What You Could Have Done: A Letter to our Community in the Wake of our Finalized Adoption

To our dear, dear friends and family,

This Saturday, as many of your know, our girls and my husband will deplane at O'Hare International Airport, and we'll welcome home not only our two new daughters but also two brand new American citizens. 

This Saturday will mark the end of our official adoption process with these two girls. 

No more trips over the ocean for their adoption purposes.

No more court dates. 

No more adoption fees. 

No more extensive paperwork. 

Of course, just because the adoption process is finished doesn't mean that the work of blending a family and helping hearts heal and creating safety and boundaries and working on family dynamics ends because it doesn't; that part of adoption work continues in full force. 

At this point in the road, though, as we come to the official end of the process, I wanted to say something to you and mark this moment with the only fitting thing: extreme gratitude. 

Simply, I want to thank you for showing up. 

Because you have. You have shown up big time these past two years. 

You have walked with us through embarking on the adventure orphan hosting, into the great unknown of adopting a teen internationally, a failed adoption, subsequent hosting periods and then the adoption of our two daughters now. 

And, I will be honest, God used you to make this all possible. 

We didn't have $40 thousand to complete this adoption. 

We needed a strong community of supporters to help us through the hardest of days. 

We needed people to come alongside of us and pray us through the impossibilities. 

We needed families to come around us in offering tangible help and respite. 

You responded. You heard the need. You felt the tug in your heart. And you stepped out in faith. 

You gave to our adoption fund when you could have bought something awesome or something needed for yourself. 

You showed up when we felt like we couldn't withstand another moment when you very easily could have tuned out our hardship in favor of dealing with your own hardships (because I know you have them, too).

You prayed when you could have spent time doing otherwise with the very little time you have. 

You were the physical hands and feet of God when you could have walked the other way during our times of need. 

You didn't pull inward or away; instead, you gave. 

And now there are two little girls who have a family who can take care of them; now a family has been brought together and knit together with faith, prayers and love. Now the extended family of these two girls on the the other side of the world who couldn't take care of them {for reasons beyond financial resources} can rest in knowing that their loved ones are being cared for, loved.

Sure, you might think, God could have done this without your help; God is a big God and he could accomplish his purposes in many different ways. 

BUT, I just have to say, it takes someone to say yes. 

God gives us free reign and free choice to do with our very lives what we choose. We can either show up and bring to the table the little bit we have and watch Him move mountains .... or we can stand in the distance as He moves mountains on His own. 

He can do either. And both, BOTH, my friends are miracles. 

One might say God moving a mountain alone is the bigger miracle. 

At one point I would have agreed because I have long desired to see God display His glory and power miraculously before my very eyes so that I could know that I know that I know He is God. 

But now I think otherwise. 

Now I think that every bit of the last two years has been God showing us His power, showing us His greatness, showing us His goodness and love. 

Because the changing of a human heart from stone to flesh ... the changing of a life from chasing selfish desires to selfless ones ... well, I'm not sure that anything else is quite as miraculous as that. 

I know because my heart is among the hardest. Our decisions shape our lives. Our lives become either legacies of our own ambitions or the ambitions of real Love. Because you gave, part of your life has become a legacy of Love. Real love. 

One thing I've seen throughout the history of God and His people is that he often does His work through His people. 

Because he cares for us.

Because he loves us. 

Because he can do it on His own, but he cares deeply about our faith, our trust, our hope. 

I think He knows this is often true: whenever we are engaged personally the miracle becomes all the more miraculous. 

It is my deep hope, my deep prayer, my deep desire that because you chose to give to this purpose, this passion of God's heart, this caring for orphans and bringing the lonely into families, that you would know the intensity of the miracle in which you've been involved. 

You could have done so much else with your various resources of time, energy and finances; but instead you gave. 

And I pray that God, in all of his love and goodness, gives you glimpses of how your giving made way for miracles to unfold and blossom right before all of our very eyes. 

I hope you know that because you gave, you were part of a miracle. And being part of a miracle is a miracle in itself. 

With love and deep gratitude, 

Hyacynth

Motherhood: Paris

I wake up to a small face inches away from my own, big blue eyes searching me, a long whine escaping his mouth, pulling me out of peaceful sleep and into the reality of Thursday morning:

He's not the only one who woke up on the wrong side of bed.

Maybe it's stemming from being jarred out of sleep so early.

Or maybe it's from feeling like I'm walking a never-ending road of healing.

But most likely, it's all about Paris.

John is leaving for Paris soon on a work-related trip ... and I am not.

So, currently, I detest Paris. Or maybe I just detest what Paris is doing to me.

I'm staying home with the boys and likely waking up to mornings like this every morning, which would be sweet if we could forgo the whine {and I'm embarrassed to admit that most of the whining comes from my own lips} but

I'm tired.

I'm still climbing my way out of the post-miscarriage anxiety and depression haze

I'm still trying to heal from this balance issue.

And I'm not ready.

Here's the thing about motherhood in this season of life:

I desperately want to mother, but I suck at doing it alone.

And here's the thing about Paris:

I want to go to Paris, but I am in a season so drenched in mothering that I cannot see past its thickness.

I told myself a few months ago when John first asked if I wanted to come along riding on his coat tails of frequent flyer miles that Paris could wait but the kids couldn't; they wouldn't be 3 and 5 forever.

A few months ago, fresh from the loss of a third baby during pregnancy, I thought that was a travesty. I wanted to soak up every ever-loving minute that these boys were small and mine to keep safely in the nest. Savor every moment, you know.

Today, with Paris looming in the near distance, I think it's a darn good thing 3 and 5 don't last forever, because my patience with 3 and 5 lately has been slim ... and I can only imagine what it will look like when I'm alone with 3 and 5.

We weren't meant to mother alone, and I know this keenly during times John is home and I am feeling well.

But when he's away and I'm still sporting tender wounds, the magnifying glass sharply focuses on my intolerance and my impatience and my limits.

Enjoyment and savoring? Those come harder when I'm simply in survival mode.

My writing off of Paris was a little short sighted. Because here's the thing about Paris and motherhood and this season of life and the intersection of all three I didn't know to put together:

there's only so much tolerance, so much patience and so much enjoyment a mother can experience when she hasn't set her own limits well.

So I'm taking a lesson from Paris, setting aside my grievances and setting my limits; I'm giving myself permission to receive the help I'll need and abide within these margins I've set.

I'm coming to understand that what I need to be a good mother isn't really a trip to Paris.

And what I need to be a good mother isn't simply to survive mothering in Paris' wake.

Rather, what I need is to recognize my own limitations, accept them and gracefully allow the gift of help from those who also know the importance of me staying within the lines right now so that there's enjoyment and savoring in the surviving.

Everyday Life: Sing

Sometimes it gets all murky.

Why I come here and open the flood gate to my heart waters, sharing pieces of life I'd maybe have trouble finding words for if we were in person enjoying a morning together beneath sun while watching little ones play in the still-green grass of late August.

Why I open white pages and scrawl out our story, pushing publish without not knowing who exactly is reading our open-book life.

Why I ever thought anyone would want to come into this space and linger for a few moments of the day.

Why I open myself to the criticisms and opinions and allow voices that aren't always kind a microphone of sorts.

I go through these waters every so often when life starts swirling and churning and kicking up sands and muck. In fact, there's been so much muck and mud swirling and churning that its kind of drown out my voice and let me quiet here and well everywhere.

Yesterday a good friend, a soul friend, emailed sharing much of these same heart aches and growing pains that stir when it comes to writing our lives and stories onto pages for others to read and share.

She called it something along the lines of existentialism about blogging, which made me laugh, too, amid the seriousness of this creative pondering and I immediately thought of a song I used to sing my heart out to while driving -- Straylight Run's Existentialism on Prom Night. And as I ruminated on her words and other friends' words, I began making a playlist because I'm always so influenced and motivated and freed by music.

In the murkiness, the words from friends and the words in song were just what I needed to sit in stillness and let all of the sediment fall to the bottom around my feet until the water started getting clearer again:

"Sing with your head up,
with your eyes closed
not because you love the song
but because you love to sing."
{Copeland}

As I quite literally sang, all those whys I was asking and other people often ask me -- all the sediment -- fell to the bottom around my feet -- leaving clear water in their settling.

While I do sing because I love the song

I sing mostly because I love to sing.

And I think most of the time

we all just need to throw our heads back, close our eyes

and sing.

{If you're feeling like you might need a little encouragement to sing your passion, you can listen to my playlist on Spotify for free.}

Bigger Picture Moments: I Want My Freakin' Village {Part II}

It wasn't the right house or the really even the right neighborhood.

Miles from a central downtown and situated just off a crowded, two-lane thoroughfare, I almost drowned in the silence of our new neighborhood as a mom then with only one toddler.

I longed for the kind of streets in which I grew up and into my own skin while outside playing kickball or freeze tag with a dozen other kids until the streets lights would flicker on and moms everywhere began shouting names from the screen door; though those days of neighborhood play came with hard lessons and hard knocks, I knew my neighbor's names, and I knew them as ones I could call on to borrow eggs or to come and check in on my sister and me when my mother's job ran long into the night.

After a few years of living here, in this quiet neighborhood that seemed neighborless, and driving miles and miles several times weekly to friends' houses for playdates that were saturated with the promise of adult conversation, a hot cup of coffee or tea and worn out children by afternoon nap time, I began uttering begging prayers

to move

or for our friends to move closer something anything for there to be a neighborhood village because honestly?

I loved this virtual community and my friends from all over our large and sprawling county but those people are hard to call in emergency, time-sensitive binds

or over to last-minute play when we need to see faces other than the ones that live in between these four walls

and, you know, you can't borrow eggs from a blog.

Somewhere in the midst of this crying out for community and trying {and failing} to find a new house in new neighborhood teeming with little kids, little buds of green began popping through the soil, I began shifting my energy from moving to making this a place I wanted to live -- a place with blossoming relationships and entertwined vines of friendship.

I met {through Twitter, nonetheless} a friend who not only lived two minutes away by car but also my brain twin through hours spent in conversation and communion of the hearts and minds.

Then a few more buds popped through just as I was about to force John to beat a for-sale sign into the ground -- another mom I'd really only known online turned out to live down the street.

A few more new faces slowly emerged, moving into the empty house on our street and we found each other through handshakes in the midst of knee-deep snow mounds and moments of serendipity while connecting virtually via an online group as we typed on our computers only three literal blocks away from each other.

We've cultivated slowly each relationship with conversation and time, offerings of help and hand and heart, and I saw that in effort more buds of friendship began to blossom in the neighborhood that seemed to be void of neighbors.

****

It's almost 8 o'clock at night, and I find myself all out of our eggs mid-recipe.

I briefly consider running to the store, but before I even give it a second thought, my thumbs are busy messaging three faces I not only recognize and call neighbor but also call friends.

And only a few moments later, I'm out my own door and standing at hers, chatting on her front porch while her littles sleep inside as the sun begins to fade into the horizon.



Just before the street lights click on, I bid her farewell and begin to walk the path back to my own house

through a neighborhood that just didn't seem right not just because of its location or proximity but because it was lacking the basic part of the word -- neighbors.

Two eggs in hand and thankfulness heavy on my tongue, my heart, I find a village, my village, in that word's restoration.

And, I find my village, too, in the realization that in order to have a neighbor, you also have to be one.

This week, we're sharing our moments at Brook's!

Thinking, That's All: Together

We've come together in thick humid air of late June, to just be.

Just be. Together.

We swing open the creaky screen door of the chalet, and it's like coming home to a place we've never before been.

A place where shoes are ditched upon entering and tight hugs follow on the tail feathers of giggling and laughter from two lovelies she and I found via friends and tweeting -- four song birds chirping from afar, finally flying toward the same landing spot for one night.

I'm starving, I exhale, after greetings are shared.

We set to work.

We feast first in meal, prepared together in the midst of multiple conversations, over the sounds of summer drifting in through patio screens.

And then we feast some more --

words meeting hearts,

toes meeting sand

photo courtesy of Melissa

waves meeting shore

glorious red streak brushed in one single stroke meeting the bluegray of water just before inky night skies stretched overhead. 



We stay up, trying to cram every last bit of conversation into the time-space we've been given together before eyes begin to heavily droop and we each give into sleep.

I wake -- hungry again -- to sunlight drenching my pillow and voices carrying up the stairs.

I whip eggs quick in a cup and throw them onto a sizzling pan

as I simply soak up more thoughts

more stories

more conversation

more of life

together.

And when the final hour draws to a close, I swallow and pause and smile.

We each reluctantly push away from the proverbial table

linger in last conversations and embraces

and fly off north and south and west.

But we fly off

full.

Full and nourished.

Bigger Picture Blogs: Let's Party like We're Turning TWO!

I can't help but to wonder where our baby's gone.

And how so much time has passed that our baby isn't actually a baby anymore.

Though I can hardly believe it, it's been two years since we birthed the Bigger Picture Blogs community.

Two years.

I kind of stare incredulously and wonder not only at how that little seed of an idea was sown and grown and birthed

but also at how its matured, developed its own personality and beauty beyond what I ever expected.

Where there was newness, softness around the edges, there are more defined features, stretched limbs and new thoughts and focus. 

We've grown so much this year. And growth requires a laying down of rocks, a celebration of sorts marking our time in becoming, in growing and living well spent.

Birthday celebrations are essential because they not only give us the chance to reflect on where we've been but also on who we've become. 


And, well, we've become something pretty spectacular; we are a commited community of writers who strengthen each other, polish each other and encourage each other to live intentionally by recognizing the bigger picture through the simple everyday moments. 


So will you celebrate who we've become as a community as we turn TWO?!


Consider this your official invitation: 

In celebration of our SECOND birthday we are hosting a very special Bigger Picture Moments that will stretch our creativity and connect our community!

We will be randomly pairing two community members to create a post for our special birthday celebration link up on Thursday, June 28 here at Undercover Mother; our creative collaborations will meet here to share their work by linking with the birthday linky and then mingle around and see other's collaborations. SIGN UP HERE TO PARTICIPATE IN A COLLABORATION!

Each creative collaboration duo will be given a prompt and work together to create a piece with one visual. 

Like any good party, there will certainly be gifts, too. We have a few lovely, creativity inspiring giveaways in store for a few of the party attendees who link up their collaborations!

And what would a party be with out some treats? Join us Wednesday, June 27 at Sarah's -- the day before our big birthday bash -- to feast on ideas for some delicious treats to bring to the celebration.

We'll each post our favorite cake/dessert recipes, baked with our own unique flavor, and link up our treats so we can share some sweetness with each other. 

Those who link up a sweet treat recipe will also be entered into our birthday gift giveaway. And feel free to be as creative as you so desire with your recipe, heavily flavoring it with sprinkles of your life or who you are or what you love. 

We are so looking forward to celebrating Bigger Picture Blogs SECOND birthday by pairing up TWO things that are at the heart of BPB: creativity and community. 

Let's party, friends!

Thinking, that's all: A blanket

A soft blue glow dimly gives light to the dark recesses of an inky backstage area.

We sit hip to hip, perched in chairs that form an oval, silent except for the wild beating of hearts, the quick whispers of courage breathed out to the first voice making her way toward the center stage.



She's first to bring life to the black print on white as she shares her story.

I find myself holding my breath tight inside my lungs, keeping vigil for her before I realize that she's got it and slowly exhale it into the soft shadows.

I hang on her words, her threads dangling in the air and grab on tight.

She brings her story to a close and a round, full-bodied applause breaks out from the audience and fills seemingly ever inch of empty space in the theater.

And the backstage?

The backstage is drenched.

It is drenched with applause, and it is weeping with awe and love

because she has broken the silence with her voice.

She has taken the first threads, added her own and she has begun weaving them all together through gifting us with her own.

The words we've all written about motherhood -- about how it's changed, shaped, grown, morphed us, made us-- come quickly, deliberately thereafter, single thread after single thread added

hers

and his

and hers

and hers

and hers

and then ours.

We are next.

As part of the only duet in the show, I've long realized that this story I'm about to give voice, this thread I'm about to add to the collection, isn't only mine.



It's hers, too.

But it's not until I step onto center stage that I truly realize it's not just mine and hers either.

There is laughter, deep thundering laughter, as we give comedic voice to the loneliness of mothering in our day in age.

And I know, in the laughter, that our stories, our threads have been grasped, they've been picked up and woven together with others

that these stories don't just belong to the people in center stage, the people giving them voice.

No.

The laughter coupled with tears tells a story of its own: that these stories are all of ours

that motherhood has given us all a song swelling in our chest in some way or another

that these threads were meant to be woven together.

Our lives, our stories weren't meant to simply be separate, dangling threads


but rather a blanket of warmth spread across shivering shoulders.



Sunday night in Chicago, I snuggled deep into the comforts of that blanket in the best of company.

Bigger Picture Moment: Benevolent Pressure

"I believe in very small group of people who want what you what and are willing to commit," Anne Lamott on writing amid the benevolent pressure of other creative souls

We've come, I think, to a crowded, darkened middle school gym, sneaked in through the back door a few minutes late to hear words from a great wordsmith because we writers feast on words like a kid devours a cupcake for breakfast. 


But I don't know really what to expect from this small blonde dread-locked life-poet once I see her standing in the spotlight, rocking her weight back and forth between both legs and waxing reality about the Holy Spirit and tattoos and how everything she eventually lets go bears claw marks from her fingers clenching tight. 


Oh, me, too. 


Everything I let go of, too, boasts my imprinted fingers and hands. 


And, then, she moves thoughts toward writing because that's what writers do; she muses on about life for awhile and then it all circles back to words, words powerful words. 


Words alone. 


And words together. 

Me, Anne Lamott and Melissa, two irons in my journey 

But there's a difference, you know. 


She speaks to my heart when she talks about how writers need to give themselves permission to write ... about how writers flourish amid the "benevolent pressure" from other writers. 


"I believe in very small groups of people who want what you what and are willing to commit," Anne Lamott says. 


Oh, me too. 


I never gave words before to that belief; however, I realize I've been living it in life with my friendships and in my marriage and in my relationships. 


But have I believed this even for my creative endeavors, my passions? I feel like I've been seeking it for almost two years now as one of the co-founders of Bigger Picture Blogs. 


Only now, though, am I putting it into practice with my heart completely wrap-wound-up-around the debut of our Writing Circles forum. Finally, we've combine two things I love, two things in which I believe deeply: sharing life through painting pictures with words amid other kindreds who write life out loud. 


The Proverbs say that as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another; we need community to permeate through all aspects of our lives if we are to be stronger, sharper.


And so as it is in life, it is true also in strengthening the skill of creating and bringing to life words and stories, of writing; there is "benevolent pressure" applied in the sharpening. 

Share a picture, words, creation or list; just come to the table with the beauty in the simple moments of the week.. 

Live.
Reflect on the blessings that were apparent to you this week.

Capture.
Harvest them!

Share.
Link up your gleaned moment this week at Melissa's! Please be sure to link to your post, not your blog. Your post must link back here or have our button in your post or the link will be deleted.

Encourage.
Visit at least the person linked before you and encourage her in this journey we call life.

Bigger Picture Moments: On Being Noticed

There is tired written across my newly sunned cheeks and wild, wind-stricken hair swept back into a sweaty ponytail when I decide to take the leap. 

I flip open the computer, see my image reflected onto the screen from the webcam and think again -- maybe I'll record my audition for the show a different time when ...

But the kids are asleep. 

The nights are short.

And time is of the essence.

I take a deep breath, open the typed piece a friend and I had just hours before co-written and talk myself into hitting record.

As I self-argue again about perhaps freshening up a bit and putting my powdered face forward, I disregard the thought and remember why I'm doing this audition in the first place:

****

It's lonely sometimes, motherhood. 

I recall days, mostly after each of my babes were born, where I felt isolated, weary, invisible to all but little pairs of needy eyes. 

Days where loneliness stretched out across the never-ending hours until my husband would appear in the door frame, me longing for cohesive conversation after feeling enslaved in a house where sickness was bounding us to couch or naptimes were holding us hostage both morning and afternoon. 

Days where I desperately needed someone, a friend to come alongside me and remind me that babies outgrow naps and winter colds dwindle and mothers again find their voices to use for something other than reading the same story a billion times or shouting in frustration for everyone to stop whatever atrocity was being committed. 

There were days where I longed and cried and yearned for a village.

I felt so alone. My friends lived far away and schedules seemed to always conflict and there were weeks when I'd see hide nor hair of anyone outside of attending Bible study or running to the grocery store. 

So I wrote it all out -- the heartache, the pain, the loneliness that wiggles itself into the cracks of motherhood amid the beautiful and lovely and wonderful. 

Someone noticed. Actually, a lot of someones in this here blog space as well as my geographical area noticed. And they felt the same way. 

This voice of mine that spent so much time coming out as solely that of a mother began to emerge into the voice of a woman who also happened to be a mother, the me I'd not really known until a community came around me and helped me muddle through all of the life that had been thumping around inside my heart and head.

I grew and a community grew around me and I grew into community and friendship and I found my freakin' village all because someone noticed, all because someone, lots of someones heard me and said, oh yes, yes, yes, I feel that, too..

But I've never forgotten the lonely that stung my heart, left me weeping and heart sick for traveling companions, left me aching to be seen, to be noticed. 

****

I blink a few times, exhale and press record as I accept the tired eyes looking back at me, the messed hair. 

Because this -- plain and simple little old me recording my half of the audition for Listen to Your Mother in a dishelved state, not perfectly coiffed, while the children slumber and I steal moments from my evening to give space for my authentic voice to rise --  this is real motherhood. And it deserves real voice.

This production that pays tribute to mothers, gives voice to all the parts of  motherhood -- the hilarious, the messy, the lonely, the beautiful, the weary, the lovely,  the completely disheveled, the imperfect -- this show isn't just for the perfectly groomed or only professional writers or only actresses who can deliver flawless monologues; it's for real mothers with real voices and real messy hair and real tired eyes who have something very real, very important to share.

The popularity of Listen to Your Mother, as evidenced by multiple-city productions now running only three years since the inaugural Madison show, demonstrates that real motherhood not only deserves a real voice but that we mothers need a space to have real voice, hear a real voice.

Because we're all just waiting to have a voice given to the parts of our lives -- especially the complicated, messy, beautiful, impossible arena of motherhood -- that aren't often shared let alone celebrated.

We're all just waiting to be noticed, to be a little better known, to be heard. 

As my voice finds the courage and strength to speak into a microphone on a Chicago stage come May 6, giving life to the other half of a duet about the weariness and loneliness and hilarity of motherhood, I hope that another mother, somewhere, anywhere, will feel just a little more noticed, a little better known, a little more heard from her time spent in a space where motherhood is shared and celebrated. 

{Also, I promise to shower before the actual show and perhaps put on my powdered face because mothers don't just deserve to be given a real voice, they deserve {and need!} showers, too.}

Share a picture, words, creation or list; just come to the table with the beauty in the simple moments of the week.. 

Live.
Reflect on the blessings that were apparent to you this week.

Capture.
Harvest them!

Share.
Link up your gleaned moment this week HERE! Please be sure to link to your post, not your blog. Your post must link back here or have our button in your post or the link will be deleted.

Encourage.
Visit at least the person linked before you and encourage her in this journey we call life.

Five-Minute Friday: Ache

Ache stretches out across my chest and floods the open spaces with longing.

In a regular time and space I don't know, there was a house vibrating with life, the very walls built with the concrete ties of love, windows and doors threatening to spill all the energy into the yard and street.

I hear the stories.

Every weekend.

Every weekend the families, they came together for the children to run and yell and play and grow and the adults to talk and enjoy and pray and grow.

I've touched these kinds of afternoons-turned-evenings in sporadic seasons of our life, sitting in the warmth of community, lives shared and hearts bared and tied together with ropes of experience and hour spent well in conversation.

I know that villages are not built on concrete slabs within the same neighborhood as often now.

I'm just now figuring out the new construction codes, and they require bricks of time, foundations of commitment and mortar of follow-through.

There's labor in the building of a home that houses community.

I've gotten my hands dirty, and now I'm ready to be coated head to toe.

Thinking, That's All: Presence

I never liked the silence of me alone in a room without at least the presence of another to make it less still.

And then I discovered a Presence in which I wanted to bask, with whom I wanted to rest in the timelessness of quiet, in the quietness of slow-passing time.

I forget so easily, though, as easily as I forget the one thing for which I went to the store when I'm walking to the checkout, cart full of things we only half-need --

I forget amid the constant foghorn of busyness sounding through the thick air that my heart is filled not by the workings of my hands, but rather its filled by His handiwork within my heart during these times of stillness, during these times when my mind switches off the constant drumming of a make-it-or-break-it beat and instead beats in the rhythm of grace and rest.

I forget that His rhythm beats in my heart best.

We spend two days, John and I, in retreat of everyday life, filling small pockets of time with silence in His presence, keeping company with others who seeking to live in the intersection of where their deep joy meets the world's deep need.

We come around the table, seeking the very spoken Words Jesus shared in the upper room with his disciples.

We break bread together, trying to make sense of those Words, apply them to the here and now of our lives.

Together, we share life in solid community, bound by an appetite to know Him and make Him better known in our own hearts and in the hearts of those who crave more than what culture says life is in the here, in the now.

We share what has left us tired and aching -- the loneliness of being alone in a crowd and the noise of brains that won't enter into the rest to which He invites us.

It is an extreme paradox, this place and time in which we live, where we feel most alone when we are together and when we seek to come into His presence we feel alone because we are taken captive by the thoughts, the fears, the busyness of the day.

We break in retreat these two days to keep company with God.

Together.

Alone.

TogetherAlone.

And the quiet isn't so quiet.

Together

Or alone

when we keep company in His presence.

Thinking, that's all: Strange isn't all that Strange

It starts with my sister and I half joking about how other families seem so normal.

Until they don't.

Like mine, for instance.

At first glance, we're stereotypical suburbanites with our two parents, two kids, golden retriever, house with a fenced-in backyard.

But then upon closer inspection you find these oddities -- these unique-to-us traits

like how E wants, no, needs someone to rub his toes every night before he goes to sleep.

Or, G, how he still will reach up to touch our ears when he feels out of his element.

And John's sock length guidelines for jean-wearing versus shorts-wearing.

Oh, me, too. With my inner deep desire to be keeper of the chickens.

Maybe those oddities are laughable, all of them.

But there's the ones I don't normally wear on my sleeve, too.  Like my brain-eating amoeba fears. The ones that are strange and deep-seeded and not readily understood or mentioned.

There's those pieces of strangeness, the ostracizing and lonely kind that leave us tight-lipped, letting the thoughts meander or stomp around the romping grounds of our minds in solitude. The kind you don't really want to share with your family or best friend or even your husband because it doesn't just dance in the room of unusual or quirky ... the isolating kind of strange that binds our tongues and keeps us standing in the quiet of our thoughts.

We walk into the church building, smiling and saying hello to families we've known for years and some for just minutes. I catch another mom's eye in the mirror in the bathroom; we exchange pleasantries. The conversation ends with wishes for a great weekend.

She seems to have it all together together -- hair brushed, clean clothes, smiles abounding and words shared easily. We both seem to have it all together.

We both seem so normal.

Until we're not.

We've all got those deep pockets of fear, these wells of uncertainty that keep us lingering in isolation, keep us captives in the darkness because we think we're too far gone.

But the lonely of strange or abnormal can only be isolating if we keep it to ourselves and everyone else does, too.

I wonder, as a community, as a church, as people who seek to walk in His footsteps, what it would take to go past the places of polite conversation and smiles and normal and venture into quirky so can begin to walk into the halls of the lonely, the strangeness together and get real about what normal really means.

Because normal redefined would make these places so many of us struggle to get a grip on far less lonely and far more easy to tackle.

Thinking, that's all: Hold the Light

There is great temptation in retreating into silence.

So many reasons - fear or shame or guilt or pride or minimizing - for concealing our wounds, quieting ourselves, never giving voice to the deep abrasions our hearts suffer.

I choked back the guilt swelling in my chest, asked my mom to take the day off Friday and come help while I rested and prayed and healed physically and John tried to order the house from an entire day of neglect and pay quality attention to our littles.

She reminds me that we have to accept help where help is freely given in love, embrace it with thanksgiving in our hearts.

We have to let the body function, be the body, if we are to really be a body united.

"From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work." Ephesians 4:16

Hurting in the silent recesses of the heart doesn't allow for love to come from the other parts of the body, doesn't let the body come in response to the pain and help aid in the healing with love.

Words.

Prayers.

Encouragement.

Flowers.

Tea.

Poetry.

Phone messages.

Arms to love on two boys.

Arms strung around my neck.

Each a different but beautiful gift from a different and beautiful part of the body.

Through this second miscarriage and then our ER trip with E after he fell and hit his head last night, you, our friends and family, have really shown me what it is to hold the light when exhaustion and doubt and hurt really set in.

So thank you. Thank you for holding the light for us.

"For where two or three come together in my name, there am I {Jesus} with them." Matthew 18:20

If I can take your burdens to His feet, please don't hesitate to share.

Bigger Picture Moment: Confirmation

A swift current of yearning flows like electricity through my body at the thought of welcoming another tiny person into our family.

I've struggled with this deep-seeded desire, questioning if I'll forever ache to smell the sweetness of a newborn freshly birthed, if I'll always want to bring a babe against my skin, welcoming another round of nursin, if I'll ever pine for the view of tiny hands resting against John's chest.

Will that ache persist regardless of how many little ones we have?

And, samely, I've contemplated, questioned if this is the time we should venture into adoption, welcome a child from another mother's womb into our home, blend ourselves into the perfect brew of family beyond bloodlines.

Do I have to bear another child to fully satisfy this feeling of feeling like we've yet to meet another child?

I've been wrestling.

Then the whole three-negative-pregnancy-tests-amid-surges-of-nausea-and-days-and-days-sans-period thing happened, and I thought with an almost-certainty that my body was again home to another little life ... only for a period to emerge so late in the game, I could nearly keep the look of shock off my face upon its arrival.

That same week, we suffered a hard loss at church, and those feelings of grief overshadowed the sadness and dissappointment and almost betrayl I felt, so much so that I never dealt with this emotions that were so deeply seeded embedded into my heart.

Until -- during an unplanned, impromtu Skype converation -- a friend asked about it all, going to places sometimes we don't go -- into the depths of the heart, the soul.

At first, I was taken aback; I'd already dismissed the non-pregnancy ordeal as not being in God's time. But she took me to a place I never bothered to tread when she asked:

"Do you think maybe that was God's way of whispering to your heart that maybe you really honestly desire to be pregnant again? Maybe this is clarification about adopting versus bearing another child naturally?"

As her words soaked into ears that could hear, I realized a confirmation embed itself into my heart: there's a deeply rooted desire to swell again with the fullness of another baby, to grow another baby, to birth and nurse another baby -- one I cannot explain, as it mightily overpower all of doubts.

Sometimes I hear God speak to my heart in small whispers -- through the soft beauty of a flower that weathers a brutal storm and still is standing tall the next day.

Sometimes I hear His voice through the burning bushes of life - the unexplained sheer forces of power and the amazing events that unfold surrounding them.

And sometimes I hear Him speak through those who love Him and seek to find the Bigger Picture in the everydayness of life.

In the flicker of conversation between friends, often in my life I've found phenomenal truth and insight shared either in passing or embedded in the depth of heavy conversation that I might otherwise have missed altogether had someone not been brave enough to venture into the depths ... had I been too busy to have the conversation.

{So I realize there are, like, several bigger picture moments in this one post ... but sometimes revelation comes in bursts.}



Join us at Sarah's to share the harvest of your intentional living this past week!

Thinking, that's all: Afloat

We'd been playing phone tag for a week solid, coming almost to the point where I normally give up on the old phone conversation hopes and defer instead to e-mail.

But in a moment of serendipity and in a moment of grace, we connect.

Voices only, at first, just giving play by plays and catching up on each other's husbands and boys, but there is goodness in it nonetheless.

Though we haven't seen each other in a year, the conversation rolls right along, smoothly, comfortably and it's almost like she's actually walking next to me on the sidewalk, enjoying the same splashes of color streaking across the expansive blues of the dusky midwestern sky.

And like so many conversations we've had in the past, so many dialogues we've shared over the years, the talk of current events morphs into actual conversation of how said current events of life are settling and digging into our hearts.

I share that I've had some emotionally exhausting weeks, and though my husband had thrown me life line of grace just about a week ago, hauling me back to His feet, honestly, I admit, I'm still finding myself treading water to stay afloat more often than not.

She says she's had the same kind of previous week, too, one in which her church community also suffered an extremely soul-wrenching loss of a young life here on Earth.

Instead of just glossing over the hurt, she dives right into it with me -- into the depths of where those losses leave our reeling hearts and minds.

She goes there with me.

To the place of "why."

To the "I don't get it."

And to the "Where is He right now?"

Those places we don't normally don't tread water together, the places we try to swim alone in the deepness, in the vastness of our own oceans of thoughts.

So I grab onto the Lifeline she's clutching, too.

Again.

I grab onto His word, the Promises of grace and love and restoration that's she's reminding me of, reminding herself of by saying them aloud.

Even though it's deep and it's choppy and it's kind of scary, I finally stop kicking and thrashing and just hold onto those Promises for dear life, trusting that it will keep me afloat, thankful that He's sent another person to weather the waters with me.

Thankful that maybe, finally, I have come to the end of trying to swim it all by myself.

{And all of this after another friend poured some truth right into my ears -- but that's my Bigger Picture Moment for Thursday and an entirely new post.}

Thinking, That's All: Generosity

I don't know what it's like to have my hometown ravashed, left in utter shambles by the powerful forces of mother nature. Or what it's like to mourn the loss of my home or worse yet, a loved one.

And I don't know what it's like to avoid driving the streets of my hometown in order to shield little eyes from devastating destruction, images that likely would tatoo themselves on their ever-absorbing minds.

But now?

Because of what's happened in Joplin -- one woman, one heart in a small northern suburb of Chicago has been forever changed.

Still, I wish the Joplin tornado had never happened.

But it did.

And because it did, people came together in a powerful way.

Individuals, friends, big companies, small artisian shops, community members, families, even strangers all banded together to raise money for the people who call Joplin home.

With hope that our small but heartfelt contribution could not only help restore the livlihood of a hurting city but also hope.

With ope that others would come alongside their bruised city and begin the process of healing the wounds.

With hope that others would hold their families in their hearts, lift their needs up in prayer.

And with hope that maybe those prayers for restoration might be answered in an abundance of ways by a very-personal God.

Our small way of helping extend hope has been through an online auction relief effort, and it was inspired by our desire to come along Sarah, one of the Bigger Picture Blogs founders, as well as the Joplin community in the way we feel we've been called to come along side her and her community.

Thus, after a morning of furiously circulating emails and a phone call from Melissa that started with "Maybe we could do something bigger ...", the Help4Joplin Relief Auction was born.



As of this post, we {all of us together -- you and me and people I've never had the privledge of hugging as well as some I have} have raised more than $1400 to send to Joplin.

The generosity shown during this relief effort has filled my heart with such joy, just gladness, such Light. And it's brought me to grateful tears several times.

I hope it's done the same for Sarah and her family.

Some say it's unclear whether Joplin will ever recover.

The news reports have been grim.

But as I said before, I believe in a Light that shines in the darkness, and that the darkness can never extinguish it*.

And that makes me I wonder, really wonder, if each small, meaningful effort, packed with heart and soul and love -- like ours or this one or this one or this one -- could actually help.

If each of us who felt a pang in our hearts when we heard the news reports visibly sprang to some sort of small action -- if the collective we could actually help Joplin not just recover but recover stronger, more mightily.

And if those efforts, those tiny steps of action, could actually change more than just the future of Joplin or any other place that takes the spotlight after disaster.

I wonder if it could change a whole community of hearts -- one {stay-at-home mom in a small northern suburb of Chicago} at a time.

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever does." - Margaret Mead

The Help4Joplin Relief Auction ends tomorrow morning at 9. If you have that stirring in your heart, please consider making a direct donation or bidding on one of the generously donated items.

Note: Jamie from Lyrical Journey is the winner of the coffee cozy from A Soft Landing and the $25 Starbucks gift card; I know, Jamie, that you {or anyone for that matter} didn't blog about the auction to win anything, but it's my way of saying thanks anyway for being the mouth that moblizes the hands and feet.

*John 1:5

A Call: Being the Mouth that Helps Mobilize the Hands and Feet

This spring has been one of devastating storms and destruction.

The most recent tornado stuck very close to our Bigger Picture Blogs Family.

Last night, Joplin, MO was hit with a massive tornado that has destroyed more than a quarter of the city and left many families without homes.

One of our writers, Sarah, lives in the town of Joplin.

While her family didn't not lose their home, close family members, friends and others have.

The town has been completely split into two by the vast path of the tornado.

Yesterday, after our family, both mine and the Bigger Picture Blogs family, heard the news, we prayed.

We prayed for help for the people of Joplin, MO.

For our friends Sarah and Justin and their family members -- prayers of thanksgiving for their safety, and also prayers of peace and provision in the aftermath of a deadly, destructive tornado that ripped a path through the middle of their city.

Today, as the images flash across screens, showcasing the devastation, giving faces to the hurting, the need for relief and rescue has become clearer.

So we continue to pray.

But, today?

Today we also respond.

As rescuers and organizations rush to the aid of families in Joplin, we have the opportunity to make a difference.

Some of the original founders and writers of Bigger Picture Blogs and our awesome community members came together this morning through myriad e-mails to help organize a large-scale relief effort in order to best help mobilize these hands and these feet by providing funds.

Thus, Help 4 Joplin was born.

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<a href ="http://www.peanutbutterinmyhair.com/2011/05/standing-together-help4joplin.html" target="Help4Joplin"><img src="http://i1003.photobucket.com/albums/af151/PBinmyHair/helpforjoplin.jpg" alt ="Help4Joplin"/></a>

This Wednesday through Friday, we'll be hosting an online auction to raise money for The Salvation Army in Joplin.

Items for the auction have been lovingly and generously donated from many, many businesses {like A Soft Landing, Hotter Comfort Concept Shoes, Shining Stones and Stoneyfield Farms, just to name a few}.

All proceeds from the auction will directly benefit relief efforts in Joplin.

So do you want a tangible way you can help families who've lost everything, families who have suffered huge devastation and families who have lost more than a quarter of their city?

Be the mouth.

Use your blog or your Facebook page to post about the Help 4 Joplin auction.
In your post, be sure to state:
1. The site and dates of the auction -- Wed., May 25 through Fri., May 27.
2. A few of the businesses who have donated auction items with links {list posted here}
3. The Help 4 Joplin button

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<a href ="http://www.peanutbutterinmyhair.com/2011/05/standing-together-help4joplin.html" target="Help4Joplin"><img src="http://i1003.photobucket.com/albums/af151/PBinmyHair/helpforjoplin.jpg" alt ="Help4Joplin"/></a>

Let's spread the word about the auction so together we can raise substantial funds to help moblize responders and quickly deliver relief efforts.

Afterall, when tragedy strikes, this is what community does -- we come together.

Please, since we can't all be hands and feet in this response, let's be a different yet equally important part of the body.

Be the lips, friends -- be the voice.

IMPORTANT: Once you write your post, please come back and link your post through Friday. {And please note -- part of the point of this link is to show a VISIBLE united support front from our community for Sarah and the Joplin community.}

Each link gets an entry for a chance to win a $25 Starbucks gift card and a beautiful hand-knit coffee cozy from A Soft Landing.

Virtual Coffee: Ten

Try not to do too much of a double take as you walk in the door for coffee today.



I promise, you are in the right place. It's not often that our guests {or simply our own feet} can actually walk through the front entry way without tripping over toys, coats and shoes, but for an ENTIRE WEEK it's been like this around here -- totally passable hallways, dirty dishes loaded in the dishwasher instead of sprawled over the counters, dining room table cleared off paper piles and toys and glasses.

You'd likely walk into the kitchen quiet and maybe a little shell shocked at the huge difference. I know, I'd whisper as we were standing in my tidied kitched waiting for the water to finish boiling for tea as the kiddos played in the {most-likely toy-infested} living room, it's insane, isn't it?

And, probably, because we're pretty good friends by now, you'd ask me if we hired a housekeeper or if I'd perhaps sold the kids to the circus or something. I'd shake my head no, smiling, and I'd tell you that it's all because I've begun pretending like Sunday, as a day, doesn't actually exist on the calendar.

Pick your brew, I'd welcome, and we'd then head over to the dining room table to chat while sipping our teas.



Likely, you'd want some sort of explanation about me ditching Sundays as a day, and I'd tell you about how as a family we've decided to observe an official day of rest every week, which has directly and indirectly resulted in our clean{ish} house.

We've chosen to consistently rest each Sunday, and this past week, our
first planned week, we observed this day in a decided way; and it has helped our lives fall into this very beautiful rhythm. And, ironically, our living space has benefitted from it, too. {I promise to write in detail about our newly established Sabbath practice sometime this week.}

While sipping tea, I'd ask how you've been this past week. And I'd probably share with you some of the thoughts that have been weighing on my mind -- mostly that of community.

I've been participating in Megan's 40 Days of Community over at her blog, Sorta Crunchy, and yesterday I shared a common struggle with being engaged in deeper relationships within the context of community.

What about you? Have you found yourself wading in the shallow end of relationships instead of venturing out into the depths? If you have, gosh, I feel you. Also, we're not alone.

On a lighter note {ha!}, you might ask about how the house updating is coming. And I'd excitedly tell you that we've decided on a beautiful espresso color to cover the horrible salmon-mauve that's currently chipping and peeling from our trim.



Though the painting won't begin for another few weekends, when it's hopefully warmer and dry, we did actually put new lights up, and that's kinda helped move our poor Charlie-Brown-Christmas-tree house on the block up a notch or two.



Kinda being the operative word.

So what's on your list to do once the weather officially turns to spring? Anything fun coming up now that it's almost April{!!!}? <

Community: Deep and Wide

It’s a rainy Sunday morning, and we’re splashing through puddles while trying to dodge fat drops of rain. We’re late, per normal, which is seemingly part of life with two small boys. As we rush into the church building, we quickly greet those standing in the foyer before hurriedly dropping off the kids in their Sunday School classrooms; we then scurry into the sanctuary, where we take our seats, two in a sea of hundreds of faces. The service lures my soul into rest, fills me with passion for such a wonderful Maker. But there’s a deep longing resounding in my heart after the service ends – one that desires to remain in communion with Him through being in communion with His people, be a part of the Body … because the body part I feel we most closely resemble these days are feet, quickly ushering us toward the kids’ classes and then out the front doors of the building, so as to drive two hungry, tired children home ...

Please jump over to read the rest of this piece and join the discussion about community over at Sorta Crunchy today, as Megan has welcomed my voice into her space during her amazing 40 Days of Community project.