My tummy is comfortably round. I try to suck it in. Especially in crowds of people. I don’t want them to see my tummy all comfortably round. I want them to see my eyes and my smile. I want to fully engage with them. To throw my head back and laugh about funny things or let the conversation meander off into random things or allow pauses long enough for talk about deep things. But, I’m distracted because I’m wondering if they’ve noticed my tummy. Full and comfortably round. Later, on the drive home, I wish I had mostly forgotten about myself and enjoyed more of them. And myself. I think that I’ll try to do better next time. I wonder how to write. I wonder what it would be like to write in a free way, with no worries or fears of what people will make of it. With no pressure to come [...]

Dear Jesus-following believer, Make it the aim of your life to know God. Not to know about Him, but to know Him. His Person. He tucked down deep into your heart this longing for Him. But, you may not have recognized it at first. You just know that daily you desire to set off on a beauty-hunt. You want to be ravished by wonder. There's something in you that wants to gather up all the glory. To hold it in your hands. To bring it in. God is there. And He's seeking relationship with you. He's not interested in your religion. He wants your friendship. But, He won't force that. He waits till you come looking and seeking and knocking. He wants to be found. We can be students of God, you and I. We've got this ability to be captivated by Him. But, our eyes are broken and so[...]

Usually, when I write here in this space, I try to make sense. I think hard about what it is I want to say, and I try to make it flow somehow and I try to pick just the right words to say exactly what I mean. But not today. Today, I'm just going to be my free-spirited self. I'm not going to think too hard. I'm just gonna type away as my brain thinks away. And I'm gonna be random. So, if you're up for some  random, do come along. There's some things I was wanting to tell you. Today, me and my three babes went on a walk in the wild woods. And this is what we found. Gideon has high hopes that his bones are actually T-rex bones. And Hopey is very fond of her rocks that she wants to add to her "collections." And that mushroom-- I'm proud of that. That's a morel. And I found it whil[...]

Jesus tells us to pray without ceasing. (1 Thessalonians 5:17) And His followers wonder how in the world we’re supposed to do that. Doesn’t God know we have things to do? We’ve got meals to make and laundry to fold and a job to hold down and a family to tend to and friends to keep. Nobody has time to tuck themselves away quietly in a corner all day and talk to God. Well, maybe monks do, but most of us aren’t monks. So, what did Jesus actually mean when He said that? I’m reminded of the story in the New Testament when Jesus went to visit the Temple. Now, I’m no scholar and I haven’t spent hours studying the Temple a whole lot, but I just know the Temple was an important place because it was where people were supposed to meet with God. It was where they were supposed to talk to Him and[...]

Today I wanted to write to you about the Maple Syrup Festival parade. But, last night tornadoes came to my friends and family in Arkansas. I laid in bed with my phone in my hand, after I was done checking on my Ma and Pa. They were hunkering down in a closet and I couldn't sleep. I could only whisper prayers, and hold my phone tight, as if I was holding on to my parents, because I hate tornadoes and I wanted everyone to be kept safe. And this morning, I awoke to find that somehow, my people, the ones that I know and love were all kept safe. But, they have friends that have lost their homes and I know of one woman who lost her husband and two of her girls. Our hearts break. So, it doesn't feel right to talk about parades. And it's hard to know what to think about God when torna[...]

It's finally actually feeling like spring here and the kids keep bringing me flowers. Gideon sprints across the yard with his glory gathered and yells for me to come see. "Look, momma! I found you something!"  And then he holds up the blooms and looks for my grin. I can't help but smile. What girl doesn't love it when a handsome fella brings her a bouquet of beauty? Even if they are a mangled mess when he releases his sweaty, grimey grip. I place them in a bowl of water and watch him head back out to look for caterpillars and roly-poly bugs. I love getting to be a momma. And I'm especially thankful to get to stay home with my kids. I've never loved any job this much. And yes, there are some hard days, but every job has hard days. And there are lots of failing days. You know, whe[...]

Around here, in this crazy chaotic house of mine, I’m teaching my children to pray. Now, you might be thinking that I mean I’m teaching them how to sit still and fold their hands and bow their heads and close their eyes. We do that occasionally, but not always. Sometimes we yell our prayers, really loud. With our eyes wide open. Like, a couple months ago, when our little friend had to go to the hospital because he was having seizures. Gideon, Hope and I sat in the living room floor and clasped each other’s hands and we yelled for God to please help our friend. We didn’t yell because we thought God was too far away and couldn’t hear. Or because we thought maybe He had gotten old and needed us to speak up. We yelled because we were desperate. Desperate people yell sometimes. And th[...]

It's funny. I've been writing on this blog for about five years now. And I recently wrote a book that will come out in August. And yet, the last few days, this has been my prayer, "Lord, teach me how to write. I don't even know how to write." It's not that I don't know how to type words out on a screen. All of us can do that. But, when I come here to this space, I have your faces in my mind and I want to give you my heart, and sometimes I don't know how to do that. I see my friends who are skeptics. Atheists and agnostics. I see my Wiccan friends. My New Age friends. My Jesus-following friends. And my friends who don't know what they believe and don't honestly care. So, I see a whole sea of faces and I don't even know who to write to. But, my friend, Kinsei, teaches me so muc[...]

A friend told me once that this moment, the one right here, is actually the most important moment of my life. He said it's because this is the only moment we've got. None of us knows if we'll have tomorrow's moment. Or another moment in the next hour. All we have is this one. This one right here.  And this moment is the the most significant moment of my life because it's the moment in which I can meet with God. John Ortberg wrote a whole book about that. A book called, "God is Closer Than You Think." I'd like to read that book someday. And when my friend told me that, I sat spell-bound. Because this sort of thinking can revolutionize a life. It can help a person with their fears. It can help them with their angst. It gives them cause for celebration and  joy, even in the midd[...]