This year I am purposing to take time with Lona to go do things.  Things that we should be taking advantage of.  Sometimes those things have to do with our soccer travels and other times it is meeting up with friends that we don't get to see often and stay in county.  This was one of the second things. I had so much fun with Lona last year at Stoney Ridge that I wanted to go back this year.  I had envisioned a foggy morning but we had rain instead. The foggy morning happened the week before. Never the less it was a fabulous time. We did the traditional stuff, animals, photos, ride to the fields and pumpkin choosing.  There of course was the corn maze and Lona and her new shadow ran through it while being timed.  We finished off our time with their apple pie and the works.  I think that it may be the whole reason I go besides the incredible photo opportunity.  On the way home we randomly drove down the country roads weaving our way back towards our house.  We were greated by an amazing sight; a bald eagle perched upon a power pole.  I don't think I could get tired of looking at these amazing birds.

Hello October,
You snuck in with teasingly warm weather but have turned abruptly to the winter grey drops from the skies. Your ground colors are bold, beautiful and vibrant yet you are moody and melancholy.  The yellow, oranges, reds and purples slowly turn to browns as your leaves lazily tumble from the trees or are whipped with the winds. Your tastes are of pumpkins, cinnamon rolls and pies but also of soups, stews and breads. Your smells are of chimney smoke, wet leaves and rain. I turn to sweaters and vests, knitted hats and gloves yet not the thick coats of the colder months. You invite me to walk your trails during the day and pause before the craziness of the next two months commences. At night I turn to warm knitted and quilted blankets with a cup of tea or coffee. You end your time here with Halloween and the little goblins at my door.  Yet, October I want more weeks from you now that I've adjusted to my schedule. The colors you give me as I turn onto my street and see the trees dressed and glowing make me smile every time. I will soak in your colors, textures, tastes and smells for the rest of the time you give me.

Every once in a while my kids say something that totally floors me. Some of the things I have heard are:
Spankings are not an option for me (from a three year old)
My peas are messed up (from a crying 5 year old)
I can't hit Isaac (from a 6 year old after the slugbug game was suspended and then we turned into a VW lot)
However this one was recent.  We were all sitting around the dinner table eating which is rare during soccer season.  Isaac is on my right and Job at the end of the table on my left.  I'm looking at Isaac and I notice the long peach fuzz hairs on his chin.  I'm thinking that with his scraggly long hair and a few long chin hairs highlighted by the light, he is reminding me of Shaggy on Scooby Doo.  I study him before I ask, "You know who you remind me off, Isaac?
"Asshole" responds a voice from my left.
I am sure my eyes turned as big as saucer plates and I whip my head  around to the child who just spoke. I couldn't possibly have heard it correctly.
"Major Asshole" Job says.  I look across the table at John and he has his head turned away tucked down and is trying hard not to laugh. I think I sat there for a couple of minutes in absolute shock trying to process what I just heard from Job. The timing couldn't have been more perfect. How he came up with that so fast I have no idea.
"You know from Spaceballs"  I lose it. My eyes tear up and I burst out laughing. Darn that show. Who's ideas was it to let them watch that show?

When the kids were younger and all at home for school I never did science.  Gasp, I know it was required.  I just felt that they were better served doing impromptu science experiments rather than a set curriculum.  I wanted them to enjoy science and get excited about it rather than the rote memorization of facts.  The boys have since gone to school and had regular science in school.  Isaac says that he wishes that he had learned something at home, he felt left behind.  However his grades didn't reflect that and neither does Job's grades.  I did however buy lots of science experiment books and encouraged them to do science experiments whenever they wanted to and figured they learned just as much doing as reading.  They would do everything all over again in middle school and high school only in depth so I didn't bother too much.  Lona, who is doing middle school at home, has a set science curriculum.  The curriculum is reading base with no experiements. If she wants to learn more she gets onto the internet and searches the subject. Last year she learned a little bit about tornadoes and hurricanes.  She looked at photos and searched the areas that those most occur at. This year she is learning about atoms and chemistry.  The other day before church she started blowing bubbles using dish soap.  She learned it from one of her dear friends and pretty soon Job was in on it too.  She casually asked about the chemical formula for soap. I have no idea but John reached back into his memory banks and pulled that out. Since we had studied a little of the periodic table of elements she had an inkling of what he was talking about. Job is frustrated that he has to learn about science at school. When he found out she was learning some chemistry and all about atoms he was upset. "This is why I want to do school at home" was Job's statement.  You can learn so much with bubbles and not even realizing it.

It pulls at me, enticing me with beautiful photography and a clean look. Little sketch journals with watercolored pictures invite me to spend time looking while sipping a cup of coffee. The sketches and colors tease me to pick up a pen and brush  but an artist I am not. Hence the reasons I take photographs. I envision the soul cleansing words and so wanting to do the same. My soul laid bare upon a white page can not be if I have yet to find it.  I am often stuck for words wanting something deep and intimate to resonate with my inner most being but have nothing. The mundane chores of dishes, picking up, sweeping, and clean toilets suck me down into what I think is a creative rut. Yet there is a kind of poetry in the mundane. It's the crumbs on the counter, the shoes in the hallway, the dried grass on the floors, the blankets strewn across the couch which testifies of the life that is daily lived here. I then realize the love that I pour out to my family by doing the mundane can be beautiful and creative. So I take time to photograph what is beautiful to me and blog. It is my soul that I am pouring out I just didn't know it.
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It's almost 4:00 and I'm running out the door again. The oldest man cub has told me that his match should be around 4:00 or so on the home court. I made a commitment to go to as many home matches as I can but I'm not going to any away matches.  Two kids, two different after school sports, both have matches or games on the same days.  Just can't be at two different places at once. So now I'm running out the door to try to make it to his tennis match.  He is playing varsity this season which is a step up from JV but he's exhibition only so his matches don't count towards team points.  He is having fun but I often times shake my head when I watch him. I've seen him use his racket as a guitar after scoring a point, I've seen him do this funky little racket tap with his partner. I've also seen him get angry with himself for making dumb mistakes.  Generally he's not too serious and has lost more than he's won.  I usually bring some kind of knitting project since there isn't a set time for his match. I wait and knit and occasionally look up to watch the ball go back and forth. Once it's his turn I set down my knitting and pick up my camera. I perch upon a small rock wall and shoot through the chain link fence.  I have my zoom lens and if I place the lens right up against the fence I can shoot through the fence without the links showing.  It's a trick I learned a long time ago which serves me well with tennis. I decide to shoot with my wide angle, I want the blue sky and all of the courts and the background and the fence so I switch lenses.  I take a couple of shots.  I like what I'm seeing but I need to scoot over a couple of inches.  Remember I'm on a small rock wall.  I place my hand down intending to put weight on it so that I can scoot except that there isn't ground there but air. In slow motion I go butt over tea kettle and land on my elbow trying to protect my camera.  I have a bruised ego and a skinned elbow to show for it. Laughingly I get up and try it again, only this time remembering that I'm on a small rock wall.

I blinked and you changed.  I really didn't know that it was going to be almost overnight, at least that's how I feel.  One day we took you to get braces put on and the next day we were taking them off.  Dr. Schoff said about two years and that's almost what it was.  During that time, I thought that it was slow but looking back the time flew by.  It wasn't just an outward transformation of your teeth but it was also an inner transformation as well.  You went from 12 years old and quiet, starting your first year at school to being 14 years old and taking a high school class as well as middle school classes.  You've come out of your shell.  You were quiet and we would marvel when you would laugh.  It would be a deep belly laugh but not often.  Now you laugh more freely and still that belly laugh.  You tease much more than ever before. You still love puns but now you are usually trying to have a come back pun for each situation. You have always been tender hearted but when you brought your "pigger" home, it really shone through in your handling of her. You care deeply about your friends and take time to really know them and what they like. You are still picky about your food but are willing to try most things. Your tastes are unique. I guess I really didn't know that you were transforming like a catapillar into a butterfly, yet not quite grown. I love the mornings that you still come downstairs and cuddle into my arms, or the nights that you crawl into my bed after a nightmare.








Maybe the passage of time isn't so fast as the braces and classes make it seem.

I feel inadequate.  I feel uneducated. I feel unworthy. I feel like I'm not the correct choice. I feel that it is a huge responsibility. I feel that it's an opportunity that I don't want to casually dismiss or take lightly.  These feelings well up inside of me when I think of this group  of middle school girls in our youth group.  I am again working with them.  I can't say that I'm leading them, for I think that they are leading me more. I want to say that I'm coming along side of them, but I think they do the same with me. This year we are working through the Gospel of Mark. The theme: Follow the Son into Darkness.  I am excited to learn along side these girls in our study. In our last meeting we took 2 1/2 minutes to look through Chapter 1 and make observations, have questions, find something that jumps out at them. In that two and half minutes I heard questions that were amazing questions.  "Why did Jesus need to be baptized? Why did the Spirit drive (lead, impell) Jesus into the wilderness. What does "Make ready the way of the Lord, Make his paths straight" mean?"  These were questions I couldn't answer.  This was two and a half minutes! Who am I to think that I can lead middle school girls. My vision for them, my hope and prayer for them is to pray for each other, to mark up their bibles with thoughts, observations, even doodles that will help them understand the text, to have an excited and unwavering faith.  I have been looking for ways to strengthen this, to involve them in the text. I have had times of great prayer time, like when my uncle died and I went to his funeral.  The whole time there I prayed and prayed. When I ran a marathon, I prayed while running, I didn't have an iPod then. I would run for two hours at a time a couple times a week and my prayer life was outstanding!  I've had times of great bible study but again they were few are far between.  However I feel responsible more this year than last year and I am reading, praying and meditating.  I feel responsible for the girls when I tell them I will pray for them. I feel responsible to find the answers to their questions. I want to learn with them and strengthen my relationship as well. This has fueled my desire to learn more, to pray more. I am excited for the first time in a long time about reading the bible. I know that I will fall down, that I will fail, but I have not been perfected yet and will not be in this lifetime.