Things for Which I Am Grateful Today

Lately, as in the past three months while I've been teaching, life has felt hectic and stressful most of the time. (Hence the lack of blogging.) Even on weekends, I tend to feel an overwhelming sense of what needs to be accomplished that I am not currently accomplishing, and a sense of despair when I feel too tired to attempt accomplishing it.

That's why today felt like a real gift from God. I don't know why sometimes I feel extra grateful for what I have, when I know that I am blessed all the time. There are days when you have to fight so hard for an attitude of contentment and a grateful heart, and other days when that spirit just seems to envelope your mind all on its own. Today I was especially grateful for everything I got to experience:

My sweet little girl

So much rain! (If you don't live in the desert, you might not realize just how rare this is.)

A Christmas-y front room

The people who live with me in this house 

Christmas flowers from my husband

A gingerbread house kit (another surprise from my husband)...

...and someone to build it with!

My toddler's "smiley face"...

...and her "kissy face."

Also, I am grateful for the book of Galatians, which is not pictured here because I've been reading Martin Luther's Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians on my Kindle, and a picture of a Kindle would be boring. As long as I can remember, I've struggled with the idea that I should try to earn my salvation or at least, to a certain extent, try to repay God. Grace is a foreign concept to my heart. So earlier this year I decided to read Galatians over and over and study it until I got it. And the more I study it, the more this knowledge that God saved me out of love all on His own, without any help from me, is slowly sinking in. It's wonderful. It makes me more grateful for Christ, and also more grateful for all the gifts He gives me.

How Are You Feeling?

Since this is the most common question I receive as a pregnant woman, I decided to answer it here, all at once. Here's how I'm feeling.

Hungry. I am hungry ALL the time.

Excited. The idea of having another baby makes me very happy.

Nervous. Can I really handle two kids? I comfort myself with the thought of all the other people I know who have done it.

TiredFatigued. Tired is not a strong enough word for how I feel most of the time. I can sleep eight hours at night, take two naps during the day, and still have no trouble going to sleep the next night. I felt frustrated by this until I read that during week seven of pregnancy, my body was generating 100 brains cells for baby every minute. Well, no wonder I'm tired!

Nauseated, but just slightly. Luckily, for the most part my nausea has neither been as strong nor consistent as it was with Alexandra. Again, I have an extreme aversion to vegetables. My earlier cravings consisted of dairy and sugar, and now include red meat as well. But they're not just cravings... I can't eat anything else without feeling sick. Early on I thought I could fight the aversions and force some salads down my throat. When those made me feel worse, I gave up, and am enjoying all the grilled cheese sandwiches, quesadillas, beef, and chocolate cereal I want.

Spacey. I am spacey. Pregnancy makes it worse, so I am more forgetful, more easily distracted, less observant, and less organized than before. Thank goodness I have an understanding family.

Emotional. I can be elated, sink into depression, rise out of it in a fury, and cry through the whole thing, all within a space of fifteen minutes. Luckily, being easily distracted keeps me from wallowing in any negative emotion for too long.

The Gift that Nobody Wants

I've been thinking a lot about pain (again- see "Art Night and Pain," Part 1 and Part 2). I began reading Where Is God When It Hurts? by Philip Yancey, simply because he is one of my favorite authors.

I haven't finished the book or sorted out all my thoughts yet. But the first part of the book deals with pain from a physiological standpoint, and the idea I've found most fascinating is that without physical pain, most humans are most likely to choose a path of physical self-destruction. As someone with a low pain threshold who hates any kind of physical discomfort whatsoever, I found myself actually feeling grateful for pain.

Yancey writes about Dr. Paul Brand, who worked with those who have Hansen's Disease (leprosy). Contrary to a long-held belief, most leprosy patients do not lose body parts due to a primary effect of the disease; rather, the nerve damage inflicted makes it impossible for its victims to feel any pain. Without pain, they are unable to know when they are engaging in an activity that is damaging their body.

Anyway, Dr. Brand's and Yancey's eventual opinion on pain can be seen in the title of a book they co-authored: Pain: The Gift that Nobody Wants. Pain is part of our body's natural system of defenses; it helps us know when to stop, rest, or change something about what we're doing. When people don't experience pain, they harm themselves. Dr. Brand worked for a time on developing a device for leprosy patients that would alert them when they were harming themselves. However, the first versions were ineffective, because patients were warned by a noise or a blinking light, which was easy to ignore and would lead some to simply turn off the device. The most effective version was one that sent a small painful shock to the armpit, one area that was still sensitive.

What stood out to me is that humans can have a lot of head knowledge that has no effect on behavior. Yancey offered one example of a salesman who had worn his feet away to stumps because he kept wearing dress shoes that were bad for his feet. Most people would have found the pain intolerable and bought new shoes or worn the orthopedic shoes recommended by their physician. Since this patient could not experience pain, his desire to look nice for his job and avoid any suspicion of his disease outweighed the damage he was doing his feet.

At first I felt astounded that someone could see such severe damage, yet choose to continue the behavior that led to it. Yet how many times have I done similar things? As a mild example, I know that drinking an entire soda at once gives me a sugar crash, yet I'll still drink entire sodas occasionally. It seems like unless pain is immediate and fierce, our cravings and psychological needs overpower our head knowledge about good, bad, and destruction.

I need to note that Yancey does go on to address the bad side of pain in our fallen world. Cancer's pain may alert its victim to its presence, but the pain doesn't stop once the patient knows what is going on. And in that case, the treatments curing the disease may bring as much pain as the disease itself. So no one is going to read about Dr. Brand and say "Hooray for pain, in every way!" And what do we do when pain, physical or psychological, is inflicted unjustly as a result of someone else's sin, or even just a simple mistake?

Yet I think it is fascinating to begin thinking about pain with the idea that for most people with bodies that are functioning well, pain is actually a gift, like a gate that keeps us from driving off the cliff when we really wanted to go down that road.

Changing Shape

I've been thinking about the issue of weight a lot for about six months. I don't know many women who don't have some kind of dissatisfaction with their weight, or even if they're happy where they currently are, they spend a lot of effort and mental energy hoping to maintain it. Before I got pregnant, I was always really happy with my body, but because of breastfeeding, I ended up about twenty pounds lighter than I was before I'd gotten pregnant, and I was surprised to discover that there were some weird things about it.

I'd never been overweight. I am fortunate enough to like moderate exercise and enjoy eating healthy foods most of the time. But I was heavy according to media standards (ha ha, who isn't?). I reached this conclusion through two means: TV, where women who were approximately my height all thought they should weigh twenty or thirty pounds less than I did; and other women who were about my height and weight, who would complain about the number they saw on the scale.

But I loved my figure! I loved having curves, and I felt very confident in my body. My belief in a God who created us all just the way we are (and who apparently likes variety quite a great deal) and my feminist ideals made me perfectly happy to be the weight I was, especially since I was exercising and eating fairly well. I felt so bad for women who weren't happy the way they were, especially if they were exercising and eating right and were still unhappy with their bodies. Can't you see that God made you exactly the way you are, and you're beautiful? I wanted to ask. I wished I could give them some of my confidence. I hoped that by making it a point to accept myself exactly the way I was and pointing out culture's flaws in how it labels, categorizes, and judges people, other women could be happy with who they were.

So when I lost so much weight, that changed, and I felt like I wasn't myself anymore. For one thing, I had a very different body from the one I'd had for more than ten years. And two things struck me: the unfairness of weight itself as an issue, and how much I still care about what other people think of me.

Yes, your eating and exercise habits can have a huge impact on your weight (though not necessarily your body shape). But so much of it is determined by hormones and genetics. Breastfeeding sped up my metabolism, simple as that. I wasn't eating more healthily than I had at other times in my life; nursing gave me an intense sugar craving so I was actually eating more sweets than before, and the extra calories it burned meant constant hunger and eating for me. Having a baby made time and energy for exercise rare, so taking a walk while pushing Alexandra in her stroller was the most exercise I got. People assumed I was taking better care of myself just because I was thinner, when that wasn't the case. It was just my metabolism, pure and simple. And I wondered how many people are born with super-slow metabolisms, and get judged as having little self-control, when they have exactly the same amount of self-control I have.

And it was weird having a body change that was so obvious to others. (It's like pregnancy, the only time in life where anyone feels free to comment openly on your shape and size.) Many people would compliment me on how skinny I'd become, and some asked if I had started exercising a lot or had a radical diet change. Nope, I would say. Some women responded as though they were envious, but I didn't want them to envy me. I didn't feel like I had become a more valuable person. But it seems to be ingrained, however subtly, into many women's subconscious mind: If I drop down to _____ pounds, I will be happy/perfect/attractive/healthy/lovable/confident. And they were assuming I felt all those things just because I was thinner. Mostly I felt awkward and self-conscious, and my inner reaction was sometimes rooted in prideful worrying about what others might think: my body satisfaction doesn't come from my weight, but because I made a conscious decision to be happy about it, I wanted to rebelliously announce.

I wanted to tell people how strange I felt, how I didn't feel like myself and I didn't know how to dress or enjoy this new body yet, but a woman who spends a lot of time complaining about the weight she's lost can be irritating (unless it's an unhealthy weight loss due to illness or something like that). So I kept my thoughts to myself.

Eventually I got used to my new shape, and realized that if I was going to be a person who was happy about their body that meant taking care of my "new" one and accepting it the way it was, with all its strange post-baby changes. I learned how to dress it, and I realized that accepting my body has always been easier for me than accepting some other things about myself. Regardless of my weight, the deep insecurities and dissatisfactions I feel are still a struggle.

I don't really have a moral or point to this story. It's just something I've thought of a lot for the past several months.

Novel Progress

I've been working hard on my novel over the past month, mostly reading through it and summarizing each scene and chapter so I have a better idea of where I'm going. Organization and details have never been my strength, so while I know what needs to happen, what the themes are, and where the action is leading, keeping track of all those little details was proving to be overwhelming for me. I found myself unable to distinguish between what I could cut, what was necessary to keep, and how to structure the things that were necessary. I even quit writing for a week and considered giving up completely. After deciding that I couldn't give up, I took the advice of a writer friend and purchased Scrivener, an inexpensive software for writers.

While Scrivener is helpful in a variety of ways, one of my favorite features is the notecards, where I can summarize chapters and scenes on little notecards that are attached the document containing those chapters and scenes. Then I can choose to look only at the notecards. This is so helpful for arranging and rearranging the sequences of events, and I don't have a million notecards to carry everywhere and inevitably lose.

The best thing that came out of purchasing the software was some much-needed encouragement. As I read through the first draft of my novel again, typing my summaries out on the little notecards, I noted how boring the first half of the novel felt. This was particularly discouraging, because you think, "If these are my ideas and characters and events and I don't even think they're interesting, who else is going to think they're interesting?" Again, it's enough to make you want to give up altogether.

But halfway through, something happened. Everything just came alive, and I was not only interested in what was going on in the story, but I found myself thinking, "This is good." There was even one chapter where I realized that when I revised it, I probably wouldn't need to change very much at all. If being bored by your own work is one of the biggest discouragements you can face, then really loving your own work is a huge encouragement. After all, if you can know what is going to happen and have read it a few times before as you were writing and revising and can still really enjoy it, then you feel confident that you can entertain others as well.

So now... to make the first half as good as the second.

A Celebration

Happy birthday, baby girl!

Fun at Grandma's house

Last week Alexandra Jane had her first birthday, and on Sunday we had her birthday party. It's amazing how much your babies grow and change in just a year. When I remember my life before having a kid, it seems strange that I only had to think about myself. (I mean, I had to think about Ian too, but not to the same extent. He can feed himself, doesn't need naps, and doesn't try to stick his fingers in outlets or eat the bottoms of shoes.) It seems like a lot of things must have been easier, but were they as fun? I don't think so.

So, in memory of my girl's first year of life...

Here she is as a newborn, sleeping on Grandma's chest.

Even when she was just 3 months old, no one could make her smile like her Daddy.

Six months old and modeling hand-knit leggings.

At 9 months she took her first flight and was so well-behaved!

My big one-year-old

We Took a Trip!

   The week after Easter, we fortunate enough to be able to take a little family vacation. If you don't count the times where our travels involved visiting someone else, this was really our first family vacation. It wasn't exactly action-packed or exotic, because it's hard to have action-packed days when you have an eleven-month-old who requires at least two naps a day, but it was fun because we went somewhere that I had always wanted to go: the Redwoods in Northern California. 

   We stayed in Crescent City at the Curly Redwood Lodge (unique because all the wood in the building came from just ONE curly redwood tree). I've posted some pictures to offer a sample of our travels.

   Here we are at the Stout Grove at Jedediah Smith State Park. The dirt trails were covered in gravel, so it wasn't too bad navigating the stroller even in the drizzle.

Ian and Alexandra in front of some of the large trees we came to see.

   The picture came out blurry, but we were just so impressed with the size of the base of this fallen tree. Impressive, isn't it?

The other amazing thing about the trip was the scenery. Below is the Smith River, which wound along next to the highway and was consistently this gorgeous turquoise color.

   We also drove north up the coast to Oregon and stopped at one of the beaches. It was a pretty beach, but my favorite thing was seeing Ian keeping his little girl warm in his jacket.

   See? The beach is nice, but not as heartwarming.

   The sunset in Crescent City was beautiful.

   On day three of our trip, we went to the Great Cats World Park near Cave Junction, Oregon. It was a zoo devoted entirely to wild cats, and our tour guide was their main trainer. He is apparently something like the Steve Erwin of cats.


   I love white tigers! Alexandra does, too.

   The trainer did not go in the cage with the lion. I guess lions are finicky, and unless you have another experienced trainer in there as backup, one wrong move could cost you your life...

   ...however, tigers are much more stable, and he not only got in the cage with this one, but also rode it.

      Later on we went to Big Tree Wayside, home of the Big Tree. While its name is not creative, it certainly was the biggest tree we saw.

   We also went to the parking lot of a place called Trees of Mystery, because I couldn't resist posing by Paul Bunyan and Babe. Now when Alexandra is old enough to learn about American legends, I can show her this picture.

   We had a great time!

Art Night and Pain: Part 2

So, after thinking about it a lot and reading the comments on my blog, here are my thoughts about art and pain. Many thanks to the people who gave me feedback, which really helped shape and clarify my own thoughts. I think it comes down to one particular theme for me, with a couple of sub-ideas feeding into it.

I think that art is a form of redemption for pain. Not, perhaps, in every sense of the word, but in the senses given to me based on the definition of "redeem" according to Dictionary.com: "to buy back" and "to recover." Dictionary.com, under "redemption," offers a definition from a Bible dictionary: "the purchase back of something that had been lost, the payment of a ransom." (Also, included in my idea is the Biblical sense that something is better and restored once it has been redeemed.)

I think that's what art does, at least when it comes to pain. Here's what I mean:

Art is typically aesthetically pleasing, or if not, is evocative of some emotion in a way that makes a statement. Through colors, shapes, words, pictures, or music, art constructs order and/or beauty and/or meaning. But even apart from the meaning, art is typically beautiful in and of itself, which in many cases is part of what makes it art. I remember being in a class once and listening to a poem written in a language I did not know. Listening to the poem stirred something in me because of the sounds and rhythms put together by the poet. I remember wondering that I could have an emotional reaction to something when I didn't even know what it was saying. But that's the case with many pieces of art. Somehow, because of the beauty and order they create or the emotion that they isolate and evoke, they become an object of value in and of themselves.

So, when an artist takes a painful emotion or experience and puts it into a piece of art, they are taking emotional wounds and redeeming them. The hurt, the pain, seems pointless; the effort of the artist pays the ransom and buys back the hurt, turning into something that has value in and of itself. In the case of extremely hurtful experiences, the beauty or value of the art may not be even close to what was paid in suffering. But something good has come out of something bad, redeeming it even if just a bit.

As I was coming to this conclusion, I questioned whether aesthetic objects alone are worth human suffering. After all, if you've been through something terrible, how could art ever begin to redeem your experience? I think there are two reasons beauty and order alone are worth it.



1) Soul scars (this term/idea was coined by my multi-talented friend Katie and I'm stealing it): People make art out of suffering because suffering shapes them. When people are betrayed, when natural disasters wipe out someone's home or town, when wars result in death, it seems that there is no good that can come out of such a thing.

Yet, without suffering, we don't become the people we are. There have been many times in my life where I have heard people, both religious and nonreligious, talk about a difficult time in their life. Sometimes they say they wish it had never happened, but they often say that they wouldn't be the people they are without the experience. Without the suffering, they wouldn't be as patient or compassionate or wise or loving or even just experienced. Most Christians I know agree that the worst times in their lives are the times when they are closest to God and feel His love the most, and that pain is what gets our spiritual attention.

And when people don't have any struggles, they tend to become shallow. I know that in my own life, difficult times give me a broader, better perspective. And so I think art reminds us of those difficult times that made us who we are. It reminds us that being cut off in traffic is not the end of the world, that there are worse things than those we've been worry about, that it's better to be grateful for what you have than to pine for what you don't have. Physical wounds leave scars; emotional and spiritual wounds also need scars so we can remember how we became who we are. Art redeems the experience by creating a soul scar for us.

2) Community: Art shows us we are not alone because it speaks to our souls. When you see a painting that moves you, or when you discuss the meaning of a novel with a good friend, or hear a piece of music that speaks to the despair you feel where a rational discussion never will, it gives you the sense that you are understood, comprehended. While you may not feel like the artist, writer, or composer is speaking to you directly, I think we've all seen, read, or heard something and had an inner reaction of "Yes! That's It!" It, referring to what we are feeling but cannot express. Knowing that someone else has created It helps us feel less alone. And so when we've had a painful experience, art relating to that experience becomes a way of communicating with others who've been there. It's too painful for words, but art lets us know we aren't alone. Art redeems that experience by giving us a deeper way to experience community.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. I'd love to hear any feedback/additions/perspectives any of you have. :)



Aside: I do not want to ignore the idea of art as an expression of the artist and a way of working through the pain. My goal in thinking about this was to examine why art that is about pain appeals not just to the artist, but to the audience as well.

We Interrupt Our Regularly Scheduled Programming to Bring You...

Just to give you all an update... I have been thinking more about art and pain. I got good ideas from commenters on my last blog post (see Art Night and Pain: Part 1) and I am refining my own thoughts to put into the second-part blog post. In the meantime, life has been busy. This is the kind of topic that I like to mull over for a while before expressing myself. Hence, the long delay. Also, I am thinking that I should include more non-serious posts, since thinking things over for a month before you post doesn't lead to an interesting blog.

So, quickly, highlights of my life currently include:

1) Alexandra is ten months old. She is crawling and happy and she lights up my life. She loves to read books, hug her baby dolls, pull everything out of her toy boxes and diaper bag, and play both by herself and with others. She likes smiling and waving at and charming strangers at the grocery store, church, and restaurants. While she doesn't say any words yet, she clearly understands a variety, including "Mommy," "Daddy," "Jessica," "Petey," "Grandma," "baby," "clap," "big," "eat," and "milk."

2) I got to play the piano for Easter services at our church last weekend. I love using that skill for God, and the more difficult and challenging the song the better (don't know why that is). I also love rehearsals... not because they're long or anything but I love working with others for a greater cause. Team efforts are fun.

3) My husband. He's always patient with me and stays at home for long afternoons and evenings with the baby because I want to play the piano at church. Most importantly, he shows me love and support no matter what. I've learned a lot about love from him!

Art Night and Pain: Part 1

On Sunday evening just over a week ago, we had an Art Night at my church. I loved seeing the paintings and sketches, listening to songs and poems and fiction, and watching the artists speak passionately about their talents and passions that mean so much to them. And it got me thinking about pain and art.

One of the artists was explaining her (chalk, I think it was) drawing of a mother cuddling a newborn... in the painting it looks as if she is whispering her baby girl to sleep. She explained that the art was done at the request of a friend whose baby was born sleeping.

When she said "born sleeping," my stomach gave a momentary lurch; I had never heard the euphemism before but could guess what it meant. She went on to give more details about the piece, and someone asked, "Was the baby okay?"

"No." The artist spoke quickly. "She was not okay."

I started thinking about why the artist's friend wanted the drawing, exactly. Surely not just to remember what must have been one of the most painful days of her life, which could have been done with a photograph. It wasn't necessarily to express herself because she wasn't the one painting it. But she wanted a piece of art about it.

And then I realized how many of the other pieces of art dealt with pain, with the times in our lives that are "not okay." One person sang a song she had written about her struggle to deal with her own shortcomings. Another read a poem expressing the shame and sadness she felt after speaking harshly to her son. Another shared an excerpt from her novel manuscript, a story (based in her own life) about two sisters with a rough past.

So I started wondering to myself why so much of art deals with pain. It deals with hurt and ugliness and experiences people would rather forget. Artists are driven to create pieces based in wounds, and even those who don't express themselves artistically often desire to see their pain reflected in pieces of art. When people could turn to God or therapy or talk it out or walk away and forget it, why do so many of us have the impulse to create or see something created that has to do with our bad experience? Why does art offer more healing of our torments and afflictions than simple understanding? It's more than just expression... if that was the case we could just (prose) write or talk it out.

I have some ideas about why this is, but I was just curious what any readers out there think, and I wanted to get your ideas to help me reconsider and process mine. What connects art and pain? Why are we driven to create about things that are not okay?

Maybe I'm overthinking it, but I'd still love to hear any thoughts you have about it... I'll post my own thoughts later on.

Childhood Memories vs. Grown-Up Realities

I went to New Mexico March 1st-7th. My mom bought an airline ticket for me for my birthday, since she was going to visit family, and we took Alexandra. We had a great time; I hadn't been there since my great-grandmother died nine years ago.

It's interesting going back to some place you haven't been to since you were a kid. It makes you realize how much of memory and reality and even how you feel about things are based in childhood experiences. For example...

We spent most of the time in Las Cruces proper, at Mrs. Naul's house and at my grandma's house. (My mom lived with Mrs. Naul when she was in college, and Mrs. Naul had a huge impact on my mom's life and spiritual growth.) Since I am now an adult and was able to do some of the driving, I got to know parts of the city I had never really seen before. But I didn't quite feel like I had "gone home" until I got to see my mom's dad and stepmom. I realized it's because as a kid, most of the time I spent in Las Cruces was spent at their house, which was actually outside the city. It was on a large piece of property that included a rose garden and small orchard at the front and a junkyard at the back, since my grandpa was an appliance repair man and a collector of pieces and miscellany (<--these are what the thesaurus is giving me as nicer-sounding ways to say junk). With all that room and a variety of old broken-down cars, trailers, washing machines/dryers/refrigerators to play around (and in the case of the cars, in), it was a kid's paradise.

That's where I spent many Christmases and a few other holidays. That's where I played with my brothers and cousins and built statues out of old appliance parts. That's where my grandma made us countless delicious meals and desserts. That's where I spent time in the wind and dust and intense sunshine. And since technically my grandparents lived in Las Cruces, that's what I always thought of when I thought of Las Cruces.

So it was weird going back and discovering that most of Las Cruces isn't at all the image that I held in my mind for so long. And going back as an adult with my mom also reminded me that she has an entirely different image of the city. She grew up in the city; since she lived there in college, Mrs. Naul's house is like going home for her. My grandpa and step-grandma didn't get married until she was an adult, so their house isn't going home for her.

This is probably super obvious for anyone outside the family, but it was weird being confronted with the difference between my childhood idea of Las Cruces and what reality is.

Random Thoughts

So, I haven't come up with anything deep to blog about over the past few days (actually I have, but haven't had the time to process my thoughts, which is quite necessary to deep blogging), so here's what I've been doing....

Birthday Fun!
Saturday was my birthday. Ian made the day so special; he watched Alexandra most of the day so I could have some extended quality time by myself (spent at two of my favorite places, Starbucks and the library). He made whole-wheat blueberry waffles for breakfast, a true sacrifice for a man who loves his breakfasts with non-whole-wheat versions of baked goods, washed all the dishes, and did the laundry and grocery shopping with the baby girl in tow. He also brought me some red roses.

A Writer's Woes
I was able to finish Chapter 7 of the re-write of my novel. The next chapter will likely be equally as difficult, because I am in a section that is necessary but not at all exciting. I feel I should be using this time for character development, but I have few ideas or inspiration. In the last version, the conversation/traveling turned out to be really boring when I read the book after setting it aside for a few months. If you're the author and you think four chapters of your book are boring, that's a problem. So brainstorming/typing/deleting/repeat, here I come.

I Love Mochas (in 12-oz. Quantities)
Since it was my birthday, I received a coupon from Starbucks for any free drink I wanted. I decided to go for it: a triple venti hazelnut mocha. The hazelnut mocha is my favorite drink, and I thought it would be too milky without the extra shot, and I never get ventis because fancy coffee is expensive enough when you're only getting talls. So I got the venti, and discovered that my life is not incomplete because I only get talls; I couldn't even drink the whole thing. Being the cheapskate I am and unwilling to pour out even a free drink, I put some in a mug in the fridge and reheated it this morning. I guess there can be too much of a good thing.

Something Pretty

One of my favorite "for-fun" websites is Cake Wrecks, which usually displays professional cakes created by less-than-talented bakers. The exceptions are Sundays, when cakes created by truly gifted bakers/artists are on display.

Some of these Valentine's Day cakes were just so pretty that I had to share...

Sunday Sweets: Be My Valentine?

Finishing What I Sta...

I get distracted easily. And I get bored quickly. Usually, if I want to work on a project that will take more than thirty minutes, I will plan breaks into the task. If I don't, it feels like torture to work through to the end. (I just don't understand you task-driven people who like to do the whole thing at once, even if it takes all afternoon!) Sometimes, that strategy works great; I think it's better to work with your inherent personality rather than against it when you can.

But when a project gets really long-term, I tend to burn out and lose interest. Crafts and scrapbooking are really hard for me; my teaching portfolio is a lot of papers in a binder that aren't organized (I've taught so many types of classes that I just grab some as needed for the particular job for which I am applying); I have lots of half-novels, half-stories, or even stories that were written but never revised to the point that they would be publishable. Sometimes it's the fact that something becomes mundane; other times, it's the fact that it becomes difficult.

I've come to realize over the last few months that while I am great at completing externally-enforced tasks, I tend to quit things that have to be intrinsically-motivated, especially if there's any type of opposition. Oh well, I think to myself, maybe that just wasn't meant to be, maybe it's a sign I'm not really supposed to get involved, or the story wasn't any good in the first place, or these people know better than me so if they think it's a bad idea, I shouldn't pursue it any further.

But lately, God has really been convicting me that I should finish what I start. Difficulties are an inherent part of life, and most things worth doing take some kind of struggle. For the first time in my life, I've been thinking that maybe, in addition to me learning from those who disagree, perhaps they also have something to learn from me, and I should pursue my goal and voice my dissent.

So I will keep revising my novel, and I will start writing posts about why I care so much about clean water, and I will stick with the ministries with which I'm involved at church, and I will continue reading through the Bible even though I'm in the major prophets and I've always quit there before. I'm not saying there aren't times to let go of an idea. I just tend to swing the opposite way, so, persistence, here I come.

Who's Critiquing You?

One of the best things I've ever been part of is my writing critique group. Initially, I asked a writer friend to be part of it (and she brought one of her writer friends) because I just wasn't writing. I was in graduate school at the time, and had been earning my bachelor's degree before that, so I hadn't really committed myself to writing anything for a long time. I wrote occasionally when inspiration struck, but as many writers know, that happens approximately three percent of the time, so laziness and business kept me from really pursuing anything.

It was time to get serious. It was time to get accountability. So I formed a writing group with my friends Rachel and Christine, and it turned out to be even better than I thought.

It's not just the accountability, the fact that I know have to produce something readable for them every two weeks. Having Rachel and Christine constantly critiquing my writing has made me a much better writer, and according to them, I've helped them in the same way. So I started thinking about how and why these critiquing meetings are so helpful, and how these elements apply across a variety of arts and other disciplines.

My advice? Whatever your art or discipline, consider getting a critique group of peers. Here's why:

• Writing (practice). Writers, editors, and teachers will tell you that if you want to become a better writer, you need to write. Same goes for any field. The more you do it, typically, the better you get.
• Reading (learning and inspiration). These same writers, editors, and teachers will also tell you that reading is a key to better writing. I love reading for fun, but sometimes life gets busy. Even if I don't pick up a single fiction book between meetings, I read and think about anywhere from twenty to forty pages of fiction from Christine and Rachel. (Similarly, watching other teachers has given me a lot of inspiration and great ideas and techniques.)
• Receiving criticism. Nobody likes to hear that a particular character was boring, or the moment you thought was so climactic fell flat. But if no one tells you, you won't fix it, and you may not change your approach in future projects. No matter what your discipline is, you not only have to be open to criticism, but you have to actively request it from people you trust. That's the beauty of my writing group: we've been working together for so long that we are really honest. Brutally honest. We are not unnecessarily harsh, but we don't hesitate to say, "I don't think that worked" or "I just don't think this chapter made any sense." Occasionally, one of us leaves the meeting close to tears. But fixing your issues teaches perseverance and hones your craft, and our writing is always better for it.
• Different perspectives. I recommend opening up your art or discipline to a variety of people, because especially when it comes to art, there are some things that are just plain subjective. That is why having three of us works so well. Usually, if two of us have the same criticism, the author takes it as a genuine problem that needs to be fixed. But sometimes the two readers will completely disagree on whether or not a particular issue is a problem, or how one character's action can or should be interpreted. When that's the case, the writer usually decides whether they agree that it's a problem that needs to be addressed or whether the interpretation is one they like. Not everyone likes the same thing. Having different people critique you helps you know when you actually have a problem and when it's just one reader's opinion.
• Offering criticism. This may be one of the most difficult parts of a critique group. When a plot doesn't work, a character is unbelievable, or the tone is inconsistent, it can be difficult to precisely pinpoint how the problem happens, and sometimes even more difficult to offer a truly helpful solution for how to fix or improve the problem. But being specifically constructive in your feedback does three things: 

1. It helps you become a better writer, because you've worked through a writing problem and can be aware of it in your future efforts.
2. It keeps you humble. It's so easy to criticize and point out what you don't like. It's harder to solve problems.
3. It builds trust. Your writer friends know you're on their side, that you're not just in a bad mood that day, but you are trying to help them write better because you've taken time and effort to really address the issue.

I do think it's worth noting that you probably want your critique group to be formed by your peers. Of course, you want to get help from the masters: great teachers who've been working for thirty years, professors, published authors, CEOs who have successfully led companies for years. They can help you grow by leaps and bounds. But a critique group formed by people close to your level means that no one is too far ahead (and so gets bored or finds it painful to examine your work on a consistent basis) or too far behind (and thinks everything you do is amazingly wonderful). Christine, Rachel, and I write at similar levels. We are each strong and weak in different areas, so that helps us help each other, and I don't think it would work the same way if we were had vastly different abilities.

Whether you write, sing, paint, lead Bible studies, knit, teach, preach, counsel, or guide a team, make the effort to get a few people you trust who will constantly offer you feedback about how to get better, and will hopefully offer to do the same for you. It usually leads to better art, or whatever it is you do. :)

Sunday Mornings

I love Sunday mornings. They are different from what they were when I grew up, but I really appreciate what they have become for me.

In case you don't know, when I was a kid, I vowed never to marry a pastor for a variety of reasons, which are too many to discuss now. One of those was that I wanted a "normal" family life, which included, in my mind, a husband with a regular work schedule and the fact that we could go to church as a family on Sundays. (And yet I did marry a pastor... I am grateful that God had a different plan for me, and since Ian was already a pastor when we met I would have no one to blame for this lapse in commitment anyway. :)

Ian works on Sunday mornings, doing a variety of things for and during the three church services, and often for afternoon or evening gatherings and meetings. So we usually go to our Saturday night church service, and he goes to work on Sunday mornings while I stay home with the baby.

In spite of the fact that this arrangement was never something I envisioned, I've come to appreciate it. I like going to a church service in the evening because I am alert for worship, fully awake to focus on God and process the message, and more relaxed and less rushed than in the morning.

And Sunday mornings are a time that I really enjoy. Ian leaves very early, and so when the baby wakes up, she and I have some time with just the two of us. Since Ian's not around, we have breakfast and get dressed and take it slower than on weekday mornings. Ian's cousin usually leaves for church around nine-thirty or ten, which coincides with Alexandra's morning nap, so then I have a couple hours to myself. I typically allow a bit of extra time for prayer and Bible study, and I look over the sermon notes from the night before. Then I have time to write or clean up the house and to prepare myself mentally for the rest of the day and the week ahead. Sunday mornings allow me to kind of ease out of the weekend and into the week, instead of feeling pushed headlong into Monday morning.

This doesn't happen every Sunday; sometimes we have commitments on Saturday nights, or if I am doing something for church services, I have to be there on Sunday morning. But most of the time, I am able to use Sunday morning as a refreshing time to gather my thoughts before the week starts.