There Goes the Honeymoon {So Much for Hawaii}

Dear John,

It wasn't much, but it was something beautiful. More beautiful than I had ever dreamed.

Two college kids just having graduated from university who fell mad into love, we didn't have a lot of money for a super-fancy wedding, but we had enough to make a day and evening we would remember even ten years later, today, on our tenth wedding anniversary.

It's a memory that almost didn't form, though, because we thought to ourselves maybe we should jump a plane, invite our closest people and get married on a beach in Hawaii.

But we couldn't do it; more than we wanted the sunset vows of forever and the sand between our toes, we wanted our people, all of our people to share our day. I know you really wanted to go, but you knew what mattered more to me ...

And when the whole thing was said and done, when we had vowed our love and loyalty before God and family and friends and we had danced until our feet couldn't dance another step, we were glad we didn't go to Hawaii; we were glad we stayed with our people. And we reasoned, we could always go to Hawaii for our honeymoon ... well, a very belated one after we'd worked for awhile and saved some money.

We were going to make it there for our anniversary; remember how your dad even bought us books? I laugh now thinking about those guides. We'd scoped out which island we wanted to visit. We looked at flights. We talked about what we'd do and see. We saved money.

And then two little pink lines on a pregnancy test told us that we'd be celebrating our second wedding anniversary with a newborn who wanted to party all night in our apartment instead of on the beaches of that far-away island we'd dreamed about for the past two years.

Life happens while you're living, and ours was no different, was it? I remember that we thought -- why pause now with one child?  Why wait to add another to the mix? Because we were mad in love with each other and mad in love with that baby boy and knew we'd fall mad into more love with another little person ... And where are we going to put these people anyway, we asked.  So we bought a house and made it a home instead of buying plane tickets to take us away from home ...

Years passed, as they do, and you began dreaming aloud, saying you wanted to whisk me off to celebrate our ten-year anniversary on those very beaches we'd thought of when we first said we wanted to do forever together.

But instead of planning our ten-year anniversary, the honeymoon we always dreamed we have, we began planning a trip that would take us around the world to bring home two very special little girls who have become our daughters. Because, you know, we went and fell in love again. Not just with each other or the children we'd brought into the world through our love, but with a crazy-amazing God who had a plan much grander than we dreamed. We fell in love with Him, and His heart for caring for the least of these and with two little ladies who we just cannot any longer imagine life without.

Instead of booking airfare to Hawaii, and you were just so close to making it a reality this year, we are instead booking plane tickets that will soon take you back around the globe to make this family theirs forever.

And I have to tell you, here we are again. With our people. And it's so much better than Hawaii.

So this isn't actually a story about Hawaii. But rather it's a story about what's happened instead of Hawaii.

And it's so much more than what I could have dreamed for us. It's so much more beautiful than all the beauty I'd hoped we'd have glimpsed on that long-awaited honeymoon we've still yet to take.

Tonight, on our tenth anniversary, we laughed uproariously around the table as we played mom-and-dad-wedding trivia, we roasted marshmallows around the fire and watched the chaos that ensued in the aftermath of sugar, snuggled with each of the littles before bed, stole a longer kiss in front of the sink and curled up in bed next to our oldest daughter to pray before she drifted to sleep.

As we watched the star-reflections on her ceiling flicker from the lamplight on her dresser, I said I thought this view was better than the one we would have caught in Hawaii.

And I meant every word I said.

There's no place I'd rather be in the world, than in the thick of this adventure, right here, right now, than being with you, with our people.

I love you. Happy tenth anniversary. May God give us many many more, as He's done with everything else in our life.

Everyday Poetry: What Did We Know

I grabbed his hand and ran wild

into roped-off spaces of ancient digs

following a man with a machine gun into the shadows.

He said he knew then that he loved me;

why else would he have followed a wild-child of a beautiful mess

like me into the dark unknown of catacombs

half way around the world from

where he first read about them in books

dreamed of a brown-eyed girl.

But what did he know of love.


I followed him a few months later

a sparkling diamond on my ring finger

back to his old stomping grounds

promised I did and I do and I would.

But what did I know of vows.


I birthed him two babies

and we built a life and planted a garden

of trust and tears and laughter

in our backyard and living room,

found out what sickness and worse

and pockets of poorer meant.

Looked at each other, hands on hips,

from across the room some nights

before finally giving in,

melting into each other's arms

wondering aloud

what we knew of love.


I've stained his shirt with soft gray smudges of eyeliner

and hot tears more days than not now

in these four weeks and counting

since the baby in my womb traded

breathing amniotic fluid for angel air

And we've folded up into conversation

of babies gone

and sleeping soundly in the next room

of heavenly lights

and earthly darkness

of questions pleaded into the night

and answers given by morning sun

of a rugged tree where He was nailed

and an empty tomb where He was risen

Realizing exactly what we now know of love

and still also have yet to grasp.

Join us every Monday for every-day poetry during the month of April!

Bigger Picture Moments: I See it in His Face

When we first were married, no one ever asked him for his ID when he'd order a beer.

But they always asked for mine.

At freshly 22, I'd tease him that I was his young wife, gladly wearing smooth skin and pre-baby curves as I joked.

And he'd look at me adoringly, smile a wide grin, and agree even though I'm actually only two months and some change younger.

It's been seven and a half years, one mortgage, one business, two little boys, two angel babies and now another baby on the way since we said I do, and when we go out now and order a drink neither of us are asked to prove we're of legal age ...

That's what living long days and learning hard into what life gives and clinging fiercely to God while together weathering storms does to our bodies -- it ages us in ways we've not only felt but in ways we can see.

Gray hairs bright and shiny amid my copper-brown locks and small smile lines surrounding eyes and body swelled and stretched in motherly ways.

But John -- he's only a little grayer in the hair and it blends seamlessly in with his short, blonde hair and the smile lines around his eyes are barely noticeable and he's seven pounds lighter and leaner.

It's when I take this good look at my own reflection and then his that I see it in his face.

There is love spread over it in ways I didn't before know or see or recognize.

And I'm thankful for the way we wear our age

reminders of the love we've sown and grown and harvested along the way.

Link your moment at Brook's

Everyday Life: Brake

He messages me in the middle of the day.

It's not unusual, but it's more than the characteristic "I love you" or "good morning."

I read heaviness, words hanging like soggy sheets on the line.

I feel like we've gotten beat up in some ways. Maybe it's just that we are walking in fog and need a lamp to guide each step.

It resonates.

These past few weeks have been damp with fine mist, thick and heavy, hanging in the short, hurried conversations, in the rush of meals around the dining room table, in the quick sinking of bodies into the bed at night -- a fog we've been trying to feel our way through.

A fog so thick it's forcing us to slow from the rapid speed we've been driving because highbeam headlights are useless.

And blinding.

That afternoon before he leaves work I call him; we are supposed to go separate ways tonight -- me to an appointment, him to a meeting, the boys with a babysitter.

Instead, though, I ask, could we just brake?

Could we flip off the bright beams and pull over to the side of the road?

Come together and look at each other instead of straining our eyes to see out the windshield a few more miles beyond where we are?

He drops the road map, and we halt to a stop.

We fling open the doors for some air,

whisper prayers for clarity into the darkness, breathe in

Your Word is a lamp for my feet and light to my path. Psalm 119:105

We sit in the soft glow.

together.

in the heavy fog.

in the stillness.

and realize we can see the ground on which we're standing.

And for now

it's more than enough Light to see the next step.

{This piece was written live at our Creative Soul Writing Circle. More on this tomorrow! In the meantime, join a virtual Writing Circle.}

Marriage: On a Monday, On Oneness

On a Monday, our feet don't stop moving in opposite directions until we're about to bid the day farewell and welcome in the night.

He was up and out the door before my eyes even opened this morning and our paths spread out over miles and miles of unshared terrain.

It's quite unlike the day we shared seven years ago, gripping each other's hands, eyes locked, voicing vows of love and respect, honesty and loyalty and, most importantly, oneness for all of our days together on Earth; even the clean, crisp air of today is a drastic difference from that day's thick humidity.

Today whirlwinds by, and to the untrained eye we seem anything but one as we quickly exchange a hello via phone bidding each other a happy anniversary, one brief email with a written sentiment and then a small face-to-face and kiss before work beckons me to return just as he arrives home, his capable hands taking the reigns of the household.

I tease him and smile, "What? No time for flowers today?" before walking out the door for work.

In a miracle of sorts, I arrive home in time for a late dinner that he's struggled to prepare amid boy-wrangling and unexpected-necessary errands and poop-splosion clean up.

We all find a space at the table and fall into a stillness of body as we recount our days.

Our oldest talks about school and then his little brother explains the basic tenants of good applesauce {"it yummy and it mushy"} as we listen and smile.

After the littles are talked out, he gives voice to his day's adventures and I can't help but laugh at the raucous of his grill catching fire at the same time our oldest reported that our youngest was mooning the neighbors with a poop-covered butt in the backyard.

As he recounts the craziness, he ends with the scene I unknowingly walked in on just a little bit ago.

"Then we sat down at the table and I exhaled and we thanked God for our food and our day ... and for mommy. And we asked Him that mommy would please come home, um, soon."

And with that prayer shared, he unknowingly unwraps for me the best anniversary present ever.

Because those heart cries are ones I pray everyday, too -- that we would just come back together at the end of days long and alive and filled to the brim with goodness and hardness and everything in between after being stretched so out of shape

and enter back into that oneness we knew in the most physical sense the day we promised it

but now know with our hearts seven years beyond.



Happy anniversary, John. I tried not to sing out of key for you. :-)

Join us at Alita's!

Five-Minute Friday: Path

I don't know where we're heading {beyond general direction}

and I'm ready to let go of guessing,

of trying to be there before

we've even walked the mile stretched out before our feet.

But. What I do know --

I want to walk it, my fingers thread through yours.

I want to run without getting caught up in the bumps we've just hurdled.

And trust that we'll be able to swiftly move over

fields of flat plains

and foothills

and mountains

alike.

That our lungs will stretch

and our legs will move

and our hearts will keep beating

in time with each other

no matter what's underfoot.

Five-Minute Friday: Together

There are twinges of headache hiding behind my eyes.

I don't know what's to blame

be it the gray bleakness of atypical April skies

or lost car keys

or mounding to-do lists

or if it's the byproduct of having scrubbed down a poop-spreading toddler and his poop-painted walls for the fifth time in so many days.

All I know is that by 3:09 p.m. Friday I'm asking God if He could just help me hold it all together for just awhile longer ...

I crave 4:30.

I daydream, eyes closed in effort to lessen the strain spread out across my forehead, about my white-car driving knight pulling into the driveway, tapping on a locked glass door to be let inside, joining me in the wildness of long days with little boys

so we can tie this day together

with palms pressed together, fingers laced.

Bigger Picture Moments: For the Worse

It's been hard for him.

These past nine or so months have grown him, too.

I haven't been the only one who feels as though I were stretching outside of my very own skin's capacity.

Though it seems like I've been the one whose been forced-chosen to ungrasp my clenched knuckles from so much, we've both let go of a lot.

Time together as a family, as a couple.

Opportunities and weekends away.

Small pockets of late-night connection as I've slept and he's battled a strong-willed toddler.

Two tiny babies from inside my womb.

And sometimes I feel like he's sort of lost the woman he married while in the thick of all her spontaneity and fun-laced ways, found himself left with someone who has a list of nos that run the trunks of century-old trees ... someone who can't even go out to dinner on a whim anymore because she must first scout out the contents of the menu.

But in the loss, in the for worse of what seems worlds away from the better, roots have been established.

We stood tall through the beautiful times of our engagment and job changes and births of babies, and now, too, we've sunk our roots into firm Soil and weathered storms of illness and loss and grief and anxiety and time spent growing together while being apart.

There's nothing flashy and romantic about the protruding of roots creeping into Solid Ground while the skies rage.

There have been days where we've come together only to utter prayers before tired eyes close, succumbing to sleep. Moments of deep-seated frustration in the boiling over of pots and helplessness in the melting of a crying, shaking body falling into open arms. Exhaustion in digging deep to find more of yourself to give to rambunctious little boys when her arms can't even hold the shovel.

But after the pounding of the rain softens and the thundering of fronts breaking the apart air fade to rumbles in the distance and the whipping of the wind gives way to soft breeze there is a beautiful calm that emerges in seeing that the tree is still standing strong-armed with thick branches and budding green with new life.

There is a growing peace found in the roots of abiding, together.

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 Alita'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.

Everyday Life: Beauty

It's maybe the most beautiful view I've breathed in all day

but

also the most heart-wrenching -- 

his small hands holding close to his sun-kissed cheeks a picture I'd taken of his daddy just a few days ago, aglow across the screen of my iPhone in the dark bedroom.



I offer earnest prayers, filling the room with whispered requests for safety as my best friend, the apple of my boys' eyes ventures off on the first leg of his work trip to Europe. Also, for deep peace to lead to deep sleep for a whimpering four year old who is having a hard time with his daddy taking such a long journey without us.

It's there, in the comfortable, dark room, snuggled beneath thin sheets so as to keep the slight night-time Florida chill from sweeping over skin, that gratitude is whispered heartily, too,

for all the things that come bubbling to the top, boiling over, for all the emotions that can't be contained when making a go at stretches of days apart.

The love that comes pouring out in hot tears choked and sputtered during bedtime because a little boy is missing daddy snuggles reminds me of a strong father-son bond that is cultivated by so much time spent together.



The confused questioning of a toddler exclaiming "dada?" as he runs toward the door to search for his dad to read him his favorite bed time book blinds me with an understanding of the foundation my husband is helping to lay for our boys.



And later, when my own tears spill from my eyes because the ache in my heart to share life uninterrupted with him I realize that six and a half years of marriage hasn't stretched and weakened the heart strings that bind us together in oneness.



The time has only given our hands the opportunity to weave more threads together.

And this beauty is somehow brought into such clarity through the blurry saltwater tears of hearts longing to be held close, nearby to the ones with which they beat in rhythm.

{I know I don't usually publish on the weekends, but I'm feeling kind of like I want to live life outloud and in the moment here in the now. So, hello, from one bleeding heart to another, this fine Saturday night. What's going on in your world this weekend? }

Marriage: On Roses

I'm guilty of putting love into a box -- a box that says a man really only loves his wife if he shows her his love in very specific, planned, romantic ways.

He's got to take her out on dates if he loves her. He's got to write her love letters like he did while they were dating. He's got to send her roses. And light candles during Saturday-night dinners. And buy her sparkly, shiny rocks to adorn her fingers and wrists as symbols of his love. Oh, how, I've mistakenly grown up putting love into this box, this perfect and rigid box. And, oh, how I've been heartbroken when my husband hasn't loved me inside the box, wondering if he even loves me at all.

It's been a process, but I'm learning to love and embrace love outside of the box. I'm learning daily about loving and living beyond that little space in which I've so frequently tried to trap affection and heartfelt emotion.

I'm learning what love played out -- outside of that box -- looks like. And it's beautiful, breathtaking.

It's forfeiting your Saturday mornings to get up with the kiddos while your wife sleeps until 10 a.m.

It's single-handedly bathing and putting two little ones to sleep while she escapes for a bit after a long day bound to the house with a cranky toddler and teething baby even though you've been working all day, too.

It's rubbing her back every night while she's pregnant for hours, attempting to make her just a little more comfortable.
It's wearing a silly cowboy hat to appease your two year old enough to let his mommy take a picture of him while he's smiling.

It's walking out the door every morning to go to a job that isn't as exciting as maybe you'd hoped because it provides for her and your little ones.

It's entertaining both kids and a dog during the Superbowl so she can sit alone and just breathe out the craziness of the day.

It's holding her when she cries or doubts or fears or stumbles or falls and assuring her that you've got her back this time and every time.

And it's being here. Being present. Being attentive. Being brave enough to love her outside of the box even when she doesn't understand what that looks like or how much it means.

And the roses? Well, the roses, really, are just the punctuation at the end of an action-packed sentence that you've been living for the past four and a half years of marriage.

Thank you for teaching me how to love outside the box, John. My heart will always be yours.
{This is a repost from two years ago. And I still feel the same.}

Bigger Picture Moments: Remember

In the midst of living, I forget.

I chase a toddler running wild and free, newly escaped from the house, down the sidewalk and because I've been tired, chasing him is the last thing I think I want to do.

I lose sight of the exploring 2-year-old mind that's developing as fast as his running legs until I capture his giggling body in my arms and kiss his smooth skin.

As my brain spins with its own questions and pondering in silent prayer and reverie, my ears filter a million and one questions, it seems, from a curious preschooler :

"Why can't I drink juice for breakfast?" {Water, child!}

"Mom, why does zero make a ten and mean nothing?" {Well ... ?}

"Why does Ms. Denise think my shrinker tool is a gun?" {Umm?}

"Mom, can you snuggle me?" {YES!}

I forget the wonder of four years old until he presses his forehead to my eyes, his freckles almost kissing my cheeks and exclaims, "You always answer yes when I ask for snuggles!"

I wander through the seeming desert of cleansing and pray for the rebuilding periods to come and give my body, my mind rest so I can pour into the man I love at night instead of cascading into sleep all while asking Him if He's listening ...

I forget the faithfulness of His hand.

I meet with a man wiser than myself every Wednesday to walk together through the grief, the anxiety, the loneliness of healing and he often holds the light for me.

And finally, after a day of questions I cannot answer -- from my own mind and from my own preschooler and even my own husband -- he asks one I can:

When was a time God showed Himself faithful?

My mind flutters and immediately I'm whisked back to time spent in the catacombs on Alexandra, holding the hand of my future husband.

I tell the story of how Love carried me to Egypt to weave together love that binds two into one.

And there it is.

Sitting mostly unnoticed on my left ring finger ... still sparkling, still shining even almost seven years later; it melts the worry and fear, reminds me of the gifts, the faithfulness that He's since sprung forth



the laughing body of a two year old

the four year old freckles kissing my cheeks

the strong arms of a loving husband wrapped around my body every night

My rock of remembrance for His love, His faithfulness.

 

Each Thursday, we come together to share the harvest of intentional living by capturing a glimmer of the bigger picture through a simple moment.  And to spice it up a little, during the month of FEBRUARY, we'll be reflecting upon the simple yet lovely gifts that are sprinkled throughout our lives. 


Share a picture, words, creation or list; just come to the table with LOVE in your heart. 

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

Capture.
Harvest them!

Share.
Link up your gleaned moment this week at Alita'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 Moment/Five-Minute Friday: Vivid

He remembers the me

-- the girl with the lip ring and fire-red streaky hair --

who ventured into roped-off catacombs while exploring the Egyptian landscape.

The me

-- 22 and the perfect cacophony of youth mixed with blind faith --

who unabashedly spoke up in foreign tongue to requests not quite understood.

The me

-- who came with forewarnings of adventure and messy --

who lived boldly, uninhibited

loved fiercely, heart outside chest

dreamed wildly, possibility endless.

He pauses.

The me he still sees burst forth though it comes through differently clothed in the skin of motherhood and marriage.

The me I was created to be

-- refurnished and brushed by the refining fires of living--

still vividly dancing amid the everydayness of life.

 

Each Thursday {Friday for me this week!}, we come together to share the harvest of intentional living by capturing a glimmer of the bigger picture through a simple moment.  


Share a picture, words, creation or list; just come to the table with thanksgiving in your heart. 

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.

Scenes from Life: How I Met Your ...

Thick ropes drape from one side of the descending, rocky staircase to the other, making a skimpy barrier across the private part of the history that's been unearthed.

And she, in a boldness that stretches beyond the sliver ring encasing her lip and fiery red streaks running through dark hair – she bounds toward the unbeaten path with spirit soaring, freedom brimming, adventure beckoning.

The girl with the lip ring, he thinks, had originally come across as kind of scatterbrained and flaky; after all, she'd  ...

I'm guest posting over at Emily's today, writing one of my very own vivid Scenes from Life. Yes, this story is totally my very own God-ordained love story. Head over to share a moment of my life I'll always remember as one of God being the author of our stories -- even and especially the love ones.

Marriage: There is Harvest

I know it wasn't always easy for my grandparents -- walking down the church aisle to exchange life-long vows before most teenagers walk down the aisle to gather a high-school diploma.

I know there was struggle.

Struggle to make ends meet.

Struggle to keep loving when loving was tough.

Struggle to grow children, a business, a livelihood, a love, a life together.

But born out of struggle was determination, was grace. And out of determination, grace was born commitment and success, new life and and New Life, new love and New Love.

And when it's all tallied up -- the years of hardship and those of abundance, the years of loss and those of gain, the years of  less and the years of more --

when the 50 years of marriage and vows have been sown, tilled, watered, sunned, vines tied and soil tended

there is a harvest.



There is a legacy.




















There is celebration.



And there is gratitude from one generation to the oldest generation for showing us the fruits of such labor and helping us set our sights on the harvest.

Happy 50th anniversary, Papa and Grandma!

Marriage: Six Years of Tennis Shorts on Saturday Night

As hours-old newlyweds, the first thing John and I did upon arriving at our posh Chicago hotel for our honeymoon was ditch the fancy clothes -- the shoes and the hose and the jewelry -- and dive head first into worn cotton t-shirts and soft mesh tennis shorts.

The second thing?

We ordered a pizza -- we were starved from not actually having eaten much dinner during our reception.

As we spread our feet out before us while perched atop the fluffy white down-covered hotel bed, devouring deep-dish pizza, our eyes locked, we grinned like idiots and he said what we were both thinking:

"We get to do this for the rest of our lives."

I laughed.

"What?" I'd said. "Throw a helluva party and then retreat back to our creature comforts and crash together?"

"Yeah," he'd smiled. "Exactly that."

****

We arrive home from a small dinner date in celebration of our sixth wedding anniversary.

We know how to dress for the occasion of dinner at an old-world-style Italian restaurant -- him in a blue-checkered collared shirt and dark-washed fitted jeans; me in apple-red high heels, black tight-as-a-glove fitted ankle-length pants and a white sweater.


 We nosh on delicious food, enjoy the patio-view and the September-blooming flowers and laugh when a little boy, about age four, races to the edge of the pond, comes to a dead halt and proceeds to pee into the pond, his parents chasing wildly behind him, only to find him at water's edge mid-pee.

We pitstop at Whole Foods and while picking up a few essentials come across coconut milk ice cream; we buy some with full intent on it being our date-night dessert upon arriving home.

No sooner than I arrive at our house after driving the babysitter home while John had wrangled the boys into Buzz Lightyear pajamas, do we both race into the bedroom to ditch our lovely threads and slide into soft cotton t-shirts and tennis shorts.

We settle the boys in between their flannel sheets, pull a fluffy down comforter over their feet and snuggle little bodies to sleep before slipping out the creaky door.

Quietly, we sneak down the stairs, sink into the couch, one spoon for two mouths in one coconut ice cream container and begin talking about the boys, our life, our day, our wedding.


 And here we are -- six years later to do the day and date -- at the after-party, wrapped up in soft clothing, our shoulders pressed together as we sit-side-by-side on the couch giggling and sharing dessert.

And while the meal du jour has changed from pizza to delicious coconut ice cream and the clothing threads of old tennishorts, perfectly worn and soft against our skin, are different and our cush landing has changed from a fluffy bed to a couch, my best creature comfort, John, remains the same.

The best creature comfort I have is you.

Happy anniversary, John. I love you. 

Marriage: On holding the bouquet

In my mind being a member of a bridal party means more than just holding a bouquet full of vibrant and sweet-smelling flowers while wearing a pretty dress; it also means helping create memories for the bride and groom as well as witnessing the vows made and helping the couple hold fast to those promises during their every-day life together.

But I must admit -- when my sister asked me to be her matron of honor in her wedding, I was totally psyched about two totally wedding-related things: planning and executing the bachlorette party and writing the toast/after-dinner speech.

These words for my little sister and new brother in law literally fell from my fingers and onto the page as one of my most effortless writings ever, so I'm documenting them here as a virtual memory from their beautiful day {with a sneak peak of some pictures}.

****

Mike, I have to let you in on a little something.

This isn’t the first time I’ve helped my little sister get all dolled up for her wedding.



We’ve done this before.

When Jill was about four years old, she married the little red-headed neighbor boy we all adored at least four times during the course of one lazy, small-town summer.

Lucky me, today, makes the for the fifth time I’ve helped my baby sister slip into a beautiful white, flowy dress, had the pleasure of brushing the ringlets of curl surrounding her sun-kissed face away from her blue eyes.

We’ve come a long way from your backyard weddings, haven’t we Jill?



We’ve walked together through quite a few different seasons of life in so many different strides – as baby sister with an older doting sister, as older bossy babysitting sister and younger always and forever talking and talking and talking younger sister, as teenagers years apart in phases of life and finally, as adults – roommates who then grew into sister friends – my favorite by far.

While life has taken you far from your farm-town roots and you’ve grown and stretched into a lovely woman, you’re still so much the same as when we were growing up.

You’re strikingly beautiful from the inside out.

You’re personable and friendly – and you still talk and talk and talk …. And talk.

Song saturates your life like music weaves into the lines of a musical.

You’re loyalty and dedication to family has remained steadfast, acting as anchors of love to those you hold most dear.

And your silliness permeates even the longest of days, often bringing lightness to heavy situations.

I know you well, sister. And I know you’ll take bring these qualities into your marriage, lacing the ribbons of your personality into the threads of your unity with Mike.



You’ll softly beckon his attention with your beauty – the kind that makes itself known through the curves of your body and the sparkling of your blue eyes as well as the type that flows from the innermost parts of your heart.

You’ll fill the silence of your home with conversation, and most likely, you’ll remember to lend a listening ear at least sometimes.

You’ll sing into your memories songs that will and take you both back to all the firsts and middles and ends and each moment in between, giving melody and harmony and lyric to the movie of your entwined life.

You’ll bind your loyalties to the family you’re making while blending together different lives and people you both hold dear.

And you’ll induce smiles– the sprawling kind during the toughest of days, when Mike is weary and needs to breathe out the heaviness of a hard day with laughter.

I know this in the depths of my core after living with you in the same house as kids and as adults. I’ll always hold close the time we spent as adults living under the same roof – happily soaking in the nostalgia of our living room dance parties to Ice Ice Baby with the boys and our early morning coffee dates in my living room.

So here we are, standing at the edge of your new life on your wedding day, celebrating your union with the man of your dreams we’ve all come to adore.

In my mind, it’s so far and yet so close to the backyard weddings of our childhood.



But this one is different by far: this time you really become one flesh, one heart with the man whose heart you’ve captured.

It’s our last wedding day hurrah for you, sister.

But please know that as you wind your heart strings together and become one, I – and each of the people who’ve loved you along the way – will support your new unity and lovingly lend you both plenty of ribbons of support to tie into your new life together as husband and wife.

Congratulations, Mike and Jill. I love you.

Thinking, that's all: Uncharacteristic

Lately, I've been doing things I normally don't ever do like painting my toenails bright pink instead of my normal wine or deep red colors

and pushing away a to-do list more than a mile high to instead soak up the last of the summer sun and waves and sand here at the lake cottage in Michigan even though I only planned on staying through late Monday at the latest {and packed accordingly}



I even drove John to the South Shore Line train station tonight, bidding him farewell for a few days so he could return to work while the boys and I linger in the swells of summer here with his mom, my fabulous mother in law.

I laughed a little today after realizing all of these oddities, remarking to John about how uncharacteristic of me it is be so uncharacteristic.

Like he normally does, he shrugged his shoulders and he reminded me of how totally characteristic it is of me to be uncharacteristic for for a few weeks at a time.

He always likes to bring up when we first started dating while in Alexandria, Egypt.

And I remembered deeply how I felt like life became just a little too boxed in and organized and grouped together for me as our class toured the catacombs with a guide ... how I just had to wander off and find the roped off catacombs, explore them with a security guard toting a machine gun who only spoke Arabic and not a trace of English.

Every time I go on one of these benders, these weeks where spontaneity overrides my list of commitments and vibrant colors peak out from behind the normal hues and I find myself residing within the very moments that I've been craving instead of just skirting around their edges, I'm reminded that I'm not bound to some characterization checklist, that I'm not at all a flat character in this novel, remaining the same and constant and totally one dimensional.

Sometimes, in the midst of kids and responsibilities and roles and jobs and all of the things that make up a really full and really wonderful life, it's hard for me to remember that I really am more than who I am in the normal everydayness of life -- that I am a round, full-bodied soul with depth.

That even though I mostly live by schedules and deep color tones and hours and crave a six-month-in-advance action plan, I also sometimes live by timelessness, too, craving a space in which I can sink my bright pink toenails in stretches of sand that collide with cool water, just dwelling in the brightness of a here-and-now summer sun and here-and-now small boys ... that my uncharacteristic hiatuses are as much characteristic as the so-called characteristic ones.

Adventures: Up and Running

So in college, probably just after John and I were engaged, I was inducted into this wildly hilarious, mostly innovative, completely out-of-the-box and totally off-the-wall type of problem-solving club I mostly refer to as the Mugford Way.

My initiation revolved around transferring a hot tub from John's best friend, Jamey Mugford's parent's old house {catch that?} to their new home.

Sounds standard, right?

Well, um, not so much.

Because they didn't just want to move the hot tub to the new house; they wanted to move the hot tub onto a platform deck they built so that they could access said tub from the second floor of their home.

So with no crane or heavy machinery, essentially the Mugford family along with John, me and Jamey's then-future wife, invented some sort of system to get the hot tub on the platform.

And it worked.

I don't know how it worked because mostly I closed my eyes during the whole process, but it did.

A few months later, I experienced another moving project where my husband and the Mugford men thought it would be way smarter and easier to move Jamey's couch from his third-floor apartment by rigging up a pulley system and lowering it out of the sliding glass door.

From the balcony.

It also worked. {Although, someone forgot to account for the swinging effect of a dangling couch, and the couch almost ended up smashing through the patio door of the second-floor neighbor's. But as I've learned almost DOES NOT count against success. Therefore, it was successful.}

This whole Mugford Way of innovation and problem-solving methods when it comes to home renovation or the moving of all things within a house -- be it hot tubs, couches or even pesky walls is like something you would see on a Discovery Channel show.

You kind of want to close your eyes while it's all happening, but it's so darn entertaining and mostly there is major success involved.

Needless to say, my extremely intelligent husband has lovingly adopted this thought process; so much so he now he often devises crazy plans to get the job done.

Like he did last night at our business.

You see, we were ushered into Monday morning with surround-sound booms of thunder, bold streaks of lightening and wild winds whipping through branches and leaves, all which shredded power lines and uprooted and rehomed century-old trees through out Grayslake.

The storm sent us running to take cover in our basement; when we emerged we didn't know how grateful we would soon become for having electricity and a roof and siding on our house.

Melissa, who still doesn't have power, said her neighborhood, which is closer to our club, was littered with trees and void of power, so when the boys and I ventured over to our Curves, just about three miles away from our home, we saw the reality the of the storm for many with our own eyes: no electricity, gaping holes in homes and broken windows.

Our club, while thankfully structurally undamaged, was left without power, which basically forced us to close Monday and, I thought, probably until the power was restored.

But that hubby of mine, he put on his thinking hat and tapped into the Mugford Way of problem solving {did I mention that both my hubby and the Mugfords have mad-business smarts and engineering brains?} to creatively get us back up and running for a few hours Tuesday night so we could at least offer a few hours of workouts and our hour-long Zumba class.

And this is what he did:


After all was said and done and I looked around our only sun-lit club with the fans whirling, carrying cool outside air into our Curves while the music was pumping -- all powered by John's station wagon, all I could say, a smile beaming on my face was
"Wow, honey, I kind of feel like a Mugford right now."


As a few of our ladies happily entered the club to workout, John and I stood there grinning like idiots for a minute looking at John's master plan in action, and, I think, for the first time ever, I felt the way John has felt from the beginning of his friendship with Jamey -- like I've been fully indoctrinated into the Mugford Way and may be at the point of no return.

{Awesomely, half way through our hour-long Zumba class, the power miraculously switched back on and we are up and running, but Melissa still doesn't have any. Will you send her some love via blog or Twitter {@Pbinmyhair} today? She can see a few things via phone Internet, and it might make her day.}

Five-Minute Friday: Grateful

We await his arrival, lingering around the front screen door like groupies camp out near the back exit long after the concert ends vying to brush shoulders with the band.

In anticipation, the boys run laps back and forth in the hallway as the summer sun spills through open windows, casting 4 o'clock shadows the floor.

My almost four year old peers out the door, watching for the white station wagon to slowly enter into our cul-du-sac, squints his eyes in attempts to discern if his car might be closely behind.

"Nope, E.," he says to his brother. "That's not it. It's black. Daddy's car is white."

He speeds through that same conversation, changing only the color, several times before asking me if it's close.

"Is it daddy time yet?"

Almost, I assure them, two boys bouncing through the living room, excitement brimming as each minute draws nearer.

And finally.

Finally.

There is white in the distance and then

finally

finally, it's parking in our driveway.

He exits the car, dressed in shirt and tie, sporting aviator shades and a wide smile.

Two small boys bound to the door, overcome with joy and flashmob the king of our castle.

He greets them with hugs, greets me with a kiss.

And my heart basks in gratitude that the father they adore, the man for whom they wait, for whom we all wait more than lives up to all the hype.

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.}