Lord, Hear Our Prayer

The internet is a formidable force for bringing the comfort and consolation and hope of the Lord to all of us. It can be an incredibily powerful medium for community. There is an unfathomable resource for prayer here. We have on the 'net the privilege of praying for people and of being witness to the miracles brought forth when fervent, faith-filled people pray for one another.

Let's be that community of hope and faith for one another.

How about this idea? What if I pop in here every weekend, share Sunday's gospel and talk a wee bit about how we can live it and pray it in our homes? And then you tell me how we can pray for you that week? Deal?

{And please, do return and let us know how prayer is bearing fruit.}

Gospel 

Mark 10:46-52

As Jesus was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a sizable crowd,
Bartimaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus,
sat by the roadside begging.
On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth,
he began to cry out and say,
"Jesus, son of David, have pity on me."
And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent.
But he kept calling out all the more,
"Son of David, have pity on me."
Jesus stopped and said, "Call him."
So they called the blind man, saying to him,
"Take courage; get up, Jesus is calling you."
He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus.
Jesus said to him in reply, "What do you want me to do for you?"
The blind man replied to him, "Master, I want to see."
Jesus told him, "Go your way; your faith has saved you."
Immediately he received his sight
and followed him on the way.

Think 

"As far as I am concerned the greatest suffering is to feel alone, unwanted, unloved. The greatest suffering is also having no one, forgetting what an intimate, truly human relationship is, not knowing what it means to be loved, not having a family or friends." ~Mother Theresa

Pray

Open my eyes, Jesus. Help me to see the lonely, unwanted and unloved in my world. Don't let me brush him aside. Don't let me be impatient. Help me stretch as You did, towards the unnoticed.

Act

Despite the grandness of His mission, despite the vast,infinite scope of His majesty, Jesus was a detail guy. He noticed. He attended to the least of these with purposeful dignity. Square your shoulders, Mama. Open your eyes. Who are the least in your midst? What are the details? Bring peace, order, and dignity to those people and places. Heal hearts and leave no one feeling unnoticed or unloved.

It's All So Much Better Outside

The place where we've been learning out of doors since the late 1980s: Hidden Pond Nature Center

The super awesome excellent book that makes nature study so easy to bring to life all year 'round: The Nature Connection: An Outdoor Workbook for Kids, Families, and Classrooms

needle & thREAD

I think it's safe to say I've found my sewing rhythm again. Despite the fact that this morning began rather poorly, it's been a good sewing day. Karoline woke me at 5:00 with the announcement that she was going to throw up. And she did. Then she asked if we could please go down to the sewing room and make something for Becca's new baby. That's my girl!

She helps me to sew by pressing the pedal. Unfortunately, she didn't wait until I said, "Go!" The needle went clear through my finger and broke in two. I sat there a minute and contemplated taking a picture for Instagram (Mike has an iPhone now and he was in NC; I wanted him to be duly impressed). Then I contemplated waking Paddy to help me, but decided he's been cranky lately and needed sleep. So I pulled out one end, then the other end, then the thread. Karoline offered me a bandaid. After I pulled out the tip end, I heard it drop. I thought it dropped to the floor, but I couldn't find it. Then I went back to sewing. My machine kept jamming, so I think maybe the tip is stuck beneath the bobbin. For about a half hour, I took the machine apart, cleaned it, looked for the tip, tried again. Still nothing. Karoline wandered back into the room.

"How are those pants coming?" said she.

"I'm kind of stuck. I think the tip of the needle fell into the sewing machine after I pulled it out of my finger."

"Are we still taking about your injury, here? You need to get sewing before that baby gets too big. There are no wimps in heaven."

I thought I'd die laughing. Becca taught her that "no wimps" line and she so delivered it perfectly.

I did finish the pants and they are so cute I'd love to make a whole wardrobe of them. Pretty and pink and perfectly reversible. I love them! The pattern is Quick Change Trousers in Anna Maria Horner's book Handmade Beginnings. When I first got the book, it made me sad. I just wanted to sew for a baby. Now, it makes me happy. There are always lots of babies in my life and a little something handmade in a gift bag is just so sweet.

I also started putting Sarah's Class Picnic Blouse together. It's slow going because Katie is sewing along on her own bouse as I sew Sarah's. I have a doable deadline, though. I want this flannel blouse for her birthday. I'm toying with the idea of the All Set pants, which are like the Quick Change Trousers, only for "big girls" or a flannel Lazy Days skirt with AMH flannel and ribbon. I don't know. I'm afraid the flannel pants with the shirt will look like pjs. But the pants are so cute, I'd love to make more...I still have a week to get it finished in time. Skirt or pants, what say you?

My reading has been pretty limited to Mission of Motherhood, but, speaking of Anna Maria Horner, I got a note that my copy of Anna Maria's Needleworks Notebook has shipped. I'm so looking forward to reading it. Given the current state of my finger, I think embroidery is not in my immediate future. She's always great reading, though.

I'm sitting here tonight fighting the urge to stash fabric. I heard we might have a hurricane of huge proportions next week. I just want to be sure I have enough thread and elastic and fabric to sew my way through the storm. Totally rational, right?

~~~~

What about you? Are you starting to think Christmas gifts? Big plans for winter home dec?  Or are you embroidering? Pulling a needle with thread through lovely fabric to make life more beautiful somehow? Would you share with us just a single photo (or more) and a brief description of what you're up to? Will you tell us about what you're reading, also? Would you talk sewing and books with us? I'd love that so much.

Make sure the link you submit is to the URL of your blog post or your specific Flickr photo and not your main blog URL or Flickr Photostream. Please be sure and link to your current needle and thREAD post below in the comments, and not a needle and thREAD post from a previous week. If you don't have a blog, please post a photo to the needle & thREAD group at Flickr. 

       Include a link back to this post in your blog post or on your flickr photo page so that others who may want to join the needle and thREAD fun can find us! Feel free to grab a button here (in one of several colors) so that you can use the button to link:-)

Yarn Along with Edith

Hello again! This is Edith and I'm so excited to be here with you, joining my friend Ginny for this week's Yarn Along. I thoroughly enjoyed our time together for needle and thREAD and am just plain giddy about turning our conversation to knitting. I do so love knitting!

Allow me to begin with a single name:

Elizabeth Zimmerman

A legend, that one. Don't you just love her?

I do. Not only because she is, like me, a quirky continental knitter. (You've read the story of her governess "correcting" the English-style knitting she learned from her mother? Apparently continental knitting had been all but abandoned in England during World War II due to its association with Germany. Ah, the politics of knitting!) No, it's not simply common technique behind my fondness. There's a true genius about Elizabeth Zimmerman and what I adore most is her brilliant humor. 

Really, you must pick up a copy of one of her books. Knitter's Almanac? Knitting Without Tears? Or how about a volume of her columns, The Opinionated Knitter? Whether or not you venture to recreate the patterns she "unvented," you'll love her wit. 

Allow me to tempt you with her instructions for knitting a ribbed turtleneck:

Pick up a multiple of 4 stitches around the neck and work in knit-two, purl-two ribbing until you are sick of it.

She's charming. And truly, she revolutionized knitting. Before the days of Ravelry's dizzying database of detailed patterns, knitters simply knew how to use a system of proportions to create garments. Elizabeth Zimmerman was the first to break down that mysterious knowledge. She unlocked the secret for people like me, those of us who are rather fond of following recipes. 

So I'm slowly branching out these days, trying to learn the logic of knitting. But not wanting to venture too far, too soon into uncharted percentage systems, I casted on a project based on Elizabeth Zimmerman's legendary February Baby Sweater, just to get a feel for her designs. Most likely you've heard of it, the February Lady Sweater? It's an adult-sized version of the baby cardigan adapted by Pamela Wynne, conveniently written in the style of a modern pattern. 

So far I'm loving it.

I'm knitting my February Lady in an autumnal palette, hues that remind me of October. I suppose I'm a bit off the almanac on that one, so let's just say I'm knitting an October Lady Sweater, shall we? (You can find my progress and notes here on my new Ravelry page.)

I chose a hand-dyed merino wool by the Chilean artisans of Araucania. This aran weight yarn is one of their Toconao Multy variations. It captures autumn, my favorite season. 

(And I just noticed upon uploading the photo above that my sweater coordinates perfectly with my tote. Funny. Didn't plan that one.)

I've only just finished the yoke and separated for the sleeves, but I can already tell you how much I love Elizabeth Zimmerman's gull lace pattern. Easy to memorize, easy to correct when your scooting infant pulls up on your chair and rips your work right out of your hands and hundreds of stitches fall off the ends of your needles. No use crying over dropped stitches with this pattern.

But I didn't have to work through the lace section to fall in love. My 14 year old daugther, Marianne, has her own February Lady Sweater in the works and is a bit further along than me. She's knitting hers in Spud and Chloe Sweater Yarn. She says it's a dream to work with.

(Isn't her tote adorable? Last week's sewing lesson. And I just noticed upon uploading the photo how perfectly her project coordinates with her tote. Strange.)

Upon writing that last sentence, I promptly left my keyboard to inspect my eldest daughter's tote. And yes, it too matches her project.

Oh my!

Eleanor is knitting Hannah Fettig's Contended Cardi in Blue Sky Alpaca Worsted Hand Dyes. She asked for the yarn for her 17th birthday. That cardigan calls for about a hundred thousand yards of alpaca. I told her that her father and I could A) send her to college or B) buy her that yarn. 

She chose the yarn, smart girl.

Of course, I'm only joking. We'll still send her to college. She just better wear that sweater every single day of it!

Enough about yarn, let's talk reading. My matchy-matchy girls and I are devouring the Bronte sisters and have been thoroughly entertained...in a dark, depressive sort of way. Today we're listening to the last 30 minutes of Wuthering Heights on Audible. Of course, we could just read aloud together, as we have done for years, but we've recently transitioned to audiobooks and called it a daily knit-a-long.

Knitting and British ghost stories. It doesn't get much better than that, now does it?

One evening after our listening, we put the littles to bed and watched the movie version, the newer production with Ralph Feinnes as Heathcliff. (Go ahead, watch the trailer.)

Mr. Feinnes is wonderful, as usual, but oddly cast, I must say. Ralph Fiennes as a strapping, dark-toned gypsy? He's too refined, too slight of build, the girls and I said. However, we were pleasantly surprised to find the part of Nelly Dean played by Janet McTeer, the talented woman who read the parts narrated by Nelly on the audio version we've been enjoying. She's absolutely wonderful. 

Really, you should download the story and listen. I promise, it'll go great with your knitting. 

Knit on with confidence and hope, through all crises.

-Elizabeth Zimmerman

Join Ginny for more knitting and reading. 

The Undivided Heart (Take Two)

Last week, I read Chapter 3 of The Mission of Motherhood. I read it and prayed about it and read it again and prayed some more. Then, I carefully constructed a blog post. Most of the time, when I write, my fingers fly and it all gets onto the screen quickly. I labored over that post. Then, I decided to give Typepad's new picture editor feature a whirl. I made a careless mistake and <poof!> there went the post.

Patrick and Mary Beth tried to help me to try to recover it. It was long gone. Over the next couple of days, I had heart-to-heart talks with three dear friends. What I learned is that some things are better pondered in one's own heart, whispered to a trusted friend, and not broadcast on the internet. In the end, I'm glad for the process of writing that post. I'm glad I could recount it in detail for my friends. I'm glad they lingered long to listen and to offer wise counsel. And, ultimately, I'm glad the post disappeared. 

My first friend pointed out that it might not be such a good idea to make longterm decisions in the midst of an intrusive remodeling project, several kid emergencies, an extended Daddy trip to Florida, and some health issues of my own. She reminded me that my introverted soul was starved. No kidding! I had had no time without strangers in my house and several children in my bed for weeks. I was desperate for silence. Also, my rhythm was rocked and the time I'd carefully carved to write without taking anything from my family had dissipated when Stephen hurt himself and I no longer had to sit for two hours three times a week while he practiced. Perhaps because fatigue was having its way with me; all I could hear were the voices saying this wasn't a real mission anyway. These weren't anything more than first world frivolties. My friend, who knows and understands the mission I want to embrace--both in my home and in the blogging world--helped me to see my blog through a new lens, both figuratively and literally. She had some tangible solutions to things I saw as insurmountable obstacles. She's promised to nudge me along the learning curve. I look forward to putting those ideas in motion.

The second friend listened long. I took the phone with me and talked and talked as I walked downtown McLean on a sunny late afternoon. Nick kicked the soccer ball around and my friend Edith and I kicked around some ideas. She helped my to see how to guard my heart, to ensure that it was undivided, even as I sought to have meaningful, God-honoring relationships both in my home and beyond my own four walls. She pointed out that long ago God had planted a seed in my marriage--one that we were certain was a call to a big family and home education.  At the time, that seemed like a big, bold mission. It still is a big, bold mission.

Then, Edith had another idea that gave me new energy and enthusiasm. She said she really enjoyed visiting with you all last week during needle & thREAD and she'd like to come back and share more sewing and some of her knitting, too. I'm so, so happy to welcome her here. I think that as I labor in my home, at my learning table, and in this virtual living room, it is good to have co-laborers who are similarly called, people who can remind me that God wants me here and challenge me to do His will wholeheartedly. 

Then, I talked to Megan. Megan has been entrusted with my heart during times in my life when it has been at its most vulnerable. And she has entrusted me with hers. On Karoline's birthday, Megan treated us to tea. I literally had not slept in over 48 hours. Life had been a blur of Spanish-speaking contractors, college applications, angry teenagers, damaged kitchen walls, crooked countertops, and hour and hours of college math. I was totally exhausted, yet the voice in my head kept saying, "You aren't doing enough. You just stay here trying to bless the abundantly blessed and still you falter all the time."

Megan whisked us into a teatime fairy tale and made the birthday so very memorable. Once, nine years ago, while looking adoringly at his wife, Megan's husband Scott said, "She has a way of making everything more beautiful, doesn't she?" She does. And I count Megan among my dearest blessings. Megan and I have been walking the Alphabet Path with our girls this year. She's all in for sharing pictures and recipes for every letter of the alphabet with you. I know Megan; beauty will follow. And there is value in beauty.

Finally, after hearing me count my failures aloud one time too many, my husband put me in the car on Saturday and drove west into my beloved Blue Ridge mountains. The kids and I introduced him to Rappahanock Cellars and he and I had big, big talk. I was reminded that ever since I was a little girl, God has called me to wholehearted motherhood and to homemaking. And ever since I was a little girl, I have wanted to write. Mike seemed at once surprised and dismayed to learn how close I'd come to ceasing to write (here and elsewhere) without really talking it through with him. All executive management, he jumped in with some ideas for how to make it work better, without taking anything from our home. He also pointed out that mission looks different in the first world. In some ways, it needs to be quiet; it must be almost secret.  It's the quiet work of mercy towards our neighbors. It is still God's work. And it still has value.

All in all, I begin this week more peaceful than I've been in quite sometime. There are some changes planned and they are all good. I'm only through Chapter 3 of the book and I feel like the fruits are abundant! Mostly, I've learned well that one way a woman lives with an undivided heart for her family is to entrust that heart to friends who know and understand how dear the mission is to her. We need good friends. Other women can affirm for us that the mostly hidden work in our homes is valuable, necessary, and lifegiving. They can challenge us to live authentic lives as wives and mothers first. They can lift us when we stumble and they can celebrate the every day. This life--large families, home education, wholehearted homemaking--it's a life apart, even when it's in the midst of ordinary suburbia. We are a missionary order of the suburban kind; aprons are our habits.

Are you thinking about the mission of motherhood, too? I'm going to join The Nester for 31 Days. I'm going to host a 31 day "retreat"here  to remind myself (and anyone who wants to come along) of the mission of motherhood and matrimony. If you want to do your own 31 Days on anything you choose, head here and join! If you want to retreat from the noise of the 'net for a month and focus your own sweet home and family, grab a “Remind Myself of the Mission” button and curl up with a candle, your Bible, and this good book! Let me know your thoughts below. We can help each other hear His mission. You can add a Remind Myself button by cutting and pasting the code below.

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Click here for the whole series.