Thanks in Thanksgiving

Like my friend Aubri over here, we Olsons had a nice, relaxed Thanksgiving. It sure is a gift to learn some things over time, like: this is only one day. If the meat and at least one side is done, we'll survive. Kids like to help with special days (even if sometimes it feels like anything but help, like when they're juggling the fine china). A clean kitchen is a great joy. And a perennial favorite: eating is fuuuuun.

I also greatly benefitted from advance planning (I won't talk at length about my Wednesday meltdown which primarily involved a cranky, overtired pregnant momma who spent too much time standing and insisting on unrealistic execution. But I digress). The bread dough and pie were finished yesterday, so the sugar-high cinnamon rolls this morning were a breeze and a hoot--the kids wanted to try using cookie cutters on the dough until I explained that the cinnamon had to have a roll to make it happy. Papa dressed the turkey--the boys debated whether it should get underwear, a ski hat, or PJs to wear--as usual, which is a huge relief for me. He also cleaned and prepped and boiled the white and sweet potatoes. He's a dream, I know!

Because he did that, I could make the Schnitzel Beans (bacon, onions, green beans and other top secret ingredients), the Scalloped Corn, prep the dinner rolls from the dough, and make eggs for a late brunch. I also did two loads of laundry and put away three weeks' worth of clean clothes in our room, which was completely tangential to the meal but made me feel fan-tad-tic (look! Our dresser has a top!). Taking a shower probably helped my state of mind, too. And washing dishes by hand and running the dishwasher twice. Then I made the (box) stuffing and creamy mashed potatoes (cream cheese, check) while Papa carved the bird and made the melt-in-your-mouth sweet potatoes. Oh, and I opened up the can of cranberry sauce that Jon and the kids love.

At four we six and a half sat down to a great meal. We talked about things and people we're thankful for, in between preventing spills, reminders to use utensils, and refilling plates (you never have to ask Small Dude twice if he wants more. He invariably says "Puh-puh," or "please!"). Then I laid on the couch for an hour while Papa cleaned up. Bliss.

Yeah, the kids watched the parade this morning (fun to converse with them about it. When asked about the Rockettes' kick line, the Little Professor said, "It looks like a combine." Why, yes, yes it does. There's a deeper social analysis in that comparison, but the literal one was enjoyable enough). They played spaceship and trucks and who knows what else for much of the day. And I find myself near sleep and realizing how few thanks I gave today, how much I took for granted.

I know better. I wrote about gratitude this very week. I said prayers and read psalms and thought about God's gifts, but these are such small tokens. Like a pastor friend wrote on Facebook today, maybe that's the point--that God is pleased to receive our tiny thanks is another indication of His unsurpassable generosity to His children. We deserve nothing and get everything, and He smiles upon us when we give thanks to Him. I can and should do better, yes, in rendering thanks and praise to my Savior. Yet He forgives even my selfishness and inward focus on this day. For His great mercy I give Him my gratitude, my whispered words. And He gives again, and will so tomorrow and until the end.

Mother of a Filler Post

I began this post over two months ago, if that tells anybody what kind of priority this blog has been. It's been so long since I blogged that those of you in cyberspace might be wondering what in the Sam Hill is going on at the Olson Homestead. Not that you've lost any sleep. But your theoretical concern piques my heart, nonetheless. So here's a beginner of a filler post on what we've been doing here.

• Learning. We're heading into Week 18 of homeschooling--yes, that means we started back up in July--so we've been hip deep in larnin'. Reading? Check-check-check. Writing? Check. 'Rithmatic? Check-check. Catechism and daily prayer and bits of ancient history and science too. And Latin and piano lessons (for the Little P). Then there's tunnel-making and ball-rolling and leaf-pile-design and all kinds of free play for the littles, and all sorts of random stuff (I'm hoping the recent fascination with arachnids passes soon, because wheesh). It sounds like a lot, but it isn't. Maybe I'll explain that more thoroughly someday.

• House-selling. Well, it's not sold yet, and maybe I should have filed this under "learning." But it's been an interesting few months in a very small market. "Why are you selling your house?" you're probably wondering. Well, the short version is we'd like to both get rid of some debt with our huge equity and possibly get a bigger house before this one gets way too small. And the good news is we don't have to rush (if we sell, we can move, but we don't have to move rightthissecond). The better news is we've had five positive showings--a solid showing for this area--and springtime is a better time to sell. So we're optimistic.

• House-moving. Internally, that is. After eight years of a series of remodels and getting used to everybody sleeping on the first floor, Papa and I finally moved up by moving down to the ensuite master bedroom in the basement. With a walk-in closet and our own bathroom, I feel like I've finally reached some point of adulthood I didn't know I was missing. And it's really quiet down there! Unless Small Dude is screaming into the monitor. Pearly Girl transitioned cleanly into a big girl bed and her own room, and Superman and the Little Professor enjoy their big boy room. Yes, Papa did a three-room furniture shuffle (and repainting one room). I was awesome at giving directions, pointing, and picking up random screws. 

• Exploring regular freelance writing. Since late August, I've been given an awesome opportunity to write a weekly column for our local paper, the Star. It's been great practice for me, and the editor is amazing--constructive, insightful, encouraging in pushing me to improve. You can look up my columns here, under "Thoughts in the Heartland." 

• Kid growing. The Little Prof (6) is seriously steaming ahead in lessons (again, possibly more on that later). Superman (4.5) is looking to follow in his tracks ("I'm crazy about history!" he announced the other day). Pearly Girl (almost, almost 3) wants to do everything the boys do, and more. And Small Dude is a year old--a YEAR OLD! No walking yet, but he's crawling everywhere and starting to pull himself up on his knees (and eating random Cheerios off of the kitchen floor. Score!). We're thinking he might, just might, decide to go bipedal by Christmas, but it's actually kind of great that he's not walking or running or climbing stairs and furniture yet. Because..

• Kid growing, part V.  Yes, we have been blessed again. Olson Child will arrive in mid- to late April 2015! I'm doing much, much better in terms of energy and appetite than for a few months there in early fall, but keeping up with four kids is, for some reason, kind of time-consuming. I keep wondering why I'm so surprised by this. Like getting used to this life somehow also should mean it gets easier. It does, in some ways--few things they do surprise me--but in other ways, it's just a dump-fest--laundry, books, toys, needs. Thank goodness Someone Else is ultimately their Caretaker! This season is just that--a season. That gives me both heartache and incredible relief.

Well, that's about all I can put down for now. My pillow is calling.

One Thousand--Ahem--Boons

No, really, Sister--thank YOU. Nice hat, too.

Maybe you've heard of or read Ann Voskamp's One Thousand Gifts. It's a beautifully written read--thought-provoking, lyrical, laughter-inducing and certainly tear-inducing. It also, from my obviously Lutheran perspective, ultimately ends up heaping law upon law on Voskamp herself and her readers by concluding that we have to give thanks in all circumstances. Period. So DO IT, good Christians! Always! No excuses! What I began reading with so much hope and delight ended with me slinking back to the library dropbox, wondering what went wrong.

And what went wrong, of course, is that we can't actually give thanks in all circumstances all the time or even act like doing so is some act of penance or some act of works-righteousness contributing to some partnership-with-Jesus contract deal. And since we can't, because we're poor miserable sinners and we generally know it (thanks for this, Adriane!), this book that tries to emphasize the good ends up shackling us with more impossible expectations rather than giving us the Great Thanks-giver Himself. Because ultimately I need to know that Jesus could give thanks all the time because He was God, and Jesus loved me even unto death, and His vicarious atonement isn't conditional on any merit on my part, like giving thanks always. Otherwise His work wouldn't be, well, a something-for-nothing gift. I realize the hyphenated adjective there is superfluous, but it's amazing how many people think of "gift" as more like the beginning of a bartering deal. "I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine. By the way, I've got an ingrown hair problem, but you're cool with that, right?" Thanks, but no. I'll take my birthdays and Christmases and back-scratching and Jesus without the sides of conditions. 

All that being said. Here I give you One Thousand Boons, my list of decidedly less--no, significantly less--than one thousand benefits that I* never, ever list when I'm coming up with things I'm thankful for. Enjoy, and go about your blessed life with all of its gifts and boons.

(*or anyone else, unless she's--or he's--crazy or warped. Join, please!)  

• The Friends of Meinders Community Library Annual Book Sale.  
• A room in which to lock myself into for five minutes of privacy. 
• That my belly button isn't in the middle of my head (that would be awkward).
• Angelika, who came up with those last two while 1) yelling at her kids through the locked bathroom door to give her some peace for five minutes and 2) explaining how truly awkward a belly button on the noggin would be. Yes, she's joined. She's actually probably a charter member.
• Accidentally dropped M & Ms under the kitchen table. That I find days later. (Surprise chocolate!)
• Bath salts and a sleep aid. Not used simultaneously but in tandem.
• And a glass of Riesling.
• The flip-down mirror by the passenger seat for mascara-application, hair-fluff-checking, and last-minute blotting of baby-stained clothing. Better than a personal stylist, IMPO.
• Bedtimes. For small children.
• Natch that. Sleeping children. 
• Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, and Sister Carrie. To remind me that my life is actually pretty s-ah-w-eeeeeeeeeet.
• Ear plugs.
• Ice packs.
• Three-packs of kid underwear.
• My Hope Is Built on Nothing Less Than Jesus' Blood and Righteousness. And that's a for-real boon.

Hiccups

When Little Professor was in utero, he often got the hiccups. I'm still mystified by the biological machinations that make this possible, seeing as though he floated in amniotic fluid and received oxygen directly into his bloodstream via God's wondrous creation, the umbilical cord. Yet there he was, maintaining an impressive esophageal rhythm that kept me feeling like my midsection was a strong second-hand on a tightly wound clock. Amazing, yes, but also just plain weird.

Small Dude repeated this feat, and like his oldest brother, has kept up the habit now that he's breathing oxygen through his windpipe. Such a small yet uncomfortable thing. He'll get a bad case that practically lifts him out of the bouncy seat with each hiccup, and I'll simultaneously snicker and sigh in sympathy, thinking of how he's nowhere close to drinking water or standing on his head to remedy his discomfort. But he'll outgrow it, and in the meantime, he'll squirm a little more and scowl and work 'em on out.

We're experiencing hiccups here, too. Some is Normal Family Adaptation to New Baby Mode. This resembles a roller-coaster ride, complete with careening turns, yelling, and a necessity for seat-belts, both literal and emotional. Some of it, though, seems more like a terminal case instead of a momentary change. With the addition of Small Dude, I'm finding the "hiccup" of his transition both routine and predictable as well as precarious and somewhat terrifying. I know the disruptions of newness will fade eventually, as will the sometimes overwhelming events that occur in a household with four children under six years of age. And for now, I'll trust that God will help me embrace all of the changes, their disquieting discomforts with their humorous additions. After all, hiccups often happen after belly-shaking laughter. And He knows our Small Dude--and Little Professor, Superman, and Pearly Girl--are big joy-givers.

Running the Neatness Marathon: The Help

...who make life's work possible.
BTW, read this book.

Last year I blogged about beginning my years-long dream to declutter. Here we are, thirteen months later, one more baby later, and what do I have to show for it?

To be honest, I'm not finished with the project yet. But however slowly, decluttering has happened in bursts, small jumps, and after long interruptions of illness, travel, and life in general. Ultimately, I've learned that some of the biggest forward-moving parts of this process have involved the help of other people. And I don't mean "help" in a weasel word kind of way; I mean it in a "we couldn't do any of this stuff without the time, physical labor, and generosity of these people" way. We can't maintain God's gifts to us without help from our neighbors. Ooooooh! I'm sensing a wider lesson in all of this. Can you smell, too? (Go ahead. You can grin at my silliness.)

I'll give more details about the Olson family decluttering project later. I think you'll understand, though, if I first give credit where credit is due. So without further ado:

• Let me strike that "I" for a "we." If Papa wasn't on board for this long project, then progress would be infinitesimal at best and, um, negative at worst. What's negative progress, you ask? That would be moving backwards into a dung heap of squalor. It would be decline of the one-step-forward, twelve-steps-back variety. Without him, our floors would remain dirty because he would ignore the mop and vacuum or our children so I could clean. But to his awesome credit, he wields mop, vacuum, OR kid duty. Plus, he jumps in with gusto to our heavy duty declutter projects (i.e. he does most if not all of the heavy-duty physical labor). He initiated the steam-cleaning project, in fact. All this on top of his normal yard/garden/outdoor work--he's hauling leaves right now as I type and feed Small Dude. One word for this amazing husband: swoon!
• Another huge contributor to our project, though she doesn't know it, is my mom. She's visited a couple times this year, always at times where we desperately needed full-time assistance (i.e. after Papa's emergency surgery and after Small Dude was born). While she didn't sit and sort old papers or move furniture or tag items for the yard sale, she did wash dishes, clothes, kids, floors and generally keep our house spic-and-span so that once she was gone we didn't have to recover our house and so we could do other purging projects later. This is one of those small-but-huge gifts. If you get the inherent paradox.
• Then there's Dan, who moved furniture with Papa out of our house for our yard sale and a few things back in, all for a measly plate of sweet treats. I don't know about you, but people who move furniture without major rewards are self-givers of the heroic kind. 
• As are people who gift us their time and energy to watch our children! My friend Devina deserves a shout-out here. She, in her great conscientiousness, heard and remembered my lament last spring on my stalled cleanliness project and in her great kindness offered to take the three older kids (I was still pregnant) for an entire day so I we could clean. Then, when she had to reschedule the original date, she showed up an extra day and took all the kids--including her four--to the park! 
• In that category also there's also Gary and Carmen, who took Little Professor and Superman overnight and for a whole day so that Papa and I could steam-clean the carpets, move furniture, hang pictures on walls that have been bare for years. The same day, the uber-awesome Terri watched Pearly Girl, even when she and Joel had a relative coming to visit. Because of that one night and full day, Papa and I got stuff done that can only happen without little ones around (even hanging frames without pictures in them because if it's going to survive long in this house, as all parents of little tykes know, it cannot. be. on. the. floor. Or anywhere remotely accessible. Which means if Papa and I don't see it, it don't get done). So thanks to these awesome folks' help, we were kidless on that productive day. I mean, except for Small Dude, who was blessedly quiet and only needed feeding when I really, really needed to sit down anyway.

Such help like this is humbling because it reminds me of my inadequacy to do everything myself. Yes, "smart" as I might be, I actually fool myself into thinking far too often that I can actually accomplish everything on my list single-handedly. Which is ridiculously impossible. And so I give thanks for all of these people and their time and efforts, who--whether they knew it or not--were giving us the ability to run the neatness marathon in front of us.

A Little Peek at a Small Dude

Today we mark the one month face time arrival of our newest blessing, our son Daniel Luke Michael. He arrived on Saturday, September 28, a week ahead of his due date, and managed to give us all enough of a heads-up to get his siblings some awesome care and for Papa to make it to both services on Sunday. He weighed in at a solid seven pounds, fifteen ounces, and measured twenty inches long (and by six days post-partum, he'd shot up to eight and a half pounds. Good eater, this one). We were surprised but pleased to see his full head of blond hair--no bald baby this time! I'll share more about his watery births--physical and spiritual--later, but suffice it to say God is merciful and we are very grateful for our son. Say hello, Small Dude!

I'd say more, but the little manny is hungry, and I still haven't figured out how to breastfeed and blog at the same time. Thank you for all of your thoughts and prayers! Our cup runs over.

Oh, and happy belated October, all, and Go Cardinals!

Fruitfulness, Round Four

Last week, post-yard-sale and some back labor excitement, Papa picked tomatoes from the garden. This is what the counter looked like after I'd cleaned half of the take from three five-gallon buckets.

As they say up here: Uff-da.

Suffice it to say, we've had a bumper garden harvest this year. Since early August, I've been freezing green beans, sweet corn (not from our garden but from three different church members--sweet corn had a good year here, too), preparing eggplant and squash and cucumbers, and this month we've been tackling the pepper and tomato haul. Yes, it's been a lot of work. We're also very thankful the garden has borne such bounty, especially considering the late spring and the fact that we were gone for four weeks after Papa planted. So Nancy, if you're reading this and still at all concerned that your watering efforts in July went to waste, please, PLEASE fret no more. God used your efforts to great success. In fact, our tomato load last week was the fourth round of our tomato haul. The first resulted in twelve pints of hot salsa and seven quarts of tomatoes in their own juice. The second begat twelve pints of mild salsa and multiple quarts of peeled, frozen tomatoes. The third produced over twelve gallons of frozen tomatoes (see how my energy with each round diminished?). The fourth round, by sheer size alone, demanded extra effort.

So last week when I decided to make tomato sauce with all two-thirds of Papa's latest picking, I had a lot of time to think about garden harvests and familial blessings. Sitting in the kitchen, destemming and slicing up countless tomatoes for what turned out to be over ten quarts of sauce (which, if you've done this before, means roughly sixty pounds of tomatoes were involved), and wincing every time Baby decided to make his presence known (the guy's running out of room!), I pondered the mysteries of fruitfulness.

Papa's planted a garden every summer we've been here, and we've had some good years. He's rotated placement, Miracle-Gro-ed, swapped out different varieties of produce, tried different spacing. He's tried onions and radishes with little success. This year, he tweaked again, but not enough to account for the haul. Our backyard neighbors planted a few tomato plants scarcely twenty feet from our garden and didn't get a single tomato for their work. Yet we planted and basically left the little green squirts alone and now find ourselves inundated.

It's not fair, in the whole scheme of things. I'm ten months pregnant. Why all this work at this particular time? But what a silly response. I could dwell on the effort such bounty requires to preserve and sustain, but that seems beyond ungrateful. It doesn't even make sense. Gardens by their very nature are supposed to produce. And when they do, we give thanks. On the flip side, our bounty seems unfair to all the gardeners who spend this month wondering what went wrong. It would seem judicious if everyone got at least a little something for all of their gardening efforts, but sometimes it just doesn't happen. Sometimes the rabbits and birds wreak havoc. Sometimes the weather soaks or scorches. Sometimes seeds and seedlings just don't take due to soil or weeds or for causes we can never determine. Experts have spent and still spend countless hours attempting to explain why things grow and why they don't. But even finding reasons why things don't grow can't suddenly make them grow. Even having all kinds of scientific answers as to how and why life can happen can't actually create and sustain life itself.

Gardens are one thing; families and children quite another. I think of my friends and others whose arms and hearts ache with emptiness, from children desired and children taken to Jesus. Like agricultural scientists and researchers and farmers, doctors and specialists can only explain so much. This is not to diminish their God-given expertise and aid in any way. It is only to say that they are not God, and they cannot act as Life-creater. Sometimes we fool ourselves into thinking they can be, that technology or drugs or some combination of scientific theory and practice in the hands of certain people can do what only God can do. But we also see too much suffering and tragedy to believe such a lie. Seemingly healthy children die young. Healthy women are infertile. And children who should not statistically survive do. My sister and I are such exceptions. We were born over thirty years ago at  twenty-eight weeks gestation. We were given less than a ten percent chance of survival at birth, but we both did. And only God knows why. We can speculate, of course. But the truth is that we don't know. And we can only trust that God's ways are best, even when we don't know His reasons for life or for death, for fruitfulness or for barrenness.

Such may sound glib or callous, an easy write-off for unanswerable burdens that provides no comfort. Instead, it is a life-saving trust in a sea of loss and suffering. We pray a meal prayer sometimes that begins with verses from Psalm 145: The eyes of all look to You, O Lord, and You give them their food in due season. You open Your hand; You satisfy the desire of every living thing (14-15). We give thanks for the nutrients God provides us for our bodies. We acknowledge that only He can give us what we need, when we need it, be it food or health or children or any number of gifts. And ultimately, whether we like it or not, we bow to the inevitable scarcity or abundance that He provides, as He sees fit. We don't like this, because it means our efforts mean, well, nothing in the face of whether God withholds or blesses.

But we also know that His gifts are always good. His good gifts always satisfy our greatest need--that we need Him, that we are, in fact, completely helpless apart from Him. And He provides for us in multiple ways, too, just not always in the forms we desire or expect. Neighbors bring extra asparagus and apples (or get five-gallon buckets of tomatoes). Some years are corn-heavy and tomato-light. Some arms hold one child or two or many, biological or adopted, and others hold nieces or nephews or godchildren or congregational children. Regardless, we receive. And--this is a hard truth--if God ordains that we should bodily starve or bear the cross of barrenness or loss, we trust that His ways are not our ways, His care not ours. This is a terrible truth, but one on which our very lives depend. Abraham wielded a knife over his only son. Mary watched hers be pierced and nailed and suffocate and die. Both wept and ached and suffered. But none more so than He who made them to begin with, Who bore and bled and died and rose to give us life that would never end, that would never stop giving.

Our family waits and prays in these days for God to bless us with another child, who is our fourth living one. This baby has grown unseen and mostly unknown, though we cherish our time with his kicks and his hiccups, even his sunny-side up turn. God knows the days He has prepared for this little one, and we trust in His promises for us and for our child, that He will never leave us or foresake us, though we all will pass someday from this veil of tears. And so we give thanks for His mysterious bounty, in all of its forms. Bless us, O Lord, and these Your gifts, which we receive from Your bountiful goodness. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.

Sweet Quiet

What sweet quiet

is soft rain

through open windows

and the flutter of an evening breeze

and a few nesting birds

and the wordless murmurs of a young boy

quickly wakened, and relaxed,

drifting back to sleep.

Love That Never Sleeps

So Superman is just a super, nearly-three bundle of energy. He also can go to the bathroom on demand. Doesn't matter if he's just gone fourteen times in the last hour. He can always, always, always squeeze something out.

So I've been annoyed in the last few months when he gets out of bed at least once right after going down for quiet time or bedtime. "Mommy?" his little voice murmurs down the hall from the doorway. "I gotta go potty." And I roll my eyes and go into the bathroom, get him all situated, and try not to sigh in exasperation (usually because I just want to nap or get things done, and I can't until he's asleep).

This happened the other day, just as it's happened hundreds of times before. Except Superman, who is incredibly sensitive and insightful, looked me in the face. When I caught his gaze, he said, "Mommy, I love you." My heart melted. I said, "I love you, too, Superman." And then he said, "Even when I'm sleeping, I love you."

In all of his little boy innocence, Superman spoke a sanctified truth. Love, real love, never sleeps. My boy might relax into slumber with his arms stretched and mouth open, his mind and body deep in nocturnal rest, but he understands that love extends beyond wakeful conscientiousness. I can't love my own children with eternal care, but Christ can. He loves all of us with a love that never sleeps. And thanks be for His undying charity that extends even to sinful moms and restless little boys.