Uncle Bill's Amaryllis

When we lived in Hardin, MT my Uncle Bill would give us an Amaryllis bulb early each December. He loved to watch the children’s excitement as they watched the bulb send out shoots and slowly bud. It was his way of sharing the Christmas season with us.

I found myself missing my Grams and Uncle Bill quite a bit this season (possibly because it’s been a quieter season than many in our recent history). I found this surprising as they've been gone for 9 and 8 years respectively.

Early in December, I hit upon the idea of sending bulbs to a few of our loved ones. It was our way of being part of their Christmas celebrations. I bought a pot for us and we’ve had a blast watching the tiny shoots and then the promise of buds and now…look at this! I can’t believe how many blooms we have.

How are the rest of the bulbs doing? Did you get blooms too? I’m wondering how long these will last. Someone told me you can plant these OUTSIDE in Texas….we may have to try that next year.

Hanging Around!

Have ya’all been praying that this little gal would let others hold her???? Sunday she went to Mary Elizabeth for about 40 minutes. She has also settled down for the boys. Mike asked me to try Bible Study again and leave her home with him and she did great!

She does still want to be held. I’ve been trying to figure out how to hold her and cuddle her with my wrists….which get sore in ratio to the hours I hold this bouncing ball of energy…..I remembered the back pack!

Unfortunately, I didn’t remember HOW to put a baby in the pack and had her in it backwards….she loved looking OUT on the world, I enjoyed not getting spit-up down my neck….but shortly before this picture I realized the mistake.

Stacia did enjoy spending hours on my back this week….but this photo is the classic.

New Friends

I’m amazed at how quickly we are starting to make friends since the new year began. All of a sudden we’ve begun putting roots down into our new Texas home. I knew it would happen. However, I’m in awe at HOW it has all started to unfold.

Several of our family walks and geogaching trips took us by a wonderful park on the river called “Kid’s Kingdom”. Nolan asked each time if we could stop and play. I promised him that I would be sure to take him to the park the following day. The day spun out of control with the start of speech therapy and the first day back at school since Christmas. I totally forgot that I’d promised and when Nolan reminded me I said – “let’s write it on the list and I’ll make sure we do it tomorrow”. I forgot that “tomorrow” was 4 Jan – Jared’s birthday. The next day Nolan was not at ALL gracious about letting me out of the promise and I knew that I HAD to keep my word. We headed for the park after school and before Birthday dinner and celebration. I struggled with this. I didn’t want to waste my time at the park. I wanted to be home. I had important things to do. I KNEW that nothing was as important as keeping my word to my son that day and so there we were. Grumpy, but at Kid’s Kingdom, about to experience one of those divine appointments.

When we walked up we noticed a boy playing with some younger kids that looked remarkably like Craig from Alaska. I pointed out to Jamin that the boy over there reminded me of Craig and he told me that he and Josiah had reached the same conclusion. In a few minutes two moms with babies just Stacia’s age came over and sat at the bench beside me. They were in conversation and I quickly realized they were homeschoolers. Somehow I became part of the conversation…not sure if Adrienne (who reminds me of Carleen) included me or if I forged in but we all three spent the rest of the time talking and getting to know each other. In a strange twist of fate it turns out that Adrienne is FROM Eagle River (where my heart still strives to abide) and her husband is also in the military, she homeschools, has 7 kids and the youngest is a month younger than Stacia. The other mom Tricia has a husband, who retired, went to seminary and is now here to be an associate pastor at a local church. Her little daughter was born two days before Stacia. She homeschools has four children and her oldest is out of the house for the first time this year. See the connections???? They graciously invited me to join them at another park the next afternoon. You all know I’m shy. Right? We went anyway. We had a great time with the two families again and with two other families. Yesterday was “homeschool park day” and we went and found all those four families and even more to visit with. Andrew (Craig’s twin) is 17 and he and Josiah had a great time with all the little guys at the park. All the little boys had light sabers and they LOVED playing and ganging up on the two 17 yo boys. It was a great day. Several phone numbers were exchanged and we feel like we are well on our way to seeing that prayer we breathe with every move “God give us at least one family friend that will last a lifetime from this assignment”….fufilled….

I am so humbled when I think that if Nolan hadn’t insisted, we wouldn’t have been at THAT park, at THAT time to meet THOSE new friends. Isn’t God amazing????

In another strange twist…at the homeschool park day were ladies I’d met at speech therapy and Wal-mart….connections are abounding.

Ladies Bible study began on base on the 3rd and I sense friendships there too…..I love making new friends.

Paintball Saga!

8 January 2006

Some of you will remember that a few months back the sport of paint ball entered our home. It found its way in through one of Mike’s squadrons. They had a family paint ball event and invited the Chaplain. Mike thought it a great idea and took the older 3 boys with him. They loved it.

Josiah then asked for a paint ball gun and “stuff” for Christmas. It seems if you own the gun any old field can work for the actual playing. Of course, with only one son OWNING a gun this turned the other boys into what Mike lovingly and teasingly called “target practice.”

Jared remedied this by asking for his own gun and stuff for his birthday. We complied.

Last Saturday Mike and the boys were invited to participate in another a.m. of paint ball fights on base. They had a blast. They asked me to come take pictures. I tried. The one above is of Josiah in gear. When the games began the little ones and I had to step inside the building and couldn’t get pictures.

I found watching this game oddly chilling. Watching my young adult sons in camo gear and my husband in camo gear jump and dodge bullets was far to close to reality for this Air Force spouse. Yep, I cried. I didn’t get photos. The one below is my favorite pose anyway…my youngest princess at rest in the protective arms of her biggest brother….I guess it wasn’t the paint ball picture nor paint ball article that Mike and the boys envisioned on the blog. {grin}

We’ve been having a blast at the park and noted that all the homeschool boys are into “light sabers”; the mock sword fights they have are incredible. I guess this tendency to play act begins young and never leaves. When we first began having boys we said “no guns” and one day we found Josiah with a Barbie….shooting her legs at his stuffed toys…

Zander's Distress

Carefully look at this picture and your will discover the reason for Zander’s distress. I couldn’t’ believe that I caught this on camera.

We’ve been spending a lot of time at the park this week. This was the first time he went down the “divided slide”. Evidently, he didn’t understand the concept…until the moment he began going down the slide. I hadn't realized it was a divided slide until I noted the strange expression in the view finder. {grin}

Hmmm…this could explain why he didn’t want to go back to the park this afternoon for Homeschool Park Day.

NARNIA MADNESS!

We hit the mother lode today!!!

We are huge Narnia fans (the books ARE even better than the movie). Last week at Kids Kingdom we met some homeschool moms who shared that McDonald’s had Narnia toys with their happy meals. I have no idea how this fact had escaped us. We’ve been ignorantly collecting a virtual herd of Furbys from Burger King. I promised the little ones that we’d find a time “soon” to go to McDonald’s so they could get a Narnia toy or two.

Yesterday, Monday, was the day. Monday’s are our hardest school days and I thought it would help the older three if I took the younger four out for a bit. We went to McDonalds….but they told me they only had ONE toy left and that they would not be getting any more and had NONE at all in the store. They went so far as to tell me that they knew as fact that there were NO TOYS in town. Bummer. The kids were sad. I promised them we’d try the McDonalds in the Super Wal-mart store. They ate and played. I finished my Breaking Free study for the week and read ½ of the TOG teacher notes for the week. We went to Wal-mart and they told us that they had only Edmund left…but they did have 4 of them and so we bought them. The cashier told me that a truck was coming in during the night and to check back. I told her that I’d been told no stores would be getting more but that I’d check.

Today, following speech therapy, Nolan and Arielle wanted to try the McDonald’s in the Wal-mart “just in case”. I warned them that this was likely a failed mission. The manager came out and told me that during the last week of a promotion they give out the toys in their “customer care box”. What? Each store has a box that they receive during the last week of a promotion that has 10 – 15 of EACH toy from the promotion. She said that many don’t want to take the time to look but that if I come in when they aren’t busy her store is always willing to check. We were able to get FOUR of EACH of the EIGHT Narnia toys (all without buying 32 Happy Meals).

Nolan has asked for a Narnia Birthday Party and so I purchased enough extra toys to put in party bags. Yippee! The great thing about these toys is that each one comes with a little cut out scene from the movie. They are really quite nice.

Such a simple thing….McDonald’s toys have made our week shine. {grin}

To make the day “perfect” we headed out and found another cache. This was the first one that ARIELLE found by herself. She was very excited. We’ve passed this monument at least 50 times since moving here. This is the site where the first Christian mission was built in Texas…or so the sign said. It is now a branch of the public library. Here’s a picture of Arielle – look carefully and you’ll see her holding her first cache!

We finished the afternoon by running across the street and spending an hour at a new park we found. I finished reading the second half of the TOG teacher notes for the week and will shortly leave for Bible Study.

Waves of loneliness…..

Small disturbance swelling until it crests and breaks over me…slowly receding…only to return…I learn to rest in the loneliness…to know that it will ebb…that when the wave recedes there will be little treasures left behind…little rocks worn smooth by the waves….pieces of shells that glitter in the sun…even food for the sea gulls…

Lonely for children who’ve left the safe little nest we call “home”… profound loneliness for family who’ve passed on to Heaven; but will be seen again….for children lost before birth but someday to be known and held…lonely for times and seasons that crested and receded…no longer to be lived and enjoyed and endured…but to be remembered and treasured and pondered…lonely for friends (and even “well-intentioned dragons”) whose lives were touched and who touched in turn…then swept out of daily life and into “the past”….

Ah…but He comes to heal the brokenhearted….brokenhearted surely not…bruised…ah yes…He who comes to mend and heal the brokenhearted surely can patch the bruised at heart as well…waves of loneliness that lead to times alone with Him…shut up alone with Him to hear, to learn, to get the courage to move on….to allow new people in…to form yet another circle of friends…in a few short months those who are strangers now will be friends….destined in the cycle of military moves to become waves of loneliness in their time….and so the loneliness crests and ebbs…and leaves shining in its wake…treasures…brilliant memories…stronger character…sharpened character…certainly in me and hopefully in those with whom I’ve collided….I am touched and shaped by the influence of so very many…I never would grow if I shut myself up and shied away from the inevitable periods of loneliness that follow close friendships….the memories sustain…He sustains…in fact the very wave of loneliness carries me deeper into His presence…His arms of comfort…His peace…trusting Him to transform this treading in the sea of loneliness into growth and maturity….treasures…

Giving up the struggle…floating on the wave…as it carries me to new adventures…new relationships…new shores…blown by the wind of the Holy Spirit to new crests of friendship…ministry…relationships…experiences…Ah…the loneliness is good…it’s beneficial… it’s joy after all…