7 Quick Takes Friday (vol. 41)

* Kidsave edition! *

WHAT a WEEK. I have so much to say I don't even know where to begin. Things have been so intense over here (in a good way) that if I just had the time I could probably write about three posts a day about what God is revealing to me through Rita's presence in our house. Since, unfortunately, my time is very limited, here are some quick thoughts about our experiences so far...

--- 1 ---

Some of you have left wonderfully kind comments saying that I must be some kind of supermom to host a Kidsave child when I have so many little ones already. After I picked myself up off the floor from the shock of someone perceiving me as one of those moms who has it all together (my real-life friends just laughed out loud at that one), I felt like I should remind everyone that I have a lot of help:

As I said in this post, we've worked hard to set up our lives so that we have an extensive support network. My mom lives less than two miles away and is here almost every day; my mother-in-law comes for a week every couple of months, and during those times I don't have to lift a finger in terms of house work; we have a friend from church as a regular babysitter who helps me out in the mornings two or three days a week; we have wonderful friends who are always ready to lend a hand in a pinch; and my husband is extremely supportive and helpful around the house.

So please don't perceive me as some superwoman! Without all these wonderful people in my life, it would very difficult for me to take on something like this in this phase of life.

--- 2 ---

Some things I found interesting about our local Kidave group:

• All of the other families have two parents working; we are the only family with an at-home parent.
• One is a single parent.
• Two of the host families are people who adopted through Kidsave in previous years and had such good experiences that they're now hosting.
• The families are all getting to know each other well since we're all at the same weekend activities, help each other out with events during the week, etc. Having these new friends has been an unexpected bonus!
• These kids are so great. I knew that Kidsave tends to look for kids who are generally well behaved and well adjusted, but they've surpassed my expectations. These are some of the most friendly, gregarious, polite children I've ever encountered.
  

--- 3 ---

One of the more interesting developments has been that the children's chaperone, a psychologist/social worker from Colombia, has been staying with us a lot. (I'll call her "Maria" here on the blog.) Typically the chaperone stays with each family for one week, but since I'm the only at-home parent in our Kidsave community, she's been spending a lot of time at our house during the days as well.

As I said on Twitter, if the homestudy was an exercise in humility, having a social worker living with us has been a Ph.D. course. Although I admit that the fact that not only has she not contacted the local authorities but even seems to enjoy our company has given me some confidence in the parenting department.

One of the most pleasant surprises of the Kidsave experience is how well I get along with Maria. She's about my age and is a ton of fun, and we've become good friends. I expect that we'll keep in touch long after she returns to Colombia.

--- 4 ---

Wednesday I had a taste of the community life I've always longed for, and it was just as great as I thought it would be. Maria (the chaperone) spend hours in the kitchen cooking up a Colombian feast to have for dinner, while Rita, our babysitter friend and I all helped out as the kids ran around underfoot. There were eight people in the house all chatting and laughing, and the smells of rich Colombian food mingled in the air with the sound of a Gipsy Kings album playing on my laptop.

Carne Guisado simmering on the stove

Fried plantains, tomatoes with onions, and Spanish-style deviled eggs using red wine vinegar instead of mayonnaise

Grilled corn (from this weekend)

--- 5 ---

I mentioned back here that I've heard that it's a good idea to set a book aside for a while after you finish it; the goal is to forget about it as much as possible so that when you revise it a final time you'll have a fresh set of eyes. It's funny that I was worried about being able to do that. I finished the first draft right after the baby was born and right before Rita arrived, and ever since then I have been so focused on other things that I almost never think about it. In fact, someone asked me how the book was going last week, and my first reaction was, "What book?" For a moment I seriously had no idea what she was talking about. Mission accomplished.

--- 6 ---

Yesterday I was going to drop Rita off to hang out at another host family's house with some of the other girls from Kidsave, and as an afterthought I grabbed a few extra party favors I had leftover from the baby's baptism (provided by her very generous godparents). They were little packages containing a children's picture of Our Lady of Guadalupe and an inexpensive but pretty rosary. When I got there and started handing them out, I felt like Oprah in that episode where she gave away the cars -- they were all so thrilled, bombarding me with big hugs and kisses on the cheek. I was blown away by how excited and grateful they were.

--- 7 ---

As I said above, this past week has been one of the most intense weeks of my life, and not just because of all the running around we've been doing; I have been challenged spiritually as much as I have been physically. Hosting a Kidsave child has been harder than I thought it would be, but it's also been better than I thought it would be. There's a lot going on around here right now. Please keep us in your prayers.

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Below is a Mr. Linky list if you'd like to add a link to your own 7 Quick Takes post. (1) Make sure the link you submit is to the URL of your post and not your main blog URL. (2) Include a link back here.

I look forward to reading your posts!

Having nothing to offer

Today is day six of our experience as Kidsave hosts, and so far almost everything is going well. I say "almost" not because there are any problems with Rita -- she is delightful -- but because I've been surprisingly stressed about making sure that she has a good time this summer.

All the other families are sending the kids to all sorts of fabulous day camps all summer, and I haven't been able to get anything like that together for a variety of reasons (limited budget, limited ability to leave house with car full of crazy toddlers, doesn't make as much sense for us since we have an at-home parent, not sure what she'd like, my own negative memories of summer day camps fit for a B-grade 1980's movie that make me freeze up any time I think about it, etc.)

In my more neurotic moments I feel like I have nothing to offer her. I worry about Rita comparing her days to those of the other Kidsave kids, wondering what horrible thing she must have done in a past life to get stuck with us. Though we are doing our best to make sure she has a great summer, what our best looks like is more humdrum and involves listening to a lot more screaming than what others could give. I'm not able to spontaneously hop in the car and take her somewhere interesting, we need to be home in the afternoons most days for the kids' naptimes, and I'm often distracted by dealing with some chaos involving the little ones. In my almost hourly temptations to get worked up about how little we can offer her, I have taken great comfort in something I read in Seven Storey Mountain a few months ago about Baroness Catherine Doherty.

Thomas Merton describes how everyone who met her was entranced by her presence. Recalling an occasion when he saw her speak to two priests, he writes, "What impressed me most was the effect she had on these priests. We had been sitting around the station, bored, complaining of this and that situation in the world. Now they were wide awake and listening very attentively to everything she had to say."

He emphasizes the Baroness' incredible presence in more than one part of the book, explaining how people were drawn to her like moths to light. And yet, in a worldly sense, she had nothing to give. She had no money, and was "dressed in clothes that were nondescript and plain, even poor. She had no artful way of walking around, nothing for the gallery." And yet, he writes of another time he saw her speak, "the impression she was making on that room full of [people] pervaded the place with such power that it nearly knocked me backwards down the stairs which I had just ascended."

If she didn't have any great speaking tricks or affectations, what was it that made people come alive to such a great degree in her presence? Merton offers the disarmingly simple answer when he recounts the time she spoke to the two spellbound priests:

What was it that she had to offer them, that they did not already posses? One thing: she was full of the love of God; and prayer and sacrifice and total, uncompromising poverty had filled her soul with something which, it seemed, these two men had often looked for in vain in the dry and conventional and merely learned retreats that fell to their lot. And I could see that they were drawn to her by the tremendous spiritual vitality of the grace that was in her, a vitality which brought with it a genuine and lasting inspiration, because it put their souls in contact with God as a living reality. [...]

It is a tremendous thing, the economy of the Holy Ghost! When the Spirit of God finds a soul in which he can work, He uses that soul of any number of purposes: opens out before its eyes a hundred new directions, multiplying its works and its opportunities for the apostolate almost beyond belief and certainly far beyond the ordinary strength of a human being.

What was it that she had to offer them?...She was full of the love of God. I have thought of these words over and over when I have felt like I have nothing to offer Rita, finding consolation and peace in the example of the Baroness. It reminds me that I need to stop focusing on how to force more activities into our days, stop comparing myself to other people with different means, and start focusing on what I can do, and what matters. If Rita has missed out on anything important so far in her visit it's not from a lack of thrill-a-minute activities, but from a lack of God's love working through me, blocked out by anxious fixations on how impressive our calendar looks. It's powerful yet daunting to realize that, if I were only willing to do it, to die to self enough to let it happen, I can always, no matter what my circumstances, offer other people the one thing they need and want most: the love of God. And if I were only to let God's love pour out through me, I would go from having nothing to offer, to having everything to offer.

About Kidsave (infopost)

The following is what I call an infopost, just a quick summary of a topic that I'm writing about a lot for me to refer to in posts so that new readers can understand what I'm talking about. If you're a regular reader, you can skip this post.


We are excited to be hosting a child as part of the Kidsave Summer Miracles program this summer. She will be here from July 2 until August 4. Kidsave is a wonderful organization that allows orphaned children to come to America for a fun summer visit (and hopefully to find a family -- 93% of the children end up getting adopted). My husband and I decided to participate in this program after hearing wonderful things about it from other people who'd done it in previous years -- even though we have four kids under age five. The story of our discernment on this subject is here. You can read all my posts on the topic of our Kidsave experiences here.

The little girl who's staying with us is 12 years old, and I'm calling her "Rita" on this blog. There is also a chaperone here from Colombia who checks in on the children to make sure all is going well, and I've become friends with her. I'll call her "Maria."

If you would like to find out more about Kidsave, feel free to contact the staff through the information here.

One couple's journey to adopting HIV-positive children (Part 1 of 3)

A few weeks ago I met a wonderful couple named Kimberly and Jimmy who are in the process of adopting two HIV-positive children from Ethiopia. I enjoyed talking with them so much that I asked if I could interview them for my blog to share their story with you. The following is the first of a three-part interview, written by Kimberly. It's a long post but I hope that you will find, as I did, that it is well worth your time to read the whole thing.


Q: Let's start by talking about your discernment. How did your faith play a role in all this? Did you go into the adoption process intending to adopt HIV-positive children?

No. When we first set out to adopt internationally, the thought of adopting a child with HIV never once occurred to us. (In fact, I don't think we even knew that adoption of HIV-positive children was possible.) Much the opposite, our very first thoughts about adopting a child were so common that the international adoption world has an acronym for it: AYAHAP. As Young And Healthy As Possible.

That's still what the majority of adoptive parents end up requesting: a single baby, preferably a girl, as young as possible and with no known health issues. But pretty quickly after God set us on the journey of international adoption, we realized the AYAHAP path was not the path for us.

Q: So how did you go from requesting a single baby girl, as young and healthy as possible, to adopting two siblings, a brother and sister, ages 2 and 6, both HIV-positive?

Strangely enough, it was God working through a 12-year-old boy -- a boy whom we've never met and likely will never meet -- that truly opened our eyes (and hearts) and changed our path.

For the sake of this interview, I'll call this boy "Essayas." That's not his real name, but it's a most appropriate substitute. In Amharic (the main language of Ethiopia), the name "Essayas" means "God's helper."

So we'll get to "God's helper" in a moment. But first, God chose to speak to me directly.

At the beginning of 2008, I had an epiphany. I don’t know any way to describe it other than that, and I’m grateful that the English language contains the perfect word for it: epiphany, "a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience."

One day last year, I was working at my desk in my home office (a most commonplace occurrence), when I suddenly had a flash of insight -- not about my work but about my life. As I was lost in thought, it was as if God gave me an unexpected glimpse of the big picture of my life, of the essential meaning of things. And I knew, abruptly and immediately knew, that international adoption was meant to be a part of our lives, that my husband and I were being called to adopt children.

I realize this might sound bizarre or flaky or just downright unbelievable, but that's exactly what happened. I can't think of a single other instance in my life where I've had a comparable experience, yet I knew then (and still know) beyond all doubt that we are supposed to pursue international adoption, that it's a part of God's plan for our family.

Now, I just had to convince everyone else of this sudden insight! When my husband came home from work that day, I told him about my experience. And though he was very surprised (we were, after all, comfortably childless and completely content with our lives), he agreed to at least think and pray about the possibility. I didn't say much more about it but just waited and prayed. Soon, after his own share of prayer and thought about the idea, he arrived at the same conclusion.

And then, the adoption adventure began. We began looking into what country to adopt from and quickly felt led to Ethiopia. Then, almost as a default, we assumed that we would adopt a baby girl. That's what people do when they adopt internationally, right? Adopt a baby girl, especially since she would be our first child. We'd both grown up with sisters; we had a young niece; a baby girl must be the way to go. So we told our family and friends about our decision, and they rejoiced. Everyone was ready to welcome a healthy baby girl into the family.

I began researching voraciously -- calling adoption agencies, poring over adoption blogs, reading countless books on adoptive parenting. But the more I researched and the more I prayed, the more I began to question the wisdom of our assumptions about what kind of child to request.

And then Essayas showed up. As I was researching different adoption agencies, I received a waiting child list from one agency. On it was a 12-year-old boy -- a healthy child, but a child who was quite a bit older than most kids waiting for adoption. A 12-year-old boy? Not a girl? Not a baby? He wasn't anything like the child we'd first planned on, but his biography was compelling. And the more we thought about it, the more Essayas seemed like he just might be the perfect fit for our family.

But first, we wanted to pray about it, and naturally, we asked our family members and friends to pray with us, as well.

And that's when...well, I don't know a much nicer or more accurate way to say it than "everything hit the fan." Some people were scared of us adopting a boy. Others were scared at the thought of us adopting an older child. Virtually no one supported us, and everyone was vocal about it. Yet, to their credit, they all agreed to pray for us, to pray that God's will would be done, whatever that was...though surely it couldn't be a 12-year-old boy, could it?

So we all began praying about Essayas (some more grudgingly than others!), and in the meantime, my husband and I fought for this child. We advocated for him. I even tracked down other adoptive parents who had actually spent time with Essayas in Ethiopia. And, as it turned out, Essayas was universally loved, a wonderful kid. More than half of the adoptive families who had met him wanted to adopt him themselves but couldn't for various reasons. And the more we argued for Essayas' right to be a member of our family, the more we felt like he was a member of the family. He had been waiting for a family for months. Surely that months-long wait must be because he was meant for our family.

So we made our decision to adopt him. And miraculously, by then our family and friends had come around, too. God spoke to them, in one instance quite literally, and the message was always the same: do not fear. "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." (2 Timothy 1:7) We all marveled at God's goodness in revealing Himself this way. And we rejoiced that Essayas, the 12-year-old boy who, according to one adoptive mother who had met him, "really, really, really wants to have a mom and dad...a family to love him," would soon have a family.

But as it turned out, that family wouldn't be us. Essayas had been on a waiting child list for months. We had been praying about him for weeks. And the day before we turned all our adoption paperwork in (we'd had to wait an extra week to get a doctor's letter because my doctor had suddenly gone out of state), another family stepped forward to adopt him. All our praying and pleading, all the strife and heartache had amounted to nothing. We'd missed out on Essayas, the child we'd fought for, by a matter of hours.

Q: That must have been so difficult. How did you react?

I'd like to tell you that I reacted stoically, that I meekly took it as a sign of God's will and moved forward with our adoption with grace. But I didn't. Both my husband and I were completely devastated. We could not understand why God would put Essayas on our hearts so strongly, why God would have us advocate for this child so much, to the point of seriously endangering our relationships with friends and family members, only to have it all amount to nothing.

As I wrote to one friend at the time, "While I am not typically a very emotional sort of person, I have just been bowled over with grief by this. It seems strange, I know, to become so attached to a child you've never met, but the sense of loss has been overwhelming and crushing...Even though I know God has called us to adopt, I am tempted to turn away from the whole thing -- at the moment, it just seems like an exercise in despair."

And it was flooded with that sense of despair that one night I called out to God for what seemed like the millionth time. "God, there has to be some purpose to this! All we've done is what you asked us to do. Please let us see that you have some purpose behind this suffering." It was a couple weeks after our adoption of Essayas had fallen through, and I had been at home, crying yet again. As I sent up this angry plea to God, I remember feeling like it was bouncing off my bedroom ceiling, drifting back at me like all the other angry pleas I'd sent up before. Sighing, I gave up on prayer and returned to the book I'd just started reading to distract myself. The book was called There Is No Me Without You.

Those of you who have read There is No Me Without You can probably guess where my story is going. But for those who haven't, please let me explain. There Is No Me Without You is a nonfiction book written by a lady named Melissa Fay Greene, describing the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Ethiopia. Like most people who decide to adopt from Ethiopia, I had started reading the book to learn more about the country of Ethiopia and why so many children are available for adoption there. As I'd already found out, when you adopt from Ethiopia, HIV/AIDS is almost inevitably part of the adoption equation.

So I knew what the book was about before I began reading it. Yet what I did not expect, and what this book reminded me of, was the idea that children with HIV can be adopted. By that point, I'd run across a few vague murmurings of such a concept. But, in my moment of despair, when I'd asked God for clarity and purpose in the midst of heartache, I was struck anew by the thought. People adopt children with HIV?

Lest you think that I stumbled across this idea and clung to it in my hopelessness, let me assure you I did no such thing! In fact, immediately after the thought occurred to me -- I wonder if our adoption of Essayas fell through because we're supposed to adopt a child who is HIV positive? -- I thrust it out of my mind. Mere emotionalism, the pragmatic part of me argued. This idea probably occurred to me because I'm grasping at straws, looking for meaning anywhere. So I promptly tried to forget it and move on.

...To be continued.
Stay tuned for Part 2 of my interview with Kimberly, which I'll post next Monday.

Photo of African orphans by louris yamaguchi

Thank you!

A big "Thank you!" to all who voted in the Catholic New Media Awards. I'm honored to have won in the Best Blog by a Woman category. Also, I encourage you to check out some of the other blogs in each category -- they're all great.

7 Quick Takes Friday (vol. 40)

--- 1 ---

By the time you read this our Kidsave child Rita will be here!...Maybe. The kids were supposed to arrive last night at 8:00 but got stuck in Atlanta, so now they're scheduled to arrive around noon today. I can't imagine how crazy that must have been for these kids, most of whom have never flown before, to end up in a strange hotel in a strange country. I hope they don't experience any more delays. I'll post some updates on Twitter throughout the weekend.

--- 2 ---

Last week was a great week for meeting bloggers. I already mentioned last week that I was going to meet Lisa Hendey but I forgot that that was the same weekend we were meeting fellow atheist-to-Catholic convert Julie D. We met up with her, her husband and one of her daughters at the Darwins' house after Mass for some extremely impressive omelets and lively conversation. I've been a big fan of her blog since 2005 and meeting her was just as great as I thought it would be.

--- 3 ---

When I met Lisa Hendey last Friday I had the pleasure of chatting with her for her Catholic Moments podcast. After one of those lunches where you think that if you just had about 12 more hours you might be able to skim the surface on all you want to talk about, we went back to her hotel and did a podcast interview where we talked about my conversion, homeschooling discernment and, of course, blogging. Our interview is online here if you'd like to listen to it.

--- 4 ---

I was trying to find a stuffed animal to give Rita as a welcome gift, and had the great idea to get her one with Texas flavor. As I looked through the bins of cute stuffed kitties and puppies at Target, I tried to think of what a local stuffed animal might look like. A scorpion in a cowboy hat? A terrifying centipede holding a heart? A cuddly fire ant? I think I'm just going to get a teddy bear and call it a day.

--- 5 ---

If you like reading conversion story/faith journey type of stuff, this article about Lenny Kravitz and his recent commitment to chastity is surprisingly refreshing. (via Veronica Mitchell)

--- 6 ---

Did you guys read the comments to the feces fiasco post? It really is feeling all The Ring up in here with the stories of the wrath of the poop-fates coming down on anyone who laughed at the post.

Oh, and one more thing: If you were holding out tips for preventing toddlers from taking their diapers off, please come forth with them now. Some people suggested duct taping the diaper on. Done. Anything else?

--- 7 ---

I feel so much pressure that both Rita and the chaperone will be with us on the 4th of July for their first trips to America! I think we're just going to go to my grandfather's for a cookout with friends and then try to catch fireworks later. With all the travel they've been doing, not to mention the 100-degree temperatures, I doubt they're up for much more than that. (Read: I am not up for much more than that and am projecting my own laziness and disdain of heat onto my guests.)

For my American readers: What are your plans for the 4th of July? Have a great weekend, everyone!

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Below is a Mr. Linky list if you'd like to add a link to your own 7 Quick Takes post. (1) Make sure the link you submit is to the URL of your post and not your main blog URL. (2) Include a link back here.

I look forward to reading your posts!

1. Theresa @ A Place to Write 2. Venite 3. Deb @ Continuetorejoice 4. NCSue 5. Debbie 6. JungleGirl in London 7. Pharmgirl @ Adventures in Pharm Land 8. Sarah Reinhard 9. Kathreja @ Vocation Quest 10. Tami @ The Next Step 11. Laura @Liming Life 12. Sarah @ This Heavenly Life 13. Nadja 14. Cheryl (My Thoughtful Spot) 15. entropy 16. TwoSquareMeals 17. Erin @ Light of My Life 18. violingirl 19. Not Strictly Spiritual 20. Becky (Beck's Three) 21. Trena @ The Third Prayer 22. Laughing Lioness 23. Megan@Blueberry Scones 24. Elena @My Domestic church

25. Heather of the EO 26. Lenae 27. Lisa (Are We There Yet?) 28. Rebecca@the blog with no title 29. Christi (The Journey) 30. Lenetta @ Nettacow 31. Steph @ My Country Haven 32. Dawn @ Sufficient for Today 33. Love2learn Mom 34. Write From Karen 35. Christine the Soccer Mom 36. Ingrid Airam 37. Emily 38. Peace Garden Mama 39. Annemarie 40. majellamom 41. Nicole @ As Many As We're Given 42. Amanda @ The Mom Job (A Giveaway!) 43. Missus Wookie 44. Katherine @ The Domestic Church 45. Dymphna 46. Sarah 47. Gill-Life of a Photographer 48. Jenny @ Heart of a Mother

49. Kathryn @ The Bookworm 50. Kim @ Love Letter to my Kids 51. Elise 52. Scarlett 53. Jen @ Happy Little Homemaker 54. Vanderbilt Wife 55. Jen @ The Short Years 56. Erin @ Coming Out Catholic 57. mom.huebert 58. Sing Me the Old Songs 59. Not!Made in China 60. Shelley @ Confirm The Work of Our Hands 61. Katie Ganshert @ Brain Throw Up 62. Rebecca @ The Divine Life 63. Carly at the Tree 64. Steph @ My Country Haven (7 Quick Takes #3) 65. A Broader Mark 66. Lindsey 67. Julie Stiles Mills 68. Constance 69. sarah@ fumbling toward grace 70. Emily a.k.a. Smoochagator 71. monica_divineoffice.org 72. Catherine @ To Mark Time

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How to get traffic to your blog (Part 2)

I'm back over at Rachelle Gardner's blog today* with Part 2 of the post about how to get traffic to your blog. If you missed it, Part 1 is here. I'll be answering questions in the comments over there. Hope it's helpful!

* It might be worth mentioning that our Kidsave child doesn't arrive until tonight. I don't want anyone picturing poor Rita sitting around and watching me BLOG on her first day in America!

Repayment for a friend

Let me begin this post by saying that I would like for you to do me a favor: Go to the fashion and modesty blog Betty Beguiles right now, subscribe to the feed, leave 10 comments saying what a fantastic site it is, make it your home page, email everyone you know and tell them to stop what they are doing and read the entire archives, and solemnly vow to read it every day for rest of your life.

Never has there been a better blog. Betty pens odes to cute dresses as if from the mouths of the angels themselves; her sagacious date night tips contain such potent wisdom that the Gosselins would still be together if they'd only seen them; she shares insights into modesty that will knock you off of your chair and leave you motionless on the floor, stunned by the profundity of what you just read. If Shakespeare could read her blog he would weep bitter tears at his impotency in the face of such prose!

Now that I have said that, let me tell you about my day:

On what may seem like an unrelated topic but I assure you has an ominous connection to what I said above, yesterday I read this post by Megan at Sorta Crunchy about how her toddler pooped on the floor at the library. "Hah!" I chuckled. "What a terrible story. I'm sure glad I'm not in her shoes today!"

I was about to move on what I saw a comment from Sarah at This Heavenly Life in which she wrote:

I tried not to laugh, for fear of bringing down the wrath of the poop-fates upon myself. Oh dear.

Immediately I realized what I had done. It's like in that movie The Ring where after you see the video you know it's only a matter of time until freakishly terrible things start happening to you. I had laughed at another mother's poop-related misfortune. My time was nigh.

For a while, things seemed to be fine. With our Kidsave child arriving tomorrow I was completely focused on getting everything ready for her visit; even though my husband and I had hired a professional housecleaner to help us with the basics there was still plenty of decluttering, deep cleaning and organizing to do, and I wasn't sure how I could get it all done.

My friend Betty Beguiles told me that her husband had the day off and offered to have him watch their four young children so that she could come over by herself and help me get ready. I started to give my usual knee-jerk "No, I couldn't possibly..." reaction, but I remembered that I'm trying to work on accepting the help that God sends me so I said a reluctant yes. "Besides," I thought presciently, "Letting someone else help me organize my messy house will be a good lesson in humility."

Little. Did. I. Know.

I had been cleaning my office while Betty was on her hands and knees getting some spots out of the upstairs carpet when I thought I heard some noise from the room where my two middle girls were supposed to be napping. I crept upstairs and listened at the door; all was quiet. I was about to head back downstairs when I caught a whiff of something foul. Following the parenting axiom that "If you think you might have smelled poop, YOU DID," I decided to push the door open to take a quick glance inside the room.

I was not prepared for what I saw.

Imagine, if you will, that someone hooked up a fire hose to a septic tank and sprayed it around a room on full throttle for a moment. That gives you an idea of what awaited me when I walked into my daughters' room. My 21-month-old has had a penchant for taking off her diaper for a long time with no serious results, so I guess I thought I could keep playing the odds until she was potty trained. Today she hit the jackpot. She had taken off a messy diaper and had evidently engaged in some Montessori-style play with its contents. It was everywhere: on the crib, on the pillow, on all the toys, ground into stuffed animal fur, smeared into the sheets and pillow -- some had even fallen down onto the freshly-vacuumed carpet.

I was in shock. My daughter looked at me and giggled, happy as a pig in...well, you know. I kept starting for her crib then stopping. I didn't know which horrific aspect of this situation to deal with first. I couldn't open the window because of safety locks and the smell just kept getting worse. I thought I was going to throw up. Just when I'd decided that the best course of action would be to curl up in the corner and cry until my husband got home from work, Betty walked in behind me and immediately took over. She told me to wrap my daughter up in a blanket to transport her to the bathtub without getting the mess all over me. I walked zombie-style into the bathroom, wishing I had a hazmat suit as I peeled off her clothes and plopped them directly into the trash can. I sat in there for a while, cleaning my daughter in a daze as I tried not to look at the wash cloth or think of adjectives to describe the texture of the water.

Finally I got her out of the bath and dragged myself back into her room to attack the feces apocalypse that awaited me. I tried to think of something I would rather do less than this task; I came up empty. I pushed the door open, lifted my eyes to her crib, and saw that it was clean. Spotless. As if it had never happened. My friend Betty had taken a break from scrubbing my carpet on her hands and knees to clean every last smear of poop out of my child's room.

What could a person ever do to repay that kind of generosity?

If I were rich I would have just started pressing $100 bills into her hand, perhaps signing her up for some kind of Lexus of the Month Club. But, alas, I don't have the means to compensate her financially for her heroic waste removal services. Finally, after thinking of everything from offering to babysit her children every weekend evening for the next five years to tattooing her name on my back to show her how very serious I was when I said I appreciated what she'd done, I recalled that she is a fellow internet nerd, and I thought of something she might like: A link to her blog. So I will just come clean and tell you that the entire purpose of this 1,100-word post about poop is to tell you to go visit my friend Betty Beguile's blog.


RELATED

• In which I have my guest kill a scorpion while I cower in the corner

Normally I try to include an image related to the subject of my post. Notice that I didn't this time. You're welcome.

The yellow sticky note

I was planning to write a new post today but have ended up way too busy getting ready for Rita's arrival tomorrow. Here's one I've been thinking about a lot lately, originally published on August 7, 2007.


I was listening to Relevant Radio this morning, and was reminded of something that happened a while back that I've been meaning to write about since it was one of those little moments that has turned out to be a salient memory in my conversion experience:

Quite a few months ago my husband had been emailing with one of the hosts of a Relevant Radio show about getting a copy of a DVD he heard mentioned on the air. When the host saw our address he remarked that he was actually going to be visiting our town soon and invited us to come down to the local affiliate to watch him broadcast the show.

We took him up on his kind offer, and planned to arrive to see the last few minutes of his show one Friday afternoon. As I drove down to the office, I of course was listening to his show in the car. I listened to a discussion between the show's guest, a well-known priest, and a lady named Rebecca who called in to share her heart-wrenching story. She'd suffered multiple miscarriages and was now well into the second trimester of what she thought was a healthy pregnancy, but she'd just received a concerning diagnosis and was not sure if this baby was going to make it. She was devastated at the thought of losing another child.

The priest gave her some good advice, but it was nearing the end of the hour and they were out of time. The show's host politely told her that that was all the time they had, said that she'd be in his prayers, and then moved on to remind listeners to support the show's sponsors and check out next week's guests.

Shortly after that I arrived at the station and headed inside. We had a nice talk with the host and I was impressed by his extensive credentials and inspired by his story of how he left a promising, glamorous career in the mainstream media to follow God's call to do work more in line with his faith. As we were wrapping up I grabbed my purse off of the desk, and lying next to it I saw a stack of some broadcast documents and personal papers that belonged to him. On top of the papers was a bright yellow sticky note with the words "PRAY FOR REBECCA" written in large letters.

It seems like such a little thing, but that note ended up being the marker of a turning point for me. I had just taken for granted that when the host had closed the segment by saying "you'll be in my prayers," that that was just a polite throwaway comment to get to the commercial break. Yet when I saw the paper and realized that he really did care enough to bring this stranger's intentions before God in his prayers, and had even made a little extra effort to write himself a note to remember to do so, I had this odd moment of being surprised that I wasn't surprised. It brought to the forefront of my mind something I'd noticed for a long time but hadn't really articulated: there are so many really good, true Christians out there!

It's sad to say, but at one point that was actually news to me. Growing up as an atheist, having never experienced God (or, really, having never allowed myself to experience God), I didn't understand the concept of faith. I was baffled by the idea of dedicating your life to some mysterious entity that you couldn't see. I was also a very cynical person, for reasons I discussed here, so it only took a few bad experiences with Christians to wholly convince myself that religion, Christianity in particular, was just a tool that people used to feel superior and to control others.

For some reason, seeing that yellow sticky note that day brought home to me just how much beauty I'd missed by hiding behind my wall of cynicism all my life -- in the world in general, but in particular with Christians. It clarified the fact that in the year or so since I'd become involved in Christian circles, I'd encountered far more people who took their faith seriously than people who didn't. Which is not to say that now that I'm a Christian I find myself surrounded by perfect living saints, but that the vast majority of people I've come to know who are self-described Christians really do take their faith seriously, really do attempt to live according to God's rules and not their own, and really are willing to undertake selfless acts and make sacrifices to help others -- even in private, when nobody but God even knows about it.

I also realized at that moment how much I owe to all these Christians who live their faith day in and day out. As a quick perusal through my archives and my old site will show, the path to conversion was a rocky one for me. Especially at the beginning when I was beyond clueless, consumed with pride and skepticism, and unknowingly doing practically everything I could to block out God's voice, there were many times when it was tempting to slide back into the comfort of my lifelong atheistic belief system.

Looking back, I see now that a big part of what kept me on the right path was my fellow Christians -- not just through overt offers of help or encouragement but, even more importantly, through the witness of the quiet actions of their daily lives. It seems that every time I got close to giving up hope that I'd ever be able to have faith, I'd have one of those yellow sticky note moments, when I'd see some Christian humbly, quietly going about living his or her faith. The warmth and peace that their actions brought allowed me to have a much-needed glimpse of Christ here on earth, to fan the flames of my own faith, just when it was down to the embers. In most cases, as with the radio host, the person never even knew that anyone else was aware of his actions.


I've been dabbling at this post for days now because I wasn't sure what my take was. I didn't really know where I was going with it. But after writing this all out I finally realize what it is I've been trying to say: thank you. I feel a great debt of gratitude to my fellow Christians whose actions kept me on the right path even when I was consumed with doubt and despair. Those of you who were brought up with faith and have always lived in Christian environments may never know just how much even your smallest actions can be a breath of fresh air to someone who doesn't know God.

In some cases it was reading the words of bloggers or commentors, in others it was interactions with friends and acquaintances in real life, and in yet others it was simply observing the actions of people I barely knew. But thank you to all the Christians whose words and deeds chipped away at my hardened cynicism, and helped show me the path to God.


photo by Peter

A lesson in prayer

When I first started praying -- when I was 28, after a life of atheism -- I unintentionally fell into thinking of God as a glorified wish-granting genie. My prayers were all petitions for what I wanted God to give me or my family and friends. As I got to know more about prayer and the nature of God, I began to spend a little more time thanking God for the stuff he gave me and my family and friends that I'd requested. Eventually I even moved into throwing out some open-ended requests for guidance, asking the Lord to show me his will for my life. And for a long time, that was pretty much it.

But something slowly began to change when I started praying the Liturgy of the Hours. It's something I've noticed in the back of my mind for a long time, but could never articulate until I read your fascinating comments to my questions about the Psalms last week. (If you haven't read those responses, you really should -- great stuff). After reading that comment thread, something finally clicked:

One of the first things that jumped out at me as different when I started praying the Liturgy of the Hours was that I found myself saying "we" and "our" more often than "I" and "mine." Other than when I prayed the Our Father at Mass, I wasn't used to saying those words in prayer. I didn't think through the implications at the time, other than to simply notice that it put me in a more humble mindset to end the day with an evening prayer like, "Almighty God, we give you give you thanks for bringing us safely to this evening hour..."

Then, around the time our new baby was born, I fell out of the habit of praying the Liturgy of the Hours. In fact, I fell out of having any dedicated prayer time at all. I simply tried to "pray without ceasing," turning my thoughts toward God as I went through my days. That is definitely a great thing to do, and I don't ever intend to stop doing that, but what I found was that when that was the only form of prayer I undertook each day, I drifted back into making prayer revolve around me-me-me! Prayers like "Lord, give me patience as I tell the kids not to jump on the bed for the SIXTH TIME..." are great, but when that's what 90% of my prayers sound like I tend to fall into thinking that God is part of my plan rather than remembering that I am part of God's plan.

It all clicked for me last Thursday, when Lauds (morning prayer) began with Psalm 143. I read:

The enemy pursues my soul;
he has crushed my life to the ground;
he has made me dwell in darkness
like the dead, long forgotten.
Therefore my spirit fails;
my heart is numb within me.

I was having a great day and feeling strong in my faith, and thought that I definitely would have skipped this Psalm if I'd come across it as part of personal prayer. "This is totally not speaking to me!" I thought, half tempted to gloss over it and move on to the next one in hopes that it would be more relevant to my life. And then I remembered something that a commenter named Jasmine said in that post about the Psalms, which was echoed by many of you throughout the comment thread:

Remember that the 'prayer of the Church' [the Liturgy of the Hours] is for the whole Church. You will not identify with every psalm at every moment, so when you pray them think of all of the people in the world praying with you who DO identify with the psalm. Pray for them and on their behalf.

It all finally clicked. For the first time, I think I really understood the power of the Liturgy of the Hours as the universal prayer of the Church. My mind immediately flashed to everyone all over the world who opened their day with the exact same prayers as I did that morning -- my priest, all the priests and nuns in the world, all bishops, the Pope, my long-lost cousin the monk, all my friends and the other laypeople throughout the world who pray the Hours -- and the wall that I'd unintentionally put up around myself was smashed.

As I had yawned through the psalmist's cry of anguish, someone out there could barely utter those same words through trembling lips and tear-stung eyes. I thought of all the people praying the Hours in that state, and for the first time was conscious of our deep connectedness as we prayed in unison as part of the mystical Body of Christ. I began offering my prayers for them, which then led me to expand my prayers to anyone else in the world who was in pain at that moment. As my heart swelled to think of the great drama playing out all over the world that morning of which I was only a small part, I thought back to my words at the beginning of the office -- "But this Psalm doesn't have anything to do with me!" -- and realized that I had learned something critically important about prayer: It's not all about me.


photo by bhsher

7 Quick Takes Friday (vol. 39)

--- 1 ---

I cannot believe that our Kidsave child "Rita" arrives Thursday! I also found out that the children's chaperone from Colombia will rotate houses while she's here, and she'll be staying with us first, so she'll be coming home with us from the airport on Thursday as well. (For those of you doing the math, that will make eight people in a three-bedroom house.)

I need tips from those of you who are domestically skilled: What is a nice welcome gift I could get for both Rita and the chaperone? I'd like to get a little special something to start out their trip on a nice note -- preferably not too expensive and easy to pack for their return trip. Any ideas?

--- 2 ---

Baby Joy is finally getting baptized tomorrow! I'm so excited. Hopefully it will not be the flaming disaster that my son's baptism was a couple years ago. One the plus side, I'm still holding out hope of America's Funniest Home Videos riches.

--- 3 ---

This Tuesday is the last day to vote in the Catholic New Media Awards. If you'd like to vote, click here to create an account (it takes about two seconds -- they only ask for a valid email account). Then you can click here to vote. I always discover a bunch of great new blogs every time I look through the nominees list.

--- 4 ---

Last week I told you guys that this picture was taken on my favorite vacation ever, and asked you to guess where it is, promising I'd give the answer this week. Nobody got the right answer! And now, the moment of truth...

This picture was taken in...

Texas! A lot of people don't realize that the Rocky Mountains extend down into Texas, Guadalupe Peak reaching 8,750 feet (2,667 meters). This picture was taken somewhere near Big Bend National Park.


We actually took this vacation to west Texas for our honeymoon. It was the best trip I could have imagined. It was a nine-hour drive (on open roads at high speeds) to get out there from the central part of the state, and is literally the middle of nowhere. All the towns had that eerie end-of-the-earth vibe where you feel instant camaraderie with anyone you encounter, and mixed in with the locals you'd meet people from places like Phoenix and San Francisco, passing through on cross-country trips.


Some of the towns really live up to the name "ghost towns," the "ghost" part coming not only from the vanished people but from that keen awareness of your own vulnerability to larger forces that you feel when you're hours and hours away from the nearest Wal-Mart, and the only light at night comes from the stars. If anyone's looking for a really unique trip, I highly recommend taking the same route we did, spending a couple weeks visiting places like Marfa, Lajitas the McDonald Observatory and Terlinguas. It's an ethereal, beautiful part of the world.

--- 5 ---

So I found out as part of my guest post for Rachelle Gardner that it's OK if I say who my agent is. For some reason I thought that my literary agent and I had an unspoken understanding that it would be best if I denied all association with him, hopefully saving him from comments from respected colleagues like, "That woman you represent wrote about scorpions on her blog again today. She's quite adept with the caps lock key. You must be very proud."

Anyway, in case anyone's interested, I'm represented by Ted Weinstein Literary Management.

--- 6 ---

Speaking of my tendency to write about stinging insects, here's a Yaya story from this weekend: Shortly after we arrived, I was on her back porch with the kids and looked up to see a thriving wasps' nest right above my head. Under normal circumstances I would tell you that it's important to control your phobias so as not to impart your own irrational fears to your kids. However, when I looked up to see 100 (OK, maybe eight) wasps buzzing around their nest about a foot away from my head, my reaction was something along the lines of "RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! NOW! NOW! BEFORE THE WASPS ATTACK US! THEY'RE GOING TO STING US!!! AAAAH!!! IT'S SO TERRIBLE!!!!!"

I had just dragged all the kids to safety out in the yard when Yaya walked outside, holding some scissors she'd gone inside to get. I shrieked a warning at her just as she walked under the nest. She looked up, shrugged, and knocked the wasps' nest down with the handle of the scissors. The nest fell right next to her feet, angry wasps darting all around her, and she took a moment to wipe off the scissors with her shirt before strolling off.

And you guys thought I was kidding when I said that she's nonchalant about being stung by scorpions in bed!

--- 7 ---

This morning I'm excited to be grabbing coffee with "momtrepreneur," podcaster and Faith and Family blogger Lisa Hendey while she's in the area for the new media celebration.

(FYI: Unless I bring my laptop and occasionally interrupt our conversation with "You mind if I blog a little bit?", I probably won't approve comments until I'm back at the house. And trust me, based on a couple of monitor-meltingly appalling remarks people have tried to slip in lately, y'all do NOT want me to turn off comment moderation.)

Have a great weekend, everyone!

-----------------

Below is a Mr. Linky list if you'd like to add a link to your own 7 Quick Takes post. (1) Make sure the link you submit is to the URL of your post and not your main blog URL. (2) Include a link back here.

I look forward to reading your posts!

1. It Feels Like Chaos 2. Angie @ Many Little Blessings 3. DarwinCatholic 4. Catherine @ To Mark Time 5. AllHisBenefits 6. Elisa @ blissfulE 7. Venite 8. Enbrethiliel 9. NCSue 10. Laura 11. Beth @ A Mom's Life 12. Aubrey 13. Pharmgirl @ Adventures in Pharm Land 14. Debbie 15. Sarah Reinhard (Moms as Super Heroes) 16. Laura L. 17. Nadja 18. Jen 19. Megan 20. Trena @ The Third Prayer 21. Tina @ Multiple Mom T 22. violingirl 23. Tami @ The Next Step 24. Rebecca 25. Heather 26. Sarah @This Heavenlylife

27. MamaT @ The Summa Mamas 28. Annemarie 29. Not Strictly Spiritual 30. Ingrid Airam 31. Mary 32. Hannah @ Mulberry Spot 33. Christine the Soccer Mom 34. Kristine@The Fire Within 35. Shelly @ Life on the Wild Side 36. Jen @ Happy Little Homemaker 37. Jamie 38. carrien (she laughs at the days) 39. Milehimama (Mama Says) 40. Molly 41. Jen @ The Short Years 42. Joy @ joy in the morning 43. Emily 44. Kathryn @ The Bookworm 45. Amanda @ The Mom Job 46. Charlotte @GTH 47. mom.huebert 48. Mrs. Bubbles 49. Steph @ My Country Haven 50. Elise@anything goes 51. Ann from NC 52. Lindsey

53. Amy @ From the Desk of Mom 54. Amanda 55. Aimee @ The Mother Load 56. Laughing Lioness 57. Emily G 58. CourageousGrace 59. Deedee 60. Erin @ Coming Out Catholic 61. angela michelle 62. Catherine @ Adventures in Domesticity 63. Theresa 64. Donella @ Converting to Catholicism 65. Shelley 66. Virginia Mom 67. Kathleen @the responsible one 68. MommyMonkey 69. Therese 70. Peace Garden Mama 71. JoAnna @ A Star of Hope 72. Finding Grace Within 73. Erin@Seven Little Australians Plus One 74. Nicole @ As Many As We're Given 75. Manda @ inside dog 76. Julie Stiles Mills

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How to build traffic to your blog

Check out my guest post at Rachelle Gardner's site: How to build traffic to your blog

Today I put on my web developer hat for a guest post at literary agent Rachelle Gardner's site about how to get traffic to a blog. I've been creating websites for more than 10 years both professionally and personally, and have had a couple that were fairly successful (one getting almost 1 million hits per month at its peak). I've learned a lot of important lessons the hard way, and I'm excited to be able to share them with you guys. I tried to condense the most essential things I've learned into one short post. I'm honored to write for Rachelle's blog and hope that my tips are helpful!

Also, if you're a writer with even a mild interest in getting published one day, Rachelle's blog is a must-read. I've done a lot of research on the subject, and I think I've learned more from her blog than from the stacks of books I've read about the publishing industry.

Comments are open over there. I'm going to do my best to respond to any questions (although I'm especially busy this week so might not be able to get to every one). I look forward to hearing from you over at Rachelle's place!

Talk to me about the Psalms

I'll be on the road heading home from our trip to Houston this afternoon, so I thought I'd let you guys do the talking today. Here's what I'd like to get your thoughts on:

I feel like I don't "get" the Psalms.

Ever since I started praying the Liturgy of the Hours, which is centered around the Psalms, I've realized that these ancient songs don't seem to resonate with me as strongly as they do with other people. I do appreciate the way they chronicle the highs and lows of the human experience, but a lot of times I just don't know where the psalmist is coming from, and some of them seem to go against Christian teaching (e.g. the psalmist asking God to smite his enemies in Psalm 69). I realize that we Christians believe that, as part of the Old Testament, the Psalms need to be understood in light of what God revealed in the New Testament...but I guess I don't understand why they continue to play such a big part in Christian prayer then.

Anyway, I know that the problem is me and not the Psalms; believers have found deep inspiration in them for thousands of years, so I'm clearly missing something. Anyone have any thoughts? How can I better appreciate these sacred poems? (As always, book recommendations would be great.)

Faith on display

The chaos of being on vacation with four kids under five in a non-childproof house is using up all my mental energy, so here's one from the archives. It was originally published on October 9, 2007, and is still something I think about a lot today. I'll be interested to hear your thoughts.


One subject that's related to our recent discussion about women covering their heads at church is the concept of outward signs of piety. In the comments here as well as other conversations I've heard on the topic, people sometimes mention that they don't do something that is an outward sign of their beliefs (e.g. praying in public, wearing chapel veils, carrying a Bible, etc.) because they're afraid they'll seem self-righteous. I've also heard people mention with a note of shame that it pleases them when others comment on their pious dress or actions.

But is that definitely a bad thing?

It love it when something I do or say or wear indicates to a stranger that I'm a Christian and they comment on it. I hope I'm not off base here, but I've been assuming that the pleasure I take in these kinds of events isn't a bad thing. I just think it's exciting when I'm identified as being serious -- or, at least attempting to be serious -- about my religion.

Once again, a lot of my feelings here are influenced by my atheist background. When I was an atheist I told myself that nobody even believed this Christianity stuff anymore. I saw what I wanted to see to tell myself that all these so-called "Christians" didn't even take their own religion seriously and just went to church for social reasons. But on the rare occasions that I saw someone who went against the grain and did something unusual as an outward sign of their faith, it gave me pause.

One time I saw a few nuns in an airport. I noticed a priest at a local restaurant one afternoon. Once on a plane there was a little old lady in the aisle across from me who read her Bible out loud (quietly) through the whole trip, and when we landed safely she looked up and profusely thanked Jesus. One day I walked into a deli to see a Rabbi and a couple of orthodox Jewish men at a table. There was a family at a diner one time who all held hands bowed their heads in a long prayer before eating.

I smiled on all these occasions. These religious in their habits, the lady with the Bible, the Jewish men, the family in prayer...their actions and appearances left me without my old line that nobody took religion seriously anymore. They might have plenty of faults, I'd think, they might be wrong, but I can't say they don't take it seriously. Their religion is such a big part of their lives that they're willing to look different than everyone else, to risk stares and perhaps even ridicule, to live their faith publicly.

I not only felt respect for people like this, but I even felt a bit of warmth upon seeing them. I didn't know where that feeling came from at the time, but looking back I think I know what it was: hope. Though I had never consciously entertained the notion that God might exist, I think that something within me felt joy at the recognition that these people obviously believed the whole God thing, and they didn't look totally insane. These people were beacons of hope to something hidden deep, deep down inside me...the part of me that wanted them to be right.

Another reason that I've come to love being recognized as a Catholic Christian is that I've discovered that many people who have fallen away from faith want to talk about it. Comments about my closely-spaced children frequently lead to the subject that I'm a convert to Catholicism, and I've been amazed at how many times people have opened up to me about their personal crises with faith and asked me questions about what led me to Christianity -- so much so that I keep joking with my husband that I'm going to get an ASK ME ABOUT MY CONVERSION FROM ATHEISM TO CATHOLICISM t-shirt. I actually wish there were more ways that I could outwardly display my faith to others so that anyone who would like to talk about it would recognize me as someone who'd be more than happy to chat with them. Sure, some people might think that I fancy myself to be some kind of holy roller, but if even one person found it inspiring or helpful it would be worth the tradeoff.

And, finally, I think that displaying my faith through attire or actions helps keep me in line. I'm thinking about hanging a rosary from my rear-view mirror, and having it there will definitely incentivize me to keep any road rage in check. Sometimes it's nice to have a physical reminder that, as a Christian, I'm supposed to be representing Christ to the world.


I want to end this with a BIG disclaimer that I'm not saying that outward displays of faith mean that you're actually holy or devout or pious or whatever (definitely not in my case!), or that if you don't do anything to "show" your faith then you're not serious about it. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I just wanted to throw this out there, especially to share my memories from back before I was a Christian, to say that I think that sometimes the concept of outwardly showing your faith gets a bad rap. Sure, it's not a good thing if it's motivated by pride or feeling superior to others. But I've noticed that, even when those motivations are ruled out, when discerning these types of matters people usually err on the side of not doing anything to publicly display their faith unless there's some extraordinary reason to do so. The reason usually cited is fear of appearing self-righteous. Perhaps that is a concern, but I think it should also be weighed with the benefits of having others recognize you as someone who is at least attempting to take his or her faith seriously. To some you may seem pretentious; but to others you may be a ray of hope.