Thursday, March 31, 2011

"This morning, listen to the voice of the Lord Jesus speak...


'...I will help you.
It is a small thing for me, your God, to help you. Consider what I have already done.
What! Not help you! I bought you with My blood.
What! Not help you! I died for you.
Since I have done the greater, will I not do less?
Your requests are nothing compared with what I am willing to give.
You need much, but it is nothing for me to grant your needs.
Help you?
Fear not! I will help you.'"


-Spurgeon

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

i am LOVING this blog.

it makes me want to move to montana.

and raise babies... but that's no newsflash.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

tuesday.

"My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird-
equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me
keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be
astonished.

The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
and these body-clothes,

a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
that we live forever."


-Mary Oliver, "Messenger"

Sunday, March 20, 2011

small group, i am unspeakably grateful for you.




Absolutely one of the biggest and most unexpected blessings of my year:
these five precious people and our Sunday nights;
the ways we are learning to do life and prayer together.

We snuck away to Meg's grandparents' cabin in Indiana last month for a retreat- Dawson took these awesome pics on Sunday morning when we were wandering around on the frozen lake.

I love my girls!


Good men.















I love you, small group! Thank you for sharing your hearts and loving mine.






Saturday, March 19, 2011

cause i think beauty is sequential.

I woke up this morning with warm sun on my face and Ryan plucking hymns on guitar in the living room.

And my plans for Saturday are a long date with God, a long walk with Mere, Iglesia, and going into the city for a double date with Steve and Tamara.

Happy Saturday.




Pics:
Wheaton morning, by Chet
A favorite of me and Mere (and her bf)

Monday, March 14, 2011

A Love Letter to the West Chicago Public Library's Children's Department

Dear West Chicago Public Library Children's Department,

How do I love thee, let me count the ways.

I won't say "let's get married and have babies", because, well, you're already taking care of my babies. My eleven beautiful babies I get to love on every week- AND their moms.

I bring them into you once a month or so, when there's time for a field trip but I need it to be easy, close, and free. And there you are... just down the road from my office... right in their neighborhood.

I've never believed in love at first sight, so I won't say that's what happened. But I can't help but admit, there was an immediate attraction. Physical appearance certainly isn't everything, but still, there it was. Your walls are lined in cheerful pictures from storybooks and fairy tales. Your carpet is bright and colorful and has letters and numbers and hopscotch squares sewed into it. There is a cage with a hamster- a HAMSTER!- for kids to peek into in one corner, and there are- oh be still my heart- BIG SOFT CHAIRS, so moms and dads and big kids and babies can all snuggle together and be comfortable as they explore a new book.

But oh-so-quickly, you proved yourself worthy way past skin deep. You are IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD, dearest Library, do you understand the significance of that? And not just because moms can come in the mornings and be guaranteed to meet their kindergartners getting off the bus at noon. Do you know how many educational resources are located close enough to even be a possibility for my families? The Children's Museum? Amazing. The zoo? Fantastic. But not if you have one barely working car, a budget stretched just to buy gas to get to the night shift at the factory and maybe one doctor's appointment, and no driver's license. Don't get me wrong, I love your cousin resources too. They offer what they can graciously and they love on my families from afar. But you, Library, your nearness has captured my heart.

And you're FREE. You're FREE. YOU ARE FREE. Do you know what that means to a low income family? Do you know how INCREDIBLE it is to be able to tell some of my parents about you, about what you OFFER, about the BOOKS and the MOVIES and the CLASSES- and then be able to tell them you are FREE?!!!! Free. You're free. You. Are. All. Free. THEY CAN AFFORD YOU. Oh, Library. The Let's Get Married and Have Babies feeling actually is making an appearance...

And you have BOOKS. You are filled with books, books, books, books, books- (AND IN ENGLISH AND SPANISH!!!!!). These families, can they afford to go on fancy vacas? Do their kids have ballet lessons and violin lessons and soccer practice and Girl Scouts? Rarely, very rarely. But they can explore ANYTHING they want because in you, they can find (free) books. And you have SO MANY. And they are SO WONDERFUL. And your amazing librarians (more on them in a minute), know exactly which ones to put out together, and how to display them. If I ask them for a book about dinosaurs, they pull out a list- A LIST- of every book about dinosaurs. Trains? Princesses? Dora?! You name it, they have it, know where it is, and are excited to point us towards them. In you, Library, my babies can read Goodnight Moon in English or Spanish. Their siblings can make friends with Anne or Jo or Sam Gribley or Maniac Magee. These sweet, sweet kids can grow their own strength of character, their love for things good and brave and true, through the books you offer. You are helping to shape and form them, Library, into who they are going to be. Thank you for that, from the bottom of my heart.

But, oh, Library, most of all, your librarians. I love your cheerful pictures. I love your accessibility. But your librarians? YOUR LIBRARIANS?!!! Who smile at even my most drooly baby? Who will use wild hand gestures and laugh at themselves in order to help a mom who only speaks Spanish, creating comfort, community and welcome even without a shared language? Who, after an hour and a half of my little ones running screaming throughout you while I frantically try to count them, pull me aside as I'm leaving to tell me again how much they love it when I bring my families in?

Library, my families love you. My sweet, sweet families who fight tooth and nail to protect their loved ones, who work low-paying jobs they are way overqualified for because it puts food on the table and they want the best life for their children, who tell me I work too hard and need more fun (!!)... these families, so often they feel like second-class citizens in the fancy, English-speaking buildings in this county. They tiptoe in and look around awed and worry to me, afterwards, about if they "did it right". But I have seen them loosen, in you. I have seen shy moms start smiling and conversing and exploring, warmed by your pictures and your books and your free-ness and your kind, kind staff. I have heard them tell me that they went back on their own, later. They learn how to get library cards. They take their children. They tell their husbands about you. They feel they belong in you as much as anyone else does.

Oh Library, oh beautiful Children's Department of the West Chicago Public Library. You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on.

Yours forever,
Emily

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Finishing books + Me = HAPPENING

Seriously. This year. Seriously seriously seriously seriously, I am going to... START books. Then READ them straight through (STRAIGHT THROUGH!). And then I am going to FINISH THEM.

I am NOT going to keep a stack of 3 or 5 or 12 (it's happened) books on my nightstand, all of which I will pick up, peruse, get really excited about for a week and then never finish... thus losssinnggg any ability to really GLEAN whatever the book has to offer. No no no no no. Finishing finishing finishing finishing finishing.

And I am actually going to READ some of the books I have been MEANING TO READ for like... the last hundred years.

K? Great.

So my plan for 2011 was... all of that... and I was going to be all super-intentional and Read And Finish One Good Book A Month ('good' meaning, preferably not a Shopaholic novel. Although I do love them). And I was not allowed to start another one until I finished that one.

Well so it's March and I've read about half of the book I started in January. (I really like it. But non-Shopaholic books don't go as fast...). And... I cheated and started a second one anyway... but it's because Mayr sent it to me and it's on Ephesians and I'm STUDYING Ephesians right now. So... it's not REALLY cheating. (Oh yeah, and I read The Help. But I did finish that one!!!).

But I am recommitting! I am going to finish the first one! And I am going to keep reading good books! And finishing them! And learning things! And being well-read!


OK, so here's some on my list for this year.

Gilead
Til We Have Faces
One Thousand Gifts
Revelations of Divine Love
Julian of Norwich: A Contemplative Biography
Cloister Walk
Wounded Prophet: A Portrait of Henri J. M. Nouwen


Anyone have suggestions? I'd especially like fiction which still count as something I could feel impressive putting on my bookshelf I MEAN which are good literature.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011



"Here dies another day

during which I have had eyes, ears, hands

and the great world around me.

And with tomorrow begins another.

Why am I allowed two?"


-G.K. Chesterton

Sunday, March 6, 2011

.miss meg.

My favorite 7th grader flew out by herself last month to visit me for a weekend.


I worked hard to keep my status as the coolest OLDEST sister (Al, being way cooler, prettier, and living NEAR DISNEYLAND, keeps me from just stealing the coolest OLDER sister title in any permanent way). We went downtown, got pedicures, ate out, went to a movie, and of course shopped 'til we dropped. 'Cause it's what we do.

I love this girl a lot.







Thanks for visiting, Meglets! Thanks for sending her Dad and Julie :-)

Friday, March 4, 2011

happy birthday sarah.


I am so thankful for you, my sweet farmer girl,





Teacher of tea and prayer and poetry,







A million memories,








I love learning through how you work for justice.
I love how you choose life.
You have taught me so much about being.
You are so beautiful.




Thank you for wholeheartedly rejoicing in my joys, and for choosing to carry so many of my burdens.
Thank you for letting me in to your joys and your burdens.
I love learning through your love and joy and life.
I love living life with you.





May this year be filled with even more learning and love than the one before.

I loooooove you!!!!!!





Human Needs Global Resources Covenant, 2009

As fellow travelers on this journey, we commit to this covenant before God. Lord, in Your mercy, hear these our prayers:

When confronted with scarcity, need, and inadequacy, may we be nourished by the Bread of Life and the Cup of Salvation. Abundance overflows from Your table, sustaining all who come in faith. Father, help us.

When monotony blurs our vision and dulls our senses, may we encounter others as Christ did, through intentional presence in daily life, submitting as clay to be formed into vessels filled with the Spirit. Christ, guide us.

When wounded by the fractured condition of Your people, may we be united by Your Lordship in faith, hope, and love; seeing, as through the facets of a diamond, the beautiful spectrum of Your light reflected onto Your holy Church joined in praise. Spirit, empower us.

When all Creation groans, afflicted by injustice and driven to despair, may the promise of redemption root us in the hope of Your Kingdom: "Behold, I am making all things new!"

Holy Trinity, send us now into the world in peace, and grant us strength and courage to love and serve You with gladness and singleness of heart.

Amen.