Another Boy!

So it's a boy.  There was no doubt, when the sonographer found the between-the-legs money shot and yup, there was definitely some equipment down there.  I'm ecstatic to have another little guy, a playmate for Xander, someone else for Scott to pass down his 'man lore' to.  There's just something about snugly little boys with big, loving, trusting eyes that make this mommy's heart turn into play dough.  Do what you will with me, little one, because I'm all yours.

With every pregnancy I'm amazed all over again when the little life begins to move inside me.  I know the science and technicalities behind conception and fetal growth, but you can't tell me this isn't a miracle.  And with this baby, every time he moves it feels like he's saying, "It's OK, Mommy.  I'm here.  I'm safe.  I'm growing.  See you soon."  How is it that this little guy is already connected to my heart and I've only ever heard his?

When I pray for him, he jumps inside me.  When I have moments of worry or some latent fear starts sneaking up on me, he jumps inside me.  Just now as I wrote this and pondered our connection, my heart full, he jumped inside me.  What a special little man he is going to be.  

God in Heaven orders the paths for our feet, He numbers our days, He reigns supreme and loving.  Sorrow may last for a night, but joy really does come in the morning, when you find your joy in the only One who remains unchanging.  

Roger, Copy That

At church on Sunday, the baby's insistence on using my bladder as a kick board sent me to the restroom during worship.  By then it had emptied of the pre-service rush, leaving only myself and one other woman, singing off key to herself in the next stall.

"Aww," I thought.  "She's happy to be here."  We finished at the same time and queued up in front of the mirror next to each other to wash our hands.

She suddenly raised her finger to her ear.  "Hello, are you there?  Yes.  Is the ear piece working?  OK, good. You'll have to report in later because I have just arrived at church."  This was all in a semi hushed, furtive tone.

Keeping my eyes firmly on my hands, I dried them and quickly left the room.   Thank you, secret agent bathroom lady, for making my day that much more enjoyable.

Media Monday - Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead

Wa-hoo!  It feels good to be back on my normal blogging schedule.  It also feels good to have a cup of coffee beside me.  Coincidence?  I don't think so.  I'm enjoying this once daily dose of caffeine allowed to my pregnant self 'to the last drop'.  But back to the task at hand.

It's Monday, and that means today I bring you a review of something I found online (Netflix, Hulu, Vudu, or other websites) that caught my interest.  Today's selection is a movie Scott and I watched back in November, which made such an impact that it caused us to go out and drop some money on a specialty kitchen appliance.  And you know that when these cheap skates spend money, it's not without conviction.

Fat, Sick, & Nearly Dead

This documentary kept popping up on my Netflix recommended queue (it's also on Hulu), and I passed it over time and again.  The cover and title are pretty ridiculous.  I mean, those grey boxers don't inspire a lot of confidence.  But I finally decided to give it a try and, as usual, Netflix was right on in its recommendations.

'Fat, Sick, & Nearly Dead' chronicles one man's journey to health and wellness through a self imposed, 60 day juice fast.  He doesn't drink your typical grocery store apple juice.  Joe Cross, with the help of a juicer, makes his own nutrient-packed juice from fresh fruits and veggies.  Starting at 301 lbs and suffering from a chronic disease, Joe takes a road trip across America subsiding only on his home made juice, and the results at the end of 60 days are no less than jaw dropping.

I won't give away the ending, but along the way Joe meets a truck driver, morbidly obese and desperate, who decides to join Joe in his own juice fast.  The two men's valiant battle to regain their bodies, and lives, is nothing short of inspiring.

I highly recommend watching this film.  It will inspire and educate you about the benefits of healthy eating, juicing in particular.  I just bought my own juicer, and have been juicing every day as part of my New Year's goal to eat more whole foods.  It's amazing.  A glass of fresh juice peps me up like a cup of coffee, stays with me, and revs up my energy for hours.  Of course I'm not doing a juice fast right now, being pregnant, but hope to do a short one in the summer to detox my body (if it's OK while nursing).

SO.  Just give this documentary a try, even if the cover looks silly and the idea of an entire movie about juice even sillier.  You won't be disappointed.

Sophie Says What?

Last night, my husband and I were heatedly discussing (very loudly), the Republican presidential primary candidates.  Sophie, who we thought we had safely tucked into bed and was adventuring in dreamland by then, poked her nose around the corner.

Me:  "What do you need, Sophie?  You should be in bed."

Sophie:  " ....... "

Scott:  "Honey, Mommy and I weren't fighting.  We're not mad at each other.  We were just really excited about what we were talking about."

Sophie:  "What were  you talking about?"

Me:  "Well, we're talking about the election for the President."  (Sophie knows about elections, since she got to see one first hand two years ago with Daddy).

Sophie:  "Who's the President?"

Me:  "He's the boss of everybody in America."

Scott:  "And we want the boss to be a good guy, not a mean man."

Sophie (with an indignant look and clenched fists):  "But JESUS is the boss of everybody!  And He's God's Son!  And He takes care of us!"

Well, that put our grownup discussion into perspective.  Why have fear when the God of the Universe is in charge?

A Slice of Sunshine

For some reason there have been pineapples in the produce section of our little desert superstore.  They called to me last week from their little plastic crates, and on impulse I found one that smelled just right and put it in my cart.  Its rough skin felt like the handshake of an old friend in my grasp.

When it was time to cut the fruit open, I stood barefoot on my kitchen tiles, my belly pressed against the counter, knife in hand.  The first slice released the sharp, pungent, sweet smell of the fruit and I was instantly transported back through time and space.

During the pineapple season on Guadalcanal, the Honiara market undergoes a transformation.  Usually the red, spit-stained walkways reek of spoiling, over ripe fruit, the ocean's catch of the day, and hundreds of sweaty, poorly washed bodies.  The sun bakes up this teaming mix of goods and humanity, making the stench palpable from the street.

Pineapple season, however, is different.  For a few weeks every year, each mat is piled with a bumper crop of the prickly fruit.  Warmed by the sun, the fruits release their spicy sweet smell into the air and the whole world smells like pineapple.  The scent lays so heavily that everything around you seems to turn golden, just because of its bright influence.  Pineapple paints the world.

Mom would come home with her van piled high and fragrant.  Ten for $2, fifteen for $3.  She'd slice it up and freeze it, and for weeks afterwards we'd snack on cold little slices of sunshine.  She'd blend it up into smoothies, or dehydrate it and save it for our morning granola out on Luaniua.  My favorite way to eat pineapple, however, was straight from the cutting board.

I'd snag a couple wet, sticky slices and take myself out to the front veranda.  Our house in Honiara perched on the spine of the first big hill that rose off of the harbor.  Balanced on the railing, my toes swinging into nothing, I would slowly eat my snack.  Always save the center for last.  Nibble down around the soft outer flesh that pans it like the sun's rays, the juice trickling down my chin.  My nose filled with the spicy sweetness of the pineapple and the underlying fragrance of frangipani blossoms drifting over from my left.  To my right, softly waving fronds framed the view down to the sea and the islands beyond.

This was bliss.

New Year, New Goals

Happy New Year, everybody!  There's something about starting a new year fresh.  Full of possibility.  You haven't made any mistakes yet, you haven't failed, you don't know what's behind the next bend in the road.  Exciting.  A bit scary (who wouldn't have some trepidation at the state our world is in as we turn the corner into 2012?).  

Looking into the next 12 months that stretch in front of me, I have a few goals I'd like to work towards.  You can call them 'guidelines', or 'things to keep in mind as I live my life'.  Definitely not hard and fast rules, or, for heaven's sake, resolutions.  I did it last year, and although I only kept up with the blog through September (that first trimester was a doozy), the goals remained on my mind throughout the year.  Over 2011, my relationship with Scott reached new depths of intimacy, trust and communication.  My kids and our family became a top priority.  I started to curb the unhealthy lifestyle I had been living, and started a new course towards health.  I wrote more than ever before.  I really think I accomplished these things because I gave myself a target to shoot for in January.

So here are my goals for 2012.  

1.  Focus on Scott.

Yep, it was my number one goal last year, and I'm keeping it for 2012.  Why?  Because I need the reminder that I am a wife first, and everything else second.  Poor guy often gets the dregs of my attention after a long day with the kids and errands.  

2.  Focus on the Kids.

This year, this particular goal means 'homeschool'.  Sophie's turning 5 next month (*gasp* how did that happen??  Wasn't she nursing yesterday?), and it's about time I buckled down to take her education seriously.  I 'play' at it now and then, but haven't put a lot of time and effort into a real schedule for her.  Poor Xander's gotten the short end of the stick as far as my educational attention goes.  What he knows he's basically picked up from Sophie.  I have several goals for both kids.  In the Spring I'm not going to put too much focus on homeschool, because I know in a few months it'll be all I can do to accomplish basic household tasks.  

But by May, I do want Sophie to:  1) learn to count coins.  2) sight read number words.  3) count by 2's and 5's.  4) improve her fluency (and confidence) in reading.  

For Xander:  1) improve fine motor skills (drawing and cutting).  2) learn the letters of his name.  3)  accurately count items from 1 - 20.  4)  learn his shapes.

I also want to implement a workable chore system for them, that we can keep up with as a team.  Sophie'll start getting an allowance as part of this system.

3.  Focus on the House.

It's about time we started all the remodeling projects we've been planning for 3 years.  THIS is the year, Scott and I have decided, that we'll put time, energy and money into getting our home the way we want it.  This includes updates, and also things like creating organizational systems that work for us.  By the end of 2012, I don't want piles of stuff everywhere in the house - like my mother always said, 'a place for everything, and everything in its place'.  

4.  Focus on the Whole.

This is my 'me' goal for 2012.  I want to lead a 'whole-istic' life this year.  I want to be spiritually whole, protecting my hour in the morning with God.  I want to be physically whole on the inside and outside, exercising daily (pilates and walking while pregnant, then working up to running 3 miles again after the baby) and feeding my body (and family) with as much whole, unprocessed food as I can manage.  I want to be creatively whole, giving my writing its proper place in my life and pushing through to write even when the muse takes a vacation.  

These are my goals to live by this year.  I'll revisit them every month, because the accountability last year kept me on track.  My friend Ami's doing the same, which makes sense because she's about as OCD as I am.  Head over to her blog and see what she's doing, and stop back in next month when I grade myself.  

What about you?  Have you made any goals / resolutions for the new year?  

The Muse Returns, and a Panhandle Pit-Stop

Oh my goodness it's been so long.  I haven't pushed myself to write lately (and the muse took a VERY long vacation) but suddenly today I feel that old stirring inside of me.  No, it's not the baby.  It's my creative itch, that oldest friend of my soul.  I feel suddenly like a part of myself that had been lost is now found.  So forgive my superlatives (and the two smileys on my facebook status update, excessive, I know).  I'm so incredibly extremely superbly happy to be writing today.

So we just returned home from a little trip into the Texas Panhandle to see the in-laws.  Any of you who have driven that God forsaken wasteland that lies to the west of Lubbock and Amarillo know that once you pass the succulent town of Hereford, you're out of potty break options until you reach Clovis, NM.

A note on Hereford.  Driving into town, we passed a billboard that read, 'BEEF is NUTRITIOUS!'.  No arguments from these travelers.  Scott and Xander would subsist solely on beef alone if they had their druthers.  Hereford, according to its 'welcome to town' sign, is the Beef Capitol of the World.  It's also the Stink Capitol of the World.  Ten straight miles of feed lots emit the most gut wrenching, vomit inducing smell you'll ever encounter in your life.  Imagine the thousands of cows, all packed together in metal pens awaiting slaughter, doing nothing but eating and stomping their ever increasing piles of feces into a sun fermented soup.  You can understand why we had no desire to stop there for bathroom breaks.

Once it was safe to breathe again, we found ourselves in the wide, flat wasteland of West Texas.  Unbroken furrows of red dirt and grass stretched to the horizon on all sides.  The 'towns' we passed through were little more than an abandoned homestead or two, and a post office with an rusted flagpole out front.

All four of us, having taken full advantage of the hotel's free breakfast an hour ago, were feeling the intense need to relieve ourselves.  The kids were squirming in the backseat, and it wasn't just from excess energy.  The baby was doing aerobics on my bladder.  Scott looked desperately at the odometer.

"It's still 20 miles to Clovis,"  he said.

"I don't think we're going to make it."  I told him.  We both looked out into all that unbroken emptiness.  Our eyes met.

"I'll find a county road,"  he said.

A minute later, we had pulled off the highway, bumped painfully over some railroad tracks, and were a safe distance up the compacted red dirt of a little country road.  When it was his turn, Xander took literally Dad's instructions to, "Pee on the tire."  He had never been given permission to pee UP before!  We sped down the road with a little wet arc on our rear wheel, leaving that particular part of red Texas dirt marked with four little wet spots.