A Little Excited About Thanksgiving

My Peter, a food lover, regards Thanksgiving Day as heaven on earth. To say he's a bit excited is an understatement; the boy can't get it off his mind. Yesterday he wrote two recipes and handed them to me with great pride. Today he made construction paper leaves as a centerpiece for the table, topping them with a small pumpkin in the center.

Something to make you smile below--especially his measurings.

Peter's homemade Thanksgiving gravy

Ingredents

4 tespons peper
1 tespon garlik sat
1 cup water
4 tespoons meat dropings

Derechens

In small pot mix in ingredents. Ster till done.

Serve imedinley. Duble for mor than 4 pepol.

Peter's Green Bens

4 cups fresh gren bens
1 cup butter
1/2 tespon sallt

Chop bens, put in stemer, mix with butter and salt.

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When Peter first brought his recipes to me, I was delighted by his enthusiasm, but appalled by his spelling--which in first drafts, is easily 2+ years behind. It's hard to witness his first drafts and not despair.

I remember several months back when he began showering instead of bathing. No longer interested in tub toys, he wanted to get in there, get the job done, and get out. He loved the hot water and the time alone to relax.

Not having any supervision, however, meant that at first he found the washing process confusing. I explained the process as a top-down regimen. Hair, then face and ears, then neck and armpits, etc.

He began having fits every night. Horrible fits. I couldn't understand how these steps could be so overwhelming to him. It seemed so easy to me, to think of it as top down, washing everything.

Finally, after a couple weeks, I posted a list high on the bathroom wall, next to the shower. The fits stopped. About six weeks later the list fell down, from too much moisture on the tape. I replaced it, but he told me he no longer needed it.

Lately, when we tackle the misspelled words from his writing, he tells me, "I'm sorry, I knew that wasn't the right spelling."


Remembering the shower incidents, I had an epiphany, of sorts. The problem wasn't that he couldn't spell. He just couldn't spell and write at the same time. He had to focus his brain on one or the other, because of the ADHD.

Now that I have a second special-needs child, I'm learning new lessons.

Each Sunday morning, watching my arthritic daughter walk down the school hall where our church rents space, I ache for the time, not so long ago, when she scurried down a hallway like any other toddler or preschooler. Now she looks....well, handicapped--especially since it's morning and her gait is at its worst.

This morning I saw something new in her gait and had a moment of panic. Was her right ankle now affected? Why was she swinging her leg around like that, before planting it?

Everyone who looked at her was smiling. Yes, they noticed her unusual gait, but they didn't focus on it. Instead, they focused on her gorgeous smile, and the fact that she looked insanely happy.

Her smile, the Holy Spirit said to me. Focus on her smile. It was as if he was telling me, she's not suffering like you think. She's taking this in stride because of my grace. Believe in my ability to provide her with divine grace, beyond your understanding. I love her mightily, and I will care for her. The situation is never as it seems to you, on the outside looking in.

Beth, it is true, is the best candidate (of all my children) to have a chronic pain disorder. She has a lovely, shining, sweet spirit. She seeks happiness and laughter always.

Our task as mothers--whether our kids are special needs or not--is to focus on what makes our children shine. What makes them beautiful? What gifts do they have, instilled in them by a loving God, who made them fearfully and wonderfully?

We always have a choice: focus on their weaknesses, or focus on what makes them special in the eyes of their Father, at the work of His hands. Addressing weaknesses and focusing on weaknesses are two different things.

If I didn't have two special-needs children, I don't know that I would have this clarity, this often. Oh...it would occur to me on occasion, sure, but not like this. There are many gifts in disability, and I think I'm just brushing the surface.


photo credit

Sorry For My Self-Righteousness

Sorry about the self-righteousness of the Christmas post. Even though I don't go on these Compassion trips, I still have some "re-entry" problems after them. It's hard to reconcile first-world values with pressing world need, but self-righteousness is never the answer. 

The Christ in Christmas

Edited to add: Sorry about the self-righteousness here. Even though I don't go on these Compassion trips, I still have some "re-entry" problems after them. It's hard to reconcile first-world values with pressing world need, but self-righteousness is never the answer. 


Have you noticed something peculiar lately?

Christmas now comes after Halloween.

I find it audacious that retailers switched the order of our holidays, without consulting us. But then, I only go to Walmart, so perhaps it's just Sam Walton and Co.?

I used to like Christmas, but that changed about six years ago, when we went to one income. Did you know Christmas is something you have to afford? If that's never occurred to you before, you haven't been hard up. Or maybe you never celebrated an American Christmas to begin with.

Even taking away all the presents and decorations and greeting cards and special outings, holiday food itself stretches a grocery budget, unless you stick to the basics.

If you lose your income, what's left of this holiday? If it's not the presents, decorations, cards, or big meals, what is it? What is Christmas--given that Christ was probably born in the fall, and no one from the Bible actually celebrated Christmas, beyond that first one featuring baby Jesus in the manger?

There's nothing wrong with remembering the gift we have in Christ's birth. His birth means everything to the Christian. Without it, we have nothing but the Law.

So, looking at the word Christ in Christmas, are we to contemplate and give thanks for Christ, more than we normally would in our busy schedules?  Most breadwinners do get at least one day off for Christmas, giving us more time for contemplation and thanksgiving, if we slow down.

Let me offer something else here. What about contemplating and acting out the lessons Christ came to teach?


Mark 12:30-31

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

When vast amounts of money are spent in decorating houses already more lavish than what 94% of the world lives in, and more money is spent buying gifts for people who already have everything they need to overflowing, are we practicing anything at all that Christ taught?

Let's review the American Christmas. We don't slow down to contemplate and give thanks for the unfathomable gift that Christ is to us. In fact, we speed up this time of year. That speeding up indicates we aren't loving God like this:  with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.

And we don't love our neighbor as ourselves in this season, either. Giving gifts to people who don't have what they need would satisfy this commandment. For this is how we would want to be loved: To be cared for in our time of need (including loneliness, not just physical need). To not be forgotten.

We all need to contemplate what Christmas should be, not what it is. When shopping this year, rethink buying something for someone who already has everything they need. How does this honor Christ and what he taught?  How does it commemorate anything, other than first-world greed?

We're to be set apart for Christ. That means we don't do what everyone else does; we don't love the world. We love Christ and we do what Christ does.

Christmas occurs in the heart, not at the check-out counter.

1 John 2:15
Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

Romans 12:2
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will.

James 1:27
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.

Literary Adventures With Daddy

Reading to my boys every night proved such a blessing, for years. So many moments with children count as icing on the cake, but nighttime reading? It's my all-time favorite.

When my husband started working days a few months ago, arriving home at 7 PM, he took over the nighttime novel readings, allowing me more time with the girls at their tuck-in time.

How I miss that time with Peter and Paul, but since Daddy only gets a couple hours per day with the children, sharing great books together has been so rich for all three of my men. However, when Beth is finished nursing, I definitely want to switch back and forth with husband on the tuck-ins.

In these last months my men enjoyed Pippi Longstocking, Pippi in the South Seas, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and The Wheel On The School. Included as well were a few Eleanor Estes picks--Pinky Pye, The Middle Moffatt, and Ruphus M.--books the boys enjoyed so much, they reread them during the day, after Daddy finished them.


















All these books were recommended in Honey For A Child's Heart.



Needing a new book for them, I perused the Newbery shelf at the library yesterday, finding Rascal, by Sterling North, which is also recommended in Honey For A Child's Heart. Though I had a truckload of groceries to put away after all were in bed, plus dishes, I sat on the floor with this book, thinking I'd just give it a quick peek before tackling the kitchen.



It was so good, I stayed on the floor from 9:30 PM to 11:30 PM, not wanting to put it down (or realizing how long I'd been there). Miss Beth awoke at 11:30, which is better than most nights, but it broke my literary dream bubble.

Oh, how you'll love Rascal! Autobiographical, it details one year in an 11-year-old boy's Wisconsin life (set in 1918), featuring his heartwarming friendship with a raccoon, whom he named Rascal and raised from a nursling. The main character, Sterling, lost his mother at age 7. During his eleventh year he was quite lonely, what with his distant though kind, absent-minded father often on business trips, his brother fighting in France in WW1, and his two beloved sisters off as adults, living their lives.

I didn't read it word for word, but I gave a good skim to most chapters. How wholesome, heartwarming, and enchanting this story proved to be! And beautifully written, I tell you. While probably best for boys, I must say that as a girl, I still found it a can't-put-down read.

There are perhaps two paragraphs Christian parents might want to leave out (confirmed by a Christian site I checked). One details how Sterling's biologist mother reconciled her Christian beliefs with evolution (common among Christians at this time), and the other being a few sentences about Sterling asking a Methodist preacher why his mother had to die, and then deeming the answer unsatisfactory. He does have faith, as evidenced in other parts, but it isn't yet mature.

Still, most books written in the early 1900's depict a Christian lifestyle, and this one is no exception. The Bible is read in the story, for example. Sterling is very sweet and innocent and his adventures prove exciting and endearing. The relationship he develops with Rascal, his raccoon, is very special, to say the least. Kids will understand his love for Rascal and they'll never want this book to end.

I didn't.

Especially when I looked up and remembered my kitchen.

Unless you have a teenager on your hands, the book is best as a read-aloud. Here are the specifics below, from Scholastic's site. Their grade level equivalents are different from Accelerated Reading levels:

Interest Level: Grade 4 - Grade 6

Grade Level Equivalent: 7.8

Lexile® measure: 1080L

Guided Reading: NR

Genre/Theme:
Biography and Autobiography
Young Adult

Find other books by Sterling North at this site: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/43889.Sterling_North

Blessings on Tuesday

My Gratitude List

 I am thankful for.....

...my Peter, who this morning came up to me with Mr. Popper's Penguins in his hand, exclaiming, "I love this book!  Was it recommended in Honey For A Child's Heart?" Yes, it was!  In looking for the Amazon link, I see it appears to have made it to the big screen? Without cable we're oblivious to movies that come and go, and I haven't seen the inside of a movie theater in three years. I just hope kids will still read the book? Movies sometimes discourage curiosity about books, unfortunately.





...the way little Beth loves the binoculars and carries them around for fun, despite their weight. She loves looking at birds and pretending she's on safari. We're going to the library momentarily and she wants to bring them. I see no harm, though I'm not sure my husband would agree. Don't tell on me? Someone at this library loves stuffed animals. Literally, you'll find at least two hundred stuffed animal puppets (and a puppet theater)  My kids have a blast with it, and I'm sure Beth will get some good safari pretending in. She says binoculars so cutely, I can't resist her right now.

...my Paul, who right now is playing a pretend football game down the hallway next to me, featuring himself against himself. He is calling the plays, running them, defending them, breathing hard, and having himself a blast.

...my Mary, who loves to write messages. I find them everywhere. She often comes up to me, with hopeful, begging eyes, asking me what her messages say. Out of love and mercy, I always come up with at least one word, though she writes from right to left still. She's beginning to understand the sound/symbol relationship, and soon, she will sound out three-letter words. When she asks the boys about her messages, they tell her the truth. It doesn't say anything. Then she lets out a frustrated cry, not because of ugliness, per say, but because she's so determined--the most determined of my kids, and the most stubborn. Paul prefers to teach himself and it works for him....he's so focused. Mary will take after him--as little instruction as possible, only to keep her from going astray in her knowledge.

...my husband, who understands my frustration with Beth's many wake-ups and helps as best he can. Her wake-ups make it hard to sit down at all in the evening--to enjoy a cup of cocoa or conversation, or anything else, for that matter. He does the dishes for me when Beth is having a particularly bad night. When she sleeps, her knees get stiff from the inactivity. Then, when her body wants to change positions, it hurts to move, thus waking her.

...all the Compassion International staff who give selflessly and love abundantly. They are my heros. I wish I could give each of them a big hug. There's so little I can do, and so much they do. They see such pain, yet they instill Hope and bring about redemption, through the power of the Holy Spirit. They are not easily discouraged; He has equipped them for this labor of love.


...a letter from Divya, who writes that with the $15 she bought a jacket, a new dress, and some sweets. And what did she do with the sweets, which she probably rarely sees? She took them to church, to share with all her friends. I can't even write it without tears. What volumes that spoke to my own children's hearts, and to ours. She is so sweet.

I ache to send more so that her parents can start a business or generate income in some way. They are both laborers, working only part of the year. But I have to remember. Lack of money isn't the real problem. If God wanted Divya to receive $500, he certainly has it in the bank. Agreed? God owns the earth and everything in it. He waited for my heart and he will use its fruit. He will multiply it, beyond a jacket and a dress and some sweets. Hallelujah!

He is waiting for the heart of every person living in plenty. For us to be willing to share, as Divya shared her candy. God will take care of the rest.

And if we don't share, after knowing the need? Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. We are studying Revelation and I know something more about God's vengeance. Just as His love couldn't be more beautiful, His vengeance couldn't be more ugly. He is to be feared!


The injustice isn't His. It's ours. We are Christians and we were saved to be the hands and feet of Jesus here on earth--not just to enjoy eternity.

You know, and I know. But how many still don't know? What can we do to spread the word? Let's commit this to prayer as the Body of Christ--for even in our churches, it isn't known. There is evidence of plenty, of waste, in almost every church I attend. Love your neighbor as yourself isn't fully understood, and how can we change that, as the Body of Christ?

It starts with our own heart, with our own prayers. How do you want to use me, Lord, from my little corner of the world? Make me your instrument of mercy and grace.

1 John 3:15-18


¹⁶ This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. ¹⁷ If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? ¹⁸ Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. source