Blessed
15 Oct 2010 Leave a Comment
in God is love
Sometimes I am really ungrateful. I find myself scrubbing a dish at the sink, and feel frustrated over the fact that our dishwasher is so old that all food residue must be completely removed prior to inserting dishes (making it almost pointless to use at all, but that’s another story). And then I realize how dumb it is to feel that way, when I should feel grateful that we have the electricity to power such luxuries, and access to clean running water, and so many dishes that I recently culled through them and gave many away.
I get mad about the fact that I have to work outside the home, losing sight of the fact that many would be thankful to have a job like mine that pays enough that I am able to make a major contribution by just working 20 hours per week. I lose sight of the fact that this job that I complain about allowed us to pay our mortgage last winter when my husband’s workplace couldn’t even afford to pay their employees’ payroll for weeks on end. This job that I complain about allows us to pay all of our bills without going into debt.
I respond in a less-than-loving way when my children are whiny, forgetting how blessed I am to have two children who are so healthy that, between the two of them, they have required a whopping TWO total doctor visits for illness. Then I think of our friends who lost their much-loved child at 25 weeks, and how they would look at me if they could hear the horrible way I talk to my children sometimes. I am so lucky to have this little boy and girl here with me, whole and healthy.
I could go on and on. Sitting in my kitchen, with household appliances humming, while my hardworking husband fills the wood stove, my daughter plays with the dog, and my baby sleeps, I have it pretty darn good.
Two prayers
23 Mar 2010 Leave a Comment
in God is love
My Lord God
I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself,
and the fact that I think I am following
your will does not mean
that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that my desire to please you
does in fact please you.
And I hope that I have that desire
in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything
apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this
you will lead me by the right road
though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always
though I may seem to be lost
and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear,
for you are ever with me,
and you will never leave me
to face my perils alone.
- Thomas Merton (1915-1968)
Prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen
Life is good. Really, really good.
08 Feb 2010 2 Comments
in budget, family, God is love
I have done a lot of whining and moaning and complaining lately. Yes, we did lose our health insurance. Not the end of the world. I signed us up for a low-premium, huge-deductible crisis coverage type plan, for the next six months. By the end of the 6 months, we will have a clearer picture of what needs to happen from there. M. may have coverage through his job again, or maybe I will be working the 24 hours a week needed to get benefits at my job. Or maybe we will just put the kids on the low-premium state-subsidized plan- thanks to cigarette taxes! 
To get us through the next few lean weeks in which my husband will not be receiving a paycheck from his temporarily broke employer, I have been working at the hospital more than my usual one shift a week. Still less than 20 hours a week, but more time away from the kids than I am used to, for sure. I can tell a difference in my daughter’s behavior already, for the worse. My mom (who is an awesome one-woman preschool) watches the kids when I work an occasional day shift, and daddy gets to put them to bed all by himself when I work an evening or night shift. I hate doing rotating shifts- totally screws up my body clock and makes me grouchy. But oh well, sometimes working whatever hours I can scrounge up is just better than the alternative of having to put everything on the credit card and getting into a big mess again. Better in the long run, that is.
Things I am thankful for:
**My sweet, unique, wonderful kids.
**My husband, who cheerfully put in 13 hours at his job today working for a rather unpleasant client, and then came home and wrestled the kids on the floor (he is now asleep on the kitchen floor, next to a half-completed kid puzzle).
**My health and my family’s health.
**A big yard with a woods to walk in whenever we want.
**Loving parents and a sister who happens to be my best friend.
**An interesting job that allows me the flexibility to work as much or as little as I need to – I’d rather not work at all, but since I have to right now, at least it’s intellectually challenging and I’m getting paid a fair wage.
**My great uncle, who is 88 and just found out that he is full of cancer. He is an old Baptist minister with huge ears and a huge heart. He showed so much kindness to me the summer after my divorce during a rough family reunion, just by putting his arm around me and saying some kind words at the exact right time. He has had a positive effect on so many people during his long life.
**I am thankful for life’s little coincidences- I worked overnight a day or two after finding out our bad financial news, and what do you know, my manager needed to talk to me after shift report. She plopped down next to me and explained that she had finally heard back about an opportunity that I have been bugging her about for months. Not sure if it will lead anywhere right away, but it’s just interesting that she approached me about it the very day that I needed that light at the end of the tunnel.
**And last but not least, kundalini yoga! I found a 50 minute youtube video, and I am loving it… I never knew yoga could actually be fun.
01 Feb 2010 Leave a Comment
in budget, family, God is love, Motherhood, work
Verses that hit the mark for me today:
Don’t be selfish, don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too. – Phillipians 2:3-4
And this:
Do everything without complaining and arguing, so that no one can criticize you. Live clean, innocent lives as children of God, shining like bright lights in a world full of crooked and perverse people.- Phillipians 2:14-15
And especially this:
Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again- rejoice! Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon. Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray over everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. The you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand.His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus… fix your hearts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. – Phillipians 4:4-8
Yeah- especially the don’t worry part.
I picked up Irresistible Revolution last night, a book by a street prophet which I started reading a couple of years ago but never finished. He was talking about doing small things with great love, per Mother Teresa’s philosophy. About not being worried about whether we can do great, huge things with our lives, and instead just making as much of a difference as we can in the little place where we are planted. About not letting discouragement over not being able to do great things for a great many people keep us from doing small things that make a difference to a small group of people.
I know that I make a difference here in my home. Even on days when I am not at my best, I make life more sane and peaceful just through being here and through not trying to do it all, all at once, all the time.
I don’t have an obligation to use that college degree full-time, just because I have it. I need to listen to my husband and stop worrying and stressing over finances all the time. We will be okay.
Around our house
31 Jan 2010 Leave a Comment
in God is love
In January, we lie around in pajamas all day. Sometimes we venture outside.
We skate in our boots on the frozen pond (OK, more like frozen puddle).
We knock the snow off the bumpers of some of the trucks in Uncle’s truck graveyard.
Icicles.
Chicken house.
Cat.
We walk to the end of the drive to get the mail, and long for summer, when we can walk down the road to play in the creek again.
25 Oct 2009 Leave a Comment
in God is love
You don’t have a soul. You are a Soul. You have a body.
-C.S. Lewis
Can can (can)
24 Aug 2009 Leave a Comment
in gardening, God is love
I am drowning in produce from my garden. This year, thus far, I have canned:
14 quarts dill cucumber spears (turned out well)
12 quarts dill cucumber coins (these don’t count though since they turned out disgustingly mushy- no wonder all the recipes say spears. Now I know.)
24 quarts of tomatoes- and many, many more ripening on my porch and in my garden
7 pints of salsa
I have frozen bags and bags of shredded zucchini, knowing that I probably won’t use it all but didn’t want the guilt of just letting it go to waste without at least trying to use it. And this week alone, I have given away 3 or 4 big bags of ripe tomatoes, because I want to put off having to can more of them, since canning as a mom of two little ones always involves staying up into the wee hours of the morning. Canning while the kids are awake doesn’t work.
I also have a bucket of green beans in my kitchen, which I will probably just blanch and freeze. I picked them from my sis-in-law’s garden today; she is so tired of all the preserving that she told me to just take whatever I wanted out of her garden, because she is done with picking beans. She also has some lovely green peppers that I was told to help myself to however many I wanted. They are so pretty and shiny, not all dull and bruised looking like the ones you buy at the store; I just want to paint a picture of them. Maybe I will.
I realize that canning tomatoes probable doesn’t save me all that much money, when you add in the cost of electricity (or maybe it does- I never added it up), but home-grown tomatoes taste so much better than store-bought, and I love being able to eat them all winter long. Tomatoes are my absolute favorite food in the whole wide world. It’s been nice this year, having so many extra that I can just give them away and still have plenty for my own family’s needs. I like that feeling of generosity- I should give things away more often.
I have gardened almost every year for the past ten years, but this has been my first year having a big garden that I actually kept up with for most of the season. It was planted a couple weeks too late, due to having my son in early May, but considering the circumstances, I think I did really well with it this year. The cabbage, peas, and beans all crapped out due to being planted too late, but the cucumbers, zucchini, squash, pumpkins, and tomatoes all did crazy good. I got a whopping ten ears of corn, but that’s no surprise, since I never have much luck growing corn. Next year maybe I will try growing the type that my sis-in-law planted- Silver Queen. She has had tons and tons of really nice looking ears off her plants.
Time for bed- I am not canning anything tonight, so I need to catch up on my sleep!
Jacob Eli Arrives- May 4th 2009
14 May 2009 Leave a Comment
in family, God is love, Motherhood
Two hours old
Jacob Eli
May 4th 2009, 2:52 am
8# 9 oz, 22 inches
I asked A, the midwife, to check me and to do a membrane sweep on Thursday, which was the day before my “official” due date, but 3 days before my real due date, which I was positive was really Sunday. I was 2.5 cm and 50% effaced. I was worried about having another postpartum hemorrhage, with all the painful and scary things that had entailed, such as manual removal of the placenta. A had mentioned a membrane sweep to encourage the baby to come out smaller/earlier/shorter labor than my daughter (41.5-wker w/ 3-day labor), and help prevent a repeat hemorrhage. The sweep involved 30 seconds of pain and then was over. A showed me the blood on her glove and said blood was a sign that it likely would be successful, and that if it worked, it was usually within 24-48 hours.
I had bloody show and cramps on and off all weekend starting Friday afternoon, when I lost the mucus plug. Saturday morning, I said a prayer for labor to start soon, and also had a little talk with the baby about being born that weekend.
I had cramps all night Saturday night, which eventually spaced apart so that I was able to sleep. Sunday morning, I was still having cramps 5-10 minutes apart, lasting around 40 seconds. I spent most of Sunday following Jubilee, my 3-year-old daughter, around the yard while she played with my nephew.
Around 4-pm, I realized things were getting intense enough that I wouldn’t be able to hide from my in-laws that I was in labor for much longer. I was having quite a bit of bloody show by this time, enough that it was obviously not just the plug. I got my husband away from his family long enough to let him know that things seemed to be getting more serious.
We went inside and watched a funny movie. It hurt to laugh, but it felt healthy since I could feel the laughter stretching my cervix open. All through the labor, I felt really strong cramps across my lower belly and hips, nowhere else. When I sat on the toilet, they got stronger, but I was still able to think of them as “interesting sensations that required all of my attention” as Ina May put it. I washed and folded some laundry, not wanting to come home to a messy house if this was it.
The birth center won’t admit you until you’re at least 5 cm, and last time I was sent home twice before being admitted, so I wanted to be good and sure that I was really, truly in labor before making the 45-minute drive up there. I tried checking my cervix, but all I could tell was that it was partly open and that the inside of it felt weirdly grainy. By 8 pm, contractions were every 4-5 minutes and lasting over a minute. M asked when I was going to call, and I decided to first take a bath and lie down to see if those things lessened the contractions.
During my 20-minute bath, I had 5 or 6 strong contractions. The moment I got out, they became much more intense, and I couldn’t talk through them anymore. When I walked around, they started coming on back-to-back.
I remained in denial for a while longer that this was really labor, but finally gave A a call around 9:30 pm. She said it was unusual for a membrane sweep to take 3 days to jumpstart things. She didn’t seem too convinced that I was really in labor after I admitted to talking through a contraction while on the phone, but said she was going to nap and to call her when they were 2-3 minutes apart and stayed intense regardless of my activity level.
After we hung up, M hurried around packing the truck and getting J ready to go. I constantly had to pee, even though sitting on the toilet made me miserable, since it was impossible to get off the toilet without going through 2 or 3 intense contractions. Then walking back to the rocking chair would take forever, since walking brought them on back-to-back. Rocking in the chair really fast made things bearable, as did standing and bouncing on my toes.
Around 10:30 pm, M decided he wanted to get a quick shower before we left, and I tried lying on my side on the bed. By now my labor mantra was, “Oh my God, oh my God, oh sh**, oh sh**, oh my God, Oh my God,” and then, “Okay, okaaaaayyyy….,” as it faded away. I was glad M took a short shower, because J was really wound up and jumping all over the bed and me, and I was lying there slapping myself, swearing, and praying. J kept piping up, “We forgot to go to the midwife place!” M asked if I was sure I wanted to go through this again (I want a big family), and I responded with a less-than-ladylike retort.
For a while I was thinking, Screw this, I’m going to ask them to transfer me to the hospital for an epidural, one unmedicated birth was enough for me. Who cares if our insurance doesn’t cover squat. But I was also dimly aware that the contractions were still more than 3 minutes apart, so I thought I was being a wuss, and I refused to call the midwife back until 11:30 pm. My need to hand the phone over to M during every contraction convinced her, and she told us that she would be waiting for us at the birth center with a full water tub.
We pulled out of the driveway at 11:59 pm. M was very sweet about taking the corners very slowly so as not to torture me. He flipped the radio to a country station, which was the last thing I wanted to hear. I mustered the energy between contractions to ask him to put on Erykah Badu. Ah, that was better laboring-in-the-car music.
I had contractions every 2 minutes or less the whole way there. On the interstate, 20 minutes from the birth center, I had what I thought were three with no breaks in between. M asked should he drive faster, and I said no. I later realized that this was actually a triple-peaked contraction, and that I was going through transition on the car ride in. No wonder it was such a rough ride! M was looking pretty tense over there in the driver’s seat, while I cried, prayed, swore, and slapped myself.
The lights were on in the birth center when we pulled in at 12:45 am. A came out and walked me in, while M carried J inside. I had 3 contractions between the truck and the building. A kept telling me I was doing great. When we got inside, I went and peed and then plopped myself in the rocking chair. A went back to folding blankets, saying to let her know when I felt like being checked.
I rocked for maybe 20 minutes, with J trying to talk me into sitting in the other rocker so she could have mine. The two birth assistants, one an RN and one a CNM, arrived and introduced themselves. Then I felt something bulge at the peak of a contraction, so M reported to A that I wanted to be checked.
A checked me, then looked at me and said, “What would you say”… long suspenseful pause… “if I told you you’re 9 cm with just a tiny rim of cervix all the way around?”
“Oh thank God!” I was laughing with relief.
“You can get in the water tub whenever you want, and you can start pushing whenever you feel like it!”
I was probably in the tub in two minutes flat. The very first contraction in the tub, I surprised myself by bearing down at the peak. In J’s birth, I never got the spontaneous urge to push, even after being 9.5+ cm for over 6 hours, so this was a pleasant surprise to not have to force myself to push. The next few contractions, I kneeled in the tub and lightly pushed whenever I felt like it, and found that wow, they barely hurt if I was pushing! When I started growl-pushing, they quietly set up all the emergency equipment and took their places around the tub. Everyone was low-key, and we joked and chatted between contractions.
A suggested that I try pushing while lying back for a while, with a full-length mirror in front of me, so I could see what kind of pushes worked best. M and J poured warm water over my belly. J really got into it, and they started calling her Little Midwife. “Good job, Mommy, gimme five!” And “Push harder Mommy!” which she was fond of saying even between contractions. The ‘push harder’ thing is funny, since I never heard anyone but her say it. She was also saying, “Oh cool!” whenever she saw the progress I was making with each push.
I checked myself and felt the water bag hanging down. A told me that the baby’s head would be right behind it, and offered to poke a hole in it if I wanted her to, but I opted to leave the bag alone, not wanting to give up that cushion before I had to.
A suggested trying a new position, so I got up on hands and knees. This felt just right, and within a contraction or two I felt the water bag surge and burst. I reached up and felt a fuzzy wrinkled baby head. With the next one, I felt the head surge right on down, and I became a crazy woman. “Oh my God it stings!” I never felt the ring of fire with J, but holy crap I sure did this time. I started yelling “OW!” over and over, exactly as M had warned them I would do. I was supporting myself from the front, and within a minute or so of nonstop uncontrollable pushes, I felt the head go from an inch inside, to bulging out, to mostly out. I remembered A telling me to flip onto my back when the head came out, since the water was so shallow. I somehow got myself back to a sitting position, while screaming like a banshee at the top of my lungs, and okay, there was the head, totally out. Seven minutes from bag bursting to head out, they told me later.
I needed to push again for the shoulders. I pushed and pushed, and nothing happened. I was getting nervous, so gave my biggest push ever, and out came his shoulders and body, and then A was floating him up out of the water to me. 2:52 am, two minutes from head out to baby out.“Oh my God, we have a real baby!” He was grayish and covered in vernix. He didn’t breathe right away, but after a few seconds he squinched his eyes open and looked at me and let out a squawk or two, and then he started looking around. J and M, who had gone into the next room, returned to see the baby.
I held him until the cord stopped pulsing, then the cord was cut and everyone but A went into the next room to get the baby cleaned up and wrapped. Everything was so *normal*. The placenta delivered spontaneously, I had minimal bleeding, and I did not at all feel like I had just had a baby. I had no tears, just one small scrape, and I wasn’t even swollen. I got out of the tub, nursed Eli for over an hour, and then showered. Eli was perfect and healthy, weighing 8 # 9 oz after his first feeding, and 22 inches long. One of the nurses was delighted, as she had never seen a waterbirth before, and she commented that she had never before seen a nurse have such an uncomplicated birth.
We rested a while, then packed up and left at 7 am, four hours after the birth. Beautiful, sunny spring morning. Everyone else was hurrying to drive to work, and we were driving home with our new baby. I felt so good! What a great morning.
Our new little man
11 May 2009 Leave a Comment
in family, God is love, Motherhood
Jacob Eli
May 4th 2009 @ 2:52 am
8 # 9 oz, 22 inches
Went through transition on the car ride there, and had a fast and intense waterbirth with my most favorite midwife ever!
