A "Luke's Eye View"

Luke loves taking the camera when I'm not looking and snapping a few pictures.  It is always interesting to go back and see what he captures:

I get a TON like this.

And a lot of this.

I get to see some of his current "favorite things."

And some truly wonderful "self-portaits":).

And then there are always a few that actually "turn out."

It is very interesting to see the world through the eyes of a three-year-old!

Three Things Luke Said Yesterday

1. "Mali is next to Mauritania."

2. "God knows that we are going to the playground on Tuesday, so He wouldn't make it rain."

3. "I was going to shoot it out of the air."

And now, a little background:

1. After Luke learned his states so well from his USA puzzle, I decided to get him an Africa puzzle. I figured that once he mastered that, we'd move on and eventually do all the continents, and then he'd be a geography guru:). However, our Africa puzzle is way harder than the state puzzle, and it has taken us all time to catch on. Lately, though, Luke has been obsessed with working on it, and so he is really beginning to learn the names of some of the countries. And thus, yesterday, he was able to hold up the Mali puzzle piece and declare correctly that, "Mali is next to Mauritania."

I am just going to be honest and say that I had never heard of either of those countries before I got this puzzle. So, I'm glad Luke is learning them. Because the puzzle pieces don't have any pictures on them (unlike our state puzzle), I have been trying to tell Luke a little bit about each country to help him picture it. Unfortunately, I don't know too much about African countries, and what I do know isn't always great. I kid you not, while talking about Uganda, we actually got into a conversation of whether "we" should have assassinated Idi Amin. Yeah. Why did I even bring him up? I kept things as much on a three-year-old level as possible ("he was a mean leader who killed a lot of people.") Luke immediately suggested that somebody should have killed him. Um...um.....it took me awhile to come up with something there, but we ended up having a good talk.

On the plus side, since my sister- and brother-in-law recently went to Ghana, we have been able to take our Ghana piece and look up pictures of their trip online. Unfortunately, the Ghana piece is subsequently MIA!

2. Luke has been making lots of statements about God lately. One of his perennial favorites is a big sigh, followed by, "I guess we are just going to have to ask God when we get to heaven." I wonder, do I really say that that often? Regardless, Luke uses it all the time. (Sample conversation: "Mama, do trains have radios in them?" "I'm not sure Luke. I would think that they do." "[Sigh.] I guess we are just going to have to ask God when we get to heaven." "Yeah, that, or ask a train engineer.") After he made his Mauritania statement yesterday, he laughed in delight and asked himself rhetorically, "Luke, how'd you get to be so smart?" Then he laughed and answered himself with, "Maybe God just teaches me things." Then he laughed again and said, "Well, that's part of it." I decided not to interrupt his "conversation," but I thought his interchange with himself was interesting. It was clear to me that he was mimicking a conversation that he and I would have.

Occasionally, though, Luke asks harder questions about God. Even his statement yesterday about God not sending rain on Luke's playground day made me pause and think before I responded to his logic. Another stumper came after I read him the story of Moses and Pharoah. After I was done, Luke asked, "Why did God make Pharoah so mean?" And then this morning, he asked, "Why does God not let some kids have food?" (This was after he had complained about his toast, and I told him he needed to be grateful and explained that not everyone got breakfast to eat in the morning.) So, needless to say, we have had many a deep theological conversation lately on the three-year-old level!

3. A couple months ago, Luke was at a Mommy and Me event, and a boy was pretending to shoot something with a gun. The boy's mom saw him, and apparently they have rules about pretend gun play, and so she asked him, "What do we shoot?" I think the answer was something like, "Not people." Luke, however, was completely confused by the whole concept, and chimed in, "Fireworks." Then he suggested, "Stones." (B/c David "shot" a stone at Goliath.) When the other boy's mom told me about the conversation, I couldn't help but be a little bit proud that my son didn't know about shooting guns. However, yesterday, we were in the yard, and we heard an airplane. Luke was desperate to see it, but never was able to, despite the fact that I tried to point it out to him. When he realized that he had missed the airplane, he came walking over to me with a huge stick, and, gesturing to the stick, said, "Aw, man! I was going to shoot it out of the air."

Nice.

So that's a little insight into the mind of my three year old:). I know that it is probably only intriguing to me, but I love looking back at my blogs and seeing where my kids were cognitively at different points in their lives. It is amazing to watch their knowledge and their reasoning abilities expand!

The Amazing Thing

"My eyes are small, but I have seen
The beauty of enormous things."

Today, I was walking across the church parking lot to mop the bathrooms in the gym. I was wearing jeans with big holes in the knees, a solid gray t-shirt, and a navy blue hoodie. My hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and I had very little make-up on. I had just come from my weekly grocery trip, which involved a lot of clipping coupons and pre-planning. And after I mopped, I was going to return home to feed my daughter lunch, pick up my son from preschool, and spend the afternoon working on potty training Anna, getting some cleaning and laundry done, and preparing to teach my Wednesday night lesson at church.

As I crossed the parking lot, I was listening to the David Crowder Band on my ipod, and a song came on that said,

"You make everything glorious.
You make everything glorious.
You make everything glorious.
And I am yours...
So what does that make me?'

This song put into words perfectly what I was feeling already. As I walked to mop floors in my holey jeans and little makeup, I felt glorious. Glorious in my "average life." Glorious in my menial labor. Glorious without having had a shower that day. Glorious in the knowledge that the rest of the day would center largely around cleaning up pee-pee from carpets and hardwood floors as I tried to coerce a toddler into using the potty.

I see all these people around me who are looking for what I call the Amazing Thing. The longing for it is present in all walks of life, but it is especially evident in adolescents and college students. People just have this nagging feeling that life is supposed to be amazing, and that something is going to come along to make it so. Perhaps that something is a great work that they are going to do. Perhaps that something is a person. Perhaps it is a family. Or a place. Or a job. Or something. And as they are waiting for the Amazing Thing that is going to bring them ultimate fulfillment, they pass their time by living an ordinary life. They do schoolwork. They hang out with friends. They have relationships. They get married and have kids. They find jobs. They go on vacations. And many of them slowly become disillusioned b/c the Amazing Thing never comes. Of, if they don't become disillusioned, they decide that the Amazing Thing was a fantasy, a dream, and they give up the quest for ultimate fulfillment.

The truly sad part is that many of these people are Christians, are members of churches, and as such, are surrounded by the Amazing Thing the whole time but don't recognize it. The Amazing Thing has been tamed, has been domesticated, has been relegated to certain hours of the week. The Amazing Thing has been reduced to a list of rules. It has been reduced to practical irrelevance. And so these Christians long for something Amazing that will make their life Amazing. In their mind, if they aren't doing something truly mind-blowing, if they aren't preaching the Gospel to 1,000's of people or writing best-selling books or starting churches on the African savanna, then their lives are not Amazing.

And all of those things are good things. But they aren't, in and of themselves, the Amazing Thing. The Amazing Thing is God, and He is everywhere, not just in mega-church pulpits, or top 10 bestseller lists, or on the African savanna. The Amazing Thing is that we can commune with our All-Powerful Creator every second of every day. The Amazing Thing is that we can be both priests of the Most High (1 Pet. 2:9) and the sacrifice on the altar simultaneously (Rom. 12:1-2). And when that starts to sink in, just a little bit, it makes our lives amazing. It makes them glorious.

I wish I could share with everyone what this life is like. I wish I could help them see how mopping the floor can be a mountain-top experience, how changing a diaper or covering a small face with kisses could be a sacred offering to Yahweh, how folding laundry and making meals for people can be full of meaning, and joy, and profound love. I feel like if people truly understood that planting the kingdom of God in the heart of a child is, in and of itself, more miraculous than preaching a sermon before 1,000's, that truly dying to yourself in your perfectly ordinary day is a miraculous work of God, that deeply loving the person who gets on your last nerve is the powerful work of God's Holy Spirit in you...I think if people realized those things, then they would understand that the Amazing Thing could permeate every part of their life right now. They would realize that truly miraculous things like that happen everyday to those who believe and who serve God.

Like I said, I wish I could make people see what that life is like. But ultimately, words won't do it. I believe wholeheartedly in the power of words, but there are some places that only God can take a person. And so I pray for the teens at our church, for the college students, for myself, and for all my brothers and sisters, that we would all continue to seek God's face, and that He would teach us all more and more how to die to ourselves and how to truly live amazing lives, finding our fulfillment in the Amazing Thing that has been all around us the whole time.

A Non-Crafter's Guide to Crafting

As I read my friends' blogs, I can't help but notice that there are a lot of talented people out there, gifted in all manner of craftiness. Alas, I am not one of them. Not at all. Not even a little bit.

I have mostly accepted that manual skills are not my strong suit. I know that I will never be able to sew or quilt. I mean, if there was one thing high school science lab taught me (and that's a big if), it's that I have a hard time even making accurate measurements. Can you imagine me actually making something that someone is supposed to wear? I have a hard enough time making things that people can eat!

However, there are times when my mom-self feels the need to be somewhat domestic. For instance, I love to celebrate holidays like Valentine's Day. I want to celebrate them well, and make them special for my children. And yet, I'm a bit cheap. Thus, the need for craftiness. As I assembled special treats for my kids to pass out to their Sunday school class, I reflected on my lack of skill and mentally put together a little how-to guide for other domestically-impaired people. I know that you're out there! So, without further ado...

My Non-Crafter's Guide to Crafting

1. If you are a typical non-crafter, you probably have zero creativity when it comes to thinking up crafts. That's okay. Turns out, a lot of crafty people want to share their awesomeness with you and so they post their ideas on this format called "the Internet." Using a simple Google search will thus put you in the midst of more crafts than you could ever dream.

2. When you pick your craft, it is important to pick out something ridiculously easy, and I mean ridiculously easy. It is a good rule of thumb for a non-crafter that whatever you are making will be twice as hard as you think it will be, and will take three times as long. Count on this. Thus, pick the simplest thing you can find.

3. If it is edible, it should preferably only have three ingredients. It is even better if you already have these three ingredients in your possession in order to save money. However, keep in mind that you will never have all the right ingredients or supplies for your craft, even if you think you do. Invariably, you will have evaporated milk instead of the sweetened condensed milk for which the recipe calls. You will have to go to the store and buy stuff. Know that ahead of time. Also, keep in mind that the ingredients list for your craft will make every ingredient seem easily accessible. This will be misleading. When a recipe/craft calls for red mini-muffin cups, for example, do not make the mistake of assuming that red mini-muffin cups are sold within a hundred mile radius of your home. The recipe makes no such guarantees. Also, when your loving husband brings back mini-muffin cups that look like they are decorated with shamrocks for your Valentine's Day project, do not overreact. He will call you "irrational," and you will look like a crazy person.

4. When you select your craft from the Internet, it will most likely be accompanied by a rockin' good picture. Your finished craft will not look like this picture. Come to grips with this ahead of time. Try not to view the picture as a blueprint for the amazing craft/food product that you are going to make. Instead, view it more as the inspiration for the "sort-of-cool" craft/food product that you are going to make.

5. During the part of the craft-making process when everything invariably starts to go horribly wrong, calmly repeat to yourself, "I was a National Merit Scholar. I think I can handle making fudge," until things start to go better. Even if you weren't a National Merit Scholar, I would still recommend it. It's empowering, and it reminds you--and the fudge--who is in charge here.

6. Always try to make crafts/food products en masse. Trust me when I say that everything looks better as a big group. If, for example, you are making wrapped squares of fudge to pass out to your toddlers' Sunday school classes, don't fret if each one doesn't turn out perfectly. Most likely, each individual treat will be slightly deformed in its own special way. However, when you put them all together in a container, they will look great.

7. Remember that you are doing your craft for kids, and they don't care what it looks like. (If you are a non-crafter, kids are the only reason you do crafts.) And if their parents give a second thought to your craft, which they probably won't, they'll just think, "Aw...how cute. She let her three year old son help her!"

So that's my helpful guide to crafting. If anyone else has any hints or tips, please feel free to share.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Bye bye, Snow...

...we hardly knew ye.

2/13/10 8:30 am

2/13/10 3:15 pm

You were fun while you lasted.  Let's not let another decade pass before we get together again!

It's Still Here!

Well, we woke up this morning and saw that the snow wasn't a dream:

 

 

After a pancake breakfast, we bundled up and ventured out into our little winter wonderland:

We walked around to the front yard and met a neighbor who invited the kids to use his sled:

  Luke was interested, but a bit unsure, so he made Anna go first to test it out.  Very cavalier:).

After Anna didn't die, he decided to give it a go!

  The kids were thrilled to stop and take a picture with me, as you can tell!  After tromping around some more, throwing a couple snowballs, making a little snowman, and taking a few face-plants into the snow (Anna), this Southern family decided we were all "snowed out" and went in for some hot chocolate.  And now the kids and Greg are watching Toy Story 2.

 

It has been a fun morning!

SNOW!!

There is a rule in the blogosphere that you have to post about snow. It's the same with trips to the pumpkin patch. If you take your children to the pumpkin patch in the fall, it is required by law to take pictures and post them on your blog. Don't believe me? Check out any blog of parents with small children, and you will see. In 2008, Luke was sick on pumpkin patch day, and I experienced the horror of not having pumpkin patch pictures. It was pretty much like receiving a "Bad Mom" award:).

But however much people in northern states might be inclined to post pics of their kids sledding and making snowmen, that desire is magnified 100-fold in us Deep-South-dwellers. In our case, not only is snow "winter fun," it is also a historic event and perhaps even a miracle (and judging from the Facebook statuses, it is also definite proof to us that global warming IS a myth, but I digress:)).

So, this is my first ever snow post. We had been hearing all day that we were DEFINITELY going to get snow, but in the words of the typical Deep-Southerner, Greg said, "I'll believe it when I see it." And see it we did, around 6:00 pm.

This was my kids' first time to see snow. Luke is literally jumping for joy. Greg is posting something on Facebook like, "The SC Blizzard of 2010 has begun."

I know this picture is waaay blurry, but I love how Luke is jubilantly pointing out the snow to Anna.

Dinner was ready then, so we ate while watching the snow continue to fall, and then we all got bundled up and ventured out in it.

The kids had some mismatched ensembles. This was Luke's coat from Gaga and Granddaddy for Christmas and a hat he got two years ago from a former youth-grouper (Mom, before you ask, we couldn't find the hat you gave him, and yes, we zipped up his jacket:)).

Anna was wearing the GA sweatsuit she had on throughout the day; a hat from the Gymboree outlet; her one big coat, handed down from her cousins in Maryland; and boots that my mom had inexplicably bought her early this fall. I believe her words at the time were, "Every little girl needs snow boots." Now, I'm glad she did!

We haven't had recorded snowfall in here since January 2000. We walked around outside with the same reaction Mike and I had as kids: Let's see what the snow looks like in the front yard! Let's see what the snow looks like on the palm trees! Let's see what the snow looks like down the street! It was so fun. I think Luke summed up our reaction to the snow when he shouted from our driveway, "Thank You, God!"

I know I'll probably take plenty of pictures tomorrow, but South Carolina snow is so ephemeral, I had to take some tonight and post them, just in case we wake up, and it's gone:).