As I sit here and rack my brain to try to sum up the month of December amidst questions and requests while everyone is technically supposed to be in their rooms "resting", I keep coming back to the idea of suffering because this month I have prayed and wept for friends and acquaintances who are suffering in some way. A classmate of Brooke's who is spending the 2nd Christmas missing an otherwise healthy dad who dropped dead one day, broken marriages and families, people who are feeling lonely missing someone they care about, plans made and plans that have changed without our input. There is so much suffering if not in our own hearts and lives, in the immediate circle of people we know and love.
One of the gifts given to me as a result of a painful year parenting my Brooke is that I am so much more in tune with the suffering of others. Gut wrenching, nerve wracking emotional unrest in a family where day by day you live holding on by the white of your knuckles, uttering prayer after prayer for your child and for your sanity will do that to you. That's what it did for me anyway. Add in the fact that I spend half of the year without my husband which is lonely gives me a glimpse into the lives of those that suffer. I get the widow. Have a kid hanging on by a thread? I get that too. We all come in contact with real life "Lifetime" movie dramas played out right before our eyes except they are real. Real people with real wounds.
I can only speak for myself, but until I had suffered so intensely over my daughter, I went on about my day hearing of people suffering, but it didn't really affect me to the point of action. That's where love is, in the action. I feel like I live with a gaping wounded heart that is not sick, but vulnerable. When I hear of the difficulties of others I pray and I cry. My heart is broken today for a dear friend of mine and her family. They are suffering so greatly and I pray that God will have mercy on them in their time of need and comfort them with peace that surpassed all understanding.
How then is it that we can celebrate the birth of a Savior who came to us as a baby to save us from our sin when we are surrounded by misery? Did He not come to take away the misery? I'll tell you how, it's because the story isn't finished yet. The plans we make with out limited vision and knowledge of what we think will make us happy isn't necessarily what's good for us anyway. When confronted with difficult situations in life we can do two things: be angry over our "unjust" circumstances or to flex and bend to conform ourselves to the plans God has for us. God is good all.the.time. We can unite our suffering with the Cross and it becomes a gift to help us grow closer to God in this life. If he doesn't take care of the suffering now, He will do that in the after life.
Besides all the weepy tears I've shed this month there is so much to be thankful for. Snow comes to mind right away because from the beginning of the month we've had so much fun playing in the snow. Not one, but two snow days to enjoy! I took the kids to a local park with a mammoth hill. We have new neighbor kids so I took those three kids to the park in addition to our 4. When the neighbor kids were inquiring about the size of the hill, I admitted to them that I was worried that it was a little too big for my taste. Being boys, they got really excited because they knew it was going to be something special, and it was. The photos don't do it justice.
My little Nashy Boy is T.R.O.U.B.L.E. It seems like I'm living with Dennis the Menace. He wants to do everything by himself, he is a bully, he breaks things, he wakes up almost every day between 6 and 7 and yells through the crack of his locked door "I waked up!". He's also has been either pitching a fit because he's not getting his way or he's just crying because he's exhausted. I laid him down for his nap at 11 AM yesterday and he slept until 2:30!
Stella's hand me down Littlest Pet Shop collection turned hallway lamp decorations.
Luke turned 7! We had a small family dinner party on his actual birthday. My almond flour recipe even doubled doesn't make enough cupcakes to fill up the cupcake stand so I improvised with Weeble Wobbles. :)
Luke got a Rainbow Loom set and is now a crazy bracelet making machine.
Nash and The Potty Chapter 2....He is hot and he is cold. He'll go many, many days pooping and peeing in the potty without any accidents and then he'll pee himself twice in one day. I don't have time to follow him around and I do get distracted therefore forgetting to put him on the potty (while he shouts, "No, I good!!") only to find out 20 minutes later that his pants are wet. I think all toddlers should come as a two pack for double our parenting pleasure. :)
I'd like to introduce you to my nemesis this winter, The Sock Pile. Luke, Stella and Nash take off their socks in random places all over the house and leave them. I have waved the white flag and now throw them into this random corner where our foyer meets our school room, the hall bathroom, and the living room. It's a nice accessible place where I put all abandoned socks now. When we go to leave, I tell the kids to pick a pair of socks from the pile and when I do the laundry I tell Luke to go get the pile and put it in the laundry room. I thought about keeping them all until they run out of socks, but it is just not worth the battle.
My mother in law has very generously bought gingerbread houses for the kids to decorate for the last few years. The kids love them and look forward to them. I, on the other hand, am such a party pooper that I'd rather go to the dentist. It makes a mess and there are impatient kids who need my help immediately if not sooner and then there's me with no patience for the project to begin with. Mark, God bless him, took the bull by the horns and broke them out while I was getting ready on the eve of Christmas Eve. It really was the gift that keeps on giving.
Stella told me a joke last week that still has me laughing. It goes like this...
Stella: Mom, why did the chicken cross the road?
Me: I don't know, why?
Stella: So it could die and be roast beef!!
I started cracking up because that joke doesn't make sense what so ever and when I told the joke to Mark over the phone, it reinforced to Stella how funny it was. She thinks that joke is hilarious.
Ta-da! Check that off the list until next year. :)
We opened gifts on Christmas Eve morning because Mark had to leave for work on Christmas morning at 7:45 AM. After the gift opening madness of a few years ago where I was not so lovingly shouting at all the kids because they were tearing into their gifts faster than I could snap photos, I decided to abstain from photographing any opening of Christmas gifts. I realize I don't care if I capture their face as they are opening presents because the presents aren't what's important anyway. I am much calmer and so everyone is much happier too.
I bought Brooke a nightstand at a consignment shop for $25 and my dad painted it this beautiful raspberry color. I also bought a really cute drawer pull at Hobby Lobby to replace the plain one and I can't for the life of me find it!
Nash got a bed tent just like Luke's. He loves it, but it's too bad he won't lay in it in the morning after he wakes up.
He also got a recycling truck that has 20 small plastic "recyclables". Not good planning on my part.
I'd like you to meet "Our Lady of Weeds". Mark said no good Catholic family could be without a statue of Our Blessed Mother in their yard so he bought me one for Christmas. I jokingly told him a few weeks before Christmas if we ever had one in our landscaping, she'd be "Our Lady of Weeds" because to say we are a little lax on our weeding is pretty generous.
On Christmas Eve we went to Mass in the afternoon followed by dinner at our house with Mark's parents, my brother-in-law Steve and our friends Cathy and Anna.
Nash loved that I let him drink out of a fancy glass. I bought them at a thrift store for 25 cents a piece to put dessert in for Thanksgiving and so I broke them out for Christmas as well just for drinks. It's a good thing he stills wears a diaper at bedtime!
Brooke got a donut maker and she and Luke made gluten free donuts out of a gluten free cake mix on Christmas Day. Brooke told me, "Mom, I didn't know what oil to use so I prayed to Jesus and He told me this one (vegetable oil) would be fine." It was so hard to keep a straight face, but who can blame the poor girl when we have coconut oil, olive oil,and grape seed oil too!
My parents, my sister and two nieces and my nephew came over on Christmas for dinner. One of the other cousins gave one of our kids these glasses which I decided we would all take turns posing for pictures with them. It was a hoot!
Luke said that my dad actually looked good with them on which cracks me up because he was serious. But then again, Luke also said my sister was a "pretty fancy lady" because she liked to look at houses and magazines about houses.
We texted this picture to Mark who was diligently working to get people to and from their loved ones on Christmas and the days following. Starting from left...Stella, Brian (my niece's BF), Stephanie, Nash, Carly, Brooke, (nephew) Jamie, and Luke. Behind the couch, (my sister) Michelle, and my parents, Sandy and Bill.
Cousins!
This is the real present, God becoming man loving us and showing us how to love so much that we are moved to action. Speaking of love in action, I just finished a book called
Kisses from Katie, a memoir of a young lady who listened to God calling her to care for orphans in Uganda. She passed up the typical American life of attending college after high school to live on a different continent to care for and love hungry/sick/abandoned people that God has put in her life. It's an amazing love story, think modern day Mother Teresa, doing simple things for God. You should be warned that this book is not for everyone. If you like life to be comfortable, then you might want to pass on this one. However, if you are wanting more, then this book might just inspire you to act yourself.
I hope you all had a blessed Christmas and I pray that you will know the love of Christ this coming new year. Many blessings to you and yours!
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