right now the littles are...

Autumn showed up this month. Our neighborhood trees are colorful, and we crunch leaves underfoot when we walk around. We have coats, hats, gloves and the like unpacked and ready. We're doing fall things. Candles, soup, snuggling under the big yellow blanket, watching Harry Potter (that's mostly just Ricky and I), and plenty of walks to admire the beauty.

Nicolas has quite a bit of homework this year: spelling words, a math worksheet, and reading to do each evening, along with special projects. He was also selected to be part of the school spelling bee in December, so we're working through word lists for that. His reading is really improving. He finished Charlotte's Web, and we just started Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, which he's reading out loud to me after dinner. He's at the age where he realizes he has the ability to lie, so we've had some issues with honesty about how many pages he's read. Having him read out loud seems to be the solution, for now. He's learning some big lessons, transitioning into a different phase of childhood. It's painful to see sometimes. I have to remind myself that childhood is the perfect, safe time for learning. He needs to fall on soft ground.

He loves silly humor, anything related to martial arts, dancing and building Lego creations. He's occasionally excited to go work on riding his bike, but tends to need some encouragement for that. He's been going to a karate class every Monday night and will probably get to test for a belt soon. There are a lot of similarities to what he learned in Taekwondo. It's so cute--he's quite focused and serious about it. He's still working on piano, although we haven't been as consistent with lessons since moving here. Sometimes it's just too much. Still, he's making his way through his book and coming home from music class at school with quite a bit of new knowledge. I think I'm hearing a pretty nice singing voice these days too; he's learning to control his pitch a bit more.

Silas is, well, toddlery. He's sweet as can be when he's sweet, and will fight to the death when he doesn't like something. It's challenging, but we have our nice moments and I truly savor them. He takes to the role of big brother well, and seems to feel quite a bit of responsibility for Aimee (this morning he helped me dress her. It took forever, but it was pretty cute.) He's learning his letters and shapes, and how to say please and thank you. I find that if I can spend pockets of quality time with him, the day goes a bit more smoothly (because toddlers never say spend time with me, please. They simply empty out all of the construction paper and slide around on it.) 

He's inherited a nice stash of hand me downs this fall, from Nicky's garage box. It makes me happy to see them out again.

He wakes up early and heads downstairs to watch "shapes". This is how I find him, usually. Or I hear his raspy morning voice saying, "Come on, Nickboy. Let's go downstairs." He usually commands Penny to come wherever he's going, too. He consumes crazy amounts of apples (seriously, like 3 or 4 a day), insists that cheese is really pronounced chee, and wants me to kiss his ouchies. He likes to put on his backpack and boots and explore the backyard, and brings me any and every dandelion he can find, with great excitement. He's just the delicious epitome of toddler boyness.

Aimee took her first steps this month! Some days she's excited to give repeat performances, and some days she just doesn't want to. Her development has always been like that, so we take it slow. She's curious, and she pulls back. I think it's partly her personality and partly a fearfulness that comes with her history. I have to reserve a special kind of patience for her; one I'm still figuring out. She's repeated a handful of words back to us: ball, Pa, up, cat, Si (for Silas), neigh (for the sound a horse makes), duck, and goat. She says "hi! hi!" and "deh-deh" for thank you all on her own though. For a while, she's been answering questions with a quiet and serious "Yeah."She loves to play with her brothers. We've discovered that she loves to swing, too. She's been too small to put in the infant swing at the park for so long, but now she fits. She laughs hard when the swing starts; it's wonderful and sweet.

I think she's transitioning to one nap, which is actually nice because it lines up with Silas' after-lunch nap/rest time. She still just about falls over with excitement when her Papa comes home. She gives kisses and offers her cheek for them, saying "ooooohhhhh". She gives high fives.

She's learned the art of feeding her food to Penny when she doesn't want it, but she's by far the least picky of our three. She's cutting three teeth right now.

So, those are the littles right now. Growing and changing all the time. On to November!

Halloween 2013

Earlier this week, after I explained the concept of trick-or-treating to Silas and he shouted that's a GREAT idea!!! It really didn't take much explanation, come to think of it. Put on your costume, walk around, get candy. Got it.

We've never done trick or treating with the kids before, because our church always did a big, fun Harvest Party. That was fun, and I did miss it. But this was fun too, and simple. Simple can be really nice. What's more, we met some neighbors. Halloween is the perfect holiday for neighborhood newcomers.

My favorite stop was a house that boasted a carved watermelon and spaghetti squash, as well as a tray of grown up candy. Truffles for the win.

We carved pumpkins the night before. Aimee didn't participate because it was just too late for her. Sister was done.

Ricky cleaned and roasted the seeds. Yum.

The kids all went as ninjas.(Is the plural ninja? ninjas? I don't know.) Sometimes, when you're a ninja, you wear a sparkly tutu.  

Aimee discovered candy. The crinkly wrappers! The sugar! She was so happy and chocolate-y. Well, they all were.

I'm letting them enjoy their candy today, and tomorrow it will mysteriously disappear. That's the plan.

Happy Halloween!

What I'm Into- October 2013

This is the part of the month where I get to look back on what I ate, read, watched, listened to, loved, and whatever else, thanks to Leigh Kramer's link-up. It's fun; you should try it!

Happenings

• Ricky and I celebrated eight years of marriage. We found a great babysitter using Care.com (which I must say is a great option for people who just moved thousands of miles and gave up two amazing babysitters back home) and went to see Over the Rhine in Alexandria, Virginia. It was such a treat. I already professed my love for Over the Rhine in last month's post, but they are truly amazing to see live. Some people sound better on their album; not them. They absolutely fill up the space with the most gorgeous, full sound and it feels like an otherworldly experience. 
• I've been going to the gym twice a week. This is a big deal. There's a gym within walking distance of our house that offers two hours of childcare per day, so really it's a win-win for us. The kids get excited to go see "gym buddies" and I get to work out on a regular basis. I'm starting small as to not scare myself away (that's how these things work for me), but I'd like to move up to three days eventually. It feels good.
• I've been writing more. I have a new project in the works that I'm really excited to share.
• We're looking for a church community. It's been slow-going, but there are few more on my "list" that I'd like to try out. Honestly, the sheen of living in a new place is wearing off, and I'm feeling the loneliness more acutely these days. We have a little joke about our new town--when we can't find something, it's just "hidden in the trees" because, well, there are just so many trees here compared to the desert we came from. So, I hope that our place, whatever it may be, is simply hidden in the trees and we haven't found it yet.

Reading

• I so enjoyed the memoir When We Were on Fire by Addie Zierman. I laughed, cried, and nodded all the way through it. 
• I took my time with All is Grace by Brennan Manning with John Blase, processing the difficulty of his story . It's a sad book, in a way, but also one of the most encouraging things I've read in some time. Grace is a mystery we try too hard to explain, I think. I have some more thoughts on this book that I'm trying to form into a post.
• I'm in the middle of The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church by Greg Boyd. I've wanted to start reading some of his books, and this seemed a good place to start. I hope to have some thoughts to share on that too. He addresses things that have bothered me for some time, but also challenges some preconceived notions that I realize I still have. It's a stretching read.
• Sarah Bessey's Jesus Feminist, which comes out next week, is definitely on my list for November and I've also been wanting to read Carry on Warrior by Glennon Melton. 

Eating

I'm back in a good cooking routine, making dinner every weeknight and usually one big meal on the weekends. When I was working night shifts earlier this year, I pretty much lost the will to cook; there was just no enjoyment in spending the time, and cleaning the mess, unless maybe I had a long string of days off and a wee extra bit of energy. I needed things to be as simple as possible. So, it's been nice to rediscover the catharsis of stirring, tasting, seasoning, and smelling at the close of the day, as the sun sets, or the thrill of throwing something in the crockpot at ten in the morning and knowing dinner's done. My favorites this month:

• Butternut squash lasanga made using a sauce with pureed cooked squash and thickened milk, with lots of warm spices.
• Pasta with the same sauce from the lasagna, with Italian sausage and cooked spinach, sprinkled with parmesan. Better than mac & cheese, in my opinion.
• Sweet and Spicy Chicken Drumsticks and oven roasted broccoli--just cut up a head of broccoli, toss it in a bowl with olive oil, salt, pepper, and shredded parmesan, and roast on a cookie sheet at 425 degrees for 12 minutes or so. Even the kids devoured it, much to my happy surprise.

Listening

• Tiny Desk Concerts! Do you know about these? I recently discovered them and think they're so fun. My favorites so far are: Basia Bulat, Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, The Civil Wars, and The Lone Bellow.

Watching

• This time of year, I just want to watch the Harry Potter movies. Ricky and I did the closest thing we could to a marathon by watching all of them in about two weeks. We may have been a little giddy about it.
• We also discovered the show Scandal. It's a fun political drama that's pretty well-written, even if the central romantic relationship is kind of ridiculous. Anyway, it's a good watch-together show. 
• We've been having living room floor picnics and introducing the kids to "old" movies on Friday nights: E.T., Disney's Aladdin, Lady and the Tramp, Robin Hood, and Home Alone (which was pretty inappropriate for our kids. I did not remember some of that stuff. Oops.) I want to do The Sound of Music, but I don't know if they'll sit for it just yet. 

So that's my October. How was yours?

Shenandoah

Yesterday we took a day trip to Shenandoah National Park, to see the fall colors. It was one of those perfect Saturday mornings: coffee in hand, road ahead, babies in the backseat and a few hours to talk with Ricky about anything and everything. That's still my most favorite thing.

We took Skyline Drive, which of course just reopened. A long line of cars waited (in my mind, triumphantly) to enter National Park land. Ours again, these treasures.

We stopped off at Big Meadow Lodge for some lunch, playground time, and a very short hike that intersected with the Appalachian Trail and had some amazing views.

I think this may be my favorite picture of Silas ever. Taken by Ricky.

What an abundance of beauty.

on church vans and the places they took us

One of my favorite bloggers, Addie Zierman, has a new book coming out today! It's called When We Were on Fire, and I'm really looking forward to reading it this week. I've never met Addie in person, but I think we'd have quite a bit to talk about over coffee. We church kids tend to have our stories about our years of certainty, our years of questions, our searching out of peace. There's no formula to it (many church kids are highly suspicious of formulas and for good reason) but a lot of us have experienced a similar trajectory with different details, and I find that fascinating and also comforting. This post is part of a synchroblog happening over at Addie's blog today, and my attempt to examine some of the areas surrounding my own on fire time.

I grew up in a small church with plenty of Pentecostal spice: no holds barred preaching, church twice on Sunday with a potluck often in between, women with big hair and heels and also women who didn't own a dress, testimony time, Campmeeting in the summer, songs about God on the mountain still being God in the valley. It wasn't an easy group to define by any means. I knew about community, and I knew about having a fire in my bones, how it felt to want to matter and make a difference in the world.

Many things have become harder for me to define now; I look back and see a mix of truly beautiful and special experiences, as well as ones that had unfortunate consequences.

Something I realize, looking back on my stories, is that many of them involve a church van. I'm thinking, too, that if you were a church kid in some variation, you may have a few church van stories of your own. Here are a few of mine.

Sunday School

My earliest memory of a church van (well to be specific, this particular one was a full-sized white school bus) was driving around with my parents, picking up kids for Sunday school. That my parents spent their Sunday mornings not sleeping in or even just making it in time for a service, but rather rising early to get the whole family ready for our bus route, is telling of their commitment level. It was to me at that young age (five? six?) and especially now as a parent of small children who sometimes finds it difficult to get everyone to church wearing shoes on both feet, or if I'm being honest, sometimes finds it difficult to get myself to church at all.

Surrounded

One of my favorite things about summer was our day at the river. We would load up early in the morning, in our Christian t-shirts and cut-off jean shorts, picnic lunches and coolers, towels and flip flops, drive off to a spot along the Gila River and swim the day away. When I was twelve, I decided I wanted to be baptized a second time in the river, because I felt I understood it all a bit better than I had at age seven. Several of us had made the decision to be baptized or re-baptized, and we all stood waist deep in a big circle as each of us took our turn.

I remember so well what it felt like to be surrounded by all that water, all those people, the tall canyon walls, to make a statement of faith and mean every word. Believe every word.

On the way home, a summer monsoon pounded down on the roof of the old van we affectionately called Rusty, and the inside part of the ceiling began to collapse down on us. We pushed our feet up against it, water dripping down onto our faces, laughing uncontrollably. To this day, when I think of summer, I think of that moment.

Safe

My youth group was returning home from a short mission trip. Our shiny new 18 passenger van had not only carried us to Mexico and back home, it also served as a place to sleep for all the girls on the trip (the boys made camp inside the cinder block church, their sleeping bags rolled out on the sanctuary floor.) We had painted faces, handed out food, shared our testimonies, worshiped with local believers, and of course the whole experience was peppered with teenage silliness and a bit of youth group drama. Tired, happy, and ready for our own beds and showers, we drove in the direction of home. In the last leg of our trip, those of us who were awake were deep into a theological discussion. There was a newcomer to our group, a tall lanky guy who had a lot of problems at home and sometimes got into trouble at school for things like flipping off the camera during the senior group picture and setting off smoke bombs in the hallway.  He seemed really smart, and also sad. I liked him. As the conversation went on, he shared some of his questions about God and pain with the group; the sorts of questions we must all face if we're honest with ourselves. As we pulled into a gas station, one of the adult chaperons scolded him for his questions that she felt were disrespectful to God. He mumbled a quiet response and most of the group climbed out of the van to stock up on snacks and hit the bathroom. 

He leaned forward, resting his crossed arms on the back of the seat in front of him, lay his head down, and sobbed quietly.  My friend and I sat there in the dark, watching his shoulders shake. I knew in that moment that bullies can have the best of intentions, that showing up for church is incredibly brave for some people.

I managed to say something that I hoped was comforting. I still hope it was.

Whether its struggling with another day at school or handing out bags of candy to kids in Mexico, we bump up against ourselves. Wherever you go, there you are. I suppose I was learning that too; I just didn't have his kind of pain in my life. I didn't know yet what it meant to not feel safe at church.

Sold Out

Every summer, we loaded into a church van and went to camp. Camp was another of my favorite things, and I looked forward to it all year. We spent the days playing sports and silly games, and the nights in lively church services. Animated speakers would encourage and challenge us to be radical in our faith, sold out, to do BIG things for God. We would linger around the altar, soaking up that feeling and praying for each other. It was incredibly intimate, I realize now. We weren't only praying for each other to have more faith or be more bold. We were praying over our deepest wounds and fears, too.

I remember feeling like there was something different in the air at camp. I would leave feeling excited to share my faith, connected to the people in my youth group as well as new kids we met, and just happy in general. A few weeks after returning home, though, I would feel the energy start to fade. It was hard to reconcile the intensity and energy of camp with the routines of high school life, but we weren't really supposed to compartmentalize these things. If you didn't bring Jesus into everything, you might be ashamed of him, and that seemed like pretty much the worst thing someone could be. 

Sting

Once, one of those church vans drove us all out to a country graveyard. On the first day of high school, full of the hopes and schemes of a fourteen year old, a much-loved girl in our youth group had died in a head on collision, and we'd all been processing her death together, as best we could. We formed a circle around her grave and read from Paul's letter to the Corinthian church: oh death, where is your sting? oh grave, where is your victory? The plot was decorated with silk flowers and teddy bears, photos and crosses, and a light that her parents had installed. A soft row of trees stood in the distance, lining the same river we had been baptized in.

The van carried us back home, where life went on. We learned about grief: what it meant to smile at school and come home to a bedroom for a good cry, about praying through pain and dancing when the pain lifted, about honoring the dead by carrying on. That's the only time in my life I've walked through a season of grief with a group of people like that. I think about all that raw, consuming sadness coupled with just being a teenager, and maybe the reason we didn't all go under is because we had each other.

Sky

There was a ladder on the side of one of the vans, and sometimes we would climb up there and talk, watching the sun sink lower into the horizon of the vast New Mexico sky. I didn't know at the time, sitting cross-legged on top of that tan rusty van, pinks and oranges swirling all around us, that I was in soul-therapy. That vulnerability wouldn't come so easy as an adult. That I would wish for something, anything, like that one day.

Spirit

I look back now, and what stands out to me as real and timeless aren't the catchy slogans or the challenges to be bold or the attempts to be relevant to youth culture. What's precious to me now are the relationships: the girls who cried with me at the altar, the boys who chased us around the parking lot and took us mud-bogging and four-wheeling, the kind ladies who faithfully took out the felt boards every Sunday and told us about Noah, Moses, Deborah and so many other complicated biblical figures, the children's church leader who captivated us with her stories and taught us how to sing in the Christmas pageant, the people who made themselves available to drive a bunch of teenagers around in church vans. The potlucks and Sunday night singing, my parents in that big white school bus. The Spirit, the sense of wonder. That's the church experience I would love to pass on to my children, although I might save some of those Bible stories for when they're older. 

I hope they have a youth group to be silly and sad and real with. I hope their questions are welcomed. I hope they get excited about their faith, and I hope they know it's okay to not be excited for a season, too, and that the small things are actually the big things. That what their friends who believe differently need most from them is a just a genuine friendship. That things like being radical and bold and on fire for God are temporary, and to place their faith in those things (like their mother did, for a while there) will end in disappointment, but that placing their faith in the God of all seasons will bring peace in surprising places. 

bend

When my weakness surfaces
it's a Monday morning with opaque sky, early blur,
and I don't summon any gladness to
help us see better,
and I don't find it in myself to bend today
into what it should be.

And we all need me to; it's in the job description.

Parents create, it's what we do,
but today I tore down
yesterday's masterpiece; the last
thing in the world I wanted.

It's wonderful and also a problem
that children are new and fresh
and attended by often-tired people
who, unfortunately, grew up.

You pull me young, and I pull you older, but slowly I hope.

Forgive me, my so-little ones,
my cares are far too many
and I pull too hard.

When my strength at last comes forth
the leaves are falling
steady down with rain,
making piles
of delight and mess,
and I've had some quiet and
some help-prayer,
and I can bend low to
find what is true again.

Parents mend,
it's what we do--

but only the mended can.

What I'm Into-September 2013

Here's a fun thing. A new-to-me blogger, Leigh Kramer, hosts this link-up for people to share what they read, listened to, ate, and otherwise engaged in for the previous month. So if you're at all interested in what I did in September, stick around! Otherwise, you know, um, don't. Or something.

Happenings

• September was full of happy events. As I posted here, we finalized our daughter's adoption on September 3rd, a mere two weeks after moving across the country. 

• Ricky turned the big 3-0 and we celebrated with dinner, presents, and a salted caramel cheesecake. In the spirit of youth, I surprised him with tickets to go see Macklemore in November. Maybe we'll feel silly, but it should be fun. I'm on the lookout for a babysitter starting now. 

• Nicolas turned seven. It was a little sad to not have the usual friends and family around to celebrate with a big party like usual, but he took it in stride. We made the day special with lots of balloons, a special breakfast, funfetti cake (hurts my teeth to just think about it), a new bike with NO training wheels, opening packages he'd received in the mail from family, and a fun night at his school carnival (it also happened to be his school's 40th anniversary that day.) The next day was Saturday so we took a trip to the Lego store. It was actually not huge like we thought it would be, and therefore a bit anticlimactic for the adults, but he loved it.

• We joined a gym that offers two hours of childcare daily. We're mostly alternating days, but we did have a "work-out date" on Saturday. I was so beat afterward that I had to take a nap. Aaaand that's what I get for working out with Ricky. It was fun though.
• Silas, Aimee and I are staying home quite a bit. I'm not planning on looking for a nursing job until January, so this is a nice break. I'm still spending a lot of time unpacking and "cozifying" the house, and we frequent the neighborhood parks and head out to the gym a few mornings a week. Our schedules revolve around naps. It's simple and sweet, and I can actually appreciate it because it's temporary (funny how that works.)

• We've been to three churches here, two of which are promising. I'll share more about that in the coming days, as we figure things out. 

Reading

• I read Nadia Bolz-Weber's new book Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner and Saint. It was refreshing to read something both gritty and vulnerable, and I came away from it encouraged in my faith. As Nadia writes, Christianity is really just a continuous process of death and resurrection, rather than a ladder we climb. It's freeing to think in those terms. I also really enjoyed listening to her interview with Krista Tippett, particularly the part where she discusses her tattoos and their meanings, and notes that tattoos often carry with them a profound story or hard-won truth. My one tattoo (the second one is brewing, I think) came from my years of grief following my father's passing and the desire to hold onto God's goodness. It's a hope really, more than an assurance. It sure is difficult to explain to curious passers-by in one or two lines! Anyway, I suppose I'm deeply curious about why people get the tattoos that they do, so this was fascinating to listen to.

• I'm still plugging away at America's Women: Four Hundred Years of Dolls, Drudges, Helpmates, and Heroines by Gail Collins. It's truly interesting material, but I suppose my brain is easily pulled away by social media and such after a bit of reading in this book. It's a good one for my nightstand.

• I just started All is Grace: A Ragamuffin Memoir by Brennan Manning with John Blase (whose poetry I've really come to look forward to.) This one's been on the list for a while. 

Listening

• I've mostly been listening to Over the Rhine's new album Meet Me at the Edge of the World. It's my favorite work of theirs so far. Their music is gorgeous as usual, but there's a sense of peace and groundedness to this album that's really special, in contrast to the tensions they expressed in previous albums. We saw them in Albuquerque in 2010, and I remember they talked about how so many are interested in the stories of how people meet and fall in love, but they were more interested in the stories of what happens after people are married. It's infinitely more meaningful to hear happy stories when people have shared their sad and confusing times as well. All that to say, I sure like them.

• I'm a big fan of Jonathan Martin's sermon podcasts, and often listen to them while getting stuff done around the house. Thank God for my internet pastors :)

Eating

• I was curious about the cauliflower pizza crust I see everywhere, so we tried it out last Friday night. It's so, so good! I used this recipe.

• I'm enjoying fall-ish recipes. Chili in the crockpot, roasted acorn squash with taco meat and melted cheese, butternut squash lasagna....you get the idea. 

• Yesterday I discovered this little gem. It's every bit as good as it looks.

Watching

• Breaking Bad, along with most everyone else. A few years back I watched an episode and a half with Ricky and decided it wasn't for me because of the violence. At some point though, the story drew me in and I've been watching it religiously since. I did see the final season including the series finale before I finished all the in between episodes, so it's all a bit of a mishmash in my head. I think I like it as much as I do, despite the violence and difficult subject matter, because the characters are so layered and remind me of people I know in real life. To me, that's one of the marks of a well-written show.

• I also have big plans to start season 4 of Downton Abbey now that Walter White and I are parting ways. Ricky and I like to keep up with The Voice on Hulu and I'll be checking in with Parenthood at some point. Yay for new fall shows to watch.

So that's September in a nutshell. What did you enjoy (or not enjoy)? Linking up with Leigh here.

Happy October!