It Has Been Almost A Month!

Wow! I can't believe I was able to let almost a month go by without writing something!! I have been a little busy, but the real reason for my absence was one of injury. I have been in pain for about 3 weeks and sporting a highly fashionable (NOT!!!) navy blue sling for my right arm for about a week :(

It's not broken, but I have definitely torn or pulled something important in my upper arm. Raising my arm straight up or out to the side, even without holding anything, is extremely painful. Also, turning the key in the door/car, shifting gears, lifting things, texting and typing.

Gwen has been extremely helpful... occasionally. LOL! She is only 8yrs old after all.

It was actually feeling a little better today until I started typing this...

When Your Child Is In Pain

I have felt protective of many kids over the years. I won't count them, you'll just have to trust me. I find though, that the 'Mama Bear' instinct comes out just a little stronger when it comes to my own child.

When she is sick, I want to be sick for her so that she doesn't have to suffer, and when she gets hurt, I wish mommy's kiss could still make it all better immediately. I yearn to protect her from the most terrible and degenerate things in this world and want to cry for every bit of innocence that she loses because it always seems too soon.

I think about this especially today because it is Good Friday. Today is the day we Christians commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus Christ and his death.

Imagine this:
You live in a wonderful place where there is no sickness or death or pain, but there are people that you love who live in a hard place and cannot get to you. So, being unable to go yourself, you send your child to lead them to you.

You watch as your child is embraced by some, but turned away by others. Some of the very people, that you love, that you sent your child into this harsh land for, refuse to listen. Then, they hurt, mock, degrade and kill your child in the most painful way they can.

At any moment you could wisk this precious child out of there... But you don't. You know and your child knows that through his death all the people you love will be able to come to the wonderful utopia that is your home. So you sit there and allow preventable pain to overcome your only child and for him to spend several days in Hell.

What kind of love would you have to have for these horrible people to contain the 'Mama Bear' instinct?

I cannot even imagine that kind of love.

Today, I spend some time in awe of love that can be that great and pray that someday I might comprehend it's magnitude.

Jubilee Duggar

I have loved watching the Duggar family from their very beginning on television. I watched the documentary "16 children and moving in" where they were living in a tiny 3 bedroom house and wearing out-of-date hand-me-downs and I was intrigued.

I'm not obsessed. I don't feel the need to watch absolutely every episode on the night it's released, but I think I have seen every episode. I love that it is an interesting and entertaining show that Gwen and I can watch together. I mean... well, we watch mythbusters together too because we both love to see things blow up, but we learn more from the Duggars. I will never make some of the choices that they make, and they would never make some of the decisions I do and that's ok.

Anyway, I just watched the episode where they found out that baby #20 Jubilee Shalom, died in the womb at 17 weeks and my heart broke for them. I don't care about the controversial issues. No one should have to face losing a child. Pregnancy is such and exciting time. Full of dreams and hopes and expectations. I don't care what anyone says, a baby captures your heart as soon as you are aware they are there.

In the past when someone close to me lost their little boy I didn't know how to express how devastated I was for them and I regret that I didn't just go over to pray with them and tell them how sorry I was. In her interview, Michelle said that having people who had celebrated Jubilee's conception, with them to mourn her short life was important.

So I have learned from the Duggars once more. If I am ever in the situation again, I will know what to do. Perhaps not what to say, because what do you say, but I will know that it's ok to reach out to them in love and sorrow.

Is it safe to say??

I went into this winter dreading all the snow shoveling, salting and dressing in several layers, boots, hats, gloves, etc.. Last winter was excruciating. Going out at 5 am to shovel enough of my driveway so that parents could pull in and have a path to get to my front door at 6:30 to drop off the kids was the bane of my existence.

And of course, I was always worried about kids being sucked in and lost! LOL!

I've been afraid to comment on our mild winter this year for fear of jinxing it, but after the 70 degree weather we had yesterday I'm going to risk it and say

HOORAY!!!

We had a tiny bit of snow back in Jan. Enough so that kids could go out and play, but not enough to cause me back pain.

Gwen is that bit of black and pink on the ground by the tree... laying in wait for winter animals.

I am really living in the wrong climate. I know that ALL of our winters are mild compared to the ones further north, but I am a summer/warm weather/no shoes kind of person. I'm not sure I'd survive a 'real' winter and I'm sure I don't want to try!





Suffering

“Does God want us to suffer? What if the answer to that question is ‘yes’? You see, I don’t think that God particularly wants us to be happy. I think He wants us to love and be loved. He wants us to grow up. You see, we are like children who think that our toys bring us all the happiness there is, and that our nursery ...is the whole wide world. But something has to drive us out into the world of others, and that thing is suffering. Put simply, pain is God’s megaphone to rouse a deaf world. We are like blocks of stone from which the Sculptor carves a form. The blows of His chisel which hurt us so much are what make us perfect.” - CS Lewis