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Bad hair day

cousins

Baby and Grandma and Focus on the Family

Garden of the gods.

Beautiful belly

Big Beautiful Belly

My dear, very pregnant friend, Dawn, came over today with her kids. My sis was here too with her fancy smanchy camera, and eye for photography. So we got a few shots of

a pregnant mama. These were not pictures of the delicate 2nd trimester belly, but of a full term, ripe and round belly, with a 8 pound little guy cuddled inside.

Dawn was feeling self concious, I'm sure, because, after the second trimester you enter the walrus phase of pregnancy. It's not cute any more; it's just big. But there is something outrageously beautiful about a pregnant woman. A woman with a full term belly is flagrantly, and obviously femenine. She is round and ripe. Her body unapologetically becries her God given destiny to nurture and mother.

Given the choice between the curves of pregant woman and the pre-pubecient twigginess of a runway model, I'd say that a pregant woman's body is more lovely every time.

It won't go away

This is the 3rd post today... I'm aware. But I haven't posted in awhile and some ideas have been knocking around in my brain. I could use the catharsis.

First, I took Baby to the Doc's today b/c her ear infection is not responding to the antibiotics she's been on. Now, she's on a hefty new one. It took 3 hours to see the doc, get the prescription and get it filled. Ever since her VCUG Baby has been traumatized by doctors. She was hysterical. M and Bub were just plain irritating, and naughty. It sucked.

Did I mention it sucked?

That serves as my preface for the following comments:

I thought that when Baby's adoption was finalized this orphan care/adoption business would go away for me. Annoyingly, it has not. I cannot get these little children out of my head and my heart. And since Baby has come into our home, and I have held her in my arms, I understand what precious treasures are wasting in orphanages, and hospitals, and street corners.

I keep telling Hubby, "I feel like we need to do something." To which he replies, "We are doing something." But Baby isn't an orphan anymore. She's my daughter. And there are so many kids out there languishing. A check just doesn't seem like enough. What can I do? What is God calling us to?

Remember me saying that I can't keep up with my laundry? Remember me saying that going to the doctor with 4 kids really sucked? Having 4 kids is hard. I cannot imagine being a good mom to 5 or 6 (though some people do it exceptionally well). We can't just keep adopting kids. There is a limit to what I can handle.

So what falls between the passivity of writing a check and the sacrifice of adoption a child. What can I do? Because I cannot not do anything -not after I know, not after I've had my eyes opened to the treasure that lays waiting in the fields of the fatherless.

Eating Cheap

So am I the only one who's noticed that grocery prices are skyrocketing? In an effort to compensate I Googled "inexpensive dinner ideas". Tons popped up. Most included refrigerator biscuits, tatter-tots, bologna, 80% lean ground beef and cream of mushroom soup. Apparently, hydrogenated oils, saturated fats and perservatives are cheap. That's not a problem if you enjoy clogged arteries, and can eat gluten. But ewww.... So I did another search "HEALTHY inexpensive dinner ideas". That was more helpful. Here are some ideas:

-Baked potato bar night.
-Soup and Salad (soup is cheap, usually helpful and always seems to have leftovers)
-Breakfast for dinner (we like to do fritta, or omlettes...eggs are cheap, a good source of protien and the lecithin compensates for some of the cholesterol - it's good brain food)
-Beans and rice (cajun, mexican, or curried lentils)
-veggie enchiladas
-burritos (sans cruddy fattening meat, and gooey sauce)
-pasta (unless, of course, you're GF, then it'll still cost you $3/bag)
-rice (w/ beans, or grilled chicken or whatever)
-polenta bake
-potato pancakes

short

This one may be short. Baby is playing in her crib, but she won't be destracted from breakfast for long.

-We had a annoying round of the stomach flu...no one escaped unscathed.

-I am, again, behind on laundry...oh when was I ever caught up...not since we've been a family of 6.

-We are officially on summer break, though I'm going to try to squeeze in some of our read-alouds, the kid's don't even notice that those are school.

-My vegetable garden has sprouted. Hubby has accused me of gardening addiction. I'm not there yet, but I can see how one could be afflicted. I'm already eyeballing areas of our yard that I want to dig up and create flower beds... just trying to figure out how irritated hubby would be if i ask him to re-work the irrigation system....I'm working up th courage...there could be grumbling and muttering under the breath.

-Pray for me today...I'm going to ask kids to do extra work, and pitch in with the chores...this tends to try my patience and theirs. But I am determined that I'm not the only one who should do the house tending around here. Little people can dust. An 8 year old can push a vacuum. I am not the one who left muddy fingerprints on the windows. My kids will grow up to be competent adults if its the last thing I do....

-E's downstairs making breakfast...I'm suspicious that I should be supervising...Baby thinks she need to eat too.

Hasta

A life well lived...

Paul Townsend died this morning, and I feel giddy, elated almost. This seems like a bizarrely inappropriate emotion but I can't shake it. There is an image that keeps replaying in my mind:

7:45 AM Paul lying in bed, face misshapen by a tumor, and body ravaged by disease.

Oh, but then 7:46 AM - Paul, body restored, and strong, standing before his Savior, and hearing these words, "Well done, my good and faithful servant." I know this is what he heard, and it gives me chills.

What a juxtaposition. One minute he is living with all that it is crummy and fallen in this world, and the next he is drowning in the pure, unspeakable joy of standing in the presence of God Almighty.

His life was well lived. He knew his purpose, and lived it. He loved his wife, and laid his life down for her. He has 2 grown children, who are a legacy to his fine parenting, and bring honor to the man he was. I am sure that his memorial service will be packed with an intricate web of people who's lives are woven together by the impact that Paul had on them.

He was that kind of man.

On his best day, Paul never looked like a football player. He didn't carry himself with the polish of news anchor. He wasn't even especially charismatic. But there was a strength about Paul that drew people to him. There was a quality about him that changed people who were with him. It must have been Jesus; it had to have been.

I know Paul's family will hear many stories of the impact their dad and husband had on others in the coming days. But I have one too. Paul, wouldn't remember it, I'm sure. But I do. It was important to me.

In the early days of Cornerstone Church we met in a school auditorium. I was a college student, and one Sunday this creepy guy started tagging after me. Cornering me. The next Sunday he brought me bizarre gifts, and again cornered me. No one noticed, and I was totally freaked out. There was something about this guy that made me feel very, very unsafe, but I couldn't name it. So I told Paul, because he was approachable, and I thought he'd take me seriously. He did. He came to my defense. Paul and Gene (our pastor) talked. The police were contacted, and this guy was asked, not to come back to the church. Ever. That day Paul was to me everything that a man should be. He was strong. He was my protector. He was so very, very safe.

I am sad for Martha, because she will have to learn how to be a widow. And she will not grow old with her love. I can't even begin to understand her loss. But in her life she has known the love of a good man, a godly man. How many women can say that?

I am sad for Natalie because her dad won't be there to walk her down the isle, and she will never get to see her dad play with her children. That is a huge loss. But Natalie has known what it is like to be "daddy's little girl". She got to be his princess. She gets to carry that in her heart.

I am sad for Bryan. He's not going to get to shoot hoops with his dad, or watch the Superbowl. But Bryan got to see real masculinity lived out in front of him.

But today I say, "Death, Oh where is your victory, where is your sting. " For in Christ, I know one who has been more than a conqueror.

Do you ever have the feeling that the thing you are about to write isn't gonna be very good, but you have to write it anyway?

Consider yourself warned....

Today was Baby's Formal Presentation. She had a piano recital. Okay, not really. Baby's worker presented all the medical and family history the county has access to. We had a chance to look over all the records. (It took 3 hours; there was a lot). Much of the information we already had access to, or had been told about. But this time we got the whole story, all in one sitting. It was a little overwhelming, really. I came away from the meeting with 2 thoughts. A) I have had such a sheltered, easy life. B) Baby would not have survived infancy if she had been left with her family of origin. And that one, point "B", is disturbing.

I really, really have no concept of how terrible life can get, how hopeless, and chaotic, and desperate a situation can become. But there are people who live it everyday.

Children.

Babies.

In our country.

In our state, only miles away.

And the cruddy thing is that there is a terrible cycle to it. Poverty. Addiction. Illness. Crappy Parenting. No education. REPEAT. And generations suffer.

I hear Baby's story, or Zeke's, or Micayla's, or Ryan's, or Elizabeth's, and I cannot help but wonder why we don't do more to rescue children from the fields of the fatherless. They are priceless treasures. They are worth our very lives, worth Jesus'. Can we not be like Him, and lay down our lives for the least of these.