Author: amylynw

A Beautiful Birthday

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Today was my birthday, and it was truly a special day.  All week, the moment I sink into the driver’s seat before going somewhere, the kids have broken out into a hearty rendition of “Happy Birthday”.  I’ve felt the excitement growing.  I love birthdays.  Then this morning it arrived!  I woke up and was served a delicious waffle and hot tea by my husband.  He took the entire day off work just so I could have some time alone.  He shooed me out of the house and I perused thrift stores and had lunch at my favorite cafe with a good book to keep me company.  I perused more thrift stores and didn’t feel the rush of people needing me.  The press to answer questions and solve problems was lifted for a few glorious hours.  Notes, messages, a few cards and lots of love was poured out today.  Matthew took the kids out on a mystery trip and came home with something I’ve always wanted but would never buy for myself: a glass tea-pot and flowering tea.  Nadine mopped the floors for me.  Then, I invited some girl friends over for some much-needed hang-out time.  When my sister arrived, she said she brought one more thing with her.  Thinking she forgot something in the car, I just about fainted when my other New York State-dwelling sister popped out from around the corner!  What a delight to see her face and laugh our guts out all together.  I’m so bummed I never asked my fabulous photographer friend to take a picture of us sisters together.  But, here is a snapshot of my day in part:

Chocolate,flowers, tea, sisters, friends, messages, more tea, surprise packages, drawings, and many renditions of “Happy Birthday” have made today so incredibly delicious.

Alternators and Roses

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Everyday joys in my life include sunny days in February and water-gun fights.  Water-gun fights that lead to washing the van with buckets of water.  My oldest daughter wearing my rain boots and they fit.

 

Little helpers and sweet by-standers.

Big brother who knows just how to make little sister smile.

This week, it was time for Betty to try her sweet self out in the cozy coupe car.  Even though her little feet didn’t quite reach the pedals, I mean, ground, she still had a blast.  Elsie is a good play mate and loved pushing her up and down the sidewalk.

 
I am reminded, however, that we all have a breaking point.  A time when life gets crazy and our hair stands on end and we just want to say, “Aaaaaah!”

I’ve had some of those hair-standing-on-end kind of days this week.  Matt’s truck broke down again and after a state trooper pushed it from the Schuylkill Expressway (Sure Kill Distressway, for those of you locals) to the King of Prussia Mall, he was rescued by my brother-in-law.  The next day we spent a couple hours in the parking lot with the wind blowing furiously at us.  He successfully changed the alternator and now it’s purring, or at least working again.  I can still hear him coming home from about a block away, but it’s a comforting sound.  Sometimes hard days produce lovely endings, like when Matthew comes home from work with a handful of these beauties.


There are many many busy hours in my day.  I love sitting down in the evening with my herbal tea and flipping through pictures in my head or on the computer.  It’s quiet.  The noise is somehow frozen into silence in those pictures, but I can still hear their voices and squeals and chatter.  Last night we baked two cakes.  The boys decorated one and the girls decorated the other.  We enjoyed the special treat and made a mess.  Jack’s mouth turned blue and my fingers are somehow pink.  It was so much fun!

 Life is beautiful, especially when it involves a snazzy blue cake and pink deco cupcakes loaded with red-hots.  My life is full of ordinary days sprinkled with extraordinary joys.

And Then There Were Twenty-Seven

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There’s a ripple effect going on right now.  It all began seven years before I was born.  In an African hospital my brother was born.  My mom and he both had malaria… but lived.  Next came my sister, right before Christmas.  Then my other sister was born.  Two years later, I arrived and haven’t left since.  I remember being three years old and waiting for the sound of the airplane coming from over the hills of our little station called Nyankunde.  That sound meant my brother and sister would be home from boarding school!  I remember the homecomings and then the days without them again.  I know now just how incredibly difficult those years were for my family.  Missionaries often get a reputation for being above the ability to experience sorrow or regret or even make mistakes.  As a grown-up now, I know that this is not how it was or is.  The reality of life hits me every day, and I think often of how my Mom did all these crazy motherhood things in the middle of Africa, without the ability to update her life for the world to see and to give her applause or comfort as needed.  Yes, those couple years of boarding school were more difficult than I will ever know.  Even though we didn’t always get along, my brother has always been someone super duper amazing to me.  He was knowledgeable in all things from airplanes to card-tricks.  He knew how to solder a pack of duct-taped-together D batteries to a little hand-held Donkey Kong video game, so that it would basically never die again.  He taught me how to master the rubiks cube and ride a motorcycle.  He has experienced many life-threatening episodes throughout his life, and has displayed God’s power in so many ways through his endurance and faith.  It’s hard to live almost 600 miles away from family, and any chance we get at building memories with this part of our family is special.  Last week we had that privilege!  
A day at Valley Forge for a picnic, a walk, and memory-making is always a treat.

  I have more I can write about my sisters, but I will save it for another time.  I love this model-like shot of B&H sporting the shades.


We kept hearing the booming of a cannon, and walked to where they were demonstrating how a cannon was fired during the Revolutionary War.


It was delightful when Matthew met us after work.  There’s nothing sweeter than seeing two girls in Daddy’s arms at once and watching Betty’s little feet swinging happily.


Later, at Grandma’s house there were dress-ups to be had, and super-secret hide-and-go-seek spots to be found.  Can you see Brian on the red Escape?  Look very hard.

I often think of the years our family has had together.  Seventeen cousins (four which were missed this week), four amazing spouses for each of us “original” kids.  The African soil on which our parents raised us has left its marks on each of us in different ways.

  These amazing kids are treasures!  So thankful for the cousin bond that I pray lasts a life-time.  I wonder just how many places they will go, and how much the world will change because they are in it.  Praise God for the courage of my parents to go, to be different, to pray for their kids, to pray for our spouses, to pray for our kids.  The fruit of those prayers is being seen in seventeen little ripples going out into this world, effecting this generation and I pray, eternity.

A Host of Ordinary

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“If we were never depressed, we would not be alive.  If we were not capable of depression, we would have no capacity for happiness and exaltation.”  I think depression is one of those things that is both never talked of, or spoken of too much.  It is debilitating, but it is also used as a crutch and a homey little corner to hang out in while the world keeps marching past.  I’ve been in both places.  It is comforting to know that depression is in fact confirming that I’m alive.  I am not something material, I am someone with a soul.  I have been silent on the topic for the most part, thinking that if I admit that I’ve been depressed then that equates having lost my faith in God.  Not true!  I have also used depression as a crutch.  Not peeling out of my pajamas, not showering, not eating correctly, basically nursing this depression in my heart in order to feel something.  If I feel like a failure, then at least I feel like something.  Those are depressing words, and they’re words I’ve believed.

In 1 Kings 19, Elijah had just come off a very enormous high.  God showed Himself so powerful.  Elijah defeated the prophets of Baal, prayed until it rained, and then the power of God came upon him so that he ran 17 miles from Mt Carmel to Jezreel, arriving ahead of Ahab’s chariot.  After all these incredible happenings, he became afraid of a threat from Queen Jezebel and ran for his life, about 90 miles away.  Then he left his servant and ran one more day into the wilderness alone, before collapsing into a bitter state of depression.  Elijah?  The same guy who “prayed earnestly that it would not rain for 3 years and it did not rain”?  The same guy who again “prayed earnestly that it would rain and it rained”?  The Bible says he was a man just like us.  He was alive.  He felt highs, he felt lows.  That week he pretty much went from the highest high, to the lowest low.  He wanted to die.

What did God tell him to do then?  “Here, do something great for me and you’ll snap out of it.”  Nope.  God told him to get up and eat.  Simple, right?  Well, if you’re anything like me, those simple instructions from the Lord are the ones that are often the hardest to do.  I’d rather do something that looks good on the outside, or maybe even go to a Bible study to make myself feel better.  The antidote for depression is obeying what God is telling us to do.  “Get up,” might be the first step.  “Get dressed,” might be step two.  “Splash some water on your face,” might be step three.  It’s one step in front of the other.  It is ordinary, non-spectacular acts of obedience that meet depression where it rears its ugly head.

Every day God inspires us to do the ordinary.  I see and hear it all. day. long.  SURELY there is more to motherhood than another poopy diaper, or dirty bowl, or broken plate, or teary naptime, or sleepless night, or messy room.  Surely there is more to my life than the host of ordinary things that pepper my life each day.  But God is in them.  He inspires them to happen each day.  He is the God of the ordinary and spectacular.  Every once in awhile we might have a Mt. Carmel experience, but generally speaking, our life is more like a drought or a run through a desert.  How awesome it is when out of the depression comes a gentle voice encouraging us to “get up and eat.”  He always provides what we need.  He didn’t tell Elijah to eat without first putting the food right there beside him.

There is no excuse for me not to get dressed… I have clothes.  There is no excuse for me not to shower… I have running water.  There is no excuse for me not to exercise… I have all my faculties.  There is no excuse for me not to eat… I have food.  There is no excuse for me to eat too much… I have self-control.  There is no excuse for me not to do every single one of the things depression tells me are impossible to do.  When we do what God’s Spirit simply tells us to do, depression is gone.  However, because we’re still alive, it will always come lurking.  May you be encouraged to fight this horrible beast with the most ordinary, God-inspired tasks that He puts in your life each day.

China Tea Cups and DNA

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Thursdays are a highlight for us this year.  Every afternoon we get together with some super cool homeschool families and have a blast doing aspects of school that wouldn’t normally be possible at home.  Last week the kids learned all about DNA from their amazing Science teacher.  They extracted DNA from a strawberry and I couldn’t explain how… I just know that I’ve never seen a five-year-old stoked about DNA.  Then we had a valentines day party with mailboxes and cards and a snack that doubled as lunch!

Today, my friend Kim, from Sanderson Images, came up with this fantastic idea to make the kids’ school portraits really creative.  She and her husband took these amazing photos a couple of weeks ago, then today the kids made a collage around their picture of things they like.  I love how each one turned out so unique to their own personalities and loves.  (I got to decorate Betty’s… fun!)
On other school days, we often break for tea around ten o’clock.  It doesn’t take much to convince me that the teapot and fancy teacups need a little love.  A fine tea time will often bring out the best in children.  When real china is served into their sweet little hands, they feel special and of much worth.

It’s a precious memory that I plan on continuing for the rest of my life.

  There is something so sweet when I see two of our children pair up and sit as close as they can to each other.

Then there is the sweetness that is sleeping children.  Apparently socks on the hands are all the rage for sweet dreams.  No lie, sometimes I sleep with socks on my hands too.  It’s not because I’m trying to fit in, it’s just because they’re so cracked that I lather vaseline all over them and then cover them with socks.  In the morning my hands are soft again… at least for a couple hours.  After laundry, cooking 3 meals, cleaning up from 21 place settings, scrubbing hands besides my own, and a great many other things… my hands are usually dry as a bone once more.  I don’t mind, though.   I love my job, I love this beautiful life God has given me.  In fact, this thankfulness inspires me to try my hand at poetry for the first time in years:

Thank you, Lord for mailboxes and letters.
Thank you for china tea cups and DNA. 
Thank you for socks on hands and dreams so sweet.
Thank you for precious friends to grace each day. 

Scrumptious Birthday

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Last weekend, we celebrated Rachel’s 11th birthday.  Rachel is my niece, and she’s a special girl to all of us.  Her recent long stay in the hospital was so difficult.  How thankful to see her happy, cheerful face again!  There was a lot of love and craziness going on the other night!


This little munchkin with a heart on her bum, knocks my socks off every day.  She personally doesn’t care for socks herself and pulls them off whenever she can.  Her sweet baby booties are just about too small for her, but they keep her feet deliciously warm.
 

Speaking of delicious, her eyes are so chocolatey.  She’s sweeter than the peppermint patty that I’m eating right now.


This one is growing up too fast for her mama.  Some days I’m lost between the fact that she’s not five anymore, and that double digits are upon us this year.  

Birthdays are special because they celebrate special people.  After cake and more cake, what party isn’t complete without the Oreo game?  I was thrilled to catch my first cookie ever, playing this game.  Usually it gets caught pirate-style, in the hollow above my cheekbone.  This time it slipped straight into my mouth and surprised me more than anyone!

Life is sweet when it’s full of children and birthdays and cookies.

The Open Book Test

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“If I give you all the answers, then you’ll never learn!”  I said in a more exasperated voice than I meant to towards my daughter.  The statement turned around, looked me in the face and seemed to echo back to my ears: say what?

I’ve been thinking about it ever since.  Sometimes things pop out of my mouth, then backfire in a way that make me a little uncomfortable.  I feel a bit silly.  Those oh-so-wise-sounding words are like boomerangs sailing from my mouth back to my heart.  Trust me.  Be nice.  Be patient.  Oh, and stop yelling, for crying out loud!  Oops.


Artwork by Jack.  Sometimes I feel like the one on the left.  Or the right.

Honestly, I’m going through a ton of learning right now.  No answers are  being shelled out to me.  Real life questions, like how & why, are prevalent in my every day.  They are like English lesson 53 is to my daughter.  She cries out for answers, yet to give in to her  pleads would be to rob her of really mastering that bit of education put before her.  In the same way,  I cry out for the answers.  His voice answers in a very familiar way, telling me that I’ll never learn if He just tells me all the answers.  Trust is imperative to obedience.  The how’s, why’s and when’s will work themselves out as we trust in the Lord with all of our hearts.

I was reading in James last week, and on Sunday heard a sermon on James chapter 1.  The similarities to what I have been thinking about and going through were so striking.  The tests God gives us are to see if we have learned anything.  He knows us so deeply, and He deems us ready to take the very test we are experiencing.  Sometimes He tests us because He wants to hear from us.  I know that is something I need to improve upon: my communication with Him.

There is a ton of learning yet to be done.  I hope that I can guide my children towards the truth without giving them all the answers.  I pray that they will use God’s word to seek out all of the answers to life’s questions.  It’s an Open-Book test every single day.  How thankful I am that He gently leads those with young… because I have five young, and I need leading.

Snap-O

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Today, after a wonderful morning with my kids, unexpectedly meeting delightful friends in a parking lot, and filling our fridge with much-needed food… something went snap.  Was it the thirtieth time of stepping over that puzzle on the dining room floor?  Maybe the crunch under my feet of the seventh goldfish meeting it’s demise.  Perhaps it was the picking of the the lock in the front door with a jack knife.  No, I bet it was that last time someone said they were hungry, even though they just ate eleven minutes ago.  Whatever the case, this mama went “SNAP-O!”  Snap-O.  Sounds like a fun game!  It’s not.  It’s dreadful, really.  It’s when your mouth opens and things rather loudly come out that aren’t nice.  It often leads to tears.  It must be followed up by apologies, or snap-o becomes contagious.

A wonderful admonition came when I was talking on the phone to Matthew and he reminded me (again) that they are children.  I thought maybe I got that by now.  Sometimes I forget, though.  Sometimes I expect so much out of them or myself and before I know it, “SNAP-O” comes flying at me like a deck of cards being released and I stand there blinking and confused.  I get tired of picking up the cards again, but thankfully forgiveness deals me another turn.  God is so gracious.

Then there was rollerblading through the kitchen,  a crying baby who wanted to be held, and multiple requests for food.  Relief came when Matthew walked in the door and offered to take the kids to the park so I could finish making supper.  I didn’t realize how much I needed that break until it came.  Peace reigned supreme as he called from the front door, “I have all of them!”  Even Betty?  Even Betty.  Twenty minutes later they came back with rosy cheeks and Betty was all smiles.  She knows she’s hot stuff doing big girl things like playing at the park with her brothers and sisters.  Her grin couldn’t be erased.

This weekend was fun and relaxing at the Weldon’s.  We enjoyed a walk, good food, and being together.Outside, the sidewalk chalk scrawled out just one request: snow, please.
The snowman lights echoed the request.

Cozy warmth beckoned me back inside, where the sound of Adele filled the kitchen and the sight of busy little chefs were hard at work.Elsewhere, the boys found things which their hearts enjoy.


Family is so incredibly special to me.  I have to focus in on these amazing moments of love…especially when I feel the Snap about to fly.

What on Earth???

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The other day Elsie said something so funny, yet so profound.  Matthew was working on something and instead of asking him, “What on earth are you doing?” she asked, “What are you doing on the earth!”  It is a valid question, you know.  One that we all should answer.  What am I doing?  Besides the obvious course of survival mode we all habitually travel to remain alive?  There have been definite days in my life where I barely survive.  Days with little feeling of hope, excitement, or feelings of fulfillment.  What am I doing on this earth?  Is my purpose far-reaching, even eternal?  Was I merely put on this earth to wipe babies’ bottoms and cook one-thousand-and-ninety-five meals a year?  Or is there a deeper purpose for my existence?

Yesterday was one of those days when it was pretty hard not to feel the breath of heaven wash over my soul.  I know that sixty-two degrees in January, in Pennsylvania, is not normal or to be expected.  I also know it is fleeting.  My entire being craved the sunshine and warm air so intensely that I feel like it was a gift from my Father sent to bless me personally.  I also know it blessed many other people as well!  I had the privilege of sharing the afternoon with some friends from church, and we took a nature walk through a near-by park.  The outdoors called our names and we just hollered right back, “Coming!”  And we went.


Betty was so cute with her little friend, Will.  She is one month older and liked trying to hold his hand.  They were so sweet together!


We explored the water and soaked in our fill of Vitamin D.

This is one reason I’m on this earth: to love these amazing kids who love life and the God who made them.

Oh to see more clearly that when I love them… what I am doing on this earth is making a difference in eternity.

I am so thankful for every moment on this earth.  There are glimpses of glory and heaven when the sunshine kisses my skin.  Then there are glimpses of how temporary our time on this earth is.  On our way home from the park we were almost hit head-on by someone speeding around the corner of a tight turn.  A flash of how fleeting and wonderful each moment we are given flew through my mind in an instant.


This morning when I got up, the kids had been awake for a little while and told me they had a surprise that I would really like.  Yesterday they had made me breakfast, so I was pretty curious what they had up their pajama sleeves this morning.  I shuffled downstairs to my chipper children who had finished two subjects of school already.  Neatly and correctly.  This has never happened before!  It touches my heart when they think of these kinds of things on their own.  It gives me hope to counter attack the doubt that sneaks into my thoughts sometimes.  My kids are messy, loud, and don’t always make the right choices.  Guess what?  Neither do I.  But they are also growing, learning, and come up with the most brilliant ideas!  I learn from them every day, and even though I love them so much, I need to tell them so better.  Hug them often.  Say, “You’re so smart!” more.  I can’t take it for granted that they’re alive!  I believe God created them to do unique and awesome things while they’re here.  Somehow He entrusted me with this crazy huge job called Mothering.

So, what are you doing on earth?

Monday Crunchies

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Monday.  The day when it feels like every cracker crumb is stuck to the bottom of my slippers as I crunch across my kitchen floor.  The day when school sneaks up and says, “Boo!”and scares me every time.  The day when the contents of my fridge force my creativity to expand to un-natural proportions just to think of something with which to feed my tribe.  The day when an extra cup of tea is in tall order.  I honestly don’t dislike Mondays, mostly because there is nothing too drastically different about them than every other day in the week.  I still cook, clean, change diapers, do laundry, make three meals, sweep dust bunnies, wipe mysterious stickies off the floor, play referee, and plop into bed exhausted.  True, Monday follows our one and only guaranteed family day, which is always a bit of a letdown.  I guess that is why my kitchen floor feels more crunchy than usual and school seems a bit harder than other days.  Today Betty also seemed to turn a corner in her tiny growing-up life.  She has a snotty nose and a sore throat, but there was more to her wee little crying fits than just all that.  They definitely left me swirling a little bit.  I’m bracing myself for a new year, new Betty.


Is there anything cuter than a heart on the bum?  Perhaps, maybe, that heart sneaking away up the stairs in a flash…

I had a lot of girl time this weekend while Matthew took the boys rock-climbing among other things.  It is rare that I catch all three playing so sweetly together.  Nadine was pushing the littles in the clothes basket, which was just as exciting as any boardwalk ride, let me tell you!

 

Betty weighed in a whopping eighteen pounds at  her one-year check-up.  She loves to walk, assisted.   Some of her new tricks include blowing kisses and giving away real-life, sloppy wet smooches on your cheeks.  She climbs the stairs in a jiffy and then lays on her belly at the top and squawks for help to get back down again.


On Saturday when she was starting to get feverish, Nadine rocked her right to sleep while humming “Silent Night”.  It was precious.


Speaking of sleep, this is my favorite part of Monday and every day. Sneaking into the kids’ bedrooms and watching the way sleep transforms their darling faces.  Betty snores and is always in a different position.  Sometimes on her tummy, sometimes her back, sometimes with her feet straight up in  the air on the side of her pack n’ play.  Elijah generally is sprawled out across his bed and can’t be woken up for anything.  Just like his daddy.  Jack is usually curled up into a tight ball, sometimes his entire body underneath the covers.  Just like his mama.  Nadine is almost never asleep before I go to bed, but when the rarity occurs, she is on her back, straight and tall, or half way under her covers and half-way on top of them.  She’s somewhat haphazard when she sleeps.  There is frequently something funny about how Elsie has fallen asleep.  She doesn’t have any one special thing which she likes to sleep with every night.  She almost always is asleep on her back, like a statue, sometimes hands folded across her chest.  The other night, unbeknownst to me, she fell asleep holding a balloon she had received that day.  It is pretty tricky taking pictures in a dark bedroom, but the flash didn’t even make her flinch.


This Monday Matthew got his third out of four infusions.  He’s feeling so much better than three weeks ago, and next week we’ll see where he is in a bit more detail.  When he got home from work, I was sitting on the dirty kitchen floor with Betty on my lap, banging spoons onto a metal bowl.  He knew about my challenges of Monday.  Then he handed me pure gold:  my favoritest tea ever and German chocolate.  Now there is a sweet way to end a Monday.