Worry

Worry has been creeping in to my heart, my mind, my body, finding it's entry ways in my doubts and fears. And I have been letting it rule my heart and mind and body this week. It is taking its toll.
When I really sit and examine some of my worries, some of them may be legitimate, but many are not. Regardless of if they are real worries or exaggerations of my brain, I still desire to not carry around such a burden. I desire peace and rest and to find my strength in those, not in figuring out how to solve all of the "problems" in my life.

Fall of Giants

My latest and longest of late book adventure is Ken Follet's Fall of Giants.

Ken Follet, who wrote the great historical fiction Pillars of the Earth, has returned with another. This story revolves around life prior to and during the first World War and the Russian Revolution from 1911 until 1925. He writes about five different families spread across continents, telling their stories, stories of the working class of the wealthy, all who are affected by the war. The details in terms of what was occurring in the war, the battles, parliaments is accurate; the characters on the scene during these events are fictional. He worked with historians to piece together the details of the coming of the war and revolution and how they all intertwine.
I have never been a big history person..I desire to know it, yet I have a hard time really engaging or remembering events. So this book has been great for me...learning more about the first world war and events leading up to it and how things played out, while also being entertained. There are the usual forbidden romances and personal struggles. And his character development is up to par and as usual he brilliantly meshes these families from five different areas' lives together.
It is a doozie: around 1000 pages and I am over half way finished and enjoying every minute. It is the first of a trilogy, so there is more to come. The next two novels will cover World War II and the Cold War.

My Valentine

You didn't know I had a Valentine? Well, every year he sends me roses. My original valentines from him were the most creative cards with all sorts of hearts layered on top of each other. Now I get roses (and a sweet card). My valentine's come from my Dad, who is an amazing man and amazing Dad..

Visitors

At the end of January we had some of my favorite house guest come for a visit.

Danielle and Lydia (and a brief glimpse of Aaron) made their way down to Nashville for a pre baby number 2 visit. I love having them here! And I love seeing Lydia grow...she has gotten so much bigger and we had so much fun reading and playing together. I so badly wish they were still here so I got to be more a part of Lydia's day to day life. But I am very thankful for Danielle and our regular phone time so that we don't seem so many miles apart.

Our visit was low key, as is both of our styles, but it allows for maximum catch up time for us and hang out time with Lydia while she is awake.

I only pulled my camera out a little, but this is a classic Lydia hair twirl finger sucking pose.



Yay friends! Until June when we meet again (and meet the newest addition!)....

Work

I don't write about work much, not because I don't enjoy my job or because I hate it, sometimes it just feels like it is what it is. And given the difficult nature of working in the PICU, I also know I compartmentalize work to a degree and try and leave a lot of it there.
But this week I had a few little experiences that reminded me of why I do what I do, or atleast helped me see some of the good sides instead of the difficult sides. First was pretty simple...I went to the Vandy basketball game Thurs (go Dores!) and they recognized a little girl and her family during a timeout because she had been born with a congenital heart defect and it had been fixed at Vanderbilt. She was probably 10 years old and I know this sounds horrible, but a normal happy little girl out there. I forget the good or even don't get a glimpse of what happens to these kids later who we work so hard for. So I got a little teary eyed sitting there and was thankful to see that what can seem hard and futile sometimes is totally worth it. If you ask that family it is definitely worth it.
Then yesterday I got to take care of a kid who has been in the hospital for months and is finally doing well and it was just fun to see the positive of what has been a long struggle. And he has got a smile that helps remind me of some of the things I forget.
Sometimes I need these reminders to keep me going.

Powerless

Powerless: that is how my RA makes me feel so much of the time. I can't make the pain go away, I am at the mercy of this disease and my crazed white blood cells circulating through my body. Yes the medicines and things helps, but when a flare happens there is always some amount of time that I sit, aware of the pain, longing for nothing more than it to leave and never come back. And that is about all the power I have in this..I don't get to dictate when things will hurt, or for how long, or to what degree they will make life more complicated. And it is really hard to feel so powerless.
Which gets me thinking, I don't really have power over other parts of my life, but I can easily deceive myself into believing that I do have that power. So this entire process has been a very humbling realization of my need for the Lord. Humbling and hard.
Our girls group continues to read through the book Waiting, by Ben Patterson. This book has been incredible and I highly recommend it. The chapter we read through for this week touched on the story of Abram, Sarai, and Hagar. Hagar was a servant of Abram and Sarai. In their long process of waiting for the Lord to fulfill his promise of a child for them, they got impatient and let Hagar in on the plan to carry the child they were maybe supposed to have. Well, that blew up in all their faces and in the process Hagar ran away but then heard the Lord calling her back into being Abram and Sarai's servant; back into facing the pain and struggle, probably ridicule or abuse or estrangement. In his calling, Hagar called the Lord "You are a God who sees me" (Genesis 16:13).
I know that the Lord sees my struggle, sees my pain, sees my powerlessness, sees and knows of my struggle more than I even know of. And in this, thankfully, I can find some comfort, and strength in knowing that in everything, I have someone who knows and sees and loves me who is in control.

Socks

Can't believe I haven't written about this yet. I started a knitting project a year and a half ago and just recently finished it. It was a 'pick it up and do a little here and there' project. Plus I needed the help of my knitting coach several times (thanks Mary Gresh!). So even though it took forever, I finally finished my project: socks. These were supposed to be a Christmas present for my sister last year. But they were a present this year, and even then were more like a New Years' present.
Finished product:

Now one was a little bigger/looser than the other, but I love the yarn and they are super soft. Hopefully they are being put to good use in Cali.

I knitted them starting from the toe going up. The tricky parts were starting and turning the heel; otherwise they were really easy. And it was my first knitting in the round project. I wonder if I will start another year long project?

Transforming

This past Sunday I had an opportunity to say a few words in front of my church. Scary! There are about 700 or so folks who were there as we were having a joint congregational meeting. My task, should I have chosen to accept, which I did, was to talk about transformation: where has God transformed something or where is he in the process of transforming. I was only given 2-3 minutes to talk, which is nothing. In preparing to talk I was instantly nervous and wondered why I had agreed to such a foolish idea, especially as the first and most obvious thing that came to mind was RA. So I tried to think of other things to talk about…now I know there are other areas where transformation is happening, but my mind was stuck on RA..I couldn’t think of anything else. So I gave it a few days and talked it over a little with friends and then Friday launched into looking into my heart.

I found that I was terrified of standing up and letting people know I am screwed up, not just physically, but emotionally. I was terrified that people would look at me differently, or forever see me as a different person. But another part of me kicked in…I have no idea why the Lord has given me this disease, what if it is to share with other people so that they too might see something. Maybe it isn’t for that at all, I will never know. But I decided to trust the fact that it was the only thing that kept coming to mind when I tried to think about talking and trust that the Lord would let me know if I was going down the wrong path.

The morning of I was nervous, but as soon as I stepped into Rockettown, I felt peaceful. My church is a safe place; it is a place that welcomes screwed up people to be honest and to step into exploring the places the Lord is leading. I have seen many people stand up front and admit weakness, failure, messiness.

So I did it; I spoke briefly on my disease and how I have seen the overwhelming love of my father as I walk through this. I am not sure the exact words…they ended up being different than what I had written out and gone over in my head a few dozen times. That in and of itself is interesting..that even some of the things I thought I might say didn’t even get mentioned. And so far I have felt good about bearing my weakness in not trusting love, in doubting, and in needing those around me to remind me.

And in the process I have come out overwhelmingly thankful for so many things and people and events in my life. Some of the things I was frustrated with last week seem like no big deal (right now, atleast, give me another week and I am sure I will have forgotten) now because I am very aware of how thankful I am for so many things.