Hilarious

A few snapshots of hilarity from my little crazies!

Little sister popped a whole scoop of butter into her mouth off the top of her pancake during one of our first meals out thinking it was ice cream.  Kids still bring it up with peals of laughter.

One sixty degree morning newest son shivers and says, "Mom, it is going to snow today?"

After pulling the hot rollers out of my hair in the car one morning before church little sister exclaims, "Mom, you look like Barbie!"  Never heard that one before.

Headed out for a date night Second youngest asks, "Why do you have to go on dates anyways?"
Me: "Because Mommy and Daddy need time to talk and connect with each other."
He: "Well you can just talk at home."
Me: "Not really.  You see there are these seven crazy kids that love to interrupt us at home."
He:  "Well, you can just wait and talk when you are grandparents then."

Almost nine-year remarks, "I like Brandon Heath music and Mandisa." I posted his remark on Facebook along with my own comments about being old enough to have kids with their own music preferences.  I showed him the post to which he stated in no uncertain terms that he was not a Facebook guy.

Toddler coming up to the large map while Mommy was teaching history/geography pointing and babbling about various locations then looking to his older siblings for laughter, which he got heartily.  I totally lost them after that.  Who can compete with a cute toddler?

Middle kid, after waking up from anesthesia groggily comments, "Mom, they gave me a real good nap!"

Little sister on an especially cold morning, "Mom, why I am smoking?"

Big sister starts by wearing Mommy's heels around the house, before long they have all found a pair, the boys included.  Yikes!

While stopping at the grocery store with all seven just to pick up bread and apples, my almost nine year old observes, "Mom, you should see the looks people are giving us.  They're like what?!  Look at all those kids."  Oh really?  Mommy hadn't noticed.

Big sister's total fascination with squirrels.  Many school lessons have drifted into squirrel watching.  Initially I thought really?  A squirrel?  They are everywhere, but not in the Philippines I guess.  Its probably how I would react to a jungle full of monkeys.

Several of the kids have suggested that we need at least seven dogs because one dog is too hard to share between seven kids.  Are you out of your little minds?  The last thing this home needs is another six dogs terrorizing it.

Superheros and Rapunzel conquering the world in the playroom and about bringing down the ceiling I think.

Little sister can't decide which costume to wear out, so she puts on both her Snow White and Rapunzel dresses.

Many more, but its lights out for tonight.

Rest

I'm not sure if things are easier than last time, I wrote.  (See post entitled "Hard")  It's not that hard is bad, its just....well, hard.  Hard can be really good and even sweet, but not usually what we crave.  It's interesting to me how often I'll be asked after an especially hard day or week if things are going better.  I rarely know exactly how to answer.  Better?  The implication is that when things are hard, they are bad.  Sometimes that's true, but not necessarily.  I think we, in America, are obsessed with comfort and ease, myself included.  It's intoxicating, alluring, and satisfying...sort of, but not really if we are honest.  I'm not saying comfort is in and of itself wrong.  However, when any good thing becomes the "ultimate thing" then our affection for it is certainly wrong.  How prone we are do make ultimate things out of the good things God gives us!  I do it constantly, confess it and then do it again.  It might be the latest, greatest, hottest item out there or it might just be solitude, a cup of tea or a good book.  It's that place our soul craves.  It is that idea, the image, the place for which we are striving but never finding.  Don't get me wrong, I love solitude, a cup of tea and a good book, but if my days are all about finding those things, I will NEVER be content or satisfied when I find them because I will always be afraid of loosing them.  I love God's gifts, but that's all that they are.  Reflections of Him.  I believe that God is a God of comfort.  I believe that He is a God of infinite pleasures, but they are all found in Him not apart from Him.  Comfort is knowing I do not live under God's condemnation, but in the freedom of sonship.  Comfort is having an advocate and intercessor in the Son.  Comfort is knowing that these "momentary light afflictions" are nothing when compared to the "eternal weight of glory" that God is preparing for us (2 Cor. 4:17).  Comfort is being free from the slavery of trying to keep God happy with me for Christ has already accomplished that on my behalf.  Comfort is entrusting everything in my life that I cannot control to the One who controls all things.  Comfort is resting in Ultimate Wisdom, Goodness, Justice, Love and Power.  Rest...what we all crave will not find apart from Christ.

"Our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in You."  --Augustine (Confessions)

So, yes, I crave rest.  I don't especially like hard, but I realize that ease in this life is rarely the road to true rest.  So, we press on believing, often without seeing, that the rest promised us is ours indeed, even when our journey is long and the terrain is rough.  For any fellow travelers who may be weary on the way, take courage and remember the One who has called you is the One who will keep you.  And that is a truth in which to find rest.    

Hard

Hard.  Keeping a house clean with seven children under foot.  Okay actually impossible.

Hard.  Finding time to write a blog.

Hard.  Not hitting the snooze button, but crawling out of bed to get truth in front of your face, before you are bombarded by the breakfast mess, lesson plans (what plans?), chores, worries, accusations, giggles, questions, errands, chatter and fears that will hit as soon as the kids open their eyes.

Hard.  Getting back to running after a month away.  Really am I that out of shape already?  

Hard.  Watching the kids you love hurt each other in words, actions, and attitudes.

Hard.  Exposing sin in little hearts.  Navigating their defiance or despair and reminding them of their great need and an even greater Savior.

Hard.  Little hearts, till Jesus makes them soft.

Hard.  Hearing a little one cry, "I keep asking Jesus to change my heart, but its still so ugly."  Mommy's reply, "Baby, Jesus hears your prayers.  Before our hearts can be made new, we need to see how ugly they are.  God is giving you eyes to see.  You wouldn't be sad about your sin unless He was making your heart soft to the gospel.  Lets keep asking God to do His good work in your heart."

Hard.  Waiting for God to do heart work.

Hard.  Worlds colliding.

Hard.  Hearing stories of pain, loss, and fear from little ones you couldn't protect.

Hard.  He said....she said...no I didn't.....yes you did.

Hard.  Being humbled.  Finding yourself inadequate.  Recognizing your own desperate need in ways that feel raw and unmanaged.  Coming to the end of yourself and feeling like its just the end.

Hard.  Believing the gospel when your heart isn't feeling it.

Hard.  Fighting to depend on Christ's work for me rather than working to earn favor that is already mine in Christ.

Hard.  Surrender.

Hard.  Receiving rather than earning.

Hard....to understand....GRACE.

Good.  God in all of it.

Messy

Messy.  Our toddler when he came in from outside.  He had gone for a "walk" with his big brother, but I think his brother gave him a dirt bath instead.  Literally it was down his diaper, in his hair, mouth, shoes...everywhere.

Messy.  The kitchen floor after the toddler wrestled with his big brother.

Messy.  My bathtub after big brother gave our toddler a real bath following the dirt bath and wrestling.

Messy.  The stroller...I guess they must have gone for a walk after the dirt bath, but before coming in to mess up the house.

Messy.  Mealtime at my house.  Sometimes I can't watch.  ;p  Eager hands covering his plate with salad dressing.  Mountains of BBQ sauce for three bites of meat.  Cereal that literally spills over the sides of bowls.  Crumbs....everywhere.  Washing the table and sweeping the floor are the dreaded kitchen jobs at our house.

Messy.  Our 9th day of homeschooling....well every day really.  I promise, I am a fairly scheduled, schooler, rarely do little hearts and emotions fit into my schedule though.

Messy.  Relationships.  If I have done the math right there are 36 different relationships to be navigated in my home at any given time, if you don't include pets (which contribute their own set of issues, but rarely are they relational).  So, I'll let you guess how often all of those 36 relationships are sailing smoothly...um rarely might be generous.  ;)  Someone seems to always be offending or being offended or both at once.  There were so many inter-personal disputes among my children the other day that required my attention.  I was seeking to address each of their little hearts, but that takes time and energy.  So many of them needed heart-tending at once that by the time I finally got around to the last one, I had completely forgotten what I needed to address with him.  Thus came the classic line, "Do you know why you are in time out?"  Now I know why parents ask that....its because they can't remember.

Messy.  Speech in our house.  If you are a grammar person cover your ears.  We have technically 4 esl kids in our house, plus a toddler and two other boys who could really care less.  So we hear "dumping dacks" (jumping jacks).  "They is tired."  "My tooth is blood." (My tooth is bleeding.)  "Caw" for car, "bote" for bolt, "ba-wee" for very and so on.  Not to mention, lots of pointing and grunting.  Can we say, "use your words?"    

Messy.  Marriage in the midst of seven little crazies.  Yes, I over-reacted, but honestly a spat over the shoe basket near the front door....really?  Yup, it was just that kind of day....but, in front of the in-laws?  Yup!  I think they still love me, or feel really sorry for my kids (just kidding I know you love me) because they both stopped by to play with the kids and help me out the next day.  Spats or no spats, the romance will never die in this house thanks to the youngest little lady in our house (6 years).  She is obsessed with the idea of us (as in Mommy and Daddy together).  She grabs my hand, puts in Paul's and giggles, "Mommy and Daddy."  Or she greets Daddy with a hugs, drags him in the house and says, "Kiss Mommy!"  More giggles.  Yes, Little One Daddy is my prince, even if we spat over silly things from time to time.

Messy.  Little hearts that need Jesus, but don't yet see their need.  What hurtful words can be spoken, what ugly tones used.  What nasty looks can be exchanged.  All that from children who can also love so deeply, care so tenderly and forgive so quickly.  Messy indeed.

Messy.  My heart in the midst of mess.  Frustrated after a bunch of child craziness, Paul asked me what what I needed.  My reply, "for the kids to stop acting like kids."  He laughed and reminded me that that was not going to happen.  True.  So, if kids, marriage, meals, houses, homeschooling and relationships are messy, why am I always fighting the mess?  I don't know.  Maybe we weren't really created for mess, and crave to be free from it, yet fight the fact that the only freedom from it is Jesus in the midst of it.

Messy.  The gospel.  Christ's suffering for my joy.  Christ's condemnation for my pardon. Justification: bloody, painful, divine.  Sanctification: daily, painful, deep.  Jesus didn't come to clean up the neat and tidy, He came to rescue, redeem, and purchase the messy, the dead, the needy.

Messy.  The place the gospel dwells which is good news indeed for my family and all of our mess.

Unplanned events

August 29, 2013

Have you ever had days that didn't go as you planned?  Dumb question.  Of course.  We all have days like that.  Most of mine don't go as planned....at least not plans made by me.  Proverbs 16:9 comes to mind saying, "The heart of a man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps."  I'm not a bible scholar, but at the very least, I think that verse indicates that my plans and the LORD's plans for my life might not be the same.  Hmmm.  Wonder who is off in her planning....not the LORD.  Today was our forth day of homeschooling.  Yesterday was a colossal train wreck, but I'm as stubborn as any of my kids and far more determined when it comes to things of eternal value (like their little hearts).  So, we tried again today.  We still don't have all the cogs running smoothly, but today was much smoother than yesterday.

I had planned for my brother to come over to help one of them with math for an hour.  The plan was he would stay and watch the younger ones while the oldest helped me run errands.  The plan was Quest Lab, Walmart, Sam's Club, and a stop by Goodwill.  Then we would swing by the house to drop everything off before I had to run to a homeschool kick-off meeting.  Well, I went to empty everything out of the back of the Yukon to make room for all the groceries (did I mention my kids can plow through the food?).  Anyways, in the chaos of trying to head out, I grabbed the tail-gate of the Yukon to close it and gave it a hard pull, bringing the corner of it down into my head!  Oh yes!  I punctured my own head!  I knew it had gone deep and my sister encouraged me to go in.  "We'll see," I thought.  I'm not sure what I was waiting to see about, but I blotted up the blood, through some frozen peas under a baseball cap and went off to do my errands.  What was the alternative?  Take all seven kids to run errands tomorrow when I didn't have a sitter.  NO WAY!

Well, 3 out of the 4 errands later, the frozen peas in my hat were now cooked peas thanks to my internal body temperature and the 99 degree weather and beating sun outside.  My head was throbbing and my husband was urging me to get it checked out.  Ok.

You have to love it when you are sitting on a table in urgent care and the doctor walks in and asks you how you are.  "Well... I'm here," was my reply.  A couple of stitches and a tetanus shot later, I was headed off to my meeting, one Sam's club run short of my well-planned day.  No one noticed the hat covering my stitches and bloody, iodine-soaked, ointment laden hair.  I laughed with some other moms about the dramas of homeschooling, vented to one about my crazy afternoon and headed to the car to find a tire very low.  Once upon I time I carried a tire gauge in my car, like before children.  I'm sure they ran off with it to use as a weapon, thermometer, or nose picker.  So, I'm in the gas station and the term tire gauge is totally escaping me.  So, I pitifully ask where i can find "one of those tire-pressure-checker-things".  No I'm not blond.  No, I'm not really a dumb woman.  Yes I did suffer a severe blow to the head.  Yes, I am helping to educated the next generation.  I actually started laughing because I knew how silly I sounded.

I filled the tires, enjoyed a late dinner of nachos and an orange cream slushy and pondered my day as I drove home.  It wasn't really what I had planned, but my heart was actually pretty okay about it.  My head still hurt, and I still had to figure out a way to get to Sam's club without seven children, but my world was still spinning pretty beautifully.  A thousand gifts for which to be thankful started flooding my mind as I drove.  Quiet and peace in the car.  Money for dinner.  No allergies that keep me from enjoying nachos and a slushy.  Modern medicine.  Air conditioning.  Friends that understand the craziness of life and laugh with you.  The fact that I smashed my own head and not one of the children's. A husband who loves me, and tells me to see the doctor when I'm being stubborn (even if he did laugh when he first learned how it happened). Ibuprofen for headaches.  An awesome bed to crawl into.  Shampoo that will get the yuck out of my hair.  A brother that helps care for my kids.  A sister that digs for frozen peas in my freezer while I mutter under my breath about how much my head hurts.  Living in a country where you can still (for now) the medical care you need.  Freedom that allows the medical assistant at urgent care to wear a WWJD bracelet and have forgiven tattooed on his arm.  This wasn't one of the mental exercises striving to get my heart into a good place, although I do that too sometimes.  It was just a giant measure of grace the LORD granted me tonight.  Thankfulness, what a gift!  Then I recalled what I had read this morning.  Six things that are true of those who are in Christ.

I am:
1. given grace before the world was created
2. chosen by God before Creation
3.  loved by God with an inseparable love
4. redeemed and forgiven for all my sins
5.  justified before God and the righteousness of God in Christ is imputed to me
6. a new creation and a son of God.  

None of those things were part of "my" plan, but they were God's plan for me and beyond what I would have know or been able to ask for. So, when it comes to plans, His are infinitely better than mine, even if His include head injuries or whiny children, or late night stops to put air in tires.  His blessings are better than I could ask for too.  I specifically asked the LORD this morning to help me understand what I was reading as I groggily tried to digest the deep, rich devotional app on my phone.  I was thinking that would look like instant understanding, but it rather took the shape of sweet, meaningful reflections late at night after a day of unplanned events.

Heart Tending

August 20, 2013

Tending.  What do you think of?  Gardens?  Sheep?  Children?  For me, its children these days, and many, many more to come….days that is.  I tried tending a garden.  The children now call it “the weed patch”.   I like gardening.  When you plant something, it stays where you put it.  Children don’t.  Plants don’t make noise.  Children do….lots of it.  Plants have a fairly predictable growing season.  The only thing predictable about children is their unpredictability.  They are noisy and obnoxious one minute, then sweet and tender the next.  Often they are best friends with each other one day then worst enemies the next.  Gardening requires a limited number of tools and skills.  Children require everything you have, things you couldn’t think to ask for and then some.  From planting to fruit, most plants require a few months at most.  For children, I think it’s a lifetime.   Plants don’t get jealous of each other; children do and can be quite vocal about it. Gardening is seasonal, there is always the off-season when the soil rests.  Childrearing is year round….no rest for anyone.   

I’ve never tried tending sheep.  Tending children many days feels like what I would imagine tending chickens might be like.  In the Bible, and I suppose real life, sheep follow the voice of the their shepherd.  Children do not.  I don’t think chickens do either.  I’ve heard that sheep follow each other, sometimes to foolish places.  Children do too.  Today it was Peter following two of the older ones down the street who were following our disobedient dog.  Thankfully they didn’t get too far.  Sheep are not considered the brightest creatures.  Sometimes, I’m not sure children are either.  In the childhood Bible pictures, sheep neatly and quietly chew on grass and lap water peacefully.  Mealtimes with children are anything but quiet and peaceful.  Did I mention messy?  I don’t think chickens are very quiet, neat or peaceful either. 

Plants and sheep (as well as chickens) were made by God for His glory, but not in His image.  Children are.    Tending to children goes far beyond meeting physical needs and raising them to be well-adjusted, responsible members of society (as if that weren’t difficult enough).  What really needs tending in children (and Mommies and Daddies) are their hearts.  So, we don’t tell them not to yell, hit, lie, tattle, take, or sass because those behaviors are socially unacceptable or even displeasing to God, although they are.  We stop and address the yelling, hitting, lying, tattling, taking and sassing because those things reveal a heart that doesn’t believe the gospel.  Those abhorrent behaviors are just symptoms of hearts that need Jesus in deep, daily, real ways.  So that is the real work God has given mommies and daddies:  heart tending.  It requires much more time, effort and energy than gardening and is far less measurable than tending sheep.  It is where the gospel should be flowing freely among very needy people.  We just need Jesus.  We all do, but children, especially lots of them together, are really good at helping us see our neediness and theirs.  Jesus is a really patient Savior to both unruly children and their parents, and  His mercy towards us all never runs out!  So in that reality I will rest tonight, because the chickens…uh children will rise early.  J

Sleep

August 14, 2013      

Sleep.  Never before have I known how good sleep could be.  I’ve pulled all-nighters in college, delivered babies, kept crazy hours with babies, worked like a dog, poured myself out in countless ways depriving me of sleep, but these recent days take the cake.  Being in week two of very interrupted sleep and jet-lag going both directions, emotions all over the place and most recently sleepless children at night, I finally hit the wall yesterday.  I knew it would be a long day when I woke up exhausted, but it actually only got worse.  The kids were gems, which was a total gift.  Even a brief nap while kids watched a cartoon didn’t do much in the course of the day.  I think I may have fallen asleep briefly while standing up with my head on the counter.  The world became foggier and foggier as the day went on.  By mid-afternoon my body just started shutting down.  My stomach was churning, things were starting to spin.  I was freezing cold and couldn’t stop shaking or get warm.  The kids were getting concerned.  I didn’t know being tired could be so bad.  I finally called my little brother Joe.  I’m not sure I even got through my question asking if he could come over.  He heard my voice and the tears and replied that he would be right over.  How relieved I was when he walked in the house!  The kids jumped all over him with delight and I collapsed into a puddle.  Not sure I ever imagined my kid brother coming to my rescue all those years ago when I was caring for him, but rescue me he did.  Thanks brother.  Couldn’t have survived without you.  With his help we made it through the rest of the night and I crashed as soon as the kids were sleeping.  Thank you all for your prayers.  I only had one kiddo come down in the middle of the night and he went back to sleep without too much difficulty.  It was the first great night of sleep I’ve had in several weeks.  I didn’t know how much we were created to need sleep and just what a lack of it can do to you.  I think need is like that.  We have needs, but as long as they are met, we don’t think much of them.  Its not until we are lacking….and often lacking in a serious way do we realize just what dependent, needy creatures we are.  I wasn’t relishing the moments yesterday as the day passed in a fog, but there is something really beautiful about coming face to face with your deep need.  And that is coming face to face with the great need-meeter.  Perhaps it’s easy to say because I did get a good night of sleep finally, but there were a thousand graces throughout the day that He granted before the sleep ever came.  I’m not promised sleep tonight, but I am thankful for that which He gave me last night and will trust that He knows exactly what I need better than I do.  Today passed with much less difficulty and even some fun and challenging moments that required me to engage in a way I couldn’t have yesterday.  The older boys began building a bike trail in the woods with Mommy’s help a bit.  We met some of the family at a playground, went for a bike ride, tried our skills at some chores (went quite well actually), navigated our first sister fight (girls sure are different than boys), tried a couple games, and worked through some jealously issues (between 3 of the 7 over time with the dog…who knew a goofy pup could be such a hot commodity).   Anyways, we are wrapping up another day and tentatively heading to bed uncertain of how much sleep we will get, but trusting the LORD for everything we need.  

Home

August 12, 2013

Home.  What a wonderful word.  What a wonderful place.  What meaning one word can hold!  How good it feels to be home and finally together as a family.  It’s kind of overwhelming.  I can’t tell you how many times in the last thirty-six hours I have spontaneously burst out laughing or crying or a weird combination of both.  How full our lives and home have become.  The funny thing is how normal it actually feels.  We are home and it feels like we just kind of fit.  Its like this is where they have always belonged and we have all known it all along and now they are here and its just fits.  I don’t know what I thought it would be like, but it’s not weird or awkward or foreign.  Its home….they are home…we are all home, finally!  Yes, I am bawling as I write.  Have you ever been overwhelmed by God’s completely underserved kindness and gentle love?  Overwhelmed….like where maybe you might stop breathing, or your soul might actually explode from unexpected joy?  That’s me tonight!  God is good.  He is always good.  He has always been good.  I came to know that goodness, though, in the dark valleys of my life.  I came to crave that goodness and nearness of His love that I found in those wrenching hard places of my journey.  In many ways I think I even grew suspect of claims of God’s goodness amidst sunshine because I guess I supposed it was just being confused with pleasure over one’s circumstances.  Sure it’s easy to be happy when things are good, I thought.  But, to know joy in sorrow is so much deeper and real because it’s where you have nothing but Jesus to be filled with and He is so much more satisfying than any fleeting pleasure.  And, He is!  But I have found much to my soul’s delight and awe how sweet His sunshine on my face feels.  Its so undeserved….so unexpected yet so His nature and a piece I haven’t known so deeply.  It’s a place where “thank you” is so inadequate, so insufficient.  So I just sit here sobbing and laughing tears streaming down my face in absolute delight.  Jesus is enough and will be again on darker days, but today I’m overcome by the sunshine poured out in my life.  I asked God to deal gently with me on this road, but I never expected this.  It’s more than I could have imagined.  I told Paul the other day, I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop….and realized how twisted my concept of God is.  It is as if I think He is in heaven just waiting for me to get too happy about something and then squash it out of me and remind me that He is the only One that can make me happy.  Wow, that sounds terrible.  It is terrible and while I know it’s not theologically correct, that’s really how I think sometimes.  So, maybe, that’s why the dark valleys are so comfortable to me, there’s not much to loose in a dark valley.  But, I think what I am coming to learn is that with Jesus there never is anything to loose.  If He is my everything, then, whether sunshine or darkness, I’m satisfied.  But, the piece of His nature that surprises me is to think that in my overwhelmed sobbing/laughing in worship over His kindness and gentleness towards me, He might just be laughing too, pleased for me know Him in this way.          

Surrender

August 10, 2013

There was significant moment today that is probably just the first of many of its kind.  Actually, it was a series of interactions between Mommy and the littlest one.  She is a bundle of energy and giggles and is quite determined to have as much fun as possible.  At one point today, Mommy interfered with that fun which set off a small chain of interactions in which she came to ignore me altogether.  None of the issues were big, but the pattern was concerning.  I half hoped it might blow over, but it didn’t and it became clear that we needed a little heart to heart.  After a series of time outs, assurances of my love, urging her to listen, obey and trust mommy, and making it clear that Mommy was in charge not Little One; her stubborn unresponsive head nodded that yes she would listen.  With that nod came a flood of tears as she buried her head in my shoulder and clung to me.  My tears followed and I just sat held my little girl who was searching desperately for a safe place, but trying so hard not to surrender.  How much that moment, or rather series of moments reminded me of myself.  What is the line from the Casting Crowns song?  "I’m trying so hard to stop trying so hard."  Surrender: such a difficult thing. 

I’m sure we are just entering what will likely be some difficult days ahead.  We leave our hotel at 4:00 tomorrow morning to start our long journey home.  From start to finish including all the layovers it will be about thirty hours of travel.  That is no small feat for anyone, but this will be undertaken by two tired parents and four equally emotionally spent children.  For three of them, they are leaving the only country they have ever known.  Emotions run deep, but children rarely have the words to articulate them.  We would especially ask for your prayers over these next two days as we journey home.  Pray for our hearts, transitions, travel time, rest, relationship with one another, sensitivity to each other, dependence of Christ and surrender to all that He has in store for us.  He has been so gentle with us, thus far in our journey and we trust Him for tomorrow as we ask for continued mercies.  Thank you all for your love.