Five Minute Friday: On Waiting

I'm joining the Gypsy Mama for Five Minute Friday today. I love a creative challenge and I never have time for much more than five minutes on Fridays. Lisa-Jo comes up with the prompt and then, I just need to let my fingers walk through five minutes of random thoughts.

On Waiting:

I know Lisa-Jo's waiting so well. Of my nine babies, seven were late. One was born on his due date (and to this day, is the most punctual child on the planet). And then, sweet Sarah, born too early, still had her own brand of waiting. So, waiting for babies I know.

My baby waiting days appear to be over. Sarah is two and a half and I think she's our very last baby. I see her out of the corner of my eye and lately I'm surprised by how much she looks like a little girl, how the baby is fading into fond memory. I don't wish it away. I wouldn't trade this little girl for all the world. But I do sort of keep looking for the baby that I usually introduce to the two-year-old. No baby. Not starting over and falling in love again with someone new.

And now, breath held, I begin a different waiting. I'm waiting to see what He has in store for the next stage of my life. I'm waiting expectantly. But it's a different expectant. I don't really have a vision for this time. I wish I did. I'd always imagined babies in arms, little ones at my knee. And I really relished every minute of life with wee ones. I never stopped to imagine everyone big. Getting bigger. With no one little. So, I wait. I wonder. And I remind myself to trust. Because so far, what He gives me has vastly exceeded my expectations. He's taught me well to wait with joyful hope. To know that life comes. And it is good. Very good.

{this moment: gracie knits}

{this moment} - A Friday ritual.  Photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week.  A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember. If you're inspired to do the same, visit Soulemama to leave a link to your 'moment' in the comments for all to find and see.

A Bit O' Green

 
Kind of a mellow day here today. We're recovering from what was a totally not mellow yesterday.  A couple of days ago, I posted this to my Facebook page:

The sweater I'm knitting says it's "super quick to knit" and "will only take a weekend to knit one up." I'm thinking that the writer knows nothing of my knitting ability or my weekends:-). I'm praying--seriously praying--I can finish in time for Sarah to wear on Easter.

Yesterday morning, I got up, worked out, had an hour solid of time with my Lenten reading and my knitting, and then had time to blog this. 

And then Christian came upstairs. It's a long saga and I hesitate to share it here because I'd never want to discourage someone from donating blood, but he had a very rare complication after a blood donation and we spent a very long day and night in the hospital. He's going to be just fine and whoa---I got a serious amount of knitting finished. Who needs a weekend? Just give me a medical emergency.

In other news, we're dipping and sprinkling Oreos and pretzels, watercoloring shamrocks after talking about Trinity, planning on green stuffed potatoes for dinner, watching a lot of basketball, and oh, we pulled Michael off the couch to start painting the kitchen. Green. Of course. (No worries, honey, it's just  a sample size pot of paint and we're awaiting your approval.).

And we're missing Paddy something fierce. 

Yarn Along

Big, deep sigh.

After several nights of Mike teasing me about my rather large stack of cotton squares, I decided that I could launch myself into a sweater. I started to knit a gauge swatch on Berocco Comfort yarn but it kept becoming impossibly unwisted. Desperate, I told Elizabeth that I certainly must be doing something wrong.

Her solution was to spin me some yarn that couldn't possibly come untwisted. I'm allergic to wool. And alpaca. And I didn't want synthetic. So, she did what any good friend would do and found some cashmere in her stash and dyed it an amazing shade of pink and spun it into an incredible untwistable yarn.

I'm totally serious. If I were ever sure God intended to help me over every obstacle of knitting it was when that yarn arrived in the mail. Cashmere for my first sweater. For a two-year-old? Seriously? Seriously. She had included a gauge swatch in the package with instructions to knit my own swatch before doing anything else. I set off to do just that. Comfortably next to Mike while he worked, I knit away at yet another square. When I was finished, there were no holes; it was nice and tidy. And it looked oddly unlike Elizabeth's.

Mary Beth took it in her hands, held it to the light, squinted at it a bit and then did this little number of sandwiched criticism:

Mom, it's really pretty. I like the way it's got this cool, unique texture. I don't think it's really a regular stockinette, but I love those little diagonals.

I wrote to Elizabeth about the diagonals. She asked I were somehow knitting from the back.

Um. Yep. All the time. I was twisting every single stitch. I'm here to tell you that that was some very difficult knitting.

Elizabeth responded with this video. And so the lady with the pink hair and lovely accent taught me all sorts of things about knitting. And then I knitted another gauge swatch. The proper way.

And it was so much easier!

So while I waited for more yarn, I made another cotton washcloth--the new way. And then another. They were awesome. I actually had rhythm. Even in cotton!

As soon as the new yarn arrived, I looked at the directions on the pattern that Carmen had suggested for me. Carmen's Tess and my Sarah are the same age. See Sarah here? And Tess here? Don't they look so cute in that same sweater? Carmen knitted both. She told me I could do this delicious sweater for Sarah. Elizabeth agreed. Elizabeth even suggested she knit one for Karoline at the same time. A three-way knitting club across three states and two time zones. :-)

I cast on. Then I had absolutely no clue what the pattern was telling me. Carmen broke it down into simpler terms. Elizabeth later broke it into even simpler terms. I was really feeling slow and utterly out of my element. Those pattern directions? They might as well be in Aramaic.

Ladies, I knit the first three rows of this sweater six different times. I'll spare you the details of my mistakes. But around time three it occurred to me that I have children for whom some things are very difficult. Their learning curves are really steep. And they were watching me. Flopped across the bed late at night while l listened to my Lenten "reading," they watched my frustration. They saw me tear up when I recognized that I had messed up so badly I'd have to start again. They watched me shake my hands to get the tense ache out. They watched me slide stitches off needles and take it all out, re-wind that incredibly precious yarn, think myself utterly unworthy of these beautiful needles, this beautiful fiber. And so, I have been very careful not to give up. Not to hesitate to admit I don't know. Not to wait too long to ask for help. Not to fail to be grateful for the people willing to patiently pull me along to do something that comes to them as naturally as breathing.

This is a tiny little cropped sweater in raspberry pink for my very smallest child. All those things are necessary: small enough that I might actually finish it before Easter; pink enough that I still love the yarn despite my frustration.

But I sort of wish it were going to be a sweater for a six foot tall boy who is always cold. Because my prayers for him are being knit into every stitch.

Check in with Ginny to see what everyone else is knitting and reading.

{Update: Christian has a complication related to a blood donation. We're on our way to the hospital. I'm bringing my knitting along. Your prayers are very much appreciated.}

Relationship and Sacrifice

I’ve gotten several e-mails recently asking parenting advice. I don’t know if I’ll ever be comfortable answering those requests. I’m learning as I go and I don’t presume to know enough to comment on someone else’s home situation with an authority at all, particularly when all I know is what I read in an e-mail.

All I can do is offer observations from experience gained in more than 20 years of parenting a large family. From my own experience, in my own house, my overriding parenting principle is to stay close to your children and to stay close to God. It’s simple advice, but not easy advice.

In the excellent book, Hold On to Your Kids, the authors write:

“No matter what problem or issue we face in parenting, our relationship with our children should be the highest priority. Children do not experience our intentions, no matter how heartfelt. They experience what we manifest in tone and behavior. We cannot assume that children will know what our priorities are: we live our priorities.

“Many a child for whom the parents feel unconditional love receives the message that this love is very conditional indeed … unconditional acceptance is the most difficult to convey exactly when it is most needed: when our children have disappointed us, violated our values or made themselves odious to us. Precisely at such times, we must indicate, in word or gesture, that the child is more important than what he does.”

There are two aspects to staying attached to children that I want to unpack from that quote. And then, I’ll look at staying close to God.

The first aspect of attachment is that we absolutely have to be honest with the way we spend our time. If our families are our first priority, then we need to devote more time and attention to them than anything else (except Our Lord — but I think we serve God when we serve our families). That means that every time we are presented with a choice about how to spend time — and there are countless times every single day — we choose according to priority. It’s not a stretch to say that most parents don’t do this. They choose work. They choose adult social relationships. They choose hobbies.

“But I need to work to support them!” goes up the cry. “But I need friends, too!” “But I need to pursue a creative outlet or a sport of my own.” Of course you do. So do I. It’s disordered, however, to ignore our children in order to support them. It’s ridiculous to spend more time developing and nurturing relationships with our neighbors, while our precious child gets the leftovers of our social attention. It’s silly to devote time to creative or athletic endeavors to the neglect of the children we co-created with God. It is up to each of us to discern if we truly manage our time according to our professed priorities.

The second aspect of attachment addressed in the quote is the idea that we love our children even when we don’t love what they do. This seems so simple and every parent I know would affirm that they do, indeed, love their children unconditionally. But many a child would tell you that they don’t know that.

I was in a fast food restaurant the other day. I spoke with six of my children at the table before leaving them to go order our food. I made my expectations for behavior clear. This was one of those times when all the stars lined up and every single one of them was good as gold. Sometimes, it happens. Actually, often it happens, and it has very little to do with the stars and everything to do with how hard we work as a family at behaving well so that we can all enjoy each other. The man in the booth next to them was not enjoying his children. And he told them so. He pointed to mine and asked his why they couldn’t be more like mine. Then, he looked at me and said, “You’re really lucky. You have good kids.”

I caught the eyes of his children and I wanted to cry. His implication was that he did not have good kids. I am certain that this man loved his kids, but if I had been his child at that moment, I would have asked myself if my dad valued me at all or if he valued some stranger’s children more than me.

One thing is certain: I wouldn’t be inclined to go out of my way to be particularly well-behaved for him. If he acted that way often enough, I’d just give up, resign myself to never “winning” his love and move on to other relationships. The best case scenario would find me flourishing in a relationship of well-expressed unconditional love away from my father. The worst case scenario would find me in a string of hurtful relationships. Chances are good I’d not be inclined to behave well.

The point is that everything we say and every behavior we manifest toward our children has an effect on them for good or ill. They feel and absorb our every action. We need to act with them in mind, every single time. Parenting with empathy is good parenting. Period.

We need to stay close to our children and we need to stay close to God. Attachment parenting requires sacrifice. God is the expert at sacrifice. There is no mentor better than Christ on the cross. We are good parents when we embrace our vocations with our whole beings; when we see that there is no greater privilege than to be someone’s parents; when we love wholeheartedly, unabashedly and with the self-donation of the Savior Himself.

{reprinted from the archives of catholicherald.com}

As Lent begins, the thoughts of the church turn to sacrifice: prayer, fasting, almsgiving.  Small Steps focuses on sacrifice this month. Would you share your thoughts with us, let us find you and walk with you? I'd be so grateful and so honored to have you as a companion. Please leave a link to your blog post below and then send your readers back here to see what others have said.