Evolution of a Knitter

Knit two.  Purl two.  Knit two.  Purl two.  What's that?  Oh, just the subconscious musings of a domestic diva in the making.  I have leg warmers in my crosshairs, and they're proving a more difficult target than those old square dishrags.  Forget knitting with two needles.  I've been suckered into using four.  If you'll remember, in "Confession 27", I detailed my particular weaknesses when it comes to peer pressure.  This particular weakness has produced my latest knitting project.

This time, it was SG.  If you know SG, you know that she's not the type to exert unrelenting merciless peer pressure.  She didn't have to.  As soon as I saw her knitting away on those leg warmers, I knew I had to have some.  My forays into knitting began as a little country girl making doll blankets under the tutelage of my patient domestic diva mother.  This grew from doll blankets into dishrags and from dishrags into scarves and from scarves into… well, nothing until now. 

My love affair with leg warmers began with my days as a dancer.  Back in the day, in our little Texas studio, there was no dancer so great as Jordan.  She was the best in  the place.  Her splits were split like no one else's, her toes pointed like no one's could, and she never had a hair out of place.  Naturally, she was out of my orbit in awesomeness, and I knew that.  I stayed perched on my bottom rung of the ballerina social ladder, content to watch she and the other senior girls do arabesques and pirouettes more fluidly than I could potta bouree.  (Pardon my French.) 

The point of that story is Jordan the best-in-the-west ballerina wore leg warmers.  They've been cool to me ever since.  When SG's subconscious peer pressure of awesomeness collided with my memories of my dance heroes, I was sunk.  Sign me up, I'm here to knit. 

In case you haven't noticed, knitting is cool again.  Last time knitting was cool, Yankee Doodle was on Billboard's Top 100, and even then, it was more of a necessity than a hip hobby.  It has made a few come backs, at least I think it did some time before I was born, judging by the presence of home made sweaters and afghans and potholders lying around.  This time, however, knitting is making fashion statements and also culture statements.  Leg warmers?  Heck to the yes, I'm going to wear them with my terra cotta jeans.  A 23 year old knitting?  Heck to the yes.  Home ec is so cool these days. 

I know, you want to know about the progress of my leg warmers.  Let me tell you, it's slow going, especially when it's competing with The Extraordinary Education of Nicholas Benedict by Trenton Lee Stewart.  It's a kid book I picked up at the library on a whim and it's proving most engaging.  I highly recommend it for people aged 10-23, plus teachers and anyone else who likes kid books.  All that to say, I have about six inches done on my first leg warmer. 

Here's the progress so far, plus a picture of my latest adventure in children's literature, which is by far more wonderful than the last novel I read.  (Love in the Time of Cholera, don't read it.  It's horrid.  That is to say, good writing, horrid plot.)

I've become so inspired with this knitting project, though it's slow as molasses on a January morning.  The possibilities are only limited by my time, money and patience.  I guess that makes them rather limited, but they do exist.  Knitting and purling argyle?  Beanies?  Infinity scarves on a round needle?  What?!  For now I'm content to knit two, purl two.  I'll keep you posted on how the fantastic legwarmers in cream are coming.  I've rewritten the pattern below from SG's knitting book with my own notes and some room for creative license. 

Much love,

Little Miss Sunshine

Leg Warmers

I don't know what size needles.  I'm using size 9 and they're making small stitches. 

If you want big stitches, use bigger needles.  You can either use a small (short) pair of connected round needles, or you can use four needles of the same size with points at both ends.  I recommend round needles.  It's faster.

I bought two balls of yarn that were 100 grams each.  I think it'll be plenty for one leg warmer each.

-Cast on 43 stitches, leaving a 6 inch tail.  (If you're casting on using the four needles, cast on 14, 14, 15 and use the last needle to knit with.)

-Take the first stitch you cast on and knit it together with the last stitch you cast on.  Now you have 42 stitches.

-Knit to the end of the row.

+Note: it's important to be able to mark your rows in some way, so you can use a stitch marker, or just the 6 inch tail as a rough guide.

-After you've knit all the stitches once, it's time to start the ribbing (the part at the bottom of the picture). 

-Here we come to creative options.  You can choose how big you want the ribbing to be.  The original pattern called for knit one, purl one.  I wanted to try something different, so I did knit two, purl two. 

-Whatever you choose, just make sure it's a factor of 42 (1, 2, 3, 6, etc.).

-Knit two, purl two until your ribbing is 2 1/2 inches, or as long as you want it.  They should go from your ankles to the bottom of your knee cap and kind of bunch up.

+Note: your ribbing should look like some version of the ribbing above.  If it doesn't, as mine didn't the first four times I tried, it just means your rows aren't lining up vertically.  Pay close attention to what kind of stitch was done in the last row.

-All the knits should line up, and the purls too. 

-Once you finish the ribbing, knit a normal stitch until they are as long as you want.  Leave room for a ribbing at the bottom, done in the same way as the top.  The main space of the leg warmer is your artistic canvas.  You can experiment with knit/purl or knit two/yarn over patterns to your knitting heart's content.

-After you finish the bottom ribbing, knit a row using the regular stitch and then cast off. 

Bam.  Leg warmers.  Congrats, you're now a knitter.  

A mishap, a joke and stuff kids say

I greet you from the fluffy folds of my bed, where I am pausing from bloggery to fit my coffee mug on my nightstand.  This mug of coffee was delivered by a magical fairy princess in a pink scarf, also known as SG.  If I didn't have so much stuff on my nightstand, I could just set down the mug without having to do an organizational overhaul.  My nightstand currently holds:

Dr. Seuss book, Bible, David Platt book, phone, lamp, vaseline for wintery hands, journal, bulletin from church, Puritan prayer book, broken watch, broken camp wristband, old receipt, remote for awesome memory foam old person movable bed, ziplock, paper man used for object lesson in class, and now - mug of coffee. 

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a car.  When I say "we have a car", what I really mean is a nice lady from the next church over has let us borrow her car for the remainder of our stay in Australia.  When I say car, what I really mean is a metallic baby blue tank with a Toyota label on it.  The thing is huge.  Look out left side of the road, here we come. 

A Mishap

The night we got the car, nice lady, who I'll call NL, drove it to our flat, where she picked me up and drove back to her house.  NL asked if I wanted to drive back to her house.  I declined.  I decided I'd rather face my nerves on my own time.  We got to her house and she showed me where the gas tank and other little details were.  I reviewed the directions to get back to the highway.  Left left right right, she said.  NL handed me the keys and waved from under the glow of her porch light.  Left left right right.  I set my jaw and climbed (literally) up to the driver's seat, determined to muscle this behemoth home. 

After squeezing out the front gate, I took a left, but I didn't count it as the first left because it was just out of the driveway.  NL would know not to count that as the first left, right?  I started counting lefts.  One.  Two.  Time for a right.  Eh.  Is this the way we came?  Hmmm.  Maybe I should have started taking rights at the last intersection?  I can always turn around, if I can find a place wide enough.  Whoa, we definitely did not come this way.  But, wait, I've been on this road before… because this is the way the bus comes from the train station!  Hark!  A flash of recognition.  I don't really remember where this road goes, just that I've been on it before, and the bus driver always used it to get home, so maybe I could too? 

Ahoy!  The highway!  Mmmm..  Yep, let's take a right.  Oops, don't need windshield wipers.  Blinker.  Blinker.  Got it.  Driving.  Driving.  Trying to figure out if I'm actually driving in the middle of the lane where I'm supposed to be.  Oh.  Dark forest.  What?  The birthday banner bridge!  This is good.  Right turn across from the shopping center.  Almost home.  Gate is closed.  Fumble fumble fumble.  Fumbling with ten thousand bangles on the key chain looking for the gate opener.  Gate open.  Repeat to find garage door opener.  Hop in and out of car seven times checking to see if I can pull in any farther.  Still can't get garage door down over hitch on behemoth.  Give up and go to bed. 

A Joke

There are two kinds of jokes, the kind you tell and the kind that happen.  Yesterday, a joke happened to me.  Now, friends, I am 23 years old.  I have been doing laundry for years.  Growing up, when we had enough laundry to overtake a small laundromat, we could sort it into very specialized piles… whites, darks, silky, jeans, magenta sweaters with buttons… you get the idea.  When I went off to college, I didn't have the luxury of specialized piles, and most of the time I'd just throw everything in, set the dial to warmish and hope for the best. 

The previous paragraph was just to do what they call establishing credibility.  If you get asked to speak at a conference of doctors on the topic of cancer treatments, you have to spend at least five minutes telling them why they should believe you.  If you're just a DJ from Milwaukee, they probably won't listen to your professional opinions on the future of oncogenes.  So now that you've spent time reading why I know about laundry, I can tell you what happened to me yesterday. 

I did that thing where you chuck everything in the wash, put the soap in the drawer, slam it shut and hit the go button.  I left out my Australian flag beach towel because sometimes it leaves blue fuzzies on everything.  I went to playgroup, came home, ate lunch, drove to Bible study at the high school, came home and remembered that I had wet laundry in the wash.  The moment I opened the door (it's a front loader) I knew there was trouble.  If you know anything about my wardrobe, you know that baby pink is not a color that appears often.  It's a fine color, I just don't wear it.

sThis was cause for concern because I could see several things the color of baby pink tangled up with the rest of my gray tshirts in the wash.  Then the ton of bricks that is epiphany hit me.  My latest and greatest article of clothing, the terra cotta jeans, had never been washed.  My dear terra cotta jeans had been in that load of wash and had shared their terra cotta-ness with my white socks, white button up dress shirt and even the white parts of my plaid flannel.  Mmm.  Yes.  The joke was on me.  If you see me wearing baby pink, you'll know why. 

 

Stuff kids say

Me to two 4 year olds: So, what do you boys want to be when you grow up?

Ethan: A fire fighter

Derrik: Nothing

Ethan: Derrik!  You have to be something or else you have to get married!

First grade girl at CRE to me: You are looking so lovely today!

First grade boy (looks at girl, then back to me): You are looking so weird today!

Much love,

Little Miss Sunshine

Alex Undertakes Initiation

If the word initiation invokes images of drinking nasty concoctions of mayo and hot sauce and pickle juice or running naked through the streets at ungodly hours, I'm afraid this post is not going to live up to your expectations.  This initiation involves a complex system of cultural, lingual, geographical and social elements.  There are preliminary evaluations to pass and oral examinations.  There are streets to cross and obstacles to navigate.  Then, of course, there's the TimTam Slammer. 

In other words, SG's boyfriend Alex is here for a visit. 

SG drove up to the city with Lois to pick him up on Monday.  The playgroup moms were abuzz with "When's Alex coming?"  "I hope they get here in time to meet him" "What time did he arrive?" and all the rest.  When I got back from playgroup, they were getting lunch.  I yoohooed at the door and clobbered Alex with an almost awkward "I know you so well, we just never hang out" hug.  Hugging has got to be one of the most socially confusing rituals ever.  Nevertheless, I opted for the clobber hug, and he didn't give me a weird look, so that was good. 

We spent the following days tromping around the city, frequenting local cafes and spending time making food… barring that 48 hour period, of course, where I ate no food and was flatonmybacksickasadog.  SG and Alex got to tour the area and go up to an Aussie animal park where they saw kangaroos and koalas and all the other weird animals that live in Australia. 

You're probably wondering what kind of guy could win the Princess SG.  Well, I'll tell you, since I'm already a seasoned Alexian biographer.  He loves Jesus, first of all.  She couldn't like him if he didn't, so it's a good thing he does.  He's a runner, which is also a plus because SG's pretty keen on zipping around the streets of our little town.  Alex is a darn good runner too, and competed at the collegiate level.  In addition to being speedy, he's also a smarty, and is currently chasing his dream of getting his PhD in Math.  Yeah.  Math.  He was in marching band in high school, so they have the band kid thing in common too. 

So that's all nice and good and whatever.  But let me tell you why I like him.  For starters, he has two younger brothers, like me.  He hates olives, like me.  He does the most hilarious Polish accent, eh, not like me.  He also makes great expressive faces and sarcastic voices.  So he gets along with SG because he's sweet and all that, but he gets along with me too, and that's good.

He's doing pretty well at Aussie Survival Initiation.  He can name all the states, knows where most of the cities are, and still says Cairns like an American (as he should).  He's ridden public transport, knows to look to the right when crossing streets, has eaten pie, rabbit, TimTams and drunk ginger beer.  He's watched The Castle and part of a footy match.  His clarifying questions are getting fewer and further between.  I'd say he's doing pretty well, having just arrived on Monday. 

We even initiated him into the TimTam Slammer Club.  As far as I know, this club only has four Americans.  It's not a weight lifting contest or a sledge hammering contest, or even a drinking contest.  TimTam Slammers only have two ingredients - TimTams and something hot to drink (coffee is best).  *A note for the ignorant: TimTams are Aussie cookies that are like two brick shaped cookies with stuff sandwiched between them and dipped in chocolate.  They're amazing.*  To TimTam Slam, bite off the very ends of the TimTam, stick one end in the mug of hot something, suck the hot something through the TimTam and shove the rest in your mouth before it completely melts in your hand.  Oh wow. 

Tonight I made dinner.  Because we're in the strange Southern Hemisphere and it's turning into winter on us, I made Cheeseburger Soup, which is a Mom classic.  I also made Grandpa James' biscuits, which I love and use for all occasions.  Making recipes from other people is a nice way to think of them, and is more practical than staring at photo albums all day.  You can't eat photo albums. 

After dinner, we watched part of Storm Boy, which Ian brought by as a part of Alex's (and our) Australian film education.  It's pretty good so far, as far as 1980s B movies go.  We're pretty enthralled, and the only thing that kept us from staying up until a crazy 10:30 was an earlyish morning at church tomorrow. 

That's all for now,

Much love,

Little Miss Sunshine

Mom's Cheeseburger Soup

1/2 lb. ground beef

3/4 c. chopped onion

3/4 c. shredded carrot

3/4 c. diced celery

1 tsp. dried basil

1 tsp. dried parsley

4 Tbsp. butter/margarine (divided)

3 c. chicken broth

4 c. diced peeled potatoes

1/4 c. flour

8 oz cheese (Velveeta or cheddar)

1 1/2 c. milk

3/4 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

1/4 c. sour cream

In a 3qt. sauce pan (just a big pot), brown beef, drain, set aside.  In the same pot, sauté onion, carrot, celery, basil and parsley in 1 Tbsp butter until tender (10 min.).  Add broth, potatoes and beef, bring to a boil.  Reduce heat.  Cover and simmer for 10-12 minutes of until potatoes are tender.  In a small skillet, melt remaining butter.  Add flour, cook and stir for 3-5 min or until bubbly. * Add to soup, bring to boil.  Cook and stir for 2 minutes.  Reduce heat to low, add cheese, milk, slat, pepper, stir until cheese melts.  Remove from heat.  Add sour cream.         8 servings

*When I did the butter/flour roux, it just made a paste but didn't bubble, but I added it to the soup, and it thickened it up just fine. 

Grandpa James' Biscuits

2 c. flour (sometimes I use half white, half wheat)

4 tsp baking powder

1/2 - 1 tsp salt

1/4 c oil

1 c. milk

Mix oil and milk well, add to dry ingredients in a mixing bowl.  Mixture will be fairly wet.  Dust board thoroughly with flour and put dough on board.  Knead lightly until it doesn't stick to your hands.  Pat to 1/2 inch thick.  Cut into circles using the floured bottom of a juice glass or whatever's laying around the kitchen.  Let sit in pan for 10 minutes.  Bake 10-15 minutes at 450 degrees F.  Makes 12 (more or less depending on the size of the juice glass)

The Question of Eyebrows or Why I'm Still Single

Is it my eyebrows?  You laugh, but that is a real question that I have asked myself about why I'm still single.  I look around and it feels like all of my friends are dating people, engaged to people or married to people.  You may come up with a quick rebuttal: Preposterous! You know plenty of single people!  That's true, but their numbers are dwindling.  Sometimes I feel like a lone oak on a sprawling Texas prairie. 

Hang on just a second.  Why am I the lone oak?  Why do I have to be the lone oak?  Is there something wrong with me that I don't know about?  Are my eyebrows the wrong shape?  Do I have bad breath and no one bothered to tell me?  Am I one of those socially awkward people who don't know they're socially awkward?  All of my deepest fears materialize into a phantom of relational ineptitude.  I let out a long, horrified AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

But really, it's not an unreasonable question to ask.  If nearly all of my nearest and dearest are waltzing their way to the altar, why aren't I?  So I turn to the checklist… To the checklist I turn:

No communicable diseases.

College degree.

Love for Jesus.

Cooking skills.

World traveled.

Arm wrestling skills.

Job prospects.

Good legs.

Musical abilities.

Of course, there are holes.  I can't do a backflip on the trampoline, and my harmonica skills are less than stellar.  I can't tell jokes, and I haven't read War and Peace.  The questions return.  Really, Is there something wrong with me?  Do I have a personality deficiency?  Did I miss Mr. Sunshine somewhere along the line?  Let me tell you, I've had the privilege of meeting some outstanding guys.  Did I bypass a hint somewhere and thereby forfeit all chances of romantic bliss?

The questions turn heavenward.  God, don't you know I want to get married and have kids and grow tomatoes?   If You really loved me wouldn't You give me what I want?  Did You make a mistake and stamp "called to be single" on my forehead?  Surely we need to get this show on the road.  I'm 23. Time's running out.  I'm practically ancient! 

If God laughs at my prayers sometimes, I don't blame Him.  Of course He knows what I want.  Of course He loves me and always gives me what I need.  Clearly, what I need right now is an autumn in Australia as a youth intern, not a boyfriend.  How do I know?  Because that's what I have.  I have an amazing roommate and fabulous friends and a church that is so cool because their median age is 70.  I have a place to live and kids to laugh with three days a week, and high school girls who challenge me to think through my faith because they ask big questions. 

Is that a valid answer?  "Because that's what I have"?  With as long as I've been going to Sunday school and youth group and a small Baptist university, you'd think I'd be able to say something more convincingly elaborate.  On the contrary, I think the more we walk with God, the more we walk in trust of His character without needing to know His next move.  The more we walk with Him, the more we realize He is utterly other, entirely unbound by human constraints of culture, time or ability.  So in the end, sometimes we just have to say, if I'm walking with Jesus, I trust that where I am is a good place to be. 

This realization will not make me feel content for an interminable amount of time.  My heart is like a nomad in the Sahara.  It wanders.  Being content is something that has to be revisited and reworked.  I have to be reminded that while there are plenty of things wrong with me because I'm human, they aren't necessarily what's keeping me on the bench during the dating game.  I have to understand that in time, my days will be full of romance and singing the ABCs with small children and juggling dinner/soccer practice/tantrums.  In time, I will look back to my year in Australia and think about how it was easier to serve God in the community, back in the days when I made my own schedule and lived on toasted sandwiches and granola washed down with French-pressed coffee. 

For now, my days are full of morning tea with playgroup moms and afternoons at the library.  They are full of holding little hands and distilling Bible stories to their basic elements so they make sense  to people not raised watching Psalty.  There are new friends to love and recipes to experiment with and literature to devour.  Could I really ask for more than that? 

To long for the future is to ruin the present, and where can we live, if not in the present? 

Love,

Little Miss Sunshine

*Editing credit goes to SG, who will soon be a famous author/editor.  Someday I'll dust off this blog post to show my children I was once edited by the great SG. 

The Lord has done great things for us; we are glad.  Psalm 126:3

Things to Do When You're Sick (that you couldn't do otherwise)

Working with children is great.  They say funny things, they do funny things, they grab your hand impulsively and implore you to make a sandcastle.  They can be really sweet, but underneath this agent-like cover is a dark underworld filled with… GERMS!  There's snot and poop and hands going in their mouths and crawling on the ground and all manner of dirt and grubbiness.  Because of this, I'm blaming the children for being flat on my back this week.  Oh, I still love them, and I've no crazy ideas about giving up a career with them, but they're not all rosy cheeks and tiny feet. 

Tuesday night I came home from a dinner with some of our old host parents and had the toughest time going to sleep.  I was absolutely sick to my stomach.  The next morning wasn't any better, and I didn't keep any food down that day.  I won't bore you with the gruesome details, but it was a swift and strong sort of sumo wrestler germ.  Only today, Friday, am I able to get back to doing some of the things I'm supposed to be doing. 

For those of you who know me at all, you know I hate being sick.  There are things I hate in life.  Things like olives and screamo music and months of rain, but they don't really compare to the way I feel about being sick.  I like to go go go go go skip run jump sleep, repeat.  I don't like to slow down unless it's by choice, which is usually why I get sick.  As I've been sick twice in two months (which is highly unusual), I've had to come up with some things to occupy my time. 

1. Read

I read a lot regardless of whether I'm sick or not, but when you are stuck in bed, you have a lot more time to soak in some good books.  Recommendations for your next sick day?  To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell.  (I was so enthralled with Malcolm Gladwell after recently reading his books Outliers and The Tipping Point that I thought I'd write him a letter and ask him out to dinner and also to marry me.  Then I found out on Wikipedia he was born the same year as my mom.  Ew.  Idea abandoned.)

2. Sleep

Sometimes people don't sleep as much as they should.  Take advantage of being sick to soak up some missed pillow time.

3. Test the nursing capabilities of the people around you. 

I don't recommend getting sick to put your nearest and dearest under examination, but if they're bringing you soup, checking your temp and googling uses for cold compresses, consider yourself lucky.  SG's a great nurse.  She makes me do things like take Vitamin C, stay in bed, and eat stuff I should be eating when I'd rather be eating Mexican food and drinking coffee. 

4. Day dream

This might sound kind of silly, but take sick time to think things over.  Planning a backyard renovation or wanting to repaint the kitchen?  Use sick time to do some dreaming about what you want it to look like.  (If you're in college and don't have a house, you can think up 101 things to cook in a crock pot.)  Shoot, think about bigger things than renos, think about where your life's headed or how you can love your family better.

5. Sip tea

I'm the first to admit, I'm not very good at sipping tea.  I won't go so far as to say that I chug tea, because that's rather difficult, but when you're used to eating on a schedule and sneaking in a cup of tea between song time and play time at playgroup, sipping tea doesn't happen.  When you have nothing to do all day but drink tea, you have time to sip it.  I recommend peppermint with honey for colds and ginger for upset stomachs. 

6. Write letters

I'm convinced snail mail is making a comeback.  Everyone's on the DIY artsy craftsy bandwagon (the origins of which I'm reading about in Matt Mason's The Pirate's Dilemma) and people are taking up calligraphy and stamping in record numbers.  (I just made that up, I don't have any real data on calligraphy and stamping growth.)  Anyway, you can write letters when you're sick.  People love getting letters!  Heck, if you're really sick and have run out of grandmas and grandpas and great aunts, write to me!  Just be sure to give your lovely note a spritz of bleach before you send it.  We only want you mailing your sentiments, not your sneezes. 

Love from the couch,

Little Miss Sunshine

Eat, Drink,and Have Birthdays

I realize that the past three posts have been absolute funerals, so I shall dispense with the solemnities and tell you about our birthdays.  I say our birthdays because SG and I are only two days apart, which is absolutely serendipitous.  (Would you say that's the correct use of the word serendipitous?)  We've been partying for almost a week, but I think the bout of revelry has finally come to a close. 

It began with birthday breakfast last Saturday.  It was SG's actual birthday, and our dear friend Chez took us out for breakfast at a little place on a little corner in the little town where we live in Australia.  They gave me ice cream on my pancakes.  It's an Australian thing.  SG's breakfast looked like it had come straight out of a food fashion show.  It had sauce swirls all around the plate.  Chez got a plate with all the flavors of a prize-winning breakfast, and she shared her bacon.

After breakfast, we tripped all over town looking for any fashion finds that flirted with our fancy.  It wasn't really quite as carefree and squanderous (is that a word?) as it sounds.  Chez needed an outfit for an engagement party, which we found on sale in a little boutique.  On the topic of boutiques, I don't know how they stay in business.  I, for one, can't muster up the bravado to shop in them.  I always feel like I'm a patient in an observation room when I shop in those places.  The owners are scrutinizing me, wondering if I'll buy the crazy floral maxi skirt or the Thai silk blouse in chartreuse.

I didn't manage to make it through the morning without a little retail therapy.  It wasn't therapy, really, it was a near necessity.  I had noticed several days before some telltale signs of wear on the derriere of my favorite pair of jeans.  Not one to walk around showing off my undies to the world, I decided replacing them should happen before the mortifying shrrrrrrip heralded the rending of my jeans the next time I decided to do the splits.

If you've wasted any time skimming through fashion mags of late, you'll know that colored jeans are the thing of the moment.  I wish I could say that in French because it would lend me credibility, but I can't.  To get to the point of an already lengthy digression, I walked out with a new pair of terra cotta colored skinny jeans.  (Fashion inspiration credit for the color goes to Sam, who recently bought some jeans in terra cotta, being the fashion forward man he is.) 

How this birthday blog post turned into the recount of my fashion escapade, I'm not sure, but let's get back on track.  Sunday, the festivities continued.  Sue baked us a cake to have at morning tea after church, and the whole congregation sang happy birthday to us.  That evening, we hosted Messy Church, which is a family/community service that involves crafts, story time, and dinner.  The theme was "You're Invited to a Party" and we used the text of Luke 14:12-24. 

After dinner, they brought out two cakes, baked by Lois, and we were regaled again.  It was the biggest birthday party I've ever had.  It was like a love explosion in our faces, and we reveled in it.  They brought us presents of Australia pillows and koala pencil cases, chocolates and colorful coin purses.  It was a celebration to bring down the house. 

Monday, the party continued with my actual birthday.  SG's culinary instincts brought fish tacos to the table that night with a flourish of mango salsa.  A-mazing.  They sang to me at playgroup, and Monica brought cake for SG and I to Bible study.  (There has been so much cake this week!) 

That sounds like a respectable end to a week of singing and candle blowing, but it wasn't.  The grand finale came Thursday night when an eclectic group of people arrived in ones and twos at the house where we're living.  Some came from several hours away.  They were teachers and students, counselors and chefs.  They're the friends we've collected over our 9 months Down Under.  They looked quizzically at our Mexican feast with Australian eyes for whom Mexico is a faraway land inhabited by cacti.  With a bit of coaxing and coaching, they filled tacos with the necessary accoutrements and thrust tortilla chips into the bean dip and guacamole. 

Having satiated their appetites, we moved on to the rite of birthday party passage, a something begun in our days at OBU.  The book was procured, and the rules explained.  Everyone reads a page before passing on the book, but you may choose not to read.  I clarified that Katroo is pronounced kuh-TRUE and began reading.  I don't think our Aussie (and the lone Canadian) friends had ever read Dr. Seuss' Happy Birthday to You and I don't think they'll soon forget it.  We laughed until our middles begged for mercy. 

From there, I tried to teach the Cupid Shuffle, but our guests' interests were elsewhere, namely, dessert.  That's ok.  I know not everyone feels the need to dance at every special occasion.  Along with dessert, we laid out two canvases and some watercolor paints to serve as a guestbook.  SG requested thumbprints in the arrangement of a bouquet of balloons, and I wanted a tree with thumbprint leaves.  Ambitiously, I was anticipating something so arts and crafty it would take over the creative underworld, Pinterest.  What I got was a tree that looked like it had sprouted a cluster of balloons, with a thumbprint flower growing at its base and a thumbprint bird flying overhead, having just dropped what I can only hope to be an egg, but surmise otherwise.  For what it lacked in technique and composition, it made up for in hilarity and affection.  It probably won't end up in a gallery, but if you could put a canvas on the fridge, I'd do it. 

The party ended with several games of Uno, some guitar playing and strange stories of people getting lost in the Australian Outback.  We hugged the last to leave adios, and turned to face the kitchen.  SG tackled the leftover food, and I wrangled the dishes into the dishwasher.  We opened our presents, sighed contentedly and floated into our beds. 

It was a good birthday, indeed.

Little Miss Sunshine

Sometimes I'd Rather Be a Snail

First, my shoulders get this feeling like I'm about to get struck by lightning.  Then, my heart gets tingly.  It's all down hill from there.  My throat feels swollen.  My face scrunches up like an accordion and my eyes get red and overflowy. 

It's love.  It's how I feel when there are 70 people at a birthday party for SG and I, singing Happy Birthday to us, dropping every R in their precious Aussie accents.  (Happy Buhthday to you…)  It's how I feel when someone tells me they know I'm going to be a good teacher.  It's how I feel when I'm crying my brains out for someone else's hurts.  It's how I feel when I read Isaiah 43. 

And I like it.  And I don't really like it. 

I like the attention and I like the compliments.  I like the thought of having friends worth sobbing over.  I like the idea of a strong God who cares about the world.  But being loved?  Mmm.  Not so sure about that one.  If I'm going to tell you the truth, being loved unnerves me a little. 

Wouldn't life be easier if I were just a snail?  You laugh, but I'm serious.  I could go through life without a care in the world except salt and pesticide and things that eat snails.  I'd just live in my shell and eat people's plants.  There would be no hurt and no hurting, just living.  Think about the expectations for a snail!  All people expect you to do is leave slime trails and hide in your shell when you get picked up.  Sounds pretty easy to deliver satisfactory results. 

When people love me, it means I matter.  When God loves me, I matter infinitely more.  I don't matter because my hair is soft, or because I got good grades in college, or because I'm a gregarious extrovert.  I matter because I am loved.  The reverse makes me much more comfortable because it makes sense.  It's fair.  I can understand being loved because I matter.  If I score the winning point, or practice the piano with enough fervor, I will matter, and I will be loved.  If I fail, I will cease to matter and the love will be bestowed on an object more worthy of it.  It's like winning or losing a contest.  It's only fair, right? 

What's not fair is when Jesus decided I mattered because He loved me.  He decided I mattered so much that He would get splinters in His fingers, be lonely sometimes, and even die on a cross.  I never had the chance to tell Him not to.  It wasn't fair.  He shouldn't have done it.  I'm not worth His life.  I didn't do anything to deserve being rescued.  He went to so much trouble, and I'm just me.  It's not fair.  I can never pay Him back.  Why did You do this!  That's what I want to yell because it's wrong that He had to clean up my mess. 

The answer I get doesn't make much sense.  Love.  How could love make people matter, and how could it possibly be true that I'm at the receiving end of so much of it.  Oh, sure, theologically, I could explain it to you and take you on a trek all over the Bible that tells the story of God's love.  I could tell you all about how God created people to be in relationships as a reflection of the community in the Trinity or Tri-unity of God.  I could tell you about the sociological and physical benefits of having people who love you. 

That doesn't mean the whole thing doesn't scare the breath right out of me. 

With love, there is dependence.  I don't like that.  It's fine for people to depend on me.  I'm made of good, reliable stuff.  I'll help you pack or clean house or write you a card when you're sick.  But me?  Depend on other people?  Eh.  Maybe for a lift to church, but really, I wouldn't mind walking.  Uphill.  In the rain.  Depend on people emotionally?  Ahem.  Once again, I'd be happy for anyone to cry on my shoulder.  Tell me whatever's on your mind.  Not a problem, but be vulnerable myself?  Let people think I can be hurt?  Let people think I have needs?  That's asking too much. 

With love, there is mattering, and with mattering, there are expectations.  In his first letter from the isle of Patmos, John writes that "perfect love casts out fear".  With love, you can fly, you can scale the highest mountains, you can change the world.  You aren't afraid to try. You know that real love makes you matter; it doesn't exist because you matter. 

There's something about the whole thing that's fierce, mesmerizing, too good to be true.  How could we have any conception of true love if it didn't exist?  If it's really true, if people really do love me whether or not I can sing or bake, it's like a sunny day after a week of rain.  If God really does make me matter with His love, it's the most sparkling, beautiful, life-giving sunshine that ever was.  And all I can do is soak up the sun and shake my head in wonder.

I am indebted to all those who have loved me, which I'm told is not a debt at all. 

Learning to be loved,

Little Miss Sunshine

PS If ever you have let me cry rivers of snot and salt water onto your sleeve, or written me a letter, or given me the gift of your thoughtfulness and time, this post is very much dedicated to you.  

Entirely Irrational

I was going to write a nice post about my birthday.  It's been a wonderful birthday so far, and it's not even over yet.  It's been full of home made cakes made by old ladies and lots of birthday hugs and kisses and presents and breakfasts and dinners and everything nice you could want on your birthday… So, why am I not posting about my wonderful birthday and the biggest birthday party I've ever had?  Good question. 

Writing a rant post on your birthday is entirely irrational.  It's been a great day, I've had so many wonderful birthday wishes, and there's enough chocolate to last a month.  And yet.  Sometimes my silly emotions don't match reality in the way I want them to.  Instead of being so thankful I'm alive and living in a first world Westernized country, sometimes I feel less than ecstatic.  I know, it doesn't make sense.  My life would be so much more convenient if I could just live like this…

Birthday magic and sparkle, Skype with best friend, lots of chocolate and love = contentedness, thankfulness, joy

Friend gets good news = excitement, congratulations, vicarious bliss

Job interview = confidence in my calling and preparation

Instead of this

Birthday magic and sparkle, Skype with best friend, lots of chocolate and love = homesick, sad, tummy ache from chocolate

Friend gets good news = excitement/jealousy cocktail topped with discontent

Job interview = nerves, self doubt, inadequacy

HELLO SELF.  Why can't I just feel what I want to feel!?  Who's in charge here, anyway?  Feeling homesick is annoying and not nice, especially on your birthday.  It doesn't do anyone any good and just makes you want to cry, which makes other people uncomfortable.  And you're 23, you should know better than to eat chocolate cake as a part of a balanced breakfast.  Also, being jealous of your friend's good news is so rude, it's like, one of the lowest of friend sins.  Can't you just be super duper excited for them and that's it?  Can't you just not think about yourself for one second?  Now this business of finding a job, you're prepared!  People think you're going to be a good teacher, and you should believe them.  You spent four years learning about how to teach math, history, art and geography by making a map out of playdough.  Have a little confidence.  Stop being dumb.  Why can't I feel all of those things when I know them to be true?

Sometimes my life doesn't make sense. 

Little Miss Sunshine, who really is having a wonderful birthday and is slightly annoyed that any negative emotion would dare set foot on the premises whilst she is having said wonderful birthday. 

Worrying Your Pretty Little Head

The world is going down the tubes.  The end is near.  If things are in such a state, we can't have long left.  Things are going to the dogs.  You could easily worry your pretty little head off thinking about it.

I know.  I know. 

There are protests in Spain.  There is child labor in Cambodia.  There is sex trafficking on the streets of your safe mid-sized American town.  The poison darts of pornography are taking people down, men and women, old and young.  Racism is alive and well in schools.  People kill each other, in war and in neighborhoods.  Fruit has pesticides.  Water has particles of this and that. 

Like I said, the world is going down the tubes.  The end is near.  If things are in such a state, we can't have long left.  Things are going to the dogs.

So go crawl in a hole.  Barricade yourself with enough distilled water and canned tuna to last until nuclear fallout kills you.  Despair.  Moan.  Wail. 

Well, that's an option, I guess.  But if you're a vegetarian (Catty, Liz, Jake) or just don't like tuna, there is an alternative to barricading and bemoaning.  It's called living in the light.  Living in the light means you see things as they are.  You don't deny that there are children who will sleep outside tonight or that people are dying of malnutrition in our advanced 21st century.  You recognize the world is scarred and scared and in some ways, a big disaster area. 

And yet. 

There is a God who paid with His life to rescue us from ourselves.  From our apathy and our hatred and our small vanities.  There is a God who empowers anyone who will follow Him.  Empowers them to give up the lies and start living for something besides their own interests.  These kinds of people refuse to run from fear, deny the indulgent luxury of ignorance, and are all about living hands on lives. 

I know some of these people.  They challenge me in all kind of ways by living in a way that says, "Hey, evil made this dark mess, but I choose to live in the light and help make things better."  They do this by moving to Hungary to teach international students.  Working with youth that maybe no one cares about.  Teaching at an orphanage in Ghana.  Giving hope to older people who feel like their "good old days" are long gone.  Sharing their house.  Digging in for the long haul.  Making choices that will make their lives uncomfortable. 

You might already be one of those people, taking the huge love of Jesus to places that don't know about it.  If you aren't, you can be.  You can adopt kids and bake pies for sick people and mentor youth.  You can sing and smile and cry with people.  You can move to a smaller house or an "undesirable" neighborhood, or a country that doesn't know anything about living in the light Jesus gives.  Start asking the question "Why not" and see where it takes you. 

Love,

Little Miss Sunshine

All Aboard the 8:06

Our story begins with me sitting between two strange men on a bench at the train station.  The man on my right is sporting New Balance shoes, light wash jeans and a button up shirt.  The man on my left is wearing black Converse shoes with red laces.  He's reading the newspaper.  Those are all the details I can give you because staring at strangers beyond your peripheral vision is weird. 

Across the aisle from me is a strange personage, being part gangster, part hipster, and part emo.  Read: sweats and basketball shoes, fabulous grey striped scarf and aviators and black fingerless gloves.  I can hear his music across the aisle.  If I can hear your music across the aisle of a train barreling toward the city, you'd do well to turn it down before you lose your hearing altogether.  I made a poor choice in sitting backwards at the back of the car. 

The reason I'm sitting on the 8:06 express train to the city is I'm going to pick up Amberly from the airport!  Yay, visitors!  She's coming down from Jakarta for a week.  She's doing an study abroad program there, and we went to university together in the States. 

Upon my arrival at the airport, I commenced pacing up and down the airport terminal whistling anxiously.  [my family and close friends have a whistle signal that gets used at school, home, and occasionally the grocery store.]  As I didn't see Amberly waiting in the crowded arrival area, I paced up and down the length of the waiting area, occasionally letting out a shrill whistle.  This did draw some puzzled looks, but I was determined to find my guest. 

Out the door and down the walk she came from the international jungle known as customs.  Dark brown curls bouncing and luggage in tow, scanning the crowd for a familiar face.  Then she saw me and we did the jr. high girl/college girl reunion squeal and she pushed through the waiting throng before we hugged the air out of each other.  We took the bus to the train to the bus to get home, where we ate lunch, which temporarily stemmed the steady stream of the latest news from home.  (Quesadillas can make even me stop talking for a period of time.)

We spent the week playing with little kids, reminiscing about our OBU days, and eating great food.  We got to hang out with friends in the city and friends in town.  We cooked and laughed and watched Downton Abbey.  It was wonderful to have company for a week that didn't really feel like company.  SG and I loved having her.

At 5:32am a week later, Am and I were standing, shivering next to the bus stop.  We rode the bus to the train station, amazed at how many crazy people get on the bus at that ungodly hour of the morning.  The train zipped us right to the city, where I put Am on the bus to the airport.  I was sad to see her go. 

I powerwalked my way to the Queen Victoria Market, an enormous collection of vendors of anything you'd want to buy.  I wandered up and down the rows of the fruit and veggie vendors.  Somehow I ended up with a bag of apples, mandarins, grapes and snow peas.  In need of some more substantial breakfast than the apple I ate on the train, I bought a cinnamon doughnut and a flatbread.  Nom.  Back to the train, to the bus, to playgroup, where I took up my usual post at the playdough table. 

Time flies, 

Little Miss Sunshine