Let the sharp edges be rounded, so that I am not an instrument of harm, but of comfort to anyone around me.

Yesterday morning I woke up feeling heavy.  I felt like my heart was saturated to the point of dripping over with tears.  I felt like I should be bowed over, walking with a hunched back.  This is not a metaphor.  I literally felt that way.   Several hours into the day, I realized that that yesterday was the anniversary of the death of my sister. 

 It's amazing how the body holds on to memories and remembers to grieve even when the conscious mind has forgotten what day it is.

     So I did what was only appropriate.  I baked gluten free and mostly paleo cookies with Four Year Old Child.  ( I realize that calling anything "Mostly Paleo"  Is equivalent to saying that someone's snarling pit bull is "mostly harmless." but just let me have this.)  

We ate them warm.  Because when you are remembering the life of someone you have lost, when your entire body is heavy with the tears weighing down your heart, look around at the people who are here, be fully present with them.  

Our most valuable treasures can only be mined out of the deepest, darkest soil of our deepest, darkest grief and sorrows.  In our hearts, we would choose to not have to suffer; we would wish all loved ones back with us; we would change decisions.  But since no human can have this option, let me look forward, keeping my eyes on the Lord, and let Him reveal to me just exactly what the unique treasure is, that which could or would be gleaned through no other means.

The deepest, darkest grief to ever happen was the death of Jesus on the cross. The entire universe grieved, was covered in darkness, and God the Father turned His head. 

 Jesus was called a Man of Sorrows, He was described as being Acquainted with Grief.  

"He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain.  Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem." Isaiah 53:3

And yet the richest of all blessings came as a result of that deepest of sufferings and sorrows; Mankind can be healed and restored to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

And after that, even Heaven.

...So anything, anything, we suffer now in this life can be used to further His Kingdom, if we submit it to Him.  

This is our hope.  

And God is in the process of healing all of His children of all of our leprosy, in all of it's various forms.  

Healed to a life of feeling, healed to a life of pain. 

 It is amazing the things we become sensitive to, once the filter of numbness has been removed...

   ...and yet, He calls this healed.

It has been 35 years since my only sister died.  My heart will never forget, even when my mind does.  I am raw, I am here, and I am alive.  And let me not forget to turn around and thank the one who is healing me.

I thank you, Father.  

I thank you.

(And please give that baby a big hug and kiss from me, I can't wait to see her.)

Performance is the clanging gong of a loud drum that reverberates in your soul and distracts you from deep living

Oh, the need to perform.
How it turns the most honest among us into the subtlest of liars.
Sometimes I feel the need to perform.
Even after all I have learned and how far I have come,
I still feel the need to perform.
It is no longer my daily focus, but from time to time, It is like a haunting whisper, like a subtle breeze of smoke that isn't directly in my face, but still causes my airways to constrict and I cough.
They judged me before, and it hurt. They could do it again.
This is the smoke.
My life cough.

I have felt the mangled claw of judgement scratch its way down my back when, (if you had known my heart) all I was trying to do was hold that which was the most dear and keep it from falling. But as I juggle wiggled my way to an imagined "balance," I felt the whispered criticism, and it stung.  So then all I wanted to do was hide.

Even before the fallout of the life I knew four years ago, I felt judged. Not liked.  Embarrassed and awkward in ways that other people were not, according to my estimation.

Examples might be: The times I tried out for cheerleading (didn't make it...three years in a row), drill squad (didn't make it, then they had a second pity try out, where I did make it because everyone made it, but then I was unable to be on the team because it was too expensive, which was more humiliating that if I had never made the team.), 
-Running for student body anything (Didn't make it. Ever.)

-and all the times I mangled anything, was clumsy or careless, was in any way learning something that would take years of HINDSIGHT to finally manage gingerly, if not perfectly, but in the moment, I had not achieved the place of hindsight yet.

 There comes a time when you realize you (by "You," I mean "I," of course.) cannot keep parceling out parts of your (my) heart, only showing this side or that side to anyone who comes around, once I have determined which side of me that person will approve of, will want to see.  There comes a time when that sort of daily figuring and rearranging takes up too much mental energy, since all of these things are all the sides of all of me. (I am good at this, I am not good at this, this, or this.  And this thing here, I struggle to maintain it.)  The picture is not complete if I have to keep slicing myself into fractures.  It hurts too much to cut myself in these mentally mutilated ways.
And that's the thing: It's in my head, It's all in my head, And you do not have to understand my life, how I ended up here, or the way I believe the Lord has instructed me to accomplish the tasks He daily gives me,* the ways He is personally teaching me to stand strong in daily battle, to walk in my freedoms, but not to abuse it or use it to again bind myself, a slave.
Even if I am only a slave to my perception of judgement.
I am free of that.
I AM FREE.
I no longer explain myself to those whose campfires have grown cold.
And yet the smoke, how it wafts around my nostrils.
I am just camping out here on this campground called Earth.
 I sit at my campfire roasting marshmallows of Mercy.  The smoke says "You burned the edges of your marshmallow, you RUINED it. You have made a mockery of life, you have ruined, you ARE ruined."
And yet I take a bite, and find that the searing and blackening on the outside of that marshmallow are covering a soft gooey sweetness of grace I would have never known was there, had the edges not scorched to preserve the middle part.
I lick my sticky fingers.
They remind me.
The sticky goo of grace, which stays behind, which does not easily wash off after the marshmallow has been eaten.

Another smoke from another fire:
There are those who have always loved me, though I knew not how to always accept their love.  While I was at my lowest, my most embarrassing.
 Those who knew how to genuinely love never mocked me or pointed out my awkwardness; my entire life awkwardness.  They just kept a spoon in the pot bubbling over their own campfire,  kept scooping out the love meat into my starving bowl.  

And yet, at the time, I didn't know how to accept it, I wanted to run from yes, even that which would nurture me to health and wholeness and help support me when my balance went wonky.

    It's taken 38 years to learn to stay.  To not turn my head in order to catch a whiff of the smoke from past destruction. It has taken 38 years to figure out exactly why I run.  It is a daily practice.

     The problem with judgment is this.  maybe I truly am the thing you are judging me for.  Maybe I truly did or am currently doing that thing you don't like.  But the judgement doesn't lead to my repentance.  It only leads me to run and hide some more.  
It's the Lord's kindness that leads us to repentance.
("Do you show contempt for the riches of His kindness, forbearance, and patience, not realizing that God's kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?" -Romans 2:4)
So maybe just maybe we could also employ this method.
(*she preaches to herself*)

-XOXO,

*But the conversation is always open, the chance to truly hear and be heard, and some of this life story has been written out in posts like the one I wrote on Sept 11, 2014, and then again the post I wrote on Sept 30, 2014

Marriage, the perfect chili of God

Sunday morning finds me how I like to be found.  Cooking, cutting, blending, marinating.  The oven is on, there are two things on the stove.  I'm cooking chili for our after church meal.  Call it "lunch," call it "dinner."  It's the meal we eat when we get home, and hopefully eat enough that I don't have to cook a third meal this day.  

Relax, day of rest.

     So far, my rest has looked like getting out of bed at 5:15.

Prayer.

  Breakfast cooked, small people cleaned, dressed, groomed. Cooking, and cooking, and cooking.  There was enough steam involved to fog up the windows so we cannot clearly see out.

     Normally, Four Year Old Child and I bake gluten free cornbread to go with the chili.  I do not have the cornbread mix, and I am not willing to use up the gas and energy to go to the grocery store this morning.  I do have a gluten free chocolate cake mix in the cupboard.  We will have chili and gluten free chocolate cake today.

  It's not perfect, but it's good.

     Marriage is like that.    

     Chili is different every time I cook it.  It takes a lot of time, because I have to start the beans soaking the morning before.  By the time we sit down to eat, you would never know that the beans had ever been hard rocks which would break your teeth if you tried to bite into them.

     I put all of the ingredients in and let it slowly low cook together, let the spices marinate until they are indistinguishable one from another.  Until together you get the tang and the sweet, the savory and the hearty, confluence of satisfaction.

 Calm down appetite, you are well satiated.

     In all of the world, you will not find two people perfectly matched, but given time, you will find that marriage makes them indistinguishable.  It's not that we were ever exactly alike to begin with, but that as we began to marinate, we cooked to a combination of all our own spicy and savory, both changed in the slow simmering process.  Sometimes and often, it only felt hot, it felt like pressure, which by definition is pain, and yet we were softened. 

Marriage, the perfect chili of God.

After church, we come home and I serve second meal.

It tastes mellow, sweet.

We have seconds,

and then chocolate cake as dessert.

That which could never last

 "I said 'Oh that I had the wings of a dove!  I would fly away and be at rest.  I would flee far away and stay in the desert.  I would hurry to my place of shelter, far from the tempest and storm."

 Psalm 55:6-8

Wind is blowing hard and loud.

Fury of God as He sets the world right,

banging our home and shaking

 off that which could never last.

Inside, my husband is beneath a quilt, rested, recovered

 from injury.

Children are making a fort of the edges that fall over his legs.

My son giggles and I feel his giggle

reverberating between my ribs.

I am in the kitchen, cooking familiar comforts.

  It requires a lot of butter.  

We do not count calories.  We eat until we are satisfied.

Outside, the storm pounds our yard

 to all softening.

Last month, we could not dig there,

and whatever hid beneath that earth did not poke through.

Once Heat hardened and humbled,

now Rain battered and tumbled,

And here we have plenty in winter.

Outside, the storm raging, 

how many storms raging,

SO MANY STORMS RAGING

and we sit here in the middle heart of it, 

Cocooning content.

"The LORD will indeed give what is good and our land will yield it's harvest."

Psalm 85:12

Someday, I will explain this, at least I sure think so.

Twice this week, I was humiliated.  Maybe I was humiliated more times than that, but there were only two times of which I was aware.  I am not brave enough to tell you those stories just now.  They are still too close to me.  But I have a sense that these two stories, when told hand in hand in years down the road, will have a greater impact than they could have at this point, were I to tell them yet.       I wonder how many things are like that.  We are all a work in progress.  And process needs to be had, and we do not enjoy the process, but in the end, we are shiny and clear for having gone through a process, which sometimes left us humiliated.   
                                                                     Oh wow.  

I told you that I was humiliated twice this week, and I just remembered a third humiliation which also happened this past week.  Three different stories, containing three different sets of scenery and characters, well, me, I was the main central character in all of them, like hi, here I am the sore thumb sticking out in the middle of my own life.  But though these events are various stories of their own, they are all related, and not just because they were stories that contain "myself" and "humiliation."  They are stories that are related because they relate to a particular subject matter that unifies them.  Maybe you would not have felt humiliated in the scenarios running through my mind if you were the me character in the story.  But oh my werrrrd, I JUST remembered humiliation number four.  Yes, also having occurred this week, and also different and the same in all the ways the incidents listed above are different and the same from each other.  Maybe it was my job to be humiliated this week.  Maybe there is a lesson I have yet to glean that will work it's way out until I understand it.  Wow, if I were reading this and not from the perspective of from within my own eyeballs, I would be really annoyed at the superfluous amount of words, yet subtle (to zero) amount of detail contained herein.  Simply put, I am too humiliated to share my own stories.  (4, And probably more I have blocked out of conscious memory.)  Writing just this makes me that much more respectful and honoring (in my mind) to those who have written humiliating and embarrassing (to them) things about themselves in public forums.  I plan to join your circle, probably in a decade or less.  When I am standing on a different precipice from here, complete with a very radically different view.  crash crash go the waves along the cliffs and these tall rocks constantly wet from the splashing and getting no relief from it.  Always cold and always standing to take another beating.  

I see Jesus in you

(a poem for my husband, because I do.)

What I've failed to look at,
notice,
pay attention to
is that despite the brambles tangled up in your hopes and motivation,
you are not where you came from
and not who you were,
though habits fall off hard,
often unnoticed until the new better thing
replaces the old rotten, but I see it.
It is not the stuff of style and dress,
but the glow of an ember from beneath a pile of dry wood,
piled dark on top of dark on top of the dark of each other.
 I see how the spark did not flaunt itself obvious on the edges of the wood,
but began in the deepest, darkest, most hidden parts of that pit,
until it grew and grew,
burning the hardest and longest buried wood first,
it burned the not visible to the naked eye,
which you felt long
before I could see it.

(If I sometimes scorch
 from being made one in close proximity to a flame burning deeply the darkest things away, 
 then I can only hold fast to the hope it will purify me also, 
will start to work on my tangle of the thorns
 of a self protected rose wishing to bloom the brightest pink, 
but unable when bound shut so determinedly.)

Maybe I am as big as my shadow

(Pre-script: Today would have been the 35th birthday of my baby sister.)

Shadows give you a visual cue as to where you are standing.  

Proof that you have feet on the ground, presence in your own life.  

 Maybe we are as big as our shadows.

We are connected in our shared unique histories of losses and griefs.  

Have you ever thought that the things that broke you, tore you open, ripped your heart down the middle, left open spaces where something grew between those cracks, and it wasn't just weeds and flowers but your whole you was expanded, and maybe we really are just as big as our shadow, on the side not facing the hot hot sun in the very middle of the longest brightest day.

Grief also looks like curiosity.

What did I miss, 

what would she look like

what would she 

who would she

how would she 

where would she go

to the grocery store for (Milk? Eggs?  Fish?  Unless she is allergic to all of those things?)

I can fill the blanks in however I want 

but all of my answers are just shadows of a silhouette I created in my mind and it grew

much larger than the tiny baby body of all that she actually ever was on this earth.

Shadows are dark and contain no detail,

just an outline or how large a person might become

if that person had become.

This type of curiosity sometimes feels like Heaven can't come fast enough

except that there are the people here who need me

to stay awake, and to fight, and to grow and to learn, and to learn to live.

Each day, I learn to live with the curiosity. 

Each day it makes space and expands in my chest so that 

I think I really am as large and as deep my shadow.

Words I can hear with no sound

"The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.  Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge.  They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard in them.  Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.  In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.  It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, like a champion rejoicing to run his course.  It rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit to the other; nothing is deprived of it's warmth." -Psalm 19:1-6

Dear Lord, what exactly are you saying with the words that have no voice and yet they are heard?

Because today, the sky was periwinkle.  

And I really like that shade of periwinkle. 

I would wear sweaters of periwinkle in that exact shade.

And what would I be saying as I wore them?

I've got some heavy things on my mind today.

I spent a good portion of last night weeping. 

In spite of this, the joy.  In spite of this, the beauty.

So I did what I usually do when consumed with grief.  I prayed and ate cookies.  Paleo gluten free chocolate chip cookies which have so many nuts in them they are practically a nut in and of themselves, with chocolate chips added for meaning.  I said to myself, "I know that cookies will not make me feel better.  But I sure do like the taste."   

    Then I left my battered heart on the altar and went to sleep.

     I dreamed that I knew something I could not possibly know,

     I dreamed that I saw what was coming, 

     and awoke with a reminder of purpose.

Then the every morning busy caught me up.

but

     As soon as I opened the front door, a rainbow was

     coming straight out of a cloud;

     I'm pretty sure it was streaming straight from the throne of God, 

and landing someplace down below what I could at that moment see, 

 touch, or comprehend.  

But there is a treasure in that ending place, I do believe.  It was meant for me, and anyone else who had seen it and taken the time to listen and hear.

I put the kids in the car, and backed out of the driveway.  As I started to drive, the rain shower began.

This flesh is the home of the treasure I hold

My hands are now open, they're empty and cold.
Too often, I've stolen what should not be sold

Too often, I've carried what I could not hold
then realized too late what I valued was mold.

While inside my chest, there lies silver and gold,
Also emeralds and rubies, the rarest, I'm told.

This flesh is the home of the treasure I hold
which cannot grow rotten, and never turns old.

...and then the princesses took all of their fancy poof skirts and mirrors back to their castles on mountaintops in lands far, far away.

Fairytale Princesses have always been a part of culture.
When I was a child, Fairy Tale princesses, like Cinderella, Snow White, and Sleeping Beauty had Fairy God Mothers; Seven Dwarfs; impossibly long hair.  They had evil queens trying to destroy them.  They wore big poofy gowns in the forest and sang songs with woodland creatures.  There was a story of good vs evil, and evil was looking like it would triumph, but then in the end, GOOD always won, and the princess married Prince Charming, and the closing scene showed them driving off into the sunset together, to live Happily Ever After in a beautiful castle.

     I think that's a pretty good story.
 I think it's the story that lives in all of our hearts and minds, for it's the very story of our spiritual reality, according to the bible. 

     When I was a child, fairy tales were kept in books and in Disney movies.
They lived in an alternate world, and their lives did not intersect with my own.
I would read the stories, or they would be read to me.  I would look at the pictures and think about all of the pretty things.  And then I would close the book, put it back on my shelf, lace up my tennis shoes, and go outside to play football. 

     But here now, in 2014,  princesses are everywhere.  Princess culture has invaded.
I think the shift began in the early '90's.   The "Princesses" became less princess-y, and increasing more relateable, realistic, less likely to go live off in a faraway land, and more likely to live in another country.  But definitely on this planet.  And possible just a few blocks over.
   Little girls dress up like them.  They brush the hair of the toddler doll versions of them.  They collect the Barbie version of them.   They watch Disney specials in which the princesses interact.  Their closets are lined with princess dresses.
I am not saying that these things are bad.
I am simply observing the shift, and can bear witness to the fact that at least one Four Year Old I know is overwhelmed by the lack of distance the Princess Invasion has brought. Her identity becomes overwhelmed by the subtle messages, not so subtle to her.
She has not yet learned to identify fact from fiction.
To say "That was a brilliant story, and so beautifully portrayed.  What was the lesson in it?"
And then put the book on the shelf.
In the culture I see around me,
The level of innocent separation and distance has been removed from today's childhood. 

And then I walk through the store and see the covers of magazines, in which real women are posing in bathing suits with impossibly long hair and unlined faces, and the caption says that so and so famous person is " 60 and BETTER THAN EVER!"
Is it just me, or is it strange to see a 60 year old who looks like a 20 year old?  I don't think, "Wow," I think, "Weird."

And then I wonder, in what way is this famous person "Better?"  Better at looking 20?
I realize that "20" is the center of the Earth, to which the force of gravity is pulling everyone of every age.  The toddlers are trying to be 20, the elders are trying to be 20.

 Princesses never age a day past 20.

There are surgeries performed, there are injections injected.

There are bones broken and rearranged and skin stretched and stretched and stretched.

How awful if anyone were to see your laugh lines are realize that you had ever laughed.
How awful if anyone were to see your crows feet, and realized that crows had ever landed on your face.
Which is apparently just one of the hazards of being a Princess.*

     Not all women have elective medical procedures involving knives and scalpels and loss of blood  done to themselves, but the number of women who do these things is increasing.  And for each new convert to Botox and elective surgery, it becomes increasingly ironically unnatural looking for a woman to do what she does naturally.

  Which is to age. 
And the saddest thing about this is: 
Aging is an honor.
 And not everyone gets to do it.
The lines are there to show where you have been, what you have done, how much you have experienced, how much you have lived.
Stretch marks can only be obtained from having had babies.
I have never been upset about my own.  I have always carried the sense that I had to earn those, to suffer for them.  It's like a tattoo on my skin, the permanent reminder that these five humans who walk about the Earth with their own opinions and eye colors once lived inside my body, their face unseen was softly unlined, and for a while, it was just the two of us.
Once upon a time, your life began inside of mine. 

-XOXO,


*yes, that was a joke, but go back and watch Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, and Cinderella, see how the human and animal world's interact therein, and then tell me I don't have a point. 

For the record, yes I plan to color my hair and wear make up and generally "do it up," because I like doing these things, and they are the measure of taking care of myself which do not involve self mutilation, and yes.  Just yes.  

   

    

On the backside of a birthday

     Right now, a certain Four Year Old Child has no toys.  

You're thinking, "but it's 2014 in the United States, HOW CAN THAT POSSIBLY BE?" 

Well, I'll tell you how.

    A Certain Four Year Old Child received many wonderful birthday presents this past week for having turned four years old.  Let me interrupt myself here to say that these did not come from me.  I believe in keeping children's birthday's simple and that while we celebrate their birthdays, bake cakes, blow out candles, wrap a few gifts, less is more.  Especially when they are very young.  Amen and amen and amen.  But the extra fancy overflowing overabundance of presents came from well meaning outside sources, and the drama and attention got to Four Year Old Child's tiny four year old head.  She started to think she was bigger than her britches.  She started thinking that since she was The Queen of the World, it was OK to talk back to her parents, to pout and whine and in everything act entitled.

  This Mama bear saw the shift in dynamic and took away all of Four Year Old Child's toys.  Even the old ones, even the new ones.  

She has now survived a night and half of a day with no toys. 

     Sometime around mid morning, Four Year Old Child's temperament went back to playful, sweet, and even a touch humble.  She started playing and singing and dancing around the house, imagining  scenarios.  And then we all went outside. 

     Outside, we accomplished all of the things on my one year old son's to do list. 

 (To see this list, please read the previous post.)  

While One Year Old was accomplishing his tasks, Four Year Old Child began collecting acorns.  She soon realized that if you shake the acorns, they rattle.  So then commenced the stepping on of the acorns to crush them, to open them and see what was inside.  I was secretly curious to let her do this  to see if there were any maggots. 

If you want to know why this was important to me, you will have to read the previous post.  

     We found no maggots inside, but something that looked like a nut.  So we stomp crushed a few more acorns, pulled out the nuts and stomp crushed those, too.

 Call it science class, mixed with cooking class. 

 Call it homeschooling.  

Call it your tax dollars hard at work.

Just don't call it spoiled.

Sometimes children will misbehave because they are overstimulated but do not know how to tell you that.  

Our lives were not meant to be Pinterest picture perfect post cards.  

Yes, you should strive for excellence in all that you do, but when excellence gets replaced by perfectionism, everything suffers. 

 The children suffer. 

 Excellence is about living to please the Lord, working at it with all your heart.  Daily working out your salvation with fear and trembling.  Taking things seriously, instead of sleep walking through life while simultaneously expecting our children to hurry up and pay attention. 

 Perfection is about living to please what we think others expect of us, but one upping that to say "I am above you, I don't need anything, and this is effortless for me.  I cannot relate to you in any way.  Look at me and wish.  Oh but I will invite your kid to my perfect child's birthday party, and everything will be "just so," and you will feel "just less than."  

   If a child already has everything, how does the child ever learn to appreciate anything?

Children are naturally busy, they do need exercise.  

And attention

And mental stimulus. 

But the wide world is in itself a very busy, 

energetic,

stimulating place,

especially to those newly arrived,

who have not yet figured everything out.

"Stillness," and the idea of "being still" are concepts which needs to be taught.

It's good for children to get bored, it's good for them to want things they do not already have.  It's good for children to have to wait.  It's good for our kids to experience times in their lives where maybe they have an uneven haircut,  or their mouths look awkward as their baby teeth get traded in for grown up teeth.  These things are called growing pains, and they lead to creative problem solving skills, which in turn lead to your child growing up to be a somewhat interesting, kind, empathetic and self controlled adult.  At least I sure hope this is true, because that is the goal to which I am looking far, far ahead.  

In the meantime, let's just say that humility and obedience will go a long way towards Four Year Old Child getting her toys back. 

(If ever.)

 

Protect your borders, then decorate from within

I sometimes think about the things my crafty friends make in these terms: 

 That looks so simple! Yet I did not think of it.  Why didn't I think of it?  Why don't I ever think of things like that? Do I even like that?  It must look good because someone else said it looks good.  Hey, whether I like it or not, at least it's a craft, and she has that, and then here we have me, and what do I have, I don't have a craft. So she wins.

Yesterday, my husband fixed our front fence.  It had been driven into by the car of an intoxicated human one night while we were peacefully sleeping and feeling safe inside the house.  Sometimes when you are peacefully sleeping and feeling safe inside your house, someone outside is damaging your parameters.  

     The result of the fence crash was that the gate would not close properly.  The latch was misplaced. My one year old son learned that he could push on the gate, and it would open wide, and suddenly the entire world had the potential to be his for the terrorizing, at least as far as his 12-18ish inch legs would carry him.  I had to follow closely behind him any time he was outside, and make sure I ran to the gate faster than he did, so that I could hold it closed until he got tired of pushing on it, and realized it wasn't going to budge this time, and focus once again on something else within the confines of the yard.  As he is one year old, it doesn't take long for his focus to change to the next thing on his "to do" list. 

 The list includes, but is not limited to, going up the two front steps, which is a full body effort, then turning around and reaching for my hand so that I can help him step down the two front porch steps, and then stopping to clap and cheer for himself, as he has once again gone up, then down two steps. 

 The list also includes climbing and sitting on one of the chairs on the porch, then grunting and reaching for my hand when he realizes that he is still too short to get out of the chair.  I hold his hand and help him down,  so that he can climb back into the chair and sit comfortably for 3 seconds, then try to get down, only to realize that he still has not figured out how to get down, and again reach for my hand.  Repetition is an important feature of one-year-old-hood.  

     So you see why it was important to me that the fence be repaired.  Much that is treasured is contained within this yard.  As my husband was fixing the fence,  I looked around and saw that I had a yard full of sticks and acorns.  What is a good homey craft anyway, but something my crafty friends had brought in from outside and called a craft? So I enlisted my four year old to collect sticks and acorns.  I put the sticks in a clean, empty jar,  and arranged them like a bouquet which lacked flowers or leaves. I surrounded the sticks with acorns.  When I was satisfied with the stick to acorn to jar ratio, Four Year Old Child said "Here's a pine cone!" so I put the pine cone on the front at the top, and called it done, and called it craft, and called it very good.  

It is now sitting on the kitchen table, next to a heart shaped rock my ten year old son gave me several years ago. 

And this is where you can stop reading, because

Let's not talk about the fact that as soon as I posted a picture of this "craft" on Instagram, the only person to leave a comment said: 

"Careful! Acorns picked up off of the ground contain maggots!" 

And then let's also not talk about the fact that while I deleted the picture out of embarrassment, and out of a feeling that all non naturally crafty people know, the "that's what you get for trying to make a crafty craft!" feeling,  I did not remove the acorn infested decoration from my kitchen table.  The very table where my people, my precious treasured and beloved people, some of whom used to live inside my body, now sweetly sit, and innocently eat the food which my very hands have prepared for them.  

For they are unaware of my schemes.

My craft is on my table still.

I have seen no maggots.

I choose to blissfully assume there are no maggots in my particular acorns.

In fact, let's not even say that word ever again.

I choose to blissfully assume that the fence our yard is surrounded by which was violated by an outsider and reconstructed by an insider will also keep out such pestilence as ma-----.

So now,

     after having lived in this house for a year and a half, I feel a little bit decorated. 

 Just don't look at the walls because there is nothing on them.  

Maybe mothers of small children don't often put things on their walls because "decorating" takes every ounce of mental strength we can muster, and also because we spend so much time looking down.