I Love You Tree!

Sweet Mama! You, with the baby in your arms and the husband working long hours and the Christmas tree still standing forlorn in the corner. I dug this up from the archives  for you, because I know that feeling and, well, I love you!

2007

The "Honey-Do List" in this house is quite long. In the interest of preserving marital bliss, I won't share it with you here. Let's just say that "Honey" started a new job just before the baby arrived and he's been working and traveling enough for two men ever since. That is the segue to revealing that (drumroll, please): The Foss Family Christmas Tree still stands proudly in my family room on this seventh day of February!

There was a time in the life of my marriage when I would have actually written that "Honey Do" list and I would have oh-so-carelessly left it lying around. Or, I would have invited his mother to dinner, knowing that he wouldn't want her to see the tree in the corner. Or, I would have pouted and moped and complained about (1)the fact that he was gone and/or (2)the fact that the tree is annoying my sense of order. Neither #1 or #2 does me or anybody else much good.  It's wasted energy and does nothing to contribute to the atmosphere around here. His mother isn't coming to dinner any time soon. And the last thing the poor, overworked man needs is another list of things to do.

There was later time in my life when I would have taken it down myself. But I have since learned that some jobs are better left to big, strong men (and I have the scars to prove it).  Now, I have a couple of big strong, young men in my house.And both of them offered to take down the tree. But I know my Honey--he wants the tree in the box just so (and rightfully, I might add--trees last longer when they are handled with care and they are far easier to assemble when put away properly). And I know my young men--better not to let them touch the tree. Family harmony next advent is worth far more than freeing up space in that corner of the family room.

So, it stands in my family room, ornaments long since put away. And it reminds me every day of just how hard my husband is working to feed and clothe and shelter and educate this very large family.  It stands there and very early in the morning when it's still dark and no one is looking, I turn on the lights and I say prayer for the man who wishes he were home more.  I ask God to show us how He'd have us live, which choices He'd have us make. And I thank God for the Honey who chose that tree and who provided for it and for the house where it stands.

So, it only seemed natural on one very cold winter evening, when Honey was still at work long after dinner was done, to turn to those beautiful children and ask them to help me make that tree everything it was meant to be.

We took the pink paper hearts on which we'd written all the things and people we love and rested them firmly on the "God" doily and we hung them on the Daddy Valentine Tree! Martha Stewart, you can have your efficiency calendar that tells us all when to take down the Christmas tree. Mine just became the Tree of Love in this house full of life!

These are my neighbors...

Small girl, up way too early, shattering the quiet I expected before dawn. I remind myself that you are not the intrusion; you are the reason that I've carved this time to fill my tank with Jesus. 

Some people can jump out of bed in the morning, swallow a handful of vitamins with a cup of coffee, scrape the ice off their windshields, commute in crazy traffic, and take on the world. 

Not me. 

I'm weak-kneed at the prospect of spending the day with six children. I jump when the phone rings and I recognize the ringtone as one belonging to a "child" living away. I am overwhelmed by mundane things like laundry mountains and soccer schedules and how to roast a chicken.

I spend my early morning drinking deep of Him because I'm going to need it.

This work at home--this holy,  holy work? It's not something we do to pass the time while we wait for Him to call us to something more, something greater. This is the more. These children in our midst, the ones that sleep horizontally in the middle of our beds, the ones that sit in the minivan as we drive to dance class, the ones who really need to tell us all about it at 10 PM, they are the holy calling.

They are the "neighbors," living right here among us. 

We are called to go and make believers of all nations. We are called to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. We are called to holiness. Holiness. Even in our own homes. Even when no one is watching, but our children. Especially when no one is watching but our children. 

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C. S. Lewis offers this. I have taken the liberty to substitute "child" where he wrote "neighbour." I suppose we could substitute "husband" as well. 

It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his [child]. The load, or weight, or burden of my [child's] glory should be laid on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the back of the proud will be broken. It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of the overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations--these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit--immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we are to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people who have from the outset, taken each other seriously--no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner--no mere tolerance, or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your child is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian [child], he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ ver latitat--the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden. ~from The Weight of Glory

This is not a stop on the way to doing great things for God. This is the place where great things get done every day.

Snow, Sew, and So much more

 

I remember practially holding my breath by the radio in the morning, burrowed deep beneath the covers, waiting to hear the announcer tell us if school was canceled. If we missed the announcement, there was frantic dial spinning and rapid tuning to catch it on another station. No more. Now, within seconds of the decision, my phone starts dinging with the news, heralded from far and wide.

And my kids don't even go to school!

The school decision has a domino effect, even here. No school in the neighborhood means that friends can come play in the middle of the day. It means that dance is canceled and the studio firmly closed. It means soccer becomes a last minute dcision and a moving target--everybody and his brother scrambles to secure indoor space all over the region and at all hours of the day. Why, sure, I didn't have anything planned or anything, let's just go check out driving conditions in two different counties.

School has been canceled for the whole week. They've even made the decision for tomorrow already.

"School" is not canceled in the Foss household. Actually, I'm feeling pretty good about the whole thing. If my children get some work done every day this week, I figure that makes up for the week when the school kids went back after  Christmas and we were still distracted by the presence of our college boys. We're all even now. More or less.

Not a lot of sewing is happening here, much to my surprise. I've been distracted away from pajama sewing by a little Valentine towel embellishment. And, as in years past, for some reason, snow means a beeswax furniture polishing blitz. We're stocked up on Daddy Van's Beeswax polish. Bored children get the polish and a rag. Kitchen cabinets, furniture, banisters--there's no end to the polishing that can be done while the snow falls and the wind howls.

We did made some really pretty snowflake ballerinas with a whole bunch of girlfriends. This craft was surprisingly successful even with tiny girls. The girl total that day was around ten, I think and everyone enjoyed the craft. I highly recommend clicking that link and giving it a whirl (or a twirl).

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 There is, of course a basket of "Snow Books." The basket grows fuller every year. Here's a list of favorites. Christine Scarlett sent me some recommendations last year (or mayb the year before) and we've added to our basket based on her suggestions. So, here's hers and mine, all together and happy.

::Our Snowman by M.B. Goffstein (I love the line, "Year after year, these things work," and I look for opportunities to say it in real life.)

::The Snow Child retold by Freya Littledale, illustrated by Barbara Lavallee (other versions available)

:: The Mitten by Alvin Tresselt, illustrated by Yaroslava (Jan Brett and others have also done this.  It is fun to do a comparison.) Jan Brett's is here.

::The Hat by Jan Brett (Hats and Mittens: they go together;-)

::  The Snow Speaks by Nancy White Carlstrom and Jane Dyer (enchanting and one of my favorite illustrators.  Pull it out again during the Christmas season.)

::  Winter Harvest by Jane Chelsea Aragon and Leslie Baker (a calming evening story)

::  Owl Moon by Jane Yolen and John Schoenherr (Caldecott, classic)

::  Ollie's Ski Trip by Elsa Beskow (nice one to read on a day of sledding, skating, or X-C skiing)

:: Flannel Kisses by Linda Crotta Brennan, illustrated by Mari Takabayashi (a just-don't-miss book favorite)

::  City of Snow, The Great Blizzard of 1888 by Linda Oatman High, illustrations by Laura Francesca Fillipucci (true story)*

::  A Day on Skates, The Story of a Dutch Picnic by Hilda van Stockum (for older readers or as a read aloud over several days)

::Snow (I love the lyrical Cynthia Rylant. She does beautiful things with snow.)

::Snowsong Whistling (We pull this one out in the autumn and love it together through February.)

::The Snowy Day (Karoline's favorite for several years. We even have a Peter doll.)

::Owl Moon (Another Caldecott. I love this story of a late night adventure with Dad.)

::Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening (beautiful, effortless poetry memorization)

::My Brother Loved Snowflakes (this one, with the one just below, makes the spine for really good unit study on the science of snowflakes

::Snowflake Bentley (Caldecott-worthy woodcuts, true story)

::The Rag Coat (this one makes us so grateful for warmth)

::Jan Brett's Snowy Treasury (all the Jan Brett snow books, bound together. Definitely a treasure.)

::The Three Snow Bears (another Jan Brett favorite)

::Katy and the Big Snow

 Here are some more links for snow discoveries:

• Six-fold symmetry of the snow crystal (click here and then click on "Nature, Number, and Geometry")HT: Kim
•   Make a virtual snowman
• The Snowflake Bentley Website
• Learn some new facts about snow
• Intermediate level list to help understand winter weather
• Snow art, snow castles, virtual snowflakes, and lots of snow info
• The official site of the Snowman story , with some games
• The FEMA Winter Storm site for kids
• Jan Brett activities

::And, finally the popcorn and marshmallows. This is standard snow food, but my littlest children probably don't know the whole meaning behind the tradition. When Michael was little, there was snow predicted one day. I made a big deal, stocked the snow books, talked it up in a big, big way. He was so looking forward to snowballs. No snow. So, I popped popcorn and made popcorn "snowballs." Saved the day. Now when snow is forecasted, I stockpile the ingredients for popcorn balls. That way, we have big, round, white balls no matter what.

 

Melt two sticks of butter in a very big pot.

 

While the butter is melting, pop 1 cup of popcorn, the old fashioned way.

Dump a bag of marshmallows into the melted butter.

  Stir until melted.

 

Pour the popcorn into the melted marshmallows and stir well.

 

Generously grease your hands with butter. As soon as the marshmallow-coated popcorn is just barely cool enough to handle, form into balls.

Even if you don't have snow, read the books and make the popcorn balls. Childhood should be sweet.

So, what about you? Is it cold and snowy there? How are you spending your days. Of course, please tell us about your sewing and your reading. And also, let us know if you have any snow links to add to the list.

And the snow,

while it is here,

reminds us of this:

that nothing lasts forever

except memories.

~from Snow

 

The Cure for the Crankies

Warning: There's no magic bullet;-)

I felt it creeping over me, a sort of sinister shadow, familiar, yet unwelcome. Even as the words escaped my mouth, I wondered at them. How could I say such things in that tone? It was the shadow—the cranky shadow. Irritability, annoyance, impatience all whined their way into the dialogues of the day.  And here I was, fully in the grips of the complaining crankiness I detest. 

How did I arrive here? More importantly, how could I find my way out? Try as we might to put them blame elsewhere, Crabby Mommy Syndrome has its root in sin. Those things which make us cranky usually point straight at our disordered attachments. Those attachments are one of four things (many thanks to St. Thomas Aquinas for nailing it all down so astutely): power, pleasure, wealth, or honor.

Every single time, when I put it to the test, Crabby Mommy Syndrome matches up against these vices. I’m irritated beyond words at the clutter and the chaos in the house. I feel like if I have to sweep the same floor one more time, I might break the broom over someone’s head. My sense of power is offended. I want control.  And without control, I think I’ll just lash out at someone so I can fleetingly feel like I have power over the situation. 

It’s so noisy, there are so many different conversations happening at once, that I’m certain my ears will burst at the assault. I yell for everyone to be quiet, the irony hitting me before the words leave my mouth. Quiet is my creature comfort. I take pleasure in silence. And silence isn’t a bad thing, unless the quest for the comfort it brings leads me to offend love. Apparently, sometimes I want quiet so badly, I’m willing to sin to obtain it.

On an otherwise calm afternoon, three reminders pop up in my inbox for soccer and dance fees just as a child texts to tell me that he’s lost his retainer. I think that wealth is not my vice, but I feel the shadow hovering as I worry about meeting each “request” for money. And then I snap at the next person who comes along and asks for something—anything, it doesn’t matter who or what. Sin lurks in disordered attachments.

Finally, there’s honor. Nothing accelerates Crabby Mommy Syndrome faster than a disrespectful child.  When our children are rude to us or when they disobey, it’s easy to forget that they aren’t put into our lives to make us feel good about ourselves. No doubt, they are commanded to honor us. No doubt, they must learn to obey. But they are to do so for their spiritual health, not for the health of our egos. Occasions of disrespect on the part of our children are occasions for us to control our passions and to correct with patience so that both parties grow in virtue. In the face of stinging disrespect, though, it’s easy to fall prey to bitter crankiness. 

So, how to remedy Crabby Mommy Syndrome? How to grow in grace and respond with charity when I’m truly ready to tear my hair out in exhausted frustration? Get close to Jesus. Rely on His grace. Stay firmly fixed on His Word. Make haste to confession, receive His forgiveness, and begin again. Get to Mass (alone if I can manage it). Pour out to God himself the struggles of my heart.  Tell Him about the hurt and the frustration and the weight of things of the world. Empty it all before the throne of mercy and beg to be filled with Him. It’s not a quick fix. It’s not a magic bullet. It’s not easy. But it is the only light that truly dispels the shadow.

The Pharisee in Us

I sat at the kitchen counter in silence this morning, raw honey poised over bitter tea, Bible open to this morning's Gospel, and it hit me in a way that it never has before today. Late last night, I read an email from a reader that began, "I stopped reading your blog because it always made me feel bad about myself. Everything in your life is perfect and if it isn't, you spritualize it until it is." 

Stirred the honey into the tea, grateful for the sweet that chases the bitter.

I get some variation of that email pretty often. Usually, my reaction is to be sure that I write something very soon after that makes it clear that I'm not perfect, my kids aren't perfect, my life isn't perfect, and none of us are under the delusion that any of it is. Perfect. This time, though, it didn't hit me that way. This time, I sort of understood what she was getting at.

I read places and come away feeling less than, too. It's not so much about perfection, it's more about something seeming being better ::  more peaceful or more beautiful or more hopeful or holier. My favorite social media is Instagram. I love a picture. I really, really do. I love the way a picture can tell a whole story. Instagram (and all its sisters) is a slippery slope towards filling in all the blanks outside the frame and making a false idol of one's neighbor. 

Yep. False idol. 

Them are fighting words. I have to tell myself that fighting false idols is critical to my spiritual health. This morning, reading today's Gospel, I thought about that email.

Mark 2:23-28

As Jesus was passing through a field of grain on the sabbath,
his disciples began to make a path while picking the heads of grain.
At this the Pharisees said to him,

“Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the sabbath?”
He said to them,
“Have you never read what David did
when he was in need and he and his companions were hungry?
How he went into the house of God when Abiathar was high priest
and ate the bread of offering that only the priests could lawfully eat,
and shared it with his companions?”
Then he said to them,
“The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.
That is why the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.”

 

 In my early internet days, it was easy to see the Pharisaical Danger. That is, I could spot what looked like pharasaical behavior in the women who read other women's words and judged those women's lives "not holy enough." It seemed cut and dried. I'd been hurt by those women, and maybe that's why that kind of pharasaical behavior really wasn't a temptation for me.  I learned to avoid those places and, to a great degree, those people, on the web and in my day-to-day life. Those were the esay to recognize Pharisees, so concerned with the letter of of law that they missed the Love of the Lord. But there's something else here about that Pharisee.

 

And this Pharisee:

 

Luke 18:11-14

The Pharisee took up his position and spoke this prayer to himself, ‘O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity—greedy, dishonest, adulterous—or even like this tax collector.I fast twice a week, and I pay tithes on my whole income.But the tax collector stood off at a distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner.I tell you, the latter went home justified, not the former; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

 

There is the obvious puffed up chest-beating, but there's also a more subtle, more insidious, and simpler warning. The Pharisee compares and in his comparison, he makes two mistakes. He wrongly judges his neighbor and he wrongly judges himself. This pharasaical behavior is the one where we think we are one thing, when in the eyes of God, we are something else entirely and the one where we think our neighbor is one thing, but she's another altogether. We aren't the Pharisee who thinks he's holy enough, we are the one who thinks she's not good enough. Or just plain not enough. Further, we might even have a false understanding of the person to whom we are comparing ourselves. The take away? Don't compare. Pharisees compare. It can't be good.

 

Jesus did a lot of talking about the Pharisees. He really, really wanted to leave us with words which would help us to avoid false images of ourselves and our neighbors. The Pharisees were all about false images of both self and neighbor. 

 

My reality is that regardless of what my blog looks like and regardless of what the graph on my site meter page portrays, I am God's. I belong to Him. He suffered and died for me. It doesn't matter where else I click on the interwebs, I am of infinite worth to Jesus, no more or less valuable than my neighbor. And so is the woman who wrote to me last night. We have value. We are loved just as we are, in all our brokenness. In all the places that would make for ugly or boring or uninspiring blogging. In all the places that blogs don't accurately reveal. And in all the places that look beautiful. He is there. Loving the real us. 

 

It is true that I can click along and take suggestions and gain insight from people who walk with me. And that can be a very good thing. It is also true that I can make false idols of each and every stop on my blog reader. I fix my gaze on my own icon of my neighbor and on the distorted vision of myself reflected in my perception of her.

 

And then. We have a mess.

 

Then, I have just surrendered myself on the doorstep of someone else's life and not at the foot of the cross.

Then, I begin to live on my own power and I am destined to sputter to a stop.

 

Why do we compare? We toss about restless on a sea of images and words that could be used to encourage our hearts and instead, we compare. We become the Pharisee that Jesus was so careful to warn us not to be. 

 

God created me uniquely. Everything in my life--my husband, my particular children, my location, my gifts, my struggles, my infirmities--all of it is God's to use to shape me into His vision for me. His vision for me is different than His vision for my neighbor. He calls me uniquely. There is a life He intends for me and me alone.  And so, my life will look different from hers.

 

We can learn from one another. We should encourage one another. But comparing? Finding ourselves lacking in the light of someone else's life as it is portryed on the internet? That's not what He wants for us. He wants a community that encourages and builds up. He wants us to link arms and look together towards Him. He wants us to look to the community for support in living vocation. Unique vocation. 

 

The Pharisee compared himself to his neighbor. The simple lesson of this Pharisee: don't compare.

 

I understand why she stopped reading here. I've done the same thing elsewhere. And truly, my heart breaks for her. It breaks for the terrible feeling of clicking away from the beauty in someone else's life, the witness of what God is doing in another family, and feeling lost and forgotten, and not good enough. My heart has hurt in the just the same way. The Pharisees didn't carry iPhones. I wish they had. It would all be so much simpler if it were spelled out: "Don't be like that foolish woman who clicks there and thinks that. Isn't it obvious that's the near occasion of sin?"

 

But no. It doesn't work that way. We have to discern. 

 

The keys at our fingertips, the windows into another woman's heart, can be among the tools in God's hands to use for our good, to shape us into the person He created us to be. Can we do that without creating idols of the tools; can we look instead to the Master Craftsman to see how He would have us use them?

 

We have to. We have to leave the bitterness of comparison to be able to taste and see the sweetness of encouragement.