aside, I am a highly sensitive person.)) what’s that, you ask?
interesting, right?
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Phone consultation, con’t……
The interview of sorts came to a conclusion. I waited for what she would tell me to do next. And then…..I was crushed and stunned when I heard the words, “I can’t help you.”
Now, mind you, she didn’t mean those words THAT WAY. She DID briskly continue on to clarify, “……you have serious emotional trauma and I am not qualified enough for what you need but I will send you names of people trained to handle trauma.”
(This was the first time someone told me I had trauma and it was VERY validating, up to this point I blamed myself for everything and all the emotions, I was deeply planted in my belief that something was wrong with me.)
I got off the phone in shock, no longer crying but shocked into that almost blissful state of numbness. I did promptly receive the Email of Names but a numb person with the words “she can’t help me” on repeat is working at a disadvantage. It took more time to pass to get to the point where I could make my ……
……..One Millionth and One-more- leap- of faith.
One more email, one more phone call, a scheduled first appointment, a 50 minute trip down the highway, and a journey that I came to enjoy on a weekly basis. Eventually the drive would come to include a ritual stop along the way for the hands-down best cup of matcha I have been able to find in these parts.
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There so much more I could say, but that, my darling, is how I was led by God to the healing place, to Emilie and her little magic room. I looked and she was holding the keys to my heart.
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Remember,
“You can be sure that God will take care of everything you need, His generosity exceeding even yours in the glory that pours from Jesus.”
“The simple truth is that if you had a mere kernel of faith, a poppy seed, say, you could tell this mountain, ‘Move!’ and it would move. There is nothing you wouldn’t be able to tackle.”
“God knows how to rescue the godly from evil trials.”
“With God, one day is as good as a thousand years, a thousand years as a day.”
*****
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“Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony.”
I didn’t go to church yesterday because I needed a mental health day. Maybe my busy life caught up with me. I have a lot on my mind. A mixed salad so to speak, with my family and my work and my life, and I am the sort who needs to think (and write) about things. And I know that when I have a struggle, I’m not alone. Some of the struggles I find myself dealing with are painful. And ultimately I think “if I am not alone in dealing with this then I want to learn all about it so I can help my friends if they find themselves in this place.” I study, and search. There are a lot of issues “out there” which I have shied away from because they are so controversial. The pain of the controversy ends up being more painful than I can bear. Injustice seems like a wall that never breaks down. But my heart wants to learn and grow and puff and ooze with tender love. Strong love.
I am always on the side of humanity.
I am always on the side of Christ.
I stand with Christ and the human. I stand with myself.
I am not firmly planted on the side of any issue. I can understand how people are gloriously complex, and I’ve heard enough stories to know that there are always pathways and reasons and journeys to whatever destination we find ourselves at in any particular moment. And then a lot of times we even change. It’s fluid and beautiful, growth.
What I never stand on is the side of the self righteous, the ones who are so narrow minded that they think their belief or opinion is the Only Right One. I don’t stand with patterned ongoing abusive behavior that leaves victims half dead on the side of the road. True evil is bent on trying to destroy peace and love.
True love is stopping to lift up the half dead and hurting people.
I have high hopes and dreams for people. I want to see people regulating their nervous systems, healing their trauma, and feeling safe enough to nurture children instead of neglecting them. The children are our future. Not a cliche but the truth. They deserve to be brought up feeling loved and taught to serve (to lift up). Brought up so carefully and thoughtfully that they don’t have to put in years of healing when they are adults.
My son found himself with the task of having to complete forty hours of community service.
These hours have changed his life. And changed our family, too, as we witnessed him working and serving his “giat” off (I don’t even know how to spell it but I’ve had it aimed at me more than once). This weekend he found himself taking food to people through the cold rain, to their cars, for five hours. He came home soaked. Last weekend he found himself with a group of all different older men, he couldn’t even laugh at their jokes as they cooked corn beef and cabbage supper together, because he was too young to “get them”. But he grew bigger in self confidence and learned a lot as he rubbed shoulders with them. “Mom I sliced ALL the corned beef myself.”
I realized more about my precious child as he explained that he “hated working at the library because it’s so quiet and they had me dusting books and it was never ending over and over and I got SAD.”
Like, I knew this child wasn’t a fan of libraries but to feel actual feelings of sadness and hatred…..I mean, that’s something.
He is a man of action, working busily in teams made up of other active people like him. This is where he thrives.
A day with nothing to do is quite a mountain for that one.
And I think about how I have ten children (teenagers and adults) and one grandbaby (also another one coming soon) and how different each of them are inside and out and how my brain at some point (even now) is going to get tired and I’m going to have to stand on a single life principle as the matriarch of my growing tribe of decendents.
Something to live for.
Something that tells them that they can always come to me and my home for warmth and a grilled cheese sandwich. A snuggle, a talk, or just to be left alone to nap or whatever the heck they need.
(We all have needs that deserve to be met).
What will I be wearing when they come close to me? (Besides the neon hello kitty socks)?
I will be wearing love.
I pray to God I’ll be oozing it.
“We don’t see things clearly. We’re squinting in a fog, peering through the mist. But it won’t be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright! We’ll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us, knowing Him directly has He knows us! But for right now, until that completeness, we have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation: trust steadily in God, hope unswervingly, love extravagantly. And the best of the three is love.” 1Cor13
“This is the blessed life~ not anxious to see far down the road nor overly concerned about the next step, not eager to choose the path nor weighted down with the heavy responsibilities of the future but quietly following the Shepherd, one step at a time.” from Streams in the Desert
Rich and I were blessed by the arrival of a new baby granddaughter, born on January 22.
The proud parents are our son Jacob and his wife Brittnee, and they named their first born daughter Lucy Adeline. She was 6 lbs, 12 oz. at birth and today at her check up she weighed 8 pounds, 4oz. I am completely smitten by her. She is perfectly healthy and a very pretty baby, so smart and bright. A marvel.
Brittnee had a c-section and I visited the hospital several times before they were discharged. I was especially thankful that Rich and I met her for the first time, together. He was so dear as he looked at every. single. stuffed animal in the hospital gift shop trying to find just the right one for Lucy; and while he didn’t fall in love with the idea of being a grandfather, he fell promptly in love with the very real and darling granddaughter herself.
Jacob and Brittnee are settling into their new role as parents like naturals and we are so proud of them. The had a baby and moved closer to home all in the same week, with good humor and grace. We love having them near.
As always, I am keeping my heart and eyes held wide open to the beauty around me, while also savoring each day’s hidden delights given for me and for me only, holding them close, to remember and thank God for….. over and over again. This is a personal journey to home, and yet we go there together on these precious golden pathways to glory, hand in hand with so much love. Welcoming new babies is a joy along the way. We love our little Lucy.
That old familiar ache of deep wonder over the gifts of time makes me feel alive like nothing else.
Good to be Home 