Family

This weekend was good.

Full of good things.

As you know, it’s been a rocky few weeks. And Bray still went and spent the weekend doing hurricane clean up with his dad at the farm. But the kids and I stayed home so they could get some rest. Moving from absolutely nothing during a global pandemic, to going back to in person school, long weekends of hurricane clean up, and football and cross country practices, wiped them all out.

This weekend held lots of good recovery and joy.

The kids largely got along, something I think that them all being in separate classes at school for the first time is helping.

Saturday morning was pleasant weather, for Houston in September, and held our first football game of the season. The boys are playing 7 on 7. We debated going back but this is their first chance to play sports since basketball wrapped in February and these are TEAM SPORT kids! The baby played quarterback and the eldest played center (much to his chagrin, since quarterbacking is his lifelong dream, ah sibling competition). They made quite a nice duo. That pairing alone led to a touchdown and two conversions. The boys won their first game 34-7 with their grandfather, uncle, grandmother, and mom/dad/sister all there to cheer them on. Gracious, it felt nearly “normal!”

Little bit had a playdate with one of her favorite people at school. This friend just joined our school and the two of them have already become fast friends. She enjoyed a virgin strawberry daiquiri poolside – quite the life!

Then, she and the baby put their combo of organizational skills/hard work through the paces. Little bit’s favorite pastime these days is watching “Mom Hacks” and then trying to implement them in our home/life. Saturday, she and the baby completely cleaned out my car (praise hands!) and organized it. This picture features her work (the bag contains a blanket, water, snacks on the go organized in a pencil case, tissues, wipes, and a trash bag). She gave us strict instructions over the kitchen table as to all of our individual responsibilities of keeping it up!

Sunday dawned and with it our FIRST morning back at church in person. I serve as an elder at my church and all our business and worshiping has been virtual since March – I remember watching the first live stream while on our Spring Break vacation in Arizona! Six months!

Since there isn’t currently any congregational singing because of the virus (and we pre-register and wear masks, I felt really safe), my good friend and our talented worship director found ways to really connect us in community and to God. So following the worship service, everyone broke into small groups, spaced out, and applied the sermon to the week ahead. From seniors to young families, we had an incredible time of inter-generational sharing. When my son talked about what the Lord’s Prayer meant to him and how he applies it in his life, I couldn’t help but tear up at this gift of time to grow in our faith together.

Then little bit went at it again. While I cooked, she decorated our entire house for fall. Yes it was 95 degrees outside but inside our house is cinnamony and full of crisp fall sentiments! I’m trying ALL these new recipes from a new favorite food blogger find called Half-Baked Harvest. I cannot recommend this super yummy chicken meatball and lemon pasta carbonara enough. Last night I also served HBH’s slow cooker carnitas, tonight is her Mediterranean salmon, and tomorrow night is one pot lemon rosemary chicken.

When I go in, I go ALL IN! (Don’t you worry, I’ll be back Pioneer Woman – my true recipe touchstone!)

I am so utterly grateful for these small life moments. I recognize them more now than before. I’m thankful for laughter and fall decor and sports (on t.v. and in real life) and friends and a place to call home.

Here’s hoping your September weekend brought you overdue rest and joy as well! Onward!

There have been a lot of tears in our family the past week.  It was early Thursday morning we woke up to the news that the eye of Category 4 Hurricane Laura went right over the farm.  The reports put storm surge lower than initially projected but winds at 140-150 miles per hour sustained. 

The family was devastated.  But waiting with hopeful baited breath that things weren’t as bad as they might be. 

The first report coming out Friday was that the structures were standing.  Unfortunately, that was not to be the case.  All three barns were destroyed.  Fortunately, the bayou house, which is my father in law’s historic childhood home moved to sit on the bayou, was still standing although damaged.  The camp house was missing siding and roof.  And Bray’s parents home was assaulted by the wind – siding pulled off, holes in the roof, water in the walls, windows blown out, and the dining room wall actually bowed out. 

The family came in waves.  Delicately driving between downed power lines and trees.  The electricity infrastructure for SW Louisiana has been destroyed.  It will be months for the smaller communities to have power restored

The kids went through Hurricane Harvey in Houston when they were seven.  Packed up their belongings in a trash bag and evacuated with kind emergency response personnel from around the country.  But our house survived.  Miraculously.  They came home and unpacked and helped others rebuild. 

They haven’t had to rebuild themselves. 

In the midst of the emotional upheaval of this year, a global pandemic, racial injustice, political vitriol of an election year, we just didn’t have the bandwidth left for a super destructor hurricane. 

Heck, my last blog posts were about disappointment, fear and sadness – and that was BEFORE the hurricane! 

Those posts were inspired at the farm and featured pictures from our time there just a few weeks ago.  Lord knows I’ve written from the farm a hundred times.  I can still see this walk from the hay barn with the baby in this post, On Bones and Wood, Down Here at the Farm.  Summers with preschoolers reminding me I’m not a farm girl despite my love of the quietude, and littles playing in mud puddles and feeding cows.  Their newfound obsession with farm life at two years old. 

They carry all that with them.  So after a long weekend of cleaning up debris, and another long weekend of clean up ahead of them, they were all in tears and exhausted last night.

We also just went back to school which adds to the exhaustion, AND we’d just finished Where the Red Fern Grows for school which added to their emotional fragility.  As I held each one, cycling from child to child (they rarely are all crying at the same time, I’d forgotten how hard that is), one voiced the question they all held:  Why did the farm have to get destroyed? Why did the barns get destroyed?  It will never be the same. 

I don’t know, I replied.  I’ve found when we don’t have the answers, it’s best not to gin up an inauthentic one.  This is one of those early opportunities where they learn God doesn’t always answer our prayers like we wanted.  He is still there though. His plans are still “to give you a hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11-13)

I wrote on Facebook Friday night, just before we drove to Louisiana the next morning:
Gratitude: thankful in all circumstances.
Well, I guess this week was meant to test that.
Monday: Needed a root canal through my new crown. Grateful to have access and ability to pay for the procedure.
Tuesday: School suddenly released so we could prepare for a major hurricane. Grateful we are one of the few families whose kids can even go back to school.
Thursday: major hurricane eye goes over the family farm leaving a disaster behind. Grateful for a big family who are all going out to rebuild and friends and neighbors to volunteer cots and food to take.
Thursday: Two kids health issues crop up requiring different pediatric specialists. Grateful I live in a city with extraordinary access to health care – appointments Monday and Tuesday.
Friday: First pictures from the farm. Heartbreaking. Then we lose power at our home in Houston. Grateful we are getting to practice what it will be like with no power this weekend at the farm and grateful we can get in tomorrow.
#imtappedout #ineverythinggivethanks #gratitudeiswork

How do we heal? 

From whatever has attacked.

We heal through our tears. It’s critical we allow them to flow.  Boy, girl, man, woman, we need to make space to grieve.

We heal through our faith.  God sustains us even when, especially when, the outcome is different from what we hoped. 

We heal through gratitude.  Giving thanks in the midst of a storm is hard.  The Bible tells us to bring the SACRIFICE of praise, because it is a sacrifice.  But finding those things to be thankful for heal.

I know we have too many to name. The people who have come around the extended family with offers of physical labor, supplies, prayers, and money to rebuild have overwhelmed us all. The kids school has been such a safe and comforting place for them to be during the week. We have a home with power and food to come back to when many of those in Lousiana, including my in-laws, do not. We have a hope, the faith that anchors my soul.

It won’t happen overnight. And we’ll have setbacks. We’ll live with the sadness and disappointment and fear I just wrote about. Then, little by little, we’ll see the restoration from the ruin.

I have a hope, found in your name. I have a strength, found in your grace. Your faithfulness, My fortress, Over and over.
Make way through the waters. Walk me through the fire. Do what you are famous for: