I found Minja right in front of the playset

Eric holding Minja

Minja came to live with us 8 days ago.  We were all in the backyard playing when I looked down and there in the middle of the grass was a little baby box turtle.  I immediately called the kids over to me and we all took turns holding this wonderful little creature.  My resourceful little Amy found a box to put the turtle in while Eric and Paul looked around for decor and food sources to place in the box.  After the turtle was in its new home for a few hours we finally came up with a name.  Well, Paul came up with it.  

MINJA

After the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  But Paul doesn't say 'ninja', he says 'minja'.  Why just the other day he said that he wanted to be a 'minja' for Halloween.  So that's how Minja got its name.  Eric and Amy call it 'Ninja' because I guess they don't see Paul's sayings in the same way I do.  

We fed Minja grass and tomatoes, but I never saw it eat.  After being with us for 8 days we decided it was time to let it go.  But before we did, Amy took some nail polish and wrote her initials on its shell.  So if you ever see a standard box turtle with ACM painted in metallic turquoise on its shell, then by all means get out your iphone and take a picture, give it some love and call us.  

We love you, MINJA.  You will always have a home here...

Official release into our side hydrangea bed

ACM in metallic turquoise nail polish.  We love you, Minja!

True hospitality

We moved into this big ol beautiful house exactly one year ago.  I remember thinking about all of the wonderful times we would experience together.  The huge family holidays, lots of birthday parties, summer cook-outs, and on and on.  I asked God to teach me hospitality.  I asked Him to help me be a good hostess.  

When we go to other folks' homes for supper or a party, I notice things like how a table is set and how the home is decorated.  I totally notice the food that the host has prepared and how it is served.  How is the furniture arranged for optimum flow of traffic?  where are the drinks in relation to the food?  How present is the hostess in conversing with her guests?  I notice all of that stuff.  

Well, we have lots of people staying in this house right now and they are exhausted.  They don't care about the flow of traffic or how the flowers are arranged.  They are broken.  They need a hostess who knows what it is to be broken.  They are hungry.  They need a hostess to has strong arms to hold them and empty shoulders to cry on.  They need Jesus.  I have been given a glorious opportunity to host some folks who - in the eyes of American society - don't have thier act together.  But really, who does?  

Loving the unloveable, serving the ungrateful, washing the dirty, feeding the hungry, comforting the broken - this is true hospitality.  This is where Jesus has me.  Big sigh.  After all, that is what HE has done for me.  Amen.

Not on my watch

Judges 2: 6-10
And when Joshua had dismissed the people, the children of Israel went each to his own inheritance to possess the land.  So the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the Lord which He had done for Israel.  Now Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died when he was one hundred and ten years old.  When all that generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the Lord nor the work which He had done for Israel.

This is a crucial time in my life as I am home a lot with four little children.  Four very bright, impressionable, healthy young human beings with a future.  I must teach them to remember.  I must tell them about the wonderful works of the God who created them.  Do they know about the many miracles of the LORD?  Who is going to point them to the truth about who made them and how they are to respond to their Maker?

Daddy and Mamma. Tim and me.

This gives new breath to my soul as I am looking forward to full day at home with the kids.  I used to look at 'all day at home' days as a dread.  But now my perspective has changed because of this teaching task to which I have been assigned.  I feel inadequate, but I know that I've got a great 'teacher's manual' to guide me through this sizable job.  So no, I won't let them grow up without knowing about how GREAT GOD IS.  Not on my watch.  

She asked me for his name...

My little Benjamin and I were at Kroger the other day just putzin' around and filling up our buggy with the usual stuff.  I pushed the buggy to a checkout station that looked promisingly efficient so that meant that I could get my stuff paid for and out of there fast.  Well, that didn't happen and I am glad.  As I was standing there looking at the ridiculous tabloids that draw in my attention like a Death Star tractor beam Benjamin was wriggling his way out of that baby safety strap and working on standing up.  This sweet old lady behind me tapped my shoulder and said, "your baby is getting out of his seat".

Thank you, I said with an sheepishly embarrassed tone.

But I am glad I turned around because what I was about to experience was precious.

I picked up Benjamin from the buggy seat, brought him to my hip and started chatting with this sweet lady.  She looked like she was at least 75 or older and she was accompanied by a nice gal wearing scrubs.  Her smile was big and bright and her eyes were just locked into Benjamin.  She reached out her wrinkled old hands to squeeze Ben's fat feet and told me that I was 'very blessed'.

Indeed, I replied.

Then he did something that he has never done.  He reached both arms out to her.  He wanted to go to her just like he reaches for me when someone else is holding him.

Just when you thought her smile couldn't get any bigger, it did and she took him into her arms and held him close.  He even rested his sweet head down to her shoulder.  The moment was precious.

Now you have to know my Benjamin.  He is a MOMMA's boy!!!  He doesn't like it when others hold him.  He will usually let Tim hold him if I am not in the room. But the minute he sees me, he cries and reaches for me.  He won't stop crying until he is securely on my hip.  

So as she is holding B she asked me what his name is.

Benjamin.

Benjamin, she says with a smile as she automatically places one hand on his head.  Well, this sweet moment comes to an end and he reaches back for me and as he goes back to the hip I am whisked back to reality of the check out line.

We waved good-bye to that nice old lady and her helper and they waved back.  Bye -Bye, Benjamin, she said.

As we drove away I was replaying the whole experience in my mind and I suddenly realized that I had not asked her for her name.  I felt guilty about that.  You see when she asked for Benjamin's name, she acknowledged his value, his worth, his honor as a human being.  He has a name and it was carefully chosen for this boy.

We all have been given a name.  We all have value, worth and dignity.  We have a place. It means a lot when we call people by their name.  I hear people all the time say "I'm not very good with names"

I don't buy that.

I think we CAN be good with names.  People that have said that oh so familiar 'Im-not-very-good-with names' bit ARE good with names because they are people who truly love and value others.  I've seen it from them.

Asking someone what their name is, remembering it, and calling them by their name has immeasurable meaning.  I experienced it that day in Kroger.  I hope to see that sweet old lady again.  And when I do, I will ask her for her name.

If these walls could talk

As I sit here tonight, I am surrounded by boxes packed full with our stuff.  In my bedroom there are a few boxes at the very place where the bassinet used to be.  There is a box in the place where the small rocking chair used to be.  My babies Paul and Benjamin where brought home to this house and they laid in the bassinet that was right next to my side of the bed and next to that was the rocking chair.  Those were sweet days with my newborns.

How many times have I walked up and down that hallway during all hours of the day and night, heck in just one month's time let alone four years? Too many to count.

I arrived at this house on July 1, 2008.  Sight unseen.  In April 2008 Tim flew from Phx to Knox, picked out this house for us and bought it.  He came back to me in Phoenix with lots of pictures, but I don't remember seeing them.  Then in June, he left Phoenix for Knoxville and moved in with our stuff while I stayed in Phoenix for a few extra weeks.  I flew out to Knoxville with (at that time) our only children and my mother.  Tim picked us up at the airport and drove us here to where I am now.

I wish I could describe what was going on in my head when we drove down the street that lead me to the place I was to call home.  I was excited, apprehensive, nervous, curious.  But mostly, I was just going.  I knew that I was going to be okay.  I trusted Tim and I knew he was going to get something that we both liked.  So we drive up to the house and there it is..

JUST KIDDING!!!!

This is the best picture I could come up with.  We have better pictures, but they are on the desktop computer downstairs and I am using the laptop upstairs.

The house is banana pudding yellow and I could not have picked out a better place for us.  God most certainly had this house in mind for us when He brought us to Knoxville.

Here are some memories that come to mind...
Dinners on the deck, slip n slide in the yard, chatting in the yard with neighbors, seeing 'welcome baby Paul' and 'welcome baby Benjamin' signs on the front door, parties in the backyard, Eric and Amy learning to ride a two-wheel bike in the church parking lot, picking apples...

Oh that list can go on and on and on.  I am sad with this move, because although we are staying in town and our new home is only about 15 minutes away, I feel as though I am watching a close loved one die.  I guess I feel like that if I leave then house, then I will loose all of the precious memories made here.  These memories are of my children during the early years of thier lives.

I suppose it really doesn't matter what kind of shelter one has to house a family.  It's the family inside the shelter that matter.

That being said, I will hang on to the memories and bid farewell to the house.  Stay tuned for more tales from a new lane on 'Tales from Lavendar Lane'

The cute things they say

Loving these little years!!!  I love it this time.  I really do.  I want to savor these moments and tuck these memories into my mind so as never to be forgotten.  My children are just so precious and I am crazy about them.

They have been saying the cutest things lately and so here I am blogging about them to share with the world wide web.

Eric - "Hey Mom, when are we going to get and SURV?  We can put lots of stuff in it and go camping."
Me - "Don't you mean an SUV?"
Eric - "No Mom an SURV.  Like Eli and Austin have"
(These little boys come from a family that own a fifth wheel RV and thus take it on their family campouts)

Eric - "MOM!!!!!!! Paul is fast forwarding it backwards!" (translation: Paul was touching the rewind button on the DVD player)

Amy - "We have to wash our hair tonight because we went swimming in the pool and so we have to get all of the caffeine out"

Paul - (might I just say that Paul wins hands down for the cutest sayings.  Maybe because he is 3 or maybe because he is just super cute)
"Mommy, I want to be on the 'ready-watch-the-gate' team" (he says this while watching the Olympics)
"I winned.  You lose."
"Theres Yoba in yours phone" (explanation: I have a ringtone that is actually Yoda saying 'do or do not there is no try')
"Bye!  I'm going to college now.  I love you.  I'll call you when I'm at college"
Singing to the tune of Davy Crockett "Baby, baby crockett, king of the wild kratts tear"

Benjamin - "Dadadadadada"

As I sit here in my living room I look around and there are toys, shoes, pencils, clothes all over the floor.  All of this stuff has a home, but it is not in its proper place.  It is all over the counter tops and the floor.  Sigh. I suppose I should get up and clean up, but alas the motivation is not there.  Instead I am sitting, typing, reminiscing.

I just love to cradle their little faces in my hands and look deep into thier young eyes.  I am amazed that these human beings have a little bit of Tim and a little bit of me in them.

I'm going to blink and they will be in college.  And I sure do hope Paul will indeed call me!

Wishes do come true...

This is Amy on Main Street at Disney World Magic Kingdom about to give Pinoccio a high five.

Can I just say Disney World ROCKS!!! I had so much fun and so did the rest of us!

"I see Mickey Mouse" came from Paul every other minute.

It truly is a magical place... at least for me and my family. My children have seen many of the Disney movies like Peter Pan, Little Mermaid, etc. and then for them to actually SEE these characters in person and wave to them is breathtaking! I was looking at this whole experience from their perspective and it was awesome, speechless, exciting and on and on.

I just tried downloading other pictures and was having trouble, so I will attempt again later. Meanwhile, here are some Disney World tips

GO during the last week of January or first week of February! It was 77 degrees, sunny and not super crowded.

Bring a backpack with lots of snacks and drinks

Get the FAST PASS thingys. The longest we waited in line for anything was 15 minutes.

See the street shows and parades. It was so fun to see my kids' faces light up when the characters waved at them.

"She waved at me!!!" From an excited Amy and it was all I could do to not run out in the middle of the parade and thank Snow White for waving at my daughter. It made her day and mine!!

As cheesy as it may sound, wishes do come true at Disney World.