Imaginary Things

So I've been trying to learn to laugh more, because it's good for me and because there is lots in my life to laugh at but there are definetly times when I need to learn not to.

Like when you three year old comes running into your bedroom in the middle of the night, terrified from a nightmare that she has had.

And she tells you she had a dream of a "a poop, and it had a face on it, and it was big and it was standing and it had a sad face." !

I wasn't particularly awake at 2:00am, and she had to repeat herself a few times, but in between the tears I finally understood what she was saying, I had to shove my face in my pillow to keep her from seeing that I had to laugh!

I went back to her room with her, and tucked her in and lay beside her for about half an hour, until she stopped shaking, and crying. We sung songs, prayed and talked about happy things until she was a little better. But she has not wanted to go back to sleep today, and I'm not sure how much she actually slept after that last night. She hugged her hippopotamus flashlight, turned on, and I did not take it away from her. I figure a change in batteries is worth both of us getting some sleep.

She's always had night terrors and a fairly vivid imagination - lately she's been drawing pretty hilarious things. And telling me bizare things like my elbow speaks spanish and likes mice (??!). The pictures here are things she has drawn in the past ten days or so - and these are just the ones I could find (click to see the enlarged version). I think they're pretty good for having just turned three!

Her nightmares this month have also included a family of cats, who wear spy glasses, and find their way into her room through the nightlight (which we therefore can no longer turn on). They don't do anything apprently except for meow. But she's still very scared of cats since a series of dreams she has had. Right now she keeps an imaginary snake by her bed, (named "my friend the snake") and has some (also imaginary) ants that appear around the house (named similarly "my friends the ants"). She just doesn't like me to catch her talking to them. :)

All of that I could take with a straight face. The standing poop-with-a-face, that was too much! :)

Thinking of Christmas

So I actually do realize that it is still September, but every year I come to December first, and realize how unprepared I am to do all the things I really intended to do in the weeks leading up to Christmas. So this year, I'm getting a few things out of the way early. :)

I love advent calendars, and just the entire season of Advent and I'm SO excited that this year I have a child who is old enough to really participate in the whole event. So I'm thinking of making an advent calendar for us to use this year. I am hoping each day will contain a small candy or other item (thank you, Dollarama!), the passage of the Bible and corresponding questions for that day and an activity that is special for that day for her and I to do together. A few years ago when I was working at the church I put together a series of verses on the themes of love, joy, peace and hope that also told the whole of the Christmas story, with discussion questions for each verse. I'll be re-designing the whole thing this year, but the concept will be the same, so I'm half way there. But I still want to have little treasures inside too, because Miranda's greatest delight is finding things (even ones she's hidden herself!) So I really need to decide on something that is more than just a little flap, and has space to store the treasures.





These are photos I've grabbed from all over the place of different advent calendars I really love. Ali Edwards did the ones on the wall, (LOVE everything she does) the little matchbox one is Martha Stewart. And the little drawers shapped like a tree is apparently something Starbucks sold last year, with truffles inside. Since I don't have a budget for this activity, I'm really leaning towards the long advent chain made with toilet paper tubes (the pink one, at right). I figure I could at LEAST figure this out. And printing off digital scrapbooking papers to decorate this will be a breeze. (My girl Melissa Bennett will have a whole series of Christmas kits coming soon - I'm sure!)





When I was little my mother sewed us a big wall-hanging with pockets and little velcro bears that moved in between different rooms of the house, doing different activities to get ready for Christmas. I would love to be the kind of mom who just whipped up wall-quilts on a whim (wow, that's a lot of W's) but I am not, and I'm pretty sure that since I can't get around to pulling out the sewing machine to fix garments, it's not going to happen for this either. :) So paper and glue it is!



I'm still looking around for the *right* nativity set. I, being a girl who thinks too much and knows exactly what she wants, am finding nothing that meets my criteria. I don't want rubber ducks dressed as the three wise men, I don't want fuzzy bears bowing before the Christ-cub and I don't want chubby little children figures. That's just confusing. I also don't want something made of anything that will break easily, because really I want a set that my kids can play with a bit. But it also has to be pretty. Yup, I know I'm asking for a lot here!



Good thing I have a few months left to get everything together. :)

Beginnings

WOW. I am finding it really difficult to believe that it is now the end of September, this week has been a big week of beginnings in our house so in my mind we're still just starting this 'year'! Last week I started going to a morning prayer group, and Jason and I started back with our cell group Bible Study. Last night was our second meeting, and I have to say I love those people so so much - I don't think I have laughed so hard in months! And we're studying the book of Romans! I know, I know. Hilarious stuff. But you really should have been there. :)


But Monday night was something new just for Miranda. I signed her up for Ballet Babies through Spectrum as soon as the catalogue came out - $20 for 8 weeks is about as close to free as I have been able to find, outside of church stuff and the Ontario Early Years Centers (which we make good use of!). I thought something like a little dance class would be good for my poor uncoordinated daughter, and her low muscle tone. She's never been especially interested in dance, but she IS especially interested in the school down the street where it is held, and above all, other little girls so it almost didn't matter at all what I signed her up for! All day monday she kept asking if she could wear her new ballet slippers and saying "I'm just so Es-sited!!" (the slippers came from Walmart and cost of all $6.00, and the leotard she wore was MINE from when I when I did ballet babies when I was three!). We walked over there in the evening, and my daughter who usually complains about having to walk up the stairs ran the whole way. And when we got to the shchool, she just ran and skipped and there was no stopping her! I was a little worried she might be the only one in a leotard (the course description said to bring children in a t shirt and shorts, with socks or slippers) but every other little girl was dressed from head to toe in a blinding assortment of pinks - some with pouffy tutus and one with what appeared to be a little tiara. Wow.

Miranda ran into the room without even saying 'bye' while I waited outside and chatted with the other moms (and tried to keep Simon from escaping) and loved every minute of her class. A big highlight was that she got a tiny sticker on her hand at the end. She was SO excited when I told her she could go back the next week! I have not seen anything so cute in a long time - a whole room full of three year olds in tutu's skipping and waving little scarves in the air to piano music. I was relieved my little one wasn't the 'crier' and didn't sit on the floor picking her nose and generally was very attentive and obedient. Even those kids were cute. Except there really was a lot of pink in there.

Miranda ran all the way home after this, which just blows my mind because I can barely get her to walk with me to the playground other nights. I was told she would always have trouble with physical activity, and there wasn't much that could improve it. I think really though, that since she looked almost as compitent as all the other girls, though more clumsy, I just need to find ways to motivate her to get up and get moving with me. (And let's face it, I definetly need to get moving more too)! So we'll see how next week goes. Three more weeks before her first 'performance'. I can't WAIT to take some photos. :)

Getting Over Myself

The past few weeks I have felt quite happy that my son - now 10 months - says pretty much only one word: Mom. His first word was 'danda, refering to his sister, and then came Dad. Once he figured out how to say 'Mom', that was it. I hear him babble "mumumumum" all through the day. I just thought he loved me a lot. :) Lately, I have come to a new conclusion.
Yesterday, Simon said Mom.....

- when he saw me bring him his bottle
- when I put some cheerios in front of him
- when I put him in his high chair for lunch
- when he was trying to steal his sisters cookie

My parents watched him on tuesday night when I went to bible study, and apparently he said "Mom" the whole time, but mostly when they were feeding him.
I think in his little brain Mom=Food!
This just about broke my heart. I suppose that's not an unnatural association to have. It makes me feel all the more guilt for not being able to nurse him. Now that I have been listenig for it, Simon says "Mom" when he is hungry only. Not when we're playing, not when we're cuddling. This has lead me to think about something Pastor Mike said in his sermon on Sunday about just 'getting over yourself'.

There have been so very few times in my life when I have been able to 'get over myself'. I am very self-conscious. VERY.I remember summers at camp when my days were so consumed with doing stuff, and prayer, and people that I kind of forgot all about me. I remember washing up my muddy face and arms after a river adventure with my campers once and catching a glimpse of my face in the mirror. It surprised me all of a sudden how tanned I was, and how my hair fell differently, and how I had a few scratches on my cheek. I tried to remember when I got those scratches, and didn't remember if I had looked in the mirror that morning. Or the day before, even. In fact, I had nearly forgotten what I looked like. That moment briefly snapped me out of some sort of automatic mode I had been on, remembering myself again. But the thing is, I'd give anything to go back to the moment before that, where there wasn't a 'me' at all, just a doing, a serving, a loving. I remember what it was like to be over myself, if only for a few days. And I wonder what it would take to get to that place now...

I think the difference, of course, is community. At camp, there were few alone moments, and many many moments full of people and life and my story was one of of many in the narritive I could see all around me. I imagine that this is what it is like going on a mission trip too, or working collabritively with a lot of pepole all day doing something you love.

So how do I find community where I am? That was one reason we moved into this co-op, and I have definetly felt like this is more of a community than my apartment building. And that is the reason I took my children to playgroups through the summer, and probably a huge reason why were are intending to send our children to public school. I think that it is far too easy for me to fill my day with thoughts of myself and my children and not be as aware of those around me since we spend our hours inside this house, doing just what we please. I know I need to be more intentional about surrounding myself with actual, living people...so I will continue going to early morning women's prayer (even though it's EARLY), cell group, Sunday worship, and finding ways for my children to interact with real live people too. Even though some of the time, some of these people won't like me.

Of course, as a mother, it is natural to believe that when my son says "mom" he means me - Right? But I guess I have to be okay if it isn't. I kind of want to be the center of his universe but it isn't true now and definetly SHOULDN'T be true. And I should never want it to be true. I am not that important, not even to my only son. And really, HIS future happiness requires that I get out of the way as much as possible and help Him see God as the center of his universe. SERIOUSLY Lindy. This was just a little reminder today for me to suck it up and get over myself. :)

Contentment

I have been feeling lately that everywhere I turn there is something new I *need* to have. I find myself making short lists, everything from Christmas presents to items I *need* at the pharmacy to beautiful home items, accessories and clothing online. There begins this urgency in the pit of my stomach, a feeling that if I only had this one thing or that one thing I would be happy, and I wouldn't want any more. Of course you're probably laughing reading this - because I imagine you've been there too. I think we all have. We are so easily deceived by the want of 'stuff'. I have begun to hate that in me. It hadn't as yet brought me to stop making lists or to search for the very best of everything out there (online, of course, malls overwhelm me). So I decided I needed to pick up a book I saw many years ago when I was a stacks-goblin (library page - there was a summer I worked in the basement and didn't see the light of the sun - cleaning, sorting and cataloguing the perpetual piles. The years I worked as a page I was commanded to be silent, never speak to a patron, reshelf and retrieve but never be seen = a goblin). The book is called "The Plain Reader" a group of essays by Amish and other plain folk compiled by Scott Savage. So I checked it out and have been reading it over the past few days, when I get a chance. It is breezy reading, but the ideas inside stick with me throughout the day and it has been completely absorbing.

The essays - by both men and women- all appeared in a small journal called "Plain" and cover topics from the spirituality of communal work, midwifery, how to hand wash clothes, how the Amish live without TV, personal stories of those who have left the world of technology for a simple life devoted to God, Family and Community. One of my favourite essays has been by a pastor who carefully evaluates the necessity of each piece of technology in his life. He drives a horse and buggy, from which he composes sermons on his high-end Mac Laptop! The mindset that all we do should be weighed against the effect a thing might have on our environment (which we are stewards of), the community, and our own souls. This goes beyond media choices to whether media should be welcome at all. I wonder what it would really be like to own nothing in this world, and not want for anything! Here is another short excerpt :

"The story is told of a man from the big city who moved to the country. It happened that the house and lot he bought were right in the middle of a community of plain people. The big-city man was a bit apprehensive about these bearded men who had no power lines connected to their buildings and who drove to town behind the clip-clop of horse hooves. But he assured himself that they looked gentle enough, and he had always heard that although they were different, they were quite harmless.

He was reassured on moving day when one of his plain neighbors showed up to help him unload his many belongings. The neighbor’s strong back and willing muscles came in handy, as without comment he helped carry in the usual North American assortment of electrical appliances and labor-saving, comfort-producing gadgets. That evening before leaving for his home, the plain man motioned toward all the appliances he had helped unload, and said to the big-city man, “Now, if any of these things break down, don’t hesitate to let me know, and I’ll come over.”

The man from the big city was completely taken by surprise, but quite pleased. “Oh, that’s nice,” he exclaimed. “Do you fix things?”

“No,” said the plain man. “I have no idea how to fix these things. But I will be happy to show you how to live without them.”


Wow. The first purchase we made moving into our little townhouse was a portable dishwasher. For the sake of our marriage, Jason said.  It is wonderful, I love it to pieces. I would do nothing all day BUT dishes if it weren’t for it. I can’t even imagine a life where I was only reliant on people. It kind of frightens me.

One thing that glares at me from these hand-typeset pages is the contentment of these writers in being in the place they are! They are not discontent! This seems so rare in my world. I think about ten of my friends from highschool. Each of them are very far from home...(Sri Lanka, Japan, Cambodia, Haiti, Indonesia, England, Vancouver, Nashville, Germany, Burma,...) and only two are married. None have children. (I’m the weird one). I think this will be a hallmark of my generation - this wanderlust, extensive travel after school, and an attitude towards family as something which happens after personal fulfillment and not something which fulfills. But these plain folk - Amish, Mennonite and others are content in the place they are and see a life of living in community, hard work and simplicity as the good life. Not a fat paycheck or a full passport. To contrast, many of my highschool friends voiceably pity me. They don't know how I can survive in this 'awful boring place'. I wish I could say that it doesn't bother me, that I would always rather my life than theirs. I must admit that I really wish I had had the opportunity to travel (right now, even traveling to Toronto makes me giddy...) but I must remember how very full my days are here, and how all around me are still people I havn't met with their own stories and life is very full and rich. I still experience new things every day. I still learn things about myself, and about God.

I am praying that I grow in contentment. My reading yesterday highlighted to me just how evil discontentment is...

"Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom. 14But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. This is not) the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. 16For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. 17But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace". James 3:13-18 ESV

The wisdom of this world - the voices, whether audible or not- that tell me to be discontent are false and cause 'disorder' and evil. That thing inside me wanting more and never feeling satisfied. That thing telling me that more stuff will heal something in me, make me worthy of something or beautiful or wanted or complete. The wisdom of people who live outside this world is very refreshing. It is full of mercy and good fruits. So I will be looking in the future for more wisdom. (If anyone is reading this, book or blog suggestions are welcome!)

I think today that part of living a beautiful life is seeing the beautiful where you are. That's my prayer today.

Why the Duplo is in Time Out.

So this morning, Jason offered to do the grocery shopping and take Miranda out while I cleaned (BLESS him) and I was getting the playroom ready for a vacuum before they left. I asked Miranda to put away her Duplo with me so the floor was picked up.

Miranda: "No thank you mommy - you can do it"

Me: "I'm not asking you, Miranda. I'm telling you. It is your job to pick up toys you are playing with.I will help. We can each do half"

Miranda: "I don't want to pick them up."

Me: "that's too bad. If you can't pick up your toys when you are done with them, they will go away. This is your last chance. If you don't pick up your toys, they will go away"

Miranda: "Okay mommy, I will not paly with them"

???!

This is currently her favourite toy. We're talking three hours or more a day in block-time. Oh well. Right now the duplo is ontop of the freezer in the laundry room, where they will stay until she misses them. And then an extra day.


And this brings me to realize that WOW am I doing a bad job of being consistant and setting rules for her. This is the problem with my little girl. She's such a GOOD child, naturally. (the above conversation is an exception, not the rule). She is very concerned with how her behaviour makes me feel - when she is disciplined, she is primarily concerned about wheather or not I am happy or sad!
In the summer, we worked on one new rule a week, things that she was already doing - like always holding my hand when we were outside near a street, NEVER leaving the house without me - front or back yard, NEVER going into the fridge for a snack without my permission, etc. These weren't things she needed me to say to her more than once, and it didn't even cross her mind to NOT hold my hand until it became a rule. It was only after these rules were in place that she began to break them, but in a way that made me happy. It's very difficult to talk to a child about their sin if they do not REALIZE they are sinning, if there is no law before them they know they have broken.

Miranda knows the summer rules by nature, and a few more that we've been praciticing along the way (asking to be excused from the dinner table, playing only with quiet toys when Simon is sleeping, etc.) but I realize I need to be much more disciplined (myself!) about seeing what rules and structure will help Miranda to self-discipline and contentment. Like always picking up her toys.

These conversations about her own sin (along with others about the nature and presence of God, the life of Christ, etc.) are all what I am hopeing will prepare for future conversations about salvation. Right now, there is no reception to that language and those concepts - which doesn't mean it isn't used, of course, but I can see what I have to build.

The other big hole is, of course, Miranda's complete lack of understanding of death.

This again - my fault. I was talking to Nancy on thursday about this when we were planning some pre-school things this year about how the discussion of salvation, heaven, the sacrifice of Jesus is irrelevant if there is no understanding of death. But I somehow can't bring myself to explain it to her without tears. I look at her, and realize that at her age, I was sitting by my mother's hospital bed, and a by the time I was five, was praying that God would make ME die instead of her so she could stay and take care of my little brother. And I began sobbing to Nancy, realizing how much I miss - if not my mother, than having had a well mother and normal childhood. (For anyone reading this who doesn't know, my mom died of cancer when I was 10, and pretty nearly my whole childhood and beyond has been coloured by the absence of my mom). Miranda doesn't know about my mom. I can't see myself sitting down with her and breaking her heart and causing her to fear that I won't be there for her.

It's what I fear most.

(here I am crying again)

Obviously there are still deep portions of this wound and this lonliness that are far from healed. But I have to go there, I have to find a way to show her life and death and the hope in Christ and to show her tender, world-innocent little soul the truths that I know.

With Simon I can already see that teaching him the sin of his nature won't be nearly so difficult (in between this paragraph and the last, I had to rescue him from trying to go swimming in the toilet, after he pulled all of my books off the bookshelf. I have to wrap this up, obviously) but it will be harder to show him the wise and responsible choice which Miranda almost always makes after it is presented to her.

I am so thankful that God has given US His law to show us our need of him, and so thankful that he barred us from the door of Eden so we might not eat of the tree of the fruit of life - imagine, if we had no knowledge of death, if there was no death, what need would we know if our saviour? Leviticus is such a rich book showing us how God's standard covers every piece and every moment of our lives, and our fall from that standard is so complete.

And meanwhile I can only pray that GOD will teach my children's hearts and that I might not stand in the way too much of them growing in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ!

(and that I can stick to my guns and keep the duplo in time out).

Baking Bread

Last Friday I had a drive do to something with my hands... so I prepared the kids and the kitchen for a day of being productive. We made chicken noodle soup, from scratch, INCLUDING the noodles, and another giant batch of Mennonite Double-Buns (Zweiback). I can't tell you how much I *LOVE* to make bread. There is something entirely spiritual about it. Thinking on the warm brown earth that grew the wheat, the work of the farmer, the mill that crushed it into beautifully soft white flour, the alchemy that turns these simple ingredients into something that smells heavenly, only after being crushed, drowned, beaten and baked. As I was kneading, and shaping the small buns I couldn't help but think through how Christ called Himself the Bread of Life, and used bread as a symbol for his own body. (!) A body that was transformed into the beautiful and useful for salvation and the salvation of His people only after being scorned, beatened and dying. Christ became something new, as we will become something new when we are given a new body at the Resurrection. A lasting, more-real-than-reality body.
It's not a fairy tale. Think upon the transformation that bread undergoes!

Then I cleaned like a mad woman before Jason came home and whipped up an apple crisp so I could enjoy the evening with a relatively tidy kitchen (because at that point I was exahusted). It was such a satisfying thing to enjoy the fruit of physical labour by eating hot delicious soup with homemade noodles, and bread.
I have to remind myself that there is pleasure in work,and that this, after all, is what my body was made for. It felt good that night to lie down in my warm bed, feeling as though I really had accomplished something after all.

It was a little thing, but I really hope to do it more often.

The Passage of Time

As I am sitting at the computer today, I heard a flock of Canada Geese flying over my house. That was the last sign I was waiting for that fall was coming. I love how it smells outside in the morning, I love the much more comfortable cooler weather, I love sweaters. I love wearing socks. I had practically forgotten how much I LOVE this time of year. There is always something to look forward to, isn't there? Even when I had a useless-day like I did yesterday!

Last night I was only woken up twice by the kids. I heard Miranda get out of bed, and walk around a little in the hallway. "What do you need Miranda?" "I need to go potty!". Alright. Sufficent cause for me to leave my cosy warm bed. Then she told me what was really bothering her (as she had hardly anything to do on the potty) "Mommy, do you see my lip" "What's wrong with your lip" "Um. I think it's tired".

Yes. I have no DOUBT that my little chatterbox of a daughter has tired lips!

Simon woke up this morning at 6:00 saying " Mom! Muuuuuuuuuummumumumum" He is finally saying a few words. Dada. 'Anda. Mum. It's so much fun to hear him saying purposeful words...my little boy is getting BIG!

Boredom

I had a though through my head today, as I was lying on the couch, with both my children watching an old episode of "Blues Clues" (a current favourite, and one of a handful of preschool shows I can stomach for any length of time) when I looked up to the ceiling, around in my basement and though - this is not a life of war, this is not a life of focus, this is not a life of fullness and joy - it is a life of getting lazy on the couch. And I was struck with shame - that if God was with me He must be entirely bored by my life.
I remember times in my life when I felt I was doing something of worth and purpose. It's something that fills me with fire and passion. Doing ministry. Serving and loving People. Teaching God's Word. Learning. It's just so hard to see a life of purpose in the place I am now. It's next to impossible on a daily basis to see how any thing I am doing is adding to the beauty of God's Kingdom and bringing God glory.

Today Miranda and I made castles from blocks, put on a puppet show, made several pieces of mixed media 'art', practiced letters and numbers, played hide and seek, made lunch together, cleaned up together... Simon and I rolled a ball and climbed up the stairs a lot. These are such small pieces. And usually I am bored by them - not fired up by them. I know that creating a loving, secure place for my children to find out who they are, and who God is - to play, create, be silly and also learn is my job right now. It is just hard to see how it matters. And I know there are moms out there are who are disciplined, organized, have clean houses and whos children eat vegetables. It's just so very hard to see how to get there from here.

I guess it's good that God sees my life as a whole, and this is only a small chapter of it. I felt disappointing to God today.
Psalm 39:5
You have made my days a mere handbreadth; the span of my years is as nothing before you. Each man's life is but a breath.

I pray that when God sees my life as a whole he is not bored by it, but is proud. I pray that I keep in my mind that I get one shot at this life, and I better make it matter.