Hello old friends! It's never too late to join me over at the new place - karenohuber.com. Here's what I've been working on over there:

LET'S TALK ABOUT THE NEW BLOG

I'm writing slower (hello, lazy writer). I'm filling up notebooks with a lot of rubbish and contemplating what direction the blog and my work away from the blog will go, and how. I don't want to fill up your browser with nonsense. My hope is to offer a fresh perspective on faith and cultural issues, promote the things I care about, and share stories from our life here. And plenty of pretty pictures of Ireland. And the kids. And sometimes the dog. And coffee.

BURNING THE LOVE LETTERS

I hastily buried letters under pillow and covers, trying to compose myself. How to tell them what it was like to discover at 19 the person you were meant to spend the whole of your life with? How to explain the humid hormone factory that is a Bible college campus? How to admit that - stupid as we were - we wouldn't change a thing? We'd walk this same road a thousand times over to be where we were that day: surrounded by the memories and the children and the life we were living. The story we were writing.

LET'S TALK ABOUT THE OLD BLOG

TRIW was never particularly focused, but I liked that. I felt freedom to "pour it out in a poem to the King... and occasionally yell." The river ran the gamut of mommy to faith to lifestyle to culture to transition to expat to re-pat to whatever-type blog. Many good conversations were had, great Jesus-y and internet-y connections were made, and it provided a tiny amount of pocket change (like $20/year, which just barely covers my yearly haircut). And then, the river ran dry.

IT'LL BE GRAND :: THE LONG AND THE SHORT OF MY IMMIGRATION DEBACLE

The immigration office is filled with those who have no other place to go. Non-profits are set up for the very purpose of counseling immigrants and refugees in navigating this new home because their old one is lost to them. They have come here for safety, for security, for their children, for a future. Many have come fighting for their lives. This is not us. So I make myself aware of the priceless gift we have of choosing where we want to live. And how, when 2016 comes and we may in fact have to leave, we have someplace to go. Families who will take us in. New countries we could pursue if we wanted to. Our life will go on.

You can add www.karenohuber.com to your feed reader, ex. Feedly or Bloglovin, or sign up here to receive posts via email.

Writing this blog was such a big part of my life - nearly all of Jack and Ella's life has been documented and every bit of Asher is on these pages. So the archives will stick around for awhile. But still, I hope you'll keep reading after the jump - and add your own words and ideas to the mix. :)

The Doctor of Naperville

I didn’t think they existed, these men of magic and menace. At least, not here. And he’s not what I expected. 

He arrives in a trench coat, gray and damp from December’s drizzle. His collar is turned up and he stands near the door – my door – a less than imposing figure, looking more like an imitation Sherlock than a voodoo witch doctor. 

Spying from the kitchen counter, I stir cream in my coffee, slowly. His narrow frame is not tall. Hair trimmed close, the color of ash. He removes his coat with precision, revealing an argyle sweater and black slacks hemmed an inch too long. He turns my way and I drop the spoon nervously into the sink, the ting of metal on metal an embarrassed echo in the empty house.

So, yes, I'm trying my hand at fiction. Click on over to read the rest and if you like it, would love a wee vote. Ever grateful for your kind words and encouragement. xx

Especially that girl, right there. That face screams encouragement.

Asher has something to say

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The End.

[written before the cold/flu hit... he even pushed enter and moved the mouse around and told me not to touch it. A writer already.]

If these banks are going to burst

So by now you've probably noticed a few changes around here. I've been a longtime admirer of Carrie Loves and somehow managed to win one of five blog templates she was giving away. Carrie let us choose our own template and then graciously worked with me on the colour scheme and any technical difficulties. You'll also find some new buttons and links to the side, showing you around the place a bit more. I hope you like the new look as much as I do... I find it calming, yet spirited and inspiring.

I also wanted to thank you for all the visits, comments and encouragement for my #31days series: at home in Ireland. It was such a treat to share more about our newish life here, show you around our home and hear some of your own stories. I had no idea I had such strong feelings on laundry, heated water and European fashion!

Now that October is over, this area of my life feels a bit spent. I'm tired of writing about moving, transitional struggles or being done with childbearing (I'm sure you're tired of reading about it, too!). And I'm looking forward to writing about other things, though they may not end up here. I'll still be around, posting a couple of times a week; I'm just not sure about what yet, and I have no idea the direction it will take. It'll still be a river into words, it'll still be a poem to the King, there will still be some occasional yelling. But I may be trying something new...

Do you like how non-commital and non-specific I'm being? Yeah, that's how my brain feels, too: an unruly tide of ideas, unable to focus on anything particular, falling quickly on one notion before flitting off in the opposite direction.

If these banks of my heart are going to burst, I want to spill beauty. I'm hoping November will give these things room to swim, and I'll be able to share the process here with you.

But now I must jet as I'm off to a final creative writing class celebration. We're a great gang of mums and grand-dads and storytellers and friends. Yes, I think we're all friends, now. And writers, too.

The imaginary life at home in Ireland

When it is midterm break, I write in the mornings. The children have creeped downstairs to watch a documentary on birds of the African air and the coffee is perfection. They feed, clothe and entertain themselves so I can sneak away to my pinterest-inspired nook and write a few words in the autumn sunrise. The burning bush out front is half-bare, undressing slowly each day, leaving its tiny red leaves like a tease from our front door.

Our house is a sanctuary, a tidy one. The only thing out of place is a creamy throw welcoming visitors as they sit on our sofa, which is not broken under the back left corner, nor is it pink velour covered with a fading blue-flowered brocade. It is deep and cushiony and I slipcovered it myself. The house smells of vanilla and cinnamon. The children eat fresh fruit under the pendant lamp. The bathrooms are clean and my bed no longer squeaks.

After a calm morning of writing (me) and reading (them), we walk in the tall shadows, collecting leaves and skipping ahead. No one cries over fear of bike-riding, no one fights over the Harry Potter DS game that has been bought and sold no less than three times between two siblings. No one has to go to the bathroom. No, no, we walk and walk under the always blue sky of Ireland. We find four leaf clovers without looking. And when we return home, we cuddle up under that same ivory throw and instagram our extreme Irish cuteness for far away friends to see. We all fit in the same frame at the same time and our smiles display the contendness we feel on our imaginary couch in our imaginary living room in the big house we own in a breathtakingly perfect country.

"Ow!"

That's me, waking up from the reverie. There has been some sort of lightsaber play up and down the stairs, and cheap plastic has hit delicate fingers and her squeal brings me back to life. This life. The one right here. Our burning bush is as it was above, but there is a bra on the floor by my unused sewing machine-turned-desk and a child standing next to me, "Mommy. Mommy. Mommy." I can't understand half the words he says and I worry for his speech development.

My coffee went cold 20 minutes ago and I'm too lazy to get some more (the coffee's cold downstairs, too, a hidden clue of the recent time change). The girl is in her room pouting. Laundry and rubbish await my arrival downstairs. The eldest appears to be missing.

We finished painting our bedroom and bathroom - an 8-month process - before the landlord comes to have a look at our power shower that's been out of service for five days. There is paint on the woodwork, on the floor and the baseboards, and I'm fearful he'll take out his white glove and chastise me. I told Matt last night, "I don't want to lose our deposit!" forgetting once again I want to "live here forever." How quickly we forget and fade back into our old ways of unpacking, living, packing and moving within a year's cycle. How temporary everything feels, as the leaves fall down and I'm so afraid to miss each one's descent, I cry at the thought of it. Autumn will be over so soon and even now darkness envelopes our house by the dinner-bell hour.

It's a mess and I'm still a mess, even though we are finally at home here. It is not perfect, and I'm frustrated more - by the kitchen counter, tapping my foot and making mental lists - than I'm content in the window seat, drinking from this same cup and reading in the sun. I've still not balanced the peace with the crazy. Don't think I ever will.

And yet, the four-year-old has made himself at home in our bed. Curled up in sheets that now match the duvet that now matches the walls, which now match the vision in our head. In the morning autumn light he laughs at me. And if nothing else in the house but the bed is a refuge for a wild child on this week off from school... if nothing else gets made and tidied but those sheets... if the house is a giant nest of chaos, reeds of toys and papers webbing in and through each nook and cranny, it still contains these five souls at its center. 

And we are not going anywhere.



Joining Heather at the Extraordinary Ordinary for Just Write. Join us.

The tables are filled with stories :: at home in Ireland

On Thursday mornings I attend a creative writing class at the library. The tables are filled with stories; not on paper, but in the hearts and pasts of each person seated at them. Some read their work and some take notes and some tell tales that make the rest of us hoot out loud (HOL).

Like everything else, I'm a writing class slacker, begging Matt to take the children to school so I can fulfill my obligation the morning of. I don't know why I put it off so long, for when I sit there with a half hour to go, looking out our window as golden leaves give up and lower themselves to the green, my hands can't type fast enough and I feel set free.

My words go unread, as of yet, but it doesn't really matter. I arrive and leave with a smile on my face. I hear their words and - at least today - cry at the sound of them. Crazy American girl, they must be thinking, in the kindest of all ways. And we depart together with stories on our lips.

In Autumn, I'm homesick for everywhere

While August takes its last breath, Autumn has come to Ireland. Those late night sunsets and early morning wake-up calls giving way to dark skies in time for bed. Matt crouches beside an outdoor fire, smelling of Colorado and camp singalongs. We fashion smores here with chocolate digestive biscuits, which is really the better way to do it, anyway. Who hasn't lost a Hershey square or two from lack of melting?

This was meant for Asher's birthday, but company and cool rain postponed the crowning event. He's not keen on cake, but could live off biscuits. And marshmallows on sticks. And cardboard, but that's beside the point. It's still summer holidays, and we - who never plan much more than a week in advance and dread the long days and endless Wii fights - we are eeking out a bit more of this season.

Fall is my very favourite thing, as we Americans calls it. My Irish friends think it's such a strange name, lacking the colour of Autumn, the rhythm of it. Whatever name you choose, wherever we are, my favourite memories are coloured in Autumn. They smell of Autumn. And when he strikes up the chiminea and I open our window, I smell chili cookoffs and football season and first day of class and falling in love. 

I bounce and stir on a hayride, waiting to see if he'll touch my hand.
I trace Chicago leaves as they turn and drape the city streets.
I ride my bike to the bookshop, feeling every ounce of fresh freedom.
I am pregnant and cuddled under a blanket on a balcony, counting kicks.
I see my mother and her umbrella at the meeting of the waters.

In Kansas, come this time, I am always desperate for it: this smell, the crackling, the turn of the weather. But here, it surprises me with its promptness. Autumn arrives on time in Ireland. Early, even. And before I know it, before I prepare myself with pumpkin spiced recipes and early season sweater sales, I am homesick. For everywhere. 

I can't help it, can't shake it, but I wouldn't even want to.

Soon, I'll be homesick for this memory, too.

Writing with Heather of the EO for Just Write.

What I'm Into (July 2013)

July was insane. Just insane. There was a road trip out west and camogie and serve week and computer camp and days without end where we stayed in pajamas for 24 hours straight (and then some). Summer always knocks me on my rear, and this one appears to be no exception. So before we hop on a plane, leave the kiddos behind with some family, do some more work and prepare for the next school year to start in 29 days (what? I'm not counting!), here's what I'm into:

BOOKS

Prodigal Summer, by Barbara Kingsolver :: This is the first giant novel I've tackled in a long time and I'm nearly done. Oh, I really like this one, like experiencing the rhythms of nature through the eyes of the Appalachian female and how we're more animal than we realize.

Coming up...

I've checked out The Astronaut Wives Club and Painted Ladies for our trip to Germany next week. And the husband is requesting I attempt to read Tangible Kingdom again. Actually, I've started reading it multiple times, attended the conferences, bought the t-shirt and I'm all-in, I'm just lousy at reading non-fiction, particularly church/work non-fiction. Stay tuned.

TV

We are almost done with Doctor Who! Just three more episodes and we'll be all caught up for the 50th anniversary. Have to tell you, though, not really loving it right now. It's like a first love that you're head over heels for and then you realise he's not funny all the time, and he yells at his sister, and maybe you got too serious too fast... I may be taking this all too seriously.

Other things on the telly/netflix... Portlandia (Season 3), The Americans (it's like Alias, but with Cosby sweaters, 80s music, and a super-mean Felicity), and New Girl (finally watched season finale, and... meh).

MOVIES

Silver Linings Playbook :: Finally got a chance to sit Matt down and force-feed this to him. Like a good man, he loved it just as much as I told him he should.

Saving Private Ryan :: I forgot how every single male actor in Hollywood was in this movie. I also forgot how melodramatic the soundtrack was. And how much I love Tom Hanks.

American Gangster :: Love this movie. Denzel is scary and Russell is the ultimate flawed hero.

MUSIC

On repeat... The Swell Season, Mumford & Sons, Waterdeep Worship.

VIDEO

This video (and article) of The Civil Wars made me feel all sad. Beautiful, haunting, sad.



THINGS I LOVE

Roadtrips
Sunsets over the ocean
Rare thunderstorms
Family coming to visit
Making new friends
Reading in an actual book made of paper
Collecting my happy kids after a day of camp
The "unrelenting sun"
Rain returning
Walks in the evening with our crew
Haircuts
Kiddos stargazing and a crackling fire

ON THE BLOG
We are all so beautiful (most-read)
Roundabout Russian Roulette (my fave)

So how about you? What were you into this month?

Note: links include amazon affiliates. if you click over and purchase, i may get a nickel or two. eventually. :)

Brought to you by the link-up at Hopeful Leigh

No fear for cold

For someone who says she hates summer, I am certainly head over heels for it today.

For today, all day, it is hot enough to languish in the sun. To wear shorts and hang load after load of laundry. To lay out a blanket and call it a picnic.

Asher comes in, in the early morning, declaring he's a "naked baby" (again; this is fairly common), and we don't mind. Because it's hot. He's three weeks toilet trained, now, so he and his underwear are good friends. The little nautical striped briefs go everywhere. He uses them as a holster. As a tool belt. As a power ranger thingy-whatever-that-is. Legos stick out from the sides and a plastic blue toy he uses as a phone. He is a naked baby, all day, no fear for cold.

Last summer, when the heat was so bad, bearing down on us like hell in humidity, there was no escape. No yard/garden to run willy-nilly in. Nowhere to run but up to the north woods. We were encased, pent up like animals in heat, so exhausted from sun we dare not open a curtain.

But this year, we fling the windows wide, airing out a long winter. We spend all day outside (OK, some of the day outside; there was still Wii-playing and video-watching). We get out the hose and let the kids have a run through it; her clothes dripping wet, she drops them on the spot and up on the line they go. We picnic in the back garden, hot dogs spilling into grass. 

I know too soon this will be over, and last week will return next week, when mist came in through the windows and I sat in this very chair contemplating my collection of scarfs instead of sweating under the sun. Today I guzzle cold water for I know next week I'll be nursing hot tea. Probably. Maybe.

Or it could stay like this forever.

This week, the country feels magical. Everyone is giggly; I can hear it on the road and from the houses. Grown adults eat popsicles in the street. The radio announcers thank their American guests, sure this weather can only come from the New World. We chat over the fence to our neighbours, the woman at the till remarks at the luck.

So sunny, so warm, so much summer for such an island as Ireland.

***

Linking up with Heather of the EO and Just Write.

Blogkeeping (or Housekeeping for the Blog)

Hey friends! Quick Saturday post to share a few things with you.

1) The sun has been out for like 3 days straight, in keeping with the time change here in Ireland known as Irish Summer Time. I just hung out laundry for the second time this week! True story.

2) I'm still slowly stumbling through the blog design e-course and while I am loving the process, I'm so impatient to implement changes to the blog in style and format. Thank you for being patient with me as I write randomly, change up the layout frequently, and post sporadically.

3) The most beautiful thing I read all week: You are as Valuable as the Orphan by Amber C Haines. Read. It.

4) I can't remember number 4. If you're so inclined, you can meet me over on Facebook. I've got a wee page with some loyal friends (and if you have already "liked" it but aren't seeing my posts, make sure you click "Show in News Feed" under the like button).

5) I'm contemplating writing a post and/or series on parenting a child with low confidence, anxiety or fear issues. Me and a number of my friends have one (mostly boys, surprisingly) and I'd love to hear your story if you find yourself coping (or not coping) with this. You can comment here or email me at karenohuber (a) gmail (dot) com

6) This weekend marks 3 months back in Ireland. While I miss my friends, my sisters, this awesome musical festival happening in Kansas City this weekend, and our church families, I'm so thankful to be here. Thank you for coming with me.

***

What's on your mind this weekend? Big plans?

Low budget writing nook

Since moving, my writing has been a bit... er... irregular. My trusty macbook fizzled nearly as soon as we landed on Irish soil (bad battery, bad charger, dying motherboard, etc.) and our desktop is stationed in our office/library/playroom, so it's been taken over by a 3 year old with an addiction to Netflix.

I had this vision for a place to write in the bay window of our bedroom, away from the bustle of the kitchen and the laundry, looking out on that one tiny mountain in the distance. But, you know, feeding the kids and getting car insurance and other such adult responsibilities take priority, so I sighed a lot. Pinned a lot of things. Made a very hefty to do list for Matt ("you know, whenever you can, no rush...(sigh)"). But tonight, a flurry of activity behind closed doors. And three children pulling me upstairs, "Close your eyes!" And voila, a writing nook.

1. Leftover piece of plywood
2. Old macbook resuscitated by a new cord charger.
3. Cuppa tea in my favourite Pride & Prejudice Penguin Books mug.
4. Cadbury Dairy Milk (mint crisp)
5. Thank you cards to be written
6. Matt's workshop sawhorses
7. Thrifted chair "borrowed" from the kitchen table.
8. Lovely view at dusk
Not pictured: Mood music courtesy of Sufjan, the man and three children who made it possible, and a whole lot of junk on the bed having just been moved from under the window to make space for a nook.

Sometimes, you just make do. Or rather, sometimes others will make something special out of seemingly nothing at all. Just for you.

My one word for this year is HOME, as in, we are making one. Here... again. Not just things, but a people and a place and a life. Do you have a word for this year? Or how are you learning to just make do?

We are living

I can't get over this, how it actually is snowing here. Right now. Nearly every day this week has been tainted with the white stuff. It never adds up and it never lasts long, but we sit at the kitchen table with a friend, talking about life and culture and adapting and learning and there it is again. Snow. We all laugh as we're all from America and it's not like we ever get enough here to need shovels or plows. But still, the weather is like this: slow cycles of drips from heaven. Wait a minute and it will change again.

We are in a sweet spot. A clean office/library/playroom, or whatever it's moonlighting as today. The books are put away, the lamp is on, the wee lad spins wooden toys on the floor. Matt pauses an extra second at the door before heading out, smiling my way. I catch his face in the glass. It's been a good morning, we are content, the snow has tapered and the children will be home soon.

We are living. There's not a moving box in sight.



He comes to me with a new creation, a story about his cartoon, a toy in his hand. He dances and shouts yes! with his hands. Today I want to dance, too, because I know tomorrow will probably be hard. Our moments of peaceful settlement are often followed by bits of frustration. It's our new rhythm, a slow cycle. Wait a minute and it will change again. 

And it's ok. I'm recognizing it now. 

Asher kisses me, grabs my arm. Glancing outside for one last look and the snow is gone. Rain has come. I've been sitting here too long and it's time to play.

***

Linking up with the EO and Just Write. I'm needing to do this more. With the boxes put away, I've no excuses left.

2012 Favo(u)rites : That caviar is a garnish! (and other things I learned from Nora Ephron)

You are daring to imagine that you could have a different life. Oh, I know it doesn't feel like that. You feel like a big fat failure now. But you're not. You are marching into the unknown armed with... Nothing. Have a sandwich.

Nora Ephron, You've Got Mail

I was just thinking last week that I should write a post on my obsession with the You’ve Got Mail apartment. 

You know the one: Kathleen Kelly’s shabby chic brownstone walk-up, home to the lone reed and upright piano, walls covered in books and mementos, and open window overlooking a beautiful autumn New York City morning. I’ve laid awake at night, trying to figure out this apartment’s dimensions (Is it a studio? U-shaped? Does the kitchen lead into the bathroom?), imagining where I would put my mother’s secretary or the wall shelf my husband built me six Christmases ago.

image source

I love that apartment. I would be happy in that apartment. I belong in that apartment, in the city, in the Autumn, with a bookshop around the corner.

So yes, I had formatted in my mind this beautiful ode to the You’ve Got Mail apartment. And then Nora Ephron died.

Nora Ephron, to quote the younguns, was a beast. She was a writer, in every sense of the word. Journalist, essayist, playwright, author and screenwriter. She nearly literally did it all. And then she started directing movies, where she created girls like me - independent, quirky, proud, loud, naïve, flawed, sensitive - and a world girls like me could inhabit.

Her genre was “romantic comedy,” but her stories were so much more than that. They were about messing up, and someone loving you anyway. They were about taking a chance, and getting let down. They were about discovering your true self, and falling all over yourself in the process. At least, these are the ones I remember.

I’m too young (yes, I get to use this phrase!) to know about Silkwood, and maybe a bit too young to really appreciate When Harry Met Sally, but I remember crying along with Annie in Sleepless in Seattle as she first heard Sam’s voice on the radio. And I remember the first birthday after we were married when my husband gifted me with a VHS of You’ve Got Mail hidden inside a brand new grey felt messenger bag.

Oh, I so wanted to be Kathleen Kelly. I even worked in a book shop (on the corner of Oak Park and Lake Street), wore black tights and black skirts, and sadly, experimented with an ill-advised short haircut.

(Side note: no one, in the history of the world, will ever have Meg Ryan’s hair in that movie. I don’t care who you are.)

But back to Nora. Her movies made me feel like it was ok to be weird. In fact, I could be weird and smart. Weird and smart and loved. Weird and smart and loved and imperfect. I could lose my temper, make a mistake, try again and conquer the world.

And now, at 33 and a mother of three and in the midst of so many life changes I can hardly stand it, I’m realizing that loving her stories doesn’t mean recreating the Meg Ryan look or working in a book shop. Loving her stories means I’m embracing my own. Loving her stories means I go forward bravely, confident in who God made me, believing that my loudness or weirdness or sensitiveness isn’t a mistake. Loving her stories means acknowledging that the world is messy and we are messy, but still, somewhere, there’s a place for us in it.

Oh, I love the You’ve Got Mail apartment, but no matter how I try to bend it, I’m not sure it’s possible for the pictures on the screen to match the dimensions in my head. Still, I’ll take solace in the world Nora Ephron created.

In her stories, it’s not about the apartment, anyway.


***

I'm reposting a few of my favourite bits and pieces from this year. God worked me over hard... I want to remember. Leave a comment with a blog post of your own, a favourite or a new one. Let's remember together.

2012 Favo(u)rites : The Old People

We sit on the hardwood floor, facing eachother, surrounded by half-opened wedding gifts and torn pastel tissue paper. My pen in hand, he reads aloud to me:

"Wine decanter," and who it is from.

I write it down for the thank you list.

We are on the third floor of an old Chicago brownstone. Our first apartment; our first home. The wedding was the week before and we are just now opening and reading and laughing and dreaming. We are married now, and the proof is in the cards and the bows and the matching pillows paired on the bed.

I slit open a small white envelope and take in the image of entwined hands, the typed sentiments, and the tiny signature written in the far right-hand corner of the page: the old people.

"Who are the old people?" I ask him, laughing.

He knows. "My grandparents." The only ones living, who couldn't make the journey, who I'd only met once or twice before. In all honesty, I wasn't sure they knew my name.

"Oh, the old people," I say, and smile. Old people who sign their cards the old people must have a story. And they did. A story of a farm, and a dozen children, and of loss, and of celebration. Of prodigals and companionship and the passing of time.

We give them their first great-grandchild and he meanders along the dirt rows of their farm, chasing barn cats. They meet and hold the girl - "Oh, look at that hair." - before we whisk her across the ocean. But while we are away the old man goes Home and we mourn from afar. The old woman still sees more great-grandchildren, laughing at their names (and we laugh, too, at our earnest originality in naming). And our children remember her and sigh with heavy eyes when she goes Home, too.

But she was ready, we say. She missed him. She is finally where she wants to be: with Jesus and with Grandpa.

A dozen years from the start we reminisce, sift through the wedding box and find the card with entwined hands. Inside hides a crisp $20 bill and it is signed,

the old people.

We laugh and laugh. "How did we miss this?" we ask. Because we know the time is soon, he writes the old woman to thank her and to tell her that we'll do with it what they would've done: go out for coffee, sit side by side, and talk about our story.

***

I'm reposting a few of my favourite bits and pieces from this year. God worked me over hard... I want to remember. Leave a comment with a blog post of your own, a favourite or a new one. Let's remember together.

My top 5 not-so-messy-parent bloggers :: 31 days of messy parenting {day 30}

I'm so tired of writing about parenting! Clearly I've still got loads of things to work through, and seeing as how I could use all the help I can get, here are some of my favourite not-so-messy-parent bloggers (though they might try to refute that!)...

Katie @ Branson Family Blog :: Katie taught me how to make banana bread and embrace simplicity, literature and British dramas.

Nearly Natural Nicole :: My blonde alter ego who encourages me to try new things (sushi, cooking), allows me to edit her writing, and won't put up with any of my crap.

Jen Hatmaker :: For obvious reasons (i.e., 7, her love for the poor, hilarity, and her prophetic voice for Jesus)

Pam @ I think I missed the class on... :: Pam taught me how to menu plan, follow Jesus anywhere (even to Iowa!) and to not take myself - as a mother, a ministry wife or an imperfect homemaker - too seriously.

Sarah Bessey :: Oh my, how I love her heart and her fire and how she makes parenting, writing, and advocating look effortless, yet profound.

Yeah, these women are awesome. The ones I know in real life have impacted my life in epic ways I can't even begin to share here... and the ones I don't yet know (though I pretend to, whatever) inspire me to keep looking upward and moving forward.

Thank you... for contributing to the mess.



Who's your top go-to resource for all things parental and/or spiritual?

Mom, can I start a blog? :: 31 days of messy parenting {day 26}

"Mom, can I start a blog?"

The eldest came at me with this request last week, not altogether out-of-the-blue. He is the super imaginative one, artistic and book-wormy and writer of notes and short stories. Still, I huffed a little bit.

"A blog? Why do you want to start a blog?" I asked him, probably not even looking at him, probably while I myself was on the computer.

"I want to write my own stories and then publish them... you know, like you!"

Oh, sweet boy. But my blog is nothing. I write about laundry and cheerios, I play more with my fonts than I do with my words, it's totally unprofessional looking and you should see my hit count. I mean, it's all very amateur and sad, really.

I say nothing of this to him, of course; but I think it when he speaks up, asks me to pay attention, and tells me what's important to him. I was embarrassed and confused, wondering why on earth he would want to write a blog.

Then, you know, I actually thought about it, thought about him. I see myself through his eyes. He sees that I'm writing down our life, sharing our stories, asking for prayer. He sees that I love the way he looks in that one picture, so tall and bright, nearly reaching my shoulder. He sees that there is something worth documenting, something unique we have, something small to offer. And he sees that others - you - join me here, comment and respond, know our faces and our hearts even if you don't know our last name.

He sees the gift he has, for words and reading and imagination, and with big brown eyes and crooked teeth, says, "You know, like you."

Oh, sweet boy. You have so much to say, so much to offer the world (or maybe just your grandparents and aunts and uncles, for now). Yes, let's start you a blog.

What strange requests have your children offered up? 

Dear Me (at 17)

Dear Me,

You think you love him. But you don't. On your 17th birthday he will give you a necklace and take you to a Cranberries concert. And you will break his heart.

You don't mean to. You love boys until they love you back, and then you fly away. This is how you work. Then there's another boy, and you think you are just broken enough for each other, that your traumatic childhoods and love for flannel and U2 have bound you together. You think that him loving you back will make all the black turn to light, but he won't.

And you will be ok.

I know you think value is all tied up in who favors you, who compliments you, the A you did or didn't get, the solo that went to someone else, the taste of a first kiss. You think acceptance is just out of reach, you feel on the fringes, you are self-conscious about your lack in ability in peeling an orange (don't ask me why - it was a thing). Even when you succeed in the best choir and the coveted acting troupes, you still feel a fraud, still long for approval.



I wish I could tell you to fight it. I wish I could tell you that the boys don't define you. The solos and the As don't define you. Not even your apple cheeks or your curly hair don't define you, though I do still admire those (spoiler alert: it gets curlier).

What will define you is slowly coming into view. You will lose it for awhile, but when you do catch glimpses of it - on the first crisp fall evening at 18, when you leave Kansas behind at 19, when you walk in Galilee - I want you to see, fully see, that you are worth so much more than a gold plated necklace or a hot prom date in an even hotter blue Jeep.



I'm not gonna lie, there is more breaking to be done. But the putting together, there is holy beauty in that. 

Let Him do that for you; bringing you soul sisters, weaving you songs, and taking you across the sea to a Wicklow mountaintop.

Let them do that for you; three imperfect little people who cuddle you in your sleep and slap your cheeks in fits of laughter.

Let the one you know you love, the one who loves you back, do that for you (I promise he will come along sooner rather than later). He'll be poor and will fill your living room with sawdust, but he will cook and carry your tears in his heart, and your head will fit perfectly in the nook of his shoulder.

There's no need to fly away now.

Also, ditch the tube socks. My So-Called Life will only last one season. The red hair can stay for awhile, though. You rock red.

Love
Me, twice your age <wince>

PS - Remember this as your own girl - your tiny twin - grows. You will need to show her, and she will need to see it, too.



I like to say I don't like teens, but I think that's because I didn't really like myself as a teen. But in honour of a new book for teen girls, here I am: writing to teenaged me. It feels... painful. But redeemed. What would you say?

I'm being committed (to Compassion)

I'm being committed.

Wait, that's not right. I mean, I'm about to commit to something. You all know how terrible I am at that: committing, staying faithful, following through, and finishing well. But I'm gonna give it a go again, for Compassion.

The thing is, I'm a terrible Compassion blogger. I get the newsletter telling me what my assignment is, and I sit paralyzed in the nice, clean chair at Starbucks, wracking my brain for anything of worth to say about poverty, about the orphaned, about Jesus in the the less-frequent-than-ought-to-be letters and drawings and family photographs I lick and stamp.

I am bereft of words. I am afraid of digging deeper into discomfort. I am lazy. And I am happy to just sit right here, drinking my latte, in a comfy Starbucks chair.

But we are in the business of challenging people, pushing them gently past their comfort zone, partnering with us in going and sending and sacrificing. So, really, it shouldn't be this hard for me to put my hand to the plough for these little ones (ok, maybe just my laptop keyboard; i'm not even entirely sure what a plough is), children we may never meet but still know through the short, shaky handwriting of a 6 year old or the intelligence and prayers for wisdom from the growing teenager.

So next month, with these two brilliant children in mind, I'm going to commit to Blog Month at Compassion. There's only four I really need to write, so should be easy-peasy, no? The kicker, the great big bonus, is that Blog Month has a goal: 3,108 children sponsored between Sept. 1 and Sept. 30. The most ever for any September ever. And that is worth writing about, worth digging deep about, worth praying and fretting and hand-wringing over.

It's the least I can do. For the least of these.

If you give to Compassion, you should blog about it. And if you don't have a blog, you should start one. And then you should join us here for the blogging month. There may or may not be prizes. Ok, there are prizes. 

Bookstore Confessions, on the Sabbath

I observed the Sabbath today. Four precious hours, armed with an oversized Fossil bag filled with library books and chapstick (my bricks and mortar), an iced coffee, and a cool summer breeze shocking the system, giving me unmatched, unanticipated pleasure after ten days of 100 degree heat.

A comfy chair is not so important to me as a beautiful view.

My intention was to read uninterrupted, but more often than not, I found myself writing. In my head, on my phone, in the pink journal gifted to me by the Thursday morning mums from Donabate. I write them letters here, prayers and questions, updates from a life in exile (or in my case, two years in my homeland; not exactly exile, but not wholly benign, either).

I think the city is beautiful.
Bricks and wrought iron.
Ivy and concrete.
Trees lining a busy boulevard.
Flip-flops on hot pavement.
It seems the city speaks to me, sometimes more than people do.

I recently told someone (ok, fair disclosure: commented on a blog) that The Confessions of St Augustine was "one of my favourite memoirs." 

Oh my, who even says that?!

Truth be told, this is mostly a lie. I have read it and I did love it, but I don't remember it, don't remember why I loved it. I don't recall the words or the voice, or the rush in my brain when I closed it and felt I understood it, felt it speak to me.

Where does one find The Confessions of St Augustine in a bookstore? In Christianity? Alphabetical by Author? Au for Augustine? He's certainly no Dr for Driscoll.

Then today, in the book I'm reading, a quote:

God is He Who gives God.

I remember you.

Ah, here he is. Philosophy. Obviously.

***

I have a love/hate relationship with bookstores. I love the smell, the mature scent of a thickly turned page, the world written out and displayed for my hungry eyes, the cover art and the panelled walls.

I hesitate. Should I really post all these existential gems on my blog? What if I write a book one day and all material must be unpublished, virgin, the rights of first refusal and all that?

Yet I hate the excess, too many options, so many possibilities but so little time and money, the bad cover art and - when it comes right down to it -  the words written that I might want to write someday, inscriptions to other people's loved ones and not my own. They have written books, and I have not. Not even a novella.



I am afraid I have next to nothing to offer. No skill, no trade, no big words made fancy by pedigree or experience. Time is all I have to offer the world. And my children; they are perhaps my true offering to the betterment of society. Though now, more than ever, I am less inclined to part with them.

I do have Jesus to offer the world, but He's difficult to market and impossible to replicate.

I covet their words, their bylines, and their cover art. I covet my need for them, our communal need to read, to learn, to grow through and from them. I wish I had something to say.

My time... and my children... and my Jesus...

But other than that, I mostly love bookstores.

To ask for some help, from you

I came to Starbucks to work and write, but it is hopping with people and the music is jamming and I've got three or four open documents in my queue, staring at me with cursors blinking. One sentence here, one paragraph there. Another is nearly finished, but waiting to pass on to better eyes than mine before hitting publish.

It is harder than I thought it would be, writing about leading a lazy life, or describing what it was like to walk arm-in-arm with my grandmother in an art gallery several months ago (lesson: write sooner, rather than later), or having a family member peruse your heart for fear it might slightly injure her's. This writing, it's a tough nut to crack. And sometimes I feel all the nuttier for it.

Which leads me to ask for some help, from you, wonderful warrior readers. What do you want to know? What have you been reading, or where do you suggest I look? I want to write more for us here, and less for me and my issue of the day (or week, or year). Let's jump off something, and wade into the depths a bit, and crack this bad boy together.

I'm all ears and typing fingers. Where do we go from here?