Friday, February 20, 2015

Mothering with Colossians


 “Since God chose you, a mother, to be one of His holy people,
you must clothe yourself with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and tireless, long-suffering patience when dealing with your children.  
(The Amplified says patience has the power to endure 
whatever comes with good temper.)
Bear with them and their faults.  
Forgive them as freely and completely as the Lord has forgiven you. 
   Most importantly of all, 
be clothed with love which is what will bind your family together in perfect harmony. 
     Let the peace which comes from Christ rule in your heart and pervade your home.  
("Blessed are the peacemakers" happens to be one of a mom's job descriptions.)
As a family, you are called to live in peace. 
     Always be a thankful mother.
    Let the words of Christ, in all their richness, 
live in your heart and make you a wise mother, and helping you to  
teach and admonish your children with all wisdom.  
Sing songs and hymns and spiritual songs with your children 
and always with thankful hearts.
     And whatever you do for your children, whether in word or in deed, 
(Correction or praise; food or stories; peacemaking or singing)
do it all in the Name of the Lord, 
as unto the Lord, 
(How gentle and loving we would be if we did it for Christ!)
and dependent upon the Lord, 
giving thanks to God while you do it.”
Colossians 3:12-17

 Paraphrased for mothers after a rotten day in which I felt like I failed as a mom and asked God to show me where I messed up and what I should have done with my day.  Early the next morning, when I opened my Bible, it fell open to a page where a marker held the spot in Colossians.  I started reading in a random column, mid-chapter, not particularly looking for answers to my mothering problem because I had read this many times before and never saw it as a manual for moms.  But this time?  
I found this beautiful manual for mothers. 

Saturday, February 14, 2015

It's a You are Special Meal

Now that our children have reached the ripe old ages of 2 and (almost) 5, I thought they'd be into the idea of a meal that celebrates how special they are to us.  And like all good children, they were.

We had pizza...



with heart-shaped pepperonis which would have been decidedly faster to come by if I had a heart shaped cookie cutter.  As it was, I free-handed them all, which did have some advantages in that each heart had its own character and sizes varied.



I had made a little extra pizza dough to turn into heart-shaped bread sticks.

We also had heart-shaped dip dollops 
(for veggies or, and in this case, pizza sauce for bread sticks).
Make 2 circles of dip side-by-side
Use a toothpick to pull the point into a heart.


At each of the children's plates, I had an inexpensive gifts.
   


The little picks in the mini-cupcakes are simply hearts glued onto toothpicks.  


The meal was such fun that I got a round of applause from my family of cheerleaders in the end.  I smiled and thanked them, meanwhile being unsure how to properly pass the applause along to my sister Laura for the original idea of doing a meal for your children and to www.cutefoodforkids.com for the heart shaped dip and pepperoni ideas.

Thursday, February 12, 2015

The Best Kind of Love


I know I'm spoiled and probably prejudiced to boot, but I am married to one amazing guy.  Valentine's Day is coming up and stores have been full of all those hearts and flowers and things which remind me of John and love. And I love being in love.

But there is so much more to love than the romantic dates.  There are things like
1 Corinthians 13:7 which says in the Amplified:  "[Love] is ever ready to believe the best."

Skip the chocolates. That would have been a marvelous gift to give my Sweetheart this past Thursday.  After a full day at the office, he had zipped in and out of the house in ten minutes so he could get to the airport in good time.  "Those guys," he said, shaking his head as he grabbed a few things for the class, "make me feel like I'm late.  I get there ten minutes before classes are scheduled to begin and they are already sitting there."

Then he kissed us goodbye and headed to the door, stopping only long enough to say, "By the way, this should be a shorter lesson tonight.  I'm just filling in for another instructor who can't make it, so I'm just going to have a time of question and answer and look over some maps. I should be home early."

Early?  Yay!  Usually these evening of flight instructing mean that he doesn't get home until 9:00.  It isn't terribly late, I know, but the quiet evening together after the children are in bed is largely eaten up. I wouldn't mind not spending most of my evening alone.

Maybe we should have defined "early."  I was thinking 8:00 or 8:30.  So by 8:20, I was halfway pacing the floor and wondering if I should jump on the treadmill for a spin, or if I shouldn't bother if he was nearly home.  I didn't like to bug him with a call or text if he was instructing.  And then I remembered my new-to-me phone has a cute little app on it called "Find Friends."

I tapped it.  And he was still at the airport.  He has a twenty minute drive which now changed the "early" to no sooner than 8:40.   So I chose the treadmill, boring ol' thing, and ticked off some lonely minutes that way.

At 8:40, the app still showed him at the airport.  And so it did at 9:00.  That was when I was just settling myself down for a pity party.  I mean, poor me anyway.  I was the one sitting at home alone for an extra-long evening instead of a short one; John was the guy getting to do what he loves and was having a full evening of it after all.

But then I got his text.  It said, "Sorry I'm late.  The guys were having a discussion on religion that I wanted to be in on."

I felt chastened. Instead of assuming John was taking his good ol' time in getting home (which would be out of character anyway), I should have known my noble husband was making himself available to speak a positive word for God.  I wanted John in on that conversation, too.  Maybe his influence on a few guys he otherwise would have zero contact with would be a long-lasting one.

I wish I would have remembered that love always believes the best.  It gives the benefit of the doubt.  No pity parties allowed for the person who loves like that.  Not even when circumstances chew the flowers off their stems.  When the romantic fuzzy feelings are missing, true love holds out strong.

That's the kind of love I want most of all.

Monday, February 2, 2015

Hospital gowns, Stitches, and the Wimp

"Yes, you are right," she said.  "This one needs to come off."

I wasn't completely surprised.  After my brother's brush with a cancerous lesion in December (you can read more of his story here), I made an appointment with the doctor to have questionable spot of my own looked at.

"It is probably an over-reaction because of my brother's diagnosis," I told the nurse when waiting on the doctor, "but I'd feel better having it looked at."

Turns out the doctor agreed that it shouldn't stay there. It had potential to become something unwanted  in the future, though it wasn't serious now.  The doctor described mine with a Latin-sounding term impregnated with too many syllables to remember or type into Google translate later.  But whatever the thing was, its name definitely sounded much more musical than "melanoma."  All I would need was a half hour visit to have it removed.

"And this one is going to need a few stitches," she said.

I wilted.  Up to this point, I considered myself a fairly tough cookie when it came to personal medical situations.  But stitch work, in my opinion, is best when done on cloth.

There was one more thing I dreaded.  The hospital gown.  I don't do hospital gowns.  I have never worn one, not even on the day my brother was born in a hospital 'way back in the era when visitors robed up before holding babies.  On that day, I had simply rejected the gown and opted to hold my baby brother for the first time when he was in the safety of our living room.

I didn't care to break that long-standing record now.

See, I knew too much about hospital gowns.  A family friend described them this way:
     "You expect ME to wear this THING?"
     You can't actually wear it.  You only approach it and they make it hang on you. Then the poor soul...now feels cool breezes in his or her back forty and the front makes you look neither like a boy or a girl but something not yet truly identified.  There are 50 or so snaps here and there, and then strings in the back.  It kinda reminds you of a moving van going down the road and the back doors are missing, or just swinging in the wind.
     Why is it so important to have the back forty accessible?  Is that where most people have their heart or lungs and other valuable equipment not mentioned?  Why not some pink pajamas?  Just simple loose fitting pajamas?  A top and some pants.  Maybe a row of snaps in the back and a row in the front."

With that kind of information, do you blame me for not wanting the gown?

Turns out I wouldn't have needed to worry about one.  The nurse who led me into the Procedures Room offered me a drape to protect my clothing and that was that.  I was grinning, grateful that I skipped out yet again on the gown even after all three of my sisters had separately told me, "I'm actually hoping you have to wear one." (I think they spoke out of sisterly camaraderie; they had all paid their dues to the gowns and wanted me to join their club.)  

The doctor and a medical student entered.  The drape was arranged.

And then things headed south.  In the silence of the room, the nurse turned to the cupboard and asked the doctor, "What size of punch do you want?"

Punch?  This is my flesh we are speaking about. My very own tender flesh.  I began to feel odd.

The needle slid in; the area burned as the numbing took place.  I didn't wince or blink.  I didn't mind this part.

"Wow. You are really tough," the student said.

"There. The worst of it is over," the doctor said.

Wrong. Very wrong, all of you.

The worst was not over.  The worst was the tension and release of pressure and the painless sensations associated with the punch.  The worst was the doctor and medical student holding a conversation about medical school and medical related stuff--a conversation I would have thoroughly enjoyed under other circumstances. The worst was that I was not tough.

I might have been fine if I hadn't seen the suture material lengthening and shortening.  The idea of intricate embroidery happening on my own skin made the ceiling tiles fuzz together. I have never even come close to fainting in my life, but I knew that this time I was in a war for my consciousness.  I deliberately drew my eyes to posters on the wall.

"Spell something," I told myself.  I concentrated on the letters. None of the words took enough brain power to distract my brain from the string sliding through my flesh.  I tried spelling them backwards.

It was when the letters and words multiplied on the poster that I diverted my eyes upwards again to find that the curtain and the ceiling tiles had become one blurry line.

The medical student noticed.  "Are you feeling okay?"

"Actually, I'm not feeling so great," I answered, feeling bad enough to be unashamed of nearly fainting out cold over three measly stitches.

The nurse brought a wet paper towel for my forehead and handed another one to me.  I held it stupidly and tried to concentrate on what she was saying.  Was I supposed to switch them out?  Wash the iodine from the sutured area?

"Your face is sweating," she said. "You can use it to wipe your face."

Oh yes. Of course. I hadn't known I was sweating.

The doctor very wisely changed the subject and included me in the conversation.  "So," she said easily and cheerily, "who has your children while you are here today?"

The fuzzy world spun back into focus and I knew I'd be okay.  The color came back into my face in full force, for I was now cognizant enough to recognize the humiliation associated with being a wimp.

How do people survive true medical crises?  Guess I'll never know firsthand even if I have the misfortune of a needing an invasive procedure.  I'll definitely be passed out cold. That might be a blessing, actually.  Not only would I not have to know what is happening, I probably wouldn't even mind the hospital gown.