Two Peas in a Pod

Two years ago today, we added another daughter to our fold, when youngest son Kyle married Dani.  Dani was an only child and how she blends in so well with this huge, loud, crazy family we will never know, but we are sure blessed that she does.  Two months after they were married, Kyle's sisters Karen and Jamie each gave birth less than forty eight hours apart.  I remember reading Dani's facebook post that read "I'm an aunt again for the second time in two days!  I love this family!"  How could we not fall in love with a girl like that!

When Kyle first started kindergarten, he was in the same class as a sweet special needs girl named Tristan.  Teachers constantly told me how compassionate and kind Kyle was to Tristan.  I was told that for many years the school made sure that they were both in the same class because Kyle was so helpful to her.  In junior high and high school, it was common for Tristan to see him across the track field or gym and run across to say hi and give him a big hug.  One time when a carnival was in town, Tristan's mother looked for Kyle to ask him if he would take Tristan on a few of the rides.  Tristan moved to a much bigger town, three hours away, when her and Kyle were Sophomore's in high school.  Occasionally he would get a text from her on the phone, but other than that, Tristan was just a fond memory.

Unbeknown to us, in the town that Tristan moved to was another Sophomore named Dani.  Their class had two hundred and fifty kids in it instead of the forty some that were in Kyle's class.  Nevertheless, Dani noticed Tristan and she always made a point to visit with her and help her out if she ever saw her having trouble with anything.  Several years later, Kyle attended college in Dani and Tristan's home town.  Kyle and Dani met and the rest, as they say, is history.

When their wedding day arrived, Tristan was one of the invited guests and her Mom and Dad brought her to the reception and dance.  She was so excited to see both Dani and Kyle and to be a part of their big day.  During the dance, several times through the night, we would see either Dani or Kyle dancing with Tristan.  At one time, we looked up and they were sitting on the edge of the stage with Tristan in between them!  Typically, they didn't worry one bit about themselves, or about it being "their day", but instead made sure she felt completely welcome and included.  

Now, two years later, they have both finished their first year of teaching special ed students.  They both love their jobs and you can tell they have a passion and love for the children they teach.   I know people say that opposites attract, but other than the only child / big family thing, Dani and Kyle seem to have an awfully lot in common.  We sure are glad their "pod" happens to be in our area, and I've been told there are a few parents and students who feel the same way!

Wiggy

Today is our granddaughter's birthday, she is seven years old.  She has a beautiful given name, it is Kierstyn Denae, but when she was a squrimy little toddler her Daddy started calling her "wiggles", it got dropped to Wiggy and it stuck.  I'm sure when she's older she will ask us to quit calling her Wiggy and call her by her name.  I have to admit, it will take some concentration to do so.  I honestly have to stop and think what her name is, she will always be Wiggy to me!

If you had a slang dictionary and looked up "Cute as a Bug's Ear, there would have to be a picture of Wiggy! She has long dark hair that almost touches her waist, dark brown eyes and the cutest speckling of freckles across her nose and cheeks.  And she is as sweet as she is cute.  The typical middle child, she is always willing to give into the others demands.  She gives the best hugs ever!  She loves to play board games and she loves school.  When you ask her what her favorite part of school is, she says "Oh the work!  I just love the work!"  And it shows.  Although she is just now finishing kindergarten she is reading at a third grade level or beyond.


Wiggy's vocabulary has always been huge for her age and some of the words she would use in the correct way would absolutely amaze us!  But even though she had an amazing vocabulary, Wiggy was hard to understand for most of the years of her life.  She had a hard time saying many sound combinations.  Clear up until she started school last fall we would often have to ask her Mom to interpret what she was was trying to say.  She just graduated from speech class.  At her last meeting the speech teacher asked Wiggy how she felt like she was doing and Wiggy immediately said that she thought she was doing good but there was one word she couldn't say right.  The teacher asked her what it was and she told her "geo-cache".  So they worked and before the session was over she could say geo-cache with the best of them!

One of my favorite Wiggy stories took place shortly after they had moved to a new town and her older brother had had a bad day at school because of someone picking on the new kid.  Her mamma had all the kids in one room saying there night time prayers.  As they were praying that things would go better for Kyson the next day, Karen said thank you that Kyson had other friends and a family who loved him and could help him through any future hard times with this particular boy.  Right then, with much enthusiasm, Wiggy jumped up and shouted "And for a PaPa who'll burn his house down if we ask him to!"  (She had easily come to this conclusion because hubby Mark can get rather passionate when he thinks one of his own is being picked on!)

I can't believe she is seven years old already.  My word time flies.  How many times do we hear that said but Wow, is it ever true!  So Happy Birthday Miss Wiggy!  I love you very very much and am looking forward to years and years of fun and laughter with you, and someday you and I will go hunt geo-cache's all day long!

Anxious thoughts

Quickly reading through two articles in the paper today made me pause.  The first one was about the search for missing victims of the massive tornado's in the south.  It told of a father who was present when the body of his twenty one year old son who was a college student in Alabama was found among the debris and twisted trees.  The father kneeled down and caressing his son's face started talking to him, telling him how much he loved him, how proud he was of him and how much he would be missed.  Having son's close to that age, it was easy to put my son's faces on that young man.  The horror of what those poor people have been living hit me like a ton of bricks.

 Next, I read about a Rwanda woman who was testifying at a trial against a man who carried out ethnic cleansing murders against her entire village, killing her husband and three young children.  Reading stories like this make me ask so many questions.  How can such horror be happening to others while I am safe here in my own home and my concerns are so trivial they are laughable.  How do people go on after something like that happens to them?  Why have I had such an easy life, nothing truly bad ever coming my way or to the ones I love?  And the big one...would I keep my faith if it did?

I've read countless stories and personal testimonies from people who have endured the worst imaginable things.  People like Corrie Tin Boom who was imprisoned in a Nazi camp and lost her sister there who not only kept her faith through it all but who's faith was strengthened.  Or the man who wrote the hymn, "It is well with my soul", who wrote it the morning after all four of his children drowned at sea.  Or Elizabeth Elliot who's husband was speared to death by the Auca Indians in South America and went on to live and teach in the very village of the people who killed him.  Would I be that strong?  Would I be able to praise Jesus name if a trial like that came my way?  Oh Lord, I hope and pray I would, but I can't say with certainty what I would do because I have never had my faith tested in that way.  It's easy to sound all pious and say I put my trust in the Lord when I live as charmed a life as I do, but what would I say or do if was all taken away from me?  On the other hand, I can't imagine how anyone could ever get through a tragedy without Jesus taking them by the hand, guiding them, loving them, comforting them.  I have a feeling these are common feelings, if I am anything, I am just a common person.  I think the only thing I can do is make sure my relationship with Christ is strong.  Make reading his word and praying the most important part of everyday.  Ask him each day to strengthen my faith.  Ask him in advance for the grace, spiritual maturity and strength I will need for any future trial.

After the last paragraph, I was interrupted by a phone call from hubby, needing me to make a "parts run".  On the way to town I prayed and thought about all these things and Jesus reminded me of two very important things he said to all of us.  Number one - Don't worry about tomorrow, today has enough worries of it's own and tomorrow will take care of itself. (Matthew 6:34)  Number two - My grace is sufficient for you, for when you are weak, I am strong!  (2 Corinthians 12:9)

All I've got to say is Wow!  How amazing is He?!?  How much calmer my heart feels after hearing those words.  If he is concerned enough about me to know exactly what I need and comfort me over anxious thoughts, how much more is He there when someone has fallen into the deepest darkest pit?  Lord Jesus, I pray for all the people today, trying to put their lives back together after a storm or the loss of loved ones.  Lord, in my comfort and peaceful place today, let me not forget that others need lifted up.  Please let them feel your presence so strongly, please show them how to lean on you, please hold them close in your arms.  Let them feel your peace that transcends all understanding.  Amen

Egg Hunt

This weekend we celebrated one of our annual family traditions. We don't buy our children birthday presents, I don't even do cards, they just get a "happy birthday dude" on the phone or facebook.  I have on occasion even forgotten to do that!  With our bunch totaling twenty seven, we have to keep our Christmas's modest, so, we do other things through the year and one of those things is an Easter Egg hunt for the big "kids", ranging in age from twenty three years to thirty nine!

This year each colored egg was worth one dollar and camouflage eggs were mostly worth $5, but a few had $10, and a couple had $20 written in them.  We usually schedule it on Saturday of Easter weekend, as most of them spend Easter with their other families.  With a family this size we have found it easier to let the other families have the actual holidays and we celebrate on other days so we can all be together.  They all came for lunch, this year it was spaghetti and we were treated to the usual trash talk about who would be the champion!  After we clean up the dishes, we loaded up the bus and headed to where Pa and I had hidden the plastic eggs.  I did my best to explain the boundaries, but they were so hyped and anxious to get started they didn't listen.  I know this because they were constantly screaming to ask us if there were any up here or over here and I had to scream the boundaries again.  I have to scream over Mark who is screaming at them that they should have listened the first time.  Soon, there are shouts of "CAMO EGG!", followed by "GOOD JOB HONEY!".  Meanwhile Grandpa and Grandma corral the grandkids and we hide candy for them in a different area so they have something to hunt too.  After about forty five minutes we gathered to count eggs.  Knowing there were thirty two camouflage eggs and only twenty were found some headed back out again, but many stayed behind being too pooped to go on looking.  Eventually even the "die hards" give up, accepting the fact that some of the eggs will stay hidden forever!  Back at home we sat down and counted out each couple's eggs and I paid out the loot.  There was much hootin' and howlerin' and braggin' by the winners, and pictures were taken of each couple and their haul!  This years winning couple was Ryan and Karen.

The kids always look forward to it, but they always tell us "you don't have to do this guy's".  We know that, and we probably won't do it forever, but  right now we all enjoy it.  We get a kick out of creating fun for the Daddy's and Mommy's who we watch put so much time and effort into doing things for their own children.  We have as much fun, if not more, planning the day, the place, and hiding the eggs as they do finding them.  And as hard as it is to make ends meet as a young family, our goal is that they will all find enough to take their family out to a movie or dinner.  We love making memories with them.  But most of all, we love watching thirty-somethings take out running across a field with a sack in their hand, searching for plastic easter eggs and how excited they get when they find one.  I guess it is true, there's a little kid inside of each of us, no matter what our age!

Rebuke a Wise Man

My bible reading plan has me in Proverbs this week.  It is one of those books you can't help but love and can have new revelations every time you open it up.  Such was the case again today.  In Proverbs Chapter nine I read:

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." Verse 10

"The woman Folly is loud, she is undisciplined and without knowledge."  Verse 13

"Do not rebuke a fool or he will hate you, but rebuke a wise  man and he will love you"  Verse 8

When I look around today, I think how very true!  The so called educated leaders, news people, and other celebrities think they are so wise but they don't have a clue and are running our country into the dirt.  They mock people who believe in God and have done everything in their power to take him out of any public arena.  No wonder, because they have no fear of God, they have no wisdom or understanding.  They are full of folly, they are definitely undisciplined, spending this country to the brink of bankruptcy.  And heaven forbid that someone may point out that they may be wrong or a different idea may work better.  That just opens up more finger pointing and hateful jabs back at that person.  Both sides seem to be concerned with only one thing, keeping themselves in power.  How long can a country last when their leaders only produce legislation that will buy them votes and keep their party in power instead of what would be good for the country?

But enough about other people. (Isn't that typical, how many times do we read the bible and think "YEAH!  So and so needs to read that!!!)  I don't think that was God's intended use for his scriptures but one I've been guilty of many many times.  These three verses speak volumes about my life.  I can't think of a truer statement about me than "when I came to know the Lord it was the beginning of wisdom and knowledge in my life."  Not to say by any means that I know it all, far from that, but it opened up the path for God to reveal new things to me each and every day.  Before that time, I was the woman "Folly".  I was loud, undisciplined and without knowledge.  Believe me, I can still be that woman, but because I know the Lord, I am sensitive to his desire for my life and open to his rebuke. 

 Which brings me to the third verse, verse eight.  How difficult a verse to put into action in my own personal life.  "Do not rebuke a fool or he will hate you, but rebuke a wise man and he will love you".  I can remember when I was a teenager my mother saying, "Norma, you are not very good at taking criticism" and I would think, "Well who would be!"  But as God points out in this verse, it is to my own benefit when someone shows me where I may be wrong or something I can do better.  How easy, foolish, and childish  it is to become defensive and lash back at the person who said something to me.  How humble to contemplate what was said and discern if there may be an element of truth to it.  How wise I would be, if I realize the person was right, to not only not be mad at them, but to thank them for their concern for me and their courage to speak up.   I don't even think it is humanly possible, it is only with the grace of the Lord that I could ever accomplish this, but it is definitely a goal worth working toward.  Because after all, I  want to be the best person, best mother, best wife, best daughter of Christ that I can be.  If  I am falling short in some way, and someone on the outside looking in sees it, and lovingly makes me aware, it will only help me accomplish those goals better.  Probably one of the hardest criticism's to take would be from someone who isn't on the outside looking in, but rather from someone who is on the inside with me, like a husband, or a child, or a parent.  I know I would (and have) immediately start thinking about all the things that they do wrong in my eyes and be ready to let them have it with both barrels!  But, I just can't seem to pull out of these verses anything that remotely says that is the way to react wisely.

Off the beaten path

 Update:  Mark feels great!  Better than he has in twelve years!  They told him there wasn't anything right about the way his former pacemaker leads were put in.  They were too short, looped wrong and the ends were even placed in the wrong part of his heart.  No wonder the poor dude has felt like warmed over death this past decade!   Amazing how the arrogant, "thought they were God's gift to cardiology" doctors with the big fancy office got it so wrong so many years ago and how the humble, down to earth doctors we have now got it right!  (Sorry, I'm not a fan of arrogant doctors!)  But, bless Mark's heart, not once have I heard him lament the loss of health for twelve years of his life, I have only heard him express gratitude that he finally feels good again.  In fact he keeps getting on me to send a thank you card to his cardiologist and surgeon!

Now, he is determined to keep the "good" times going, so we are trying to eat as healthy as two people who love to eat can, and walking anywhere from three to five miles every morning.  We could be the human form of those commercials that were on TV a while back for some weight loss drug that showed the little stick man shrinking down to nothing while his poor little chubby stick wife keeps looking the same. He has shed about ten pounds and looks fantastic, while I, on the other hand, keep watching the scale stay stuck on the same line day after day after day! But that really is alright.  I feel good and I know that eating right and exercising at our age is more about health and feeling good than it is about skinny jeans.

 



But even more than that, our walks are like a mini vacation every day!  And I have Mark to thank for that.  He announced the first day that he can't stand just walking the road.  He wants to be able to see new things.  I thought, "OK, and exactly how are you going to do that, we can only walk four different directions from our house and it pretty much all looks the same."  I couldn't have been more wrong.  We do off-road walking!    He talks to the land owners around us and gets their permission and we and our dog Shadow head out cross country through pastures and wheat fields and I absolutely love it.  I never know which way we're heading.  He makes that decision and is always thinking of new places to take me and it is a surprise each morning.  Last night I heard him talking to someone on the phone and when I asked who he had been talking to he said he was getting permission from someone to take me on a walk through a new place.  Occasionally, we load up in the pickup and drive a short ways to get to where he wants us to walk.  I had no idea the beauty that surrounds me and all within five miles of home!   We've seen a newborn colt who wasn't even dry yet, countless deer, had turkeys run right in front of us and fly into a tree, and watched dozens of gorgeous sunrises.  We've walked though the plum thicket groves in full bloom, walked to many farm ponds and watched Shadow learn how to swim in them, walked by the river and collected all sorts of

interesting treasures to show the grandkids like different animal skulls and deer antlers.  We've come upon some amazing deep gullies, climbed down into shadowy basins and climbed up some very steep cliffs to get out of them that left us laughing and catching our breath when we finally reached the top. I am always so glad that my phone takes pictures so I could capture some of the truly breathtaking scenery stretched out before us.  I tell him every morning that I feel like I'm on vacation, traveling down a scenic walking trail.  What a wonderful way to start our days!  Gotta go, I've got some thank you cards to write!

Buck Pee and Syrup

Today is my oldest Grandson Brett's eleventh birthday.  Brett is an interesting child to say the least!  When he was a toddler, he didn't give his mother a moment's slack.  Now, he hardly ever gives his mother a moments trouble.  A couple of the adventures he sent his mamma on are definitely worth archiving in our families history blog!

Adventure number one started with a frantic phone call from daughter Kristi.  Brett was about two years old and good mommy that she was, she called me instead of beating her little darling within a inch of his life.  Seems little Brett found the syrup bottle and took it to his parents bedroom, popped the top and proceeded to squirt it across the shoes in the closet, on their clothes, jumped up on the bed leaving a trail of syrup everywhere he went.  There was syrup on each blanket, each sheet, each pillow, each shoe, each wall, well, pretty much every inch of their bedroom.  When I answered the phone, I heard, "OKAY!  Give it to me straight!  What am I doing wrong as a parent and what can I do differently because I don't think this is what normal children do!!!!"  I assured her that normal toddlers can get into things you would never imagine but she  assured me that she had been around toddlers all her life being the oldest of six children and she didn't care if it was normal she honestly wanted to know what I had observed in her parenting and what I would do differently.  Wow!  How many mothers ever have that questioned posed to them?  (That is just an example of Kristi's humility and willingness to learn from others.  We have often commented on this positive trait of hers.) But truthfully I had not witnessed any grievous parenting mistake but she pressed me to come up with something because "She was turning this child around!"

So, I told her the only piece of parental advice I have ever given any of my children.  You are the boss!  The child is not the boss.  If you want them to do something or want them not to do something, say it once and mean it.  Choose your battles carefully, because if you tell them not to do something and then later decide that it really was no big deal and let them do it, it sends the wrong message to them, the message that if they just keep trying they will get you to cave.  Don't worry about what other people expect out of their children, different families have different rules and expectations.  Each family will learn what is important and what works for them.  But make sure they know what you expect out of them, and again, YOU are the boss, they aren't.  In too many families it's the other way around.

Grandpa loves to tell the syrup story as well as the one below.  He always finishes it by saying he doesn't know what Kristi did to Bert (what he calls Brett) that night and he probably doesn't want to know, but he was a completely different kid after that, a model child who never got into anything.  I don't think that was probably the case, but you know how grandpa's love to exaggerate!


The next story I'm not for sure where it fit into the timeline of the syrup showdown, if it was before or after, but it definitely deserves a place in the archives also. This time Brett was just trying to mimic his daddy whom he adores.  Shane is an avid hunter and so of course little Brett loved to imitate him and played hunting all over the house.  One day Kristi saw him with her squirt bottle of water that she used for her hair, squirting it all over the living room furniture.  " Brett, stop squirting that water all over the furniture" she said as she took the bottle away from him.  "But Mommy", he cried, "It's not water it's my buck pee so the deer will come."  "At first Kristi laughed but them she glanced at the bottle and hoped she was just seeing things when she thought she caught a glimpse of faint yellow in the bottle.  She took off the top and sniffed and sure enough, Brett had dumped the water and proceeded to make his own "Buck pee".

Today Kristi has four little boys ranging in age from Brett's eleven to baby Branden's one.  She is a wonderful mother to boys.  Whenever she was working outside and wanted the boys to keep the youngest one safe she would tell them to pretend he was an "injured soldier and they had to keep the enemy from getting him" thus she has a knack of making a chore into fun.  Brett now, is a very independent little eleven year old, getting up and making his own breakfast of bacon, eggs, and pancakes.  Kristi has seen him outside when the others are playing and he's picking up the yard and when she asks what he is doing, he'll answer "Oh, I thought I should be doing something constructive."  Kristi has commented many times that she sometimes worries about how old he acts and wishes he would just be a kid.

When our family of twenty seven all get together, we are quite a boisterous bunch, noisy, silly, and probably a bit embarrassing for the pre-teens among us.  Last year for his tenth birthday we gave Brett a surprise party.  We decorated our family bus, loaded everybody up, drove into his yard, his uncle went in and grabbed him, carried him upside down onto the bus as we all screamed "Surprise!"  We then headed to a bowling alley forty miles away for pizza and bowling.  As usual when we all get together we had a blast.  But the one thing I will never forget about that particular time was how much fun Brett had.  How he turned lose and we actually saw this ultra-mature"thirty year old in a ten year old body" transform into a child in front of our very eyes.  So thanks for the memories Brett and now this grandma is going to go in and bake you some chocolate chip cookies for your eleventh!