aiming higher

Some necessary but unexpected outpatient surgery has found me this week often on the couch. The first day or so I was able to relish a favorite book, Stepping Heavenward: One Woman's Journey to Godliness, by Elizabeth Prentiss. This author is perhaps better known for her hymn, More Love to Thee O Christ. The story begins in 1831, as Katherine Mortimer starts a journal on her 16th birthday along with a pledge to live her life afresh for God. The beautiful but painful story of her sanctification follows. The pages are a treasure to me as much of what Prentiss covers is barely hinted at in Christian circles today: God's willingness to undertake our sanctification just as willingly as our salvation, the hidden life of a believer especially in days of suffering, prayer as an avenue to the heart of God, and a high call to holiness in the life of a woman and mother. Here is one of my favorite tidbits, as Katherine recalls the judgment of her terminally ill, God-fearing, stoic father-in-law:

"But is a mortal man who cannot judge of his own state to decide mine? It is true he sees my faults; anybody can who looks. But he does not see my prayers or my tears of shame and sorrow. He does not know how many hasty words I repress, how earnestly I am aiming, all the day long, to do right in all the little details of life. He does not know that it cost my fastidious nature an appeal to God every time I kiss his poor old face and that what would be an act of worship in him is an act of self-denial in me. How should he? The Christian life is a hidden life, know only by the eye that seeth in secret. And I do believe this life is mine."

She determines to begin to call him "Father", something she has been unable to do up to this point. It is a predetermined act of love; one of the will, not of the emotions.

The hidden life of a Christian who can assess but God Himself? Let us take care not to judge too harshly those whom His dear Son indwells.

come on out!

The McLean County Fair is running from July 29-August 2. We hope to see you there, at the largest and longest running 4-H Fair in the world! Wednesday is Dollar Day, get in for a buck.
http://web.extension.uiuc.edu/mclean/fair/index.html

snapshot

I remember well the longing I had each morning, over ten years ago, when I scurried out the door for work. "What will it be like," I wondered, "to have my home be my place of work?" I had lazy days of lounging at home with sweet, mostly well-behaved children on my mind at the time. Yes, I knew that being a stay-at-home mom would not be easy, but really...I had no idea.

Well, here's a glimpse at a day in the life of this mother.

4:15 AM
Awaken with a jerk to the noisy banter of the paperboy(s). (It sounds like there are at least three, maybe ten.) I make a mental note to call the Pantagraph later and complain. Lay in bed, hoping to catch a few more precious minutes of sleep.
5:15 AM
Still awake, decide to get up. I can get a long quiet time in this morning, so all is not lost in getting up this early on a summer morning. Shower, then pray and start digging into the first 7 verses of Philemon.
6:00 AM
Micah is up, getting ready to go to day camp with Eric. They are out the door by 6:30.
6:30 AM
Josiah yells, "Mommy!" down the steps. I groan a little. He's up early today. Then smile and go up to greet him. We have breakfast together, since his tummy is always hungry immediately upon awakening. I throw in a load of laundry.
7:00 AM
I'm in the middle of a painting project on the kids' bathroom. I can't paint in the morning with a curious 2-year-old watching my every move, but I can clean out the cupboards. It will help with the clutter in the bathroom, so I spend the next hour tossing out expired medication, band-aid wrappers (which my 8-year-old stuffed back into the cupboards after getting band-aids), and other junk.
8:00 AM
Rouse Rachel, my late sleeper. Downstairs now for a second breakfast. I change the laundry and get out my coupons for today's grocery trip. Rachel practices her math facts. She has five each week that we practice 4 times a day.
9:00 AM
Out the door to the grocery store. We hit two, and shop the sales and great Wal-Mart prices to make the biggest bang for our grocery buck. Shopping with Josiah is a fine art of negotiation. I tell him that at Wal-Mart today, we are going to "zoom-zoom". This is a term from the movie Bolt which means Mommy will push him in the cart so we can go fast. Josiah would rather walk, but the "zoom zoom" concept makes him more willing to ride. I have played with the idea of leaving Josiah at home while I shop, maybe on a Sat. morning, but I would deny at least 10 people a smile. He greets everyone he meets, and brightens the day of several people in the process.
10:50 AM
Home! I made great time today, and spent less than usual. We scramble to put groceries away and put on swim clothes. I had promised we would have lunch and spend an early afternoon at the pool.
11:15 AM
Ready to go! We climb into the van, and start our trip to State Farm Pool. As we back out of the drive, I make a mental note to tell Eric to put Josiah's small basketball hoop away, as he never plays with it. I forget about the construction and take Main Street.
11:45 AM
After construction delays and a quick stop at the bank, we finally arrive at the pool. I make a mental note to take Veteran's Parkway home. We order our lunch.
12:00 PM
Lunch is finally ready! I'm given a free cookie for our wait. We dig in, hungry.
12:20 PM
Time to hit the pool. The kids enjoy the "tot pool," then we head over to the bigger pool for about two minutes before deciding to try out the lazy river. I go around with Josiah twice. It feels great to sit and float! Off to the spray area, where Josiah sprays an unprepared woman holding a now-soaked magazine who had been chatting with her friend. They giggle hysterically. I am thankful for their patient response, not sure mine would have been quite the same. Then I realize they are sitting near spraying water, so must have been willing to take their chances. I choose a chair, pull it back a few feet and let the kids run wild.
1:40 PM
We climb in the van and head home. On Veteran's. It takes 20 minutes instead of 30.
2:00 PM
Josiah is down for his afternoon nap, two hours late. He falls asleep in less than two minutes. I finish painting the bathroom. Several more loads of laundry are done and folded. Rachel practices her math facts a couple of times.
4:00 PM
I lay down on the couch, wondering why I am so exhausted. Instantly I am asleep. When Eric and Micah come home at 4:30, I don't want to budge.
5:00 PM
We wake Josiah up from his nap. Supper time! Thankfully we have lots of leftovers to choose from tonight. Rachel practices her math facts. Eric and I discuss what to do about the Japanese beetles that are eating the leaves off our fruit trees. I change the laundry while Eric and the older kids clear the table.
6:00 PM
I run two bags of clothes to a neighbor's house, and a recipe is tucked in another neighbor's door. Not sure she uses her front door much, I make a mental note to call and tell her it is there.
6:15 PM
Out of steam, Eric and I sit down to watch a movie the kids checked out from the library this week. It is very good, but Josiah is jealous and wants me to watch him. I spend two hours craning my head around his, as he climbs on and off my lap, and looks at me to say, "Hi!" about 50 times.
8:00 PM
Older kids join the neighbor kids outside. Josiah gets a bath and heads off to bed. I change the laundry.
9:30 PM
Everyone is in bed, including me. I instantly fall asleep, realizing I never had time to call the Pantagraph. The windows are closed tonight, so hopefully we will sleep through the 4 AM party this time.
11:15 PM
We wake up to our dog pacing the floor. We can hear distant thunder. Suddenly there is a loud crack, and the wind howls. We grab the kids and head to the basement. Almost as soon as we get there, everything quiets.
11:30 PM
Everyone back to bed. In the morning we discover our small basketball hoop has blown over, and the two bricks that held it in place are just inches from the front of Eric's car. One of our small and worst-infested apple trees has snapped off at the base.
11:45 PM
Eric puts the still pacing, panting, thunderstorm-stricken dog in the garage for the night. We finally fall asleep to stay.

It's exhausting, but I wouldn't trade this job for the world. Sometimes, though, I wouldn't mind a bit more sleep.

how often has this been true of me?

From Elisabeth Elliot's daily devotion (http://www.elisabethelliot.org/devotional.html):

Recently I committed a sin of what seemed to me unpardonable thoughtlessness. For days I wanted to kick myself around the block. What is the matter with me? I thought. How could I have acted so? "Fret not thyself because of evildoers" came to mind. In this case the evildoer was myself, and I was fretting. My fretting, I discovered, was a subtle kind of pride. "I'm really not that sort of person," I was saying. I did not want to be thought of as that sort of person. I was very sorry for what I had done, not primarily because I had failed someone I loved, but because my reputation would be smudged. When my reputation becomes my chief concern, my repentance has a hollow ring. No wonder Satan is called the deceiver. He has a thousand tricks, and we fall for them.
Lord, I confess my sin of thoughtlessness and my sin of pride. I pray for a more loving and a purer heart, for Jesus' sake.

the UK for Christ

Tomorrow Jared (my youngest brother) and Michelle (his lovely wife and my sis-in-law) leave for a mission trip to the UK with their church choir. Here is their blog if you'd like to follow them across the ocean, with your thoughts and prayers,. They are greatly needed to minister in an area that has grown cold to the message of the gospel. As Jared noted on his blog, "missionaries have commented that if the direness of the UK situation were known to US Christians, we would quickly mobilize to help them spread the hope of Christ." http://uk09.pcpc.org/

keeping it in perspective

I enjoyed a rather humorous moment in Bible study at our church this summer. We were working through an introduction on Colossians, and talking about the false teaching of legalism Paul deals with in chapter 2. Most of us had a heading in our Bible over chapter 3 that read something along the lines of "Rules for Holy Living." Many of the women bristled over the use of the word "rules." Wasn't that what Paul had just argued against in chapter 2? Living by rules? Why be loosened from them in one chapter only to be shackled again in the next?

What perhaps strikes me as most humorous is the fact I had completely missed the irony when I read that heading on my own. I've always had a rather compliant personality, and rather than resist rules, I appreciate them because they let me know what is expected of me. Please, give me some guidelines...for living, for friendship, for social situations especially, because I am completely clueless how to act without them. I'm not saying this is an aspect of my personality that is a complete asset. But it does make me easy to live with. Just let me know what the rules are, and I'll comply.

Perhaps there are some who have wondered why I am not following the rules of grammar, then, in capitalizing my blog posts? Did I miss that lesson in English class? No, not at all. But I have to admit I was delighted to think...this is my blog. Hey, that means, I get to make the rules. And break them if I want to. So I'm not gonna capitalize (or always use good grammar.) Because this is one place I can operate outside of the rules.

Maybe it is the rebel in me finally raising it's ugly head. But I have to admit there is another way to look at things.

The way I see it, God is the only true proper noun in life. All else that happens to me, to my family, the activities I post or the pictures I take, need to be viewed in their proper significance. Which is, that while I do believe each of us are significant to God, anything He does is far greater than what I can post here. I want to live in light of His greatness.

So I will keep on posting with lowercase letters.

And if He has some rules for holy living that He'd like me to follow, I'm willing to submit to His authority. God's "rules" are far different that man's, and He supplies what is needed to follow them by the resurrection power and righteousness of His Son. "So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed." (John 8:36)

big dreams

fast friends

This week Micah and Rachel have been taking their turns staying with Eric's parents in Rockford. While I know Grandma and Grandpa are enjoying their one-on-one time with each grandchild, it's been a blessing on our end as well, as our attention toward the two remaining children becomes more concentrated on each one. Rachel and Josiah spent their first day together squabbling about one thing after another, but the second day they became best buddies. Here they are, playing "road construction" together in the backyard.

Apparently they were up to other things as well. One morning I was in the midst of a cleaning frenzy, and the kids must have picked up my camera. I found these when downloading pictures today. Let us know if you are in need of an amateur photographer.

Even Eddie got a ride on the train. I wonder how much the fare is for small or stuffed dogs?

finding things that work

The past couple of weeks have been more tolerable on the home front as we have seen great gains in Josiah's behavior. It has been interesting to read books about strong-willed children (SWC's) and find out more about what is going on in their minds! As a result, Eric and I have found it helpful to phrase our directions to Josiah a little differently. Instead of "Josiah, come here and go potty," we say, "Josiah, you can walk to the bathroom to go potty, or I can carry you." We have an goal in mind we would like to see accomplished, and Josiah gets to pick how he will comply.

I've started to read Cythia Tobias' book, You Can't Make Me but I Can Be Persuaded: Strategies for Bringing Out the Best in Your Strong-Willed Child. What she says seems to reinforce the idea that a SWC often interprets a simple direction as an ultimatum. This triggers the child to fight for another way at all costs, even taking punishment to win. Cynthia is herself a SWC as well as the parent of one, so it's interesting to hear her talk about how she interprets the world around her.

In many cases, parents don't realize that what they intend as a simple directive (go to bed, sit down, stop hitting your brother) can be taken as an absolute ultimatum by the SWC. For years I have avoided patronizing a particular restaurant in our community. The reason? A neon sign in the window says, "Get in here!" My objection seems ridiculous to some of my friends, but I resent the command. What the marketing department thinks is cute, I think is insulting. Another organization specializing in family products used the motto "Go home!" Although they were trying to command attention, it created a certain amount of hostility. In several southern states numerous highway billboards advertise venues and huge red letters that simply say, "Exit now." My husband sees this as a friendly reminder of which exit he needs to take, but my strong-willed mind hears it as an imperial order: "Get off the highway now--and I mean it!" So when it's my turn to drive, I pass by the exit with those billboards. I wait until I get to a friendlier exit and work my way back however I have to.

The idea behind securing obedience from the SWC is: "tell me what you want me to do, but give me some control over how your directions will be carried out. Let me problem-solve, give me choices, but please, recognize that I am intelligent enough to come up with a workable plan to do what you are asking of me." As parents, we maintain authority while sharing control with the child. Control...now you're speaking the language of the SWC.

I'm trying to help the kids pick up on our tactics, as they are often issuing stern commands at their youngest brother, who then digs in his heels and yells "NO!" at the top of his lungs. But they have noticed what we are doing works and I sometimes hear, "Josiah, you can give me the toy or else go to time-out." Well, we have a little more work to do with them. But there are less power struggles over all, and that is a very good thing when you're living with an exuberant strong-willed 2-year-old.

Where are Eric and Micah today?

At the Rebelution Conference in Chicago at Moody Church. You can go here for the promo video but reading the book Do Hard Things is even better whether or not you are a teenager. Micah is at the young end for this conference geared to 10-20 year olds, but we're praying he will catch a vision for a different kind of mindset for his teen years.
http://www.therebelution.com/conference/

New Song by Meredith Andrews

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfEO5zdh4tk

Eph. 2:13-16
But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

Colossians 1:19-22, 3:1, 3
For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him...If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God...For you have died, and you life is hidden with Christ in God.

To Eric

The day I married you was the best day of my life...until every day after that. Where did 15 years go? Happy Anniversary to my best friend.

today's Duplo builder, tomorrow's engineer

Josiah says his plane has "wings, a nose, and a propeller."

I made it all by myself!

the learning curve

Note to self next time we spend a morning out:
-take stickers
-take snack
-take imagination for anything that might keep a 2-year-old busy
-take 2 Tylenol for the headache you will develop if you forget to be prepared

This morning was our annual trip to the allergy doctor, followed by a few errands. It did not go well. It is amazing how much trouble an energetic toddler can have in a room that is only 6x8, and sparsely (i.e. not!) furnished with toys. I later carried him to the van, kicking and screaming, from our errand to deposit money in the kids' bank accounts. Apparently the list of things I had to accomplish this morning were quite different from Josiah's list. Add a hungry tummy and a bored mind, and you have a recipe for disaster. I should have known better.

When I share that I have learned a lot from Kendra Smiley's book about how to help my strong-willed child, I do not mean to say that I have arrived. There is a lot left to learn, and it keeps me on my toes with Josiah and on my knees before God.

So, just who qualifies as a strong-willed child? Dr. James Dobson writes that a strong-willed child "seems to be born with a clear idea of how he (or she) wants the world to be operated and an intolerance for those who disagree." In his book on the subject, Dobson goes on to say, "Just as surely as some children are naturally compliant....there are others who seem to be looking for a fight upon exit from the womb. Such a child comes into the world smoking a cigar and barking orders in the delivery room." Kendra adds a few other aspects to this definition. A strong-willed child is very (not enough room for all the very's) persistent and is even willing to take punishment to win. He does not like to be controlled and will strive to control anything that may threaten to control to him.

This idea that there can be a child who would be willing to take punishment to win was completely foreign to me. I had it in my mind that misbehavior+consequences=repentant child. When that was not working with Josiah, I wondered what I was doing wrong.

Yet a strong-willed child does need discipline, and discipline is effective over time. There are a few things I have had to learn:

1. A strong-willed child is waging a battle for control. This is why living with one seems like a fight. There is a constant struggle for who will be in authority.
2. As a parent, you must choose your battles wisely.
3. When you choose a battle, you must win.
4. Punishment must be administered lovingly, consistently, and without emotion (meaning the parent must maintain control of his/her emotions).
5. Parenting a strong-willed child is a marathon and the battle won't be won in a day, week, or month. It will continue for the duration of childhood. As a parent, I must keep the big picture in mind.

That last point is a good place to end for now. I can become discouraged about the morning Josiah and I had, frustrated with his behavior, and beaten down with humiliation (this all happened in public, after all!) Or, I can shake off the dust, remember what we have both learned, and keep on keeping on.

As my son's future depends on it, I must choose to persevere.