my baby

Finally a Doula

I met a couple last spring at Farmers Market. They were selling tie-dyes trying to make money and I was massively pregnant with Abigail. The girl got really excited when she saw my belly and told me she had just found out she was pregnant. I love pregnant women. Nothing kills my shyness quicker. They introduced themselves as Mama Love and Cosmo, and i saw them at coffeehouse a few more times, and they made it up to our place in Ben Lomond once, before they took off for the rainbow gathering. Love showed a really strong attraction to being around Christians, so I told her how to get a hold of friends of ours that were going to be there, in the hopes that she'd really connect with them. She didn't, and as they were going to Wyoming to live and get ready for their baby, I thought i'd never see them again.
I was walking down the street after coffeehouse one night and who happened down the street, but Mama Love and Cosmo. And this time, they had her son with them, a two year old boy, and she was weeks away from her due date. They came back to try to find a place here. We got to help them out a little bit here and there, and she called me last sunday to tell me her water broke. Monday night when I talked to them their hadn't been much progress, so I went up to see what I could do. I ended up leaving 2 hours later, but they called me back before I even left the parking lot.
I stayed, with Abigail, til 6:00 in the morning. I went back around 11:30, again with Abigail, and she had her baby at 2:10.

It was awesome. I thought I would be clueless and afraid, but it was the most natural thing ever. She really didn't need much help, so it was a perfect first time. And Abigail was perfect! I didn't know I could do it with a baby along.

Please pray for this little family, they are in a hotel right now, still looking for a place. They can come stay here if they need to, but they really want an apartment of their own.

What Bella"s been up too lately

my pretty lil Hannah
emanating cuteness

6 MONTHS

Wow. my baby is 6 months old. Last friday on october 20. I wanted to do something special so i took the girls to the butterfly grove. Every year Monarch Butterflies migrate and every year they come to this one eucalyptus grove at a state park called Natural Bridges. There's thousands of butterflies. Very cool. I thought Isabella and Hannah would be thrilled. I was so wrong. They couldn't have cared less. I took them to the little museum/gift shop after, and they had a ball. The highlight for me was when they walked up to a display case containing ONE dead butterfly, and went bonkers with excitement. LOOK MOM! A BUTTERFLY! Already catalouged in my "funny, inexplicable things my kids have done" mental file cabinet.
Isabella is getting so big and she surprises me every day with how intricate and deep her mind is. I am the mom of a almost kindergardner, someone i can hold conversations with and explain things too. She's getting so independant.
Hannah is my anxious little helper. I want to pick some verses out and print them out and hang them up, just for reminders, and so as I was reading my bible this morning she was sitting on the table, holding my pen, ready to hand it to me.
She is quite the little comedian too.
Abigail is my chill little momma's girl. Everythings all good as long as i'm holding her. I keep waiting for Nathan to be able to watch her for longer than 10 minutes without her freaking out, but she just wants me. She's staying little so much longer than my other two, i can hardly believe she's 6 months old. She is just now fitting 3-6 months well.

Motherhood is so wonderful when i am living for my kids.

if we had a boy, he'd probably look like
this

Costco

Ok, OK , if you know me at all, you know I LOVE COSTCO. But it's getting rather silly to me lately. I was looking at phones, cause ours keep acting weird, and there wasn't one pack with less than 3 phones-some had 5. We need one phone. That's it. One phone.
And their jars of mayonaise! Jeez. They just built a new safeway right up the street from us too. It's can fit 2 and a half of the old size safeway inside. It has a starbucks, a jamba juice, and a huge food deli. Costco was all good when we lived at the Land, but i find myself cutting back on stuff we buy there cuz it's just too dang much. I'm sick of American size portions.

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A wedding that made me happy-and gave me a new sister

Jen and Justin Crompton
September 17 2006



Witnessing this marriage was rather extraordinary for many reasons. The first, and overwhelming one was the fact that both have struggled with almost fatal injuries. Justin was in a car accident while biking, and was run over-his helmet was all that saved his head from being crushed. His family was told in succesion that he wouldn't live, then that he would never walk or talk again. He graduated college with a degree, and is now married to the sweetest girl ever.
Jen had leukemia and had to undergo chemo. She had been 'clean' for 3 years now-the time limit they put on survivors to be declared cured.
It's just amazing to see two people who God has touched in such amazing ways being joined together. They have shared so much of the same experiences.
And i love gaining such a great girl as a sister!'
And it was pretty cool seeing my shy Nathan walking down the aisle in a tux. He was the best man.

Three little girls that make me VERY happy

2 videos that make me happy

Cape Cod




land of mystery and wonder
just kidding.

But it's pretty darn sweet. Nathan and I actaully walked across this bridge together as newlywed honeys. I loved Massachusetts enough already, without being married to someone who grew up there and still claims it as home.
We leave tonight! So excited. Not as excited as Bella, but close.
I used to think of Massachusetts as my home, too, so going there is a little like going home, too.

Processing

The story of my life lately. Processing, analyzing, organizing and taking out the trash. My mind and life feels like my mom's attic. So packed you have to take everything out to find anything. Filled with old things, things that are molding and falling apart, things you should have gotten rid of YEARS ago, but couldn't let go or forgot you had. I have been praying for God to clean me, to streamline my life, make me more efficient. My mind feels like a messy house that you can't quite get on top of and keep clean. I feel like I am failing in every aspect of my life, and I am, quite frankly, freaking out. And breaking. But I am hoping that this is just a major spring cleaning and that this is what I have to go through to clean house. I am so majorly, newly (again) aware of my massive need for God and his mercy and love and wisdom.
I really need balance. I need to know what God has called me to, and what He hasn't.
I've gotten used to being the mother of toddlers and baby's, but Bella is not a baby or toddler anymore. She is almost out of preschool age and i feel like that has snuck up on me. Where did the time go? It takes a whole new level of discipline to be the mother of an almost 5 year old-especially since i plan on homescholing.
Please pray for me, that i can be that girl again that could get up at 4 every morning and work 2 jobs. That God would give me supernatural powers to be the best mom ever. That I would know who I am called to help-and who I'm not.
I feel so lazy, and my main thought every day, (for those of you who've read Laura Ingalls,) is "how on earth did the mom's work as hard as they did?"

Something worth visiting Michigan for.
and i finally found the recipe.

Lebanese garlic sauce.

2 bulbs garlic
1 cup oil (olive oil, if you want to be real healthy)
juice from one lemon
salt to taste (at least a teaspoon.)

Use a blender. Blend the garlic, then add the oil slowly.
Add fresh lemon juice. Blend til thick and white.
Eat with anything garlic tastes good with.
I dipped pizza in it last night and it was great.

IT WILL BURN YOUR MOUTH.
if you are anything like Renae, or Bella, you'll keep forcing it down anyways cuz it's gooood. Good enough to travel 3000 miles for. And i found out today that people eat the same ingredients together to do a liver flush. Super bonus.

MOM and DAD





I find myself really missing my parents-again. Being a mother, myself-for 5 years now, has changed my outlook so much. Has gentled me so much in my judgement of my parents.-and changed my perception on things I thought they did wrong but realize now that they were just doing their best. I find myself thinking back to my childhood, now that Bella is older, and old enough now to remember what happens now, when she's older. My mom was so sweet. She did so much with us. The zoo, Greenfield village ( a wonderful fake old fashioned town park thing) Making every holiday incredible, always ready to fight our battles, I could go on and on. We were her whole life. She taught me how to read before I was in kindergarten.
Now that I'm teaching Bella the basics, I realize what a task that was. Now that I'm raising my children, I realize what a huge task that is, and how hard it is to be a parent. sure, my parents made mistakes. But everyone makes mistakes. I wish I had the wisdom then that I had now-to see the love behind all my mom's and dad's actions.
To see their actions in a different light-and not to view everything as negative or condemning. My mom is sick now, and worn down, and partly because of her service to me and my brothers. When we all were sick, she would still be going, taking care of all of us. She worked so hard-I wish that I didn't feel like it was too late to give her all the honor she deserves. If you are reading this, mom, dad, I love you and i'm grateful that you are my parents. Thank you for all your love.

I think there's been a consensus on the whole "stranger touching my baby, what should i do?" issue.
Judging from the comments, I think slapping is the winner.

I miss Alias

Party Time for baby Sunshine




party over

Stomach Flu strikes again

Baby Etiquette

I'm used to people cooing over my babies. I start to get on edge when they try to touch them. I get very edgy when they actually succeed at touching them. But I had a scary (to me) experiemce last night that puts me way past edgy. Nathan and I were just standing in downtown santa cruz and this girl I know at the mission came out of nowhere and put her hand on Abby's face then tried to KISS her. I jumped back about a foot in shock and fended her off with one hand. She's come up before and touched her cheek, and I hate it, but I haven't said anything. But last night really got me to thinking. We're down here to minister to a certain culture. And some of them live on the street-the girl that invaded my space lives in the woods in a tent. That's really scary to me. I don't like any stranger touching my kids, period, no matter who they are. But I definately don't want someone who lives in the woods and on the streets touching my kids. But I can't just leave Abby at home, either. So what do I do? Where do I draw the line? I am a huggy person, but I am very protective of my personal space, and Abby is solidly in my personal space. But where is the line drawn when it's ok to offend someone because I'm not comfortable? I need to put her in my other sling so she's closer-and I'm going to make big buttons-one that says "DON'T TOUCH MY BABY" and one for her that says "DON'T TOUCH ME"

Just for anyone who's curious-I went with the red. We bleached it first. I highly recommend bleaching your dreds (if you have them,and you're into cheating) it accelerates the maturity process at least 6 months. At least.

this week in pictures

hey everyone
please pray for Bella! She has ashthma. Poor girl has been coughing like crazy all week.

I got so caught up in remembering the funny name thing I forgot to mention just how small a world it is-French Chris lives RIGHT NEXT DOOR!
craziness.

My Little Ladies

Wow
It's a very, very small world
Nate was walking home last night from the coffeeshop, and he ran into an old student from the Land. There were two Chris's there at the time, so he was known as French Chris. The other Chris had long hair, so, our creativity was put to test and he ended up as, can you guess! Long hair Chris. I called for him once at the flat, to see if he had been sighted and the person who answered thought I was crazy. The whole time I've been a part of this ministry we've had a hilarious lack of creativity at naming things. The Land. The House. The Flat. The Big House. The Arcata House. The blue car. The red van. I love it.

I've never met a more creative, smart, talented, outstanding group of people as I've met in Prodigal Project. It's funny that we all share the simplicity in naming things and people.
We tried to name the houses in Arcata (we had three)-I think by the fruits of the spirit. I can't remember how quick that idea died.
I miss all of you so much it hurts. Remember the long rambling staff meetings we'd have in Arcata? Good times

a few items of interest from our week(s)
(borrowing this format from Rachel, thanks girl!)

1- So, in our burning desire to move back to santa cruz, we decided we'd move ANYWHERE, as long as we could get off that darn hill. For those of you who have been on that darn hill, it's no joke. We actually were calling it that freakin hill, til Bella started repeating us, then we quit. Anyways, we were looking in a section of town called the flats. The Santa Cruz ghetto. We didn't think anyplace else would rent to us, it was a quick walk to work for Nate, and we were getting desperate. Now, i'm from Michigan, and I've lived in Detroit, so any "ghetto" in santa cruz didn't seem very scary. I mean, c'mon, santa cruz. Well, one place we were looking at seemed promising, so i went to doublecheck it before we turned in the application. Nathan had gone to see it, but I hadn't. Well, the ad described it as a two bedroom apartment. It was two tiny rooms, a kitchen, and a tiny bathroom, no bathtub. For 1200 a month. When I asked the landlord why it was described as a two bedroom, she replied that most people used both rooms as bedrooms. Yeah, cuz they don't have a choice! Right outside the apartment was a very nice park. Unfortanately, it was chock full of drug dealers, as was a car parked right next to the apartment door. And to top it off, two nights ago there was a drive by shooting, right outside what would have been our apartment. Two people had to be airlifted to San Jose, their condition was so critical. Praise God we listened to Him and just waited for a better place!

2-And, we got one! We are in a real two bedroom, in Soquel, right on the border of santa cruz, and about a 5 minute drive to downtown. This place is also 1200 a month, and is in a beautiful area. I can go downtown at night and witness!
Nathan can walk to the bus stop, so I get the car, so i can go downtown during the day and witness! Life is sweet. I met a girl yesterday that is homeless and pregnant-very tweaked out, and i was able to buy her linch. I love feeding pregnant women.

3-We took the girls to the best park in the whole world last night. I swear, it's really the best ever. I was really surprised by one thing. Every single kid at that park was completely polite and sweet. Every single one. And they all loved baby Sunshine. I let a group of little girls hold her for a little bit. I've been rather preoccupied with the whole isssue of abortion again, mostly because of an encounter I had at coffee house. A girl that came found out she was pregnant, but she was 6 months along when she found out. Kinda of a shocker. The first thing she said to Ronee as she pointed to her belly was "I gotta get rid of this." I'm not sure if she has had an abortion or not, i'll find out next week, probably. That was weeks ago, and I'm still depressed. But I felt so much hope last night, from that group of kids. Their reaction was overwhelming. Every single kid I walked past exclaimed how cute she was (one girl said she was like a baby flower) and wanted to touch her in some way. And they all wanted a baby sister. It just melted my heart-their reverance for babies. I pray that that doesn't get sucked out of them by this evil twisted society we live in. I really need to start speaking out again against abortion. I still have a bunch of pamplets and things I wrote at the land, and testimonies from girls who came through the Land that had had an abortion. I need to start passing them out and distributing them again.

I feel energized again to do all the things I feel called to. What a difference it makes, not living on top of that darn hill!

This week in pictures