Candy Cane Joe-Joes: oreo cookie with creme filling laced with crushed candy canes. God bless Trader Joes.
Missing presbytery to tend my sick chickadees. (There had to be a silver lining…)
Planning the Christmas Eve morning service. For the first time in umpteen years, we will miss the live broadcast of King’s College-Cambridge doing the Service of […]

R went to the doctor; he has bronchitis.
I have a lingering cough but think I do NOT have bronchitis, although I was working from home this afternoon and got so tired I had to take a nap at 3:30. Then I had to wake up really suddenly to go pick up M so I had […]

The last sliver of a truly breathtaking pecan pie.
Sarah McLachlan’s arrangement of What Child is This/Greensleeves–it is more haunting than the original.
The new booster seat for little she-who-is, which enables her to buckle and unbuckle herself.
Today’s rehearsal with Small Choral Ensemble at church. I brought the girls to give R a little break. C sat […]

This started as a comment to the comments on the previous post but it just got too long. Proving that if blogging is good for anything, it’s good for driving a discussion firmly into the ground.
Point the First
Apropos of Songbird’s and Keith’s comments, it seems that real life lies on that great continuum between “perfect” […]

Some of you may have read or are familiar with the Five Love Languages books. In essence, each person has particular ways they prefer to give love and receive love: gifts, acts of service, physical touch, quality time, and words of affirmation. These fall on some sort of continuum for each person. The trick is […]

My husband accompanied my brother this morning to stand on line for a Nintendo Wii. They headed out at oh-dark-thirty this morning but were, sadly, thwarted. There were 30 people in line for 6 units. They are trying to be philosophical about it–”That’s the most I was willing to do, so I’m OK with it… […]

It’s Thanksgiving morning and the house is full, with two more at the extended stay motel for reasons of crowding and allergies. R woke up this morning realizing that the turkey was brining in 2x strong solution so he’s taken it out and returned it to the fridge. Now the 20 lb. CostCo Megabird will […]

R is sick again. Or still. Homeboy needs to go to the doctor. I’m now the healthiest adult in the house, and that’s not saying much.
The divine miss m has been perfect during the day but had the night from hell last night. I was up with her every hour or two. So I’m fried. […]

So the board of the RevGalBlogPals is meeting at the moment via chat.
Can I just say that meeting with a group of people, while sitting alone in my living room sipping cocoa is oh-so-civilized?
Chat also requires a person to think through what to say–Is this worth the time to type it?
For that reason alone, […]

Remember last week when I asked “why have I been spared” the illnesses? I know the world doesn’t work that way, but what was I thinking putting that in writing? [Cough, sniff]
The divine miss m is also sick–still, or again? R thinks it’s again–she appears to have what I have, which is not the same […]

after reading donald hall’s “last days”
after the poet closed Jane’s round brown eyes,
the reader closed the book,
rolled away from the light,
pushed her face into his bare back,
and breathed until her vision clouded.
though the skin grew clammy with each puff,
it remained warm, a miracle.

We are asked to say five things we are thankful for.
The grace and hope that hums below the surface of so much of life
Husband whose company I enjoy after 12+ years and who seems willing to put up with me as well :-*
A network of support that helps make this very full existence possible: MaDear, […]

new mexico
(for little she-who-is)
in the bath
she presses her palms
like a prayer together
then peeks them open
to let the water pour through;
and the shriveled knuckles,
the stones of flesh, the fault lines,
are O’Keeffe’s pink-white cliffs
that once cupped ancient waters
just as devotionally.
hand
(for the divine miss m)
the rocking chair is her Everest.
she will scale it, with or without my
permission or […]

9:30 a.m.
Preschool dropoff goes better than yesterday. No tears, but she still seems reluctant to go in to the room. Luckily the preschool director, Presbyterian-Quaker, is nearby and helps ease the transition.
noon
MaDear meets me at church and we head into the meeting house for the “preschool Thanksgiving program.” The children file in by class. […]

So little she-who-is refused to say the pledge of allegiance in preschool today.
She’d been having a very off morning, and the teacher, a very gentle and sweet person, apparently “told her that I [the teacher] might need to talk to her mother [me] about it and she decided to cooperate.”
My thoughts, in approximate chronological order:

Whoa, […]

Last night I got an e-mail from the editor of a second mama-related e-zine asking whether I’d gotten the e-mail a couple of months ago saying that they’d accepted two poems for their website. Well no, I hadn’t, although it’s possible my bizarro-world spam filter ate them up. So two pieces will be up on […]

We had dinner last night with Dr. College Friend, who was in town for a conference. It was good to see him, although a bummer that we weren’t able to meet his spouse and son, who are staying in the area with her sister but were unable to make it last night. (And can I […]

…a stewardship sermon?
based on the book of Ruth,
particularly the passages that appear below
“Where you go, I will go. Where you lodge I will lodge.
Your people will be my people, and your God my God.”
How many times had Naomi heard Ruth’s words echoing in her mind since that day? Even after all this time, the scene […]

Those of us who are in the United States have just been through quite a topsy-turvy election. During the campaign we heard a fair amount about red states and blue states, when in fact most of us live in some shade of purple. And so… a lighter look at those confounding colors:
1. Favorite red food
I […]

When you think about “what comes next” in your life’s work or career, and you picture yourself doing whatever usually “comes next” for people on your particular career trajectory, and that next thing feels interesting to you but you also feel a real No, or Not Now, about it, how do you assess whether that […]