Delicious Weather.

Recently it 'iced' for a day and then snowed for a day on top of that. Icing with Frosting on top!

Mmmmm.

I grew up in Nevada. Then I moved to California. And then I moved out here to Oklahoma. We've been here for almost 5 years, and STILL this 'ice' nonsense baffles me. It's not hail, it's not sleet, it's not snow... it's ICE. They call it 'icing'.

But it's not like frosting on a cake.

Apparently, "ice" can be an adjective.

I took these pictures this afternoon... it's what is left of the snow on top of the ice. (Now picture that ice layer on all the roads!) (Hint: Cars become hockey pucks.) But, as you can see, the whole front of this fence is also covered in a thick layer of ice.




I don't understand this. It is a VERTICAL surface.

I don't feel smart enough to grasp how this is even possible.

Still, I love it, even though I'm not intelligent enough to understand it. Snow (and now ice!) is my mostest most most-er-ton FAVORITE weather ever.

What's yours?

Breaking the Ice.

I can't help but think this ice storm is my fault.

You see, God is doing something huge in my heart. It started a few days ago... something I have been shoving down and running from for 10 years now. Something major that never got properly dealt with... a big pink elephant swept right under the rug.

Under normal circumstances, this thing would continue to sit- just out of sight but so obviously there that my attempts to cover it up seem almost laughable now. Picture an elephant. Under a rug. With a coffee table on top. And perhaps a vase of flowers or a spot of tea perched on top of it all.

Cue the ice storm.




I've been trapped in this house for... days upon days upon days. With my family, my husband. With no where to hide, I have found myself suddenly exposed.

Oh, how it hurts. Oh, how I long to cover it back up and keep pretending it's not really there... dusting around it while shooting resentful sidelong glances it's way every couple of years.

It has to do with intimacy. And the past. Broken trust and long years of masked agony.



In the midst of all this pain, there has been exorbitant amounts of hope and promise. In my mind, God gave me a picture of the current state of my heart. Simply this: there was a dam built up- holding back a huge body of water.

All the freedom I have longed for but felt impossible to attain... just out of my grasp... this is where it has been hiding! Behind THIS wall! And I felt the unmistakable whisper in the deepest places of me:

"Behind this wall there are FLOODS of freedom for you, Emery."

And here it sits... dammed up and tucked away inside a part of me I dared not shed light upon for fear of what I might find. But now that the light has illuminated this abandoned corner of me, I find that there is nothing to be afraid of! I find that there is GRACE and PEACE and KINDNESS.

Instead of harsh judgement and retribution and 'you'll get what you deserve', there is this:

"You, O Lord, keep my lamp burning;
my God turns my darkness into Light.
With your help I can advance against a troop;
with my God I can scale a wall."
-ps 18:28,29

Even this wall, yes. Even THIS wall!

I am so anxious for my freedom, I can almost taste it. It feels good to be in a place of expecting big things from God again. There is never a more sorry place for a Christian to be than in a prolonged state of CRUISE CONTROL. If we don't expect big things from God, if we don't leap from our comfort zones on a regular basis, the scenery will never change. It's like we're not allowing God to show His glory through us when we live that way. We live muted lives- dimmed by our own fears of the unknown.

I'm over feeling dimmed down, muted, gripped. I'm ready to be free.

He is so good and kind and gentle. And I am so very grateful to be in His care.

Things I Adore.

the combo of these book jackets + book marks = sheer genuis by icoeye.

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macbook covers to DIE for by twelve south.

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these incredible keyboard alphabet stickers by chris delorenzo.

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these typography inspired home stickers by harmonie intérieure

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and this home... the most perfect thing i've ever seen.

Cabin Fever.

He is finally on the mend! Oh, oh, hooray! He was SO sick.

I have felt soooo cooped up these last few days as I've been nursing little Myer back to health. I'm so ready to get OUT. Word on the street, though, is that a mega ice-storm is on it's way, and the whole entire city has already preemptively shut down. So much for getting out.

Looks like it's going to be a few more days until I can return to a life of normalcy.

I am currently trying not to feel too sorry for myself whilst drinking hot cocoa and downloading tons of free books onto my Nook to help occupy the (possible) shut-in hours ahead.



Okay, okay. Maybe it won't be too bad after all.

These boys can make even cabin fever feel delightful.

:)

An Ongoing Synopsis of Today.

6:00AM

I awoke this morning to the sickening sound of my own nose cracking, a dull crunching between my eyes.

The pain shot me up out of bed. Myer had slammed his head down hard into my face after we brought him into our bed in the wee hours of the morning. He was there so we could keep a close watch on his breathing after a night full of Urgent Care and breathing treatments and low oxygen levels.

Ugh.

I held back my wailing as best I could. Myer was already crying hard enough for the both of us.

Chris tried to comfort me while also trying to comfort our very sick baby. After a few minutes of recovery, I stumbled out into the living room to help with the first round of medicines for the day.

10:30AM
We are all tired today. Home-bound for the 4th day in a row. Ezra's incessant sniffing and the cartoons blaring on the TV are making me feel like a crazy person... like the sounds are inside my skull. I keep plugging up my ears for brief moments of silence.

My head hurts. I keep checking my reflection in the mirror to see if the pain and pressure are branching out in the form of two black eyes. At least then my outsides would match my insides.

These last few days have pummeled me.

1:00PM
Myer has definitely 'turned a corner' and is feeling better. He's looking a bit brighter, and for that I am beyond thankful. Last night was scary, but Chris and I handled it with level heads and steady hearts.

I can't stop thinking about how thankful I am for modern day medicine. For the fact that it is available and accessible to me 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We are so far BEYOND fortunate to have access to medicine when we need it like that. I know most in the world cannot say the same. What a sobering thought.

Ezra keeps asking me about hair today. "Why do we have it? What is it for? Why does daddy not have any?" I told him we have hair to keep us warm, and then he asked me why God didn't want Chris to be warm- since He'd taken all his hair away.

I am stumped. heh.


4:58PM
Ezra was just rummaging around in his toy basket and then exclaimed, "Hey! My Hair Ball!"
Me: "Your WHAT ball?"
Ez: "My hair ball!"
Me: "What in the world is your HAIR ball?!"
Ez: *Looking at me like I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed* "Because there is a picture of a rabbit on it."
Me: ...?
Me: ...?
Me: Ohhh, your HARE ball!

(How silly of me.)

hahaha.

My Day, In Photos.

The boys aren't feeling so hot, so our day has been very lazy. And beautiful.











And then this sexy beast showed up and made life marvelous:





I am currently UP TO MY EYEBALLS in free eBook downloads.

I feel like a kid in a candy store!

wee!

Ezra, an Interview.

What do you want to be when you grow up?
-An astronaut because I really want to go on a planet and I love spaceships.

Who is your favorite grown-up?
-Mama and Dada

Who is your favorite baby?
-Myer and Abby

Do you want any more brothers or sisters?
-Yes. Five total.

What would you name your brothers and sisters?
- Myer
-Allah (I kid you not.)
-Noah
-Abby
-Ash. He's going to grow up to be a space man too and he's going to help me because I don't want to be alone in space.

How old do you think daddy is?
- 99?

What is your favorite thing to do?
- Play with my new castle toy.

What do you think Myer will be when he grows up?
- A policeman or an astronaut.

What does love feel like?
- happy.

When you grow up, where will you live?
- In your house. All our other babies will live in houses that say 'SALE'. But I will live in your house forever and ever and there will be three of us.

If you could have one superhero power, what would it be and what would you do with it?
-Super strength to fight the bad guys!

What is your favorite word?
-Moustache.



Me: "Thank you for talking to me, ezra!"

Ezra: "That was a LOT of questions."

Me: "Sorry."

Ezra: "Oh! You don't need to be sorry about that, mama."

16 Months Later, A Proposal.

August, 2008
January, 2010

The other day, in our living room:

Ezra: "Keira, will you marry me? You are my BEST friend."

Keira: {After looking Ezra up and down for a moment} "...Nope."


Look out, world. Heartbreaker on the loose!

hehe.

When The Baby Turns One.

So, he turned one today...

...aaaand my baby fever escalated to about 300 degrees Fahrenheit.

What in the Hay?? It took four years to catch the baby fever again after I had Ezra.

Is it hot in here, or is it just me?

heh.

Anywho. Thanks to all who called, texted, sent cards, and messaged birthday wishes to our little man. He loved all the special attention today. But mostly, I think, it was all about the cookie:



"oh mommy, has i told you lately that i love you?"




"wait... there WILL be more where this came from, yes?"

It feels like that was the fastest year of my life. What a precious little patootie he is.

Motherhood Resolving.

Sometimes I envy my husband.

I was talking to him last night about how I sometimes feel it would be so nice to have a job where you leave the house in the morning, work really hard, and then at the end of the day you leave and get to have some sort of feeling of accomplishment.

As a mother, I don't often get to feel that sense of "closure" or accomplishment after a long day of hard work.

A hard day of work for me never really has a 'resolve' at the end of it. It just blends into the next day of the same. I feel like all day long I am cleaning and tidying and feeding and cleaning and tidying and feeding, and then at the end of the day, after everyone is cleaned and fed and asleep, the house needs to be cleaned and picked up one last time and then it's time for bed.

Nothing I do with my hands during the day "sticks". I do everything that I do knowing that it will need to be done again in an hour or two.

Clean clean clean clean tidy clean tidy. Never ending. Never resolving. Never feeling like it's really accomplished because it doesn't last.

I am thankful to be home with my kids. So very thankful. There is nothing else I'd rather be doing and no one else I'd rather have raising my kids for me.

But on some days, like yesterday, I just feel worn out and bone tired. Yesterday I looked around and felt totally smothered by my house and the endless job of keeping it nice, and it was turning me into a RAGE monster. The monster was just below the surface-- threatening to squeeze out through my tear ducts.

Chris could tell that I was on the verge, and that I was so worked up that nothing I was doing was helping my situation (i.e. trying to clean the floors while the baby was still eating and throwing goo on top of the floors I had JUST cleaned) so do you know what he did? (Men of the world, TAKE NOTE.) He forced me to go take a bath and relax and breathe for a moment. While I was doing that, he bleached and scrubbed the kitchen floors for me. Oh yes he did.

By the time I got out of the bath, my head was on straight again. I had gotten a chance to breathe. The rest of the day, we worked together on the house- happily, CHEERFULLY... side by side. And by the time evening rolled around, it looked AMAZING.

At the end of the day, it wasn't so much the fact that he had helped clean and grocery shop and all that. It was more the fact that he helped me get to a place of feeling like I'd accomplished something. He could tell that's what I needed (before I even knew it) and he gave me the boost I needed to get me there. And I know that the house will probably look much like it did early yesterday in, oh, about 29 seconds flat, but you know what? Today, I am okay with that.

Because I was reminded that it isn't so much about WHAT gets done at the end of the day as it is about WHO you do those things for.

I keep the house nice because it blesses my husband and my kids. And they in turn work hard and bless me in their own sweet ways. We're all working hard together for a purpose.

And suddenly, cleaning the floors doesn't feel like my own personal purgatory anymore. It feels almost noble. Like it's the most important job in the world.

All because of who I am doing it for.

The Many Months of Myer.

My BABY is turning one in a couple of days, so I thought I'd put together a little photo tribute of his yummy face.

You know, for the good of all mankind.

This baby right here has been a springboard into deeper pools of joy than I ever knew existed.

Myer Elliot. Our baby sunbeam with cherries on top.
















Oh, how we love you so!!

Old Bones, New Hearts.

It was one of those last minute day trips where you look at each other across the living room and say "do you want to just go for it?" and the very next second you are scooping up small shoes and wiggling them onto little feet and gathering up armfuls of jackets and snacks and milk and diapers and driving south- nodding your head to good music.






The Natural History Museum in Norman, Oklahoma- where the bones of old dinosaurs cause an almost 5-year-old boy to squeal with fits of joy and delight.

As I wandered through the clean, warm rooms and looked at these giant bone puzzles I couldn't help but be reminded of the steady pattern of life and death- racing along like a loaded freight train. Completely unstoppable. Yet here we are... often trying desperately to feel like we have control over the past, present, future... building up bones and chasing fountains of youth until our pockets are empty and we've wasted huge chunks of our life on being terrified of death.

Mind boggling, that.

UGH, to live like there was no tomorrow! That is the desire of my heart! To RUN and not walk towards my neighbors, towards those most desperate for love! To LET GO of the wall I am hugging and step out into the vulnerable open space! To live in a way that I would be proud to see my boys emulate with their own lives!


I feel so far from these things. The thought of them somehow brings feelings of both hopeful longing and defeat. How much have I already missed out on by living the way I have been living? Has too much passed me by to even bother trying now? Have I missed it completely? These are the thoughts I find in my head.

This morning in church, we talked about the book of Ezekiel.

God says in Ezekiel that He will open our graves and bring us up from them, that He will put His Spirit in us so that we may live, that He will remove our hearts of stone and replace them with hearts of flesh that beat. That POUND. That THWUMP! He speaks of calling out to a valley of dry bones- causing them to be wrapped in life and flesh once more... a second chance army... called into true life! Not just glued together bone puzzles in sterile museums for collecting dust, but LIFE that dances and hollers and brings glory to Him from all who look upon it!

We are never too far away for hope to reach us. Hope always has longer arms.

We are never too old or too burdened to start a new chapter in our stories.

Every morning is a new day. A new chance. A new grace. A fresh start. A clean page.

All we have to do is wake up, open our eyes, swing our feet onto the floor, and start saying 'yes' to the still soft voice in our hearts. Yes yes yes yes yes. Yes I want a new heart. Yes I believe in you. Yes I will cook for my elderly neighbor. Yes I will speak lovingly to my children. Yes I will read Your words. Yes I will go to Africa. Yes yes yes yes yes...

Oh! He is a 'yes' worthy God!

Yes yes yes yes yes!