A Walk in the Park

We live in an adorable little town smack dab in the center of Pennsylvania's Amish country. It's quite picturesque, really: lots of farms and horses and buggies. And whoopie pies in every flavor imaginable. Heck to the yes.

For several years now, we have been going to our town's Christmas tree lighting, and, the following day, the "Christmas Day in the Park", a fun craft/treat/Santa Claus outing. Can I just say that the Christmas tree lighting is always super lame-o? Like, Christmas carols two octaves too high and a piddly 6' Douglas Fir... Really, people? I could do better than that in my front yard. Next year, we're doing it at my place.

(Yes, I went out in public without makeup. So shoot me.)

(I told the girls to give each other a hug. They started hugging the tree instead. Dirty little hippies.)

But the next day is usually pretty fun for the kiddies. We started at the Visitor Center, where each kid was given a bag with a colored balloon on it. We visited each vendor downtown that had a corresponding color balloon; inside there were crafts for the kids, stories being read, or a small gift or treat.

(Our awesome friends Michelle and the Lovable Levi joined us.)

They also opened the Elementary school, where they had more crafts and games and live music and a zumba class for the kids to work off their candy canes.

Outside, they had fire pits and free marshmallows, funnel cakes and horse-drawn carriage rides, while Santa rode around and waved at the littles (on a crazy loud fire truck, waking up my baby who was so peacefully slumbering in the carrier). But I can't really complain because everything was F-R-E-E, which was definitely in the budget this month!

Then, should you want to stand outside in the arctic line, you can wait for an hour and a half (yes, we did) to sit on Santa's lap.

Or, if you're Cana, lurk in the background and give him the stink-eye.

Some of these activities fall into that "more fun in my imagination" category. It's cold, and the baby is cranky, and the girls have melted marshmallow and candy cane glop congealed to their jackets and their noses and their mittens. (Wait. They weren't wearing mittens. BAD MAMA!)

(wiped out!)

But one thing that I really admire about my parents is how purposeful they were about creating traditions for us. (For years, we went Christmas caroling [with a group] at 4 am on Christmas morning. No lie.) I have such wonderful Christmas memories from when I was a child, and I want to do that for my girls. Even if it means falsetto Christmas carols and congealed marshmallow glop.

What about you? Do you have any special traditions from when you were a child? Do you still practice them with your children/family? Have you created new traditions? I'd love to hear and get some ideas from you!

Makeover Monday-- Chevron Buffet Table

I love doing crafts and fun home projects. I don't do them super well, so it seems a little narcissistic to document them on my blog ('cause who really cares if I spray painted my candlesticks? Yeah, didn't think so.) But, two things: 1) I really want to become more purposeful about blogging. Not necessarily because I am wanting people to read it, but because I think it's a really easy way to chronicle the life and times of our little family. And 2) I actually love when my bloggy friends post pictures of their homes, or a craft they completed, or a Christmas gift they are creating. Because even if I don't share their style sense, it almost always motivates me to want to create something personal for my own home, most of the time using something we already have. So, in that spirit-- I am going to try and regularly post some of my projects (remember-- we gutted a garage/warehouse and turned it into a home, so there are lots!) on Mondays. Hence "Makeover Monday." Lame, huh? "Magnificent Makeover Monday"? "Moderately Magnificent but Mostly Marginal Makeover Monday"? It needs work.

Speaking of makeovers, I need one. For reals. Clinton Kelly can hit me up any.day.of.the.week.

I saw this buffet months ago in a junk/antique shop downtown. It wasn't so much that I *loved* it-- but I had been wanting some kind of buffet/server in our dining room. I did love that it was only $20. So I called Chris and asked if I could buy it. He said no. :) But he went back a few months later and picked it up for my birthday. Awwwww....

Not surprising that it was still there, cause it was in rough shape. Here it is before (I had already removed the door):

(It's ok. I know it's ugly.)

Here it is after a coat or two (or four) of paint:




Kinda fun? Kinda lame? I (personally) love how it turned out, and it's great for storing bibs and tablecloths and our huge stash of mismatched cloth napkins. It's definitely not perfect, but nothing in my house is. It makes me feel more comfortable with my lack of personal perfection. :) Are you working on any makeovers? Do you know Clinton Kelly? Can you put in a good word for me?

Occupy Lititz

The riffraff finally found their way into our part of the country last week. *Sigh.*

(I have a feeling this could change everything.)

"Ruby does the Frog"

Alternate title: "Me Babbling on like a Momma-Moron for 30 Seconds and my Baby being Cute for Approximately 1/10 of a Nanosecond." Nana, this one's for you.

with a mother's kiss

Can I just be completely candid and say that sometimes, I despise being a stay-at-home mother? Really. I don't mean, "eh, sometimes it's a little difficult..." I mean, sometimes I hate it. I know, I know. There are millions of women who would do anything to be able to stay home with their babies all day, everyday. I know that I am lucky blessed to be able to do it. But sometimes, it just blows.

I am under no illusion about the demands of a working mother; I know it is exponentially harder to care for your home and your family and make dinner and shop for groceries and give baths when you're working outside your home. But sometimes I sit and fantasize about what it would be like to have adult conversations every morning. To not have someone (or two or three someones) sitting on your lap while you're trying to answer an email. To not take your lunch out of the fridge and have little baby birds surround you, open-mouthed and waiting for you to share. I know it's not easier. But sometimes I like to fantasize.

I don't want to give the impression that, given the choice, I would prefer to have a "real" job. 'Cause I wouldn't. I don't want to give the impression that I don't enjoy my children. Oh, I do! So very, very much! It's just that... well... honestly? Sometimes parenting can feel more like a chore than a joy. I read all the mommy blogs and we save our toilet paper rolls to make crafts and go on nature walks and have dance parties and make playdoh pizza. And that's so idyllic, right? Except that most times? Most times, I have to stop Cana from eating paste when we are making toilet paper roll crafts, someone's melting down on our nature walk because she's hungry, someone bumps into the dresser during our dance party and gets a goose-egg, and playdoh ends up in hair and smashed into the carpet. I am trying to learn to "roll with the punches" and chill out and not let smooshed-up-playdoh bother me. But sometimes, it's just more fun in theory.

We broke out the Christmas music a few weeks ago. We were listening to James Taylor, a cd I stole permanently borrowed from my mother. We were singing along to "In the Bleak Mid-winter". Remember it? "If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb..."? But I was particularly struck by a verse that I had never noticed before:

Angels and archangels may have gathered there
cherubim and seraphim thronged the air
but only Mary, in her maiden bliss
worshipped the Beloved with a mother's kiss


Mary was advancing the Kingdom of Heaven... with a kiss. Later, she would worship differently; maybe feeding the poor or visiting the shut-ins... but for now, she worshipped by kissing her baby, changing his diaper, nursing Him when His belly was hungry, quieting His cries when He scraped His knee.

I'm no Virgin Mary and my kids are faaaaar from the Holy Child. :) But I want to remember this. When Cana is eating paste, or when the girls are bickeringbickeringbickering. When Ruby just won't go to sleep. When I've tripped on a toy again. When my first impulse would be to scold or nag or even yell at my children, I want to worship instead. Worship by responding kindly, by speaking gently. Worship by dying to myself (and my carpet) and allowing them to enjoy being children. Worship by getting off of Facebook and playing with them. Because, at least in this stage of my life, my job--above groceries and scrubbing the toilet and giving baths-- is loving my family.

And I long to do it well.

God is an Attachment Parent

OK, so let me say off the bat: this is not a post about judging parents who choose to formula-feed their babies, who work outside the home, or who love Gary Ezzo. (Although, as an aside, I could write a 5000 word essay about how much I hate Gary Ezzo.) It's (shockingly!) not meant to be snarky; it's just some thoughts I have had recently on my parenting journey.

Last week, my sweet sister-in-law invited me to go along with her to New York City next month. I have not been to NYC since I was a little girl, and I have been longing to get away to check it out as an adult. I thought about it for a while before I decided that it would be wiser to sit it out this year. You see, Ruby won't take a bottle of breastmilk, and NYC in mid-December would likely be cold and no fun for an itty-bitty. And even if Ruby would take a bottle of breastmilk, 12+ hours away from my baby would be excruciating painful, unless I wanted to carry my Pump-in-Style over my shoulder and pump on the steps of Madison Square Garden every 3 hours. So, yeah... disappointingly, a no-go.

But this week offered me a fun surprise! Chris was touring for a few days with Jake Shimabukuro, and would be in NYC all day Monday and Tuesday-- but he didn't have a show on Monday, so he'd be free to hang out and play. I lined up someone to watch the big girls, bought a train ticket (pathetically, my first time ever on a train!), popped Ruby in the sling and headed out to the big city. Ruby was a doll; she alternately checked out the Wall Street Occupiers and dozed against my chest through FAO Schwartz and Central Park.

But I am not going to lie. There were a few times where I thought, "Man, this would be way easier without an infant." Any parent out there would attest to the fact that infants require a lot of face time. For the first several months, a breastfed baby cannot be away from their mama for more than two or three hours. I began to think, "Wow... that doesn't always make it easy for the mama." In fact, I was kind of starting to feel like "poor-me-I'm-a-martyr-to-my-children-who-are-sucking-the-very-lifeblood-out-of-me-every-two-hours-around-the-clock!!"

And then I had, as Oprah would so obnoxiously say, an "aha!" moment. Breastfed infants can't be away from their mamas for more than a couple of hours because God designed them to never be far from their mamas. It's such an embarrassingly simple truth that I feel self-conscious even typing it out. It's not accidental that human babies are born as the most helpless of mammals. Calves can walk within a few moments of birth, and kittens begin weaning from their mothers at just 4 weeks of age. Human babies are purposely and compassionately designed by God to need us for everything.

How have we as parents gotten so far away from this truth? We read up on how to schedule our baby's feedings, naps, bowel movements! because it simplifies our lives--when our babies intrinsically know what they need, when they need it. We fill our home with "baby entertainers" like swings and bouncy seats and play-yards that mimic the motion and noise of a parent-- and our babies just want to feel our warm bodies beside them. Most land mammals go to sleep with their young tucked in snugly beside them, while we relegate our babies to a lonely crib down the hall.

I'm ill-qualified to judge other parents; after all, I routinely bribe my kids with treats and let them watch copious numbers of library movies. And I firmly believe that different methods work for different parents. But I, for one, am painfully aware of the fleeting brevity of this sweet infant stage. And as such, I will store up these moments of night wakings and unpredictable napping and frequent nursings and the feeling of being housebound-- I will store them up as precious jewels from Jesus... for it is from Him that I have been fed when hungry, held when tired, comforted when scared. It is Him who stored up my "tears in a bottle" instead of letting me cry it out in a quest for my independence.

My heavenly Father... the ultimate attached parent.

Do not rejoice...

Last night, Chris and I were watching the Apprentice. I hate to even admit that on the world wide web. I didn't *mean* to watch it. Seriously. Chris just happened to turn it on as I was getting up to go to bed and I get.sucked.in.every.time. Just about the time that Nene was about to shove her boot up Star Jones' bottom, the TV switched to breaking news: President Obama was going to make an important announcement from the White House. Chris and I mused over the possibilities, while mourning the loss of the Nene and Star footage. Maybe we were going to war with Libya. Maybe good ol' Barack was gay. Maybe he was resigning. MAYBE, just maybe-- he was resigning so he could replace Steve Carrell on The Office, surmised Chris. (You know-- cause "being the President is too hard-- [that's what she said].")

Obviously none of those scenarios was the case. And as the news of Osama Bin Laden's death went viral, I found myself wondering how I should feel about this. How should I react? Surely, an immense amount of pride in our military-- coupled with a slight distaste on the back of my tongue at the way the President seemed to take credit for this feat. Surely, a reminder of the evil, evil nature of this terrorist, coupled with the thought that he got what he deserved.

But then the camera panned outside of the White House to an impromptu parade on Washington Avenue-- people yelling and jumping and dancing and singing "We are the champions" and chanting, "USA!!! USA!! USA!!!" Later, I watched as jokes about Bin Laden and photo-shopped cartoons of him appeared on facebook. And truly-- it's funny. I laughed at them (like someone commenting about Osama's last fb update: "someone at the door--brb." Come on. That's funny stuff.) But largely, as a whole, as a nation... I began to wonder-- is this really the appropriate response? To joke? To celebrate death? Even the death of an evil man?

A friend posted this Scripture on her facebook, and it was a timely reminder for me: "Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, and do not let your heart be glad when he stumbles." (Proverbs 24v17) Why not? This man was directly responsible for the death of thousands of innocent Americans; he was indirectly responsible for the death of tens of thousands of our military men and women as they pursued him in the war on terror. If we should rejoice in anyone's death, it would be this man! But even God-- who has the most right of anyone to be offended by this man's actions-- doesn't rejoice. As Ezekiel 33v11 says, "'As surely as I live, ' declares the Sovereign Lord, 'I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live.'"

I can't laugh because it's not funny. War sucks. It is ugly and gut-wrenching and awful. And even if we are the ones who come out on the top, there's really no winner in the end. We're all losers. I can't rejoice... because this man-- this wretched, sinful man-- wasted his life on something he believed was the truth. Just like the fictional Calormenes who threw their devotion at the feet of a donkey for the love of Tashlan, this man was utterly, despicably blind--giving his life away to hatred and violence and extreme-ism-- because he thought that's what his God required of him. He's not the first, and it's certainly not merely his particular religious leanings that make him guilty of this atrocity; Christians have been killing and hating in the name of Jesus for centuries.

I'm still trying to process this... what it means for America, for Islam, for the precious families who lost so much at the hands of this man. I guess this is what I want to take away from it: I want to *get* it. I consider myself a religious person, but I don't want to be religious in the way that Bin Laden was religious. I want to know the heart of Jesus. I want my heart to break for the things that break His heart. I want to follow not just the letter of His law, but the stirrings of His soul. I don't want to spend my life following what I believe to be real Christianity, only to find out that I missed the spirit of it. I read an article today about how some Muslims are angry about the way that Bin Laden's burial at sea was handled, saying that it wasn't truly done with Islamic custom in mind. Really? 'Cause I'm not so sure Allah's gonna overlook the blood of three thousand innocents just because Osama's head is pointed toward Mecca. I don't want to rely on the proper burial rites, or the requisite church membership. I want to know God.

My heart hurts for this whole situation. I am intensely proud to call myself an American, intensely proud of our Navy Seals. Seriously-- those men are no joke, and I am grateful for their sacrifices. But I am saddened by the state of our broken world... that it comes down to us hunting each other down, hating each other, killing each other. And while God is still on His throne, this is not the way it was supposed to be. My heart yearns for heaven; come, Lord Jesus. Come.