Rare Gift

Tonight my littlest babe fell asleep on my shoulder.

It was kind of an emotional day (we are debriefing this week).  Lil’ A sleeping on my shoulder is a rare occurrence indeed. Just a happy little gift for her Mama.

Better Late Than Never (Baby Eats Food!)

My other babies ate food (rice cereal) on their six month birthdays. This time around, I wasn’t so eager to start the baby food stage. And since lil’ A has still been nursing great, I just waited! Until a couple days ago that is.

Buuttt the time had come. I mean, the girl eats a whole meal of crumbs off the floor during the day, so why not give her the real thing!

Avocado was her first food. It’s perfect. So full of nutrients and healthy fats, doesn’t require cooking and its easily mashable. I’m a fan.

The classic grabbing the spoon.

Whaaaaaa?

Maybe she likes it?

Oops!

She had a fan club while she was eating. She was being cheered on by her big brother and sister. They kept saying she was eating ‘guacamole’ which  wasn’t very far from the truth. She actually did very well until she sprung this leak and then a couple minutes later lost all that she had eaten. Um, not bad for a first time? At least it went down. Nevermind that it came back up…

Sweet N suggested: “Maybe she’d like guacamole better with chips?”

Haha. Well yes dear, I suppose she might! That might be a bit further down the road though…

One Year Ago

It’s one year ago today that we boarded a plane and departed our African home country.

One year.

I recall sitting in the car all loaded up to go to the airport in the wee hours of the morning. I looked up at our front gate and lighted stairwell and our front door at the top. The front door whose opening and closing sounds are etched in my memory. The front door that my kids stood by for their ‘first day of school’ photos. The door that heard a thousand “Keef, tamam? Inti quesa?” The front door that let in and out many dear friends and visitors. The front door I would decorate for birthday parties. The front door that allowed too much dust to blow beneath it. If I listen, I can hear the sound of the door opening and closing in my head and my heart leaps because that door opening and closing often meant that my love returned from a day’s work and was home for the evening. That was such a good feeling.

The approaching date of this anniversary has had me reflecting a bit more than usual. And in some ways I feel like my life is so very different from what it was a year ago. And in some ways I feel like not much has changed, apart from my physical location.

I guess it’s that our final season in Africa was when I really came into my own. I stepped into a new ‘me’. Understood myself more. Stepped up and into who God made me and the things He’s put inside of me. Using my gifts, just being me and God’s using me by just me being me. In that regard, I feel much the same on both sides of the globe. I’m still me and I always will be.

So I feel much like the same person. That’s good! I don’t imagine everyone who has been through what we have could say that. I’m thankful that my identity is not tied up in where I am. But I suppose that just because I feel mostly the same inside it doesn’t mean that I’m understood the same by those around me. I still get those moments, a year later, when I am reminded that I have a weird history. I lived where? I’m different is what I’m saying. I can always blend in and be fine and happy, yes, but inside I sometimes I just want to respond in Arabic, you know?! It feels so natural. But how many times can I mention this or that about Africa before people start tuning out? Um, like, once… MAYBE. But Africa is a big part of who I am. God used our time in Africa (oh no… too many Africas!!! Must stop or readers will stop reading!) hugely to shape who I am. But I often keep it to myself because few around me know that part of my life and I end up feeling silly mentioning it so often. I’m not bitter at all, it’s just how it is and that’s fine.

Aaaanyway. Enough about how I feel inside and out. Blah blah blah.

The other main components that make up my life that haven’t changed between continents are:

1. My family is with me. Halleluiah! Plus my baaaabbbyyyyy! Oh I love her so much, my strong little baby who went through so much in my belly. She’s in my arms, glory!

2. I adore caring for my family and my home.

3. I run a preschool. In many ways very VERY different. In some very small ways, the same.

4. I have joy!

Now, there were some rough patches in the midst, for sure. But the joy I had from life and loving and pouring out my life in Africa is the same joy I have here for the same reasons. That’s God’s grace people. He’s so good.

It’s been awhile since I burst out in tears over some aspect of loss that we have walked through. But when I think about that front door it gets me every time…

A year ago I walked out that door for the  last time. And now I have no idea if others are using *my* door. Do children walk through that door? Does a wife’s heart leap for joy (or sadly, fear?) when a husband opens it? Are there toddler footprints in the dust on the stairs leading to it? Has a dust storm blown it open and there is no one to close it again? Something about that door. It gets me every time I think about it.

Doors. Chapters. Seasons. Open. Closed.

We’ve experienced loss. But we have been renewed. I have joy. Expectation. Vision. I have supreme thankfulness for all the beauty and ugly from those seven years and all he taught me. And I have supreme thankfulness for where God has brought us now.

I am in his hands.

Amen.

(2010 desert road trip, one of my favorite memories)

Creativity of Note

My boy made this cool multi-media (oooohhhh it sounds so cool) drawing around Christmastime. I just loved it!

And Sweet N did a lovely job decorating our door!

The little things I don’t want to forget…

A Four Year Old Girlie

My older girlie turned four last week!

(Birthday balloon in bed tradition)

A special breakfast setting…

So thankful to be with family to celebrate. Birthday pancakes are so much more fun with cousins!

Deeply involved in “Go Fish.”

Girl cousins to church in matching outfits… thanks to Grammi!!!!! Also, the whole congregation sang to her… must have been so embarrassing but she held it together!

Then to Chuck E. Cheese’s for a little special fun…

We had the joy of celebrating with our families at Grandma and Grandpa’s house in the evening.

I whipped up this simple little beauty for her…

And she might have spit on it as she was blowing out the candles. Woops!

She has been SO much fun lately.

One of her middle names means “Cheerful bringer of joy” and that is definitely who she is! She skips half the places she goes, makes goofy faces, sings made-up songs and just bubbles over with happiness (most of the time). She adores her baby sister and helps me take care of her and watch out for her. She loves to write her name. And paint. And do craft projects. One of her favorite things is making cards and delivering them. She loves to give things away, both as gifts and things she doesn’t need anymore. She has the best giggle in the world and will ask to be tickled again and again and again when we tuck her into bed at night.

Three was great. Four is going to be greater!

She is such a gift to me.

Happy Birthday Sweet N!

Love Them

I love these two and this photo of them together.

That’s all.

Some Traveling Notes

We just drove two days halfway across the country.

Again.

The night before we left we enjoyed the snow that fell during the day.

Good thing I packed their snow things!

Now I just need some things for myself. I still can’t feel my bum.

Poppi got out his tractor and gave the kids a ride. And their mother may have joined them for the majority of it.

Even in this blurry picture you can see how much fun they are having. I promise you I was having more once I put down the camera and jumped on with them.

Except for that numb bum part. And my fingers? I couldn’t feel those either.

But it was REALLY fun.

Then we went inside for hot chocolate that Grammi made!

Just like when I was a kid! It was special!

The next morning we started our drive.

And this girlie is definitely in the running for best baby road tripper EVER.

Like in all the history of the world.

I mean, I haven’t done research on, like, all the babies of the world. But I’m pretty sure that if I did, she’d be in the tippy top of the demographic.

She has spent four entire days of the last two weeks of her life strapped into this child restraint seat.

And she just smiles at ya. Or coos. Or talks. Or plays with toys. Or looks out the window.

Or sleeps.

It’s pretty much amazing.

And this kid is pretty great in the car too. This particular creation is finger lights cleverly stowed inside a silly putty egg.

And there you have a glowing egg!

Cool, huh? He’s fun.

And regarding the other child. She did great on the way east. Today, finishing the drive west? Um, notsomuch.

But I love her still. And forever. And always.

She’s got spunk, that’s for sure.

In other news, Lil’ A slept in the tent for the first time last night!

I never trained her to get her used to it, but we had to pull it out last night. I was worried. But I shouldn’t have been. I put her in it and closed the door. She cried for approximately one second, found her fingers, rolled over and went to sleep.

Well, okay!

In the morning she was snoozin’ good.

That was that.

 

So after 22.5 hours in the car in the past two days, numerous vehicles and trailers spotted on the side of the road (awful roads) we returned home!

There is no place like home.

Aaaaand the moment I walked in I received the reward of all my frantic hard work trying to clean my house top to bottom as we were leaving.

Glory halleluiah it was so clean and beautiful.

By the way I’m not ready to put Christmas decorations away yet.

LASTLY… I was so happy to have a very healthy stack of Christmas cards to open. It was so fun and I feel so loved!

Whew!