may ousted me towards a new weakness. in addition to around the clock morning sickness, my mother has been in the hospital and rehabilitation center for twenty three days. i have neglected my flowers and chickens, any personal time at all, and all else i have needed to to care for my mother and father. anyone would have done the same. knowing she was coming home, we spent eight hours at their house saturday cleaning and preparing. sunday, i had a pulled muscle in my back and i've been in bed ever since. be still, he says. be still, pray, seek, know me and the power of my strength. why - during times of weakness and of despair, do i forget to drink deep from the living water. i plea the grace of christ when i am weak, but that never negates the reality that without him, i shrivel quickly. and so i am here knowing that he needed me to be still and hear him more than i needed to save the situation, all situations, on my own.

I meant to say in the post before that what I am afraid to say in writing about some pulse so near to my heart is EXACTLY what I used to urge my students to do. If you can push through the fear of weeping on a dusty white keyboard, a journal page, and write your experience aloud, you have then written well. It demands courage to be vulnerable and the bliss that follows with remarkable release. The reader, too, then gains a sense of pathway to know and sympathize with you and once there is an identification of "ahhh, you have felt that too!", there is a way to be brother and sister. If I let you in on my groaning, your quiet groaning seems less hopeless. I feel so convinced of that.

While we are adding a bedroom for Mya to the back of our home and my belly is pushing outward on my sundresses, my mother is in her pink top and shorts exercising with the physical therapists. She reminds me each time i visit that she is well, that she is just a lap or so from finishing this trial. She hasn't once questioned why. She has been a remarkable student.

The girls are finishing up the year at Antioch and it's the last year that they will all be in the same school together. I think people wonder how you can offer enough attention to multiple children and I thought the same thing last night as i made bedtime rounds to their cheeks and sides. My heart only grows larger, my capacity for multiplied love expanding like a hummingbird vine. I don't attempt to slot time for each daughter, i can barely keep myself from them all the time. And Love, in charge of my day and night, gives me grace to love in a tiny way as He loves.

I fear writing about the topics that are so close to my soul. I can barely write about my children and my husband. And I have had a difficult time writing about my mother having a stroke and finding affliction. She has never been wounded, she is as strong as the tide and loves life as much as any person I have ever spoken to. She adores and has giant patience with children, she is a rule breaker, a party lover. But over all, she is the purest of hearts, she gives and does not tire. She is selfless and wonderful. Everyone who knows her, loves her. Everyone speaks so highly of her. She is an original beauty.
She had a stroke on Saturday morning and I listened as her voice grew quiet, and her body was still and worried. I curled beside of her waiting for the ambulance and praying to our Father pleas of help and words of trust and love. She locked eyes with me, she wondered if she would ever get well. I kissed her head, I rubbed her hair, I prayed with my soul for her and over her. She wept and spoke quiet and still. I have not exhaled since that moment.
By now, she has made it through ambulance rides, Neuro-ICU on Mother's day, and several days in a dull tan hospital room with florescent lights. Her window can be easily seen from the courtyard below. It is a window on the third floor spilling over with flowers. She has averaged twenty visitors per day and has easily become the favorite of the nurses. I have been sitting with her during the day, sending her and pop food for the night from the dear people at school. My father has not left her, he has showered her with his nearness and care. She has been honored and adored and is fighting for the use of her right hand and arm, the recovery of her walking, and the complete clarity of her speech.
But it is hard for one to understand where I am aching as a daughter, as a friend, for those who have not panged through this. I couldn't have beforehand understood and God forgive me for not being more sympathetic towards people with aching in their hearts. Isn't life easy without tragedy and trial. But grace offers me sound sleep, Christ offers me Hope beyond reasoning. And the children give us all a motivation to continue to sing.
Perhaps tomorrow on to rehab for her, and finally out of the dull hospital room with horrible florescent lighting.

On the wind, He sends me a baby bird.
To dress in glory sunlight sheets
He clothes my heart with morning song
He lifts my face to see the rolling wings down
through the unreachable belief of a miracle.

I have wanted another child for at least five years. I was afraid to speak such a desire. I concealed my longing and disciplined myself to hush. And then I told Bryan. And then I told Madison. And then I began to pray. And then Bryan began sharing my desire. And the community that had been formed around our table from the Lord, divine friends beautiful and more real than trees, became close. And in relationships there is a point of progression to move on, or to leave. The stuff we conceal is protected by fear's walls. Friends, God-sent friends, can look into those places and identify. It happened. Miranda gave us hope. She worked for a place that could maybe help us. They couldn't in the end, but it gave our hope a fountain. I continued to pray every day, in the morning, on the porch with the Lord, giving it to Him, crying, surrendering. It was a long season of trusting Him either way. I trained my mouth to say, "Yes, Lord, your will be so in my life. Take this desire if it isn't from you. I don't want despair. I can be content if I have you and nothing else." The desire remained. I told my girls of my heart's desires. We prayed every meal, every morning, every night together for a baby. We made an appointment for Bryan to see his doctor, he referred us to another doctor. It was expensive. The Lord provided unseen money. He had a surgery in February. We carried, we cared for him for four weeks. He was weak, I loved him well. I saw a friend. Her husband had the same doctor, the same surgery, and she had a baby in her arms. She helped me hope. She gave me God's words. My friends helped me to pray, they asked, they loved me.
On Monday, May the 5th, we found out that God gave us a baby. On Tuesday, May 6th, my doctor confirmed and said it's a miracle. It's a miracle. Praise to the Lord the Almighty the King of Creation. Oh, My Soul Praise Him for He is my health and Salvation. All ye who hear, now to his temple draw near and praise Him with glad adoration. Our baby is due on January 12th, 2009. "Oh Lord, you are my God; I will exalt you and praise your name, for in perfect faithfulness you have done marvelous things, things planned long ago." Isaiah 25: 1

I had Bible Study with the children yesterday. The Lord placed it on my heart to tell them to read His word every day to get to know Him more. We read the story of Zaccheaus together and looked within the text for details, for salvation, for the things that he did to draw the Lord close to him. The children were listening, they were quickened by the Lord. I was elated. I want more time to dig into the word with them. This is it! It's not craft, business, confusion....it's digging, it's worshipping.

It's Cinco de Mayo. It's one I will never forget. Ever. Going to have a spinach salad at Hawthorne's with Bryan with full out joy in my bones.

I love this selection from Life Together: Community. Beautiful.

Everything in my yard is in bloom. We have 13 chicks in the coop. A baker's dozen eggs soon per day.

i forget to do this, to write about the ordinary life which will turn into extraordinary memory for the whole family. I want to remember these days with you little girls: our singing on the way to school to Billy Jonas, Bethany Dillon, Nickel Creek and the way we are all pretty tense trying to get out the door on time. We have to work together. If one person is ill, cranky, slow to get up and get moving, the rest of us focus on that person like an immune system goes to the site of infection with an extra pulse and attention, and we work to get them back on track. Ele is not a morning person, Madison is very efficient and non fussy about her clothes and so she can stay in bed longest and be ready first. She's not big on breakfast, so that cuts out time, too. Mya always takes a long bath first thing in the morning and loves to take her time getting out, drying off, and can never find that one piece of clothing she was dreaming of wearing. Ele hates early morning. She hates it. It's hard for her, she fights, we plea, she grunts and kicks and storms around stomping. She requires babying, caudling, coaxing. It's a feat. But so great when we all finally get into the car and ahhhhhh, we did it! We also make lunches, sign things, search for shoes, pack extra shoes for p.e., etc. all while we're half asleep. It's quite a way to start the day.
It makes me remember the quiet way we woke the campers at Celo with strumming and singing "Here comes the sun" while we walked slowly by their closed tent flaps. Then the yawns, the bed head and the slow walk to breakfast. Summer is coming. Hallelujah.

We have 3 pretty brown hens, a mother black hen and her 11 chicks, a bunny, a gecko, a dog, and a cat currently. The little brown hens were waiting on the porch for Mya and I this afternoon. My rose bush has exploded with pink blooms. We will work on the chicken pen this Saturday. My mom's birthday is on Saturday. She has a slipped disc in her back for the 6th day in a row. We are getting ready to go and see Luke's game and bring Lizzy home for a sleepover tonight. Mya and Bryan just got back from a run.

A normal nothing out of the ordinary day of waiting. The best of days; free from sorrow, near to the blessing of the Lord.

Sometimes my students from Metrolina flood my mind. Besides the fact that they were a huge investment of my life and time, they were a beautiful lot. I loved them for many reasons. They were my treasures, and still are. So I started thinking of many of them last night. I have not written to them in quite a while and wanted to hear from them, but I'd lost all of my contacts. And I didn't know what I would say. It feels like I have nothing to say. Lately, I am plugging along trying to have the girls clothes cleaned and folded so they can have their favorite things to wear, have Bryan's clothes for work ready to go, feed the chickens (15 of them) fed and watered, the bunny, the cat and dog, the gecko (that reminds me) and think of sunday school materials i need to pick up for 30 or so kids that will be waiting on me on sunday, preparing the workers, being an available aunt, vacuuming, windows, you know. and my mind just wants to sit and spill words out and arrange them into meaning so as to reveal the beauty of God. When in the world will i ever ever ever have time to be a vessel? to be a disciple? to do this grand thing that i have been called to do, marked to do, glorified to accomplish?

And so Sarah wrote to me. And Haley wrote to me. And delivered messages from the Lord of love. And as I sat this morning, taking a break from laundry to respond to Sarah, I realized something very key and powerful. It was through ministering to her that God revealed himself to me. And something that didn't occur to me until this instant is that when I am doing what God has called me to do, God shows up and says this is my son listen to him! I was helping Sarah to see the Lord through her confusion and in that, God spoke to me. The hauling of this cross occurs as you face these duties with grace. The way my spirit responds to chaos and to the relationships I have where no one else wants to help or is able to help is Christ in me. What I must do is to be Christ in His patience, His love, His forgiveness, His patience, His love, His forgiveness over and over again. I cannot manage people. I am a horrible leader. I am an encourager. Let the leaders be born. Let them come out. Let the feet be in motion, and the hands reach to help else the entire system, the whole body is in a cast of motionlessness. All I know how to do is to continue to encourage the others to move, move closer in. Forsake the fear of becoming too predictable. God wants to assign new glory to those establishments that man has marred. That will occur through our willingness to be Him in ordinary situations. Whether what i am called to is successful or doomed for failure, I must be Him daily. And I can't determine my own worth by how much I master a new thing He's revealed to me. I must sink lower, go further away from pride in spiritual accomplishment and call myself chief of sinners, so that as I become less and the light of revelation is lowered deeper into the caverns of my being, my breath is slow and steady and His spirit becomes a loving wind that goes out and not stays in. Okay. it is miserable to be outside of the body of christ and to then manage productivity on my own. this. this is what we were created for. at all stages of life, to be for someone Christ's voice and power and love and hope. it cannot happen alone.
i see that from the time of my teaching high school, teaching pre-school, and now teaching students. people need to know that He's still here and they will often know that by Him in us. If no one is around, if you and I are alone because it's easier to be alone than to deal with people, how will He ever be known? It isn't mysterious. It's mud upon my eyes. It's so grit real, so much in the table full of snacks and the pots of chili and the bowing and getting back up and loving and the ceasing of analyzing for a second to praise God for THIS place, THIS time.