reds and greys

Winter Storm Hurcules is bearing down upon us. Well, it's actually already here. Matt is out shoveling, bless him, and I am still in bed. The little girls are raging and shouting in their usual way. Ermintrude is snotting everywhere. I feel, in my soul, that I will soon be joining her--something about the terrible painful feeling in the back of my throat and the wooly fog in my mind and the sense of immanent death. It really feels to me like I am lying here wearing Alouicious' new helmet, even though I'm not.

They all look so exasperatingly healthy. Even Ermintrude is busting with energy. Wretched children.

We all enjoyed ourselves this last week, even to the point of it being just a little too much. Goose, Cornish Hens, an extra Turkey, a Beef Roast, little sweet peppers stuffed with blue cheese and then wrapped in bacon, Trifle. Yesterday, as I inhaled a tub of gumbo handed to me by a friend, I resolved never to eat anything again for a least three days. But then I split open a gorgeous sweet dripping red pomegranate and squeezed it into my glass of champaign.

All the eating, it's so delicious, but I do feel that if it goes on things will begin to unravel in my life and mind. A diet, or a fast, is what's called for in the first days of the new year.

And a fast would be fitting to mark the sorrow of loss, of grandparent withdrawal. We had such a good time with Matt's parents! Ice Skating, Star Wars, meal after meal after meal, little outings to the store, lots and lots of patient loving attention from someone who is not your mother and who thinks you should be allowed to eat as much candy as you want.

The stark cold gray of winter was genuinely suspended for a brief bright week of inside light and gold and red. For a fleeting moment I wondered if God is calling me to give up complaining about the weather in 2014.

But then I thought, that can't be right. Complaining about the weather is really who I am in my essential being. So for 2014 I'm going to just try to read a second book. I read one in 2013 so I feel up to the challenge of reading another one.

Beyond that, I plan to just take whatever God sends. Snow? I'll try to deal. Suffering? Hopefully that won't be what he sends but I won't say no. Inclinations to Prayer? Those I'll take. More work? Well, that's to be expected. Good rich things? So many good things were given in 2013 and God was so good, I know there will be many good things to accept from his hand.

Happy New Year! 

the picture up above

As I'm considering what might be fun for Christmas, as in what on earth shall I give anyone, I've been arguing with Matt over whether or not we should get another family picture taken. The answer that we have for ourselves, of course, is a resounding NO. Why subject ourselves to the trauma and unhappiness of even one hour of trying to appear to be a pleasant and loving family when I could just knit another pile of dubious scarves and hats. In my mind there is no contest.

But others, i.e. Grandparents and so on and so forth, like the fancy picture in a frame, as indeed I probably shall when I don't have to be in it. And, truth be told, I protest too loudly and too much because I am always trying to get clever blog headliner pictures. Which leads me to the picture above. So many of you have complimented me so much on it, both here and randomly on the street, and I've been meaning for sometime to give credit where credit is due. 

While at the wedding of our beloved youth minister and his gorgeously stunning wife, I manipulated a clever, talented and long suffering friend to point my tablet at us and shoot. 
She, I could tell, was wounded in her soul to use such a device because she has a real camera and takes real pictures and earns real money and yet she deigned to use what was there, arranging us and knowing all about angles and light and everything. 
AND, more also, she magically captured our soul. Go check her out!
It's hard for me to consider getting another picture taken ever. I'd sort of like to get this one blown up and pasted on the wall at church except that that would be weird and wrong. 

Merry Christmas!

now that christmas is over

It seems time finally to post some gratuitous baby/children pictures from the last few weeks.

 Here is Marigold badly in need of a haircut and an attitude adjustment. She picked out the shoes herself--shunning the pretty black patent leather for her favorite red clunker shoes.

 Here is Matt after the Christmas Pageant on Christmas Eve administering libations to people like me who were filled with relief and joy that the pageant went off So Beautifully! I await with eagerness seeing the video (I know someone taped it, surely) and pictures by Andrea Kovac.

 We came home from the service that night and ate three very nice cheeses, a pate de compagne, a gorgeous loaf of bread, olives, those little tiny hot dog things wrapped in pastry, and mussels in white wine with a little bit of onion and garlic. I ate far to much and didn't sleep well, but it was worth it.

Here is Elphine and Marigold. Lately, Marigold has required that Elphine carry her everywhere on her back--everywhere! And Elphine is very nice about it especially as Marigold is a fat chunk of a toddler now, eating everything in sight.

Romulus with his new flashlight, doing what he does best, which is to lie on the floor and moan gently about there being too much work. This from the child who has only one job--gather the clothes off the stairs and put them in the laundry hampers. That's it. Just gather the clothes and, no, don't interrupt or lie down, gather the clothes and carry them into the laundry room and put them, no not on the floor, In the Hampers.

Gladys got a little notebook and a fancy pen which she carries with her everywhere, making little marks that look sort of like letters and explaining them to anyone who will listen. Every time we sat down to watch a movie she began talking and kept on until the movie was over. Strangely, we managed to see five different versions of The Christmas Carol over the course of ten days.

The boys received boys and arrows from the bosom of Santa who ought to be stopped. Elphine has a pretty good steady hand and in this fine clement weather has been working at it a little every day.

This is the Sunday of Advent 4. There are 20 or 30 of these pictures and only two of them turned out.

Here is Gladys in her Christmas dress on Christmas Eve. Everything was wrong. The seam of her tights was not fitting over her toes correctly, her little pantaloons wouldn't stay on the right way, her hair kept needing to be combed. In short, she was a miserable wreck. Nearly didn't participate in the pageant as a result of everything in life being so difficult. Changed her mind at the last moment and turned out to be a perfect angel (bwahaaaaaaa, get it, she was an angel in the pageant, get it?).

These aren't in proper order. Here Elphine, Romulus and Alouicious are all watching Matt showing them how its done.

So everything is finally put away and we've had a miserable first week of school back. I did make some New Year's resolutions, for the first time in a long time. I'm going to seriously read books, hopefully every day, and I'm going to try to recover my love of cooking. My husband has become such a good cook that I'd sort of given up. So last week I made meatballs.

Tomorrow I'm going to make a meat pie and Wednesday I have determined, God willing, to make a cheese souffle. Matt, apparently, has never seen or tasted a souffle (that spelling doesn't look right) so he won't know if its not as it should be. And now it is time to stop this and find out why every single child is crying or shouting.

Merry Christmas!

I'm watching a cool documentary about earthquakes on Matt's new Kindle Fire while he snores loudly. He outdid himself in the way of goose, Brussels sprouts (that can't be right, is that really how you spell that?), Cornish game hens, mashed potatoes, gravy, and the sermon in church. Its the first time I managed to get to church on Christmas day. The girls thought they would come but then changed their minds and ran back home to keep playing. Everyone really played wildly and devotedly for the whole day. Well, I say everyone, but I obviously mean the children. I didn't play. I made bread and Yorkshire pudding and weirdly, decided to flame my persimmon pudding. It didn't flame very much but it was really delicious, if I say so myself. And the table, which I neglected to take pictures of, was beautiful thanks to Matt's mom and aunt.

So obviously I'm just being stupid now. Being that its 12:14 and everyone will wake up shortly and want to know what my problem is and why I'm not rising with a song on my lips and joy in my heart. Merry Christmas! May all 11 days remaining be beautiful for you.

a little gift to you

maniacal laughter

Feel led to blog....can't think of anything to blog about today.
HAHAHAHA
Sorry, I just have Adrian Plass stuck in my head all the time.
I do have lots of things to blog about but more pressing is the fact that Matt's parents are coming in four days and there are a myriad of ways in which I am not a tiny bit ready for this occurrence, among them being my intention to pull off a full week of school, get my laundry room into sparkly order, do a little more painting, finish a bunch of presents, move the girls out of the guestroom into some other bedrooms, and just generally be on top of everything in my life. In other words, it would be deeply irresponsible of me to blog this week, And Yet, I probably will because that's what I do when I am trying to avoid reality. I think I've had it in my mind that this coming weekend is Christmas. Found it a great relief when I looked at the calender yesterday and found this to not be the case.

st. nicholas

St Nicholas visited Good Shepherd this Sunday (does ANYONE have a picture?) and then circled back through town Monday night bringing the four girls very pretty tea spoons (which he got online from a really fabulous place in Canada) and the boys camping knife/fork/spoon pocket implements in their own little cases. St. Nicholas, as usual, fretted very much about everybody being happy and went to bed at midnight the night before thinking that someone would maybe have rather had an actual toy.

And, of course, he fretted very much that he had bought stupid Santa chocolate lollypops instead of  buying a St. Nicholas' bishops mold and making his own chocolates. Also, he was foolish enough to put handfuls of chocolate coins in each shoe instead of carefully counting to make sure each child had the same number of chocolates.

Fortunately for him, after the initial screaming and shouting, everybody was able to settle down and make it fair. And the spoons turned out to be good for eating soft boiled eggs, drinking tea, and having relationships with each other as they appeared to take on the personalities of dolls. And the pocket implements were AWESOME and were good for eating both breakfast and supper, for cutting a small wooden dowel into bits of sawdust and for becoming a more cool person. Eventually, though, some people were just too exhausted to keep eating chocolate, and eating with the special spoons, much as they would have liked to.

 

Anyway the house was well prepared for his visited. Monday we managed to dig some things out of boxes. (WRETCHED baby finger prints on camera lenses.)

 

And snapped our very clever fake pre-lit tree together. As I have shouted to anyone who will listen over the past few weeks, When All The Children Can Walk and Buckle Themselves In The Car And Cut the Tree and Drag It To The Car And Drive the Car then we'll get a real tree. Until then, the magic of Christmas is a fake pre-lit tree. Tuesday morning as I groped my way towards the light, deeply regretting having any children at all, much less six, I said to Matt, "Wouldn't it be great if this was it? If now we went back to our normal lives and there was no insanity in three + weeks?"

He looked at me in abject horror. "Oh, I guess not," I said. But if I was in charge of everything......its probably too horrible to even say out loud.

In conversation with children

Romulus gagging and trying to get through his dinner.
You know this black stuff on top of the potato? Well, that stuff makes some people throw up.
(Nobody is allowed to say they don't like something at dinner, and nobody is allowed to throw up.)

Romulus putting a little world on the Jesse Tree.
God created the world?! Seriously?!
(Like we haven't mentioned this over and over in the last four months! What!)

Alouicious flirting with logic.
You know why I believe Santa is real? Because people don't go outside at night and so it must be Santa that brings presents all at once. He's the only one that's out late.
(He's right. We Don't Ever go outside after dark. Congratulated him on his astute reasoning.)

lilies of the valley

There ought to be a law against any change in routine ever. Nobody knows what to do on this ordinary regular morning because of all the previous days of partying. And I also seem less able to grope my way towards sanity than I was a week ago.

And there's only like three weeks until it all gets messed up again. Its fine for Jesus to say, "don't worry about tomorrow" but I don't think he was accounting for the insanity of Thanksgiving through Christmas. Well, I mean, obviously he was accounting for it, in some spiritual way. But there ought to be some kind of scriptural dispensation allowing certain kinds of people (like me) to freak out for this period without falling into sin. Who's with me?

On that note, we will go do something sensible and calm, like math, and try our very best to push the encroaching madness off to at least another portion of the day. Happy Advent!

Christmas in my heart the whole year long, blast it all

The baby is quietly waddling around the house undoing things--taking all the bottles out of the bottle basket, all the gray square mats out of the workout corner, all the toilet paper off the roll, all the clothes out of the laundry basket, all the kitchen towels out of the drawer, all the parts of the kitchen aid out of the cupboard, all the low lying ornaments off the tree.

Yes, we still have the Christmas tree up. I hate looking at it. I lie on the couch every evening and imagine taking the ornaments off, one by one, and wrapping them carefully and placing them in their bin. I can see, in my mind, where each of ornament will go and how they will fit together. But then, when I stand up, it all fades away and I forget that we have a living room or that Christmas was a month ago or whatever.

So I thought perhaps today, being a snow day, I might take a stab at coping with the tree. However, I've already made pancakes (does anyone else experience abject rage when, after serving up an entire meal at great personal expense of energy and time, 3 out of five children come back TEN MINUTES LATER to say they are "hungry" and what else is there to eat?), bread dough and done a load of laundry. That's probably enough for the whole day, given that shoving all the children in and out of snow pants, boots, hats, mittens and scarves will take about three hours, and then it will be time for supper or lunch or something. But maybe I could start by just getting the bin out to stare out for a few more days.

It might be really nice to have it down by Valentine's Day. Or the Super Bowl. Or the time my mom arrives (next Tuesday, PRAISE THE LORD). On the other hand, maybe we could leave it up "so she could see it" and then I could actually stage that now totally false picture of all the children in their Christmas clothes in front of the tree, followed by the equally false picture of all the children in their Christmas pj's in front of the tree.

Either way, when it all comes down to it, its not about the tree still being up or the baby wrecking the entire house or the children eating all day long, its about the fact that I am probably NEVER GOING TO GIVE BIRTH EVER.

Feast of the Holy Innocents

Matt tells me today is the Feast of the Holy Innocents. I had to preach on this day a few years ago while being pregnant (but not this pregnant) and I must say it was really a rough experience.



On the whole, in the days since Christmas, since I didn't have any time to think before, and am now feeling the full effects of pushing through the week of Christmas on adrenalin, I've been thinking on and off about Mary. Particularly, I've been struck by the timing of her labor and delivery. Obviously, the whole thing was ordained and orchestrated by God--to fulfill the prophets, to have the Shepherds in the right place, etc. etc. But when I think how much time I spend fretting, this late in a pregnancy, about timing, I find it extraordinary that God would time things So Badly for his own mother. (I jest, but only a little.) The very idea of taking a long very uncomfortable trip and giving birth in a place absent all reasonable comfort without one's own mother and family around in support is terrible to me. And yet Mary went ahead and did it. And we can probably reasonably assume that she didn't fuss. And that she trusted God. I am so devoid of this lack of fussing and possession of trust that I can barely look at the picture of the nativity without shame and guilt.

Because from 36 weeks on my whole life is generally consumed with worry and anxiety about timing. There is no good moment to have a baby. You'll miss something--all the children at home will do something interesting that you'll miss, papers won't get graded, something at church will fall through the cracks. I would like to plan ahead for all these eventualities. I would like to be able to schedule and be in control. But the only thing I'm allowed to have control of, when the moment arrives, is the choice to give life, to give birth.

And for those who don't make it, who flinch in the face of this thing, I grieve and morn, and today I pray.

Christmas in my heart the whole year long

Still can't get over how weird The Christmas Carol is and the whole idea that we will all be saved from being ghosts if we just give to the poor.

Still, had a very nice day out yesterday buying five of a lot of things to fill out stockings and other matters. Look like a crazy woman, putting five of everything in my cart--five large oranges, five chocolate Santas, five enormous candy canes, five tiny flashlights, five little puzzles, five boxes of chocolate biscuits, four pens and note books and one tiny doll.

"I have a lot of kids" I said apologetically to the checkout lady as she tried to look uninterested (but I know she was interested).
"When are you due?" She asked in gentle horror.
"In about a month."
"Well, good luck" she admonished.

Luck is not what I need. But I said thank you "in the spirit of Christmas". Today, "in the spirit of Christmas" I'm going to make Persimmon pudding for Christmas dinner and help each child try to secretly make something for some other child. They drew names again this year and they're all obsessed with painting bird houses.

Weekend in Review: Christmas Pageant Edition

First, go read this, which is not related to the pageant but is good for you and then come back.

I've been considering to myself over the last few weeks What it is about the Christmas Pageant. Or to put it another way, What is it about the Christmas Pageant? Why do I get so geared up and run around with so much energy this time of yea?. When you mention the word 'shopping' I get all tired and procrastinating and whiny. When I having something to do on the pageant I leap up to do the next thing and make the next list and am not only On time to everything but even sometimes early. Those of you who know me personally will attest that the five Sunday's of pageant preparation I have trouble making good eye-contact and finishing sentences. I'm always scanning the church horizon for errant children or people trying to escape and not be involved.

I haven't really come up with any decent answers. All liturgy is interesting to me, but the Pageant, I don't know, its just so exciting.

This year, and I do probably say this every year, is particularly wonderful. My Mary is four or five inches taller than Joseph (which is just Fabulous). She has serious backbone and intensity and I think the congregation will be enthralled. My chief shepherd is small and his manner is tinged with belligerent wonder. 'Let us go Now' he says scowling, 'even unto Bethlehem and see This Thing which has come to pass.' Herod is equally captivating. He leans forward, points his finger and shouts, 'Go and search diligently for the child.'

The choir will sing 247 in the Episcopal Hymnal, the Magnificat (if I had a hymnal on me I would tell you more about it), Luly Lulay, and in the Bleak Midwinter among other things. In short, the music should be wonderful.

to be continued as everybody is crying...would that their crying sounded like this...

Merry Christmas

We're all wandering around in a food laden stupor, covered in fabulous toys and, how shall I put it, snot. Either Everyone has a cold or Everyone has allergies. The effect is the same, no one can breathe.

The thing I am Most Grateful for, as I sit here, is that we put all the toys away a week ago and so in the children's rooms there sit cool clean empty shelves in which to stuff all these toys. So far Elphine (see some previous post or other) has only been able to remember two toys that were put away. Plus, they were So Grateful yesterday, breathless even, to receive such beautiful things to play with.

We are about to waddle out to walk off some of the pounds we gained yesterday, but I wanted to tell you what we ate before we go. Matt completely out did himself, and remember, he didn't cook at all five years ago, except Ramen Noodles.

Here's what he cooked
Roast Goose
Roast Duck
Gravy
Mashed Sweet Potatoes
Asparagus

Here's what I cooked
Yorkshire Pudding
Nigella's Perfect Roast Potatoes
Biscuits
Persimmon Pudding

The Duck was also according to Nigella, boiled for 40 minutes, roasted an hour at top temperature. The Persimmon Pudding was from my dad who got it from his mother.

Merry Christmas

Women

Women are so funny. Men are too but I wasn't talking to a man. I was talking to another woman, whose name I don't even know, and this is roughly how it shook out:

her: what are you knitting?
me: a little dolly scarf. I'm really behind. There's no way I'll have this done by Christmas (notice the self deprecation, the subtle put down of myself, doubtless based on my own insecurity and anxiety that CHRISTMAS IS COMING)
her: Oh, I'm totally on top of things. I do everything way in advance. I mailed everything out last Tuesday and my cards out today and I'm baking 10 dozen cookies tomorrow out of this book (shows me the book).
me: Oh, that's very nice. I'd love to be on top of things but it just didn't happen for me this year.
her: Well, I'm a very organized person.

At which point I began to knit furiously and try to examine what about Her would make her feel so insecure a to want to put me down. I so enjoy these little moments of self awareness.

How it Went

Matt has written pretty thoroughly how the hearing went this morning. We took the two oldest with us and they were golden and perfect even though we had to wait for a lot of other cases to be heard.

Now they are shouting and running laps and jumping off the furniture and I am googling, of all things, for a Magical Princess Talking Chair which my daughter unhelpfully saw somewhere and appears to have prayed to Santa for. It is interesting that Santa, apparently, can be contacted spiritually, in their hearts as it were, and not in person (they wouldn't talk to him in the mall, or go near him, sensibly).

Anyway, I have nothing to say about the hearing except that I think it is so funny, and a little weird, that the prosecuting lawyer seems to feel so persecuted by the long process we have put him through, as if it isn't his job to do the work he is doing, and he isn't being payed by the hour. I mean, I'm really sorry we didn't just sign everything over and give up. I think its sort of amazing that they expected us to. But I find it a little whiny that he would take it personally. Also, due to the razor like perception of the judge, it is ridiculous that so many of us (well, I was a baby so I don't count) sat quietly by while 1. women were ordained illegally, 2. the Prayer Book was "revised" and 3. the Dennis Cannon was 'passed'. But, God is patient, even with me, and even if it is 30 years late, better now than not at all. Not that we're trying to take it back, but certainly not to prosper it in all its weird and whiny works. As for me and my household, we look forward to our new life in a new church.
Here's the Video