And you know what? I really was ok with that. Sure, the idea of my husband taking a box of Revlon to my tresses makes me more than a little nervous, but I acknowledge that getting my hair highlighted is completely a vanity thing for me. I am happy to swallow my vanity if it means living debt-free. Bring on the box kit.

My sweet friend Cindy knew very little of this when she handed me an envelope as we were sitting in Caribou Coffee.

“I won it at a raffle, but I don’t color my hair, so I thought of you.”

The outside of the envelope read “Complementary Cut and Color, a $135 value”

I started crying immediately.

Because, no, I don’t need my hair highlighted, and no, I would be by no means ‘suffering’ to go without a professional dye job. But, I recognized this as the extravagant love of my Heavenly Father, and the kind thoughtfulness of a friend.

(a friend that I totally started crying in front of in a coffee shop and I think maybe she got a little misty eyed, too.)

I am leery of the message that if you are wise, faithful, and generous with your finances that God will bless you with financial security or earthly possessions. We are not promised security or comfort. I think what really happens is that because you are living intentionally (being wise, faithful, and generous) you notice God’s blessings - whatever form they may take.

Tuesday night, my blessing took the form of some hair dye, aluminum foil, and a fun conversation with a sweet expectant mama who did an impossibly good job with my color and cut.

{sorry for the blur, but look! pretty hair!}

If you live in the Twin Cities, Meranda at Studio Bodair in Lakeville did a fantastic job on my hair. I highly recommend her!

:: :: :: Let’s chat.:: :: ::

How have you experienced – or given! – extravagant love?

Both hands free, no little feet traipsing behind me, no little heads to check are clear of it’s swing – I open the door.

They’re home, all of them, and I’m here and good grief this is liberating. I eye the cake display. I debate between the lemon blueberry cheese cake and a red velvet cupcake. Or maybe I don’t need either. I am getting a coffee, after all, and dinner is not that long past. But there’s only one piece of cheesecake left and about 4 people in front of me.

I tell myself “If it’s still there when you ring up, indulge.”

From the side entrance, she comes around the back of the cafe. This friend of mine, available at a moment’s (ok, 15 minutes’) notice for a one on one date on a Sunday at 7pm, we have a funny story.

Once college classmates, yet I could not have picked her from many the other 600 people with whom we graduated. Funny to think we once sat on a too-small stage for an entire commencement ceremony some 800 miles from here and didn’t know each other at the time.

We hug.

Then we hum, haw, what drink to order to go with my… I see the empty spot where the cheesecake once was. O well. Medium latte it is, but with only one shot, lest I don’t sleep tonight. She has cocoa, smart choice. I buy.

The barista brings out our drinks and we laugh giddily together; both glasses towered impossibly high with whipped cream.

Corner booth, straight down the wall from the corner booth we sat the first time we met. We slide in.

Then, I had my first baby with me, 4 months old. Walking up she looked familiar, but as we got to talking, it was unlikely that we had ever crossed paths at our alma mater. We probably wouldn’t have crossed paths here in Minnesota either had it not been for the internet.

We’re not allowed to talk kids this time, though and I stated that from the beginning (for my own sake). This is my time. They are home and I am here and I can breathe. I attempt a sip of my latte and get a face full of whipped cream instead. We discuss cars. There’s always something with cars, isn’t there? We discuss houses and real estate  markets and interest rates. We discuss the goings ons of mutual friends. We laugh about… well, I can’t tell you. Slowly, in creeps the topic of theology.

Her email was sweet and appreciated. She said that she lives in the Twin Cities and, ‘I love reading your blog! My husband and I went to Wheaton, too. What year did you graduate?’ I replied, shared our majors, dropped some possible mutual friend names. Then on a whim I asked if she’d ever want to meet up for lunch with a cute baby boy and maybe his mama.

A youth pastor and a fellow alum, I thought her a good person to bounce thoughts off of about a recent sermon at our church. It got under my skin in that way that sermons can when something doesn’t align with your own doctrine, your own understandings and grasping at the mystery of it all.

I make headway on my whipped cream.

She didn’t think I was crazy for asking if we could meet (after she confirmed that she was not, in fact, an axe murderer, of course). Lunch it was, I picked the cafe, she picked the corner booth. We talked life after college, husbands, Minnesota weather, blogging, and I nursed my baby. An immediate friendship was born.

We talk out hypotheticals.

“If God regretted it, then did He have foreknowledge of it? And if He had the foreknowledge of it but knew that He would ultimately work it together good, would He regret it?…”

“And if His big-picture-Will for our lives is to bring Him glory, highest glory, how detailed does His will get? Was there someone else I could have married within His will? Does He care if I live here instead there? Should I wear a blue shirt today?”

Two years later, I still have a 4 month old, but tonight he waits for me at home. My once 4 month old nursling is now a brave, strong 2 year old. Iron sharpens iron as our thoughts roll over and under and through the ways that are not our ways. I love these conversations. Finite minds pondering the infinite.

Same cafe, new booth. Same friends, new depth of friendship. Same God, new understanding.

Funny how God works, isn’t it?

I watch their days mostly from above them.

I lean over his crib and tuck the blanket up around his frogged legs, from above he takes up a humorously small area of his mattress.

I walk into the play room where he is crouched over a recycling truck making sound effects, loading and unloading the bins.

Over the changing table I negotiate with him. ‘The less you kick and cry the faster this will be.’ He looks up at me without a clue what I have just said but he calms, if only a little.

Standing in the bathroom while he’s squatted low on his potty, I cheer him on, talk him through it.

He’s fussy and anxious and tense so I put him to the breast. I look down at his face resting against me and I stroke his hair with my fingers. One of the best views in the entire world.

On the ground in a flash after being told ‘no’, he’s flailing and screaming and O my heavens what do I do with this kind of explosion? I step over him and leave the room.

:: :: :: :: :: ::

I think of God, watching my day from above {and from within, and next to}.

The dinner I stir and chop and serve.

The laundry I bend and load and unload and fold.

The diaper I change, the blanket I tuck, the baby I nurse.

None of them unnoticed.

Sometimes I feel like all of life hinges on a pendulum that swings between good and bad. There are times when things all crash down at once, the world and it’s troubles open up and swallow you whole.

My senior year of high school. My parents’ divorce. An unexpected breakup with my boyfriend. Hurtful, cruel comments from a teacher. Severe migraines. Collapsing during school and taking an ambulance to the hospital. Swallowed by the bad.

I remember a few times in life I have been so surrounded by tangible blessings that I have feared heaven couldn’t be better than this. As a newly engaged woman, I honestly worried that Jesus would come back and I’d have to go to heaven instead of enjoying God’s earthly blessings (apparently I really liked wedding planning?). I worry about that now, too. My heart is supposed to long for heaven. Scripture tells me my citizenship is of another country, that this is not my home.

But our citizenship is in heaven. – Philippians 3:20

And maybe it’s not. But I kind of really like this house.

My mid-twenties. A husband who loves me and whom I love more everyday. Two beautiful, healthy, growing sons. Two! An impossibly supportive extended family. Health of loved ones. The financial ability to stay home. Friends on similar life paths. A passion for a craft. A warm and beautiful house.

When I look around, I start to worry. Is this the apex of the good? Is the pendulum about to swing the other way? This can’t keep up for too long. Isn’t that just so me? To be surrounded by extravagance and yet to be consumed at times by fear? Ridiculous.

So what is it I fear, then, that’s worth this bitter taste despite a mouth full of sweetness? This bad pendulum swing, what does it do? Now 8 years later I can see what my senior year did for me.

I realized first hand the importance of a Christ-centered marriage and family. I left for college without an attachment at home and met my husband to-be within hours of walking on campus. I felt the impact teachers have and wanted to use it for good – I went into education. I had to trust that God would provide me the strength and health I need to complete what he has in store for me.

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him. -Romans 8:28

What is this bad pendulum swing, then? If God works it al for good, which He does, which He has, which He is doing, then is it bad?

Well, yes. There were things that happened to me that were not God’s will. They were the result of my own sin, of the sin of others, and they were fallenness. They were unjust. But they were also good.

Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?” – Job 2:10

Ouch. I do. In the moment, the hour, the day, I resent the trouble of life. These days it looks like tantrums, exhaustion, stubbed toes and unreliable cars, but other days it has looked like my family being ripped in half after 17 years into my life. I kick and I scream and I don’t accept it. Yet it works out for good.

The pendulum swinging. It works out for good. Both sides are good. It swings from the apex of good to the apex of good. Blessings. All of it.

Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea. – Psalm 46:2

When? When will we stop judging people in Jesus’ name?

I breastfeed without a cover. I also nurse in a way that I am personally comfortable with as far as modesty is concerned.

So imagine my surprise when I received an email that asks me to “reconsider [using] a cover when you are in public areas”.

The email’s author wanted to remind me that “This day in age a young boy… isn’t going to walk by you and think wow how great she is feeding her son the natural way,  he is going to think wow a breast!” and that “You are unintentionally putting wrong thoughts into men’s minds.”

Really? Have you seen me nurse my son?

And beyond that, what would this boy think in an art museum? Is it the curator’s obligation to put covers over what is normal, natural, and beautiful because of what someone might think?

Or perhaps is it on the shoulders of those raising the boy to teach him about what is normal, natural, and beautiful?

Even more, as he grows and learns, is it on the boy to learn to take each of his thoughts captive?

While some may think it “immodest” to nurse without a cover in “a world that has been corrupted by sex.”, I believe that I am called to live in a way that is not shaped by the world. No, I am not going to go running down the street nude because society tells me not to, but I am going to carryout my various tasks in life in ways that I believe are honoring to God.

For me, this means dressing each morning knowing that I will likely need to nurse my baby in public. I wear a nursing tanktop so my back and stomach aren’t exposed and a shirt that I pull up so that the top of my chest is covered.

For others a cover is what is comfortable for them. I completely understand that. I am never going to see you nursing with a cover and judge you. Please, extend me the same courtesy.

But if you are feeling like you HAVE to use a cover, like it is the only proper Christian way? Please hear this:

You can nurse.

You can nurse in public.

You can nurse in public modestly.

You can nurse in public modestly without covering your baby’s head.

Recently, as I was nursing OBrother on a bench at the zoo, a little girl sat down next to me and said “The baby is eating!” I smiled from ear to ear and told her that yes, the baby was eating.

Maybe she will grow up to happily and comfortably nurse her babies?

doing a ‘no-no’,

that is, standing on a chair,

do you discipline him?

And what if that child

caught standing on a chair

was doing it in order to reach,

let’s say,

his Bible.

What then?

Then, if you’re anything like me,

you are so proud that you

take a picture

on your phone,

you completely forget about

whatever it was

you were going to say

and you sit down and read together.

Then, your eyes water.

And you embrace the title of

‘push-over’

just this once.

He gets it. He gets a lot more than I know.

So what does he know about the Bible? I could say things to him like ‘It’s the most important book in the world’ or that ‘It’s God’s Love Story’ or ‘Mommy and Daddy use this book to know what to do and how to live’… but would he really understand that?

Would he see it? Does he see it?

No. No, not really. Sure we read stories during breakfast, but to a great extent, I see that as a check mark in my day. Maybe even a check mark in my Christianity. ‘Read the Bible to your kids?’ Check.

But throughout the week, OBaby doesn’t see Mommy sit down and read her favorite book very often (if at all). She’ll pick up the novel she’s reading, the book about theology, the laptop, her phone, her knitting… but very rarely her Bible. OBaby would have little reason to see the Bible as a special and important book because he’s not seeing it modeled.

Ouch.

I am not trying to beat up on myself here, just trying to be realistic. OBaby is at the age where he is absorbing how our lives work – what our routines are, what our perspectives are, what we do regularly. And perhaps it’s not realistic of me to think that I could be sitting in front of my toddler son reading the Scripture on an almost daily basis. There are seasons of life, I get that, and I also get that this is a full-blown chaotic one.

But I find time for other things.

In five minute increments, sure. Pick up my knitting, knit 1 purl 1 knit 1 purl 1 kni… hear a thud, set down the knitting, go console toddler. Send a tweet on my phone, get kicked in the bladder from the inside and rush to the bathroom. Open the book I’m devouring… be asked to help build a tower, set book down. So I have time for things, but in a very weird staccato kind of way. And Bible reading is supposed to be reverent and set aside, right?

Wrong.

I think this is it. This is my obstacle. Something about the chaos of my day feels incompatible with reading Scripture, but really, is there anything more compatible? So I don’t know. I don’t really know where to go from here, but I do know that I need to come to terms with the reality that reading my Bible is not regularly going to be a ‘find a peaceful place, light a candle, take off my shoes’ kind of event for the long foreseeable future. And that’s ok. Reading my Bible might just be a ‘leave it open on the dining room table and make it through a few verses a day’ event for a while.

Whatever it looks like, it needs to be visible. It needs to be an important part of my week and my life so that OBaby can understand that God’s Love Story is for all people, it is for everyday.

It is for him.

A few blocks from the store but not yet to my destination, there she was.

Pushing a wire personal cart through the snowslop on the side of the road. As far on the side of the road as the terrain would allow. The sidewalk must not have been clear because no one would choose to walk along 4 lanes of traffic if they had the option.

She was older. And far from steady on her feet walking along packed snow.

Cars moved left to keep moving toward their Christmas errands, food, gifts, patience. I moved left. And then I heard it. I dreaded hearing it, I kind of knew I would hear it but I hushed the thought and filled my mind with to-dos.

Allison.

Pull over and help her.

Crap. There it was, and I had heard it. No pretending I hadn’t.

But the traffic confusion. But OBaby in the back. But she’s probably just going right there. But she probably has far to go and my destinations are right here. But it would be awkward. But she’d probably say no anyway. (And finally…)

But we’re too far past her now.

4 more blocks, wait in line, medium Chai tea, pay, thanks and merry Christmas!

Allison, maybe she’s still there. Turn around if she is.

OK! OK! If she is still along the side of the road I will U-turn at the next signal and offer to help her. Sigh, feel conflicted, sip my $4 hot drink and adjust the air temperature control.

She wasn’t there. I looked hard. Traffic was flowing fine in the opposite direction, no signs of an older woman unsteady with her groceries (or possessions?) out in front of her.

Now come the truly conflicted feelings. Missed opportunity. Selfish. Unwilling. Unkind. Disobedient.

I sit in that place for a while, eventually feeling Grace but not having yet forgiven myself. Then I find a parking spot and it’s off to get ham, champagne, and patience. Next time, I tell myself. Next time.

Ham, champagne, Christmas, January, early February now.

Costco bound, this time alone and for milk, eggs, shredded cheese, apples, graham crackers. I decide that I deserve a treat. On past the store to the drive-up cafe. Alone time and I am already feeling more decompressed.

Brake lights.

There she is. Pushing her cart, snowslop, 4 lanes of traffic.

And the cars are moving left. My heart leaps.

Let’s do this.

I put on my hazards and I don’t get left. I pull over several yards ahead of her and get out. “Are you headed somewhere? Can I help you get there?”

Her name is Deb and she’s going only about a mile away and she wants to pay me. “You certainly cannot pay me, don’t be silly. Here, let me open the back and I’ll lift in your cart.”

The whole ride to her retired living apartment complex up the road (how often does she walk this route, I wonder?), she tells me that she wants to pay me and that she wishes her children were as helpful as me. She raised them, you know. But they’re busy now. They come, they do, but not often enough for grocery trips. She would really like to pay me, would I take a check? She could run up to her apartment and grab cash if I’d wait.

“Deb, please don’t worry about it. I’m just glad you’ll get there safe and warm.” I pull up to the entrance, open the back and lift out the cart. One last denial of any sort of repayment, a warm hug and I am on my way toward milk, eggs, shredded cheese, apples and graham crackers.

But mostly, I’m on my way toward growing, learning.

And I am thankful for second chances.

{photo credit}

It started out with me deciding to do nothing during naptime. No knitting, no dishes, no blogging, no emailing, just drinking tea and being quiet, looking out the window. {Actually, before that it started with going to Bible study that morning and hearing my dear friend Kelly who blogs at LoveWell say that she used to have time to look out the window.}

Sipping my tea, looking out the window, thinking about that sweet-cheeked boy napping on the other side of the wall. Thinking about winter and how hard it has been on my soul. Thinking about how far I have come and how much more joy I allow myself to see in the everyday. Thinking about how unsure I am of my ability to be a mom of 2. Thinking about God’s faithfulness. Thinking.

My thinking kind of turned into a conversation with myself (wait! don’t run away scared yet!) about where I am, where I’ve been, and where I’d like to be. It was so good to dwell on these things in a level-headed moment and not in the moment when my head finally hits the pillow on a day I feel that I have failed. I was able to be honest with myself, in both the good and the bad, without my immediate situation skewing my perspective.

Of course I am going to give myself a poor mark when I am down in the trenches and can’t see out of the dishes and the laundry and the discipline. And yea, on those days when I actually remember to get the recycling to the curb and manage to have the floor clean-ish by the time DanO gets home, I’m going to have a rosy outlook.

But this was just a Tuesday, and it was a really good place to start.

I wrote encouragement and grace into the letter first, because really, I have been given grace. We all have. I have learned that motherhood doesn’t stop stretching you when you aren’t pregnant anymore. That is when the real stretch marks happen – on your comfort zone, your personality, your tendencies, your patience. And darn it all, I’ve learned a lot in these 18 months. The first point of the letter was to remind myself of that.

In the second part of the letter I talked to myself about my fears. My very real, very specific fears for this new baby and this complete upheaval of our lives. I reminded myself of promises and peace and to take very deep breaths and deep baths as often as possible.

Lastly, I addressed where I could use some more stretching (and I don’t mean my hips). I called out (a few of my many) weaknesses and I told myself to work on them. This is where I felt a wee bit kooky, but you guys, it was so good! So. Good. to be intentional and write these things down: to hope for and set out to work for growth in my life in very specific ways.

And again my friend Kelly encouraged me, this time via email, that David talked to himself in the Psalms (“Be at rest, O my soul!”) so surely I’m not too far off the rocker. (PS: I adore her.)

I folded it up, both pages, and tucked it into my bedside table drawer to find and read to myself in those moments in the morning when I want to give up – when I feel like I have already failed at the day, or those moments in the afternoon when I go in there to hide from life, or those moments at night when I need to remember the new mercies held by tomorrow.

And this, all this, because I looked out the window.

{May you have time to look out the window this week, and the curiosity to follow through with where that leads you.}