Thursday, January 27, 2011

Happy List

At church this past Sunday we were encouraged during sharing time to not just think about all the of the concerns to pray for but that we also look at what we are grateful for. The leader told of her conversation with her daughter the evening before and how the daughter named the 60 some things on her happy list. 

So in spite of the challenging days of the past, I've been trying to consider what I would put on my "happy  list".  So I thought I'd share what I've come up with.

1.  Walking hand in hand with Anya on our walk home from school, catching snowflakes with our tongues
2.  Eating at church on Wednesday evening - no dishes or food prep for the day
3.  An unexpected visit from my college volleyball coach who heard we moved to the area
4.  Snow falling - at least there is something exciting to watch on a gray day
5.  Keen shoes that I bought at Christmas from the Cabela's bargain cave - great to walk in outside
6.  Seeing and learning about an AGA stove from a friend - sure would be nice to have an oven/stove that stays warm all winter long and ultimately would help keep our kitchen warm
7. Getting my Ohio drivers license - after the 2nd visit, I didn't have a marriage license the first time.  I should say that I did pass the test the first visit :)
8. A night at home with the family - no games, no meetings, no church
9. Ironed fabrics waiting for me to come up with something to make
10. A morning breakfast out with two ladies from church
11.  Looking at seed catalogs, thinking about spring plantings
12. An exercise DVD that made me sweat!!
13. Great tasting pork BBQ from our farm
14. Looking forward to family coming in for Jeff's installation service this Sunday
15. Seeing AJ and Jeff snuggling on the chair

I'm thinking about our Virginia friends and family in PA who have gotten a lot of snow.  I know the girls are wishing for snow days again.  They have quickly realized that snow does not equal no school here in Ohio. 

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Dusting it Off

So today I pulled out my box of fabrics.  My original thought was to just bring some color into my life - let's just say I needed to do something. 

I was commenting recently to a friend that I thought I would title my next post "Bipolar" or I also thought about "Let the Tears Flow".  One of the things that I had told myself when I started this blog was that I needed to be real - to not just say what I think others would want to hear.  So the reality is that, true to form in past transitions, that it all hits for me a period of time later - maybe it's once I know that everyone else is doing okay, then I let down.

So all to say, the emotions have been all over, a true rollercoaster, thus - the bipolarness.  I know I should not joke about that, because I know and have worked with people who truly struggle with bipolar depression and it's not a journey I (or they) would want to be on.  I am grateful that my struggle is situational and not long-term.   More than likely it's seasonal - so the 2 degree mornings and now the grey days are about doing me in.  I'm sure it didn't help to just have read a book where the character had the opportunity to leave up-state New York in winter to go to Maui for a work trip and without thinking twice she left her husband home to do all the farming chores alone for a few months.  Let's just say, if presented with the opportunity to go south right about now, I wouldn't think twice and GO.  I'm trying hard to remember why we came here to Northwest Ohio, not that Harrisonburg is the best place to winter, but I'd at least be hoping that the sun would be shining.  For now I'm thinking much further south would be much better.

But since that won't happen (I've already begged Jeff to go somewhere and he didn't go for it) I decided today to try something new.  So I pulled out all of my fabric and had fun remembering the different things I made with certain fabrics.  I then decided it was time to set up my sewing machine.  So I pulled a table out of the garage, set it up in my room, dusted off the sewing machine and am going to see if any creativity can flow.  I have an idea but don't know if it will work or if I'll make myself even more crazy.

But for now it was fun to discover a mostly finished quilt top, some quilt squares from a class and a bunch of scraps.

I keep praying for April to come soon.

Monday, January 17, 2011

Our Virginia Girl


So today is Anya's 10th birthday!!  Each birthday we retell the girls their birth story.  I started telling her last night before bed that when she woke up this morning I would have already gone to Rockingham Memorial Hospital in Harrisonburg.  I also told her that she, like her sisters, was overdue.  And so by this day I was extremely ready for her to be born - 9 days late is a long time when you are pregnant.  Her time of birth is 11:40 a.m. and weighed 9 lbs. 10 oz.

She has a unique story in that she was born while we lived in Roselawn residence hall on the EMU campus and then lived in two more dorms after that - Northlawn & Elmwood.  Most kids can't say that they lived on a college campus until they are students there.

Anya has been an active child all of her life - she was riding her bicycle (with training wheels down the sidewalk to take Kate to preschool) at two and then by four she had learned to ride her bike at Grandpa Helmuth's house.  A whole new world opened up to her when we moved to our farmette on Singers Glen Rd.  She played outside, rode her bike up and down the lane, helped with chores and soon was mixing milk to feed to her calf that she was raising.

Some highlights of recent years:
* Finding her inside the calf pen reading to Buddy, her calf
* Watching her patiently have the newborn kids get use to her and then watch them come running when she got home from school and call for them
* Asking her dad once while we were butchering a turkey and he was gutting, "can little girls stick their hands in there too?"
* Watching her friendship grow with cousin/neighbor, Ginny and riding her bike through the field over to their house to play
* Having her take a liking to an EMU basketball player, MJ, and wanting to stay after a game until she came out of the lockerroom to say good game
* Her taking pride in the fact that she grew two inches in three months over this summer - she keeps trying to see how much more till she's taller than me :) she's currently 4'11 1/2"

All to say, we're excited to celebrate with her today.  We're excited to see what this new year will bring.  She continues to grow and mature in to a wonderful, fun young lady. 

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Moments of Hope

As I am reflecting on this past week I am encouraged by moments of hope.  There have been a number of things that have brought a smile to my face (I'm not going to deny that there were plenty of times of frustration/saddness, but I'm choosing to focus on the hope for now).

1. After learning that Jessie, our lab, had been hit on the road while we were at church one evening, Jeff came home to find her huddled in her kennel, refusing to come out of the dog carrier.  I prayed that if we were going to have decide to put her down the next day, that she would just die in her sleep.  She was still breathing in the morning but still wouldn't come out.  I called to get her in to a vet and Jeff helped me put the dog carrier in the back of the vehicle. When I got to the vet, the first sign of hope came when I looked in on her and she was perky and excited to have been on a ride :)  When we got the carrier on the ground, she willing got out and walked around.  She was limping so we knew she had been hit, but she was back to herself. 

2.  One day on our walk home from school Emily was telling me about her Financial Management class.  She is a brave soul being the only freshman in a class of juniors/seniors, but she loves it.  She said, I am so glad I'm taking this now, I have so much to learn and went on to talk about the US debt, taxes, etc.  She said the next day in class that they were having a cafe and reading the Wall Street Journal :)  The more we talked the more I liked this teacher, it reminded me of the years I taught business and some of the non-traditional ways of teaching that I incorporated.  It was great to see Emily excited and wanting to learn - another sign of hope.

2.  On Friday night we watched our first Pettisville girls varsity basketball game with the invitation from a couple from church - it was fun to watch one of the youth play and to see them come from behind to win in overtime.  It's amazing that we are beginning to see people from our past and it helps me to realize that we do know some people here.  Stan Roth lives in this area and helps to coach soccer around here.  He mentioned that he's seen my brother Ed (Eddy as he said, which let's you know he was a friend from high school days) at some of the state soccer games. It was also good to be a part of the Pettisville community.

3.  Kate had her first home basketball game-so it's the first time we've seen her play.  It was fun to see the progress throughout the game from a tentative player to a more aggressive defensive player and an offensive player that worked hard to post up inside and had four points!

4.  Saturday morning we were able to bring Jessie home from the vet.  She had a dislocated femur and they had her back leg bandaged up so she couldn't use it.  Today we were to take off the bandage.  She is very hesitant to use it and we can tell that she is still sore.  Tonight I sat in the garage with her for over an hour trying to coax her out of the carrier.  Finally with Jeff's help she emerged, ate, went outside to do her business and then Jeff caved to my begging to let her sleep inside tonight in the kitchen :)

5.  And probably my greatest hope for the week came today after church when someone came up to me and wondered if I had any interest in using their garden patch this year.  He usually had corn in there but this year he thought he'd put it in cover crop unless I would have interest in using it.  Just three days earlier while waiting for Kate to finish practice and I grabbed a paper and pencil and just jotted down a few thoughts.  They were:  find some sponsors to grow fresh food for the community; provide local food for the community meals that just started, for our church meals, for youth fundraisers, for some local families who can't afford to buy it.  Of course my thoughts also went beyond veggies to fresh eggs, bread and meat.  Obviously I can't do all of that, but this conversation today brought me hope that maybe some of this could become a reality.  So needless to say I pulled out our Four-Season Harvest book and am scouring the pages for what I can learn.  We'll see what emerges, but for now it has provided me with new found energy and hope for what is to come.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Firsts

FIRSTS.  While I would say that I'm typically one who doesn't mind change, I"m also one who does not like to be the first do something.  I like to sit back and watch someone else do it first.  I don't know if that's because I'm a visual person and need to see it being done first to gain strategy or if'it's because I'm afraid to fail.  But as I've been thinking about all the firsts that we had this past week I have to say that it's good to have it behind us.  I do know there are more to come, but it seems like the biggest ones are past - first day of school, first day at a new church, first sermon at Zion, first time for buying furniture, first time to have zero emails in my EMU email account, first time to do two puzzles in one week, first time for being sore after playing the Wii by myself (I really didn't think I got much of a workout playing boxing and tennis, but apparently it did something).

I remember saying to some of the 1st year students I worked with at EMU, that you will never have to have another first semester of your freshman year again.  Second semester always feel different because you know where classes are, you know the people living on your hall, you have begun to be involved, you know the flow of a semester and you just seem to be more focused.

In the midst of the emotional energy it took for the girls to start a new school, each day they came home with stories of hope.  They each made connections and it's been fun to hear them talk about different teachers and students, to see that Emily's facebook now has some Pettisville friends on it, to see Kate connecting on the basketball team, to see Anya's confidence to start in a mini basketball clinic with others from school and not be afraid to go play. 

While each of them would say they had a good week, Kate said it well on Friday.  "It's been a good week, but I'm ready to go back home now."  Home being VA where it doesn't take so much energy and to go back to what feels comfortable.  It was also good on Friday night for Emily to have enough courage to verbalize that while it's been fine on the surface, it's been really hard.  That she was just needing to be real, to cry and to have someone listen.

I'm always humbled by what our kids teach us.  I too had a good week but I would also say I'm ready to go home now - but home is now here and what can I do to make this feel more like home for me and the family.  I'm not necessarily saying I want everything to be comfortable but I do want to create a safe haven for our family and others.  A safe haven where we can be real with each other.  Where we don't just say what we think others want to hear.  Where we will be honest, where it's okay to cry, laugh, or whatever is needed at the time. 

I realize that we are at a unique place in being able to start again.  I don't necessarily like the feeling of starting over with getting to know people for the first time, but maybe I can see it more as an opportunity.  I do know how much I appreciate hearing people's stories, for our stories have shaped us.  So rather than thinking of this time as starting again, I see it as a continuation of my life, for our stories go with us wherever we go. 

I do want to be intentional about what this looks like-I want to take time to reflect on what I have learned, pay attention to where I feel God is leading me, to be creative and dream, and to be grateful for each day that I have.  So as Jeff challenged us today in the sermon, to seek God in this new year to see how we can write a meaningful story, one that we will one day tell as we sit before God's throne.  I recognize that our stories are not always filled with joy or have easy answers, but I want to somehow bring glory to God through whatever and wherever the journey takes me.  I do know that I want to make a difference.  That I want to find meaning and a purpose.  Am I willing to sit long enough with God to know how and where to be present using the gifts He has given me,  am I willing to take some risks? 

Enough for me to ponder on for now.