Sick in July, and Other Questions for God

We are recovering from a bit of nasty over here. All three kids came down with some version of, as Thea calls it, "the pukes."

As in (to her terrified VBS volunteer): "I wish I would have been here yesterday when you had popcorn for a snack. But I couldn't because I had THE PUKES."

As in (to the cute check-out girl at Whole Foods who has alarmingly large ear lobes after a piercing experiment): "I helped Mommy pick out that apple you're holding. I can touch all the apples today, but I couldn't yesterday because I was home with THE PUKES. Apples don't taste good when you have THE PUKES."

As in (to our neighbor who was out to walk the dog and got a big hug from Thea en route): "I've missed you! Too bad THE PUKES have kept me inside!"

So we don't have many friends left, and I murmur "Lysol! Purell! Clorox!" upon waking out of deep and interrupted slumber. I also can do laundry like a mad woman and at all hours.

Laundry is a great distraction from theological wrangling.

One of our children, who shall remain nameless because this child prefers to be blogonymous (so catchy, this made-up word! Anonymous + Blogging mom who hasn't learned discretion = blogonymous! I love it!). My blogonymous offspring prefers to talk theology when gripping the toilet bowl at 3 am.

As in: "Mom, whyyyyyyy does God let us get sick?"

And: "If our world is broken, why doesn't He just fix it and not let me throw up?"

And: "Why did Adam and Eve HAVE to disobey God? And give me some examples of how YOU sin."

I'm not joking. And I want to point out that at these moments, I am the only parent in the room. Marc prefers strictly daytime theology talks.

I do my best, people. I am not equipped to solve the world's ills or to tease out The Meaning of Suffering at my best time of the day, much less while the world sleeps and my Crank-o-meter is on a dangerous upward climb.

At around 4 :15, I suggested that God was, in fact, answering this child's prayers and that He was, in fact, healing the wonky belly. "Your body is getting rid of the ick," I said. "It's flushing out the bad gunk and getting your belly back to its healthy self. I mean, what would happen if you weren't able to get rid of the gunk? What if your immune system couldn't attack the gunk and the gunk just stayed in there FOREVER?" 

Silence. Perhaps a wee bit of fear at the size of my bulging, blood-shot eyeballs and the wild mane of lioness hair I was sporting. And my need of a bra while changing the sheets. Again.

Then, "Is not being able to throw up an actual medical problem or are you making it up?"

And so it goes.

I know God is good and that He hears every whiny, pitchy prayer we all utter, even at 3 am. And I know He knows when we have THE PUKES. And while my science may be sketchy, I'm grateful for healing, in whatever form and at whatever time of the night. 

But if you want the details on how it all worked out, find Thea. She'll tell you ALL about it.

Three Cheers for the Cambridge Mama!

Can we get an amen and huzzah and nice-bloody-work for this woman?

Photo Credits

Not only did Kate Middleton-come-Duchess-of-Cambridge become pregnant while the whole world speculated on her ovarian activity, and then carry that pregnancy past her due date while the whole world stalked her, she then birthed the child and had to appear on the steps of the hospital FEWER THAN 24 HOURS LATER.

I would like a moment of silence.

Plus, she has shiny hair and a pleasant smile, two things that were noticeably absent from my appearance in the first years days after birthing. And how about the pooch?!?

Photo credits.

I wanted to break into "God Save The Queen" when I saw this, or at least a Beatles medley. Such courage! Such grace! Such a normal, postpartum pooch! Praise God for this woman!

If only she'd been around as a beacon of light to me in my own postpartum moments. After Ana, in particular, the truth came heavy (ahem) and hard. I remember humming as I packed my hospital bag. First, please note I PACKED a hospital bag. As opposed to the second and third times around when I threw a pair of underwear into the front seat and shrieked at Marc, "HOW DO WE DO THIS AGAIN?!?" Somewhere we have a photo of Marc getting ready for Mitchell's husband-coached, natural method child birth. I promise that in said photo, Marc is reading the coaching guide IN THE BIRTHING SUITE. We are overachievers.

K. So I hummed as I packed my hospital bag for Ana, so chipper that in a matter of days, I would again fit my svelte and newly un-pregnant bod into a cute pair of jeans that had fit baggy and loose before becoming pregnant.

My last day in the hospital, I could fit one calf into the jeans and I nearly had to resort to using Marc's Swiss army knife to force my sausage-calf into that little hole, DANG IT. So I applaud with joy Kate's unwillingness to force her body into Spanx and instead to even display to the entire world what a real woman's body looks like after giving birth.

Bless her pea-picking, honest, British heart. May Prince George Alexander Louis sleep through the night before the summer is over, and may he be very clever with letters by kindergarten as writing that name will pack one royal punch.

Photo via Reuters

Did anyone else have trouble fitting into the hospital outfit? Or were you all much wiser than I and went home in the maternity clothes you wanted to burn? Smarties, all of you.

Rocking Out

Remember pop music? Yeah, neither do I. But I did watch the Grammy Awards show this year, which made me FEEL like I know pop music. I didn't exactly recognize 98% of the artists sitting in the crowd in their astonishing fashion choices. I looked for some fashion highlights to post here, but most of the humdingers involved copious amounts of flesh, cleavage, and sequins in questionable places. Trying to keep things PG around here. I should, though, point you toward this man. 

Photo credit.

His name is Red Foo. Much like my name is Red Foo. In other words, we both made up our professional names. But at least I didn't use Foo. Or Foo-Foo, if you've read Stretch Marks. But I digress.

I heard a few songs that were painful, some that were funny without intednding to be, and lots of good stuff. These two are Goyte, the people who got Record of the Year.

I, for one, was unaware we give awards to Record of the Year. Did you know we do this? One record (record?!) that just jumps to the top of the universe for the entire year? I admire the commitment here. One record, best of the whole year. I can't ever really choose my favorite song of the AFTERNOON, much less the year. But these people got it. And I like their song. I also liked it when the girl of the group received her award and she fell all over herself in pure, childish joy, not because of the Record of the Universe award, but because Prince was the one who presented it to her. Prince, who is a musical genius but who is also roughly four feet tall plus hair height. It was an awesome moment.

Today is a lovely summer day, and I think we should all acknowledge our hipness and the Record of the Universe by listening to Goyte's song with the volume turned up. This version is so fantastic. I recommend watching it and then having your children reenact it. Thea likes to be the love-tortured girl, Ana likes to be the male lead who opens his mouth off its hinges when he sings, and Mitch likes to be the guy in a hat who prefers not to look at the camera. 

Some people are talented enough to homeschool their children. I give my children the gift of pop-song-recreation. Our children might end up working for yours, but we all know who will be the life of the company Christmas party. 

Turn it up!

Listening Up in the Minivan

Anybody else putting on the miles in the minivan this summer? 

Listen, I didn't ASPIRE to own a minivan. I didn't exactly aspire to own any particular vehicle, as cars are not at the top of my Most Interesting Things List. I very much appreciate a car that runs well, has a functioning radio, cools and heats at my will, and has power steering and power brakes. I have owned cars that do not fulfill these criteria, and I have had periods of my life and travels during which I owned no car at all. So cars are awesome and practical and fast.

But the minivan. Our best friends, Ryan and Betsy, have openly and frequently mocked us for "selling out" and buying a minivan. I'm not sure what this means, but I suspect it has to do with not looking as cool as they do in their Honda Pilot. This is true. Ry and Bets are also cleaner people, which means that when they open their doors after a ride in the Pilot, newspapers and water bottles and hairbrushes and stuffed zebras don't fall out. They also maintain clean cup holders, vacuumed floor mats, and windshields that haven't developed that curious grime that accumulates after five unclean people and a zebra breathe in an enclosed space over a period of time.

Here's the catch: Ryan and Betsy are missing out. Minivans are awesome. They are huge and can tote around thousands of children and their friends. They have sliding side doors that are perfect for people embarking and disembarking all on their own. They have removable seats that make it possible to haul a twin mattress, three end tables, two suitcases, a rug, and three young children, all before even touching the front two seats (true life, last weekend). And minivans have a certain je ne se quoi…Glamour? Elegance? Panache? Or dare I say, swagger? 

I love our minivan. I'll probably still drive one when I'm a granny, since my kids will need someone to haul their dining room table and stuffed zebras around. I'm a helper that way.

If you are spending inordinate amounts of time in your vehicle, might I recommend some children's audio books to break up the tedium? These are all delightful and will be sure to distract your children from poking each other's eyeballs with Pixie Stix or from plummeting into Whinese Zone. Whinese is a horrible, easily acquired language that can drive parents to dangerous swerving and wild arm-groping into the back seat for a leg to squeeze. Whinese can produce vows screamed out the window at 75 miles per hour that invoke the fury of an Almighty God, thunderstorms, and promises never, ever to take a road trip again.

These are all hypothetical situations. But in case you have hours in the Swagger Wagon in front of you, might I suggest great stories, wonderfully told?

1. E.B. White.

I love this man. He wrote some of America's most beloved children's literature, and if you are super smart, you will find a way to listen to Mr. White reading his own work. We have listened to Charlotte's Web, and I may or may not have laughed, cried, and shook my head at the beauty of his story, told in his voice. We are now listening to his reading of The Trumpet of the Swan, and I feel like I'm digging my toes into warm sand every time we turn it on. Pure delight. If your library does not own copies of E.B. White's audio books, request them ASAP or, even better, donate them as a gift to all the story-hearers in your community.

2. Clementine.

The Clementine books are fantastic and the audio versions are pure fun to hear. Sara Pennypacker is the actress who reads these books, and I feel the very least we can do is listen to a person who goes by that name. Even though Clementine is a girl, my son enjoyed hearing her escapades as well. Also, while Clementine is spicy and busy getting into trouble, she is not mean or snarky. So your kids don't end up sounding like bad sitcom impressions when you turn her off (ahem, Junie B. Jones).

3. Mrs. Piggle Wiggle.

The woman will fix all your parenting issues, teach your children manners, and she will entertain at the same time. If I could have Mrs. PigWig for dinner, I would. Since that's looking unlikely, I happily press PLAY and listen to how she fixes Donny, Suzy, and Winifred all up and saves them from uncertain futures of chewing with their mouths open and general hard living. So satisfying.

4. Adventures in Odyssey.

Buckle up. If you are new to AIO, you will find it shocking that there are a gazillion of these from which to pick after its long and still-going-strong run as a weekly radio program. I can understand if the words "weekly radio program" make you think of sitting by the fire during the Great Depression and waiting to hear the voice of President Roosevelt, but I assure you, AIO peeps are masters at great, Christian-rooted storytelling for kids and families. Some of the episodes can tend toward saccharine, but in general, this is fantastic family fun. My kids are mildly obsessed and consistently put Odyssey on their birthday and Christmas wish lists.

5. Mercy Watson books by Kate DiCamillo. 

DiCamillo wrote Because of Winn-Dixie and The Tale of Despereaux, so she's pretty much story-telling special stuff. Mercy Watson is a pig who loves hot, buttered toast. I can't think of a better way to build a story, or a meal, for that matter.

Anyone else listening to stories in the Minivans of Love? I'd love to hear. Adult literature also welcomed, though I might need to wait for a few years (or good earphones) to pull that off…

What's on your playlist?

Oh, Say, Can You See?!? No, Really! Right Over There!

Happy Fourth! What a great holiday. No need to shop, unless you include going to the store for brats and the fixings for a root beer float. No pressure on making the best dessert or the loveliest centerpiece. Heck, you don't even need to shower if you don't want to. Just jump in a pool, lake or leaky hose and that's close enough.

I hope you have the chance to massacre sing the national anthem today. I will be forcing my children to listen as Marc and I attempt two-part harmony and inevitably wind up in a different key and laughing so hard, our root beer float escapes our nostrils.

In a land far, far away, I sang the national anthem before a basketball game. This was a defining, disheartening moment of my life and one which I hope never to repeat. I sang it a cappella, which sounds simple and moving, right? No. No, it was not. It ended up more on the screechy side of moving. Screechy and amplified in a gym. 

Never again.

The one redeeming attribute of that performance was that I remembered the words. This earns me some points, I feel, since the song does include the words "perilous," "gallantly," and "ramparts."

In retrospect, though, the words should have been secondary. I should have taken a page from Miss Maya Rudolph. B to the R to the A to the V to the E!

Happy Fourth and happy antheming! Break out the sparklers and sing loud, sing strong, and sing whatever words you can remember!

Hannah Mae The Courageous

Last weekend we traveled north to attend the best birthday party ever. It was for Hannah.

I, for one, am so glad I get to write this story instead of speak it as I can't seem to talk about Hannah without going into the snort-cry. We are long-time friends of Hannah's parents, Sandi and Dave. Sandi and I used to teach together, back when we were young, spry, and one of us was sporting an unfortunately short haircut. I taught with my butch cut Sandi while she was pregnant with Hannah, and I was forever scarred with envy when she was a billion weeks pregnant and still able to fit into her jeans with merely the help of a rubber band to close her zipper. I love Sandi, even though she's skinny, beautiful, tall, and organized. This is true friendship.

We met Hannah during her very first days on this earth. I have a photo in a safe somewhere of me with the butch cut, holding baby Hannah. This photo shows the cuter half of that moment.

When Hannah was about four months old, she started having seizures, and after a very long road with gut-wrenching hospital stays, doctors appointments, long nights, and scary moments, Hannah was diagnosed with a very rare seizure disorder that typically takes the fragile life of a baby by age two. This month, Hannah turned thirteen.

Oh, how we love her. How I love watching her parents nurture her with grace and patience and the ferocious love of people who truly know Jesus and His bone-deep joy.

How I love watching her siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents embrace Hannah, reminding her in every single moment how much she is loved and prayed for and admired.

How I love learning from the McDills how to imitate God and His stubborn caretaking of our hearts, there always to hold our hands, pick us up, cradle us, wait for our wholeness.

How I love it that Hannah cried with joy when her baby sister, our goddaughter, Faith, was born.

How we watched, prayed, and waited with full and heavy hearts as Hannah's dad, Dave, served in Afghanistan. Sandi served her children faithfully as she waited for his homecoming. (Apparently, hyperventilation into a paper bag, my coping mechanism of choice, did not appeal to Sandi. Did I mention she is also tall and thin?) For the record, Dave's send-off ceremony was one of the most wrenching and beautiful experiences of my life. I had to be taken out on a stretcher due to my uncontrollable sobbing, but it was worth it, particularly when Dave returned safely 15 months later.

How I love seeing Hannah communicate with blinks and and facial expressions in a way no doctor predicted she could. I love it that Hannah proves everybody wrong.

Dang it all, I'm deep into the snort-cry again. 

Happy birthday, sweet Hannah Mae. You are a tangible, real-life expression of the beauty, creativity, and fierce love of God, right here among us. We love you so much, it hurts. 

For more on the McDill family, please see this fantastic article, recently published in the Colorado Springs Gazette. 

Pool Time and Other Dangers

I really do love me some pool time. Am I wrong to say such a thing, in this day of skin cancer awareness and limited sun hours? Well, I do. I'm not saying I bake out there until my epidermis flakes off and  my hair catches on fire, but I do love to feel the sun on my pale Midwestern bod and to remember again that God loves me. 

This is in sharp contrast to a certain Norwegian who lives among us and who has been known to marvel at his BLUE skin. Skin so white, it's BLUE. Marc runs to the shade (sprints) after fifteen minutes, but I just slather on some more 50 SPF and count it good. In a not-so-distant future, people might start asking me if I'm Marc's mother, but at least I will be fully fortified with Vitamin D and happy summertime memories. That must count for something.

Photo credits

Which is good, because my recent pool visits have me counting lots of other ways I'm losing. First, I'm not sixteen. That, my friend, is very, very noticeable at the pool. Lots of people at the pool ARE sixteen, and they have the abs to prove it. And long, luscious hair which requires more than a quick shampoo every three days. Ahem. And they paint all their toenails in one sitting, which has a startlingly beautiful effect on one's feet. And they have perk in perky places and lift in lifty places. 

They are something to behold. 

I feel shocked, really, when I remember I passed that mile marker over two decades ago. The perk has parked, the lift has lowered. And now I wear a skirt when I'm swimming. 

Seriously. This is a blow to any woman's ego, is it not? I wear a skirt. Sure, it's short and cute and in a cute paisley print, but it is absolutely, undeniably a skirt. One short stop up from this.

Photo credits

Skirts are awesome for dipping, throwing, and rescuing young children in the water. They prevent innocent sun bathers from seeing middle-aged groceries and other dangerous possibilities. And they are very practical for women who spend an inordinate amount of time failing to understand how to tighten and loosen goggles. (Am I alone in this? Do your children's goggles make you feel stupid? Are they secretly some Mensa test that I continue to fail?) 

So swim skirts have their merits. But they sag when wet. And cling in odd ways. And they are SKIRTS.

But here's the deal: When I was sixteen and didn't know perk and lift were temporary situations, I thought my thighs were too muscular. (HA!) And that my calves were too manly. (HEE!) And that my feet were fat. (WHO IN GOD'S GREEN EARTH CARES?!) So today may I be fully grateful for the healthy body I've been given, may I make peace with the skirt, and may I embrace my voluptuous feet. Heck, with this sunny perspective, I just might paint all those toes the same day AND take a webinar on goggle adjustments. Watch out, world!