Our baby has been sick with the flu this week. Some may have seen Mark’s blog about it, so I thought I would say here that she is on the upswing. I think in a few more days she’ll be back to normal.

Charis’s sickness caused us to cancel participation in our town’s tour of homes that I mentioned a few posts back. It was a good decision, as I am now feeling a bit wimpy myself, and the tour is scheduled for tonight.

We’re busy with life, but one encouraging thing has happened. We found a new babysitter who seems to have a fairly available schedule. Since we have lived here, babysitters have been hard to come by. We’re hopeful this is the beginning of getting out together sans children a bit more often.

In other news, we have purged the toybox. This is hard to do with 3 children insisting that every toy you choose to get rid of is extra special. But after the initial painful separation, they seem to forget it ever happened. It is so healthy to get rid of extra “stuff.” In addition to providing more space in your home, every time you do it is an opportunity to thank God for His goodness to us. Just so you know, I have purged some things from our closet, too, and I plan to keep it up over the coming weeks. So we aren’t just subjecting the children to the great clutter removal.

This new cd from Wes King is beautiful. I haven’t listened to a lot of contemporary christian music in a long time, but I decided to get this cd because I’ve heard really good things about Wes King. I enjoy the whole cd, but I find the song “Slow Miracles” to be particularly touching. If you enjoy music with a folk feel, this cd is worth getting.

“The only christian goddess is the church.”

Calvin Horne, commenting after his history lesson on the Peloponnesian war.

This will be another story about how God protects His own. Yes, I know that sometimes He chooses to have His children die young, but He often cares for us and protects us from harm.

Today, I was driving on I-44 from OKC headed toward home. When crossing the bridge that goes over the Candian River, I heard thumping noise coming from the front driver’s side tire. I was sure it was flat. The area I was in was pretty desolate. The rain was also coming down. I had Calvin and Charis with me. I did not think there was even enough of a shoulder for me to pull over, let alone for me to try to change the tire myself.

So I drove further on to my exit–about a mile. I found a quick lube place, and even though it wasn’t part of their list of services, they changed the tire for me free of charge. (I did get an oil change though, just to be nice.) We were on our way once again. I got less than a mile down the road, and I heard thump, thump, thump. I pulled into a plant nursery parking lot, and looked at the tire. It looked fine. I assumed the thumping was just from the imbalance of the spare tire with the other three tires. I pulled back onto the highway. Less than a 1/2 mile down the road, the front tire flew off the van and down the road. I struggled to keep the van under control, and managed to get over to the side of the road. Unsure what I was going to do, I sat there for a moment. Then, out of nowhere, a police car appeared. The officer came up and offered to help. I was sure glad of it. Our cell phone is on a prepaid program, and I only had about 8 minutes left. So I hesitated to make any calls because I wanted to be sure I would be able to keep the connection. The officer took my driver’s license and my AAA card, and he called a tow truck for me. He had to leave, but he had another officer come to sit behind me with his lights going until the tow truck came. (There is absolutely no shoulder on this highway, so having a police car with lights there gave me a much more secure feeling than just my measely little emergency lights did).

The tow truck arrived. The driver was very nice and helpful. He helped me with all my baby stuff and even held Charis while I climbed into his very tall truck. A passerby told us they saw my tire roll into the parking lot of a bbq restaurant up the road, so the tow truck driver pulled in to the place to recover the old tire for me. Then we proceeded to a garage less than a mile down the road.

When we arrived there, an older lady who worked there was very happy to hold Charis while I retrieved all of her things from the van. I called Mark, and we waited for him to come for us. The mechanic and his family who run his shop were also very kind to us.

Ultimately, I am thankful that I and my children are alive. The details sound pretty unremarkable when I retell the story here, but when I consider all that could have gone wrong, it is really amazing that we are all ok. The original tire could have blown on the interstate and made us lose control. When the spare came off, I could have easily lost control and swerved into oncoming traffic. When the spare tire flew off the front of the van it was going so fast it went up hill before it landed in front of the bbq place. I am so thankful that no one came along in another vehicle at the time it was barreling up the road.

So, in the end, I am thankful all we have lost today is a little time and some money for the repairs to the van. We also may have to agree to some settlement to pay for some minor damage done to the bbq place by the out-of-control tire.

If it wouldn’t have ended this way, I know that God would have had a plan. But I don’t want the day to get away without acknowledging His protection of us and thanking Him for it.

I just got off the phone with my mother. She informed me that my 27-year-old niece who is in the army reserves has received orders to go overseas. She has been active duty here in the states for the past 18 months, and it looked as if she would be able to stay home. The plan now is that she will be sent somewhere in the Middle East on December 10 for 18 months. She is leaving behind her husband, and her two sons (7 1/2 and 18 months). Fortunately, as far as care for the children is concerned, her husband’s parents and my brother (her dad) and his wife live nearby where they will be able to help with them. However, I can’t help thinking of what her boys will be missing to have their mother gone for so long. As a mom, I can’t imagine what it would be like to leave them behind. I know this has happened time and again since the war in Iraq began, but I hate it. And, I particularly hate that women can be sent into combat. Obviously, I hate it that it is affecting my family directly as well. So if you think of it, please pray for my niece (I won’t publish her name since I don’t have her permission.) I also have a nephew who has been in Iraq for 7 months. He has a wife and 4-year-old daughter at home. So prayers for him would also be appreciated.

You’ve heard how towns recruit residents to put their homes on display during the holidays. Generally, the homes are, shall we say, showplaces. But in rural OK, a showplace is not required. That’s right. You guessed it. Our town’s chamber of commerce has asked us to put our 3 bedroom ranch-style home complete with discolored vinyl white siding, dirty (very difficult-if-not-impossible to-clean) windows from the 1960s, and mismatched furniture on this year’s tour. Because we want to be supportive of the community, we are going to do it. But I still chuckle at the thought of it.

I went to Wal-mart for the weekly hunting and gathering expedition late this afternoon. A friend was along with me who kept Charis entertained while we walked the aisles. We finished paying for the groceries, and stepped into the frigid below-normal temperatures of central Oklahoma to walk to my van. We loaded up. In my rush to get out of the cold air, I gave the van door a hearty heave-ho to close it, but I didn’t get out of the way quickly enough. My right hand was smashed–squeezed together in a way that is not natural. It is not broken, but it is bruised and swollen–really very attractive. Perhaps I’ll make wardrobe selection in the next couple of weeks to match the changing colors of my large bruised hand.

Ok. Not really big news. But I just had to brag that I ended the day yesterday with an empty laundry hamper. It was the first time in about 6 weeks. It’s a good feeling, even if only happens every now and then.

It has been over 4 years since our second youngest child was a baby, and we had forgotten how funny babies can be. Tonight while our nearly-six-month-old Charis was sitting beside me in the living room, she just started opening and closing her mouth, and noticed the smacking noise she could make with her lips. Now, after a bit of practice, this seems like a fun way to entertain herself. She also used it to get my attention, and the smile on her face betrayed her self-satsfaction over acheiving her goal. It is just fun to watch her and appreciate all the little things she learns in a day that will eventually serve her in some useful way (or maybe not so useful, but you know what I mean).

I asked Laurel to include me in the interviewing that has been going around in blogdom. I didn’t realize the questions were up on her blog for about 2 weeks, then it took me that long to answer. So here, at long last, are the answers. I wish I could be as clever as some of the others I have read, but alas, I think I have come up short. However, I enjoyed participating. I guess that’s all that really matters.

1. You grew up in a really large family. How has your growing up experience influenced how you parent your own children?

I was the youngest of nine children, so by the time I was being raised, there were really only 3 – 5 other siblings around at a time. During some of those years, those siblings were adults who returned home for one reason or another. So I am not sure I have really made much of a connection to the “largeness” of my family affecting my own parenting. That being said, I definitely see ways my own upbringing has influenced the way I parent my children. The home I was raised in had little structure. My mom worked full-time, and my dad, who was much older, was not at home a lot of the time. I think I really craved structure in my life. So as a parent, I try to provide more of that for my children. Now, compared to many, our structure is lax. However, I am talking about basics like having most of our meals together around the kitchen table; getting up and going to bed at basically the same time everyday; having family devotions daily. Another thing I always wanted as a child was to be involved in activities at school and in the community. So since for a variety of reasons I didn’t have many of those kinds of experiences, Mark and I try to provide those for our children, within reason–refer back to all those blogs last spring about little league.

2. How, after attending an Anabaptist college, did you end up Presbyterian?

First, I grew up in a Baptist denomination that had some Calvinist beliefs–specifically, I was taught predestination from a young age. So I think I was “primed” to become presbyterian in time. I chose the college I attended, not because of its Anabaptist roots, but because it seemed to take Christianity seriously, which was more than I could say for the two very respectable “reformed” colleges I considered attending. Actually, by attending the college I did, I was even more prepared for my eventual transition to presbyterianism through a CRC friend that took me to an OP church 30 minutes away from campus for one year of my college days and through the work of the Coalition for Christian Outreach, a Dutch-influenced college ministry. But even with both those influences, I still considered myself a baptist at the end of college. However, about 6 months after graduation, I moved to Florida to live with my sister and her husband. Though they were also baptists, they took me to church at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church. After one week in the young adult Sunday school class, I knew I was going to join the church because the teaching in that class was so good. After a couple of weeks, I began working for the church’s television ministry, where I was exposed to reformed theology on a daily basis. I did join Coral Ridge about 3 months after my first visit, although I still had the typical baptist reservation about baptizing infants. It took several discussions/arguments with Mark (who, incidentally, became a co-worker at Coral Ridge after I had been there for 2 years) to bring me over on that issue.

3. What do you like most and least about being a pastor’s wife?

I like being a pastor’s wife most because I have access to a lot of the answers to spiritual and theological questions in a way that I wouldn’t have if I had married, say, a plumber (of course, that would have its benefits, too.)

What I dislike most about being a pastor’s wife is sitting in worship without the assistance of my husband in training our children how to be in worship. God has been gracious to me in this regard, in that, the older children have learned quite well despite my inadequacies and struggles with attending to them during worship.

4. Who are your favorite literary heroines? With what fictional character have you felt the greatest kinship?
My favorite literary heroines are all the protagonists in Jane Austen’s books. They all seem to be the same person, just slightly altered from book to book. They are intelligent, poised, attractive, and socially adept–all the things I like to imagine myself being.

I think I have a real kinship with Anne Shirley from Anne of Green Gables. She reminds me of myself as a child in the way she rambles on endlessly and will talk to anyone who will listen.

5. You just won a contest sponsored by Miramax. They offered to make any book of your choosing into a film. What book do you choose? What casting suggestions do you give?

I think I would choose The Moonstone by Wilckie Collins. It is the quintessential British mystery, and the characters are so well developed, it would be intriguing to see them brought to life on the screen. For Detective Cuff, I would cast Tony Shaloub, currently the star of the USA network series, Monk. House steward, Gabriel Betteridge, would be played by Michael Keaton. The challenge would be doing justice to the characters and plot without losing too much in editing, since the book is quite long. (BTW, If there is a movie version of this book out there, please tell me about it.)

When you post your answers on your blog, please include the following:
::If you would like to participate too, here are your instructions:
1. Leave me a comment saying “interview me.”
2. I will respond by asking you five questions (not the same as you see here).
3. You will update your blog/site with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.::