{For When Fair Trade is All Theory}

My husband has an aunt, so really I do too, who is known in our home for three things: a wildly compassionate, tender heart, a pulse for justice and equality, and a knack for sending sweet little packages.

The day we closed on our house, we left the bank, key in hand, to walk through the empty rooms together – all full of cobwebs and hope, trespassing on the future with the giddiness of kids at Christmas. When the doorbell rang we froze: our doorbell was ringing. We had a doorbell!

{ppssst… I’m guest posting over at Kristi Griem’s blog today! {click here to continue reading}

Note: When Kristi approached me about writing about fair trade for her Fair Trade Fridays Series, I was pretty sure I was not up for the job. I felt inadequate & even hypocritical to approach a topic that has moved my heart, but not to action. This post is demonstrates my process in taking those first steps. Won’t you join me over at Kristi’s today?

On Coffee & Creativity Percolating

Oh, hello there, friends. It’s been a little quiet around here.

I’ve been busy: creativity oozing out of my brain kind of busy. (Warning: adverse effects may include lack of sleep and mountains of unwashed laundry.)I’ve been working away – painting, decoupaging, tracking down burlap coffee sacks, and chopping up century old sheet music, replete with little lesson notes: “Curve fingers. Don’t rely on no. 3. Memorize by June 18, 1918.”
I’m doing some decor for a little coffee shop that just opened up. I’ve never done anything like this, and it’s been a ball. Here’s a few shots of my work in progress.
That last one’s my favorite. I spent hours working on the others; I painted those in less than three minutes.  I’m thinking about starting a little Etsy shop to sell some prints. What do you think? I might just do it . . . that is, just as soon as I can unearth my dining room table.

This is The Day, This is the Day

I wrote it on the chalkboard the day my little one woke up for the day at 3:30 in the morning, and her sister an hour later. It was a moment of desperation, the trained teacher in me picking up the chalk and yelling over the chaos: “Everybody, listen up!”  just because the craziness had to stop. I mustn’t have expected them to listen, because when they stopped short and turned towards me, I had no plan, no words.

So, I scratched out the words penned by a psalmist, the lyrics of one of few songs my mother would belt out on the piano. Just to put a marker in the day, just to keep me from loosing it completely. I wrote it out from memory, words I needed more then they, and I told them, after the seventeenth meltdown, and just before a very early morning nap, that we would all work together to find the goodness to be glad in.

And writing truth in chalk, it didn’t create world peace or prevent the eighteenth meltdown, but somehow it did slow me down, and that was days ago, and the words still linger, and I am learning to rejoice in these busy, small days.

Stopping with Ann to offer thanks today, for…
– my amazing sister, and the sweet baby boy she birthed early this morning, her seventh!
– letters and packages from grandparents far away, and a visit from Papa
– the rare treat of watching the SuperBowl with all three of the men I love most: my husband, my Dad, and my Father-in-law, all in one house for an evening!
– visiting our old church and the sweetness of old friends and familiar faces
– how heartache draws community together, and the gift of offering presence and prayer
– little questions that force me to stop, and answer thoughtfully, and evaluate the state of my own heart
– a new (old) book to read and friends to hash it out with
– chocolate chip cookie dough, enough of it to freeze some and give some and bake more than we should have eaten!
– a creative venture – paintings and decoupage and new friends being made here
– decades old Lincoln Logs, resurrected for another generation
– a husband who hears my heart
– warm breezes and little walks in the middle of winter
– piles of old sheet music, with little notes from piano teachers a century ago: “curve fingers, memorize by April 8, 1918”
– quiet here tonight

On Tenderness Being Born

There are just two kinds of tender.

The first: spring green pressing through earth, tender shoot of new life. It is the soft mush of newborn feet, uncallused, so vulnerable. Or the essence of old love letters, penned before routine and distraction and mortgage payments made commitment an act of love, when it was all flowed sweet and wild and effortless, all the time. New life is always tender.

The second tenderness is a birth story too, but one of the soul. It requires, like spring crocuses and newborn life, a passage through dark soil, a labor through perilous birth canal, but here the contractions and dark dirt that precede tenderness come in all forms: grief and disappointment, brokenness and discipline. Like a meat mallet tenderizing tough flesh, the pain of loss makes its mark, and we press into the darkness, right through it to the light, and when we emerge we are not what we once were.

And we must press through pain, right into it, if we are to emerge. The hiding and distracting, the numbing and the sugar coating and the easy answers – they leave us right there in the dark unborn. When our hearts cry “no more” and the way to the light is not clear, but we keep moving forward – keeping hope that light will come, and when we whisper it to each other in the darkest nights, and keep vigil with the slightest hope that morning must dawn – our hearts grow tender unseen.

So press on, dear friend. Press on.

Yes, linking up this Friday with Lisa-Jo and the community over at the Gypsy Mama, who invites me & you to write for five unedited minutes:
“For fun, for love of the sound of words, for play, for delight, for joy and celebration at the art of communication. For only five short, bold, beautiful minutes. Unscripted and unedited. We just write without worrying if it’s just right or not.” -Lisa-Jo
This week’s word: TENDER.

On Vivid Colors Bleeding & Love Painted Here

Sometimes life bleeds vivid, and there are no words to write: just tears and quiet and being held. And some grief we walk through out loud, and sometimes heartache requires cocoons of silence, and let me tell you, sister, that is just fine too.
And life is a mess – all this beauty and pain running together. And the water, all alive, it makes this paint so unpredictable.  Sometimes I downright prefer the rigidity of pencils and ink – something that won’t bleed and run wild in all the places I’ve meticulously sketched out. There are days I long to abandon color altogether, and just cling white knuckled to neat lines and even control.
But even when I give up and walk away from the brushes strewn across the dining room table and the color seeping right through my best attempts to just hold it together, I find I cannot escape: this flaming red, her deep blues, that kissable pink.
The fresh fallen white light out here burns my dim-glassed eyes, and these colors etch deep into my heart. Life is teeming, even in loss, and all pain is anchored by joy, and these gifts keep this beating heart anchored in the love.
So I scrawl it out, and I let color seep off the brush and onto blank pages, pigment filling in empty. Late in the day, sun streams in, unexpected, lighting up color and casting glints of hope across my page. And when dark falls and vivid colors fall silent, I close my eyes, and exhale the ache, making space to just breath in the grace of it all.

Counting gifts today… Join us here?
– a weekend with extra hours of sleep
– the gift of paint, therapy for my soul
– first big snow and wide-eyed wonder
– getting to know new friends & the sweetness of old ones
– cookie dough in the fridge
– old hymns and quiet sanctuaries
– oatmeal
– good friends who are neighbors
– a new book
– out of the blue phone calls

On Coming Home to Discipleship

Hours over tea, walks through woods, and afternoons of folding laundry together.  It was in these mundane places, over Lo Mein on a Styrofoam plate, and pesto chicken in the tiniest house in Park Ridge, garbed in college hoodies and insecurity, that my heart found a voice of hope, grace to question, the comfort of being known.

I can picture their faces: Wendy, who took an awkward junior higher under her wing; Jen, Amy, and Wanda who made time for a college student on a busy campus; then Linda, Nancy investing in a young woman, a new mom. Each walked the road I longed to call my own, not flawlessly, but with a vulnerability and an invitation to sojourn together.  Some of these relationships developed effortlessly, others were purposefully pursued and scheduled.

These women, in different stages and seasons, each gave me a gift that I’m still unwrapping today. They discipled me. They gave the gift of their intentional presence, hours in conversation, offering perspective, pointing me, again and again, to Jesus – to His Word, teaching me to pray by practicing it with me.
I have been on the receiving end. And I have given, too, of my heart and time, for other young women. And the process, the beauty of transformation unfurling in the lives of those I’ve been privileged to journey alongside, it has brought joy, and sometimes heartache, and it has changed me.

Discipleship.  It is at the core of the Christian experience, a grace offered along our pilgrimage on the narrow way – this strange experience of living as free and fully loved people, longing to know, really know, the God who is beyond comprehension, and learning to abide in Him.

And I find today, with a life full of friends and endless books and blog posts available, with challenges and encouragement abounding, that discipleship is the place I am aching to return to. Discipleship is where the gritty growth really happens. And it is a hole in my life right now.  I heard this interview last week, and it has been ruminating in my mind, causing me to think about the gift of discipleship:

How often do I long to embrace a calling and look to climb ladders and build platforms, when really, I need to go lower, to break open the hard places and walk under the wisdom and grace and truth-telling of a one who has also set her heart on pilgrimage, someone I rub shoulders with in real life, who loves because Jesus commands and invests because she longs to see the image of Christ revealed.

Oh, how I need that intentional relationship, centered on transformation, where vulnerability and honesty pave the way for the hard, beautiful labor of spiritual formation. And while seasons of solitude and silence provide a unique, and sometimes necessary catalyst for growth, this work of discipleship, like community, calls us to acknowledge our weakness and need for another. It flies in the face of our celebrity culture and distracted lifestyle.

And I suspect even when wrinkles deep reveal years of laughter, and my hair is white as snow, I will be found, even then, as I am today: in need of accountability and challenge, of a grace filled place where wisdom can speak to my pride, and failures are brought directly to the cross. I do not want to see the day I isolate myself from the wisdom and tenderness of women who’ve walked this road and can breathe encouragement and truth right into my soul, not today, not ever.

So, how ’bout it, friends? Maybe today is the day to begin to pray for a woman who has walked this road with faithful heart, to  learn from her, maybe read a book and hash through it together? Maybe today we yield to this sweet grace? What do you think?

Fish & Friends Lunch : Little Ways to Say I Love You

In elementary school, I would often discover bananas bearing love notes, inked on peel before I had even crawled out of bed. There were rare nights in sweltering summer, after all the work of putting four girls to bed, that my parents would come in, and tell us to pile in the van: we were going on a pajama run to the ice-cream stand.

As a parent of young children, our days, by necessity, are chock full of routine. Nap-times and diaper changes are eventually traded for ballet lessons and homework time, and dinners need to be made, and does anyone ever conquer the laundry mountains? Tell me there’s hope for the laundry mountains, somebody. Anybody?

Let me let you in on a little secret my parents knew: sometimes, in the midst of all the doing, the simplest act of intentionality can go a long way in reminding  your child that you love them, and you’re all on the same team. And sometimes a banana peel is the perfect place to communicate the mother love that’s too big to fill any canvas.

Last week, we were learning about the letter f in our house, and there was much talk of fish and frogs, which led to pond habitats and my old friends Frog and Toad, and on Friday, we had an out of the ordinary lunch. And let me tell you, talking about it all week, and working on it together filled these little hearts up with wonder. We called it…
I collected only the simplest ideas on Pinterest (see my Fish Fun idea board here) and came up with this simple menu:

• Peanut Butter & Jelly Sandwiches
• Tuna Sandwiches
• Fresh Fruit {blueberries, strawberries, apples}
• Fresh Veggies {carrots, celery}
• Ants on Log {the celery, peanut butter & dried cranberry variety}
• Circle Crackers with Peanut Butter
• Blue Jello & Mini Marshmallows
• Fishy Crackers

Pretty sophisticated, huh? Well, they thought so, anyway! The kids had a blast creating these delicacies – and everything but the veggie slicing & dicing was completely doable by a two and five year old. We invited a very special guest and had a blast chowing down and reading stories from some of our favorite pond dwelling characters. I had planned to incorporate crafts and all kinds of other activities, but no one seemed to notice anything lacking, in fact it all went just swimmingly! Here’s a few more shots of our creations:
{inspired by Jill, who makes the most inspiring food art for her kids, and fabulous crafts, too at Meet the Dubiens.  This is a mash up of her fish in water and swimming fishies  }
{a little pond scene replete with snails and logs, again inspired by Jill’s lovely caterpillars}
{inspired by another Jill, who also makes food art that my kids would surely swoon over at Kitchen Fun with My Three Sons, and her awesome shark}

So tell me, do you have any special, unexpected ways you show or tell your kids you love them? Or maybe a special memory of something simple that stands out in your mind from your own childhood? I’d love to hear!

Awakening and Winterfields

When we go driving early last week, the fields are laced with frost.  It’s been cold here, but no sign of snow in our future, and she asks as we drive along, morning sun making silver glints on stalk stumps: “Mom, what will happen if it stays cold all winter and never snows?” and she says it with all the drama and desperation a five year old can muster, which as you may know, is not insignificant.

I tell her that it will snow, that there’s plenty of winter left, and that it always snows here. And thirty years of winters vouch for me, and probably it will, but really, I have no idea.  And there are places in my life that I feel like that sometimes, too: What if this is it?

It creeps up, this fear-filled discontent, when my eyes are fixed firm on the temporary and all the very real places that ache and frustrate.  But it’s hard to live in hope when my eyes are fixed on frustration, when my heart is asleep to the promises written in an ancient scripture, that could, even today, breathe fresh life into dry bones.

But it is hope that calls me from the kitchen with fresh brewed coffee and I come with my pillow hair and eyes still groggy to find that waking up requires letting go of the warm-wrapped comforters and the dreams, both idyllic and nightmarish, that fill my sleeping hours.  And the hope that’s offered as I sink into the Word, and stumble through learning, again and always, to pray, it is real and concrete, and I feel it as I push past awkwardness and offer to pray with a friend, and when defenses crumble and I see the face of my best friend in the husband I’ve been pushing away all week.  And this morning, I as I look out the kitchen window, I see glimpses of snowflakes dancing in the icy wind.

Yes, linking up this Friday with Lisa-Jo and the community over at the Gypsy Mama, who invites me & you to write for five unedited minutes:
“For fun, for love of the sound of words, for play, for delight, for joy and celebration at the art of communication. For only five short, bold, beautiful minutes. Unscripted and unedited. We just write without worrying if it’s just right or not.” -Lisa-Jo
This week’s word was AWAKE.

On Noise and Focus {and some fab links}

Sometimes the noise around here – on blogs and in tweets, over phones and through emails and on social media streaming all day – sometimes its a beautiful melody, that causes this heart to stop and soak up the beautiful in all the broken and in the made-whole and in all the being made new. And I am thankful for the music makers in my life.

But some days silence is needed, and I am still a learner in this. I’m a little embarrassed to admit it, but it’s true: I regularly delete the twitter and facebook aps from my phone, and then re-ad them again, once I remember that I can live without them.

And today it will be quiet around here. I’ll be restoring order to endless laundry heaps and hosting a tea party for a bunch of dolls and hoping for a few minutes of silence to linger in this new book.

I’ll leave you with a few things I’ve read that have stuck with me & inspired me this last few weeks, in case today is a day you’re looking to turn up the music and dance. Either way, be it in quiet (just ignore all this beautiful noise below) or in the music, I hope your day is full of sharp focus, friends.

Photography :: I’m pretty psyched about learning to use my camera well, but my lack of interest in reading the user’s manual has left me shooting in manual mode. I think I may have stumbled onto a gold mine here… Check out this and other posts via Michele (aka SomeGirl)

Art :: It’s like a little peak into intriguing exhibits at the art museums all over the world. Feeds this little creative soul. The stickers and toothpicks were particularly fun.

Marriage :: John Gottman’s book has made a big impact on our lives, and I was pretty psyched to see Corey at SimpleMom.net sharing a little about the book today. And, ahem, it would, perhaps do me good to revisit some of the concepts.

Mothering :: I had the privilege of spending a few serendipitous hours with Kristen this fall, and came away so inspired to know and nurture my kids. Her heart and her blog are beautiful, and she shares one of her time tested anchors for mothering here.

On What Single People wished Married People Knew :: It’s lengthy, but I hear her heart cry, and have sat long talking with single friends, and I agree, it’s time to stop offering formulas and start to listen and walk with. And while we’re on the topic, this too. Found both of these via Leigh‘s suggestion – she shares the best stuff.

Food :: And, finally, the recipe that blew my mind this week. Two words: *avocado fries* That’s right people, avocado fries. This recipe has beautiful pictures, this one has cilantro dipping sauce. Be still my heart!

On Recovering from Rough Days

Sometimes mornings don’t roll out of the right side of the bed, and an afternoon can unravel without warning.  Today was one of those days, when piles of dishes and tired kids’ meltdowns intersected with the intensity of the day’s commitments and a heart-weary woman. Their so called nap time [Heh.] consisted of wailing in one room and raucous laughter in the other, and my sanity was waning.
But somehow, in the middle of the afternoon, a recovery was made. Their night ended with Snowy Day and lullabies, and mine with slightly softening heart and strewn toys re-ordered, even if the sink, still piled high, whispers even now of tomorrow’s litany looming.

And I’m not sure when the turning happened, but it had me pondering the practical ways we crawl out from the chaos, in the midst of the crazy. And I thought of my mom, a master of the practical, and the simple gestures that can change our course, when we’re too soul-weary to see the forest from the trees, the just-get-you-through-the-day-til-you-can-get-the-quiet-your-soul-needs kinds of practicalities. So here’s five that seem to work when desperation strikes here, every now and then:
1. Eliminate the word NO from your vocabulary for a day.
This was my mom’s number one tip.  Decide for the day, even the hour, that the word NO will not pass through your lips. Whether its the chicken or the egg, sometimes a constant negative response begets a cycle of conflict.  Now, I’m not suggesting you say yes to any request (Sure, honey, you swing your brother from that chandelier!) but consciously choosing to ban NO causes us to think about what we’re saying, to pause long enough to hear the heart behind the question.  Redirect, if necessary, but let this day be one where you choose in.  Just for today.

2. Make a change of scenery.
A trip to the library. A desperate plea for a spontaneous playdate with that friend you’ve been meaning to connect with. The back yard. Sometimes just leaving the chaos behind can create a buffer zone, embarking on a new adventure gives everyone an opportunity for a new start.  Sure, you will have to come back to it, but you’ll have gotten out, turned a page.

3. Accomplish something {singular}.
Let go of the long list of how things should have gone today, and focus on one small, attainable goal. Bleach the tub, organize the junk drawer, sweep the floor or make cookies. (Hmmm… tough call there.)  Give yourself a free pass for the day from all that you’d hoped to accomplish, just for this day, and soak in the satisfaction of one small job done well.

4. Join the resistance.
Sometimes, turning the tables upside down, putting on your bunny slippers, and announcing an impromptu screening of Mary Poppins in a pillow fort gives everybody a break. That means you, too, Mama.  Leave your smartphone or copy of the Hunger Games in another room, and be fully present in the ridiculousness. Go all out, have the pillow fight, and start fresh with new structure and systems tomorrow.

5. Make an SOS call.
Give your kids a free pass, something that will occupy them for at least twenty glorious minutes (my new favorite, courtesy of a wise mama: a classic read-aloud audio book from the library & a big box of Lego) and call a friend. Admit defeat. Let her give you a pep talk and remind you that you’re normal. Be honest, laugh at yourself, and give your kids a hug before your jump back in. Do pizza or cereal for dinner, keep it simple.

And when you’ve made it through the day, and you will, friend, and they’re all miraculously sleeping, you can take the time you really need. Pick-up the mess and re-order your brain, center your soul, take a bath, or implement a new plan of attack for the routines and responsibilities of the day. Figure out what works for you to restore peace and order to your heart and home; its different for everyone.  And remember, the way the day starts or the how of it’s unraveling does not determine the way it ends. (Ask Micha.) And tomorrow is a new day, hope springs eternal, and there will be new mercies with the morning sun. So hang in there, okay?

Do you have a practical tip to turn the tides of crazy day?  Leave a comment & tell us: what works for you?