I’ve never really understood the whole pancake on Fat Tuesday thing. I mean, I understand the history; but I’m just not that excited about pancakes for dinner. To me it would feel like a fast rather than a feast. So we had chicken stir-fry for dinner.

We didn’t get around to making Anthony a cake yesterday on his birthday so after we returned from his pediatrician checkup this morning the big kids and I whipped up a whole wheat chocolate wacky cake. No frosting or frills. But we put in a candle and sang happy birthday and then Ben helped blow out the candle. And Anthony had a great time eating his first ever chocolate cake.

I say, “If only I had wings like a dove that I might fly away and find rest.
Far away I would flee; I would stay in the desert.
I would soon find a shelter from the raging wind and storm.”

Recently I have felt so restless, so buffeted by raging winds and storms. My soul longs for peace, for a refuge. Right now the desert has a very great appeal. And so to the desert of Lent. The deliberate renunciation and flight into the shelter of the fast where suddenly the choices become fewer and life becomes simpler.

This Lent I’ve got a few things I want to do. First, I’m going to fast from social media. No Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus or Google Reader. Nothing that will push content at me. I will continue to write in this space—but not participate in blog memes like Jen’s 7 Quick Takes and Like Mother Like Daughter’s pretty funny happy real. I want to focus on writing for me and not writing for others. I will check my email—but only once a day. I might visit a few of the blogs that I love but again, I’m going to restrict the amount of time I give myself to read online. I’m going to replace that time with prayer and spiritual reading.

I also have wanted to take up the Forty Bags in Forty Days challenge. I want to declutter and get rid of things we don’t need. This house is too small and we have too many things. More, I have come to realize that excessive worry about these things is troubling to my spiritual health. I want to detach and focus on trusting in God. I want to stop hoarding books and clothes out of a fear that someday we might want them. I want to make this home more of a haven for my family and I’ve realized that my inability to get rid of the stuff is making this home less homely, less hospitable. I’ve got a plan of all the spots in the house that need attention and oh am I eager to get started.

I want to spend more time in prayer. I want to try to get to daily Mass once a week. I want to spend more time reading with Bella and Sophie and Ben (and maybe Anthony too!)

I plan to try to give up sweet things as well just because it always seems to make Easter sweeter if I have been abstaining from chocolate. The few times I’ve not done so it was not fun. It isn’t at all about losing weight. Rather this too is about simplicity and focusing on the good foods we have and not the automatic reach for the sweets when I’m stressed or tired or bored because I need to fill in a gap in my day.

And so here we go…. into the desert.

We should remember that the highest and most important title for Jesus is “Son”. Now to what extent was this designation already linguistically prefigured in the way Jesus talked about himself?... Unquestionably it lies in the attempt to summarize in one word the overall impression given by his life. Now, the whole direction of his life, its root and term, lay in the name “Abba” - ‘Daddy’. He knew he was never alone; up to his last cry on the cross he was wholly directed toward the Other, towards him whom he called Father. This is what made it possible for his true title of nobility to be neither “King” nor “Lord” nor any other attribute of power, but one word that we might equally translate by “child”.

And so we can say that, if childhood holds such a pre-eminent place in Jesus’ preaching, it is because it is so closely linked to his own, most personal mystery: his sonship. His highest dignity, pointing to his divinity, is not, in the end, a power he possesses for its own sake but consists in the fact that he is turned towards the Other – towards God his Father…

Man wants to become like God (Gn 3,5) and must become so. But each time that – as in the everlasting dialogue with the serpent in Paradise – he tries to attain this by freeing himself from the tutelage of God and his creation to rely only on himself and to put himself in this position; each time, in a word, that he becomes completely adult, completely emancipated, and wholly rejects childhood as a state of life, he ends up in nothingness because he rejects his own truth, which is to be dependent. It is only by preserving what is most essential to childhood and the existence of a son, lived first of all by Jesus, that he enters into divinity with the Son.

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger [Pope Benedict XVI]
Der Gott Jesu Christi

I’m short on words today because I can’t stop looking at all these pictures. So I’ll just leave you with a few of my favorites.

What? You should have seen all the pictures that didn’t make the cut!

Happy birthday, my sweet Nini boy. I love you more than I can say.

With the exception of Downton Abbey, which I watch during nap times, I do all my tv watching with Dom after all the kids are in bed. So the shows that we watch are the ones that are mutually interesting to us. Dom isn’t at all interested in period pieces so I keep my Downton Abbey habit to myself, though I have tried to get my mother and sister hooked on it.

1. Once Upon a Time
I’m really surprised at how much I’m enjoying Once Upon a Time. When I heard it was a show about fairy tale characters that was being produced by some of the people who were involved with Lost, I thought it was worth checking out. When I learned it was a Disney product and realized they were going with Disney versions of characters, I became skeptical. I’m not a huge fan of the way Disney adulterates my favorite fairy tales. But I’m glad I gave it a chance. Although there is a distinct Disney flair—such as the dwarves named Sneezy and Grumpy and the prominence of Jiminy Cricket—still, they have taken many bold steps away from the Disney versions of the fairy tales to make characters and stories that are new and unique versions of childhood favorites.

One of the things I loved about Lost was the multi-layered effect they got with the flashbacks (and later flash-forwards and flash-sideways). It allowed for much more complex storytelling and character development.  Once Upon a Time has taken the same idea and uses it to move the story forward on two different levels. First, there are all the story land characters who have been magically transported to the small town of Storybrook Maine where none of them remember who they once were. There a little boy, the grandson of Snow White and Prince Charming, and the adopted son of the Wicked Witch—cleverly named Regina in the contemporary world—who has discovered the truth about who everyone is. There is his mother, Emma Swann, who magically escaped the curse and was raised as a foundling in the modern world not knowing who she was or where she was from.

And then there are all the backstories. Each episode jumps back and forth between Emma’s investigations in Storybrook and the history of one or more of the fairytale characters as they were in their former lives. Here we revisit familiar fairy tales and find all sorts of twists. At first I was a little worried about the revisions. It seemed more of the same trend to make fairytale princesses into “strong” women who don’t need rescuing. Really? Snow White as a Robin Hood sort of character, attacking Prince Charming’s coach? However, it soon became clear that the writers are doing more than knee-jerk revisionism. They are building a world and creating an overarching history that connects all these various characters together. It’s a bold move and some of the stories are more successful than others; but I really love that I never know exactly what to expect.

Every episode draws me in further and just when I think I know where they are headed, there’s a new, surprising twist.

Just one thing irks me a little and that’s the fact that Prince Charming is married to another woman in the Storybrook world. That puts me, the audience, into the uncomfortable position of at once wanting to cheer on his relationship with Mary Margaret (aka Snow White) because they are, after all meant, to be together while at the same time neither of them know that they aren’t committing adultery. I don’t think there’s a very nuanced handling of the adultery issue, either. It seems that adultery really isn’t supposed to be a big deal anymore. We’re all supposed to just see it as another turn in the road. (Kind of like this Washington Post story that Mrgr Pope responds to which claims that divorcing your brain-damaged spouse and marrying a new love is the real way to honor the vow “in sickness and in health.”)

Is anyone else watching Once Upon a Time? And am I the only one bothered by the adultery issue?

2. Person of Interest

I started to watch because it sounded like it might be interesting and because it starred Jim Caviezel and Michael Emerson (Benjamin Linus from Lost), but Person of Interest has developed into one of my favorite shows. The show is built around the premise that Emerson’s character, Finch has built a computer which was built to predict acts of terrorism. As a side effect it is also able to predict violent crime; but the government isn’t interested in that information and so Finch decides to take the law into his own hands, enlisting ex-CIA operative John Reese as his accomplice. The premise is interesting but not enough to hook me in. What does bring me back week after week is how the show presents a complex study of character, of guilt and innocence, of crime and punishment and redemption.

The computer only gives Finch a social security number and no other information with which to stop the crime that is about to take place. I love how the show lives in this tension of ambiguity. You always get to know the “person of interest” first before learning if they are the victim or the perpetrator. So you are allowed to develop sympathy before passing judgment. The title is so revealing because the emphasis is on “person”. You see the full humanity of each person. Even if they are a villain, they are never a monster.

This article captures some of what I like best about the show. Saving the Part of Yourself that Matters Most.

Are you watching Person of Interest? What do you think of the show?

3. Castle

Now Castle is a show that has far fewer pretensions than either Once Upon a Time or Person of Interest. I’ll confess I started to watch primarily because I fell in love with Nathan Fillion’s character Mal in the series Firefly and movie Serenity. Oh how I wish there had been more episodes! But Castle is a fun show in it’s own right. The basic format is a police procedural as mystery writer Rick Castle follows homicide detective Kate Beckett around in order to collect material for his next novel. Sexual tension crackles between them, witty repartee flies. Castle has a brilliant daughter and a flighty actress mother and Kate has two sidekicks, Ryan and Esposito. Not every show needs to challenge me. There’s plenty of room in the roster for light fare and Castle fits the bill.

4. Downton Abbey

Yes, everyone’s watching Downton and I’m no exception. I’m a sucker for period drama, for all the lovely dresses and the big manor house. And Maggie Smith alone is worth the price of admission. Sure the second season has become a little like a soap opera, but I’m still hooked. I’m always far behind everyone else though as I download the show from iTunes and then watch in the little bits of time I can steal here and there when the boys are napping and the girls otherwise occupied. Since Downton isn’t Dom’s kind of thing and I’m always showing up to the online conversations a few days late, I’m rather languishing for someone to chat with about the show. For one thing I seem to be the only one who is bothered by the Bates and Anna storyline. As with Once Upon a Time, I’m annoyed with the fact that I’ve been roped into wanting to cheer for the adulterous couple. I was kind of able to ignore it last season when Mrs Bates was offscreen; but when she showed up it really hit home for me that he’s a married man. For better or worse—and really it does seem to be for worse because she’s a rather nasty character—still, he made vows to her. It was especially egregious when there was a scene with Mr Bates and Anna kneeling in a church to pray right after talking about their relationship. As if the writers were trying to convince me that really everything was ok, pay no attention to the wife behind the curtain, see these are really nice people who pray they aren’t really committing adultery.

Oh there are so many other things I could say, all sorts of good bits of things to mull over; but I have to get to bed. There is so little time between the time the kids go down and the time I must go to bed. And that is the only time we have for watching shows, spending alone time together, and it’s also the only time I have to write with no little people distracting me.

But if you’re watching my favorite shows, please leave a comment and tell me what you like about them. I’d love to have a good chat.

1. So our Valentines Day was very nice, though low key. Dom brought me flowers and chocolates and a card…. and BBQ take-out because I totally lost it over figuring out what to do for dinner. The kids and I made Valentines cards. Or I tried to make one. When Dom came home mine was still unfinished. Not that he minded at all.

Paper dolls, Bella style.

2. After a while though Bella got bored with pasting hearts on paper and began to make her own creations. She brought me an “outfit” that she had made.

A beautiful bride!

A tall yellow dress form with arms and blue shoes. She told me it was a wedding dress. Later she added a blue head and a blue veil that was longer than the dress. Then she drew a face on it and added a heart sticker.

Bride doll with veil

She also made a black bridesmaid with green high heels. And a family, mom, dad, and children that never got heads.

Bridesmaid with green high heels

Sophie’s children

Sophie made some people too, figures cobbled together with little scraps of red paper.

3. Have I mentioned that Anthony is walking now? He’s been making strides for weeks and now he’s probably at about 75-80% walking to about 25-20% crawling. He’s slimmed down considerably, just as everyone said he would, though he’s still a pretty chubby guy. And he’s going to be one on Monday!

4. Today Ben had me reading Curious George backward. He likes to open books to the back. This time he was turning the pages for me while I nursed Anthony. I think he knew it was funny to read it backward. When we got to the title page he made me read it to him twice. And he laughed. At least reading backwards is a nice change of pace.

5. Bella doesn’t just play with beads, she becomes a jeweler making fine jewelry and selling it to support her family. I just love her imagination.

Bella at Ikea

Yet another reason to homeschool. I would be so sad to miss all the Bella stories if she weren’t here all day. I’d be sad not to see her playing so sweetly with her sister. Oh of course they fight; but they really are the best of friends and I love the way they work together.

Sophie at Ikea

Anthony at Ikea

6. This weekend we went to Ikea and bought some more shelves to deal with the overflowing clutter of the school books and art supplies in the dining room and the mess of the pantry. Then on Sunday we moved the furniture. The futon went from the living room to the office and two bookcases went from the office to the living room. How is it possible that both rooms feel bigger and more open? The kids all seem to be enjoying the change. We should probably rearrange the furniture every February.

Dom and Ben at Ikea

7. Today the weather was lovely and after naps we all went to play outside. I pulled Anthony around in the wagon, first with Ben and then with Sophie. Then Ben pulled Anthony. The weather has been so very mild this winter, a nice change from last winter when we were buried for months under feet of snow.

Ben pulls Anthony in the wagon. I couldn’t believe he could actually do it.

This week’s Quick Takes are being hosted by the lovely Betty Beguiles.

[Sorry about the Amazon buttons. I really prefer the look of the images without the “buy now” buttons; but they take twice as long to cut and paste into the blog as the pre-made button. And yes, we do get a little bit of money for the Bettinelli book fund if you buy after clicking through from one of our links. Thank you for supporting our book addiction]

I’ve already packed away the Christmas books so I can’t remember all the new ones we got. I know we did enjoy these two:

The Donkey’s Dream—we didn’t get to read it more than a few times before the Christmas book were packed away; but I love the way the book delves into traditional Marian imagery. The kids might not understand it all; but boy did they get it.

Joy to the World Tomie de Paola, a great collection of some of his best Christmas stories. It duplicates a couple we already have but it’s nice to have them all in one volume. And Sophie really loved the story of Los Posadas, though it was the way that you love a roller coaster or a haunted house, a delicious scare with the devils paired with the reassurance of the familiar Biblical Nativity Story characters.

Georgia O’Keeffe by Georgia O’Keeffe This isn’t a children’s picture book, strictly speaking, but I believe in giving kids books with real art and it is entirely suitable for young children. We’d checked this one out from the library last fall and the girls loved it and I loved it. Even Ben liked looking at the pictures. Georgia O’Keeffe is one of my favorite painters so I love being able to share her with my children. I saw an exhibit of her work at the Dallas Museum of Art many years ago and I still treasure that experience among all my experiences of looking at paintings. There is something marvelous about Georgia.

What is truly wonderful about this book, which I didn’t realize the first time we had it, is that it is a book by Georgia and not one about her. Consider these notes from her Acknowledgements for the original edition:

I wish to thank William Einstein, a painter, who died some years ago, for urging me in the early thirties to write about my painting.

He went away and I forgot about it until Virgina Robertson found the writing a few years ago and encouraged me to continue.

Juan Hamilton has helped me with this book for the last three years and has taken care of many details, from collecting the paintings and arranging the photography to working with the color proofs and layout.

I love that the text is all Georgia’s own words about her art rather than some art critic’s explanation. It is a delightful window into her own thoughts about the paintings and is so fresh and vibrant. Bella loved when I read it to her. She wouldn’t let me stop but kept begging for more and more and more. She said the words helped her to see the pictures and to understand them.

It’s a big book, large full-color panels. Luscious. This copy is an ex-library copy with that nice durable library binding. I don’t feel so worried about the kids paging through it because it’s already stood up to quite a bit and it isn’t new and crisp.

Emily by Michael Bedard pictures by Barbara Cooney
This is a sweet little story about a girl who meets Emily Dickinson. Even though Bella has no previous acquaintance with Dickinson, she loves this picture book. Of course, she’s already predisposed to love everything by Barbara Cooney. Reading this book along with A Snow Story has prompted Bella to begin asking, “What’s a poem?” She thought she knew but both of these books present very metaphorical definitions of poetry, which puzzle her because she is still a very concrete thinker in many ways. Some day soon I need to use this book as a launch pad to get us into more Dickinson. I think Bella would like that very much.

Emma by Wendy Kesselman illustrated by Barbara Cooney A story about a 72 year old grandmother who takes up painting when her family present her with a picture of her childhood village that doesn’t match up with her memory. I love the lesson that it is never too late to learn a new skill. Bella, Ben an Sophie, all seem to like this book. Recently they’ve been playing at being artists and I think this fits into that game nicely.

Joan of Arc: The Lily Maid by Margaret Hodges illustrated by Robert Rayevsky, a beautiful version of the story of a medieval saint. I love the medieval feel of the illustrations. It’s fun for us because I was able to point out that the girls’ beloved St Therese once dressed up as St Joan. So far she hasn’t become a part of Bella and Sophie’s playing; but I’m sure that day will come.

Saints Lives and Illuminations by Ruth Sanderson. This volume focuses on saints from the first centuries of the Church. (It does include Constantine, who is considered a saint by the Orthodox churches but not, I believe, by Catholics.) Many of these saints don’t make it into children’s saints books very often, so it’s a nice mix. Includes St Nicholas, St Lawrence, St Helen, St Ephraim, St Catherine of Alexandra, St Benedict and Scholastica, St Mary of Egypt, and many of the Irish saints. I love it. The illustrations are gorgeous and it’s a book worth lingering over. 

Psalms for Young Children by Marie-Hélène Delval. I was of two minds about this book. On the one hand I know from personal experience that children are able to appreciate the beauty and grandeur of the psalms without any need to translate them into simpler language. My children do listen as I pray the psalms and I can tell that the psalms speak to them. They speak to their hearts even if they don’t understand all the words. On the other hand, I do like the simple paraphrases of one or two main ideas from each psalm. They choose verses that speak to children’s various needs in prayer and I think provide a nice entryway for children into making their prayer into a real conversation with God, expressing their fears and desires, vocalizing their praise and petitions, in short the full range of human emotion and experience. So I would say that this book is not a substitute for introducing children to the richness of the book of psalms, the Church’s universal prayer; but a good supplement to such an introduction. Just as when teaching Shakespeare, I might have children read a simplified prose version first before diving into Shakespearian language, I see these versions as a way to highlight some of the main themes of the psalms in a plain, everyday language any child can understand.

The Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen illustrated by Kevin Hawkes A sweet story about a lion who loves story time at the library. Indirectly it’s also a story about rules, especially about the times when it is necessary to break the rules. Also about admitting you are wrong and seeing the good in people who are different. The pictures are magical, reminiscent of Robert McClosky’s Make Way for Ducklings. Ben, Sophie, and Bella all love it and request it; but it seems to especially speak to Ben.

Little Blue Truck, this book was one I picked up at Target on a whim to fill out the gift roster for Ben and Anthony but we have all come to love it. One of those rare books that has a rhyme and rhythm that is delicious to read, with plenty of fun animal sounds. It’s the story of two trucks: a friendly little blue truck who befriends all of the animals, and a too-busy, stuck-up dump truck. The dump gets stuck in the mud and Blue gets stuck while trying to help get him out. Then all the animals who couldn’t be bothered to help the rude Dump come to Blue’s aid. Despite their collaborative effort, the animals can’t budge the trucks until the little green toad saves the day. A perfect book for my truck-crazy boy.

Five Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed board book by Eileen Christelow. Ben loves to jump on my bed while chanting, “No more monkeys jumping on the bed!” So this board book was a no-brainer.

Shark vs. Train I’m not a huge fan; but I seem to be the exception. Ben and Sophie and Bella all seem to like this one. Ben and Sophie more so than Bella.

Rose of Lima by Mary Fabyan Windeatt

Actually not a picture book but a chapter book. Rose is my confirmation saint; but sadly this is the first book I’ve ever read about her. Bella and I loved it and it gave us much to talk about and think about. Today Bella was pretending to make a stations of the cross int he back yard just as Rose used to do in her garden. It has fired Bella’s imagination and that is the best sign of a book that has done it’s job. I’ve been inspired to dust off a full-length biography of Rose that has been on my shelf for years. It was interesting too how much Rose’s life was an imitation of St Catherine of Siena. I’m still slowly nibbling away at Sigrid Undset’s biography of Catherine and so was able to appreciate that aspect of Rose’s story even more. I’m finally really seeing the influence of my patron saint in my life, though it took having daughters who name their toy camels Rose and Lima before I really appreciated the first canonized saint of the new world.

Here’s what I said about the book in October. (I meant to write more but life happens. Right now I don’t seem to be able to grab much writing time. I’m hopeful that as everyone mends things will look up; but right now things are still a bit crazy.)

Wish You Were Here: Travels Through Loss and Hope by Amy Welborn

I feel like nothing I can say will do justice to this book. It is so intense so personal, so that at times—most of the time—it feels like eavesdropping. But it is beautiful, a treasure I am so profoundly grateful that Amy was wiling to share this journey with us.

The book is very easy to pick up and put down, which is good because it’s a book I want to nibble at rather than gulp. To swallow it all too quickly, to wolf it down as is too often my wont, would be a terrible shame. This is a journey to savor slowly. Partly because sometimes, sometimes it’s a little bitter. Mostly, though, because it is so beautiful and rich.

The short sections, each one like a cut facet on a gem, sharp and focused, jump back and forth. Now you are in Sicily, now on the other side of the Atlantic back at home. Now you are in the “present” on a curious journey through an ancient land, full of sun and shadow, sparkling ocean, vivid architecture, curiosities and personalities at every turn. Now you are wandering through the halls of grief, startled to find death just over your shoulder. Faith is everywhere, elusive, beguiling, always the end of the journey, glimpsed at every turn.

Here’s what I wrote in the comments over at Reading for Believers (which Betty Duffy elevated into it’s own post):

I’m trying not to be all gushy and fangirl about Wish You Were Here. Amy’s was one of the first ever blogs I read and I’ve always felt she was sort of a kindred spirit. And I remember reading what she wrote at the time of Michael’s death and her blog posts about Sicily so I sort of feel like I’m approaching the book with a very strong predisposition to love it. And maybe there are funny echoes in it for me in that I’ve never really wanted to go to Sicily very much until I married a man who is half Sicilian and then we discussed it as our dream honeymoon but couldn’t actually afford to go. So there is that layer of the emotions from my own marriage weaving throughout.

All that said, I do think its a magical (I’ve not read Didion’s book; but I can already tell you this is completely different) sort of mash up of travel memoir and a very Catholic exploration of grief. She does both genres so well but the way she slips seamlessly from one to the other is sort of breathtaking. (See, I’m gushing.) Just to do a reality check I read a chapter to my sister this evening while we were making dinner. Oh even better than I thought. The prose is lyrical but down to earth. The imagery doesn’t beat you over the head but somehow the details of every tourist stop are marshaled so that you are constantly staring death in the face. Most of all what strikes me is how faith informs everything. It doesn’t make death and grief easy, doesn’t make it go away. Just that it is the medium in which they happen.

I’m still reading, still trying to get a handle on it. Hopefully a fuller review will follow. But I won’t make any promises because, well, life happens.

1. Well, now that Anthony has been on antibiotics for a week and is feeling chipper again, Ben has an ear infection. Sigh. After several nights of crying at bedtime and being up in the middle of the night, he finally admitted it hurt and agreed to go to the doctor.

2. This morning I called the pediatrician and got an afternoon appointment. When I told Ben I’d take him to the doctor after lunch, he said, “My belly’s full.” So I tried to explain that his appointment was in three hours and not dependent on when or whether he ate lunch. No dice. “I want to go somewhere,” he insisted. I repeated that we’d go in about three hours. A few minutes later he appeared in the kitchen wearing his boots and holding his coat. Persistent little fellow. It makes sense in his world. We’re always telling him if he gets his boots and coat we can go. Thus, he’s got his boots and coat, we can go, right? So we went for a walk to get out of the house while Anthony slept and my sister stayed with the girls.

It turned out to be exactly what I needed. Fresh air, sunshine, a long stroll at a two year-old’s pace with a sweet little hand tucked in mine. I haven’t been able to get much of a break in the past few weeks with all the sick kids. I thought I desperately needed some time alone. A lot of time alone. But perhaps a walk with Ben was even better medicine for what ailed me.

3. Sophie began to cry as we were heading out the door for our walk, “I don’t want you to leave! I don’t want you to leave!” She’s still feeling pretty rotten. (In fact she claimed she had an earache but the doctor said they looked fine.) While we were walking I found a tiny pine cone and gave it to Ben. He was delighted and held it in his mittened hand for a minute and then declared, “I’m going to give it to Sophie. To help her calm down.” So sweet and thoughtful. My heart is melting.

4. Sophie tells me that Miss Irwin is going to fall off the holy mountain and die. Bella corrects her and tells me that it is called the Mountain of Death. And now Bella tells Sophie that she has to be the mean person who pushes her off the mountain. And Bella asks if Sophie will bury her while she’s lying on the ground with a burial sheet. Evidently Miss Irwin has graduated from firefighter to martyr. (Of a sort?)

5. Bella: “What kind of air is in a balloon that makes it float?” (The lady at the grocery store gave Anthony a free Super Bowl balloon on Monday.)
Sophie: “Affection.”
Bella: “No, it’s helium.”

6. Sophie’s most recent song has been stuck in my head: “Boo didda didda dadda, boo didda didda dadda, on Patrick Frank Day.” She says it means Christmas is coming. (To something very like the tune of “Did you Ever See a Lassie?”)

7. Ben found the train pajamas with the hole in the toe that I hadn’t got rid of fast enough and put them on tonight: “There’s a hole in my jamas! I want somebody to cut the hole off! Cut the hole off!”

Karen Edmisten’s new book is shipping early! I got my copy yesterday on Tuesday (but then on Wednesday Anthony spiked a fever and I’ve been holding him almost non-stop while battling his ear infection ever since and so I was unable to finish this post.)  I am honored that Karen chose to include a short poem I wrote. Although I didn’t write it directly about my own miscarriage, that experience obviously informs the piece. I wrote it when I was asked to pray for a mother who had recently lost a child to SIDS. But at the time I felt funny about publishing it. It seemed too raw as a response to a stranger’s grief. Then I remembered it almost a year later when a dear friend had a miscarriage. I went back and re-read it and found that it was good. And true. So I published it. I have been told by many women that my little poem has brought them comfort. Now, nestled inside Karen’s gem of a book, I have hopes that it will reach many more than it could tucked away here in my blog’s archives.

But oh I was going to write about Karen’s book. Did I mention what a treasure it is? I thought I was done grieving our baby Francis but as I’ve perused these pages I have found my tears flowing again. In just three weeks the anniversary is coming—five years since that terrible day. And yet that date, February 25, lies just between two wonderful anniversaries that have since joined our family’s calendar of celebrations: February 20, Anthony’s birthday, and March 4, Sophie’s birthday. I think God knew what he was doing when Sophie was due almost a year to the day from the day I lost Baby Francis. This is the way the world is, death and life so intertwined you can’t pull them apart. Had Francis not died, I’d not have my Sophie. It is a grief and a joy both. And now Anthony. It is a miracle when you consider that after the miscarriage I was told I had cancer and was going to have a hysterectomy. I went through such a dark week, thinking Bella would be the only baby I’d get to hold. And then there was Sophie… and Ben… and Anthony.

Life after miscarriage. Sometimes I feel like I don’t belong in that sisterhood of grieving mothers because mine has been such an easy cross when I know so many mothers who struggle so under such a heavy weight. But I do know that whenever I hear of a mother—or father, let’s not forget the fathers—who has lost a baby, I know my heart now reaches out in a way I don’t think it could have before.

And then there were these words, that Colleen penned recently after losing yet another of her babies:

But I hold in my heart the greatest of all consolations, the hope of heaven.  For I realize, that even when my body is well past the age of bearing babies, even if I should live until I am 100, always, I will be an expectant mother, until the day I hold my babies for eternity.

I love that. I will always be an expectant mother. There is still that eagerly awaited little one, the one my arms ache to hold and that hope of a longed for meeting in heaven.

I hope that After Miscarriage finds its way into many hands, many homes, many hearts. The stories, poems, prayers and memories Karen shares are a beautiful balm for grieving parents because they are full of the healing love of Christ.