Cheerful Giver

Yesterday Gabe had off work, so we had our Valentine’s date a day early. It was snowing furiously and the roads back into the sticks where my parents live were unplowed when we took the children over after lunch. There were 10 inches of snow, it was hilly and curvy, and I confess that I shut my eyes a few times when I was scared. You know a slide into the ditch isn’t so bad if you don’t see it coming, right? I have to hand it to him, my husband is a very good driver. Also a Suburban is a very good vehicle to be driving in snow like that. No sliding at all.

The city streets were nearly deserted, and we were the only patrons at Lone Star Steakhouse. We aren’t ordinarily steak house people, but we had a gift card so there we were. I am a chicken or seafood fan, but last night I ordered a steak at a restaurant for the first time in my life! It was very good, yes, but I slightly regretted not getting shrimp. 🙂 Now I know. We lingered until more folks started drifting in for supper. The stores were closing early, except of course, Walmart, where the shoppers were ambling through the aisles of teddy bears in heart mugs and chocolates wrapped in tinselly boxes, and people like me were buying flour and croutons and salad dressings. Actually, I have heard urban legends of people who live at Walmart when there is a storm with power outages. Not a bad plan, I suppose, if you fancy sleeping standing up in the bread aisle.

By the time we got back home, there were another 3 inches of snow accumulation, making it a grand total of 13 inches of fresh stuff on top of last week’s frozen pile up. It is settling slightly today with brilliant sunshine and blue skies. This winter, out of necessity, my husband’s work schedule being what it is, I learned to scrape snow with our little loader tractor. It is fun, except I am a bit embarrassed at my lack of skill when I am out by the mailbox where anybody driving past can see that the woman hasn’t done this real often. But I am good at pretending that I know what I am doing. 🙂

Oh, one more thing. Those verses about feelings I was looking for? I thought of one: “God loves a cheerful giver.” And look at the context, please.

2 Corinthians 9:6-7

English Standard Version (ESV)

The Cheerful Giver

⁶The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully^[a] will also reap bountifully. ⁷Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

Here is my 10 cents about love today: Loving=giving.

God loves cheerful loving. I mean, giving.

Cheerful loving/giving is not possible without a decision from the heart first.

If you love/give bountifully, you will reap bountifully.

If you feel that you are only reaping sparingly,(everybody hates me, nobody likes me, guess I’ll go eat worms…) maybe you need to check your sowing.

Easy-peasy, right?

Still not Feeling It?

I have a theory that the happiest people are the ones who think the least about whether or not they feel well/happy/accepted/appreciated. It seems like a preoccupation with my sensitivities is a pretty sure way to find something a little off. As I write, I am becoming aware of a mild headache that has niggled all day, a soreness in my shoulder that may be arthritic, and the way the laptop is digging into my leg in an uncomfortable way. I sense that I need tea to drink but I don’t wish to get off the couch to make it, so I shall have to just sit here and suffer. Oh dear, but I am starting to feel blah.

If you really want to know why I have been thinking about this subject, it is because it is February and that, for me, is synonymous with “not feeling it”. I don’t want to grouse about the weather, but it feels like winter has been long enough. I can’t even look at photos of the tropics without coveting a ticket on a flight south. 🙄 If I start getting mired down with how little I feel like making any effort, I start worrying that anything I do will be useless in the long run if I didn’t really feel like doing it and who wants to spend their life doing useless stuff?

Our world today is saturated with “I deserve to be happy” messages. The right to the pursuit of happiness is in our constitution, although I suspect that it had a nobler meaning than having my cheeseburger just the way I want it when I want it.

image source

Did you know you can “open happiness” by drinking a bottle of Coke? Or you can “let happiness find you” when you fly to Fiji. And if you could drink a Coke on the beach, now that would be double happiness! But if you can’t have that? What? You are doomed to be feel unhappy.

I started looking at God’s standards for my life. Does the Bible say anything about my feelings? There are lots of admonitions to not grow weary in doing good. It appears to be a given that we will be tempted to be swamped by how we feel. But don’t let it make you faint (give up) because you will reap the rewards for perseverance. -My paraphrase.

I thought of the parable of the father who had two sons whom he asked to work in his vineyard. The first one said, “I will not,” but then he changed his mind and went after all. The second son readily assented, only he never showed up in the vineyard. Jesus asked, “Which son did the will of his father?” It’s obvious, isn’t it? Was the father pleased with the son who really didn’t want to pick grapes that day, but did it anyway? Of course he was.

There is a verse in Proverbs 16:3 that has often guided me through a quagmire of negative feelings. “Commit thy works unto the Lord, and thy thoughts shall be established.” That is exactly opposite from how I think it should be. (“I wish I would just love to cook! Then I could enjoy this constant onslaught of hungry people.”) Instead of grumbling and sighing about how little motivation I have to cook this supper, I can choose to say, “Okay, obviously the people around here need some nourishment before hunger incites a revolution. God gave me this work, and I want to make something that they will really enjoy eating, so bring on the cookbook! I have a whole freezer full of beef…” I may feel silly with the line “God gave me this work” in the same line as “freezer beef”, but it is truth and it helps me get my heart in line. You see how the feelings just sort of meekly come along when the thoughts are established? Trust me, I have tried this both ways. 😕

I have come to the conclusion that

A. Feelings are an indication of being alive. In that capacity they are helpful in figuring out what is going on inside me, but they are not navigational tools.

B. Feelings are not evil, but the heart that they are born from can certainly be evil. Sometimes the violence of my feelings is an indication that something is terribly wrong, but it is wrong on a much deeper level than an emotional turmoil.

C. Feelings are not terribly important on their own. They are a direct result of the way I think. If I take my thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ, I will not need to worry overly much about how I feel.

Is that too simplistic?

But I Am Not Feeling It…

Tell me, quickly, on a scale of 1 to 10, how important are your feelings?

Do you feel that your actions have any merit if you don’t feel like doing the thing that duty insists you should do? “…Uh-oh, here we go again!” Hey, I heard that!

What do you say to your child when he doesn’t feel like eating veggies, turns up his nose at the green beans, preferring mac n cheese and chicken nuggets? If he gets force-fed vitamins, isn’t he still healthier than if he lives on artificial food? Suppose he doesn’t want to wear socks in sub-zero weather, but you are firm, and he wears them anyway. Are his feet warm or cold because he was unwillingly obedient?

What if you are in bed under the down comfort on a frigid Saturday morning and your children come stand beside the bed at seven o’clock and plead that they are starving and breathe jungle breath in your face? Do you suppose that God is displeased with you because you groan in your spirit when you slowly crawl out of bed to make pancakes and gravy?

Or maybe your husband asked if you could take the family vehicle to get an oil change and you really don’t feel like taking all the children in for twenty-minutes in the greasy waiting area at the Quik Lube but you do it anyway. Is it love if you didn’t really feel like it?

What if you are asked to teach a Sunday school class but you would much rather just listen to someone else teach instead of applying yourself to a job that is going to require some hard study? You say you will do it, even though you feel a bit unwilling. Can anybody be blessed by your reluctant obedience?

Help me out here. I can’t seem to find any verses in the Bible mentioning that how I feel is really important. Am I missing something?

Mama with a Cause

(photo source)

That question I asked at the end of yesterday’s post? I know the answer, and so do you. Of course our assignments as mothers are important. They just don’t always feel that way. There are a lot of very worthy causes for women to pour their energies and passions into, making a difference and all that. It just so happens that my calling has placed me into a spot where I believe it is in everyone’s best interest if I stay home and do it. There are days when I have had an overload of domesticity and I could rally about as much enthusiasm to Save the Turtles as I “feel” about Making a Home.

I remember one day I had a bit of an epiphany. There had been a night of interrupted sleep, the third baby uncomfortable in my womb, and my little boys were doing laps around me, full of impulsive ideas to have fun. Clear as a bell, the thought came: If I am going to be a mother, I might as well give it everything I have. The truth of the matter was that I wasn’t giving it everything. I was spending too much time trying to figure out ways to make this job less demanding on me. This attitude was sucking all the joy out of my days.

That was when I decided to quit keeping a mental tally of the hours of sleep I got, the numbers of times I had to lay down my book to get a drink, the tons of laundry I pulled up and down stairs and in and out of machines. I stopped resenting wiping noses and concentrated on how cute the noses were. I love children’s literature, and now I got to read it out loud, all the time! Things became funny, my own private comic strip. They actually became fun (most of the time). Joy came back.

I am not going to pretend that the adjustment to whole-hearted momming was easy for me. I have an insidious desire to spare myself from too much hard stuff that didn’t die its final death in one instant. There have been many times when I have thought longingly of the English and their nannies. On the days when I am overwhelmed with the vastness of the job of raising my children, I need to pull my head out of the sand and remember my credo.

I have been given this job as a sacred charge, and I am going to give it everything I have, by the grace of God. I am a Mama With a Cause!

Assignments

Our moderator/superintendent at church has been challenging us to look for the appointments God has set up for us during the week, those chance meetings, the few words exchanged with strangers, the “coincidences” that come up in the course of the days.

I thought to myself, “I have been inside my house or on our property this whole week, with the exception of a short jaunt to Save a Lot. All week. How would I have appointments with other people?” I didn’t even get to talk with anybody after church because the service ended later than usual and then it was time to scoot off home so Gabe could go to work.

But I had assignments. Oh did I ever. “Feed the hungry.” I did that a number of times. “Pay attention to the needy.” (I even wiped their bottoms.) “As much as is possible, live in peace…” You wouldn’t want to know the kinds of battles that break out when all the little people are housebound for long stretches of time. “Be kindly affectioned.” I wonder if that would include not yelling when they wash the lettuce with Palmolive while I am doing laundry downstairs.

What do you think? Are assignments as important as appointments?

It’s Sunday

I am taking a day off. Although I find that it is easier to keep up a conversational style in blogging when I do it frequently, there are times when nothing much comes to mind and I do not want to burden other folks with pointless stream-of-consciousness when what I really wanna do is sip my coffee and look out the window at the fresh snow falling, falling.
Have a restful day, all you nice people!

About that Oobleck I Mentioned

Here it is, but take it from me and just don’t do it. See, it sounds so deceptively simple. My boys stirred the 1 1/2 cups of water into the 16 oz. of cornstarch and suddenly it all seized up. “Hey, this isn’t working! It said to knead it together with your hands.” Naturally I plunged my hands into the mass to knead it and instantly got a traumatic flashback from years gone by.

Back then I was working part time at a bulk food store and occasionally there was a need to scoop corn starch from a large bag into smaller sized bags for the shelf. The first time I was assigned that job, I scooped right into the powdery stuff. It squeaked and felt silky and hard at the same time and my every hair stood on end in horror. I was too embarrassed to tell my boss that I would rather do anything else, please just let me wash up the floors on my hands and knees. Anything else. That day I got cornstarch overload and I got really good at being busy whenever it needed to be bagged again. Anytime a recipe calls for cornstarch, I am very, very careful with spooning it out. I get a nasty little chill just stirring a few tablespoons into liquid.

But after reading how neat this stuff is, today I dug my fingers into the oobleck, then shuddered and quickly went to the sink to wash the mass off my hands. The children found it terribly fascinating, how it gelled and wept and turned mysteriously solid by turns. I let them make a huge mess all over the kitchen because I knew cornstarch washes up very easily. My oldest son couldn’t believe I tolerated the drippings and spills. He got a spatula and tried valiantly to keep it in one spot on the table, to corral it into a bowl, just anything to contain it. “Mama! They even have it on the wall! Make them stop.” He was nearly frantic so I reassured him and sent him out of the room until the little girls were done having fun. They tiptoed into the bathroom for a full scrub down and then I cleaned the kitchen for the second time today.

This is one “neat” experiment that is definitely not for the faint of heart. I guess next time we probably will just pass on it.

Interrupting Myself

I should be cleaning the cornstarch play goo off the kitchen table and floor, but first I wish to describe to you the meandering journey I sometimes make through the house.

It is 10 A.M.

The scholars are schooling, the littles have a snack to feed their dolls and now I need to Get Something Done, AKA Beat Aside the Chaos.

I start with the bathroom, because for me personally, chaos in the bathroom is terribly disheartening.

One boy already took the dirty laundry downstairs for me, but he dribbled a few socks and missed the towels hanging on the hooks, so I pick them up and take them down to add to the laundry piles.

I notice that one load is finished washing, throw it into the dryer, put in another load.

Oh, I am low on soap, need to write that on the grocery list.

I look over the shoulders of students, correct sloppy handwriting, encourage accuracy in math.

On the way back upstairs, I see that the tot has taken all the Laura Ingalls Wilder books off the shelf again, and I put them back into their spot.

Hey! There is that extra owl button I need to replace the one we lost so I put it in a safe place.

I am walking past the freezers so I think about supper, naturally, and take out a pack of hamburger.

I hear a squabble in the girls’ room, drop the burger into the sink, and go to settle it.

Sit here, little girl, and look at these books. And you, sit over there and look at those books.

Okay. Where was I?

Oh, the bathroom!

Yeah, the toothpaste splatters on the mirrors are really getting to me. I wash them off.

As long as I am cleaning glass surfaces, I might as well go shine the appliances, especially the spot on the dishwasher where gravy dribbled last night at supper.

Speaking of gravy, I should use that leftover gravy with meatballs tonight instead of making a spaghetti sauce.

I check the cupboard for rice. Almost out. Shopping list.

What was that other thing I was going to write down?

I can’t remember for anything! Oh well, it will come to me.

Hey, is that a trail of ants carrying off crumbs?

Get the broom, quickly!

I am gonna have to set outsome traps again.

I open the closet door, nearly get beaned on the head by my box of household tools.

“Boys!” I have a few choice admonitions for them on getting a stool to put the tools properly back on the shelf so that other unsuspecting folks don’t get hammered and wrenched when all they wanted was an ant trap.

I set the trap carefully in a spot only readily accessible by ants.

There is a hair bow under the table. I pick it up and take it to the bathroom.

I am right back where I started.

A half hour has passed and I have been very busy, but it doesn’t look as thought I have accomplished anything, really, except to cause myself to feel a little dizzy.

I don’t think I am ADD. At least I didn’t use to be. I used to pride myself on being so efficient I took my own breath away. 🙂

I think that I get so used to being interrupted that I even do it to myself. This goes way beyond multitasking to plain downright silly. I sort of hope I am not the only one who does this.

I am trying to stop it; I am trying to be more productive. I have to discipline myself to actually, literally stay in a room until I am done with it. I pile all the stuff that doesn’t belong in that room outside the door. Then I pick up one pile and take it to its home and stay there until I have done all that needs to be done there before I go back for another pile. I can’t tell you how hard it is to break the habit of suspending what I am doing to pursue yet another partial trail.

Wait… Am I hearing someone in the candy bowl?

Reliving my Babies

I have never put together any sort of photo album for the two smallest girls. Olivia’s is done up to 18 months, with about three years to go. Each of my children get one personal hand-scrapbooked album, which usually fills up at about 4 years old. When Rita was 3 months, we had a computer crash that wiped out years of photos, then we had camera fiascos and I lost the memory card in the bowels of the CD reader one dark night. You could say it hasn’t been the most fortunate set of circumstances. For a long time I held out hope that my brother could retrieve our files off the crashed computer, but alas, it was not to be. Eventually friends and Facebook albums provided me with some of her as a newborn, so I have cobbled together a file of about 300 photos that I am getting developed to put into their books. That is about 295 more pictures than I have from the first four years of my life, so I think they will be fine. 🙂

Anyway, I have been looking at our photo archives, and every now and then I would say, “Gabe, come look at this! Remember this expression? Can you believe how little they were when Addy was born?” And so on and so forth with the stuff parents say and then resolve to enjoy the moment more. I will spare you, but just share a few snapshots that make me smile.

Four years ago, the happiest, jolliest baby ever.

She’s a Tomato Peight. (Someday I will post my husband’s essay on the subject.)

The child has a surprising aptitude with scissors.

And here we are four years later. Next thing I know her dad will be walking her down the aisle.

Snow Day, 2

My children asked me, “What’s a snow day?” And I had the startling revelation that they really don’t know. We used to sing a song at school, “Whatever the weather, we’ll make it together,” but we should have added a quick clause: “Except when it snows and sleets and freezes too much.” Homeschoolers, however, do the whatever the weather thing. It’s the time of year when too much study drags down little people but we have to keep on going. So we think up excuses to have tea parties. We always make a party for the beginning of school, the half-way point, and the grand finale at the end. We have tea parties on birthdays and holidays and as rewards when the house is all cleaned up. Even the boys love it! We just eat our ordinary food, except we pretty it up with garnishes and cut teeny squares of bars to serve on glass plates and everybody gets a little candy favor.

I have no glass-fronted hutch to display my pretty dishes, so unless I use them, I never see them. We keep watch at second-hand stores to replace the teacups that happen to get broken. None of them are heirlooms or priceless, but it is so much more fun to drink out of teacups with dainty handles.

Now I decided that we will also party for snow days. Because snow days should be fun! While the boys were finishing up with their history classes, the girls dressed in pretty dresses with flowers in their hair. We spread the lace table cloth and got out the brand new tea party dishes! (Goodwill, 2.99 🙂 ) It took us about an hour to prepare and then it was time for fun! It was a Snow Day!