courage dear-heart

it is one of my favorite quotes from a book..."the voyage of the dawn treader" by C.S. Lewis. there is a section when all of the characters are on the boat the dawn treader - one of the islands they visit is the place where all your dreams come true. at first, this sounds like paradise, but you quickly realize that your dreams are very strange places where everything unusual and frightening can happen - they realize that all of their dreams quickly become nightmares. and everyone is living in their own kind of torment. they hear everyone around screaming, but can't hear what is plaguing each of the others. they have lost their sense of direction, and it is completely dark. everyone begins to feel as though they will never escape this haunting.

in this moment, Lucy, cries out "Aslan, Aslan, help us" (or something like that). and at that moment a huge bird flies over her head and whispers "courage, dear- heart". then the bird proceeds to light their way out of the darkness.

courage dear- heart.

that is what i told someone today. i had to break some bad news to her, news that i knew would rock her world and send her into her own cloud of confusion. sometimes being a leader means that we see the storm coming before the person does. and we offer words of encouragement, experience and hope. but words can't describe the process that they will have to go through. and my process is different than theirs, so at best, my words can be road signs and signals that will hopefully prevent them from going off the trail all together. but it is theirs to walk, and be faithful, and keep their heart pure before the Lord. no one can make that choice for them.

all i can say is courage- let this fashion you, let this make you the woman you are supposed to be. let your heartache see you trust God through the storm. force your flesh to sit and listen while you worship through your tears. let every demon in hell see what you are made of when things don't go your way, and let heaven mark you down as one of those who will not bow to self-pity and anger. courage dear-heart. there will be better days, but you will be better for these days.

and one day, you will have to tell someone bad news and with all of the compassion in your heart you will say "courage"- and you will know just how much they need it.

the little moments

it is easy to forget, that it will not always be like this. that emma will not wake me with little coos, that she will not giggle just so and squeeze her hands together like she is in love for the first time - she will not always be small enough to pull out of her car seat sound asleep, and let me carry her sweet smelling self into the house to put her to bed.

i get tired and busy and forget sometimes that it will not always be like this.

these moments are the ones i will remember when she goes to school for the first time, or the first time she has a crush on a boy, or when she graduates, and (jesus help us) when she gets married. i know i will ache for that little moment when i got to snuggle my little girl and put her to bed.

so i look at her now, with her hair in yesterday's ponytail, making a mess of the living room for the first of 5 or so times today, and i love her so much it hurts.

these moments go by so fast, and there is no slowing them down. only living in them while they are here. so, sitting here in my pajamas, earlier than i want to be awake, i celebrate this little moment and the joy she brings me. parenting is the ride of our lives, and we have just begun.

time to go play on the floor with our little wonder.  

a full circle kind of day

i would like to take this opportunity to thank the people who took our chicken, pork, turkey, shawn's runners from our back porch and my ipod, my new yummy cherry lotion from body shop, our movie mania card for the video store, and all of our cd's from our car.  it is true, last week, we woke up to the sad news that we had been robbed. they must have been hungry to take our frozen food - so that is how i was able to let that go. i have to admit that i was pretty sad about my ipod, and my lotion! how strange.

one week later, we have now locked the freezer, replaced shawn's runners, and managed to figure out what to make without chicken. we have emotionally recovered from our loss.

but tonight, around 9:00, a delightful surprise knocked on our door. our friend kyle showed up with a sly smile and a handful of money. WHAT???

our amazing friends felt bad about our chicken loss (actually they felt the worst about my ipod) and they took up a little offering for us. how sweet is that?

so you thought i was kidding when i was thanking the people for taking our stuff...i was being serious. if they hadn't taken all of our stuff we wouldn't have been able to see that beautiful part of our friends hearts. if you were one of our friends that snuck up on us with that fun surprise, and you are happening to read this, i thank you most sincerely.

a nice discovery

i am renewing my permanent resident card so i can stay in Canada. and as i was rummaging through my papers in my "immigration" file, i ran across the vows i spoke to shawn on our wedding day. it may seem strange to find such a thing in my immigration file, please reference the last blog about being an overcoming disorganized person. the fact that i still have it is success to me.

anywho - i was reading these handwritten thoughts that i spoke to my groom on my wedding day and it flooded my mind with so many memories- i am going to type it here as well. that way if i ever forget that "marriage vows" are under "immigration" - i will still be able to read them.

Shawn,

God told me once that i would always be surprised. and you have been the biggest surprise of my life. you arrived in my life as a friend, and you have proven yourself to be one of the kindest, most thoughtful people i have ever known.

on that beautiful day in november you emerged from the shadows and somehow were transfigured from a friend into a question mark - "could shawn harvey be the one i have been waiting for?" the months that followed turned my question into a resounding YES!

Shawn - today you are giving me a wedding ring, but that ring is replacing another ring that i have worn for many years. this ring has been a daily reminder to me that i was set apart for holiness, heroism, vision and restraint. these commitments that i made with this ring kept me walking forward in the darkest times - those decisions demanded a song of praise when my heart was in captivity - those decisions transformed me from the selfish child that i was into a friend of God.

For so many years i have loved the Lord as my redeemer and groom. He has pursued me and provided for me as His bride. Until today the garden of my heart has been shared with Him alone. I have been a garden enclosed. but today, i become your bride. I welcome you into my heart, and everything that i have built with Jesus, i now freely share with you.

Thank you for being my friend, my ally, and my greatest supporter. you have taught my heart to dance again, and i love you. I am so glad that you are the one i have waited for. you were worth it all!

...six years later and i could say all of it, all over again. thick and thin. better or worse. sickness and health. till death do us part.

i love that man.

overcoming over and over

i am a recovering disorganized person. i spent years of my life creating crisis and then cleaning up my own mess. i work hard now to be organized, a good communicator and responsible. this comes easier to some, so this may not make sense to you if you are one of those. for me, making sure my schedule is clear, not double booked or overcrowded, that bills get paid on time, documents are renewed before critical things (like my permanent resident card to stay in Canada) expire - these are all the things i have to spend extra time thinking about because my default position is to forget and then i have a crisis. if you are like me, you may understand, if not, you could be thinking "people like you drive me crazy". yes, i know.

that is the other problem. i like making people happy, so when i do create a crisis, say by not communicating with work about what days i am coming in this week, i am spun into an anxious mess. i hate disappointing people, being the weak link, or feeling like i got my priorities messed up. this is all because i am recovering from being that disorganized mess. i got so tired of saying "i'm sorry, i will change".  i did change, but i created a crisis today and right now my head is spinning with all of the old anxiety.

it is funny to me how we can overcome so much, but one little moment, one mistake and we are flushed right back to the old version of ourselves.

i hate condemnation. there is nothing beautiful about it. and guilt just makes me feel like i have to strive to outrun it. guilt makes us busy. i hate the guilty busy.

so, right now, i am choosing to start this day again. refresh my view of myself. i am not the mess i once was, i have to assume that others see that. in fact, i am pretty sure this is all just in my head and no one else is thinking twice about it.

funny thing about overcoming, it sounds like you would only have to do it once, maybe twice. but time has shown overcoming is a life-long process, and today i get another chance to crawl out of the old me and live in the new.

and i need to be thankful that in Christ, i get that chance as many times as i need it. so thankful i am.

here's to starting over...

everything stinks

sorry it has been awhile since i have written - i was in alberta for about 4 weeks. but in case the news hasn't reached the great big out there, i am pregnant. yup - it finally happened. i am one of those gals who has a little life inside. i still can hardly believe it. i am thankful that i am not experiencing much morning sickness, but there are a couple of other little side effects happening. one of them is that everything stinks. strong smells that don't necessarily stink to others like spicy things, fast food, emma's poopy diapers (well, those actually smell).

it is a strange thing. we had yummy souvlaki for dinner last night, today, i opened the refrigerator and oh! it stunk! couldn't even eat it after that.

but it feels like i have a little bottle of carbonation in my lower abdomen, and i will put up with all sorts of stuff in order to carry and eventually see this little miracle that is growing there.

milk doesn't smell, maybe i will have some more of that.

so excited

well, here is some good news for my little heart.  shawn and i have been a bit stressed about our vacation this year. in shawn's words "i want a happy wife and i want to avoid spending a lot of money". i want that too. but i have to say that "staycations" are just not my thing.  you don't really relax. at all.  i have prayed for a solution. and then....today! a friend here in edmonton was telling us about this little rustic cabin they built near here, and they were saying that they had a heart to loan it out out to friends or people in ministry. then, while we were talking we figured out that we could house swap - they could enjoy our area of the world and its closeness to alot of fun things - and we could enjoy some camping in a little cabin out in the middle of nowhere. yes, just what we need! it is just a little way away from sylvan lake and other cute little towns that we can go and explore on days that we feel like going for a little day trip.

oh, i am so excited to tell my husband that we get to have a vacation!! he is going to be so happy!