I started a photography site a few weeks ago. Thought you guys might like to check it out:) If you would like to, click HERE. You can leave me comments and even buy pictures if you want:)

“Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get—only what you are expecting to give—which is everything.” -Katherine Hepburn

I’ve been learning that vulnerability is key to love. I really don’t think you can have one without the other. Which makes me wonder how God handles it all. He IS love. He is the very embodiment of love…and wouldn’t that make him more vulnerable than anyone else too? He loves more deeply than we can even imagine…and we so carelessly walk through life…hurting him…and when you think of hurting him…you must realize that it goes DEEP. Our sin hurts things deep inside him…in a way that we can’t even experience. Because of how deeply he loves us. It’s quite the incentive for me…to walk more carefully…to give him everything…to obey him…to let him lead me.

Being in a relationship with a guy has been teaching me things about loving. About vulnerability…about how tough it is to be vulnerable…especially for me…because I’ve got issues (lol). I’ve been through some amount of pain…and somewhere along the line I think my heart kinda took over for me and wrapped a part of itself away from everyone and it hasn’t really been noticeable to me until now. You know how there’s this part of yourself you don’t walk into very often? You lock it away and when something inadvertently opens that door and you’re forced to face it you are immediately overwhelmed with a shocking wave of pain…and then you slam the door shut again and breathe deeply for a while…then you slowly step away and hope you don’t have to deal with that again for a while…sometimes it takes a few days to recover…and you hope it’ll go away on its own. But it doesn’t. I think we were meant to walk so closely with God that we take our hurts and wounds to him the moment they happen. If we give him our shattered dreams he is able to form them into pure beauty…and then we have beauty for ashes. It’s really amazing…how we could live if we chose to do it that way…but we don’t. Well, at least I don’t. I bury it deep and close it off from myself and everyone else…and then I miss out on things.

Pain is a funny thing. It seems to be the tool God uses most to draw us closer to him. I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because nothing else would really make us aware of him. I know it’s worked that way in my life. A friend of mine wondered a while ago if maybe one day (once we’re in heaven) we’ll look back and wish we would have faced a little more pain in this short lifetime…to be that much closer to God in eternity…it was an interesting thought to me. Gives one a whole new perspective.

So I’ve come to the conclusion that vulnerability is the exact opposite of control. It’s giving God (or a person) the right to see the most painful or ugly part of you…to actually feel it with you…it’s the scariest feeling I’ve ever experienced. Just the thought of it fills me with a certain fear. But despite that, I know it will be worth it. It would even be worth it if the person rejected you. (God will not!:) “I’d rather someone hate me for who I am than love me for who I’m not.” Right? So why do I hide behind my little protective layering? If I’m protected by walls that people cannot cross and if I keep control of everything I’m actually killing part of me. The part of me that can love the deepest. So that’s where I am right now. Knowing all this in my head and kind of telling God I’m willing…but still cringing a little in fear.

Here’s to a loving God who doesn’t leave us where we are but is constantly transforming us more and more into the best we can be in him…the more joyful and full of love and his mercy we can be…THAT is love!

Here are a few quotes I’ve been enjoying recently.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one. Wrap it up carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.” C.S. Lewis

“The answer to religious complacency isn’t working harder at a list of do’s and don’ts. It’s falling in love with God.”

“What love we’ve given, we’ll have forever. What love we fail to give, will be lost for all eternity.” -Leo Buscaglia

“To love is to place our happiness in the happiness of another.”

“The suffering caused by shattered dreams must not be thought of as something to relieve if we can or endure if we must. It’s an opportunity to be embraced, a chance to discover our desire for the highest blessing God wants to give us, an encounter with himself.” -Shattered Dreams

Goodnight everyone!:)

A laugh is a smile that has burst.  -a church sign

So we went home to Honduras for 2 and a half weeks. It was…well, there are hardly words. Bittersweet almost captures it, but then it doesn’t quite after all. There were amazing times of beauty. When we rounded up the kids who don’t live at the home and gathered them all together and had them living with us…for example. I had never hoped we’d all be together again as a family ever again…I’d actually cried about the hopelessness of everything. But then we had over two weeks of pure bliss when that dead dream of mine was actually made a reality. Even though not everyone was there, I was thankful for the ones who were with us. Orlando (the man in charge of the home now) even let Lidia and Ninfa come visit us for a night and a day. That was wonderful of him and we had a lot of fun with them…

We went to the beach and it was amazing. Long walks on the beach with the girls and talks about life. It’s hard to be very involved in someone’s life and then have this long seperation tear us apart…and then we get back together and there’s a little over 2 weeks to get to know them again…to try and catch up…to try and pour the love of months into them…and…*sigh* It just doesn’t really happen. But it was worth it. The time flew by on rapid wings and before we knew it, we were saying goodbye again with tears in almost everyone’s eyes.

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if we had rebelled and refused to leave the kids…where we’d all be now…what life would be like. What we’d have–what we’d miss out on… I think maybe sometimes people blame us for leaving too soon…for not fighting harder…sometimes I wonder why we didn’t. But then I remember…I remember God. The peace we had…even in the midst of all the tearing and ripping apart of our lives. I still don’t quite know how we survived it…and how the kids survived it…and then what came later for them. The passing around…the different families taking care of them…it all seems senseless to me. But then I look into their eyes and I see how much they’ve grown…how much more potential God has worked out for them through all the pain…and I again have hope. I believe that God can and WILL bring beauty out of this.

For all of you who are wondering where all the kids are, I will list their new homes and where they’re staying.

Harmony is living with her aunt Chena.

JD is living in town (Leo paid for an apartment and other things…he’s working–translating with Jerry).

Josseline is living with Wilma now…we actually arranged that while we were down there:)

Cristian is living with his mom in Tegus.

Yolanda just moved in with Andy Schmuckers:)

Lidia and Ninfa are probably with Mamucha now…unless they’re still living with Orlandos…

That’s all the little ones. The older ones are all kinda having to fend for themselves…living with relatives or apartments in town…you may pray for them if you think of it…all of them, actually.

Here are some of my favorite pics:)

Another one of Lidia and Ninfa:)

Cristian and I:)

Harjy and Yola…

Me and the boyfriend:)

A napoleon tree with my mountain in the background…

A flower within a flower…

I finally got some spiderweb pics…early one morning…

La familia:)

Me and JD…

Love:)

*drum roll*

And THIS is my favorite pic of the entire trip! (I think…these are hard decisions, you know:)

The end…

me   

“What do we live for, if not to make life less difficult for each other?”   

Well, it is after 1:00 in the  morning, and since I made the mistake of a caffeine overload before I went to bed tonight, I am hense destined to the frustration caused by the racing mind of an exhausted body. So I have decided to give in, once again, to the demands of inspiration/insanity; whichever you prefer to call it.

I’ve been making discoveries lately, and I feel like sharing some of them tonight…so I shall ramble away and hope that some of this makes sense to whoever reads it.

I’ve lately been very convicted of pride in my life…it’s something that horrifies me a great deal, and yet I must admit it’s a huge part of my life. I think God must hate it a lot. It’s listed in the 7 things he hates, actually, “A haughty look” he calls it. It’s one of those hidden sins you can live with and kinda pretend away most of the time…it’s not as obvious as some, I don’t think, but it infests every thought and clouds every motive. I feel like crying when I see how much I’ve let it rule my life. It hurts me a lot to know there’s something inside me that God HATES. And I’ve been thinking about WHY he hates it so much. We’re his creation and he has made EVERY SINGLE good thing in us. Our OWN righteousness amounts to nothing more attractive than filthy rags…so we take the gifts he’s given us and take credit for them, and steal the glory that is rightfully his and it’s just so WRONG. But his reaction isn’t like ours would be. I don’t think he’s greedy for our praise and actually giving credit where credit is due like a normal human being would be if his exquisite work of art walked off yelling, “Look at me! I made myself!” (I’m sure he feels the same sense of outrage that artist would feel though:) But anyway, beyond just claiming us as his creation because he thinks he deserves our praise…I think he hates pride MORE because of what it does to us. Pride is the same as self-righteousness…and it leads to judgements passed on our fellow human beings. Setting ourselves up as better than someone else is so ugly. It divides and kills relationships…which is the main reason we’re on earth to begin with. How come don’t we just get shot to Heaven the minute we’re saved? Adriel said something about that the other Sunday and I thought, “Wow, that’s an attractive thought!” No sin. Just, “Jesus, forgive me, I repent…I surrender.” and WHAM! Heaven:) Complete freshness. Washed in his blood…without a blemish. But we stay. Why? To take others with us when we go, duh. And how can we truly love and draw people closer to God when we think we’re somehow better than them? *pause* I think I had more to add to that, but I can’t remember what it was. I guess I’ll just finish up this paragraph with acknowledging that pride is a part of myself I hate most of all rightnow, and I’m deeply ashamed of it…and I’m trusting God to root it out. I don’t care if it’s painful. I don’t want even a smidgen of it left in my life by the time he’s done.

I’ve also been learning things about faith. You know how you usually know a lot of stuff in your head, and then God comes in blazing light and moves it all down to your heart? That’s what he’s been doing to me.   I’ve come to the realization that EVERYTHING is about him! “Everything is in Christ and Christ is everything.” Even faith is all about him. It’s not about how spiritual we are, and how much we’ve grown into being able to trust him for things. Faith is simply a reflection of what we think about the character of God. So who do you think God is? Do you think he is God? Do you believe that what he says about himself is true? If so, then obedience and trust (going hand in hand) are suddenly far more simple than they were before. We are the ones who constantly complicate things. The Christian life may be difficult, but it’s still as simple as it always was…we’ve tricked ourselves into believing it’s complicated and almost impossible. It really isn’t. God is pretty nice when it comes to making a way for us…a way that has all been figured out before we were even on the scene…a way that is simple and wise all at the same time…a way that is definitely the BEST way possible!

And then when it comes to faith…I found a few quotes that I especially like.

“Faith isn’t a ‘leap in the dark’ as some people would have you believe. It’s believing that you can step into the darkness because God commanded you to and promised there was a rock there to stand on. It’s simply believing what God says. It’s not a leap in the dark when you know there’s a rock there.” -Paul Washer       (And isn’t it awful that God says, “Trust me. Take that step.” and I argue and whine and complain and doubt until I finally hack up the courage to do it, and immediately find that rock and I’m all like “WOO HOO! That was awesome!” And then he says, “Step again.” and I start all over with the doubting?)

“The greatest act of faith is for me to be able to look in the mirror of God’s Word and see all my sin and flaws and deformity; to see that, as it is in the mirror of God’s Word and BELIEVE that God unconditionally loves me. Now THAT is faith!”  -Paul Washer

And then there’s this evidence of God’s love. This may not sound right to you depending on your view of Song of Solomon. Some view this book as Solomon ranting about the Queen of Sheba and it being something meant for husbands and wives…like a love story or something. But isn’t the relationship between a husband and wife but a very pale shadow of what we’ll share with Jesus? We’re his bride, no? So anyway…where he says, “With just one glance of her eyes, my heart beats faster…” I choose to believe that this is how God feels about his bride/Christians/you (if you belive:). And so…isn’t it a wonderful thought to know that when you kneel down beside your bed at night or lie down in the grass under the moon and stars and look up and start thinking a prayer, that God’s response is NOT indifference, it’s more like a leaning forward and hushing, and his heart beats faster. I find this to be a HUGE incentive to prayer… I’m still not sure if I agree with the whole thing myself, I actually heard these thoughts in a message and I followed through with more thoughts of my own…but yeah. You don’t have to agree with it:) But I still stand on the fact that God loves his church FAR more than we can imagine! And He DOES hear our prayers…every single one of them.

You know how it’s so easy to go on and on about oneself? It’s so easy to talk about ME!:) Perhaps we bore a lot of our friends because of this very reason, but he’s constantly telling us to “Come to me and I will give you rest.” This is proof enough that He actually delights in the sound of your voice. He WANTS to hear all the things that would bore others. He longs to be a part of every single detail of your life…and there’s only the deepest JOY in letting him take over! Joy and peace and rest.

And then I was doing an assignment for Sunday school just tonight (yes, I am the queen of procrastination:), and I found some awesomely awesome quotes in the book we’re studying on!

“In divine irony, God has so structured life that living for ourselves guarantees that our deepest needs go unmet, while living for others instead of self puts us in a place where the deep needs of our heart can be met. It is a lifestyle of faith. When we stop living only for self and trust God with our own needs, he not only meets them, but also uses us to meet them in others.”   -Eddie Rasnake

“It is not the job of the branch to produce fruit, but rather to bear it as a result of staying connected to the vine.”   -Eddie Rasnake

There’s more proof that it’s not about us at all…but about HIM, and believing what he says, and then HE will do the work. Even that line about the fruit. It’s so simple:) You don’t see apple branches groaning and straining…trying to produce some fruit…it’s simply a natural process…a result of being connected to a root system and the trunk, receiving nourishment simply because we’re connected to him. He wants us to depend on him.

So there. I think my brain is almost as tired as my body now…and if the caffeine would only die down and go away…maybe I’ll sleep?

Goodnight everyone…here’s to a closer walk with him every day…until there’s no more distinction between “Him in me” and “me in me”…till it’s all just HIM! Man…I want that.

me

I don’t know any greater therapy for the alleviation of misery than obedience. In the deepest extremity of sorrow, God gives us things to do–he offers us the consolation of obedience.”                  ~Elizabeth Elliot

I feel like writing about Harmony tonight. I’ve been putting it off for a long time. Her birthday has come and gone and I did nothing. Because I knew this was going to rip me apart and that I would probably cry and that it would be difficult—to say the least.

But I think I just might be ready now.

Maybe.

We shall see:)

Harmony was born to a mean mommy. Maybe I shouldn’t put it that way…maybe she was just too young. Inexperienced. Irresponsible. Selfish. But for some reason, I don’t feel like excusing her too much…maybe simply because I love Harmony so much that I feel ill towards whoever even thinks of hurting her. And her mommy was one of the only ones of the mamas to drop off her children without ever coming back to check up on them…to give them a little love in spite of dumping them. So…although I probably don’t hate her, I simply do not like her a lot either…because I know she hurt Harjy.

But I’m GLAD she gave her to us. Harjy was and is one of the most beautiful creatures to ever walk into my life and stay as a blessing and a joy.

When she was 5 or so she officially moved in with us (she’d lived in other people’s houses before that…but still lived in the home there). She was a morning person. Like none I’d ever met before. She would awaken promptly at 6:00 every morning…but instead of rudely waking everyone up, she would pitter outside to the trampoline and sit there and sing. She would sing and sing till the guys woke up to milk our cows. I don’t think I ever heard her singing (I’m NOT a morning person, needless to say:), but I heard about it from mom, and it’s one of those memories that stands out to me…simply because it’s so uniquely HER.

She has a great love for horses. As soon as she moved in with us, she made friends with all the horses. They would come when they saw her…because they couldn’t help loving her…they were captivated…like the rest of us. She was barely as tall as the weeds growing in our field and she had this huge, bright pink hat that she’d wear whenever with the horses…all you could see was the hat floating across the field as she walked toward her beloved horses.

I remember one time she came to me with great big tears pooling in her eyes as she confided to me that she thought Palomino (the most lethargic of our horses) was mad at her. She said that she’d been talking to him and he’d turned away and ignored her. She felt shattered at how he’d treated her, and I tried to comfort her while valiantly trying to hold in the giggles as well.

Harjy might very well be the most loveable person I know. She’s so REAL and in just being her, she has a way of saving you all kinds of trouble in making yourself love her…you just naturally do…because you MUST. There isn’t much choice in the matter:) She has an amazing capacity to love and is one of the most loyal people I know. She has a strong sense of justice and will stand for what she believes even if people don’t agree with her. She also stands up for her friends…to the point of physical violence. But that’s another story for another time;)

I had a lot of switching around when it came to which girls slept in my room at different times. After Harjy moved in, she kinda just stayed…because we both liked it that way. She was growing up and we had more and more in common in our ways of thinking and talking, so we would stay up late at night and talk and giggle. We ended up getting deductions from our allowances many times as a result of giggling too loudly. The walls in our house were very thin and Papa and mom were only a few bedrooms across from us. So if we’d hear a warning knock on the wall we knew it was already too late. Papa didn’t appreciate stolen minutes of precious sleep so he didn’t bother with a whole lot of warning talks or anything. We’d just find out by Saturday when we saw how meager our allowance had become.

Harmony can mimic pretty much anything and come away doing it better than the original person could. She can hiccup on command and it sounds EXACTLY like a drunk-person hiccup and she had quotes from movies that she’d spout off at all the wrong (or right—depends how you look at it:) times to shock and make people dissolve into laughter.

I remember we watched Dennis the Menace once when she was a lot younger, and she was sitting on some distinguished person’s knee and telling him about how this little girl was calling the boy a “Baby-rump-kisser.” My mom was mortified and I don’t think we watched that movie again for a very long time.

She’s extremely artistic. She draws beautifully…and is getting into color pencils too. She loves playing piano and composes some of her own music…and plays by ear. She’s also developing photography skills…something I find quite awesome:)

She isn’t the type to blow up all over a person. The deeper the pain and hurt and anger the quieter she gets. There were times when I’d find her on “my/our” hill just sitting there quietly. I knew from experience that just sitting beside her in silence for a while was better than asking questions right away. I would wait…then she would talk on her own. If she needed to.  And her artistic side would enhance when she was in pain. She’d draw a lot to get rid of nasty emotions inside her. And boy can she draw!

She has been deepened and broadened and beautified through pain. Sometimes I look at her eyes in recent pictures and it’s like before and after pics when comparing her to the image in my head…the way I remember her. The carefree childlike joy is gone…and now replaced with a pain in her eyes that hurts me beyond words. I wish I could shelter her from the hurts life throws our way…I’d like to protect her from ALL of them. And this is impossible. What’s more, I cannot even hold her through the storm. I’m too far away…and our contact is very limited.

She’s had too much ripping in her life. The loss of all stability…the loss of a daddy and mommy who loved her…twice.  And now, over and over again, as people keep passing through her life—to take care of her, supposedly…but sometimes I wonder if doing it only for a time may be worse than not “helping” at all. Who wants temporary parents anyway? Then again, there isn’t much choice in the matter, and life wasn’t meant to be fair…so maybe I shouldn’t question these things. God is her daddy…and he is taking very good care of her.

I’m not sure if it’s fair to say that Harmony is more special to me than anyone on this earth. Because I have many many special people. But maybe Harjy is just specialER than most. Because there was a sweeter trust and beauty about our relationship…something I’ve never experienced before or since…it was…well, SPECIAL. I’ve never felt a more protective-sisterly-LOVE for someone in all my life. And I had gotten quite comfortable and fulfilled in my role as confidant and sis. I loved it, to be honest…and treasured every bit of it. I loved being there for her. Even fighting her battles at times. It hurts awfully to not really be a part of her life anymore. Sometimes it seems almost surreal. Like it simply could not have happened. How did I lose so much? Maybe it’s all a nightmare after all and I’ll wake up soon and things will be beautiful again. Ha. So much for wishful thinking.

Reality is crushing at times.

After we found out we had to leave, everything changed. We clung to each other more fiercely in spirit. Determined to enjoy what little time we had left, but always with the knowledge that it wouldn’t last. I’ve often wondered if it’s better to know something bad is going to happen before it actually happens, or if it’s easier to just get slapped in the face with it. I haven’t decided yet. But knowing we were leaving was like knowing we had a terminal disease and we were going to die soon. You LIVE for all you’re worth, but everything gets tainted. Puts a whole new perspective on things, that’s for sure:)

Anyway, Papa’s study (the room right beside mine), was one of my special places to go hide when things got kinda bad. I did my devotions in there, and Harjy didn’t like falling asleep by herself so she’d wrap herself in a blanket and come wait for me in the study. She would sit on the floor…and we’d do our own things in comfortable, companiable silence and then if we thought of something important or random to say, we’d say it. One night, a few weeks before we left, she was sitting in there with me and then she spoke into the silence completely out of the blue, “Beth…when you’re gone…who am I gonna talk to?” I remember sitting down beside her wordlessly and just hugging her as we wept. It’s a bittersweet memory.

Well, I kinda knew this was going to be hard…and it has been. But I feel spent of words now and finished. I shall add some pics and then go see if I can sleep…you know how it feels when things start resurrecting old memories? I’m getting a little battered by the waves of recollections…the laughter of the past…and I feel old and tired now…and my eyes feel scratchy from too many tears…*sigh*

I think she may very well be the most beautiful person ever…inside and out.

Her and the broster.

“He ages the finest who matures the slowest.”         -Dave

So I’ve been meaning to update for a while but have been crazily busy the past few days–or weeks–or MONTHS…I’ve even missed 2 of my little kids’ birthdays so there will be future updates for them (unless I decide to put them off till next year:), and for now, I shall proceed to dazzle you with the beauty in my life!

They looked like they were in love to me…

The pic of my first day lilly:)

I’m into daylillys rightnow…so you must bear with me:)

Dar offering me a very past-the-prime flower:)

A moment of fun…

This pic just does something to me…

Willy and Anika:)

Dar and Anika:)

Just Anika.

Cute and dirty toes…

Love this one!

With mommy…

“Through a screen of hair…”

The results of tiredness and icecream cones:)

Happiness:)

Meggy felt quite accomplished today:)

Love how their personalities come out in the next few:)

The beauty of Esther…

Jaime’s “Huh?” look.

A butterfly who liked Dave a lot:)

Orchids…so beautiful..

I love all the color in this pic.

And in this one:)

Yes. The end.

 Flowers are God’s undertones of encouragement to the children of earth.             ~Beulah

Lidia and Ninfa turned 14 just two days ago. Seems so hard for me to believe that they are already that grown up!

Since I’ve started this thing of writing out little character sketches of my family around the times of their birthdays…I shall now try to capture them a little.

Lidia might be my hardest sister to capture. I’m not quite sure why…but she is so deep and hidden with her thoughts that she’s hard to get to know in a very deep kind of way…hard to put into a little box and understand.

When I first met Lidia, she was 2 months old and I was 8. I adored her. Her and Ninfa were the first children my parents ever took in and I can still remember the endless joy they brought into my life. I toted them everywhere. I think I’d always subconciously wanted little sisters, and I found them…perfect. I remember the devastation I felt when I found out that their Gramma wanted them back. I think I cried for days. And then after 6 months, she changed her mind and I remember the happy day of going back to their little mud hut to pick them up and bring them back home with us. I was ecstatically happy!

Lidia and Ninfa are twins and their mommy is a deaf mute. She came to visit them sometimes as they were growing up, and carrying on conversations with her was quite interesting. The spanish language already uses a lot of handmotions and speaking with her was all handmotions and pointing. She was actually very fun to “talk” to. I think she loved her daughters but was just completely incapable of taking care of them.

While she was with her Gramma for those months is when her head got crooked. They would let her lie on a bed all day and she had to turn her head to look out the window so all that time of lying in one position got her head to grow a little crooked. It was the cutest, curliest little head…always bent to the side…almost quizzically. We went to a chiropractor to help fix it, and she had to have a little band tied around her head for a while. It soon straightened out and is unnoticeable now.

She was always very smart…we could tell from the very start. She didn’t walk as soon as Ninfa but she could talk far sooner.

She’s a clown. She would watch someone do something that made us all laugh and before she even fully understood what she was doing, she’d mimick people and have us in gales of laughter. She’s not scared of being the center of attention and having people surrounding her. It’s a strange combination. So silent about the depths of her heart, and yet, so confident.

Lidia might be the funnest person to tease…ever. She has the most infectious giggle and I love provoking it. I used to make my rounds every night and tell all my sisters goodnight and she would always hide somewhere and wait for me to find her. It became a game. She’d lie as flat as she could beneath her covers and I’d pretend I didn’t see her and I’d talk with Yola or someone else nonchalantly ignoring her until I’d suddenly pounce on her out of nowhere and she’d squeal out giggles as I tickled her. Then I’d hug her and say goodnight.

She was always the best at memorizing verses and stuff and she’d proudly recite them at “bala” speed to me as soon as she’d have them down pat.

She’s been through so much. She’s not one to share her heart about the painful things going on inside her…but if I’d ask questions enough, she would talk…and her wise, commonsense-ish way of looking at things always amazed me.

She called me “garroba” (lizard:) because of my tendency to sit outside hoping for a tan.

She writes us all very faithfully. I think she might be the MOST faithful. She makes sure to send notes along with everyone that comes up and lets us know what is going on in her life…which means so VERY much to me…

Lidia is loyal and kind and compassionate. She loves deeply and isn’t afraid to show it with random hugs and squeezes…or suddenly plopping into my lap for no other reason than knowing she could.

Now for my favorite part: PICS!!!

Her lopsided dimple is adorable:)

One of my favorites of her:)

This one captures so much…

One of her giggling fits.

I like the pensiveness in this one…

Her sweetness.

We both had candies in our mouths…it’s just funny:)

This is her half-pleased, half-guilty look. She had just been caught as the person to sneakily attach something to the back of my skirt…:)

Trying to look scarily angry…and not quite succeeding:)

Doing her hair in braids…a long tedious job…

But the results are fun:) (her and Ninfa both had shirts that said, “Blame my sister.”)

The first word that pops into my head when thinking of describing Ninfa is simply “sweet.” She personifies sweetness in every way. She can even ALMOST manage to be sweet when she’s angry. I used to watch her when sister-fights would break out and instead of screaming or losing her temper, she’d mumble under her breath about things…it was so funny to watch!

She’s phlegmatic to the very core of her little being. She doesn’t get extremely excited or angry without serious provocation. So it was always fun to see what it’d take to make her REALLY laugh. 

She’s the kind of teaser that will be sitting beside you, and silently reach over and pinch you…completely out of the blue…hard enough to make you yelp and jump. She loves getting a reaction out of people.

She had this sweet habit of patting my cheek whenever she felt like it. It was her equivalent of Lidia’s hugs.

She was always very active as a little girl. She had a certain purse that was always attached to her arm…like it grew there…and she’d run through the house with it swinging and bouncing against her. She never walked. It was always all-out running, or a skipping jog at least. She was running through the house before Lidia even started walking. I guess it was more of a waddle than a run…at that age.

She had this funny, cute habit of humming when she was looking at books. She would content herself with sitting on the couch with one book at a time (only pausing to toddle to the bookshelf and switch books:) for hours, softly humming to herself. It was the most fascinatingly adorable thing to watch.

She had lots of words bottled up inside…and one question was enough to jiggle loose a flood. During the time that we shared a room, she’d talk non-stop every night until we were ready to go to sleep. It was so much fun…listening to her chatter…knowing she didn’t talk like this to everyone. It was a special privilege:)

She’s non-confrontational. Kinda like me:) She doesn’t like conflict, and will shy away from it as much as possible. But some things were worth her standing up for. I remember that she’d always sit outside the door whenever Lidia got spanked. She’d sit there and cry for her sister…it was painfully beautiful.

Ninfa is loyal…deep inside. Once she loves someone, and you win your way into her heart, she won’t desert you. The love she felt for Lidia surpassed all others. She always stuck up for her twin no matter what. She didn’t do it loudly or with great force. Just that quiet, stubborn way of hers…standing between her sister and anything that was against Lidia. It was almost odd. Lidia always seemed older and stronger than Ninfa…but it was the youngest who usually stood up for the older. It might also have something to do with Lidia’s propensity to get herself into scrapes:)

Wondering what I’m doing…:)

Her grin:)…I love this one.

Her “indian hair”.

Her sweetness…

She hated pics…but would try her best to grin at the camera for me:)

Being crazy:)

I love this one…

A while ago…

Here’s both of them:)

I absolutely LOVE the reckless joy in this pic! (Jessica took it, I think).

The end:)

me  

“Wisdom begins in wonder.”

Here are some flowers and other fun pics I’ve taken over the past few weeks…

Hope you enjoy:)

This is one of my favorites. So incredibly unique.

A flower within a flower.

I think daisies are becoming my favorite flower to photograph. Their simple beauty captivates me.

Had a happy encounter with a butterfly the other day.  If you don’t know this already, “maripositas” is spanish for “little butterflies”…and you see, they’re a sort of passion with me. This one seemed to like me especially and I can’t think of anything that could’ve made me happier than this little bit of beauty consenting to sit on my finger for a while.

I was even allowed a kiss!

Beauty…

The end.

“Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.”    –C.S. Lewis

Recently, one of my friends mentioned something about God being our everything…and it got me to thinking. What is God to me? There is no possible way I could ever capture even a fraction of who he is in my life and what all he’s done for me…because I don’t think I even know. My little pea brain cannot be expected to grasp even a teensy tiny bit of his greatness.  But the part that I do understand…the parts of Him I’ve grown to love…that, I CAN try to capture and write. So here goes. I shall try to do it in order…the way he’s revealed himself to me…allowing me little glances and peeks of how absolutely wonderful he is. In doing this, I think I will probably also write a little of my spiritual journey…

My Comfortor: This is when he first became real to me. At a time in my life when I was shocked at the depth of pain I was made to experience. The unexpectedness of it caught me off guard and I had no idea how to handle it. I turned to God and have found comfort in him like nowhere else. It’s funny, but when the Bible tells us we will not be made to suffer more than we can bear (my own words there), I don’t think God coldly stands back, evaluates us and says, “Ok. She’s ready. Bring it on.” I don’t think I would ever have been ready for some of the things I’ve been through. Humanly speaking, there’s no way I could have made it through. So I think God gives us pain. We don’t really have a choice in the matter…but that’s because no one would willingly choose pain. Because we don’t see the big picture. Our vision is so clouded by the now that we couldn’t possibly fathom the GOOD that God can bring through it. So he doesn’t let us choose whether we want pain or not. He just gives it to us and trusts us to trust him. I’ve thought about it and I think it’s like a two-hand deal. In one hand is the pain, but then he draws out his other hand, and in it is strength. We can choose to face it alone. But if we choose to trust him, to accept that strength…the results are amazingly beautiful. And in that…he has become…

My Strength: I would be either insane or dead without him. 

My Savior: You’d think this would be first, huh? Well, I’m weird.  I’ve lead a different type of Christian life, maybe. He’s been my Savior since before I even knew it. This is in the order in which I “found out” different things about him…and I don’t think I really knew him as my Savior until after he’d become my comfortor and strength. I’m not quite sure why…maybe it was my pride. Not wanting to admit I needed saving. Maybe it was the fact that I ”accepted him into my heart” when I was very young. Almost too young to really fathom what was going on. Nontheless, he has saved me. Saved me from so very much. And I love him for it.

My Healer: He has healed me in ways I once thought completely impossible. There are things in life you don’t think you’ll ever get over. Things you don’t even WANT to get over. And yet…he heals you from even those…if we let him. Some people think God will do only as much as you trust him for. I suppose that’s true, to a certain extent…but I find it very humbling to think that God could have stopped at the end of my faith. He has gone so far beyond that. Surprising me with joy when I least expected it. Filling my life with so many reasons to praise him. He amazes me.

My Guide: I must admit I’m a horrible follower. I don’t obey very well and I’m constantly wondering off, but he faithfully guides me back, over and over again…and loves me despite myself.

My Fortress: Maybe this should be under “My Strength” but “Fortress” just captures it better. I get a picture of this big rock cave. Where I run whenever I need him. Always faithful. Always exactly where I left him last time. A place to hide from storms that threaten to annihalate me completely. A place I can run without shame or worry. I never have to be afraid that I’m getting on God’s nerves because I’m constantly needing him. He delights in my neediness. Because it’s then that he’s my strength:)

My Forgiveness: There are times when it’s hard to forgive myself for things. I don’t think I have much of a problem with forgiving others *looks around nervously*…or myself, come to think of it. I think I’m far too easy on myself. I can come up with the grandest excuses and weedle my way out of things I should be very very sorry for…and I’m just…not. But then there are things…things that can fill me with regret so profound it threatens to swollow me whole. It did for a while. Guilt. It might be almost worse than pain. Especially if it’s mixed with the pain of loss…and remorse…and… Anyway, I’ve decided that guilt is only good for one thing: to bring us to repentence. After we repent, it’s useless; for good, anyway. After that it just gnaws away at a person until we feel like we’re drowning in it. But sometimes God’s grace is almost unfathamable. It doesn’t seem quite right. Like it’s too easy. Maybe we should punish ourselves first. And so we do. We make ourselves miserable…for what? Nothing, really. And we’re selling God short. But he forgives even THAT unbelief.  Yes. He is mercy, grace and forgiveness…all wrapped up in so much love he takes my breath away.

My Love: This, he’s been from the very start…but I don’t feel like I’ve known it until very recently. How his love really works. It’s all-consuming. It’s the purest, most unconditional love I’ve ever known. It leaves me completely speechless…and I really can’t think of much more to say about it. Other than that I’m thirsting for it like I’ve never longed for anything else. It’s become my life-goal to allow God to love people through me. I want him to simply take my body and use it as a little funnel to pour his love through…and in the process I want to forget all about me and simply become that love. Because if I can love the way he does I’ll never have to worry about the “careless permission of sin” that some people view as love…but this is a  love that inspires a love for God in the hearts of those around me. True God-love.

My Joy: He gives me so many reasons to thank him for the rest of my life. He has a way of surprising me with his love. Little things I could easily take for granted (and do, way too often)…he hides it in the little spots of an ordinary day and then reveals beauty and encouragement just when I need it. Through my friends…through the simple, smooth petals of a tiny little flower… And I keep discovering anew how deep his love really goes. I think it will take a lifetime and then the rest of the entirety of eternity to begin to understand his love for us. And this fills me with joy.

me 

“I trust that God wants the very BEST for me. Not only in the end but along the way as well.”                   ~me

I think I may finally be almost happy. Have any of you ever felt a certain guilt when wondering how happy you were allowed to be? Like complete joy is forever out of your reach and you are destined to sadness for the rest of your life? Like maybe it was just your destiny. Your lot in life. Like you didn’t really deserve better.

I grew up very happy. Carefree. Joyful. I think I might have had a perfect childhood. The perfect combination of security and upheaval to keep me willing to adapt and away from that selfish “it’s all about me” kind of mentality. But at a certain time in my life, pain entered and somehow kinda took over. It’s been a pretty constant companion over the past few years and I’ve become accustomed to it. It’s made me grow and it’s done amazing things between God and I. And I knew that someday it’ll be worth it. You know. In heaven. We’ll look back and see how everything made sense and we’ll probably marvel at how blind we really were, and we’ll just thank God for loving us inspight of it. I was ok with a life of pain. It’s good for me. The constant ache is simply a part of life.

But lately, I’ve had this feeling that maybe God wants to give me more. Maybe he wants me to have joy…even NOW. Even in the process of growing in him and living… Maybe I was settling for less than what he was offering. I think I was. I think he wants to heal me into joy. And I think he’s been doing this inspight of my doubts all along…and now that I finally know what he’s doing I pretty much can’t stop grinning. I made the mistake of underestimating my God (like I’ve done many times before and like I will probably continue to do…for many more times…he’s easy to underestimate…simply because of how unutterably HUGE he is), and I think he sometimes chuckles when I finally catch a little glimpse of what he’s really up to in my life. When it bursts upon me and I SEE and I explode into squeaks and giggles.

I love my God a lot tonight. I love him a lot most of the time, but extra tonight…simply because I’ve caught one more glimpse of how much HE loves me.

So this is for all of you hurting ones out there. If God can work through the pain in my life and bring me joy…and healing…and beauty…he can do so much more for you. And just think. All you have to do is surrender it to him! What an immense privelege. To be allowed the honor of giving our lives to a God as great as this.

He wants our lives. He does amazing things in us once we give it all to him. Some people promise that God wants things…but that he’ll give them back once you surrender. Do we really want them back? I think he’s got so much BETTER things planned for us…so far beyond what we could ever give him. He amazes me. And I adore him.

Goodnight, all.

me

PS. Here are some of my favorite girlies. They remind me to trust in God like a child. With complete abandon.

(I didn’t take the pics. The first and last are from Joy and the middle one is Cabob’s (in more ways than one, as he’d be sure to tell everyone):)