Not-So-Deep Thoughts about Dug Down Deep

Oct 292009
 

Yesterday I read the first chapter of Joshua Harris’ new book Dug Down Deep.  I would have read the whole book, but for two facts: it doesn’t come out until January 19, and I don’t seem to have quiet as much uninterrupted reading time as I did last time Joshua Harris released a book.  (It took me several sittings to read this first chapter!)

I was struck by several things as I read it.  First of all, his youngest daughter’s name is the same as my youngest daughter’s: Mary Kate!  Why I had never realized that until I read the book’s dedication, I’m not sure.  Of course, when Mary Kate Harris was born we probably hadn’t even met Ruth Ann Acheson, let alone thought about Mary Kate Acheson!  But now I’m going to have to go search joshharris.com for pictures of the little one who shares my daughter’s name.

The second thing I realized is that I like authors from Oregon.  My two favorite present-day authors are Randy Alcorn and Joshua Harris.  I’m not sure if it is all the rain that makes them better writers.  Or if I’m just incredibly partial, having grown up in Oregon myself.  Either way, they are excellent authors.  And this first chapter of Dug Down Deep was proof that Joshua Harris has not lost his writing ability as he honed his preaching skills.  If anything, his writing has just gotten deeper.  (Thus the book title, obviously.)

I am looking forward to reading the entire book whenever I can get my hands on a copy.  It is possible that, since it deals with theology, I may not agree with every little thing in Dug Down Deep. But I’m guessing it will make me think, regardless.  And that’s what digging down deep is all about: “understanding what I believe and why it matters.”

Early Morning Inspiration

Oct 292009
 

I’ve decided the 3 a.m. feeding is the best one for receiving inspiration for hard-to-word sentences in that article one is finishing.  Especially when it’s due very soon.  I’ve also decided that deadlines are helpful in getting a writing project finished!

I have written more this past week than I have in a long time.  And it has been just plain fun.  I’d almost forgotten how much I love to write.

Of course, at 3 a.m. I’m grateful for a pen and paper so I don’t have to turn on the computer to make those few little notes.  Because turning on the computer might mean finishing the article at that time of day.  Making for not a little lost sleep!  I know.  I’ve done the 4 a.m. article thing before.  It was one of those that had been on my heart for a year, and I woke up one night and couldn’t go back to sleep until I put on paper—er, screen—the words flowing in my mind.

Yes, we all write one word after another (or so says Bill Stott in Write to the Point and Feel Better About Your Writing).  But sometimes those words come faster than others!  And as I’ve discovered once again, the more I write, the more I write.  Something about making it a habit.  Or just plain remembering that when I write, I feel His pleasure.

of homegrown tomato sauce

Oct 282009
 

Have you ever tasted homemade tomato sauce?  From tomatoes grown in the dirt around your home.  Tomatoes that have been chopped on your kitchen counter.  Tomatoes that have simmered for hours on your kitchen stove.  Until the extra liquid has evaporated and the tomatoes have reached the smooth perfection of…homemade tomato sauce.

Last week I made homemade tomato sauce.  Then I diced up a leftover chicken breast (from a whole chicken that had boiled on my wood stove in a cast iron pan), and tossed it with pasta, artichoke hearts, mozzarella cheese chunks, and some Italian herbs.  Topping it with my homemade tomato sauce, making sure some cheese was near the top to peek its way through, I popped it in the oven.

The bubbling and browned delight that came out was absolute perfection.  Most especially because of the homemade tomato sauce.

Pixel Envy

Oct 272009
 

I think I’m glad that lots of people with great cameras come to visit me.  Because that means I get lots of great pictures of my girls and my man.  The only problem is, scrolling through the slideshow in Picasa, I get incredible pixel envy when comparing their pixels to mine.  Not to mention the way their cameras take pictures when you press the shutter, instead of three seconds later.  One actually catches the proper expression that way–what an amazing concept!  Also amazing is this day and age of technology where the fabulous 5 megapixel camera one got so very recently is so quick eclipsed by 10 and 12 megapixel cameras that cost the same or less!

I used to always be the person behind the camera.  Seeing events through the camera’s lens.  I take a lot fewer pictures these days.  Maybe it’s because I’m often holding the object of the photo.  Or maybe I want to be more wrapped up in the moment than the shot.  But that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy the photos other people take.  I’m always grabbing camera cards before people leave, so I can download their view of our farm and family.  And of course, as occasion presents itself, I pick up their cameras to enjoy the latest and greatest in shutter speeds.

Another Thursday at the Little Pink House

Oct 242009
 

YLCF Blog CarnivalI know, I already told you about a Thursday at the Little Pink House.  But that was before my Mommy Dayze got doubly busy!  And when life was a little less “normal.”  So I decided to join the YLCF “A Peek Into Your Day” Blog Carnival, just for the fun of it.  I’m not even eligible for the drawing, being that it’s happening on my own website and all that.  But all y’all should write about your day and enter.  Because there’s this adorable blue and brown day planner…and like Ash, everything blue and brown catches my eye…so much so that it’s the only reason I found a nursing shawl the other day—‘twas the blue and brown fabric that caught my eye!  But I digress.  I’m joining the carnival.  If for no other reason that to finally try out making a link on a Mr. Linky!

Where does a mother start the tale of her day?  At midnight when she’s exhausted but still awake due to drinking both glasses of the mocha smoothie she’d made herself in order to get through the previous day in a semi-alert state?  At four o’clock in the morning when her baby girl cries but then puts herself back to sleep, forgetting that Mommy doesn’t go back to sleep quite as easily?  At five o’clock when the baby girl wakes up again, deciding she is really truly indeed hungry and ready for a meal?  Or at 7:39 a.m. when that same little girl once again rouses, deciding it’s time to eat again, since she was too tired to eat much earlier?

Well, at 7:40 a.m. on Thursday, October 22, I whisked the pink swaddled bundle out of her play pen and we glanced out the windows for any deer who might just be hanging about, then made our way to the radio, turning it on in time to catch the last part of the Huckabee Report.  While I fed Mary, her daddy read to us from Isaiah.  Big sister was still sleeping, due to a late night at Aunt Katie’s last night.  Merritt prayed for our day, then we snuggled back under the covers to listen to the local morning news.  It’s been a while since we’ve had lazy mornings we could spend under the covers waiting for Ruth to wake up.  This morning, we laughed at Mary, who kept falling back asleep, obviously dreaming happy dreams of food, from the smiles and smacking.  It was just too much work to stay awake to eat real food—when she was awake, she just stretched and yawned and stretched again.

Ru finally awakened, and with Merritt trying to burp and rouse Mary for me, I got Ru up (a special occurrence these days, since it seems I’m always nursing Mary when Ru rouses).  A few more snuggles, then Ru decided it was breakfast time.  She liked her daddy’s suggestion of hot cereal so much that she nearly went off our bed head first in anticipation of it!

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Pooh and Piglet

Oct 222009
 

Dear Ruth Ann and Mary Kate,

Before you were born, Ruth, your Great Papa and Grama B. gave you a stuffed Winnie the Pooh Bear.  As you grew, Mommy took pictures of you and Pooh—and soon, you were bigger than Pooh!

When you came along, Mary, we thought it would be fun for you to have your own Pooh friend.  Great Grama B. brought Piglet to your baby shower.  Now you and your sister both have Pooh characters to pose with you as you grow!

So far, Ruth, you’ve thought it necessary for Pooh to join sister in all her pictures with Piglet—and usually you yourself jump in by the end of the photo session, as well!

I love my girls.  And I hope you two will be best of friends, just like Pooh and Piglet.

Love,

Mommy

(Made with Creative Memories Storybook Creator Plus from Grandma)

RuRu

Oct 212009
 

Dear Ru,

You’ve discovered some new hobbies these past few weeks.  With your daddy applying plaster and tape to the sheetrock as we remodel our house, you have been right by his side (often with the white mud all over your clothes to prove it), watching his every move.  A few days after he’d first been working with his trowels on our walls, I found you with the spatulas Mommy had given you, applying invisible plaster to the walls with the same deft movements you’d seen Daddy use with his trowels.  You mimic everything we do, with a precise duplication that is scary!  I had a loose eyelash I was trying to get off on the way to church on Sunday.  I turned to look at you as you pulled at your eyelashes with your thumb and forefinger.  And this morning, you changed an invisible diaper on your baby, holding her legs with one hand just like Mommy does Mary’s legs, wiping her bottom with an invisible wipe, and then pretending to wrap her diaper around her.

Then this evening, while I was nursing Mary, you handed me your little Corolle baby doll, wanting me to nurse her.  I finally said, “You feed your baby!”  You proceeded to roll up your sleeves and put your baby’s mouth to your forearm.  Explaining why you often suck on your own arm when I’m feeding Mary: apparently you think babies get their sustenance from mommy’s arms!

Amazing how much easier it works for you right now to use a pretend diaper, rather than the frustration of trying to get real clothes and diapers on your dollies.  Your dollies go around without clothes on most of the time—as you would if we let you!  You are in a stage where you prefer to be undressing rather than getting dressed.  Last night when your daddy put your pajamas back on you again, you pointed to your dolly and let Daddy know that you had taken off your p.j.’s because dolly didn’t have on pajamas.  Your kind daddy put dolly’s nightgown on her, and then you seemed content to stay in your pajamas.  Incidentally, when Mommy checked on you before I went to sleep, you still had on your pajamas, but dolly had already lost hers.

When your Great Aunt Margie arrived the other night Daddy took the flashlight to show her our new bedrooms (which don’t have lights wired yet).  You were so incredibly fascinated with the flashlight that Aunt Margie passed on the story to your great grandparents when she picked them up the next morning.  They just happened to have a flash light that they wanted you to have.  You were thrilled and proceeded to study every nail in the addition, every book, every spot in the house with the flash light.  Now everyone’s donating their almost-dead batteries for your flashlight supply!

One night when Aunt Margie and cousin Rebekah left, you signed please and reached out your arms for them to come back and hold them.  You also called for “Mah-eeh” which I think must have been “Margie,” because it was not “Daddy” or “Mommy”!

Last week I let you take your first nap in the play pen in your new room.  Meanwhile, your sister borrowed your crib.  I forgot I’d left her burp cloth in your crib.  That night, when your daddy and I came to bed, you popped up in your crib: sister’s burp cloth on your shoulder, snuggling your Bitty Baby and patting her back just like Mommy does to sister.  The expression on your face was priceless.  Your daddy tried to capture it on the camera but you kept giving him funny expressions every time he pressed the shutter!  Imagine your delight when your Great Aunt Margie arrived (without having known the story!) with miniature burp cloths for you and your dollies, just like the bigger ones she had made for sister Mary.  You’ve been a busy mommy, burping your dollies like a professional ever since, burp rag tucked under the chin just like a violin and everything!

You are getting to be so big.  Looking back at the past month’s pictures show just how much you have grown!  And we just weighed you, too—at 1 year, 11 months, you weigh 24 pounds!  You’re already in size 5 shoes, but somewhere in between 18 month and 2T clothes!

Mommy loves you, RuRu.

Love,

your mommy

Tuesday News

Oct 202009
 

First of all, a weigh in.  Not for me!  For the girls.  We weighed them both last night on Papa and Nana’s veggie scale.  Mary Kate is exactly 11 pounds at 7 weeks old.  And Ruth is a whopping 24 pounds at 1 year 11 months old!

We had a fun weekend with more company!  They apparently wore Mary all out.  She slept nearly 8 hours last night.  But to make up for it, she’s having a rougher time today (stocking up on food and snuggles for another long night’s sleep, perhaps?  a mom can hope!).

When my parents, youngest siblings, and maternal grandparents were here last weekend, they left my cousin Matthew (who has become bestest buddies with my brother-in-law Mason).  This weekend, my paternal grandparents, Aunt Margie and cousin Rebekah (Matthew’s grandparents, mom, and sister!) came—ostensibly to pick Matthew up, but my girls think it had a lot to do with seeing them!

We’ve been so blessed to have visits from so many family members.  I’m thankful they are able to make the trip sometimes, since we’re sorta stuck on the farm in the summertime, and don’t get to travel everywhere we’d like for as long as we’d like in the winter.

In addition to taking lots of pictures (which Rebekah has promised to send to me on a CD!) and getting in lots of snuggling and playing time with the girls, everyone got the Grand Tour of the farm, and Grandpa supervised the guys hanging sheetrock, cutting up Merritt’s doe, and skinning the nice buck he got yesterday morning (we have three tags between us this year).  We spent much of the day at my in-laws’ since Ruth needed an undisturbed nap.  Marlys fed us fabulous tacos and excellent fish chowder…plus we introduced my family to the Acheson signature “Flat Apple Pie” (apple pie made in a jelly roll pan, drizzled with frosting).

We’re slowly but surely making progress on the remodel.  Merritt has been busy most mornings and evenings the past week, but we keep assuring ourselves life will slow down.  I may just have to prove to him that I can put mud and tape on sheetrock.  I’ve watched it be done all my life.  The problem is that my hubby likes the old-fashioned look of a smooth wall—no texture—which means the tape job has to be good, not, um, amateur like mine would be.

So yes, thanks to help from Matthew and Mason yesterday, there’s just a bit more sheetrock to put up (and we’re down to the small pieces of sheetrock I can help Merritt with).  Then there are the laborious coats of plaster and tape and sanding it all down and doing it again.  But when we’ve got that done, we’re on the home stretch for now, as we’ve decided to wait until at least spring before we buy carpet.  So the last decision for now is paint colors.  We’re thinking pale green and yellow for the girls’ room…our room is more undecided, though we do have a wallpaper border chosen!

Well, that’s the latest and greatest from the little pink house this Tuesday.  I’m off to find some chocolate to top off the deer heart and potatoes we had for lunch, then finish laundry and prepare some Japanese stew for dinner.

(And all this has been typed with swaddled, sleeping baby in my arms…someone’s having a tough naptime.)

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