Reconciled

So um... it's been a while.

2012-01-11T05:30:00.000-08:00

God has made it clear that we are not going to adopt at this time. It is still something we hope to do someday. Part of his making this clear to us was blessing us with another biological child. Due to the point we were at in the adoption and the agency we were working with this meant we could not proceed with an adoption.

Tomorrow our little one will be 16 weeks old... and two weeks from then I am scheduled to have my gall bladder out.

I would appreciate prayers for the safety of our baby, "Melchizedek."

Just as important as my religion

2011-08-19T04:09:00.000-07:00

"Women’s rights are very important, just as much as my religion."

These are the words of a "pastor" who just so happens to also be a Planned Parenthood chaplain... who was not admitting to being associated with PP when he said this. He was describing how he was "prolife and prochoice." The full story is at Live Action, but again, I'm looking more at this particular quotation than at the story as a whole.

There are at least three HUGE, GLARING problems with this statement.

Number one:
If anything in this life is as important as following Jesus (or more important), you are not truly following Jesus. You are trying to serve two masters. You cannot follow Jesus and "Women's Rights." Either you will love the one and hate the other, or you will despise the one and be devoted to the other. Trust me, if you are trying to follow something else and Jesus, you will have to choose. And Jesus is the right choice. The only thing one can follow along with Jesus is someone else walking with him--and you must be prepared to leave off following that teacher if he leaves Jesus' path.

Number two:
Christianity is not opposed to women's rights. Because I am a Christ-follower, I believe in women's rights. Jesus was a radical in a time when women were property, could not work, and were considered disgraced if they left the protection of a male relative. Jesus had women who followed Him and His disciples, and told them plainly that their place was learning from Him, not merely housework. Jesus considered men and women equal in dignity, equally clean, equally able to serve God, equally worthy of spiritual and physical healing. Men and women, at least if married, have different roles, and biology dictates some things are reserved for women--but they are always equal in dignity and worth. To pit Christianity against women's rights misunderstands at least one of them. The radical idea that women and men are equal in dignity, in worth, and under the law is a concept that comes from Christianity, at least in the western world--not to mention any dignity and worth children are accorded.

Number 3:
Abortion is no part of women's rights. I am all for women's rights. Killing an innocent child is not a right. If in this day and age, the only way for a woman to be considered equal with a man is to destroy the child growing within her--thus repudiating what makes her different from a man and going against every feminine instinct--then the women's movement has utterly failed. Men don't get to decide whether they are pregnant either. They don't get to decide that the death of their child will open up all sorts of opportunities and make it so. And so long as a woman can only be equal if she is unpregnant--as much like a man as possible--women are not equal in dignity, or even opportunity. Anything I have to kill my child for can't be worth it. And being able to do the same things as a man if I kill my own child doesn't make me equal. It is still saying that I must become like a man to have the same opportunities. No. My fertility, my breasts, my lactation, my pregnancy when I am pregnant, my period are all part of being a woman. How can I be equal unless I can bring the package with me? How can I be equal if I need a surgery to make me equal? Why can't I be equal as I am, as God made me, whole and undrugged and alive? Equality means that I am already equal, have always been equal, and will always be equal, the whole package of me. I cannot become more than I am by taking parts of myself away, and that will only make me equal if I started out greater (which I do not believe I did, but if I were greater for being a woman, why reject that?). Abortion is a great human rights tragedy, often used to abuse and manipulate women--more abortions are coerced than not. And it certainly does not give equality to unborn women, who in many countries are being killed at unprecedented rates for the crime of being female.

So this so-called pastor denies the equality of women by insisting they need abortion; he denies that his religion encompasses women's rights and has given that cause all the progress it has made; and he denies Jesus by setting the idol of "women's rights" on a pedestal beside Him, and choosing that over Him. Pray for his conversion, or at the end he will be worse off than those of Sodom and Gomorrah.

Jesus, in all this, through all this, with all my life I follow you.

Musings on life

2011-08-18T03:00:00.000-07:00

Came across some quotations recently.

"When the baby was born, I felt like I had just witnessed a miracle. Before I saw Kiera with my own eyes, she was like a fantasy-enigma that we were all pretending was there inside Shannon's belly. I couldn't wrap my mind around it, and then all of a sudden, it was real — here was this beautiful, perfect baby girl with a body, breathing the same air I was."

The article from which I pulled the quotation is on homebirth. But it is interesting that the author mentions it's hard to see the baby as real when she's inside her mommy. Even with the big belly, it's hard to believe there's a real little baby in there. Then she's out--and you can see her, hold her, touch her, she has a name and a face and a personality. Maybe this is part of why some people accept the killing of these babies? Is this why it's okay to kill a fetus at 30 weeks but not a newborn 10 weeks premature? I also hate the hangup on looks, as if a baby who is quite literally a blob of cells at a few days old has less value than a little one who can hiccup and suck her thumb and kick little feet. Littler and less developed tends to make people more protective... until that means looking "not human," whatever a specific person means by that.

PS Our first home study visit is TONIGHT; please pray for us!

My savior was beaten until He didn't look human. And then He died to save humanity.

And of course nowadays I relate everything to adoption. It's easy to ignore a description of a child with no picture. It's less easy to ignore a picture, even a poor one. It's even harder to ignore a picture of a sweet boy who is smiling at the camera. But behind every picture is a real child, and if we held and talked to that little boy or girl there's no way we'd be able to turn our backs... at least, I hope not, and I wouldn't. So remember that all children, whatever their size, whatever their abilities, are so precious to God. They are living human beings equal in value to you.

And I'm gonna save the other quotation for later, because two children that I have and hold every day want me now :)

Ready to begin home study!

2011-08-03T05:38:00.000-07:00

We got word yesterday that the agency we've been in contact with will be able to do our home study! We've been assigned a social worker, put some money into the process, and presumably our application is now being processed.

Next to Godliness ;)

2011-07-27T04:55:00.000-07:00

One of the major things on our agenda besides paperwork as we prepare for adoption is picking up our house. If you know me in Real Life, you are probably aware that this is not our family's strongest points. "Stuff" accumulates on our shelves, on our tables, and you have never even seen the computer room. So/Because that's where we just throw piles of stuff when company's coming.

We have been (slowly) working on this. There was the night I found every empty cardboard box in our house and broke them all down. Probably 40 of them. There was the day our friends watched our kids for the morning so we could work on the aforementioned computer room (so. much. better. now.) There was the day we took 4 totes, 4 boxes, and 2 bags of toys up to the attic. I've worked out a plan for rotating them. There was the first day I rotated the toys, which also resulted in cleaning a couch and organizing the kids' books in the computer room (the ones that aren't out). There was the day I cleaned under the couches. And there are still many days and many little things ahead of us... but we are working on it. Putting stuff away. Donating stuff. Cleaning stuff.

If you are reading this and have advice on these:
hard water stains in tub
getting that last bit of dirt off hard floors when you sweep
robotic vacuums
vacuuming carpets in households with long-haired persons
teaching one-year-olds to clean up after themselves
I would love to hear from you in the comments!

My adoption blog has a post about why to advocate for specific orphans, if you are interested.

The Lord of this world is hard at work...

2011-07-21T07:47:00.000-07:00

As I have mentioned before, there is a lot of need in this world.

Children are dying. Some are dying due to neglect because they do not have a mommy and daddy, some are dying because their mommy doesn't want them, and some are dying because our medical science simply cannot save them. People are hurting and need our help.

Satan is at work in our world. There can be no doubt that those who give in to the evil side of human nature are serving him. But Jesus is also at work in this world. With miracles? With signs and wonders? Not precisely. Like all of us, Jesus uses His hands and feet to do the work... but we are His hands and feet. We are called to do His work in our world. You don't need to worry that you aren't doing everything. You can't do everything. That's why Jesus' body has so many parts. But if you are doing nothing... are you sure you're part of this body?

I want to share 3 stories I have heard today about people who need help. If you had time to read this, you have time to pray for them. There's no reason not to do that much. And then I'm going to share 3 stories about how Jesus (in the form of His servants) is at work in the world, because we all need some good news too. But you will have to get through the hard stuff to read the good stuff.

Caleb is an unborn baby boy. He's due to be born in less than a month. And he has been given less than a 50% chance of survival. Caleb has a diaphragmatic hernia that will require surgery as soon as he is born. He may also have a heart defect.

What you can do:
You can pray.

Joshua is a young man with spina bifida and a host of other diagnoses. He has 8 siblings and a very hard-working mommy and daddy. He has just been placed on hospice care. Spina bifida is not fatal, but because of the other issues Joshua faces, including cancer and genetic differences, he does not have long to live. He is five years old.

What you can do:
Joshua's daddy is a great provider who has been working 60-hour weeks to make sure his son (and other children) have excellent medical care. At this point, though, he needs to be home with his family, spending precious time with his little boy and his grieving family. But he has no more vacation or sick time. Joshua's mother is seeking donations to help her husband take some time off to be at home with them.
UPDATE: You can read about and donate to the Parker family here.

Dakota (not his real name) is an orphan in Eastern Europe. He is 8 years old. I don't think I even understand what his special needs are, but because of them he lives in a mental institution. On the Reece's Rainbow board, someone posted pictures of Dakota from an organization called His Kids Too. I don't know for sure whether this was taken before or after his RR profile picture, but no child belongs in an underfunded, understaffed mental institution. We--the body of Christ--need to help these kids, who are images of their Father in heaven.

What you can do:
You could commit to adopt Dakota. You could not officially commit before completing a home study, but if you start NOW, Dakota will not have to spend another year in the facility he is in now.
You can donate to Reece's Rainbow. Younger children--who might already be in an institution like Dakota's, and will definitely end up in one if they are not adopted--have specific grant funds. You can donate to an adoptable child (like 5-year-old Oleg, who has Down Syndrome), and their grant will help them get adopted. You can donate to a family in the process of adopting, like the Warner family. Because older boys are rarely adopted, you can't specifically donate to Dakota (until a family commits to him), but you can donate to a fund for older boys with special needs, and the next boy 6 or older with special needs will have that money toward his adoption when his parents come for him. You could also donate towards Reece's Rainbow's administrative costs.
Or, you could donate to organizations that are making a difference in the lives of children in Dakota's country, like His Kids Too, Life 2 Orphans, or Project TLC.

Now for 3 more positive stories:
My friend Jodi is adopting a beautiful little boy named Niko (Kody on RR). Niko has a craniofacial difference and lives in Eastern Europe, in a different country from Dakota and my little girl. But soon he's going to live in Pennsylvania! Every day families are stepping out and committing to supply the needs of the least of these.

Here in the US we are making legislative inroads to prevent children from being killed by their families. The latest in a long line of pro-life bills making sure that women know what abortion is, stopping federal funding for organizations that kill babies, and criminalizing doctors who kill viable children is a bill from Ohio, signed yesterday. It would prevent doctors from killing children deemed viable, and the governor estimates it will save 700 lives a year. We can't rest until every person's rights are upheld from fertilization to natural death--but we are making great strides toward protecting at least some children.

Elizabeth Anikuzhikattil, a mother of 15 children, passed away last week at the age of 94. Eleven of her children are serving the Church as priests, nuns, and a bishop. She goes to join her husband, who died in 2006. No doubt she and her husband were extraordinary parents, as they raised 11 children willing to give their whole lives to the service of Christ.

What will you do to make more happy stories and less horrible ones?

Proceeding with the adoption

2011-07-19T05:16:00.000-07:00

We are proceeding with our adoption! We resubmitted our application, I presume with all the necessary information this time....

My other blog is probably going to be where I put most of the information on our adoption process... as well as pictures of other adoptable kids who have touched my heart when there's no adoption progress. This blog still kind of doesn't know what it's for :)

Hannah very much wants a big sister. She wants us to be the family of the little girl we are going to adopt. I have been careful to say that we hope this girl will be in our family, not that she will be... we have already had the experience where we thought we would adopt a little boy, and it turned out another family in-country adopted him. I have reminded Hannah about this and told her that the little girl is not her sister yet, we just hope she will be. I am hoping everything works out though!

New beginnings...

2011-07-12T10:40:00.000-07:00

I am setting up a separate adoption blog to chronicle our family's journey as we pursue the adoption of a little girl I have fallen in love with.

Our adoption will be a private, facilitated adoption from Eastern Europe. There is a little girl there that we want to bring home, but with this country, there are no for-sure guarantees until we go back for a second trip for court--even after we are referred to her.

We are hoping to submit our application very soon, and then we can begin our home study.

Need

2011-06-09T14:30:00.000-07:00

There is so much need in the world. Children are sent to institutions to die. People spend their lives without families. Parents kill their own children before they even see the light of day.

As Christians we are called to do something about it... but it's hard to know what.

Please pray with Pete and I as we seek God's will about how to do our part in God's plan to change the world.

Considering Adoption

2011-06-06T07:14:00.000-07:00

I have always wanted a big family. So far, God has blessed us with just two children on Earth—Hannah, 3, and Peter, almost 1 ½.

Before Hannah joined our family, we weren’t sure I would ever be able to have a child. For years we wanted kids, but God did not so bless us. We were very open to adoption, and had just gotten physicals as part of our home study the day before when we learned we were pregnant. We loved her. I was terrified God would take her away. I don’t know if I really believed I would have a healthy baby until I held her.

I would have been open to pursuing adoption while pregnant, but our agency did not allow couples who were expecting or had added a child in the past year to begin adoption. So we forgot about adoption and welcomed Hannah, and nineteen months later Peter.

I was hopeful that we would continue to welcome a new baby every 18 months or so, but Peter reached his first birthday without being a big brother. Five months later or so, I saw a picture in an adoption magazine of 3 little kids who needed a family, with the youngest having special needs. I also thought the middle girl’s face looked like Hannah’s, and the baby boy’s face looked like Peter’s. After praying a week or two, we decided to inquire about them. They were already spoken for. I had thought they might be ours. But now I had remembered adoption. And I still wasn’t pregnant. I filled out a form so we could look at other waiting children with special needs—but their needs all seemed much more severe. We weren’t sure how much we could handle with two active little kids already. We didn’t want a child who was too old to be ours, and we felt like we didn’t know much about school age children, so we put our limit at 4 or 5 years old. I wanted to adopt a sibling group. I knew I couldn’t handle legal risk—not when falling in love with a picture does a number on me every time. We have been trying to figure out where God will lead us.

I started looking at waiting US kids. They were older or had very significant needs. I looked at waiting international children. Some of them looked so much like my boy they could have been my son (like Kyle). Some of them I hurt so much for their needs, but felt like I didn’t know if we could handle them (like Dmitriy). Some of them desperately needed a family so that they could get proper medical care (like Vanessa). I left some pictures open to show my husband. One was a picture of Mason. We decided to pursue his adoption.

For a week I threw myself into research and paperwork. I scoured the internet for people who had visited him, got in contact with a woman whose son had a similar condition, found an agency to do our homestudy, looked again and again at the pictures of this handsome little man Reece’s Rainbow sent me—what a smile! Then we learned he had been adopted by a family in his own country. That’s wonderful for him, and a great sign for his country. But I had thought he was going to be my son—he had been waiting so long, and then as soon as we started pursuing this—maybe before—someone else adopted him.

We are considering Ethiopia. There is need for adoption from Ethiopia, where traditional family safety nets—the care of orphaned children by aunts, uncles, and grandparents—have been devastated and overloaded by the AIDS epidemic. That’s the direction we were leaning before we saw Mason. But adoption is a hard process. It’s a long process. We may have to avoid conceiving in order to pursue adoption—and I don’t like the idea of telling God no to a child of my womb so I could say yes to adoption.

And sometimes it is so hard just to take care of my two kids! Some days it seems like one is lying on the floor whining “I can’t do it” while the other is taking nosedives into furniture and bleeding all over his clothes, while the laundry and dishes (let alone less urgent housework pile up). And how could we consider adding to our family? But we could afford to do it. And if not us, then who? What about our situation is so difficult it we cannot take on one or two more kids who really need a home? Are we really that much worse off than everyone else with problems and kids and jobs?

But in the end, the question is only this: What would God have us do?

Hospitality

2011-05-18T13:40:00.000-07:00

I am not required to feed a stranger who comes to my door. I am not required to make sure he has a place to sleep for the night and that clean clothes when he wakes up in the morning. If my husband left with the stranger, and they made less money than I did, I wouldn’t have to send them checks in the mail. Indeed, implying I have that level of responsibility for a stranger is ridiculous. It might be kind and generous to do some of these things, and one could argue that if I do not feed a hungry stranger I am going against Biblical teaching. I would certainly feel awful if that stranger died because I had not given him a hot meal and a warm place to sleep.

Suppose the person who comes to my door is not my stranger, but my son.

If my son came to me hungry and wanted to eat, I would feed him. To never feed my son would be illegal. To not ensure he had a safe place to sleep would not be merely inhospitable, but criminal. Making sure he has clothes to wear is not a touching act of kindness, but a requirement. If I give shelter to a stranger, I am doing charity–but if I refuse shelter to my son, I am guilty of child abuse. Even if my son were in my husband’s care and not mine, I might be legally obligated to help pay for his needs.

Abortion is not evicting an ungrateful tenant; it’s putting one’s offspring out of his or her home before the child can survive on his or her own. And it usually involves not just eviction, but dismemberment–something it is illegal to do even to strangers. If the person a woman is pregnant with is her son or daughter, she has an obligation to that child she would not have to a stranger.

Babywearing revisited

2010-08-26T09:46:00.000-07:00

I've posted on babywearing before, here.

But two Sundays ago I found a Moby wrap on the Exchange Table at church... and so I picked it up and have been doing some babywearing with it over the past week.

Suddenly I understand how people do that, to some extent at least... my major issue--back pain--is not a problem, because the Moby distributes Baby's weight much better. It's a bit more natural, and isn't (quite) as stupid-looking to be wearing without the baby. It doesn't press on all the wrong places (though I could do without the knot at the small of my back; either it's not long enough or I'm not skinny enough to bring it around and tie it in the front.

Some things I've noticed:

Worn babies still fuss for no discernible reason. I'd thought that worn babies in aboriginal societies and such never cry, especially when not tired... well, it happens. Especially if the worn baby is bored.

Not all tasks can be done while wearing an eight month old. For instance, if one tries to wear an eight month old while emptying the dishwasher, he may take bowls away from you and threaten to lob them across the room. Didn't try cooking; smarter than that (after the dishes, anyway).

Given enough time, an eight-month-old can probably unwear himself. He can definitely get his arms out, and seeing as he's almost escaped a stroller once, I'm pretty sure falling asleep wearing him is unwise.

Wearing a baby in a moby is not painless--but the pain is more of an I-exercised pain than an I-did-something-horribly-unnatural-to-my-back pain.

I can actually feel my baby's body language--how cool is that? I can tell if he's tense or relaxing, where he's looking.... maybe if I did more babywearing I could even try some EC.

Do not attempt to catch a 2-year-old coming down a slide while front-wearing an eight-month-old.

All in all, I am very happy to have a Moby and wishing I'd gotten one in May of 2008. But that's a lot to spend after I'd tried quite a few 20-buck carriers and not liked any... I might start buying them for baby showers or something though

Having fun together

2010-08-19T08:22:00.000-07:00

It is so neat to be able to enjoy things together with Hannah. We've been taking walks and she's old enough to enjoy looking under rocks for critters--one of my favorite pastimes. Last Sunday she played a game with her aunt and uncle, her grandma, and I: pass the pigs. It's fun to be able to enjoy big people things with her.

Hi, Mommy!

2010-08-13T14:36:00.000-07:00

"Hi! Hi! Hi! Hi, Mommy! Hi, Mommy! Hi!"

This is what Hannah says when I go out on the porch to use the grill. She waves at me from the other side of the door.

"Hi, Mommy! Hi!"

Melts my heart....

Is this what we are to God?

I am sure He is pleased when we display and seek understanding of the spiritual things that are important to Him. But He is also pleased when we seek to be close to Him and to communicate with Him. Not to seek what we want from Him, or even His favor... but just to say, "Hi, God! Hi! Hi Jesus! Hi Jesus! Hi! I love you!" It's more gratifying than "Hannah wants snack!" or the thinly disguised "Baby wants to watch Veggie Tales" that so many of our prayers sound like....

Hi, God. Hi! I love you. What are you doing? Can I help?

Networking

2010-08-12T10:57:00.000-07:00

Networking can be hard work. By networking, I of course mean helping to dig a hundred-foot trench to connect our house to our in-laws' with a cable.

I think I can count that as my exercising for the day.

Oh, plus add in a screaming 8-month old and a "helpful," slightly tired 2-year old. At lunch time.

Wisdom vs. Foolishness

2010-07-22T05:57:00.000-07:00

So on Wednesday I was blessed with two children who took a nap at the same time. Of course--especially after my bathroom-cleaning experience--I wanted to do something productive. I started to put away the dishes in my dishwasher. But something about that didn't sit right. What would God have me do? Memorize scripture? No--closer but still not quite right. What God wanted me to do, in the quiet house while my children slept, was to pray on my knees.

And so that's what I did.

And then he wanted me to work on memorizing some scripture.

And so I did. And I had heard that skills stick better if one takes a nap after--and I was falling asleep. And so I napped. And I woke up, and worked some more on memorizing scripture. And then the children woke up, and we took a walk, and I worked on reciting the scripture I memorized. (I guess I did it quite a bit, because this morning I started to recite it and Hannah said, "I don't like that song.")

Because while now I am eager to clean in worship of God, if that's not what God has for me right now, it isn't worshiping God. And doing His will is more important than a clean house. Even though I really want a clean house.

And doing God's will is wisdom. So perhaps from a worldly perspective, praying and memorizing scripture while my children slept was not a wise use of my time--but if what God gave me to do seems like foolishness, it is only because God's thoughts and ways are not ours.

For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight. (I Corinthians 3:19a)

Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? (I Corinthians 1:20)

God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise. (I Corinthians 1:27a)

The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing. (I Corinthians 1:18a)

Do not deceive yourselves. If any one of you thinks he is wise by the standards of this age, he should become a "fool" so that he may become wise. (I Corinthians 3:18)

Worshiping God

2010-07-20T12:50:00.001-07:00

A continuation of my series on cleaning the bathroom several days ago--anyone know how to change the dates?

On Sunday (7/18/2010) our congregation had the opportunity to hear an excellent sermon brought to us by Pastor Steve Coddington; our sermons are available for download here.

The sermon involved the fact that heaven was a really cool place and it will be awesome. But one of the quotations that struck me was that our lives should be arrows pointing to God (or something like that). We should be worshiping God all the time, in all we do. I knew that. But I hadn't applied it to cleaning. But that morning, my cleaning was worship of God. I scrubbed the toilet for God. I cleaned the dust and scum from the crevices of the window track to God. And God was glorified in that.

And further another thing occurred to me--in heaven we will be eternally engaged in worshiping God. Yes, that will involve singing and dancing and all that normal worship stuff. But I bet that won't be all of it.

I don't know if there will be a need to clean in heaven. Will plants need dirt and water to grow? Will our heavenly bodies need food, or is the feast metaphorical? Will our heavenly bodies leave oily secretions or lose hair? Not really sure. But if one takes the descriptions of heaven at all literally--and I tend to take the Bible literally when possible--there's a whole lot of clear stuff in heaven, and a whole lot of shiny stuff, and a whole lot of people. And here on Earth, at least, that would mean there's a whole lot of work to do. And if there's work--that will be part of our worship. Not just an unpleasant side effect of life or worship--but in heaven, it will all be worship.

And it can be now, too. So whatever task God sets before you today--even if you find it unpleasant--especially if you find it unpleasant--do it to God as an act of worship. Because isn't making clean that which is unclean the very work of God?

Part 1

Part 2

Good Works that God Prepared in Advance for Us To Do

2010-07-20T12:46:00.001-07:00

(a continuation of the series on cleaning my bathroom--yes, I'm writing a series on cleaning the bathroom)

For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:10)

So I've heard this verse before, but I had always heard/applied it in the context of charity, of doing things for others.

But as I cleaned my bathroom window, this is a verse that came to me.

The good works God has for us can be mundane household tasks, as well--like cleaning the bathroom window, or the toilet. And as I cleaned, I realized that the very process of entropy--the dirtying and breaking down of everything around us--is part of God's plan to prepare good works for us. That God, in his infinite wisdom and mercy and grace and goodness, while I had neglected my house, had been preparing good works for me... good works like toilets that needed cleaning. I saw that the little cup my toilet brush sits in was dirty... and I praised God for preparing that task for me. I was doing God's will. He had been giving me these good works, though I hadn't seen or recognized them as such. I had missed opportunities in the past to do His work in taking care of our house (which is, of course, His), but I could do it now.

I haven't managed to get back to that place since that morning, but maybe while I am waiting for Hannah to pick up so we can go for a walk, I can clean some windows.... Now at least I want to do these things instead of dreading them :)

(To Be Continued)

Part 1

Part 3

The Center of God's Will

2010-07-20T12:24:00.000-07:00

A couple times recently I have felt like I am in the center of God's Will. Which I think is pretty awesome.

The first time was when I was giving my husband a backrub a few days ago. And then again this morning when I was nursing my son. He fell asleep, and I went back to bed. But I couldn't sleep.

I began to feel that God wanted me to clean the bathroom. This is not a common thing for me (as you might deduce, had you ever seen my bathroom). Well, except for the occasional pregnancy-induced insomia/nesting combo. And I am not pregnant to my knowledge. So I cleaned the mirror. And I cleaned the window. And I cleaned the toilet. All very thoroughly--and I felt I was in the center of God's will. And it was so amazing that it'll take 2 or 3 more blog posts to detail all the insights I gained this morning while cleaning my bathroom.

And as I cleaned the toilet I could see many more things I could do stretching out before me, that I could do and be in the center of God's will: More cleaning. Picking up. Making lunch for my husband. Taking a shower. God is so good.

Then my baby woke up and started fussing, and I kept cleaning the sink even though I should have tended him first. Everything gets so much harder when the kids are up. I didn't want to leave a relatively simple job half-done (it worked out fine; he wasn't really crying and I was able to get dressed rather than getting him right away; but I didn't have that feeling of being in the center of God's Will). But I want to be in the center of His Will.

Part 2

Part 3

God is Good

2010-07-13T09:05:00.000-07:00

I had been getting very frustrated. It seemed like Hannah wasn't listening and wasn't doing the right thing, and then she started un-potty training. I knew she could do it because she hadn't been having more than one accident a day since at least her birthday. But she stopped using the potty. So I got frustrated and I yelled at her a lot. And then before long I was yelling at my husband too, and complaining about how much I felt like he wasn't doing.

And then I realized (partly thanks to my husband) that I was doing the same thing. I had figured out the right thing to do--pray--but I'd stopped doing it. And then, no matter what happened, I kept doing more things wrong, even though I knew I shouldn't be doing those things. Sound familiar?

And I wasn't doing a very good job of showing Hannah that I love her. Truth be told, I wasn't doing a good job of loving her at all. I was trying....

And so we prayed together, the four of us. I thanked God for each of my family members--my wonderful husband, my wonderful daughter, my wonderful son. I asked God to forgive me for how I'd treated them. And I asked Him to help me love them as He does.

This week is going so much better. And the only thing that's changed is my attitude.

Prayer works.

Praise God.

So hard to come up with things to post....

2010-06-19T03:01:00.000-07:00

Happy Father's Day weekend!

I am so happy my kids have a Daddy who:
Works hard to take care of our family
Loved them before they were born
Accepted them as gifts from God
Tries to spend time with them
Loves their Mommy and is married to her

I am so happy my kids have a Daddy who:
Died for them to have eternal life
Is creating an eternal home for them in His mansion
Loved them and planned them from the beginning of creation
Is all-loving, all-forgiving, all-knowing, and all-powerful
Has plans for their future, plans to prosper them and not to harm them
Knows them fully and intimately and is drawing them to Himself

In other news, we should be getting our Massachusetts Choose Life license plates soon. Yay!

Spiritual growth

2010-05-27T12:54:00.000-07:00

I don't know if I can take credit for this--I know some of it is my doing but not all. But Hannah is so spiritually aware.

I've posted before about how she wants to pray a lot. Well, now she knows when she needs to pray--when she is frustrated or upset. If she wishes someone were there and they are not, she prays for them. If she is frustrated with me or her brother, she wants to pray. I know this is because I pray when I am frustrated with them. And yeah, it happens enough for her to pick it up. Bad or good? I don't know, but I think it's awesome she's praying so much.

A few days ago I was singing "How Great Thou Art," and Hannah was trying to sing along. I talked to her about what the song meant....

I asked her if she knew Jesus could live in her heart. "Heart." I asked her if she liked Jesus. "Yes." Did she want Jesus to live in her heart? "Yes."

She's two. I don't know how much she understands.

I prayed.
"Jesus, Hannah loves to talk to you by praying and learn about you. If she is truly ready and willing, I pray that you would come and live in her heart. Amen."

My job's not done, not by a long shot. I don't know if she understood any of that. But she picks up on so much. She's learning letters and numbers and colors and animals--and all of that pales next to the importance of learning about God. And I wish I were more productive and less angry and frustrated and sleepy--but if being overwhelmed at the edge of myself leads to my daughter's spiritual awareness, if that is how God uses my weakness to display his strength, bring it.

Blogging, tweeting, electioneering and babies

2010-05-12T13:27:00.000-07:00

Haven't been blogging recently, have I?

Let's see... Third (Peter) turned 5 months old yesterday. He started cereal in the evenings at 4 months 1 week, and loves it. My supply wasn't keeping up, and he was nursing I think more than ten hours lots of days... but now that's more reasonable and he's so much happier. The time was right to start cereal, and I'm at peace with doing it, and it seems to have made everything work better. I wanted to make it to 6 months exclusively breastfeeding, but with all the problems we had early on it is great that we managed to get to exclusively breastfeeding at all. Maybe next time around :)

Firstborn (Hannah) turns 2 on Saturday, and we're having a party. Seven toddlers, 10 adults, 5ish teens, 4 preschoolers and gradeschoolers and a baby have RSVPed. (4 toddlers and 6 adults haven't gotten back to me). Activities will include coloring, balloon sorting, bubble machine, and eating jigglers. Hannah selected her own party favors--rubber duckies and mini-bubble containers.

I am losing weight (yay!) by eating low carb (boo!). My husband was elected town moderator on May 2 after serving a year by appointment (because no one else wanted the job then), beating two challengers and drawing more than half of the popular vote.

I'm on twitter as @GlorifyHisSon, hence some of my lack of blogging.

I've been feeling pregnant since March, testing every other week, and failing all the tests. Today's sign of pregnancy: peeing all the time.

Pray!

2010-03-26T13:35:00.000-07:00

A week or two ago, Firstborn picked up an interesting habit.

She climbed into my lap and demanded, "Pi!"

At first I thought she was referring to her brother. "Is the baby Pi?"

Firstborn grabbed my hands. "Pi, pi!"

Not having the advantage of a title above the encounter, I was stumped.

"Ama, Ama!"

That one I knew--amen. She was telling me to pray. And I couldn't very well say no, of course, nor did I want to.

Since then, we have been praying together several times a day. We pray for our family, for our country, for an end to abortion. We pray the Lord's prayer, Psalm 139, and Psalm 23. We sing songs praising God. I stop what I'm doing to thank God with my daughter. I think it's awesome.

I don't know how much she understands, but she's listening. She repeats names when I pray for our family. And she really likes the line about God's powder. You know... "Yours is the kingdom, and the powder, and the glory, forever and ever."

Continuing to grow up so fast...

2010-03-26T11:30:00.000-07:00

Firstborn is getting so big... she is getting the hang of this potty thing most of the time (praise God!) and starting to pick up on her own when I ask sometimes (praise God!) and putting more words together, and even conversing at times. Current favorite word: stuck.

Baby Third and I are sorting out some painful latch issues, but things are getting better there.

Leaps and bounds

2010-03-13T16:38:00.000-08:00

My little girl is growing up so fast--learning tons of new words and actions.

Yesterday she started making up her own songs, singing, and "dancing" (spinning around in a circle). Lyrics frequently include references to "Hannah song" "baby," and "strawberry."

Beginning to wonder if potty training is worth it... she realizes half the time where she needs to pee and never with poop until some's on the floor, it seems. On the upside, it saves on diapers; however, cleaning up is not fun, even though there's not much carpet in our main area.

Third is so smiley and plump and long. He turned 3 months on Thursday, and I have put away his 0-3 month clothes now (which really have been too short for him a while now). He filled out a new 6 month sleeper quite nicely today.

Daddy is currently town moderator (meaning he moderates town meetings). He was appointed to fill a vacancy when the previous moderator became a selectman, and had wanted the job for years before that (but had not wanted to run against the previous officeholder). He has to run for election now, and is up against two opponents. He's the best man for the job, even if he is the youngest moderator in the state--no one can remember and follow the rules like my husband :)

Lack of Trust

2010-03-05T10:56:00.000-08:00

Okay, scratch that. Not going to be taking an internet break.

But I do think I need to work more on having some sort of relationship with non-internet people

It is probably a sign of some sort of disorder that I don't trust anyone in my real life except my husband, and I don't feel willing to expose myself emotionally, and I just can't bring myself to trust anyone... yet people I don't really know on the internet I share myself with and I am open.

Somehow someone else on the internet is safe, but real life people are scary.

Maybe it's because I can control the contact on the internet. Maybe it's because if someone says something stupid, I never have to be around them again. Maybe it's because people in real life have hurt me much more frequently than people on the internet.

Real Life

2010-03-04T09:52:00.000-08:00

I think I need to take some time off of the internet to try and engage with Real Life some more.

Pregnancy during Advent

2010-02-24T11:37:00.000-08:00

For much of the Advent season last year, I was pregnant.

If you are a married Christian, I totally recommend taking the opportunity to be pregnant during Advent, should it arise. As my husband put it, "It gives a whole new meaning to waiting for a child to be born." I thought a lot about Mary's pregnancy with our Lord as I carried my son, and as I went into labor (and went into labor... and went into labor... and went into labor). I wondered about her labor, her pregnancy, and Jesus' birth. I don't know if it was particularly more spiritual than other Advent seasons, but it did help me look at the story differently, consider it from new angles.

And on the day we celebrate the birth of Christ, I had a two-week-old son I was struggling to nurse. (No Christmas pageant at my church, though he certainly would have made a sweet Baby Jesus).

What would Mary have been thinking as Jesus was about two months old? Would it have been clear how special He was, if not for prophesy and predictions made to Joseph and her? Was He brighter and more alert than other babies? Was there a glimmer in His eyes of the soul that existed before the world began? His looks were ordinary, that we might not know Him by those. But as Mary fell into the rhythms of life with her Firstborn Son, were there moments when it was clear that He was also the Firstborn of all creation? Or as He ate and slept and pooped and cried and stared at His mommy and daddy, did He seem like any other two-month-old baby, special in how He entered the world but not in how He dwelled there? Were there moments when Jesus woke in the middle of the night and she asked herself, "Is He really who the angel said He would be? How could this tiny, dependent Baby ever be the One to save us all?" Or was it clear somehow even as she bathed and swaddled and fed her son that he was also the Son of the Most High?

It's an interesting exercise, and one I suspect I'll be doing all of Third's life. All children are miracles--all people--and it's hard to imagine that one day these tiny little people who depend so much on me, who started out as single cells, will one day be a grown woman and a grown man. Third may not be a messiah, but one day he could be a pastor or a doctor or a lawyer or an accountant or even a senior software engineer. But now he lies sleeping at my breast.

In Spirit and in Truth

2010-02-23T11:07:00.000-08:00

So now to balance things out with a more theological post... not deep, more of obvious, but theological nonetheless.

Three Sundays ago I started bringing my Firstborn to part of the worship service at church. She is 21 months old. I want her to learn that church is where we worship God--that worshiping God is something her parents do and enjoy, not just something her Sunday School teacher does--that Jesus is there for her, too, when she chooses Him. Heady stuff for a girl who's not yet two, but she understands more than we think, and I don't want to wait until she can grasp the doctrine of the trinity, debate Calvinism versus Arminianism, and distinguish and interpret the allegorical and prophetic portions of Revelation before she came in with us. She knows what music is, she knows what reading is, and she certainly knows what joy is.

I knew it wouldn't be easy or all-at-once. In conjunction with my plan to bring her in, we started family Bible time. Daddy reads a passage from the Bible; we talk about what it means; we pray; and then we all sing a song together. At church we go over what will happen ahead of time, and practice if we get there early. We listen to them play a song or two. We can dance if we want but don't sing along. Then they sing some more songs, and we sing along and can dance if we want. Then they read the announcements while we sit still and listen quietly. Then they read from the Bible while we sit still and listen quietly. Then we go up to the front for the children's message, and we sit still and listen quietly. Then she goes to the nursery. The hardest part is sitting still, for Firstborn. The second hardest part is quietly. If she is not doing the right thing I take her to the cry room, and she has to sit on my lap. If she is good we can go back in.

There was, however, a kink in my plans other than Firstborn's inability to sit quietly (which I believe will come with practice). I wanted Firstborn to see us worshiping God. And I wasn't.

Not because I was too busy tending a toddler and worrying about a newborn, though that was true as well. Because for years I had been going to church but not worshiping God.

And Firstborn was bound to realize this.

See, I don't stand still when I worship God. I dance. Probably not quite like David. More of interpretive movement. But I don't go to a Charismatic church or anything. Everyone else in my church stands up to sing the songs (unless, of course, there's no asterisk by the title--then they remain seated). If someone is really moved they might raise their hands in the air. But that's the limit. I could probably get away with swaying. Sometimes I would picture in my mind's eye how I would move if I were going to move with the music.

But when I worship--if I'm really going to be all there, focused on God--swaying or raising my arms is not going to cut it. If the song says to bow down, I want to bow down. If the song talks about clean hands, I want to raise them up. If the song talks about mighty waters, I want to live them. That's how God made me and how I'm wired, I guess. When I realized that it revolutionized the way I worship. But somewhere along the way I lost that. 'Cause it's weird.

But I knew my daughter needed to see me worshiping with all my heart. So I tried to. I tried to think about worshiping God and not about how silly I looked or what people would think of what I was doing. And then after Firstborn was safely in nursery, I went back in. And I just stood there and sang, because I didn't have to worship in spirit and in truth anymore.

Um, wait. Who am I worshiping and why again?

If I'm going to show my heart and my joy in worship to Firstborn... shouldn't I also be showing it, say, to God? Duh.

If that's the way I worship best, then why aren't I worshiping like that? Doesn't God want me to worship Him in the way He created me to worship?

Something's wrong if I am willing to worship God for Firstborn but not for God.

So I have been worshiping God. I know it is what he wants. I know it is right for me--and I'm not saying anyone else is doing it wrong. And it feels good (even if I still feel silly). No one has said a word about it (though many have commented how cute Firstborn is, even though she can be disruptive.)

And this Sunday I felt full of joy and energy. I started paying more attention to the sermon--not just trying to focus my ears but listening in my spirit. And it is such a joy to worship God with abandon. To recall the joy when I first found Him. To be back in the knowledge--not just in my head but in my heart--that Jesus is awesome. And I want to share what I'm learning and how I'm growing and I want everyone else to have this joy in their worship.

To worship in spirit and in truth.

Quick update

2010-02-23T10:37:00.000-08:00

So much is going on with my little girl!

She's working on transitioning to her "big girl bed." She took a good nap in it yesterday but today wouldn't settle down, so she's napping in her crib right now. Peter's hammock is fine for the moment, but it would probably be good to have some space before her crib became his. I know she understands, it's just a matter of her staying in bed long enough to sleep.

She seems interested in the potty again. Yes, three weeks ago I said she wasn't ready for it. She wasn't. That was three weeks ago. Now she is sitting still longer and is even showing signs of knowing when she needs to pee and going to the potty--I think. I hope. So I will probably be bringing the potty down again and having some no-pants time.

Today she was playing with her letters and was able to identify two of them! She (inconsistently) knew H (the first letter of her name) and I (because lots of times it sounds like that's what she's saying, so we point it out to her.

She was also playing with a large, purple, foam six-sided die. She has been improving in her concept of numbers. She obviously recognizes when I am counting. When she is "counting" she uses the gesture I use when counting in her books--pointing with the index finger. She started doing this when we count while she's on the potty (to teach her to sit there long enough to do anything (or get a snack)). But we don't make that gesture then--we count on our fingers, which is clearly different. So she understands those are the same sort of thing. She made another breakthrough as we were playing with her d6. She would roll it, and I would say the number and count the pips. Previously she would say "two" (dih), "five" (foff), and "nine" (nye), and occasionally copy a number someone else was saying. (Her counting generally goes, "two, two, two, two" (etc) or sometimes "nine, nine, nine, nine....") She happened to roll a one. "One!" I exclaimed. I touched the pip and said "one." Firstborn touched the pip and said two. From then on she touched the pips as she counted! Next she rolled a two. She touched each pip. "Two, two." And stopped. I told her it was a great job. Also, she copied me when I said the numbers three and four. She started calling out the numbers as she rolled them--usually three, but once nine. I think she's close to actually counting. I know she gets the concept of two, because if she gets food for me from her table, she'll get me one thing, but once she wanted to give food to me and to Third, so she got two things. Now to put all of that together....

I am so lucky that I get to be her mom. Even if she does spill my drink on the floor whenever she gets a chance (any advice? Please?)

The doctor thinks Third is advanced for his age--he watches and recognizes people, he tracks, he has rolled over, and he sometimes likes tummy time. He has a lot of awake time, always alert when he's not eating. He is nine weeks old, but most who see him guess 3 months. Who would have thought he started out losing weight, refusing to eat, and sleeping too much! He is so sweet and laid back.

At this rate, I don't have to homeschool Hannah. I figure if she's always above where she "should be" according to public school guidelines, there's no need to formally teach her things. And at this rate she will have mastered her kindergarten skills by two and a half. Unschooling, here I come!

By the way, it turns out whenever I feel overwhelmed, I'm getting sick and don't realize it yet. I'll have to remember that for future reference.

Trust

2010-02-18T11:48:00.000-08:00

Last week my daughter fell into a box.

She couldn't get out of the box herself, but I was watching. Before she even called out I answered her: "Do you need help?"

She said, "Help." And she waited patiently, trusting that I would be there for her when she fell.

And so I extracted myself from her brother's mouth, got up, and helped her out of the box.

I wasn't upset that she couldn't get out of the box. I wasn't upset that she fell into the box, because she hadn't done anything wrong that had made her fall in. I wasn't upset that she didn't call to me and keep asking for help getting out of the box she was stuck in.

Firstborn has also decided not to go down the stairs anymore. She knows how, and has done it many times. She can do it if she wants to badly enough. But she stands at the top of the stairs and stares at her mommy and says "Up!"

I tell her that she is capable of doing it herself. I don't pick her up as soon as I can, most of the time. In fact, if I have other things to carry down (especially her brother, who cannot get down the stairs on his own), I might make a trip down and then come back for her. Sooner or later I help her--after I give her the opportunity to do it herself. If I leave her at the top of the stairs alone she whines and cries and shouts for me. Sometimes she starts coming down a little bit, but never very far.

I'm not mad at her for not going down the stairs. I might be frustrated, but I know her motivation is not willful defiance or a desire for control, but fear of the stairs (which could be dangerous) and a lack of belief in herself. I don't swoop in to save the day right away, but I will return for her. I will never forsake her, because I love her. But her light and momentary sorrow doesn't mean that I'm going to remove her immediately from the situation.

Sometimes she is defiant. Earlier this week we were picking up, and I told her to put a book away. When she did not pick it up, I handed it to her, and told her to pick it up. She threw it down and grinned at me. I explained what would happen if she did not pick up the book, and she stood there. I handed her the book. She threw the book. I put her in time out. Several minutes later, after I had picked up everything else, I picked her up. I told her she had been in time out for not listening when mommy said to put the book away. I hugged her and said that I still loved her. And I showed her the book and told her to put it away. She brought it to the bookshelf but couldn't get it to stay inside. So she asked me to help. She handed me the book, and I put it on the bookshelf.

That time I was very frustrated. I still loved her--but she was not doing the right thing. I had plans for her. My plans weren't really that she put Jack and Jill and Other Rhymes into the bookcase. No, I could do that very easily myself; I picked up the other toys and in the end I was the one who put the book in question where it belonged. My plans were that she develop a servant's heart, that she learn to work joyfully, that she take to heart the importance of obedience. (And maybe getting to bed sooner rather than later.) I did not need Jack and Jill for these things. One book on the floor wouldn't prevent me from going to bed, and wouldn't make our house a disaster (not that it isn't). Picking up that one book did not ensure that she learned joy in her work. But it was a tiny step.

I wasn't angry when she didn't complete the task I gave her. I was only disappointed in her when she did not try. I gave her the help she needed to complete it (though with enough work she could have done it on her own).

And then there's Third. He's a bit over two months old. He is starting to show an interest in the world, and in everything he does his motives are pure, though often selfish--but he can't understand enough even to defy me. When he won't open his mouth wide, and he has a poor latch, I get frustrated at him. I know he is capable of a good latch. But I don't punish him (except that he gets less milk), I help him. When he doesn't sleep at night, I may be frustrated, but not at him. He is hungry or uncomfortable, not disobedient. So I answer his cries; I go to him and I hold him and feed him. All of life is insurmountable obstacles for a newborn. So I place no obstacles between him and what he wants and needs, and help him to get that if he needs help.

Right now I feel like I want help. I am asking God for help.

Maybe I have fallen in a box.

But maybe I am just standing at the top of the stairs telling him that going down is too hard, and I need to be carried.

Or maybe all of life is so difficult right now that he has simply placed a door in front of me that he will not close, and requires only that I walk through, and if I cannot he will carry me.

I am good at resting and trusting. And if I am stuck in a box, that's what I need to do. If I can do nothing, the groanings of my spirit will be sufficient for Him to hear and save. But if I'm at the top of a staircase, He does not want me to stand and wait for Him--he wants me to pick up my Blankie and follow where he has gone before, and he will catch me if I should fall.

The problem is that I don't know which analogy to use.

A history of my conversion to Christianity as told through attempts at evangelism

2010-02-08T08:28:00.000-08:00

I started to write my experiences on the receiving end of evangelism on another blog, but it turned into such an enormous piece I am separating it out and writing it here. I offer this only as my own personal story, and not as a recommendation of what you should or should not do in your effort to make Christ known to someone.

I was baptized as an infant. It was arranged by a Catholic relative.

A family friend took my sister and I to a VBS-type outreach one summer when we were quite young. I don't remember it very well. I do remember thinking it was very unfair, because the other kids were able to figure out which cardboard character was Peter and things like that, which no one ever told me. Anything spiritual I missed out on.

In high school one year I sat with two Christians for lunch every day. Why? Because they were willing to sit with me and no one else would. We played cards. I don't remember their names. The guy--he was a senior, I a freshman or sophomore--invited me to church or something a couple times, and I said I couldn't go without finding out. At the end of the year it turned out he was giving a speech for graduation. I think he might have been some sort of class official. He asked about my views on life and I think I ended up talking about stuff like aliens and life on other planets. The other girl wasn't there that day, but was the next. The next day he asked if I wanted to say what I told him the day before again to her. I felt somehow like I shouldn't. He gave us his speech, which included how some people were looking for answers in things like life on other planets, but that the answer everyone needed was Jesus. Something like that.

It made no impact on me. Not sure I really understood it. Later I remember my mom telling me that this family friend's husband had lost her job, but she believed it was for a reason, because they believed everything happened for a reason. I remember thinking (and likely saying) that it was stupid to think bad things happened for a reason.

I also was mentored by a teacher that same year I think, who in retrospect I think was a Christian, because at one point she took me out of class to explain that many people found it offensive when someone took God's name in vain. I do not think there was a spiritual aspect to the mentoring.

I think at some point--maybe in this year as well--I tried praying. I didn't get it.

I moved. I decided to make up my own religion. I figured something made up 2000 years ago wasn't really better than something made up today.

I had always been free to learn more about God or church or religion if I wanted, but I never wanted. My parents would say they are agnostic. I don't know if that period illustrates more how hard God was working to reach me, or how much my own spiritual blindness and deafness, or Satan, or all of the above, worked to keep the message of God and His Love obscured to me.

Through all of my early life I felt I was missing something. I thought it was friends, which I rarely had in abundance if at all. I was always the kid everyone else made fun of. I say this not to complain or elicit sympathy, (in retrospect there are aspects of this for which I am grateful) but simply to show the picture of who I am.

I told some classmates later that I had made up my own religion, and some of the things I believed. They told me not to tell one girl in particular--maybe because she was a Christian? I didn't. Judging by what happened to a meat pizza on a Friday night, all but one of these were Catholics. The other was a Mennonite, I learned at some point.

I went to a third high school. It was a specialized school for students interested in math and science. Really I'm more interested in English, but I am good at math and science. So I applied and was accepted. While I was there I learned that I wasn't the smartest person there was. There were many other people as smart or smarter than me. Perhaps to most people this wouldn't have been shocking, but for me I think it was a surprise. At the same time I found a community of people like me--not everyone in the school, but a small group who liked to congregate around chess boards at lunch time and talk about obscure topics. You might call them/us geeks or nerds. Belonging was an entirely new feeling for me. I think I may, at some point, have in some way worshiped the spirit of my school and of what I called my people.

And there was a guy. He was definitely a geek, though perhaps not the geekiest of them. I think I first met him during orientation, though he didn't make much of an impression on me then. Later, we were vying for the bottom spot on the chess ladder as we lost to everyone else. So it was decided I had to play him. At first I refused. I thought it was more fun to keep going without ever playing each other. But someone insisted, so we played, and he smashed my face in. In a purely metaphorical sense, of course. And we played many games of chess, with me winning once in a while. And we spent time together, though I was also spending time with lots of other friends. It is worth noting that the school was in the area of 75% male, and that only two of my friends were female. This rarely occurred to me.

At some point I started emailing my guy friend every morning. Why just him, I do not know. I think I would have fallen for any of my guy friends. But he ended up being the one. And we ended up going to the prom together (his senior, my junior--combined at our very small school (~70 or 80 juniors and seniors). And someone asked if we were a couple, and he thought they just meant tonight, and said yes.

We spent more and more time together. At some point I learned he was a Christian. At some point he told me that God would always come first in his life (meaning I could never be more than second). Anyone who wasn't a Christian and had a normal level of self-esteem might have moved on then. But I said "Okay."

What was he doing dating me? I think he just kind of fell into it as we spent more time together. It was a first relationship for both of us. I certainly don't think he set out to date a non-Christian.

I pressured him for sex. He said not yet. I said when. He said when we got married.

He compromised. We did things we shouldn't have--things we didn't know we shouldn't have, like making out, and things he knew very well we shouldn't have as well (not sex), all initiated by me.
(And anyone reading this who thinks that their daughters need to be protected from non-Christians and not their sons, I hope this scares you.)

At some point in high school, he took me to a youth event. There was skating, bowling, a hockey game (we rooted for the referees), and some sort of evangelistic outreachy thing. One of the chaperones asked if I wanted to go down during the altar call. But he got my name wrong, so I said no. Not sure how much I understood then either.

He went to the college that shared a campus with our high school--seniors took college courses there. I followed, mostly because of him. His having a dorm room meant I could do more. He held firm enough not to have sex with me, which I am sure was very difficult. The next year he commuted from home, but I had a dorm room. And at some point, probably counseled by Godly mentors for his own good, he said that he couldn't keep seeing me because I was not a Christian. Of course I was emotionally invested. In that moment I realized I was willing to live a lie for him. And so I said "Tell me more about what you believe."

I started going to his church.

And something miraculous happened--at some point, I started believing what I was hearing. It had nothing to do with a childhood VBS week, or two friends who spent a long year ministering to a girl who felt completely alone, or a teacher who tried to make an impression even though regulations constrained her from sharing spiritual truths. And it certainly was not a direct result of missionary dating.

It didn't have anything to do with a rally and a youth leader who forgot my name--though it might have had something to do with a curious thing I felt in my heart every time I heard that man pray.

I cannot and do not discount the possibility that my baptism as an infant conferred some small measure of grace--especially since nothing similar has happened to my sister, who was not baptized.

It may have had something to do with a night spent with three other lonely, searching people as we stayed in one of their parent's houses while out of town for a larp (live-action role-playing game), crying with each other and feeling alone though we were all very good friends, and my private realization that I was in sin--that God had given me a good man and I had done nothing but try and corrupt him.

It may have had something to do with being willing to live as a Christian and hear the word of God, that perhaps my heart was that much softer, or as I sat in church and heard the words more they started to make sense.

I am left simply to conclude that God used every available means to get at my heart, even the sinfulness of the teenager I would one day marry. And that in the end, it was only through the work of the Holy Spirit in my heart that I was saved, after every human effort to show me love and make me understand had failed. There is not now any doubt in my mind that I am saved, forgiven, and set free from my past and my sin.

Breastfeeding

2010-02-03T08:13:00.000-08:00

So two days ago Third finally figured out this breastfeeding thing. Yay! Yesterday he wanted to nurse so much he was not willing to take a bottle unless he got really hungry. Boo! Today he will fall asleep nursing before doing it too much and I am thinking from the wetness of his diapers he isn't quite getting enough (though I am giving him bottles too).

I am also sick and dead tired. It feels like I am failing at even my most basic tasks as a mom. I need to be writing down what he is doing when, but I just can't seem to make it happen.

Firstborn learned yesterday afternoon to climb up on the couch. She used her newfound skills to turn on several devices and call Grandpa (I assume she managed to get into the caller id log or phonebook or redial). I am on antibiotics (which can be fatiguing) for sinusitis and I suspect I had another UTI as well. I called though because I thought I might have mastitis. Now I am fairly sure I have neither that nor conjunctivitis. I have new glasses (got them last week) that sometimes seem to throw off my vision.

Here is where, if I were a good blogger, I would tie this all together with some sort of spiritual truth.

Um...

God is love.

They grow up so fast

2010-02-02T09:39:00.000-08:00

I have decided to work harder on potty training, so Firstborn has been spending part of the day running around naked the past few days. Not much success yet, but only one puddle, and I know she's ready to learn.

Speaking of ready, I am also pretty sure she's ready for a toddler bed. We are getting one from some friends who no longer need it, possibly this month. If she naps at Grandma and Grandpa's it's in a big bed. She lies very still--more so than in her crib.

Third has outgrown his newborn clothes and is in the 0-3 month size. Luckily, dh finally bought me a cheap $20 digital camera since we lost ours. But that was less than a week ago and now it's missing too.

All of a sudden Third has figured out this breastfeeding thing! He will eat whenever I put him to breast, starting yesterday. Is it just time? Was it losing the breast shield? I don't know, but I'm glad it's working.

Third has put himself on a schedule. He wakes up in the morning just before we want to, and is up through our and Firstborn's breakfasts. He wakes up again for a quick noontime meal, and then again when it's time to get dinner ready, and is up off and on through dinner, Firstborn's bathtime, and her bedtime, and our bedtime. Then he sleeps until midnight, or two or three. Sometimes he'll be up both those times. Sometimes there will be another brief awake period in the morning or afternoon. It's not exactly a convenient schedule, but predictability is nice.

Third is better at regulating his temperature than I am--he is too warm sometimes in a fleecey sleeper. So much for one-more-layer-that-I'm-wearing. His sister has apparently not gotten the memo, though, and is still quite disturbed if he isn't wearing a hat. She will make an excellent little old lady someday. (Of course, so would Daddy, who's concerned about Firstborn wandering around without socks. Because she takes hem off.)

Went for a walk with Firstborn recently and she kept up with me, and stopped when I told her to. Yay!

I think she might be done napping. A real shame, because I'm not done with her napping. But she wouldn't nap this weekend, then had one yesterday and was up early and during the night, though she fell back asleep. We're trying things without a nap today, and she's doing fine.

God bless y'all

Picking up

2010-01-29T11:36:00.000-08:00

I hate the house being a mess. My husband hates the house being a mess. We go through cycles of thinking of doing something about it, deciding to do something about it, talking about what to do about it, and occasionally even doing something about it.

Here's what I've been doing recently that's working:
Geting up. After the baby's morning feeding at 530 or 6 (already Third is more organized than I--he's put himself on a schedule somewhat), I get up. I might be so ambitious, once Third is asleep again but before Firstborn wakes up, as to get dressed and make myself breakfast. Doing this means I get breakfast, which is a good motivator. Today I had ranch scrambled eggs with kielbasa and mozzerella. After that I work on dishes, figure out firstborn's breakfast, and maybe work on laundry. And veg a little. So the day starts out with food and minor accomplishments, and when Firstborn wakes up, I'm ready for her.

Child labor. Never too early to start. It's good for her sense of self-worth and work ethic, now and into the future. She's really not helpful yet, but it's an investment in her future and my own (hoping she will help cheerfully when older). Should I find time to work on dishes and laundry, she can open and shut drawers and cupboards. She can carry plastic or metal items (and probably breakables too, but I haven't been so bold yet). I can, in fact, give her a stack of tupperware and tell her to put it in the tupperware cupboard, and she is likely to do so. Well, now it's rubbermaid, but that doesn't work as well as a noun and some of my heirloom pieces predate the change. While she isn't really helping much--it may take longer with her help--another major non-obvious benefit is tat she's not getting into anything else while I'm working.

Teaching personal responsibility. This has been a major good change. Okay, I've done it two or three times, but I'm gonna stick with it, really. Before naptime/bedtime and meals, Firstborn picks up her toys. (And in the space of that sentence, we did it again! Go us. I think there's some sort of time differential though... within that sentence, hours passed for me, but only seconds for you.) She needs direction. She needs help. She needs very specific instruction. I do most of the work. But I try not to criticize/correct her work where unnecessary (if the car goes on her couch with her stuffed animals, no big deal--okay, I moved it. But in philosophy I shouldn't have). And by making it her job instead of mine, it helps me stress less, even if I'm still doing the bulk of the work. Not to mention--she won't be twenty and a half months old forever. I have to remember I am investing in the future, teaching and instilling habits that I hope will last a lifetime--habits I wish I had.

Getting all the dishes done before bedtime. If they don't all fit in the dishwasher, they get handwashed. If the dishwasher isn't full, fine. Being in the dishwasher counts as done (and I run if it is full). Just out of the sink and off of the counter. This is something I managed for a little while when pregnant with Third, but then didn't keep up with--but it's a good practice and makes me feel better about things, and now I'm back on top of it again.

Making Daddy's lunch at night. Not really picking up/cleaning, but he appreciates it, and like keeping things picked up, it's a way to bless him. If I wait till morning, when Third is up (and sometimes Firstborn), it's kind of hit or miss.

That said--we didn't do any of this last night when we got home from Bible study at 830. But now the toys are picked up, and... the toys are picked up. Still working on those dishes.

The things we should be doing:
Vacuuming. Probably more than once a week... but once a week would be a start. I imagine our motivation will increase when Third starts wiggling around on the floor and eating things he finds.

Putting away things right after we use them. The little things like hanging up coats when we come in, cleaning up dishes and Firstborn's tray after meals, restocking diaper bags after going out, taking care of mail as soon as possible....

Third needs a bath more often. No, babies don't need baths every day, but twice a week would be a good start. Setting days for it could help. Every night wouldn't be awful--to get him towards a bedtime routine. Firstborn gets a daily bath (almost always) and likes it in theory, but complains about getting her head wet. And having her head rubbed. And getting it wet again. And having it dried. And the whining gets to me a lot... which makes that whole rejoicing thing I mentioned last post hard. Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.

I used to do the guinea pig cage and litter box weekly on Mondays. Having a set day seems to help me. Hasn't been consistently weekly since Third was born, nor have I even been making any effort to put it on a certain day.

So I am a long way from perfecting this... a very long way... but we are working on it.

In the midst of struggles

2010-01-25T09:29:00.001-08:00

I just lost a huge, marathon post on some of my struggles right now.

Maybe there is a reason for that?

The important part is not the struggles.

Here is what is important, so perhaps it is appropriate that it be the bulk of the post rather than a footnote.

The one task I can be completely sure, in this life, that God has appointed for me is to care for the children of my womb, because God and God alone opens and closes the womb. My special area of ministry and missions is in my home, where I am called to be a servant to my husband and my children. While I may struggle with some aspects of what I am called to do, at times, my attitude should not be one of resentment, reluctance, fear, or even just getting through it:

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice!
Philippians 4:4

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as if working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.
Colossians 3:23-24

Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
1 Corinthians 15:58b

For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Ephesians 2:10

So when I make my husband a lunch--the one thing I do just for him that has no benefit to me--I need to do so with as much cheer as if I had been asked to do so for Jesus. When I spend time with my daughter--who I am so blessed to have--I need to focus on her and love her like that was the most important task in the world--and in truth, it's hard to think of many that matter more. When I wake at night for the third time to feed my beautiful new baby boy, I need to do so with joy and with thankfulness. And as I prepare this temple for the possibility that the Sovereign God of all the universe, the Master Artist who created every living thing, might once again choose to join with my husband and I in using us to create His newest masterpiece, and use me to nurture and grow a new soul created in His very Image (what greater honor or privilege could there be?), I need to give myself to that task with my full heart, rejoicing that all of this truly is for Him.

Sometimes I try to live like that, though I usually fall short. Self-sacrifice? Yes, but what better things could I do with my self? God's divine purpose for my life goes far beyond what I could come up with.

Babywearing

2010-01-22T06:40:00.000-08:00

Wearing my baby is such a sweet, wonderful, common-sense... theory.

I love the idea--my hands are free to handle household tasks and cuddle older children; baby is snuggled warmly and safely against me; supposedly, with some types of carriers, he can even breastfeed while I move about my daily business.

One of the differences between theory and practice is that in theory, there's no difference between theory and practice.

For me, I can't seem to make it work.

I have tried the breastfeeding-in-sling thing with Firstborn. It might work with practice, but I can't see making it work while in motion, so what's the point?

It kills my back. I've tried three types of carriers and every one is bad for my back. I end up in pain after even a few hours. Granted, carrying the baby around is at least as bad, so Love or I will often wear Peter when we are out and about and that's the easiest way to do things. But wearing Third is not an every-day around-the-house option because of this.

Skin to skin contact is supposed to be one of the best ways to convince a little one to breastfeed, though, so last Saturday I decided I was going to wear Third all day, at least for the day. The back pain was worth it to get him "back to breast." I used a carrier where plenty of skin would be exposed, stripped him to his socks, and buttoned a sweater around him. Not modest, perhaps, but I wasn't planning on going out.

Firstborn was most interested in my "baby shirt" and wanted one herself, so we found her a toy carrier so she could wear a doll--very cute.

Ideally I also would have done nothing but tend to the baby all day--but that wasn't happening. So I tried to do normal things--things like baking and unloading the dishwasher. Saying that I had my hands free would not be quite accurate. I did, yes, but there was also this large baby between them, impeding my vision and range of motion. If I bent over, I had to support him with at least one hand. Everything took twice as long as usual, at least. And anything that would require having something against my chest or stomach--like doing dishes in a sink or carrying something big--would have been an impossibility.

He also was not waking up well that day--maybe because he was too comfy, or maybe because he was getting sick--but I blamed comfiness and by Firstborn's naptime I was just holding him a lot, and putting him down when I had to do so.

I also don't cloth diaper or cosleep. I've tried making my own baby food and bread, but have never done much. (I'm not breastfeeding, either, but that I'm giving my best shot!) I admire all those fun crunchy attachment parenting things... but for various reasons, they don't work for our family.

Well overdue for an update

2010-01-21T07:39:00.000-08:00

I'm really bad at updating my blog on a regular basis....

So I have a beautiful baby boy, Peter Sidney III, who not only has his daddy's name, but was also born on his daddy's birthday, 27 years later.

He had kind of a rough start--he would not breastfeed, had jaundice, was on the bottle, went back to the breast, was not gaining at all on the breast, went back to the bottle and refused to breastfeed at all, did not reach his birthweight until 3 weeks, but then was almost caught up to where he should be at one month (nine pounds!), had a mild tongue-tie divided....

Third is six weeks old today, is occasionally doing some nursing (15 minutes this morning--the most he's done in three weeks or so), and we are all (Daddy, Firstborn, Third, and I) recovering from a nasty 24-hour bug... at least, we hope he's recovering. We worry about him quite a bit with all he's been through.

I could tell my body was getting ready for the birth the weekend before Thanksgiving, but it was three weeks before he came. I was in active labor that stalled out at least 4 or 5 times, sometimes for hours.... We went to the hospital a couple times before I said I was going to just wait three hours and if I hadn't had the baby, figure it wasn't the real thing. But when it did happen, my water broke, and one hour fifteen minutes after that, he was born. Would have been quicker if the hospital people hadn't been trying to take vitals and stick me with an IV and such. We were just 46 minutes into Daddy's birthday, so we figure that's what he was waiting for :) On an interesting side note, Firstborn was born on Daddy's work anniversary, we realized recently. Maybe the next little one will have a special birthday too?

I have been pumping, and that's about half of what baby is eating, but with pumping, feeding, eating, and working a little on potty training big sister as well, it's hard to get everything done... with breastfeeding, skin-to-skin, pumping, and feeding are all one activity at the same time, and no cleanup is needed. So it's been a challenge to find time for it all--especially skin-to-skin, because that's the lowest priority. I need to work on that.

Firstborn loves her brother although she also would like more attention--she is always wanting someone to read her books. I give her as much attention as I can.

It is amazing how much she is growing--she is sensitive to others' emotions (some of her favorite words are happy, sleepy, and crying). She can say "Babylon Five." (We really don't watch that much TV...) She is working on potty training--don't know if she gets it yet. She's putting words together all the time--baby cup, baby shirt, baby crying, baby sleepy, daddy sleepy, baby sleeping daddy....

I am very blessed.

Seven months pregnant

2009-10-28T05:46:00.000-07:00

My son is now less than two months from being born. He is fully formed and would probably be okay if he were born today (though that's not what I want and would not be best for him).

He already is developing a personality--he seems more active and more stubborn than his big sister. He has definite opinions about the positions he prefers. He is kicking me very regularly as I type this--the only thing Firstborn ever did regularly was hiccup, and this is a lot more random than that. Come to think of it, I don't know if my son has even had the hiccups.

He probably weighs 3 or 4 pounds now. He probably looks like you would expect a newborn to look, only smaller and skinnier.

And it would be completely legal for me to have him killed.

There's no reason for that. It would be no more harmful to me--probably less--to simply give birth to him at this point. An injection could give his lungs a better chance, and he would likely live a full and productive life, though he might face temporary setbacks or possibly permanent difficulties due to his prematurity. If I decided I no longer wanted my son (and I do want him so much!), there would be plenty of families willing to love him and raise him as their own, even if he did face challenges due to being born early.

There is no reason for abortion to be legal after viability. It's not about bodily sovereignty. It's not about choosing whether to be pregnant. It's about choosing whether a child may live or die.

Late abortions are about killing babies.

Disclaimer: Nothing in this post should be taken to imply that I support women making the decision to give birth early because they do not want their children or do not want to be pregnant anymore. Nothing in this post should be taken to indicate that I think a woman's right to do what she likes with her body should trump a child's right to life at any stage of pregnancy.

sentences

2009-10-02T11:46:00.000-07:00

Firstborn said her first confirmed "sentence" this weekend. (This is the kind of sentence where the requirement is only that there are at least two different words, and they are related somehow). Her sentence was "Sit sit sit sit kitty." (This translates roughly as, "The kitty is under the chair.") Since then, she has said several more sentences, including "Duck quack quack," "Cat quack quack" (still working on those animal sounds I guess), and "Esther kitty" (our cat's name is Esther). She now seems to be frequently saying several different words in a row, though I often can't tell what most of them are.

Okay, I don't usually do poop, but I will share a story including poop, because... well, because.

So Daddy was changing the diaper and asked for help because it was poopy and green. This was due to a kiwi for breakfast. While I worked on the diaper, I told Firstborn that the diaper was green because of the kiwi. I asked her what color her poop would be if she ate chocolate. "Bah."
"That's right, chocolate is brown!" (I thought this was just a coincidence--it might be). "What color would your poop be if you at a banana?"
"Yl." I was speechless for a moment. I looked at Husband, who asked, "Was that yellow?"
"It sure sounded like it."
"What color would you poop be if you had blueberries?"
"ll." (pause) "ee." (Were those colors? I don't know.)

I also have heard reports of her matching colors, but I don't know if she did it on purpose. She hasn't done it since. I've talked about colors for over a year, and we've had a color book for several months, so it wouldn't surprise me if she was picking up something.

They've stopped making it

2009-09-21T08:09:00.000-07:00

So we live in rural Massachusetts (yes, there is such a place) on 40-someodd acres of "house lot." Basically, we bought the extra land from Love's parents and had it made part of our house lot for tax purposes. At some point we might have it become forestry land, which could be even better, if it's long-term enough.

Just recently we learned that two "house-lots" right across the "street" from us are on sale for half the price they were last time they were offered. (The house lots are probably actually buildable, but certainly not easily buildable. The street is a dirt road.) In addition, the owners are willing to sell about 19 acres of backland (past a bridge that would need serious updating before any of it is legally buildable, on a road that is drivable only by offroad vehicles) for a not-too-unreasonable price.

We'd love to buy it, but right now we have no equity. We'd basically have to take out a loan on the equity from the land itself at a much higher interest rate, which we don't want to do, and the taxes would go up too. That's if we could get a loan at all. (Our credit history is impeccable, Love's job is very safe for his industry, but can you blame the banks for being wary right now?)

I would like us to at least make some sort of lowball bid on the land, at least the backland (really the best investment; doubles the amount of house lots we could get if we ever did the road). The last two owners have had to sell the land quickly for negligible amounts due to not paying taxes, so if it happens again, why not sell to us? Not sure what we are going to do.

Right now houses aren't even moving, so house-lots are not in demand, much less backland. Our financial position is stable--we're living the American dream with our house that the bank really owns--but we don't have the kind of free cash that we'd need to do this lightly.

Don't know whether anyone is actually interested in this. If, however, someone who reads this is looking for a place to build, I could give more information, I guess.

More on my brilliant daughter, if you're not tired of that

2009-09-14T13:18:00.001-07:00

On Friday, Firstborn suddenly became very helpful. When I sorted magic cards, she brought me more from another part of the room. When I loaded the dishwasher, she brought me clean tops from the tupperware cupboard. Since then, she's also carried objects to people to help us pick up. She has previously helped get out-of-reach laundry for Mommy, and started handing me ducks when we pick up at the end of bath time.

Her implementation often leaves something to be desired, but her heart's in the right place, so I definitely tell her that she's a good girl and so helpful.

Her new favorite word is sit (sis or sszss). She gets a book (or several), brings it over, backs up to me on the couch and says "sit, sit, sit." She loves having mommy read to her. She also likes to sit on pillows, in chairs, in boxes or baskets, and in baby carriers/car seats (belonging to babies or to dolls).

I still don't think she realizes that she's about to get a brother, though, no matter how much we've told her. But she does like to carry and feed and kiss her dolls--and shake them.

Smart kids

2009-09-08T10:09:00.000-07:00

My husband and I are both very intelligent. I expect that our children will also prove to be very intelligent, barring any disabilities. But at the same time, I know that every parent thinks his or her children are brilliant, so I am not sure of whether to trust my observations. Also, I know there's more to life than being smart, and I'd rather my children display diligence, compassion, and Godliness than sheer brilliance.

A few days ago, Firstborn was transferring water from her leaky sippy cup into a small cylindrical block and then drinking from the block. I was convinced this was a sign of her genius. Even though the cylinder had a hole in the middle. She was making a mess, but I was impressed enough to let her keep doing it anyway.

She has displayed willful defiance before the books have said she "should"--you know, when they give you a big smile and shake their head no as they do something they know they shouldn't.

Someone commented she knew a lot of words for her age--not as sure how typical that is. She seems to be adding a new one almost every day--pop (we have jewelweed to thank for that one :), please, vroom, belly button, shoe, rock-rock, cracker....

Books are some of her favorite toys.

She already plays creatively--the same object can become a hairbrush or a phone. She will on occasion pretend to feed a doll.

She knows how some of her books go--as soon as I turned to the page that said "God made deer," she was already finding my ear. (She always does that--she hears ear and she knows where that is.) She's also associated pictures of objects with the real thing (mainly cats but possibly ducks), but this is a step beyond that, because there's not a picture of an ear on the "God made deer" page.

She knows what button is pressed to get out of her car seat. She can't operate it (which is good), but she plays with it when she wants out.

If she has a shape-sorter toy, she can sometimes put the shape through the hole if I point at the right hole. If she doesn't manage it, she takes the top off of the shape sorter and puts the shape in, then puts the top back on.

So I think my daughter is brilliant. I don't particularly intend to do anything about it--at least not anything different--but I do think she's smart. I think that if I work on things at her level, she's going to pick them up fairly quickly. Some of that's practical--she can now indicate whether she's all done with her food (dah and pushes on tray) or wants more (mmm and pointing). Some of it is less so--I'm working now on "What does the ___ say?" (she will spontaneously make animal sounds, but doesn't know that question yet).

But I'm not pressuring her, because at this age (one might argue, at any age) learning is supposed to be fun. And at any rate, I keep hearing about a friend's niece, her age, who prefers realistic bears to teddy-bear type ones once she saw bears at the zoo and can express this (this was at 12 months), or the boy at church under a year who can already say words and names much more clearly than Firstborn can at 15 months.

She speaks

2009-09-01T08:35:00.000-07:00

Firstborn now has many words. She has said:
cat/kitty, momma, daddy, ball, mmm, please, stick, duck, down, cup, Blankie, doll, foot, wigglytoes, diaper, smart, good job, no, bye-bye, book, car, vroom, her name, tweet-tweet, turkey, an animal sound (growling--between a bear and a duck; made by all animals, in her opinion), banana, bread, fan
She may be saying other things I haven't caught on to yet as well--right now most of her words start with a d, and the number of syllables does not always correspond to the length of the word. All of these are words I am fairly sure she has both said and comprehended. And there's probably more I'm forgetting.

She also definitely understands, though she has not to my knowledge said:
clap, hair, ear, nose, mouth, tummy, belly button, nap, up, chair, seat, grandma, grandpa, shoe(s), head, hand, cracker, cookie, yummy, medicine, tub, in, not, don't, bird, frog, spoon, fork, dancing, dog, bear, bottle, brush

We still have a ways to go before real, two-way communication. I really am going much more by context than sound in interpreting her words. So if she is pointing at her cup saying "dup, dup" I know what she is talking about. If she is watching "King George and the Ducky" and pointing at the screen saying "dut, dut" I know what she's talking about. But if she's not pointing or carrying the object she's talking about, I rarely have a clue. Sometimes her understanding impresses me--like associating a picture of a cat and a real cat, or when I told her that a freestanding fan was a fan and she went and pointed at a ceiling fan instead. She tries to put on clothes and shoes, and she feeds a bottle to a doll on occasion. So there are a lot of things she understands--but what she is thinking is often still a mystery. Real conversation is a way off. It's less common than it used to be, but she'll still point at something and call it "dah" and I'll still not even know what she's talking about sometimes.

She's also really adorable. Complete strangers randomly come up to me and say how beautiful she is.

Movement

2009-08-25T09:27:00.000-07:00

I had been worried the past couple days because Third (the baby--he'll be a III) had been moving less. Well, he's making up for it today! I think it may have had to do with a position change; before he was always transverse, with his feet on my left side, but now he's definitely breech.

It's so neat to feel him move.

Vaccinations

2009-08-24T10:34:00.000-07:00

So today I found out that it is, apparently, no longer possible to get the ethical version of the vaccine for mumps or measles.

The vaccine that is offered is the combined MMR (measles, mumps, and rubella) vaccine. In terms of ethics, the rubella vaccine is the worst offender. It was derived from the cells of two children whose mothers were advised to abort them because the mothers contracted rubella, which could cause complications for unborn children.

No more children will die if I did choose to vaccinate my daughter, but that's not something I'm willing to participate in. I don't think it's okay to benefit from murder.

I was actually kind of impressed by the doctor. When we were first deciding we had a list of ethical versus inethical vaccines put in Firstborn's folder. Well, I had just assumed they were following it until at her last visit they tried to give her MMR, which I knew was not ethically produced. Since then, though, they did try to get the ethical versions, even trying to order them from out of the country, but apparently they are no longer made and won't be for at least 2 years. The doctor would really prefer she were vaccinated, because Firstborn would apparently be at risk if she came into contact with children from other countries. And measles and mumps are bad. Apparently there haven't been any cases in our area recently, though there have been 2 in the US this year. So it doesn't seem like it's really risky....

I also refused chickenpox, but apparently a lot of people do that, and they didn't push too hard on that one. She did get Hib, pneumococcal, and dtap.

Firstborn is on antibiotics indefinitely for urinary reflux to prevent a UTI, which kills me too, and I know it can't be good for her. This is something she's likely to outgrow and they didn't test for up until recently. If she gets another UTI they want to do surgery--for a condition that will likely correct itself within a couple years.

I'm glad that we don't have to contend with epidemics. But I don't agree that it's okay to kill a child to prevent an epidemic. I don't think that my daughter needs to be on antibiotics--but I took drugs for more than half of my pregnancy that may well have saved my other little one's life.

Where is the line between the part of medicine that is a blessing, and overmedication?

Well, I guess that's something the government will be deciding....

Day 36

2009-05-04T18:06:00.000-07:00

You probably didn't notice, but according to my count before, it would be day 37.

We got to see and ultrasound today, though, and (quite reasonably) it appears that the baby was conceived the day after I ovulated.

He (or she) measures at 7 weeks 1 day gestational age.

Only one.

Heartbeat 147.

Twins would have been nice, but I'm fine with one. And he (or she) looks healthy, which is good.

Poor Big Sister :( (Day 33)

2009-04-30T17:29:00.001-07:00

Firstborn has been sick. Possibly a UTI, and there's teething involved as well. Tuesday she was seen, and was fine, but we got a urine sample anyway, and it might be a UTI--hopefully I will find out tomorrow. She has antibiotics and all she seems to want to eat is medicine and breastmilk. Thank God for flavored medicine! I am a little frustrated that all the work so far on weaning her has probably been undone, but I do want to do what's best for her....

She started batting her ear and screaming today, but only when she was tired. And her fever (102 a few days ago) is gone. She seems to have developed a rash, but I suspect it's unrelated--I am betting I messed up a load of her laundry by adding too much detergent or the wrong kind. She will have a new tooth tomorrow, I am sure. Hopefully that will mean a full night's sleep for me.

The other little one (little ones?) have been making me ravenously hungry and sometimes putting me in some crampy pain. I know my cervix is closed tight, though, so trying not to worry.

My first appointment is next week and they will definitely be doing a dating ultrasound. Because, of course, anyone who thinks they ovulated sometime other than day 14 (even with a negative pregnancy test on day 22) is obviously either stupid or a pathological liar. I had an interview on the phone for my history, and tried to refuse to answer the LMP question, but she badgered me into it. Sigh. Hopefully they won't try to tell me the baby is "too small" by going from the wrong date.

I have had a funny, bad taste in my mouth today, no matter what I eat or how much I drink. I don't know if it's a form of morning sickness.

Day 27

2009-04-24T07:19:00.000-07:00

Yay! I had some morning sickness! Just a little nausea, but I found it exciting.... yeah, I am weird.

I also could swear I felt movement yesterday, but seeing as I've had phantom movement since giving birth to Hannah, I think I'll chalk that up to I'm crazy.

And I am so, so happy! I blame that on the pregnancy hormones--I love pregnancy hormones.

Day 23 and all's well

2009-04-20T10:06:00.000-07:00

I passed that 3 week mark with no bad signs... I am sometimes even feeling pregnant, which I do not think I was this early with Firstborn.

Firstborn, like every other mother's children, continues to be breathtakingly intelligent and stunningly gorgeous.

Yesterday morning she was playing with two plastic keys and reached way into her toy basket to pull out the third that matched. She then proceeded to pull out a completely different-looking set of keys. And while I was talking to her, she said "dee"!

She's also pulling up more and more, and sometimes even close to standing on her own. Not much cruising yet.

Today she rotated her straw cup when she couldn't get water out until she could.

She's been very tired the past few days. I hope she is getting enough to drink--but she will drink when she's thirsty enough. I guess, though, that she wouldn't be drinking as much as if she were getting all of her nutrients through drinking, right? Still, I wish I knew what the "right amount" was. She is loving whole milk, which I've been giving her daily even though she's only 11 months (gasp!) instead of a year old.

Day 21

2009-04-17T18:51:00.000-07:00

I miss my babies. And I don't know what to do with that.

And I know part of it's hormones... but that doesn't invalidate it. It isn't going to go away; there's not going to be resolution, and it won't be okay, while I am on this earth.

God be with them.

Day 19

2009-04-16T03:07:00.000-07:00

Firstborn did something new yesterday--she pulled herself up on an inanimate object. I caught her on camera, too! She was quite pleased until she wanted to get down, and then things didn't work so well. But mommy helped.

The nice thing about being pregnant is that when Firstborn does something new, it's not bittersweet at all; it's okay that my baby is growing up.

I've already had a prenatal appointment rescheduled. I'll be going in on the 5th of May--5 weeks exactly. It's nice that they will be earlier, although I hate the way that they end up rescheduling almost every prenatal appointment I have. It's also probably too early to find a heartbeat (although there will be a heartbeat (or maybe several). They'll probably do a dating ultrasound, and that would probably give me a number for sure, so M'Love will meet me there.

I need to start buying more food for Hannah; she eats quite a bit sometimes.

She'll be walking before I know it... and God willing, perhaps even using silverware.

I have been worrying a little more about the baby... at this point, I have gotten as much reassurance as I could possibly get, but... I still worry some. I don't want to lose another child ever again. I don't care how many drugs I have to be on, how many times I have to get stabbed with needles, whether I can eat chocolate again before menopause.... my babies matter more. I'm hoping that something I've done--whether the diet or the drugs--has given me a better chance. So that I can just do the drugs and the diet and the stabbing in the future, and have more healthy babies.

Today's sign of pregnancy: insomnia (Apparently (according to reliable sources) the inability to sleep through the night happened with Firstborn before I even realized I was pregnant, as well as lasting throughout the pregnancy and several months postpartum (due first to my body and then to the baby :)

Day 18 (on breastfeeding)

2009-04-15T02:25:00.000-07:00

I tried to cut Firstborn back to 3-5 times a day breastfeeding, but it seems like my milk is drying up completely. I don't know if it's because I cut back, because of the progesterone, or because of the pregnancy.

It is kind of sad it's over--especially because she tries and then cries when there's not enough, and she still isn't into cups. Cups are sometimes interesting when she feels like it, but they aren't a major source of liquid, in her opinion. I guess she will learn... but I feel like I'm not giving her what she wants and what is good for her, when she is very clearly making it known. When she wants to breastfeed, she claws at my shirt and buries her head in my chest. I never expected to feel this way when it ended, but I suppose I expected it to be more gradual too.

On a lighter note, she's started pointing and is closer to using words for things. However, she's just not there yet. She points at Dada and says, "Dada!" We say, "Yes, what a good girl, that is Dada!" Then she points out the window and says, "Dada." Um, no. Sometimes she seems to call me Mama... and sometimes she seems to call me Dada. Her babbling sounds more wordlike too.

Today's sign of pregnancy: waking up in the wee hours of the morning every day, even when I haven't gotten enough sleep.

Day 17 (the numbers game)

2009-04-14T17:53:00.000-07:00

My hcg numbers:

4/8 11dpo 15
4/10 13dpo 47
4/13 16dpo 321

The upside is, the numbers are really great, according to the doctors. So I guess they are at least not suspecting anything like molar pregnancy. And I read somewhere that (in a small study) 96% of those over 300 on day 16 carried to term. So that's nice.

It seems like conventional internet wisdom, though, is that numbers going up really fast could mean multiples.

My numbers more than tripled in 44 hours, then more than sextupled--almost septupled--in 77 hours.

Anyone want to shed light on this?

I know I shouldn't get my hopes up too much so soon, but those numbers are on fire! They offered me another test, but I asked if it was necessary and they said no, so I said I'd skip it unless there was a reason.

Am I crazy for wanting multiples?

I like not knowing how many children I am gestating more than not knowing how many children I failed to gestate, though!

(Multiples aren't an effect of metformin that I know of; anyone know different?)

Today's sign of pregnancy: M'love says the hormones are affecting me. He means I'm irritable.

Day 16

2009-04-13T07:03:00.000-07:00

I finally got my second set of hcg levels back. They're supposed to double every 48 hours or so... well, they just-over-tripled in a little under 48. Aside from assorted very rare scary awful things, this could mean that I am gestating more than one baby. At very least, it's a very good sign that I will remain pregnant for the next 8 months or so. I called M'Love to tell him. He is not as joyous about it as I am... he knows I get my hopes up too easily :)

They also told me to get another hcg level this week (hmmm... why would they do that unless... oh, yeah, because my numbers are still "low" unless, oh, maybe I really did ovulate when I say I did? Yes, they seem to think I might just be either stupid or a pathological liar. Next time maybe I will just lie about my LMP date.) Anyway, my father-in-law told me today was good so I got to go feed the vampires again. Will find those results out tomorrow.

As we left, a car turned down my street. (You must understand that where I live, more planes fly over my house than cars drive by it. I live on an old dirt road a few miles from a small airport). So we stopped to say hi, and it was my future neighbors. (They bought land across from us before Firstborn was born, and it must have been almost a year since I saw them.) Anyway, as we left after chatting about their plans to someday build a house across from mine, she commented (Dad had told her I was pregnant): "By the time we move in, you'll have 3 kids!"

Hmmm.

A girl can dream, can't she?

Firstborn was asleep when I got home, and stayed asleep as I removed her from the carseat, and woke up only twice and briefly on her way upstairs to bed. Still napping. She had a big brunch: cheerios, sirloin tips, pork roast, butternut squash, French toast, and peach yogurt. She kept finishing stuff, so I kept giving her more :)

I still have to clean back up after a busy weekend--the less we're home, the more there is to do. I did clear the coffee table Saturday, so all that's left in the living room/kitchen area is the shelves and the magazine rack. (Well, and a whole bunch of stuff you can't see, but I'm going to get the visible stuff first).

Saturday I also made brownies with Easter candy-decal-hardened-frosting-things (courtesy of the discount rack last Easter) and two kinds of chocolate chip cookies (big peanut butter chips and mint/chocolate swirl chips with walnuts). We brought them to share on Easter. I actually did end up eating a tiny bit of cookie dough and crumbs yesterday, and today after I packed them up to send to work with M'Love, I ate the leftover brownie crumbles. I guess I am paying for that with more sugar cravings, but I broke open some diet cream soda to combat them.

Anyway, all is well. And I should probably stop putting off my housework now. Or maybe go check message boards.

And, oh yeah:

HE IS RISEN! Praise God.

I have officially made it through Day 14

2009-04-12T03:59:00.000-07:00

Now that I am on day 15, I am even more optimistic. Hopefully my second HCG results, which I can't get until Monday, will be good as well. I think I am going to wait till after week 3, though, to tell the rest of my side of the family.

M'love wanted to tell people right away, so since we were telling my parents first this time, I called them Thursday night (but my mom thought we should tell my dad, so he didn't find out until yesterday). So he's already told people at work, and will probably be telling a lot of relatives today.

This baby is keeping me warm already, something Firstborn never did. So maybe this is a boy? Or maybe that's the progesterone.

The latest test results

2009-04-10T10:24:00.000-07:00

So none of my loyal following have asked how my test results were?

Okay, fine, I'll tell you anyway.

I'm 13 days pregnant. And I couldn't be more thrilled. I would really appreciate prayers for the baby, still, but I'm not worried at all. There are so many things that are different--I'm having no sugar and very little carbs, I'm on metformin and progesterone (my progesterone is at 8.8 and should be 10, but I'm hoping that's not too bad). So there are 4 different things that might help this time and weren't a factor the other times (including for Hannah, who is of course perfectly fine). I have told Firstborn, of course, but seeing as her receptive vocabulary includes only kitty, daddy, mommy, Hannah, no, nose, and tummy--and I'm not so sure about those last 6--I'm pretty sure it's not real clear to her. But M'Love and I are thrilled.

This is, by my estimation, my 11th (or maybe 9th?) pregnancy. I don't know; I wish I did.

This is my third pregnancy that has been confirmed, and the second confirmed by the medical establishment.

I'm glad I'm not worried, because it wouldn't help anything. I am enjoying it right now. I'm hoping it lasts about eight more months, but if it doesn't, I don't want to spend the intervening time afraid and worried.

I need to figure out what I need to be eating and how to get Firstborn to consistently drink from a cup. She'll do it for a while, then lose interest for a week or so, it seems like. I don't really want to wean her, but I know it's likely to happen during pregnancy anyway. There was already a time when she seemed uninterested in nursing for a while. So I would like her to be able to drink when that time comes.

Today's signs of pregnancy: Hungrier and peeing more.

The Baby, the Testing, and the Productivity

2009-04-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

Firstborn isn't feeling well today. She was up all night, off and on; she has a really awful diaper rash; she has a temperature; she has a runny nose; she's had some gas; and I think she is teething too. Poor babygirl. I was sick and husband was sick, as well, last week, so hopefully she doesn't have that. And hopefully she isn't reacting poorly to the metformin I'm taking... but the pattern doesn't quite match that.

But I called up the doctor's office, and they just said to change her diaper often and let them know if it gets worse. She's napping now, at last, so hopefully she will get a bit of rest before we have to go, but not sleep so long I have to postpone leaving, or wake her up.

I'm going to get bloodwork soon.

I have several signs this time:
Faintness/dizziness/seeing black whenever I stand up (which I know my SIL had when she was simultaneously pregnant and breastfeeding)
More, um, stuff than I would normally expect at this point in my cycle
I have a temperature of 99 degrees--extremely unusual for me--and I have been feeling warmer subjectively as well.

So I am (of course) hoping that this is for real. I will find out tomorrow.

I've been playing with pictures and sending them out to family, and albuming some. So that is good. I framed a princess picture in a frame that says little princess.

This means that my kitchen table is almost clear (yay!) and the coffee table has improved too (yay again!). I am doing laundry and hope to clean the guinea pig cage while Firstborn sleeps (first nap since Saturday).

God bless y'all.

Blog Identity

2009-04-04T03:13:00.000-07:00

So, I haven't posted in a while.

Therefore, I should post.

Firstborn continues to get bigger, curlier and teethinger.

My blog seems to have a bit of an identity crisis. Sometimes I post about moral issues (with political ramifications, but my focus is not on the political). And sometimes I post about my real-life issues and frustrations and joys.

Hmm. I thought for sure that would go somewhere, but it didn't.

So I guess this blog is about issues of morality in reproduction, and about early miscarriage, and about the struggles of a quiverfull mom who doesn't actually know anyone else quiverfull except her husband.

And the results are in....

2009-03-26T09:33:00.000-07:00

Yeah. Not pregnant again.

Guess there's always next month....

At least the medical professionals were very accomodating, so I can go get my arm stuck with a needle any time I want, and if I do get pregnant, I will be prescribed progesterone if my numbers are low.

My mom came over yesterday to play with the baby. I think she may be teething--she was fussy and less hungry than usual, and today her cheek seems swollen....

So since Firstborn did not require my constant attention, I managed to get a lot done:

I cleaned the guinea pig cage and litterbox.
I cleaned all three end tables.
I cleaned out and stashed three or four boxes that had previously occupied the middle of my kitchen.
I made homemade applesauce.

The only thing I intended to finish and did not was cleaning Firstborn's room. That's especially tricky because I can't do it during nap time.

There are now more clean areas than unclean in our main living/dining/kitchen room downstairs.

Clean and/or cleaned up daily:
2 couches
4 end tables
floor
sink

Still a mess:
coffee table
kitchen shelves
kitchen table
magazine rack

Getting this one room done will be a huge accomplishment. It is where Firstborn and I spend the majority of our time, and M'Love spends the most time with us (though he's in the computer room when he has to work).

Perhaps when I prayed for God to help me be less lazy, it worked? At any rate, I am thrilled with the progress, and M'Love appreciates it too. The problem is, we end up getting to bed late because I end up doing housework after I put Firstborn to bed. I need to get more done earlier, I guess.

After stuff is clean, in addition to keeping things picked up, I need to work out a schedule for actual cleaning, in which (hopefully) I only have to do one major task a day, maybe two.

Babies

2009-03-23T13:44:00.000-07:00

Firstborn is, as always, gorgeous. She enjoys pulling up on someone's hands, nursing, and chasing cats (followed by tormenting them if she can catch them. She crawls by using her left arm and right big toe. Her hair is getting curlier.

I'm on metformin and looking into progesterone. I'm having no sugar and have drastically slashed carbs as well (trying to have them only at dinner, sometimes lunch). I've been having goat cheese omelets for breakfast, which is working very well, though there is more prep time.

Hopefully I will be getting a blood test this week, and then, if I am pregnant, I may be able to get progesterone.

I would appreciate prayers. Not for me to get/be pregnant--only that if I am, my son or daughter lives.

Cleaning up

2009-03-18T11:24:00.000-07:00

Over the past few weeks I've been making amazing strides toward picking up my house and keeping it in a picked-up state. So far I have no clutter on the couches or the living room floor, no dirty dishes being left out over night, and I'm caught up on laundry. And I am beginning to think that picking up the rest and keeping it neat is doable.

So my plan is to keep pluggin' on and clean one small area at a time. Once everything is picked up I will make myself a schedule for actual cleaning. And then things will stay picked up and clean.

Praise God!

Random small update

2009-03-12T10:40:00.001-07:00

Friday is my birthday, so my mom took Hannah and I shopping and then had all three of us (plus my dad) for dinner. Got some cute baby clothes and also bought a pregnancy test. Didn't tell my mom anything, and don't think she saw the test.

I'm not pregnant.

Didn't really think I was.

Haven't heard back from the doctor yet.

Life goes on.

Spiritual Warfare

2009-03-09T11:22:00.001-07:00

Last week was a difficult week for me. (No kidding, right?)

Saturday night, after Firstborn was in bed and before m'Love came home (he was out judging all day), I was reading Matthew and it was a really awesome experience. You know how sometimes when you read the Bible you actually feel like God put those words there for you, and when the Word says "you" He really does mean "you"? Well, it was like that. I've never really had that experience before. I know that the Bible was written for me, that the Word is living and active, and all, but I haven't felt anything supernatural when reading the Bible before.

And last night a thought popped into my head. It went something like this:
I would renounce Jesus Christ to have more children.

I don't think that was my thought. I immediately recognized the thought as wrong, and after thinking hard about it for a moment, I told Jesus that I would not renounce Him to have more children. I would not even renounce Christ to save my children's lives. And I am glad that I can honestly say that to Him. He is more important.

I can't remember much else in the way of spiritual warfare in my walk with God so far. But I do want to be totally sold out to Him. I hope that my faith is deepening--and I want to make every effort to add to my faith, goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. And maybe something about losing Ebenezer has deepened and strengthened this. I try so hard to find meaning in these tiny lives; I can't figure out what God is doing. I would never choose to lose a child to deepen my faith, and I don't think that one ever really does have to choose between being a good Mom and a good Christian. But what God chooses for me, in His perfect will and His perfect understanding, it is not mine to question. I mean, obviously, I cry out, I ask why--but I have to trust in Him, that His will for me is good. I know God loves me and wants what is best for me. So if I had a miscarriage, God will work through it to bring about my best interests, in His perfect wisdom. In this as in all things He works for my good, and my husband's, and my daughter's, and Ebenezer's, and that of my other children. Not that miscarriage is good--it is part of the great evil in the world that stems from the fall, as is all death--but God is still good.

So I will strive to hold on to God, through depression, through death, through hardship, through all kinds of evil. I will try to hold on to His joy and His promises, because on my own I have nothing. And it does seem that something is happening, if I can feel both God and Satan working in my life.

And God might have been telling me that I am still pregnant with Ebenezer's twin brother, and that I should call him Matthew. But that's almost certainly my having an overactive imagination.

Feel free to pray for me and my family.

Ebenezer

2009-03-07T02:39:00.000-08:00

I had really hoped, after Hannah, not to have a period again. I didn't really think too much about why. After all, no one wants to get periods. They're messy and inconvenient.

I thought that getting pregnant with Hannah fixed everything--that it meant I worked now. That I wouldn't have to go through all that stuff any more. My depression was healed. I figured my infertility was healed. The same people that said "if you adopt, you'll get pregnant" (not that I believed them, or it influenced my decisions) also said "once you have one, you'll have more" with plenty of anecdotal evidence to back it up. And I did believe them.

When my period started coming back I looked at the bright side--at least it meant I was probably becoming fertile again. I didn't think about the possibility it might happen again. I don't know why, really. I guess I just figured that I was fixed, that everything worked.

I have been trying to enjoy Hannah. I know there's no guarantee I'll have more, and that even if I do I want to enjoy her. She's getting so big, and it would be so much harder if I thought I might not have another. That thought had occurred to me.

Even when it started I didn't think that's what it was. I passed some tissue. I looked at it. It didn't look like a baby--but at 10 days it wouldn't. It wasn't much--but how much would there be at ten days? There wasn't a lot of pain, like with Ruby--but Ruby was 21 days. I ended up calling the nurse hotline from our insurance.

She was using some sort of diagnostic tool (like WebMD). She was very nice and very talkative. I asked how I could tell the difference between a very early miscarriage and a heavy period. A blood test, she said, or maybe having the tissue analyzed. She said she'd send me more information in the mail. She said it sounded to her like I probably had a miscarriage. She also thought I might need medical care right away. I told her I'd had these symptoms before, and I didn't think so. She said to get care if the symptoms got worse or I felt faint.

I called my doctor's office yesterday. I talked to a nurse. She didn't know how you could tell an early miscarriage from a heavy period. She would talk to the doctor and get back to me. There is no way to tell. A blood test wouldn't show anything--not at ten days. I asked the nurse if there were other explanations for what I'd seen. She said it could be uterine tissue. But there's no way to tell.

I cried last night. I think it had finally sunk in.

The internet says that Metformin might help with recurrent early miscarriage associated with PCOS. My doctor had mentioned it for insulin resistence, but not for this (and she knew that I had a history of possible early miscarriages, I think). Presumably she didn't know about those studies. So I have emailed her about that. I have decided to cut refined sugars out of my diet, cold turkey. That's the only thing I can think that might have been different with Hannah; I might have been off candy then. I'm also going to get back to exercising more, but that's a seasonal thing. I don't know what might or might not help. But if I can give my babies a better chance, I want to.

I am so grateful for my baby girl. Maybe she's just a miracle; maybe she will never have biological brothers and sisters on this earth. At timees it still seems unreal, after more than 18 months since her conception, that I could have a baby. A daughter. I am sad right now. I am so afraid of losing her. I love her.

I don't know how I can keep going through this. But what choice do I have? To risk never holding another newborn is a greater risk than to risk losing another baby. To love at all is to risk loss. I can't think what form of birth control I could justify, because I am not at any physical risk. And I think God knows more than I do, and I wouldn't want to thwart His will. And my children--God knows them. He created them, and He is infinitely capable of caring for them. I do not even know how many I have, but he knows how many cells were in their tiny bodies. I have never seen them, but I think--more likely than not--they are gazing on His face. I will never hold them, or teach them; I will never know their voices or their gifts. They will know nothing but being loved by their Father in Heaven. No, it is certainly not better for them never to have existed. There is no loss for them. And someday I will know how many children I have; I will hug them and love them.

But for now I have grief and pain, and the awesome responsibility of training up a single, beautiful miracle. To die is gain, but to live is Christ. God, use me.

He is my Stone of Help.

Ebenezer Cooper
2/21/09-3/2/09

More on the baby

2009-02-28T11:06:00.000-08:00

Firstborn is now working on pulling up (although she seems to have quit for a while after falling and hitting her head each time--low pain tolerance).

We are working on clapping--she can slap mommy's hands but not clap her own.

She has started sharing some--she will offer me what she is playing with occasionally, I will take it, and then I will give it back (or trade). Sometimes she will give it back again. She's just so precious, and I get so much joy from just watching her and thinking about her.

It is a great thing to be happy. Now that I know what it's like, I am going to try to hold on to it. And with that sweet baby girl around, it won't be hard.

Firstborn is growing so quickly. At nine months, she's outgrown half her 6-9 month clothes and some of her 9-12m pants, and can wear some 18 month pants. I had to buy her new clothes (that was a fun shopping trip). I had to go to the toddler section instead of the infant section. She's growing so fast! It really is a little bittersweet; I so hope I will be going through all this again (and again... and again... and again...)

Oh, and she's definitely scooting forward now. Right now, in fact, to pull on my keyboard wire.

Theology and punctuation

2009-02-25T12:13:00.000-08:00

I have long believed that proper punctuation and spelling is important. This is near and dear to my heart. I react to written statements like "I don't want to loose control" or "I went over they're" or "My son Joshua, had an evaluation done" or "There are too many law's today" much the same way a musician reacts to Junior Asparagus singing, or normal people react to the sounds of fingernails on a blackboard. Nothing annoys me more--well, okay, maybe negative attitudes about children. Conversely, a semicolon used correctly fills me with peace and joy. And maybe I have issues, but I have a point, I think, somewhere further down.

At any rate, proper punctuation is of the utmost importance in theology. Consider the name I plan to give my firstborn son: Peter Immanuel.

Peter means Rock. Immanuel means God is with us.

Taken together: The Rock God Is With Us. Obviously this is theologically inappropriate. Its meaning should be rendered: The Rock, God, Is With Us. This is just a silly example, obviously. (And no, it won't be Peter, Immanu,el.)

But today I read that someone thought a certain worship song contained the line:
Oh my God, this love, how can it be?
He thought it sounded like a "valley girl" misuse of God's name, as in, OMG, I love your hair!

Clearly this is part of a widespread problem in which worship songs are improperly punctuated. The correct punctuation is: Oh, my God, this love, how can it be? "Oh my God" is perilously close to a misuse of his name; "Oh, my God" is more clearly an address of the Father.

I don't know how all these mispunctuated songs end up in church computers. Some are theologically troubling; some merely funny; some are noticed only by the sort of grammarians who thought Eats, Shoots and Leaves was one of the funniest books ever printed. But it takes away from the sincerity and focus on the worship of God--at least for me. Maybe they were released that way; maybe someone typed something incorrectly along the way. But commas don't just go wherever you take a breath, or where there's a line break. Proper punctuation determines what a sentence means. A comma splice looks unprofessional to those who know it's wrong, and those who don't won't care if a semicolon is used instead.

As the sound guy's wife, I've occasionally had the opportunity to fix glaring problems before they were inflicted on the congregation as a whole. It feels really good. I encourage the stewards of church worship music to either properly punctuate the songs yourselves, or seek out someone who can. I, for one, would be thrilled and honored. Punctuating is almost as fun as compiling survey results!

This public service announcement has been brought to you by the Save the Semicolons foundation.

New things

2009-02-25T11:55:00.000-08:00

My doctor's visit went fine. I hadn't felt depression for most of the intervening time, though, so I think it was just a cycle thing. So I just got a physical, which included a tetanus shot.

Basically the only other thing that might be a problem is the abdominal pain I got when I may have ovulated last month. I'd never had ovulatory pain before, and it wasn't what I would have expected it to be like. So if I have it again, they might want me to get an ultrasound (ew).

Some new things that Firstborn is doing:
She shared today. She wanted to give me a postcard she was playing with. And then I gave it back, and she shared it again. Great fun, it appears. So I traded her for an envelope. She was uninterested at first. Then she picked it up and waved it around, saying, "Dada, Dada."

So we wrote a letter for Dada. She really is not to the point of wanting to write on paper, even when shown how it is done. (I am not suprprised or dismayed by this, just noting it.) And I addressed the (used, wrinkled) envelope to Dada. We went to the mailbox. She tried to pull off her hat when I put it on her, which she had not done before. (No, really. I have a nine-month-old who doesn't mind wearing things
on her head.)

Just a few minutes ago, I saw her move forward on her tummy to get a toy out of reach. Certainly the first time she's purposely moved forward that much.

The other new thing: she can bite. Hope we can nip that in the bud (so to speak).

Daddy claims he heard her say "kitty" when the cat ran in front of her. I'm unconvinced. She's also called her shoe kitty. And her father. All reports of new activity don't count until Mommy sees them.

The Tooth

2009-02-17T02:12:00.000-08:00

As of February Fifteenth--nine months exactly--Firstborn has a tooth!

On Friday I was at my parents' and had looked up when I got a tooth. It was on the bottom in the front--but at around six months.

Saturday night I dreamed I held Firstborn over my head, and noticed she had a tooth in the bottom front.

Sunday at church I checked, and I could feel but not see a tooth in the bottom front. By the time we came back to Grandma and Grandpa's (my in-laws--we go there for lunch after church every Sunday--though we actually went to a party for a friend's deceased mom in between and had lunch there this week) the tooth was visible if one looked closely. Grandma was impressed. I called my mom yesterday, and she was impressed as well.

I had really expected the eye teeth to be out first--she's had bumps for those since about three months.

And now she's sleeping much more peacefully. Yay!

So now you can file this under "things only first-time mommies care about" and be back to your regularly scheduled life.

Valentine's dinner

2009-02-15T02:32:00.000-08:00

We decided not to exchange gifts this year--M'Love says that I get a mortgage refinancing for Valentine's day. Since I'd gotten such an extravagant and thoughtful gift, however, I figured I could at least make him a fancy dinner.

Okay, okay. I'm being a little bit uncharitable here. The lower interest rate means lower payments and thus we will have more money each month with which to theoretically do romantic things.

Anyway, here's what I did for dinner:

A special new creation of mine: fake lasagne.
If you have a lasagne-lover but think it's too much work to bother with the layering and the huge, fragile noodles, this might work for you too.
One box of small shells, cooked
A little over half a big container of ricotta (small container would work as well), mixed with one raw egg
About 3/4 of a pound of shredded mozzerella
Hamburg or sausage, cooked and crumbled (I used leftover hamburg, previously incarnated as tacos. More would have been better--I'd recommend at least a pound.
Tomato sauce to taste.

Mix it all up in a big ol' casserole. Throw it in a 325-degree-F oven for about half an hour. Serves about sixteen (we'll be eating this a while).

I pushed it into a heart shape on each of our plates. I also made salads with a heart like shape (his in lunch-meat turkey and mini tomatoes, mine in pepperoni). I made pink milk (courtesy of Wilton's food coloring). M'Love was quite impressed.

Firstborn had rice krispies.

For dessert (later in the evening), we had peppermint ice cream pie (scoop about right amount of ice cream into graham cracker pie shell; let stand on shelf awhile; smoosh down to conform to shell; refreeze. Inspired by a recipe in the Parade around Christmastime) topped with a dollop of whipped cream and a conversation heart.

Firstborn's dessert (immediately after supper) was leftover pureed peaches followed by leftover pureeed bananas. Then she had bedtime snack while we watched a DVR'd "Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?" (Not quite as intellectually stimulating as Jeopardy, but one of the cleanest shows in Prime Time television, 'cuz hey, they got fifth graders on there. Oh, and don't think we have real Tivo; we have a hacked-together homemade DVR system including a computer hooked up to the TV and free software that took about a month to set up, and still isn't perfected now that someone is causing us to need subtitles.) We followed that up with some Netflix Deep Space Nine; Firstborn finally drifted off partway through, and we had our dessert while watching the last part.

M'Love was impressed with the Valentine's day meal; he thought the fake lasagne was as good as the real thing and even suggested sending some in his lunches. He is the only one in his office whose wife makes him a lunch, and he likes to show off.

Firstborn let us sleep through the night last night, unlike the night before. She's been sleeping erratically the past couple weeks, due to a growth spurt (she went from still fitting most of her 3-6 month clothing to outgrowing some 6-9 month clothing in less than three weeks. All of a sudden I look at her and she looks huge, and I never noticed her growing up till now) and teething. Why did I wake up at 4:30 then? No clue. I dreamt she grew a tooth, so I'll find out when she wakes up.

Happy (day after) Valentine's day!

Birth Story

2009-02-11T10:33:00.000-08:00

Because hey, everybody loves birth stories, and I never posted mine.

So here goes.

I was teaching at Pioneer Clubs on Thursday, May 15 and had been feeling pretty awful. But then I'd been feeling awful more nights than not, and we were needed, so we went. Coincidentally, I'd read up that morning on how to tell when your water breaks, so when my water broke (around 7:30), I was pretty sure that's what it was. But hey, plenty of time, so I finished out the teaching segment and M'Love and I left rather than staying for gym time. As we turned out of the church parking lot, we debated whether to go home or to the hospital. We had a bag in the car, but there was more stuff I wanted. So I said we'd go home quick. By the time we got to the main road, though, I'd changed my mind.

It hurt quite a bit, and the contractions weren't quite by the book--about a minute to a minute and a half long at most but very close together--sometimes less than a minute apart. I had worried about not knowing when I was in labor. Well, I was partially right. I can't distinguish labor from a stomach bug, except that the pain is less constant in labor. I know because I'd had a stomach bug a month before. Same pain, and we ended up in the hospital, IV and everything--but no contractions. And I'd had some feeling-off type stomach pain every evening for weeks before the fifteenth, because I remember it was worst on Thursday nights. But no one noticed, because the monitoring was in the mornings, and I never had anything then. I'd also been dilated enough to feel her head for over a week, and not realized that either. They hadn't been checking me at appointments, which was fine with me. They'd offered at the last one, but when I asked if it would really tell them anything, they admitted it wouldn't, so I declined the extra handling.

When we got to the hospital, they let us skip the incessant filling out of paperwork, and once I got a bed, I was at seven centimeters. I felt like I had to pee, but couldn't. The contractions were so close that they couldn't get my vitals. I wanted to move but was not allowed to. They wanted an internal monitor, but they refused it, and because of my size and I kept moving, the external monitors were flaky. I knew Firstborn was fine. M'Love said at one point there were nine people in the room, but I wasn't looking and didn't have my glasses on anyway. They made me stay on my back, and I made M'Love and the nurse get cold washcloths and put them under my lower back. They made me do the stirrup thing too. When I had to push people held my feet and thet helped some. I could feel Firstborn coming closer and then sliding back, but it hurt so much less when she slid back. The doctor (whom I had never met before) was talking about sucking her out, but was going to just do an episiotomy first (necessary to get the vacuum in place anyways). At this point I'm okay with anything and just want to finish this, of course.

The next push--as M'Love puts it, "as soon as he got the scissors out of the way"--I felt her head come out. I knew it was almost done, that it would be just one more push, so I kept pushing and out she flew. Apparently it looked seamless to M'Love, who later opined that he then knew why they called it catching. My palindromic baby was born at 10:01 PM.

I just kept saying, "My little girl! My little girl!" I had expected, I think, to recognize her somehow, but I did not. We had discussed cutting the cord on the way to the hospital, and my husband had expressed a desire to leave that sort of thing up to the professionals, but they handed him the scissors and told him what to do, and he did it. They kept trying to take her, but I wanted to hold her more. They were stitching me up (I had torn as well as being cut) and I told him it hurt worst than pushing her out. He told me he was using more "numb medicine," and I told him "Use as much numb medicine as you want." I tried to feed her but she wouldn't latch on. Then they took her. As we had arranged ahead of time, M'Love went with her because they wouldn't let me go. I did end up taking a short nap. I rung my bell and no one came, so I wandered out in my hospital gown, found someone, and told them to take me to my baby or I'd go find her myself. They took me. They had her under a heat lamp, and she was sleeping. Apparently doing well.

They kept us in the hospital three days because of some strep thing, and somehow during the hour I was in labor there they didn't quite manage to get as many antibiotics into me as they had wanted. The second night M'Love went home for a good night's sleep and a change of clothes (knew I needed to do more packing) so that he could help comfort Firstborn some of the time. She didn't look like the name we had picked out, but rather than changing it at the spur of the moment, we figured she would grow into whatever name we picked and stuck with it. The days in the hospital were not restful, and I only really managed one good feeding. I did manage to get a sensation of letdown, which they wouldn't have let me out without--don't think I've actually felt it since. (This despite the fact I'd been leaking for a month.) I think she was two or three months old before she really got the hang of breastfeeding.

I can't help but wonder if she would have nursed better if I'd gotten more chance to try that first time. I could have kept her warm enough. I also think maybe I could have gotten her out without getting cut open if I'd been allowed to move. It makes me want to avoid a hospital next time. But I don't know what other options I have around here. I am not sure about getting where I'm going--or if we have a midwife, her getting here--in time. It bothers me a little, but my husband doesn't really want to discuss it--something about the order of my horse and my cart. I have pointed out, though, that considering it will be even quicker next time, he doesn't want me hesitating because I don't want to go to the place I'll be giving birth, unless he wants his next offspring named LeSabre--or worse, F150.

And then I had four months of afterpains. Just had to throw that in there in case anyone's jealous of my two-and-a-half-hour labor. And then some more at six months for a little while. The doctor said something to the effect of yup, that's weird, guess it sucks to be you. And my episiotomy didn't heal right, but they didn't notice that.

Not once in the whole process did I consider not doing it again. Well, maybe once. When the afterpains came back again at six months post-partum. But I still rejected it.

Time for another update

2009-02-09T06:51:00.001-08:00

Well, since I last posted, the carbon monoxide detectors went off, the car died, I attended my first Magic: the Gathering tournament since Firstborn was born, Firstborn started taking breastmilk from a cup, I had an actual real-life conversation with someone who has more than four kids at my church, the youngest of whom is a little younger than mine....

Life is good. God is great.

Firstborn is still rolling and rotating but not crawling. She can get to all fours, but then goes backwards. She ends up backed into corners.

Our attempt to do a major, all-day event with Firstborn in tow went about as well as could be expected. I don't remember my final scores (I played two flights, Husband judged) but I had fun and Firstborn didn't suffer too much--though she didn't always get fed on time. She spent some time in her playpen (which we barely use at home) and some time walking with Daddy. Quote for the day: "Judge! The baby needs more puffs." It made me feel a little better about things in general. I really can do things still, when it's worth it.

I think I finally got a real period (I'd had fake ones for a couple months). Perhaps some of my depression-type stuff came from that, and I'm not really slipping back into how it was before. I feel optimistic about this cycle. I'm really thinking this might be it--and feeling optimistic at the beginning is unusual for me. But I also think saying anything jinxes me.

Firstborn's been a little fussier lately, probably teething I think. Hard to tell though. I think she's been teething over 5 months, but no teeth yet.

She absolutely loves rolling around on the floor now, and she's napping again more days than not. It is so nice not to have to hold her all the time. Not that I don't love holding her--sometimes now I pick her up when she's not demanding it though.

She has a beautiful smile that makes everything better, anytime. I can't see her sweet smile and be unhappy.

Firstborn's words

2009-01-22T02:18:00.000-08:00

Since I posted about Firstborn not doing "real" babbling, she spent most of yesterday evening saying dada and this morning made a sound starting with k when she saw kitty for the second time. (Last time it was "kee" and this time it was k'gha or something). I really wasn't worried, but now she's doing great. She is also starting to get into fingerfoods (though still not big on being spoonfed anything with chunks). She's been sitting in the high chair while we eat dinner at the table. Two days ago she got a frozen sweet potato French fry, a cooked one, and a piece of rice cake. She highly enjoyed mangling her French fries and even ate some of them. Last night she had six peas and a piece of rice cake. Much to my surprise, she ate most of her rice cake and at least two peas (though she hasn't liked pureed peas and hadn't eaten her rice cake previously). Since the rashes have been toning down now that I'm using All instead of store brand detergent, I'm pretty sure that was the cause of the worst of it.

The odd thing--which I noticed and no one else would have if I hadn't pointed it out--is that she seems to lose 5-10 weight percentile points on their computerized growth chart each time. When I told the nurse, she said that since Firstborn looks fine the chart must be wrong (huh?). When I told the doctor, she said something to the effect that as long as she was staying in the same curve the percentile didn't matter. But when she looked at the chart, she started from today and went back: 19th, 26th, 33rd, 42nd.... and she did say it seemed odd. She mostly attributes it to increased mobility and decreased breastmilk, but that only explains this month. Again, I'm not real worried; she is gaining, eating, and has rolls on her arms and legs (but not a fat tummy or face). But we are going back in a month for a weigh-in, just to keep an eye on it. My personal theory is that her birthweight has to do more with my genetics, but her size as she gets older has to do with her own genetics--so if she is small she may be like her daddy, who is smaller than his younger brother in all their pictures after 3 years old (but you wouldn't know it now). Her height fluctuates between 60 and 40, probably depending on when she hits growth spurts.

I have an appointment for me scheduled next month too. They might even prescribe something beforehand. They said it was fine to be on them while breastfeeding. I asked if it would be okay for the baby if I conceived, but then also said they'd take me off it if I did. Hmm. I will talk more with either my doctor or my pharmacist before I take it, and I won't take it if it might harm my children. I still think pregnancy is the best cure, and if I had more confidence I could get pregnant I probably wouldn't bother with medications.

Milehimama--I am one of those people who doesn't really trust modern medicine, but doesn't really trust herbs either. But give me the information, and I will at least discuss it with the doctor, especially if the drugs they recommend aren't really safe.

Thanks all for commenting.

Depression

2009-01-20T00:55:00.000-08:00

I can tell I am starting to get depressed again.

The good thing is that I can tell. I am completely aware that it is some sort of hormonal thing. Before, I was depressed for a reason, and that could have been a part of it. Now, I am so in love with my new baby and my wonderful husband that almost nothing in my life could be better. I am happy. Sometimes I am just full of joy, and it's a wonderful feeling, and I don't want to lose it. But that depression is creeping back again, and honestly, if it's just a hormonal imbalance, I have no problem, theologically, with treating it. Now I know how I feel when I am not depressed, so I am not afraid of changing who I am.

So maybe I should get some sort of evaluation? Should I be on drugs? If all I need is some sort of drugs to make my hormones work, that wouldn't be a danger to a baby, I would think. My other options include: 1. Getting pregnant again (and if it were that easy, I would be); or 2. Lots of feel-good-horomone-releasing activity (which while it sounds good, and goes well with #1, I'd probably need more than I can get). So I think I will ask about this today at Firstborn's appointment (her doctor is a family practice doctor).

Other things I am going to ask about:
Rash control: Firstborn does not have diaper rash, but she does have heat rash (the doctor suggested baby powder before, which is working on these most of the time) and another dry rash, mostly on the legs but somewhat on the arms, which I am attributing to the type of detergent I bought a while ago. I've stopped using that detergent on her clothes, and was treating the rash with lotion but am now using baby oil. It's getting better, but I suspect it's more the change in detergent than the oil instead of lotion.

Talking: I'm not really concerned about this, but Firstborn makes up her own sounds rather than using sounds that will facilitate speaking in English. She isn't combining vowels and consonants; few of her sounds qualify as either, but she is proficient and growling, buzzing, squealing, clucking, coughing (yes, on purpose) and trilling. I figure this isn't really a problem because she is learning new sounds and adding them to her repertoire, but the baby books say she ought to be saying things like da-da-da and ga-ga-ga and ma-ma-ma by now.

Solids: The child refuses to eat anything which is not pureed. I can get her to eat a little, but she clearly finds any sort of chunk repulsive and once she figures out that's what she's going to keep getting, she refuses to continue. I got her to eat a piece of rice cake she'd soaked in apple juice today (~4 bites) and some of my homemade baby food (sweet potatoes and rice) but she would not eat the whole bowl. Normally Firstborn loves rice, apple juice, and sweet potatoes, warm or cold, so the issue has to be texture. I'd love to keep making my own baby food, assuming I can make the time for it, but if the baby won't eat it, it won't save money.

Today's sign of pregnancy: Stupid tests, give me the right answer!

Eugenics

2009-01-19T06:13:00.000-08:00

This article was shared in the comments on another blog:
http://www.slate.com/id/2208633/?gt1=38001

If you don't want to read it, it's a take on a couple who screened IVF embryos for possible genetic cancers. The article is pro-life. There were 11 children conceived in a dish. Six had the gene for breast canceer. Three had "other defects." These nine children were put to death, and their remaining siblings were given a chance. One of these died (likely also a casualty of the IVF process). The remaining daughter then became an infant, thus gaining some civil rights.

The family will now know they are not passing on the cancer gene.

Obviously, I find this abhorrent. If there were a way for me to take those nine little girls and boys myself, I would do it in a heartbeat--cancer, other defects, and all. After all, most of us don't have any guarantees. I can deal with "might get cancer someday," and I'd rather have "will definitely have cancer some day" than "was killed at the instruction of her own parents."

I am reminded of a Star Trek episode, the Masterpiece Society http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/The_Masterpiece_Society_(episode)
The Enterprize is trying to save a colony of people who have genetically engineered the perfect society. Geordi (the chief engineer, born blind) is able to come up with a solution based on the technology that allows him to see. Throughout the course of the episode, though, it also becomes clear that Geordi would never have been allowed to be born in that society. (There are other themes and subplots too, which I am ignoring).

And I am wondering, how many of us are perfect enough that we were worthy to be born? I have weak eyes, as does my husband. His back is bad. I probably have the "fat gene," and I have polycystic ovaries. My husband has mild hypoglycemia, and I had gestational diabetes. I imagine most have a similar list. And of course, we all have a sin nature. We have caused pain to others. There was only one perfect human being--and he caused his mother just what those parents of the eleven were hoping to avoid: watching her child die at a young age.

Mary saw the child who had been a miracle beaten until he was unrecognizable, tortured, and stabbed. She saw her son die through no fault of his own, but because of the Fall and mankind's sin.

Wouldn't it be better if he didn't have to go through that?

Today's sign of pregnancy: hormones, insomnia, hormones, warmth, hormones, libido, hormones, and hormones.

Less kids to focus on ministry

2009-01-14T06:38:00.000-08:00

I promised to post about those who say they want only a couple kids to focus on ministry. This post ignores the fact that I find all forms of birth control unacceptable, because that would obviously be another reason not to contracept. I just want to challenge this mindset.

First of all, that's rarely the reason. It just sounds more Christian than "I don't wanna drive a minivan" or "I hate being pregnant" or "I need sleep." Are there some couples who decide to really throw their lives into ministry, or go to dangerous places, and decide that they can't bring a child? Yes. But most people who say this are probably talking about teaching Sunday School and leading a Bible study. And to those going to situations where there is poverty and danger? There are children there. In most of these places, if American culture hasn't contaminated them, children are welcomed and valued--as Scripture states they should be. That part of the culture is one missionaries should be encouraging. I can't conceive of going into long-term ministry in a place and saying, explicitly or implicitly, to people with children, that they are better off not having children at all. How can they model Christian family life to those people without any children? The idea that children should have everything and never work and never be in a difficult situation is not found in the Bible. That may be a cultural value, but my understanding is that being a missionary isn't about propogating cultural values, but Biblical ones. Granted, I have never been a missionary (at least a long-term missionary). But I don't trust the theology of people who deliberately sterilize themselves, so I don't know why anyone who believes openness to life to be a positive good would trust them on other matters of theology either.

Secondly, parenting is a ministry. Not only is it a ministry, it is one of few we can be certain God has given to us, specifically. The Bible is very clear that God creates children. If a person, using the normal biological act, gives birth to a son or daughter, God intended parenting that child as a ministry for his or her parents. I've done nursery, and Sunday School, Pioneer Clubs, and even been a Sunday School Superintendent. I never felt called to it. I was filling a need, and that is good; I'm not saying one should only do ministry when one feels called. But there can be no doubt God intended me to be Firstborn's mother. When I feed her and play with her and read to her and walk with her, when I teach her and love her, I know with certainty I am doing something God intended me to do. How could I leave her with someone else and a bottle of something made by scientists so that I can teach someone else's children, when I am sure God means me to care for the first baby and not at all sure I am called to teach the others? Maybe in some other season of my life, when I don't have a very young child, I will teach Sunday School again. I still take a turn in nursery often--I would do it every week if I could. But if my baby and another are both crying, who do you think I will comfort first? When I have left Firstborn in the nursery, I have trouble concentrating anyway. My ministry in my home, to my family, must come first. I have no business teaching Sunday School when my living room looks like it was hit by a Christmas tornado. If I can get my home under control, and Firstborn can get through it without nursing, I would teach Sunday School if I was needed. But if I do these things to the detriment of my own family, my priorities are misplaced.

Third, children are not a hindrance to ministry or spiritual growth, and the insinuation that they are is a lie straight from hell. I'm convinced that any ministry God wants me involved in during this season of my life will be one where Firstborn fits in. Are there ministries that would be more difficult with children? Absolutely. But the church is a body with many parts. Single people, childless couples, and couples who no longer have young children are all important parts of the body that can participate in these ministries--and ministries that really can't be done by someone with children, even many children, are fewer than most probably think. At the same time, mommies are part of the body. Nursing mommies shouldn't be prevented from participating in church functions, or made to feel unwelcome. They should try and keep themselves modest, and their children from being a distraction, but the church needs to be open to all its members, from the one-month-old to the ninety-year-old. I love hearing babies cry during the service. Even in my struggles with infertility, it seemed such an affirmation of life. I like that my church has a "parents' room" where those with young children, babies, or children with disabilities who might distract others can sit and still hear the sermon. I don't like that the sound quality is awful and no one makes fixing it a priority. I don't like being told I can't go on a women's retreat with my nursing daughter. I don't like the expectation that my husband and I cannot be ministered to at the same retreat, or that my spiritual growth depends on seperation from the family unit God has designed. I think that there should be more effort to minister to the body rather than its parts. I think that families with children of all ages, families without children, nursing mommies, the elderly, and single people should all feel like part of the body. And I think that the body's best work can be done when the whole body is present, and that the body can be best cared for when we care for the whole body.

Lastly, the couple that wants to "focus on ministry" is also focusing on themselves. It may not seem that way, but think about it--they are only considering the ministry they can do. If they have only two children, they may do more. But if they had 11, how much more would those extra nine do for Jesus? And if those nine had an average of six children each (the average before birth control was widespread), that would be 54 more souls, and 54 more workers for the kingdom. If Christians were to have all the children God wanted us to, we could see some very big numbers. And if God wants that couple to only have two, he can make that happen as well, without the use of birth control. But what would it say to the world if we trusted in God enough to give Him control of the future? And just think, in the next generation, they'd be voting. The liberals are already concerned about the fact that we have more children. I can't wait to see who my future children are--missionaries, lawyers, politiciana, artists, builders, pastors; single people devoted wholly to God, or mommies and daddies raising up a new generation of soldiers for the cross.

Today's sign of pregnancy: Joy! and hormones.

The problems of different types of birth control

2009-01-14T04:40:00.001-08:00

This grew out of a post still in progress, but the tangent was getting longer than the main point.

The Bible does not prohibit birth control flat-out. Well, there is that part with Onan, but no one is sure that's necessarily what it means, and it doesn't necessarily speak to all kinds of birth control. So, I will.
I don't necessarily see birth control as wrong, but all forms of birth control have problems that make them unbiblical.

Hormonally based birth control carries the possibility of killing babies. No, I'm not making this up. Everyone who isn't pro-life and everyone who's pro-life and Catholic seems to be aware of this. But somehow right-leaning evangelicals have missed it--probably because they didn't want to hear it. It can prevent a blastocyst (that is, baby) from implanting in the uterine lining (that is, living--continuing to grow and thrive). If you can't see how that is intrinsically evil, I recommend you study Exodus 20:13. I actually think these should be illegal, just like abortion. I don't intend to make all birth control illegal, just those that harm someone other than the user. The rest of these are between the user, their partner, and God. But hormonal birth control is wrong unless your life depends on it.

Some forms of birth control mutilate God's temple--our bodies. Cutting or removing parts of our bodies which God created and which are working fine should not be something Christians do. There are people out there who think that getting a nose-ring is disrespectful of their bodies but have had a fully functional organ removed or made nonfunctional by cutting. Really, hormonal birth control can fall under this category as well--it changes what God has made and made well into something other than what he intended. So even if there were no chance of hormonal birth control killing a child (for example, the pill for men) it is seeking to change something which God designed that is working fine. Killing sperm (or, if they design some other drug or device, killing an egg) seems questionable for this reason as well. Again, I am not referring to removing a defective body part to save one's life. It is like the difference between removing an arm because it is gangrenous and removing an arm for no good reason.

What's left are sexual practices and barrier methods. Barrier methods come between a husband and wife in the act of marriage. It just seems weird that anyone would want a piece of rubber between themselves and the other person. From what I've heard, no one does, but for the "danger" of getting pregnant or the danger of getting a disease (not present in monogamous marriage). I can't say from experience, but it seems that this would alter the experience. And even if it didn't, I am not romantically intereested in a piece of plastic. My objection to sexual practices is about the same. If a couple does something non-reproductive because the regular act doesn't work at the time, or on occasion for another reason, that's one thing. But if it is regularly occuring to stop reproduction--that's not God's design for marriage. The couple is defrauding each other. And I don't think NFP (for prevention) is any better. The basic premise is that the couple does not have sex when they are likely to conceive. The problem is that this is also when they are most likely to want sex, and when sex will be most enjoyable. God designed us that way. I say they are defrauding each other. Paul allowed abstinence for prayer--he did not talk about abstaining so that you wouldn't have kids so long as you pray. And the verse in Ecclesiastes about "a time to embrace and a time to refrain" is not about NFP--it's actually probably about abstaining during infertile times (during menses and a week after).

And if a pregnancy were really so grave a risk that it was worth defrauding each other or mutilating God's temple, why would one use a method that had "failure" rates? Even sterilization can "fail." Wouldn't abstinence be better?

For me, unless there were a very good chance pregnancy would kill me, I can't see myself using birth control. This doesn't mean that no Christian anywhere should use birth control. If I lived in China, I would use birth control. If I lived in such poverty that my children could starve to death, I would consider it. But that's not an issue for me, nor is it an issue for anyone in this country, or most industrialized nations. And if I were talking to someone in a desperate situation--oppression or poverty--I would hope I could find better ways to help them than helping them decide whether using condoms was within God's will.

So when God said "the whole world," he meant....

2009-01-14T04:40:00.000-08:00

Suppose when you were watching a special about Billy Graham, someone said, "When God said to evangelize the whole world, He didn't mean that Billy Graham should do it all himself!"

How would you respond to that? What does the attitude make you think?

It certainly seems to be saying that evangelism isn't always good. That God doesn't always want it.
Which would make me wonder about the speaker--where did he or she get that idea? Presumably, if the speaker is a Christian, he or she thinks that evangelism is sometimes good--but why would it be possible for there to be too much? Perhaps too many new converts would prove too great a strain for the church. You have to disciple them, teach them, train them... not that anyone was worried about that at Pentecost, but this is modern times. It just isn't normal now for the church to get whole bunches of new believers now. Just think if your church held an outreach, and so many people were saved that it doubled in size. You might need a bigger sanctuary, or more chairs, or another service. It might be expected that almost everyone would take a newbie under their wing--even those not involved in the outreach! And updating the directories, the birthday lists... these would be a logistical nightmare.

Maybe Billy Graham should start practicing disciple control. He could just stop preaching each time after he got a reasonable number of converts. Or if he wants to keep preaching, at least take the gospel out, since that would solve the problem. Practically everyone has already heard the gospel--maybe we have gone forth into all the world and made disciples, and we're done now. And if you're nodding your head right now, God help you, 'cause I can't.

In case you haven't figured it out yet, I'm making an analogy. Quite a while ago, I heard a comment very similar to the one above. It went something like, "When God said to be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth, he didn't mean that [person in question] had to do it all himself!"

Let's take a moment to compare and contrast Genesis 1:28 with Matthew 28:19-20.
Because I know I'd be too lazy to look them up if I didn't know them:

God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."

"Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

Both commandments occupy special places in the Bible; Genesis 1:28 is God's first command and first communication with human beings, and Matthew 28:19+20 is Jesus' last words before being taken up to heaven. Both commands are about creating followers for God, dedicating new lives to Him. So why are many churches concerned about one, while most ignore the other?

Oddly enough, the best argument I can come up with against birth control rests on the similarity of these two verses. Basically, under the old covenant we are to multiply, but under the new covenant we are to make disciples. And to some extent that is true. Paul said that to remain single and work for the kingdom of God was better than to marry. But, he didn't say anything about marrying and remaining childless. The change there is that once, marriage was normative, now, singleness is considered better. That's the difference there. Even if there were a form of birth control that were biblically acceptable (I'll post about that seperately, 'cause it just turned into a huge tangent), I don't think that couples should contracept to "focus on ministry" either (and I think I'll have to save that line of reasoning too).

And while the two passages in question are similar, they don't contradict each other. You can go forth with children, you can make disciples with children, you can teach with children. More difficult? Maybe. But not impossible. It's not explicitly or implicitly overwriting the old commandment.

So why is it that people are still trying to make disciples, but not trying to breed them? People do make excuses--
"Evangelism isn't my gift."
"I don't know any unbelievers."
--but we all recognize that those aren't good enough reasons to avoid spreading the gospel. We don't all have to be Billy Graham or Jim-Bob Duggar, but God expects us to take the opportunities presented to us. If someone doesn't go into the streets every weekend to share with everyone they can find, that's okay. But if they avoid meeting or interacting with non-Christians to keep from sharing the gospel, it's not. If someone is asked the reason for the hope that is given, and refuses to give an answer because they are afraid, and are already mentoring someone, and have already made a convert or two, and they don't have time to take this person to church on Sunday mornings--that's a problem. And you may have noticed how ridiculous that sounded.

Because we don't make converts. And we don't make children. God does. Only he can change a heart--or create one. I know I can't make children, no matter how much I try and pray. And no matter how much I try and pray, I can't convince someone to trust in Jesus.

All I can do is refuse to be used.

Mobility; Baking; Bible

2009-01-10T04:39:00.000-08:00

Well, Firstborn is making strides (or at least rolls and wiggles) toward true mobility. She can get to pretty much anything on the floor and within eyesight. Which means that M'Love and I have to actually get on this babyproofing thing. Or at least, cleaning up and vacuuming the area she usually plays in. And maybe after we clean we can get to the tree and take that down.

I had such lofty goals of actually getting the presents put away after Christmas, and of getting at least the living room cleaned up while M'Love had a week and a half off of work. But then between sickness and a general unwillingness to do hard work, it didn't happen. I just get so overwhelmed by the prospect of cleaning up I don't get out of the starting gate, and there is just so much stuff, and so few places.... We are hoping that today will be babyproofing day. But I suspect it's also growth spurt day. Yesterday Firstborn polished off 3 consecutive containers of squash for lunch, and might have kept going a bit longer had I not tried to fob off some mixed vegetables on her instead. Today she woke me up around 4:30 AM and proceeded to nurse for two and a half straight hours. I don't mind--I'm glad she likes her vegetables (at least the orange ones) and I read the internet or play games while she eats. As I write, she's about a yard from where I put her down, accomplished primarily by rolling. She's alternately fussing and squealing as she flails her limbs and plays with Blankie.

Firstborn is actually napping a little now. I think I just have to "train" her to do it, and I think I may try to get Babywise. It was recommended by somebody in my computer who says her children sleep. I made some candied citrus peel yesterday, and it turned out very good--you'd never know there was fruit involved. I also ended up with some extra sugar-stuff that turned into hard candy. My next endeavor in the baking arena will be to melt some peanut butter melts, stir in peanuts and marshmellows, spread in a pan lined with waxed paper, and top with some festive Christmas marshmellows. I want to bake more. It is relaxing and gives me a sense of accomplishment.

I like to cook, even though sometimes it can be a hassle with a child who always wants to be held. Last night for dinner I made some "Manager's special" (marked down) cheese & garlic sausage. I took it out of the casing (casings are ew), chopped it up, and fried it. I warmed up some leftover spatzlen, added some Italian pizza cheese, and added the sausage and some butter. Good stuff. I cook very multiculturally--last night was pirogis and chicken nuggets.

Last night while M'Love was drawing Firstborn's bath, I flipped open a Bible to a random page and Firstborn and I read Psalm 8. She enjoyed it and so did I. An added bonus was lots of body parts I could point out (fingers, hands, feet, mind). This inspired a (very incomplete) silly song version called "Under the Feet" (to the tune of "Under the Sea" from the little mermaid. Apologetix hasn't called yet. I really do need to get back into daily scripture reading and memorization, for my sake and Firstborn's.

Well, that's enough earthshaking social, political and religious commentary for the day.

Today's Sign of pregnancy: No, really, this time I'm sure it's pregnancy mucous

Socialization

2008-12-28T06:49:00.000-08:00

I find it ridiculous that people think that public school is the only, best way for children to become socialized.

Take me, for example.

You know how, in every school, there's at least one kid who is a complete outcast, whom all the others tease? That was me. I'm not playing for sympathy here, just saying it like it is. In elementary school, I got hit, tripped, spit on, called names, excluded. How much do you think that taught me about interacting with other people? Even to the extent most people mean socialization, I missed out on it. As I moved to other schools in other parts of the country later, which seemed a jubilant second chance to me, I still was unpopular. It wasn't as bad as before--I was an outsider, not the one everyone had picked on since they were 6 or 7. I just didn't fit in. I had a couple friends, but I didn't really know how to stay in touch when I moved again, or what friends did together, or how to evaluate how good a friendship was.

Looking back, the fact that I didn't get involved with drugs or sex is purely by the grace of God. I would not have been able to defend myself or known that I should. I don't think I was ever even taught that sex outside of marriage was wrong. I did not grow up in a Christian home (not a bad home, not bad parents, but not Christian).

I moved after my freshman year of high school, and after my sophomore year went to a specialized school for math and science. My husband still finds it funny I ended up there, because I ended up majoring in English, which is a much better fit for me--but it was the school for smart kids, and that did make a big difference. My oldest current friendships are with those who went to the Academy--not all even at the same time. It was my first taste of belonging to a community, and it was where I started getting some socialization--through chess, of all things. It was where I learned I was a geek--and that was freeing. At least one problem I once had--acting violent/angry--completely disappeared. And most importantly, it was where I met my husband.

I'm still a geek. I still lack many social skills other people take for granted. I still have a hard time beginning and maintaining friendships. I will never be normal. I think people instinctively dislike me. Some of this may be appearance, or mannerisms, and some may be my flawed perceptions. I will never be normal, I'm pretty sure. I remember learning in my first high school that the number one thing kids my age feared was not being liked by peers, and I almost laughed out loud.

I am not looking to change my past, which helped make me the way I am. But I can't help but think that I might be different if I had a different school experience. And there is no way I will send my daughter to that sort of environment. Much of my problem may be genetic; my parents don't have a lot of friends, and my husband was never really popular either. He ignored or doesn't remember it. He also had one of those weird school experiences where he was moved up and then held back for social reasons... At any rate, it seems like Firstborn is more likely than most to end up in the position I experienced. And the alternative--that she would be the one making fun of someone else, or that she would just live in a culture where exclusion, mockery and abuse were okay between children--how could I condone that? I know that some parents want their kids to be a light in their schools. In high school, maybe, for a particularly mature teen, but I don't think elementary school kids are ready for that. I certainly don't remember any kids out of the hundreds at my elementary school being a light, and it seems to me that telling a five year old to be like Jesus and throwing them in a public school environment is like telling her to make good nutritional choices and sending her to a candy store every day.

Socialization is one of the main reasons I plan to home-school my daughter.

Christmas.

2008-12-22T05:08:00.000-08:00

Last Friday we had possibly the worst ice storm ever in New England. It pretty much missed us.

This weekend we accumulated a respectable foot-and-a-half or so of snow. Having grown up in central New York state, I am unimpressed. Of course, where I lived, they knew how to handle snow. They had big plows, ditches designed to catch the plowed snow, and they never decided not to do anything and left a couple inches standing in the roads. Or at least, that's how I remember it.

This weekend I also made about 19 dozen cookies, and I'd like to get another kind or two done. I made about 15 dozen holiday chocolate chips (one bag of regular chips, one bag of swirled); 4 dozen holiday funfetti. Also did pretzel rods dipped in white chocolate and pretzels drizzled with chocolate and peanut butter on Friday (although that turned out more of pretzels drizzled with chocolate and globbed with peanut butter). We decided to have individual bags rather than family containers this year, and I'll be making between 45 and 50 (we'll do this for all of my husband's mom's extended family, and probably also for his parents and brother's families. And a couple for some of my family.

Today I'm working on Christmas cards, which we bought from a store this year. Usually we get them free from my husband's work (he works for a custom printing company), but this year they won't be getting that due to economy stuff, and also have a forced vacation between Christmas and New Year's Day (their slowest time of the year). My husband could work then anyway--he is a website guy, not in production--but wanted it off anyway. I've sorted out (on my list) those that can be hand-delivered to save on postage.

So it's pretty busy, but I feel like it's under control, which is kind of surprising for our first Christmas with Firstborn (on the outside, anyway). No more presents to buy, though a couple still need wrapping. And I need to sort them.

Today's sign of pregnancy: Well, none, but it's early yet....

Baby stuff

2008-12-19T10:28:00.000-08:00

I love my daughter so, so much. Even when I get a little frustrated, one of her big, beautiful smiles make it all worthwhile. I honestly don't mind holding her most of the time--but it is hard to hold her all of the time.

Some days, she is willing to be set down for a little while at a time. Even then, sometimes she is unhappy if I leave her sight. I've heard some people say that I trained her this way--but then, they are also the ones who talk about letting her cry it out. I can't do it. I'll let her cry a little while, sometimes, because sometimes she calms down after that--but I don't think it's good for her to cry a lot. And usually, all it takes is holding her to make her happy. How can a mommy refuse?

I tried babywearing some when she was littler, but it's just too hard on my back to do it on a regular basis. And there's so much it's difficult for a one-armed mommy to do, not to mention that's as hard on my back. So I feel like I keep slipping further and further behind on housework (not that I was ever really on top of it).

Those who have been there: is this my fault, or normal, or just part of Firstborn's individual personality? To what extent will it go away if/when she becomes more mobile? If it's my fault, is there away to avoid spoiling the next one rotten while still meeting his/her needs? I know it's just "for a season"--but I'd like to hear that from someone else, too. And maybe get an idea how long the season is.

I don't think that I am pregnant, at the moment--but I did dream I had a baby. I called him Sam at first, because it went with Firstborn's name, then remembered I didn't like the name Samuel, so changed it to Shem. (On waking, I at first was confused how Sam went with Firstborn's name, but then realized it does. Sam is not on my "list", but Shem is.) I gave birth to him in my Grandma's living room (she lives 5 hours away) just like Firstborn (Firstborn was actually born in a hospital). I was telling Firstborn about this in the dream. She was still the age she is now, and I never actually saw baby Sam/Shem. In the dream I inspected the carpet for stains, and saw none. (The carpet was actually similar to one in one of my parents' old houses; the carpet actually in my grandma's living room was different, and has since been replaced by fake wood floors.

Obviously I would like to take this dream for a sign. But then what would I make of my dream the previous night, in which my sister, Captain Janeway and I sat around a table talking to some very fat aliens with funny-looking eyes?

Today's sign of pregnancy: vivid dreams and chocolate cravings

Other stuff

2008-12-13T09:56:00.000-08:00

I haven't talked much about my daughter. She is wonderful, beautiful, adorable, brilliant, smiley, etc. All the wonderful things everyone thinks about their children. She likes to feel new textures, steal glasses, be held about 15 hours a day, and eat. Occasionally, she gets an exciting opportunity to bang a hard toy on a flat surface. She also enjoys large tags, wiimotes, keyboards, cats, and pureed carrots or sweet potatoes.

A guest blog from Firstborn:

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About "Today's sign of pregnancy":
This is mostly a joke. Before I was pregnant with Hannah, I was always looking for signs of pregnancy. Practically anything can be a sign of pregnancy, so you could always find one (fatigue if nothing else). So it is meant to be tongue in cheek, especially as I don't know I am. It is a way of poking fun at my eagerness and optimism in this area, really.

Some good blogs to check out today:
Making Home on stay-at-home-mommying
Generation Cedar on socialization (I may blog more on this topic myself).

Today's sign of pregnancy: change in breastmilk

Legislating morality?

2008-12-13T05:31:00.000-08:00

This is a phrase that gets thrown around a lot. What does it mean?

Ultimately, I must conclude: nothing.

There are really two ways to interpret it:

The first is that the law can't tell you what is right and what is wrong.
Good news: it doesn't. No one is trying to pass a law that says "Gay marriage is bad, "Abortion is wrong," or "Believing in God is stupid." That isn't a law. Law governs behavior, not thoughts, opinions and morality. It may (and does) influence these things--but a law that said "Consider others before yourself" would be legally meaningless and unenforceable besides. Law tells us whether or not something is legal, but not whether it is moral. If a law were passed that made abortion illegal, people would still be free to think it was morally acceptable. If the law were changed to say that one man could marry another man, people would still be free to believe that action was wrong.
If one interprets "legislating morality" this way, no law does.

The second way of interpreting this statement is that the law, or lawmakers, can't make laws based on morality. I am not the first to make this point, of course, but--all laws come out of a moral system. All laws "judge" an action as good or not good. Why do we have laws against murder, theft, and abuse? We believe these things to be bad. Wrong. Immoral. Social evils. All law legislates morality. It seems like people use this phrase for issues like abortion and gay marriage, but don't realize or care how it applies to the laws they want made. For example, they want government to take care of the poor. But they forget that the money the government uses for this comes from somewhere. It's not that all this money appears in the coffers and they have to find a way to use it all up. When money is taken from one person and given to another, those doing the taking and the giving are certainly making moral judgments--that everyone deserves the money, or food, or whatever. That some people have too much money. That everyone should share. That charity is good. Take your pick--but forced charity certainly legislates morality as much as "forced gestation." Certainly requiring doctors to take the lives of children, clergy to declare two women "wife and wife," or taxpayers to fund the destruction of small, frozen children forces a certain morality upon them. All legislation legislates morality.

Of course, that leads to another discussion: what does law do? What should law do? When I first considered this question, due to a book my husband had to read for Sunday school, it took me a while to formulate my philosophy of law. I had one, but I couldn't verbalize it. After thinking on it for a while, I decided that I was a libertarian. I used to think that I was the opposite of a libertarian, but that's just because most libertarians seem to have a different worldview than I. Basically, I believe that Congress should only legislate what the constitution allows it to control, and that personal liberty should allow people to do as they wish when it does not harm others.

Of course, there is a lot of disagreement on what this entails. Can an adult make a decision that harms himself or herself? Can another person help him or her carry this out? Can two adults do something together which will harm them both but no one else? What constitutes harm? What if the harm is smaller or larger in comparison to the restriction on personal freedom?

Abortion is an easy one here--abortion kills a child, who has no choice.

Gay marriage is complicated. I'm in the "why on Earth is the government deciding who can get married?" camp. Civil unions for tex purposes for whoever wants them. Marriage is a religious issue, so leave it to churches. This has the neat bonus of making sure that anyone who wants to get "really married" has to find a church, and will probably have to go through a premarital program that includes the presentation of the gospel. At least, it would at my church.

Adultery is another difficult one. Should two unmarried people be allowed to do what they want together? In an ideal world, no. And there is some justification for that view; the spread of disease is a public health concern. What if one of the people is married? What if children are involved? I don't know. I don't think that stoning should be the punishment if it is illegal. No one seems to, even those who think it's okay for the government to compel giving because the Bible commands it.

It gets complicated, no matter what. Granted, my view as a stay-at-home mom not old enough to run for Congress is a little irrelevant.

But it seems like we should all be able to agree that it comes down to more than "legislating morality" or "not legislating morality."

This post was inspired by the discussion of praying for Obama and his family (a good idea for both sides of the aisle) at Seeking Faithfulness.

Today's sign of pregnancy: constipation

On Angels

2008-12-09T14:00:00.000-08:00

I believe in angels. I just want to say that to start. Angels are real, created beings that are mentioned in the Bible. Angels have appeared to real people, foretold real events, and there is no reason not to believe that they are present in the world and God works through them.

But there are a lot of misconceptions about angels.
I don't know where they came from, but they didn't come from the Bible. We won't be angels when we go to heaven. We might be like angels, but we won't be angels. And there seem to be so many people who believe that children become angels, or worse yet, are reincarnated angels of some sort sent to Earth for a short time. There are way too many Christians out there calling their children who died early, especially before birth, "angel babies."

I understand the desire people who have lost children through miscarriage, stillbirth, or death in infancy or early childhood feel to give meaning to the short lives, to make there be a reason that they went through what they went through, and the child went through what he or she went through. But it just ain't good theology. Angels are supernatural beings. We have no reason to believe that supernatural beings get conceived in human form, for a short time or for a long one--with one exception.

I don't know whether I had children before Firstborn. But if I did, they were not angels. If I had been able to give birth to them, they would have screamed and misbehaved and sinned and pooped like other children. I don't know whether they are in Heaven, even, really--the Bible does not tell us. God may save them all because of their innocence; He may judge them based on the choices they would have made had they lived; He may have predestined only those who would not have chosen Him to die this way--or only those who would have followed Him. He may have taken them in because they are, of course, "like little children."

But while I may hope and pray they are in heaven, I don't think they were or are angels. (As an aside, I kind of don't know how to pray about that kind of thing, but I know that my God, Who is outside of time and space, understands my heart and knows what to do with these sorts of petitions). I know that they have "fullness of life," but I don't know what that means. Did they finish gestation, and are they growing up now? Did they appear there in adult bodies? Does someone care for them like I care for my born daughter, or are they just worshipping God with everyone else? I have to accept a lot of unknowns, but I would rather accept them than this strange little fantasy that they have grown feathery wings and are fat little sexless babies sitting on clouds--but then, I have to accept unknowns as to whether those children existed. Before Firstborn I was sure; now I'm not. I know that God is good, God is just, and God loves me and all of my children--and I have to be satisfied in that.

Today's sign of pregnancy: abdominal pain

Life: I like it

2008-12-05T08:55:00.000-08:00

I have a beautiful, six-month old girl named Hannah Jane.

I have a wonderful, loving, overindulgent husband.
(What's that? You can't breastfeed in the computer room and you want me to hook your computer up to the big screen TV so you can play video games on the couch? I thought you'd never ask!)

There are actually people with big families in my church! Praise God!

I discovered that if I walk in a different direction, I actually have neighbors! There goes that excuse for not engaging my community... Sometimes I walk with a woman who has a daughter barely older than my own. She recently asked what church I attend; she goes to one quite a distance away and is considering switching to one closer. She's at least ten years older than I am.

I have a new niece (my brother-in-law's third child). So Firstborn has a girl cousin six months older and one six months younger. My husband thinks that's great too.

I've been feeling really awful. I'm sure I'm pregnant. Even surer than last month. Much surer than the month before that.

Today's sign of pregnancy: waking up early for no good reason.

Update

2007-11-10T14:27:00.000-08:00

So I haven't posted for, oh, eight months.

What's new?

I'm 11 weeks 2 days pregnant.

Does anyone really care about anything else? Because I don't.

My husband and I found out the day after we completed the medical exam for adoption. There is one healthy baby with a good strong heartbeat who is steadily making his or her presence known without making me too terribly sick.

I'm still not sure it's sunk in all the way.

God has completely taken away my depression. I couldn't have gotten out of it myself, but He is faithful.

http://www.cooperjr.name/pictures/baby/2007-10-18.jpg

Points to ponder:

2007-03-25T04:08:00.000-07:00

Organ donation
Does homeschooling need to be regulated?

My Life

2007-03-20T14:50:00.000-07:00

I feel like my life is a soap opera.

A bad soap opera. And not particularly interesting. I don't expect reality shows to come knocking.

Maranatha

2007-03-20T14:12:00.000-07:00

I wasn't supposed to get pregnant this month.

I didn't think that I was. I could have gotten a test, even, but it would have been on the same day that I became unpregnant if I was pregnant. It is not the first time I have had symptoms of miscarriage when I shouldn't have been pregnant. That is part of why I had believed my doctor when she had claimed that I hadn't been pregnant. Enoch was the first baby who died under that woman's care.

And I guess it would make some sense that my cycle would not be normal right after a miscarriage. But Enoch wasn't conceived right after a miscarriage. But then, this is the first time it would have been two in a row.

At any rate, I had some very real near-suicidal depression on Friday. And church was difficult this Sunday. Looking at this sweet little girl who is always volunteering to pray, and thinking how I won't know what my children look like until heaven. Listening to the fifth-grader who always thinks first of how people need the gospel, and commenting on his heart for missions, and then realizing that I won't know that about my own children--where there special giftings and callings are--in this lifetime.

And all I could think was how I wanted Jesus to come back, or call me home.
I sure have that "treasure in heaven" business down, at least.
Maranatha, Lord.
And that's her name. I don't know why or how, but I feel like God gave me that name for her.
That has not happened before with any of my other pregnancies.

Maranatha, Jesus. Until then, take good care of my babies, however many of them there are.

live journal

2007-03-16T12:21:00.000-07:00

So today, for the first time in 8 months or so, I posted something in my livejournal. Feel free to read if you like, but please don't link here from there or refer to me by my blog name. The essay I wrote there mentions why I decided to move to blogland instead of staying in LJland where everybody knew my name. I also talk about abortifacients and Christians' right to know when they are prescribed a drug which may have effects to which they have moral objections. And since I was writing in LJ (okay, since I'm having a bad day and I am a bad Christian who is bad at "getting rid of all bitterness and anger") I made sure to be a little angsty.

If you have been praying for me--thank you. I am doing better now.

At the moment I think I will probably get through this week alive.

Please pray for me today

2007-03-16T05:45:00.001-07:00

Something random I wrote today

2007-03-14T18:33:00.000-07:00

So, a couple people who read my blog have recently claimed that I am a good writer.

This is something I wrote today.

Have fun.
(For anyone who is curious, I had to post this in IE instead of my normal browser, Opera.)

Sarah Saved had no children, and it seemed like everything reminded her of it. When the children went up to the front for the children’s sermon, when they flooded back through the sanctuary (not much of a sanctuary from thoughts of infertility!) on their way to children’s church, when she had to walk by the nursery on her way to Sunday school... and in the middle of all of it was Brenda Breeder. She herded all the children downstairs to children’s church, carrying her toddler with her instead of putting him in the nursery, as if no one else were good enough to look after him, even though she was teaching a craft her own three older boys and thirty-odd others besides. To top it off, Brenda was very pregnant with yet another child—five! Just seeing the Breeder brood was enough to make Sarah livid—at herself, at God, but especially at Brenda. Brenda was forever counting off her kids: “Josiah, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Levi... and little Elijah,” Brenda would say, resting a hand on her bulging abdomen with the last.
She can barely keep track of her kids, she has so many, Sarah thought with disgust. After going through the grueling adoption progress, she was sure she would love her firstborn child more than Brenda could ever love Josiah. Before Sarah and her husband had started the adoption process, she had even fantasized about stealing one of Brenda’s little blond-haired, blue-eyed boys. Surely she could give the child more attention than he would get in a family of six, and Brenda would probably not even notice that he went missing. Now, though, Sarah was waiting to get a baby of her own, and the Breeder boys were just a reminder that she was still waiting. Brenda knew that she was adopting, too, but she just didn’t keep her big pregnant belly out of the way.
A gentle nudge from her husband informed Sarah that the sermon was over and it was time for Sunday School. Great. Big old pregnant Brenda would probably sit next to her again.
Brenda ambushed her in the hallway before she had even entered the classroom. Handing off the toddler to her husband, Brenda accosted Sarah with The Question: “Heard any good news yet? I keep praying your little one will come soon! He could be Elijah’s playmate!”
“No,” Sarah replied. Why did she keep rubbing it in that she had a baby coming soon, sure and for certain?
Brenda squeezed her shoulder. “Just keep trusting in the Lord.” What did Brenda know about trusting in the Lord? It seemed like she had a baby every two years like clockwork. What did she know about being given a body that didn’t work? About having to wait on someone else’s approval to get a baby? About having a heart that raced with every phone call only to break a little bit more when she saw it was not the social worker calling? About being surrounded by pregnant ladies who couldn’t help but remind her every Sunday that her arms were empty?
Sarah stayed in the hallway a moment after Brenda went in, and then sat across the room from her. Brenda came over to sit next to her with a big, happy, pregnant smile. It must be easy to be happy when everything you want falls into your lap. Sarah had thought that a class on Psalms would be uplifting. But Brenda made it miserable. She would always talk about being blessed. But God didn’t bless Sarah.
“Oh, Sarah, I love this psalm!” said Brenda, pointing out one of the psalms they would be studying. Wonderful—more stuff to remind her that she didn’t have kids. Children were olive plants. Whatever that meant.
“And just how many olive plants do you have again, Brenda?” Sarah asked, feeling more than a little snippy—which she thought was justifiable.
A palpable silence fell over the room as everyone turned to look at her. She hadn’t sounded that snippy, had she?
Brenda took a moment to reply.
“I have ten children. The first five are waiting for me to meet them in Heaven. Then we adopted Josiah. And then God blessed me with four more boys. And all it would have taken to save my other babies was aspirin—but then I wouldn’t have Josiah.”
Brenda fled the room.
Sarah was left to remember that Josiah looked a bit less like a clone of his father than his little brothers did. She recalled how her husband had urged her to be a little more charitable to Brenda—“She’s just trying to be friendly.” In shame, she thought how sure she had been that Brenda had no sorrow in her life—in fact, that no sorrow could compare with hers. And she remembered that each time she had asked for prayer about the adoption, it had been Brenda who offered the prayer. And then Sarah Saved prayed for forgiveness, and went to make amends to her sister in Christ.

For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
Matthew 7:2 (New International Version)

Blogger will not let me type in the text box to make posts. Don't you hate being forced to update to a buggy product?

2007-03-12T14:21:00.000-07:00

Things come together: doctors, ancestral land, adoption

2007-03-05T08:42:00.000-08:00

I saw the doctor and it went very well. He is everything that we were looking for: compassionate, knowledgeable, and willing to explain medical concepts without condescencion. He was very clear about the testing regimen he would use and why each test was necessary. He never assumed that I would not understand something.

Also, it looks like we have paid all the medical costs we are going to pay this year; insurance will be covering the rest of the tests.

I have been meaning to do a post for some time about how I feel about the land I live on. Our lot was given to us by my husband's parents. Despite the fact that it has been less than two years that we have lived in this town, and less than that we have lived in our house, I feel very strong roots here. My husband lived his whole life next door to our house. This is ancestral land, like the land alotted to the Israelites in the Bible. God willing, the children of the children of my children will one day live in this house. One day when I walk through the woods I will be followed by a gaggle of enthusiastic little ones. Sometimes I imagine that my little ones are following me--Joseph, Isaiah, Elisha, Enoch, Simon Hosea and Ruby. I know I could never have had them all, but I imagine their faces and I imagine holding them close and if I work in the nursery and a small multitude of under-twos surrounds me as I read a book to them, I think to myself, this is what should have been...

At any rate, I feel ties here like I have never felt before, even though I am bound to this family by marriage and not by birth. And it saddened me that my father-in-law was selling much of his land to finance his retirement, even though it would be in state hands and not built on. If we could have bought it, we would have, but it just was not feasible.

The state was not offering what he wanted, though, and then after the appraisal came back with a price less than half of what he had been willing to settle for, I asked my husband again if we could afford it. And it had become feasible. So we talked it over with my in-laws. They had not wanted to settle for so little. But they very much liked the idea of selling it in the family. If one day a profit was made on it, we would be making it. Because we were buying it at "market value," it would not be a difference between my husband and his brother. We can consider it an investment. And it would mean that we could do for our children what my father-in-law did for us. All four of us consider all of these to be advantages.

My husband has looked into the funding of this, because we really aren't wealthy--not for Americans at any rate. Basically, if we refinanced our two-year-old mortgage we could get the money for the property, consolidate it with the existing property to reduce the tax rate, and get the money not just to buy it, but also to continue retirement investments and to fund our adoption. I wouldn't even have to be more frugal at all. (Not that being more frugal would be bad, but our lifestyle is not exactly profligate as things stand). In fact, this would actually help us with our adoption. And my father-in-law mentioned to my husband that maybe the way things went with the state happened that way so that we could buy the land. And maybe it did. I certainly can see God's hand at work here.

God willing, here is what I would like to happen: the land deal finishes, we use the money to finance an adoption, and the process goes quickly. My problem is diagnosed and fixed (or I simply get pregnant and stay pregnant with the help of progesterone and/or aspirin and no clear diagnosis) and continue to have many children. I know God's plans aren't my plans--but that is what I am hoping for.

God bless y'all.

Doctor Update

2007-02-24T05:16:00.000-08:00

Thanks all for your prayers...

It has been a rough week--my husband and I have both been sick--but I am still going to give a quick update.

I made the phone calls I needed to make yesterday.

Not only did no one give me any trouble, but I got an appointment for this Wednesday.

I know I prayed a lot about this process--I suspect I haven't been the only one praying. So if you have been praying about this: keep it up, please!

Pray that Dr. C is compassionate and that God will give him insight so that my next son or daughter will be saved.

And today I woke up happy.

Today I am going to a woman's breakfast put on by our church. My mother-in-law and I are going together. (I have an excellent relationship with my mother-in-law. She lives next door, and sometimes we play scrabble. My husband and I, along with his brother and sister-in-law and their son, eat there every Sunday afternoon.)

((Speaking of which--last week my sister-in-law was making a list of my nephew's cousins and including some long-dead cousins. So I added to her list. She liked my names. She caught on eventually to what I was saying, because she also had a miscarriage--I don't know what age--some time after my nephew.))

Doctor search

2007-02-13T16:40:00.000-08:00

I did some more research into doctors today. Found out that to see a specialist I either have to see a Fallon doctor (none of which are close) or get a referral from my Primary Care Physician (doctor with whom we are very unhappy). So my options are: get a new primary care physician (whom I might or might not like) and then get a referral; go to somewhere far away to see someone I might not like; or try to get a referral from the doctor that we know we are unhappy with. The other problem with the new-PCP problem would be that they might want to see me before giving me a referral, thus adding yet another thing that must be scheduled three weeks in advance (time husband needs to take off from work) to a very cramped time frame. Because I would really like this resolved before I ovulate.

However, the Fallon customer service representative was friendly, helpful and knowledgeable. I have never been anything but pleased with Fallon's customer service. Even when they really cannot help me, they give me the impression that they wish they could.

Joy, conversation, and naming names

2007-02-13T07:50:00.000-08:00

One of the things that has been going on the last few days is that God has been giving me joy. This is more impressive than it would be for some people. I know some people have joy all the time, and it's easy for them. But the last time I remember having joy was several years ago when God gave me joy and peace on my mission trip to Costa Rica. I guess all there is to say is, all things are possible for God. I am having trouble holding onto joy, so if anyone has ideas on how to do that I would be appreciative. And joy doesn't mean that there isn't depression. But God is powerful.

Another thing that you probably wouldn't know about me is that I am not much of a conversationalist. Yes, I talk a lot on my blog--but I talk about what interests me. Now imagine me in a social setting. Remember how your mother always said not to talk about politics and reliegion in polite company? Well, I don't have many other interests, unless you count miscarriage as another topic... and that still isn't polite conversation. So I try to avoid social engagements that don't involve gaming. Oh, I haven't mentioned I'm a geek, either. I am a geek. I like to play card games, trading card games, board games you have never heard of, computer games, and sometimes role-playing games. Most of the time I spent getting to know the man I married took place over a chessboard. I still go to social gatherings at my church--but more out of obligation than true enjoyment, and we tend to leave early (My husband is also not huge on socializing).

[Insert transition here]

Garrett, the baby I mentioned in my last post, died yesterday morning. The link I posted in that thread is still good.

Speaking of links...

I was looking back at my first post about Stand and Be Counted and realized that my email address was wrong. D'oh! I am a horrible blogger. Somehow, I have to publish a post before I proofread it, and then I will end up publishing it several more times due to mistakes. The email is now correct in that entry: y a e l c w _ at _ gmail __dot___ com.

If you are curious, Yael is not my real name, it's reverse-engineered from YCW. I do not want to publish my name on the internet, although if you really wanted you might be able to figure it out. But if you are a regular reader and want my real name, I am willing to share that information in a securer medium such as email. I am not trying to avoid responsibility for my words or beliefs. Be assured that there is a real person behind the alias, and that I don't have a whole lot of others out there. The only others were in my livejournal, where I no longer post because the community of people I know there are (in general) diametrically opposed to everything I believe in (part of why I started to blog and do so anonymously), and on one other blog where I began posting before I began being YCW. If you prefer something namier, feel free to call me Yael Christiana Waters.

I have a few post topics bumping around that I will probably get to eventually. I write them down so I will remember them, but then don't get around to posting... so hopefully that will happen soon....

Dannielynn Hope, Garrett M

2007-02-10T06:54:00.000-08:00

Many things have been said by others about the death of Anna Nicole Smith, and I don't feel any need to contribute more.

However, I really feel for her baby, Daniellynn Hope, age 5 months. Currently there are three men claiming to be her dad, and they will probably be poking her full of holes to do DNA tests to figure this out.

I really hope that things will be set up so that the money, if it goes to her, is HERS, and all these men will lose interest (unless, of course, they are actually interested in being a daddy and not a reverse sugar daddy). I hope that she ends up adopted by parents who love her and each other, not by someone who wants her fortune (or potential fortune--there is still debate on whether that money should go to her or her mother's late husband's son).

I would take her in a heartbeat, and never touch the money.

May God bless her and keep her, and may His will be done in her life.

Also, pray for Garrett, a little boy born on the seventh with multiple heart defects. He is not expected to survive short of a miracle. He is on life support but will be removed soon to spend his remaining time on Earth with his family.