the gallery. . . in the garbage

Every time I go home to my parents' house in Illinois, I try to go through the closets, attic, basement to see what remnants of youth might still be lingering unbidden. With that wonderful walk-up attic, there is plenty of storage, so my parents have been generous about letting me and my sisters hang on to things. . . but they are also thrilled when we clean things out. Usually they have urged me to take whatever childhood things I would like for our family, so on previous visits I brought home vintage Fisher Price toys (the castle! the A-frame! the yacht!) and books (The Fourteen Bears Summer and Winter! Gyo Fugikawa's Busy Day!).

This time I finally dug out the four huge paintings I made for a watercolor class my sophmore year of college. I took pics, and then folded them and trashed them. I don't regret finally throwing them away, since they are not all that great. But each of them had one feature I thought I did well, for my first painting class. And since I have not painted since then, getting them out to look every few years when I would visit home and admiring that one touch of artistic value in each made me feel a sense of accomplishment. Of course secretly I wish I was a really good artist. I am not, but have my moments in which I can pretend.

And since this is my blog, I'll finally get that exhibit of which I have always dreamed. ; )

watercolor lends itself so well to imitating stained glass! I was astounded to find a matte board of the exact same shade as in my painting, but in retrospect should have gone with basic black--the resulting color effect is too grandma, too motel art. Still, for my very first watercolor painting ever, made up in my own mind, not bad.

This painting is of an image I tore out of a woman's fashion magazine, like Vogue. I thought it looked cool, and I was actually proud of the way I was able to reproduce the sheen of the hosiery. My instructor was not as impressed.

My roommate took a pic of my back and I used that as the model. I tried to use colored pencil along with the watercolor, to give an "old" texture to the skin and hair, but it did not turn out great. I liked how the hair turned out, though.



my final piece, which earned me an "A." It looks much better in person. The instructor praised me for my use of gesso (can be used to thicken the paint and give texture and depth) in this work, but, actually I just painted the whole thing using watercolor paint straight out of the tube.

Illinois

At the Abraham Lincoln museum in Springfield, IL.

If you are ever in that neck of the cornfields, you MUST go visit--the most amazing, interactive, technologically artistic museum I have ever experienced. Highly educational, very powerful, even for the young kids.

One of the highlights for the girls was ending the museum tour at Mrs. Lincoln's Attic, a large room with many different kinds of old-fashioned toys, a historically-correct play kitchen, a large wooden dollhouse with child-friendly furnishings and farm animals, even historical dress up! We could have spent several hours in that one room alone.

G as Abe Lincoln

Back at my parent's home, we made a trip out to the farm where my dad (a retired biology teacher) works much of the year.

There is dad and his farmer friend. . . and Ferdinand sitting just quietly and smelling the flowers.



Happiness to my girls is a field full of flowers that nobody minds them picking.








Have I ever mentioned that I love old barns?

I wrote some in an earlier post about the idyllic stay we had in my parents' home, my childhood home from third grade on. I tried to capture some of the special feel of the neighborhood and the house, but am not a good enough photographer. But these will at least give you an idea of my physical roots, and hopefully convey the tranquility I feel when we are there.

Merciful, Faithful Lord of Miracles

God is so, so Good.

Yesterday afternoon He worked another miracle. Mom and dad are in town; after parting with us outside of Sacramento two weeks ago, they headed up to Canada and are now driving down on their way to southern CA, visiting family and friends along the way. So yesterday I took them and the kids downtown Santa Cruz to walk around and windowshop. The weather was gorgeous. I found an adorable, reasonably priced top, which my wardrobe desperately needed. We tried on hats. We splurged on fruit smoothies. We stopped into a favorite shoe/sock store and discovered that an adorable pair of little toddler keens (our favorite kid shoe) that D and I had previously seen and wanted for E (but for which we had not been quite willing to fork out the dough) were now on sale--and then my parents said they wanted to get them for E as an early birthday present! The day could not have been going better. . . until I stopped at Noah's Bagelry to pick up bagels, and discovered my wallet was missing.

I had used it at Jamba Juice, and thought I had felt it in my purse in the Sock Shop, before mom and dad offered to pay for E's shoes. But it was no longer in my purse, nor in my pockets, and my hasty retracing of steps between the two stores offered nothing. My first thoughts were pretty desparing: in my mind, downtown Santa Cruz must be one of the worst places to lose something of value, there being so many people hanging around there, always looking for a handout. A misplaced wallet could be a windfall for someone. As I told the girls in the car as we left downtown, the person who found my wallet would be one of two kinds: either honest, or dishonest. But of course there is always hope, and I found myself oddly swaying in emotion between confidence that I would get it back and despair that this could end up really, really bad (identity theft, financial ruin--you know how the mind goes).

Of course I was praying from the moment I realized it was gone. My prayers were not purposeful, coherent, more like feelings and fleeting thoughts. But I was conscious of one specific prayer: I asked God to convict the heart of the person who found it so that he/she would return it. I also felt strongly like God was telling me that He would show me something about Himself through whatever came of this painful situation. So while I had to call D and report the missing wallet, in case we needed to start the process of cancelling credit cards, etc., I was still actually pretty hopeful that it would all be ok, since God is God. (I was not planning on writing this next part, but am suddenly feeling compelled to write Truth) He is merciful, He is compassionate, He is faithful, He is extravagant with His blessings, He has promised to never forsake me. He is entirely capable of taking care of me, of our family. Whatever money we have is a blessing directly from Him; even D's ability to provide for our family is the result of God's loving provision. Even if things sometimes go badly, even horribly, God is no less loving or Good, and if I trust Him and continue to follow where He is leading, all will be well. "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose"--Romans 8:28. "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?. . . No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us"--Romans 8:35, 37. Amen!

Okay, I'm coming down from the exultation and back to the story. But you know how it ends already, since I said it was a miracle. The story is in how God did it.

We left downtown shortly afterwards, did a couple of in and out stops on the way home, crept in slow traffic on the highway, and arrived back home to find. . .

a note, stuck in the door. It read: "Please call _____ ask 4 Tom. I have your wallet."

So, not only did God make everything right again and return the wallet to me, He did it even before we got home. He was answering the groanings of my heart even as I uttered them. That is how faithful He is--that He knows what we need even before we ask, and delights in blessing us.

When I called this man named Tom, he said he found my wallet right outside the juice shop. So he must have left downtown immediately with the intentions of returning it, and even though he lives in Santa Cruz, he drove all the way to our town, to our house, to give it back. When I thanked him for being the honest kind of person, he told me "that was how he was trying to live these days." When my dad drove over to pick up the wallet and met him, Tom told my dad that he had not always made the right choices in life, but he was trying to do the right things now. So right from the horse's mouth--God convicted this man to return the wallet, just as I had prayed. Now I am praying that God blesses this man as much as He has blessed me.

And then, as if God thought I needed a little extra assurrance that this whole experience was the manifestation of a personal, loving God in action, He gave me one more validation. After getting home, finding the note, estatically calling first Tom and then D, sending my dad off to get the wallet (thank you, dad!) and getting the kids all settled down for quiet time (which they did not necessarily need, but which I desperately did), I sat down to nurse E while surfing favorite sites on the web, so I could start relaxing and slowly unraveling the knots that had built up all inside of me. I was current on all my favorite blogs, so I decided to read from the archives of my friend Rosa's blog, since she started blogging just before we became good friends and I have not read all the early entries. And a random minute later, I came across her own blogged experience of something lost and unexpectedly found, and how she felt God spoke to her directly through the experience.

http://rosa-sinensis.blogspot.com/2007/12/lessons.html (If you want to read it--her insights are good)

It was as if He was saying to me, See? It's not just your imagination. I am who I am, unchanging and faithful. This wasn't the first time and it won't be the last.

O frabjous night!

Cousin Katie, her new husband Dave, and my girls.

The impetus behind this whole roadtrip was that my cousin Katie was getting married in Chicago, and even with a small wedding planned, she was kind enough to make room on the guest list for us. Her wedding was the only excuse we will have for who knows how long to get the family together, so I really wanted to go, and thought it would be so cool to drive and get to see some of this grand United States, and D was so sweet to literally go along. : )

The wedding and reception took place at the quaint (read $$$) riverside Harrington Inn and Spa, in Geneva, a suburb of Chicago. The wedding was simple, and gorgeous. Katie looked amazing (so unfortunate none of my photos highlight her gown, her hair, her overall radiance--guess that is what the professional photographers are for), my aunt and uncle looked so elegant, the groom cried when his bride approached him down the aisle, all the words spoken were eloquent and moving, all was beauty and glow and happiness.

My cousin and aunt, in their thoughtfulness, had reserved a room at the inn so that we had a place to take children for nursing, naps, etc., and had engaged the services of two twenty-something women (the young, single childhood development teacher at my aunt's high school and her sister--dream sitters!) to stay in the room with our children during the reception so that D and I could party with the grownups while our kiddies were tucked safely and snugly into bed. And my aunt and uncle, in their graciousness, encouraged us to just stay the night in that room, so that we would not have to wake the kids up late and move to a different hotel.

When my aunt first asked us if we would like the option of childcare for the reception, of course we said, "Sure!" But at the time we did not realize that our children would be the only ones using it! So it was very humbling to be the recipient of such a generous gift. It was awesome to be able to simply take E upstairs and nurse him and settle him down in the portable crib provided by the hotel, and then waltz away to dinner with the rest of the family while E was watched over by two extremely nice and overqualified nannies-for-the-night. And then to come up with the girls later, after dinner and a few dances, get them in their jammies and say goodnight and leave them for games and stories with the nannies while D and I danced the night away. Ok, I danced and D took blackmail photos. But it was so much fun, and such an unusual feeling of freedom! Sometime around 11:00 pm the caterers brought out the "boost of energy" food--coffee, mini hamburgers and tatertots with the fixin's and dippin's. I had never seen that done at a wedding reception, esp. one that served a full sit down dinner only hours beforehand, and yet the food was so welcome! And thus fortified, D and I helped close down the party.

The experience would not have been possible without the luxury of the hotel room on site. And I do mean luxury; when we tiptoed back into the room so late, we just had to say goodnight to the nannies (already paid by my aunt) and then we got to wind-down in style: whirlpool bath for dance-tired legs and feet, spa-quality little shampoos and soaps, complimentary cookies and milk brought to our room by the hotel ("tuck down service," they call it. I call it fabulous).

When we left the reception, the caterers had been gathering up the floral table arrangements and those of us still around were encouraged to take what we wanted. I took a white rose for each of the girls, and then took one whole bouquet up to our room--the flowers were just so fresh, so beautiful, I had to rescue at least some of them. Without a vase, I just tucked the bunch into the hand-towel rack next to the bathroom sink, and that was the crowning touch to the overall elegant bath. And, perhaps, to the whole beautiful, delightful night.

Cute baby

Ok, here is another video, for those of you who have not seen baby E for a while! I took this just a few days ago, as he was keeping me company while I folded clean laundry.

On illness (yuck!) and birthdays (yay!)

#3 is 4!

So, I have really been wanting to post things here--so many things yet in my mind and camera to share! But on the 3rd I came down with some yucky crud and spent the weekend sick (body aches, headache, sore throat, low fever, runny nose, etc). But was not home in bed, oh no! B's 4th birthday celebration was on the 4th, at the local living history ranch. What more fun could you have on your birthday? Wearing pioneer dress up clothes all day. Marching in a parade (as a suffragette!). Playing with your closest friends in the spreading limbs of a ginormous tree, in plant mazes and tunnels. Being serenaded by a small symphony as you picnic on blankets spread in tree shade. There were lots, lots more fun things going on--this is the second year we have chosen this location for our Independence Day/B's birthday, and I think it will become tradition--but unfortunately I was really just functioning well enough to get through the day and not act sick in front of the birthday guests. I am still not well, but am at least functioning--which is good since it has been a really busy week! But between illness and busyness, I have not had a chance to post any more. Sorry about that, anyone who has not yet abandoned me. I hope to post some more travel pics later today.

In the meantime, here is a video snippet of the 4th of July Parade, at Wilder Ranch State Park, off Highway 1 just north of Santa Cruz. Happy Birthday little B!

out of orbit

oh, i forgot about the whole "re-entry" phase. Ugh. Girls having unusual crying fits, yelling at each other, melting down over the littlest things. Oh, yeah, i remember now it usually takes about a week to get everyone back to normal. who knows how long it will take now!

Hope your week is better than i anticipate mine being!

p.s. i am talking about the biggest girl too. ok, so i am not yet crying and screaming, but i definitely noticed i was struggling with readjusting last night when i let myself get too low blood sugar (getting dinner to the table on time is way harder than i remember!) and was sick and tired of reminding the girls about good choices and the rules of our home over and over all day. luckily d came home and could help interface. but he and i were clearly tired and not in our right minds either--he left out the milk (luckily just a little left) and i was going to chastize him this morning, until i realized i had left out a brand-new contained of sour cream. d'oh!

anyone think it is safe to eat sour cream that was at about 65 degrees for 8 hours?

but God is still Good, and can redeem anything, and just now i was able to handle a child who pulled "I'm not going to and you can't make me" for her first time ever patiently and calmly and even, dare i say, lovingly. and the crisis is now over and peace momentarily restored. but now i had better go eat--keeping up the blood sugar is so vital to good parenting in this house!