© Copyright Carol Walker and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

The last 72 hours have been an emotional roller coaster for my family.
My daughter, who celebrated her first anniversary July 10th, had a positive pregnancy test Wednesday morning.
We were thrilled for her and our son-in-law.
Today, she miscarried.
Shortly after leaving the doctor's office, she texted me and said, "I don't know how I'm supposed to respond to this."
You know what? I don't know how to respond, either. I don't even know what to say to her, my own child, beyond, "I'm so sorry."
I had planned to post a poll today: "What should my grandma nickname be?"
Instead, I find myself in a state of shock, not just hurting for my daughter, but hurting for the multitudes of friends and family whose miscarriages took place "under the radar," and wondering how many women out there are still suffering in silence.

• Those who have endured the pain, loss, and confusion alone because they didn't have anyone to turn to for comfort or counsel. 
• Those for whom the twin demons of guilt and shame crept through the fog of grief and sorrow to torment them further with self-doubt and fear for the future. 
• Those who felt as if they were somehow at fault - as though they had failed - and didn't have someone around to tell them any different. 
• Those who have been offered empty platitudes and casual reactions.
• Those who suffered at the hands of insensitive medical personnel shuffling them through a cold, clinical system. 
• Those whose husbands or boyfriends lashed out in anger (or worse, relief) because they couldn't process their own emotions about the experience.

If any of those descriptions are yours, my heart goes out to you. May God reach out and bind up the broken places in your heart with His divine love and mercy and grace, and may the sweet spirit of the Lord whisper words of comfort, encouragement, and peace in your ear.


"He heals the brokenhearted, binding up their wounds." Ps 147:3 TLB

"You have seen me tossing and turning through the night. You have collected all my tears and preserved them in your bottle! You have recorded every one in your book." Ps 56:8 TLB

"Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. 
Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart
and my portion forever."  Ps 73:23-26 NIV

Imagine yourself at your ABSOLUTE worst. Stressed, angry, teetering on that narrow gauge rail between tears and rage. You're depressed, frustrated, frazzled, exhausted, and ready to quit and/or run away from home.
You might be a mom or a student, a small-business owner, a minister, or a volunteer. Nothing has turned out the way you expected. The answers to your prayers seem to be delivered to other people's houses. Your dreams for the future have slipped through your fingers like a mist. Even basic tasks seem to be too much to handle, but you slog along, day by day, trying to stay on top of the essentials like a circus performer balancing on a ball.

You're trying to be a good parent, a good spouse, a good Christian, a good worker, a good friend. The problem is no matter how hard you try, you never quite feel like you measure up, or some other demand arises and pulls at you from another direction. You're a hamster in a wheel, running faster and faster and never getting anywhere.

Now, imagine Jesus walking up to you in the midst of all that misery, pressure, and strife. He is the embodiment of LIFE - strong, healthy, relaxed, peaceful, bubbling over with joy, pure, honest, kind and loving. And here's what He says to you...

"Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me - watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly."

Jesus is not stressed out. 
Jesus is not panicking about the state of the economy.
Jesus is not worried about natural disasters, plagues, or politics.
There's no state of emergency in heaven. God is not looking over at Jesus, biting his nails and grinding his teeth, muttering, "What are we gonna do now?"
And instead of saying to us, "Do this new program. Try this new method for success. Work a little harder. Do a little more." Jesus says something unexpected (doesn't He always?). 

Oh. My. Stars. If you don't get all gooey inside at the idea of Jesus - King of Kings and Lord of Lords, the Prince of Peace whose name is Faithful and True - saying that to you, your wood's wet. 

But how often, instead of going with Him,  letting him show us how to recover our lives, how to lay aside our worries and cares and burdens, we say, "Oh, thanks for the invitation, Jesus, but I'm so busy. You just don't understand. I've got so much I have to do, so many things to finish up today. In fact, I'm already running late. Gotta go, bye."

And we jump back in our hamster wheel and run ourselves even more ragged, until our bodies or minds start to break down and we can't run any more. Somehow I think Jesus would rather we come away with Him than spend our lives chasing the end of the wheel in a frightened, panicked, high-pressured hurry. 

The world - YOUR world - may be in a state of chaotic frenzy, but Jesus is waiting for you, hand extended, eyes shining with love, saying, "Come away with me."

I'm not even going to wait till I brush my teeth. I'm going. Are you?

It's been pretty warm around here. Not nearly as hot as the East coast this summer, but western Colorado's semi-arid climate literally sucks you dry. Forget to drink enough water and dehydration sets in fast.

During certain seasons of life it's easy to get spiritually dehydrated. Periods of intense stress (an ailing parent or child, marital problems, health issues, financial trouble, etc.), and times of transition (changing careers, moving, new parents, new empty nesters, home remodeling, puberty, menopause, college, etc.), are seasons of life that lend themselves to spiritual dehydration.

Symptom #1: Thirst and/or loss of appetite. Just like natural thirst, many of us don't recognize spiritual thirst anymore. We try to satisfy that vague sense of dissatisfaction with food, entertainment, or retail therapy.
I'm one of those people who hates to drink water. When water seems the most repulsive is when I need it the most. A loss of appetite for the things of God - His Word, prayer, worship, praise - is a pretty clear indicator you are spiritually thirsty.


Symptom #2: Fatigue, weakness or chills. Living in a perpetual state of fatigue and exhaustion is not normal. Seriously. Spiritual fatigue can show up as fear, apathy, withdrawal, isolation or susceptibility to temptation. Being "too tired" to do anything is ABNORMAL for believers! Feeling spiritually cold and insensitive is an indication you are probably dehydrated, though the enemy of our souls likes to tell us we're just "bad Christians" when we experience those symptoms. No, you aren't bad, you just need a drink!

Jesus talked about water and thirst and drinking a lot. He lived in a hot, arid climate. The people around Him  understood the importance of staying hydrated. Just getting enough water to survive was a major expenditure of time and energy. It was critical for survival, and Jesus wanted them (and us) to understand preventing spiritual dehydration is just as important.

On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice, "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.

John 7:37-39 (from New International Version)

We don't have to suffer repeated bouts of Christian heatstroke if we'll stay hydrated, conscious that in certain seasons, it's important to drink more, not less. It figures that those times when we need to be spiritually hydrating ourselves the most are the times when we are the busiest, the most distracted, and the most likely to shuffle our relationship with God to the bottom of the to-do list.

If you are a believer, the Spirit of God lives within you and is a continual source of living water. You don't have to wait for rain, you have to tap in to the artesian well that is the life of God within you! I like these instructions from Act 3:19 in the Amplified:

So repent (change your mind and purpose); turn around and return [to God], that your sins may be erased (blotted out, wiped clean), that times of refreshing (of recovering from the effects of heat, of reviving with fresh air) may come from the presence of the Lord;

Repent? Think about it this way: If you were marching through the desert and getting dehydrated, and there was an oasis just behind you, wouldn't it make sense to run back to that oasis and get a drink? When and where was the last time and place you felt spiritually hydrated? In praise and worship? While reading your Bible? Praying? Fellowshipping with others? That's your oasis. Now change your mind and purpose: Make that oasis your number one priority.

Need a place to start? I've been listening to the following song, appropriately titled The Desert Song by Hillsong. Sing it through a few times, meditate on the lyrics. And let that river of Living Water in your spirit begin to flow freely with praise, with worship, with thanksgiving.

Here's to a well-hydrated week, no matter what season of life you're in right now!
GO GET A DRINK!


http://www.susanica.com/photo/30
http://www.eldoradosprings.com

Unless you're the parent of a toddler or the caretaker of a senior citizen, constipation is not a socially acceptable topic of conversation. For some reason, discussing the bowel movements of people who wear diapers is perfectly all right, while everyone else suffers along in silence.


So what happens when writers (or artists, or musicians, or dancers, or designers, or other creative types) experience creativity constipation? The symptoms are similar: irritability, discomfort, fatigue, isolation, the ingestion of strange substances in a desperate attempt to "get things moving."

Writers with creative constipation will sit and strain, sometimes for long periods of time, but no words come forth. Any words or phrases that do appear tend to flit by as quickly as they came. There's no relief.


Shift positions. (Did you know there are yoga asanas for constipation? Are there yoga asanas for writers?) Change rooms. Change chairs. Clean the desk. Sort the mail. Defrag the computer. Make new folders for your WIP. Eat. A lot. Surely one more trip to the pantry for another handful of calorie-laden simple carbohydrates will trigger some kind of movement, right?

Redesign your blog page. Update your website. Look up inspiring writerly quotes to post all around your desk. Consider buying novel writing software. Balance checkbook. Never mind.

Go for a walk. Try to think about novel. About plot. Imagine your characters. Wonder why that contest judge made that comment. Rethink your ability to write anything worth reading. Worry about dying in a tiny apartment, surrounded not by stacks of ancient National Geographic magazines and yellowed copies of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, but amid ceiling-high reams of unfinished and/or unpublished manuscripts.

Attempt snowflake method. Again. Can't get past first three steps.

Debate taking up smoking and drinking bourbon. After all, it worked for Stephen King for a long time. Once you get famous you can afford to go to rehab with Lindsay.

Oh, yeah, you're supposed to be writing inspirational Christian fiction. Opt for prayer instead of bourbon. Feel selfish and narcissistic for praying for your own success at a task you've wanted to do since long before you were born again. Does God even LIKE fiction?


Give up. Turn off computer. Go to bed. No sooner than your bloodshot eyes slip closed, ideas stir. Sentences form. Plot twists emerge.

Your creativity, you realize, isn't dead. Your writing ability, at whatever level it may be, is not the issue right now. The problem, quite simply, is fear.

You're afraid it will hurt to get that story out. Afraid to finish what you started. Afraid you'll split open from the inside and bleed to death on the pages. Or, like the toddler who screams hysterically the first time the potty chair is emptied into the toilet and flushed away, you're afraid YOU will disappear when your story becomes reality. You'll lose your identity the way mothers have Empty Nest syndrome when their children move away from home. Maybe you're afraid you're going to be embarrassed, humiliated, and rejected by others because of your bodily functions... like making a stink in a public restroom without benefit of air freshener or a fan.

What's the cure? Prune juice? Milk of magnesia? Ex-lax? Fiber? More water? All reasonable ideas that have practical applications from a creative point of view. (But you're going to have to find your own definitions for writerly prune juice.)


Step back, separate yourself from the rules and and the pressure and that big hairy deadline looming just around the corner and remind yourself why you originally started doing what you do. Just like David prayed, "Lord, restore to me the joy of my salvation." We need to have the joy of creating something, just for the fun of it, restored to us.

From one (formerly) constipated pre-published writer to another... 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/x-ray_delta_one/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tom1231/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonnowitts/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/amypalko/

Do you believe in magic?

(Stop singing the song.)

I don't mean eye of newt, toe of frog concoctions, or witches and warlocks sorcery-type magic. Not "saw the beautiful assistant in half," abracadabra, bibbidi-bobbidi-boo magic. Not "this cleaning solution will remove every kind of stain" kind of magic you saw on the infomercial at 3 o'clock in the morning.

I'm talking about the magic we (secretly) believe will help us accomplish the things we desire; like losing weight without dieting, having well-defined triceps without exercise, and getting rich quick while we lie beside the pool in a lounge chair sipping fruity beverages garnished with paper umbrellas and plastic swords.

In the back of our minds, we believe the people who have accomplished those things are the beneficiaries of some sort of magic trick. And so we buy into advertising gimmicks that appeal to our faulty belief system. We're desperate for those empty words promising magical results without manual labor or mental effort to be true.

Unfortunately, there are no fairy godmothers, no magic wands, no love potion #9. And when we begin to come to that painful conclusion, we're like little children who've discovered Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny are just mom and dad sneaking around in the dark of night taking bites out of cookies and leaving faux rabbit tracks on the kitchen floor. Disappointed and discouraged, we resign ourselves to the fact we must not be lucky enough to be the recipients of the spells that bestow fame, wealth, health, and love. No wonder so many of us lack the confidence required to do what's necessary to achieve our goals!

Christians are quick to say they don't believe in magic. But how many Christians are struggling to live on a flimsy fairy tale faith, copycatting the "formulas" of the people perceived as the best, the holiest, the most successful sheep in the fold, in a feeble attempt to con God into giving us the same results? Prayer becomes less of a living conversation with our Heavenly Father and more of a ritual incantation. Giving becomes a matter of "if I give, then I will receive," instead of a heartfelt desire to bless others whether there's something in it for us or not. People run from meeting to meeting, from minister to minister, itching for the secret formula for their instant success. I think in the spirit realm it makes us look a little like the fella in the following video.


When these formulas and rituals fail to produce the anticipated results, the results can devastate a person's walk with God. Some fall away completely, rejecting everything about God and the church. Others carry on dutifully attending church, saying the right things to the right people, but inwardly they are empty, hollow shells, torn apart by the little voice in their head telling them God and unicorns and abracadabra all belong in the same box.


We need to examine our hearts and our actions for this kind of magical thinking and expose it. Why? Because by holding on to it we set ourselves up for a cycle of defeat. It's as bad as any gambling addiction ... Just one more coin in the slot, one more lottery ticket, or this is the horse that's gonna win me a grand."

Whether your magic addiction takes the form of prayers, incense, incantations or candles; or always seeking the next new thing to make you happy - relationships, jobs, houses; or sitting around waiting for Tink's pixie dust to dribble on your manuscript, or your invention, or your mailbox and bring you dramatic overnight success; consider this post an  intervention.

Quit looking for the easy way out. Quit trying to skip steps and beat the system. God rewards faithfulness. He rewards diligence. And He honors pure motives. None of those things are easy, and they don't guarantee instant results, but they will produce good things in your life. Things that last.

For me, this means more Butt-In-Chair time writing instead of searching for "how to write and sell a bestseller" articles and living vicariously through others on Facebook. For someone else it might mean getting up a half hour earlier to exercise, or giving up an episode of America's Got Talent to take care of those nagging and necessary chores around the house. Painful, but productive!

Where have you fallen into the habit of magical thinking?

At 6:04 p.m. today I will have attained two-score years.
I like the way the French language expresses age...  j'ai 40 ans ... I have 40 years. As if it were an accomplishment!
As someone who was once told by a doctor I needed to give myself permission to take a nap, I think the following list I ran across on Tumblr tonight might be a good set of guidelines for the coming year. I need to post these all over my house as a constant reminder. Care to join me?
Here's to a year of peace, joy, love, and dreams accomplished!

Are you a Francophile?
A lover of all things French?
I had a French alphabet book as a child, and I clearly recall poring over those pages, trying to pronounce the words.

In 6th grade I began taking French lessons from Madame Anne Vogt. She was Swiss, and spoke fluent French, German, Italian, Romansch (the fourth official language of Switzerland), as well as English. I can still read a bit of French even though speaking it fluently escapes me.

July 14 is France's version of our Independence Day. It commemorates the 1789 storming of the Bastille - a fortress/prison in Paris where political prisoners were frequently held. (For you Anglophiles, the Bastille was similar to the Tower of London.)

The revolt was a rallying point for the common people of France to rise up and overthrow the absolutist monarchy and feudalistic society that had ruled them for centuries. Six weeks later, the leaders of the rebellion signed The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, a precursor to the French constitution and an important document in the French Revolution that followed Bastille Day.

How is La Fête Nationale celebrated? With parades and fireworks and flags! Of course, the first anniversary of the storming of the Bastille involved a four-day celebration with fine wine (would you expect less from France?) and running naked in the streets. O-kaayyyy. Well, the French have always been less prudish than Americans.

Celebrate with our French friends and neighbors today. (Let's just skip the naked-in-the-streets thing, please!) It's worth remembering again this month just how precious and valuable freedom is, and how vital it is that we support those who fight for it, regardless of their nationality or ethnic background.
Everyone wants to be free.

God is continually at work in our individual lives, and He'll use every method possible to demonstrate His love and mercy and grace. That truth provides a framework for Marlo Schalesky's latest release, Shades of Morning.
I was alternately convicted by Marnie Wittier's habit of storing her sorrows, hurts, wounds, and regrets in a box on the shelf; amused by the innocence and wisdom of her Down syndrome nephew, Emmitt; and confused right along with Taylor Cole as to how his life had turned out the way it did.
Best of all, the ending didn't fizzle out, as some do. I was surprised (pleasantly, I might add) right up to the last page. I've read inspirational books that weren't at all inspiring, but Shades of Morning is not one of them. It truly fits the genre description!

MARLO SCHALESKY is the author of several acclaimed novels, including Christy Award winner Beyond the Night.  A graduate of Stanford University, Marlo also has a masters of theology from Fuller Theological Seminary.  She’s a regular columnist for Power for Living and lives with her husband, Bryan, and five children in California.

Back cover blurb: Marnie Wittier has life just where she wants it. Quiet. Peaceful. No drama. A long way away from her past. In the privacy of her home, she fills a box with slips of paper, scribbled with her regrets, sins, and sorrows. But that’s nobody else’s business. Her bookstore/coffee shop patrons, her employees, her friends from church—they all think she’s the very model of compassion and kindness. Then Marnie’s past creeps into her present when her estranged sister dies and makes Marnie guardian of her fifteen-year-old son—a boy Marnie never knew existed. And when Emmit arrives, she discovers he has Down syndrome—and that she’s woefully unprepared to care for him. What’s worse, she has to deal with Taylor Cole, her sister’s attorney, a man Marnie once loved—and abandoned. As Emmit (and Taylor) work their way into her heart, Marnie begins to heal. But when pieces of her dismal past surface again, she must at last face the scripts of paper in her box, all the regrets and sorrows. Can she do it? Or will she run again?

A couple weeks ago my 12-year-old asked me how old I would be on my upcoming birthday. When I reminded him I will be 40 this year, he looked at me seriously and said, "Have you made your bucket list yet?"

I haven't been able to get that innocuous comment out of my mind. With every major milestone in life, we might make resolutions for the year to come, or create an inspiration board (for you artsy-craftsy types, check out this link with instructions from simplemom.net), or we might just keep a list in the back of our minds of things we'd like to do sooner or later. Before we die. And preferably, before we're too old to physically and mentally enjoy the process.

But I'm not going to make a bucket list. The phrase "kick the bucket" comes from people intent on committing suicide who stood on a bucket while they attached the noose to their necks. When they were ready, they kicked the bucket out from under their feet. Not a pleasant turn of phrase, is it? The bucket LIST, then, would be akin to a suicide note.

Now, if you're more normal than I, you're thinking, "It's just words, what difference does it make? That's not what we mean now when we say it." Okay, that's fine. But I eat, sleep, and breathe words. If I close my eyes, there are words behind my eyelids. Words (for me) trigger joy, grief, terror, passion, fatigue, and more. Words are more real to me than reality sometimes. Perhaps it's the writer's curse. Whatever it is, I need something more cheerful and positive to describe the things I'd like to do than "bucket list."

Maybe a list for each new year. My daughter compiled a "crazy 18" list for her 18th year. I think she accomplished everything on it except skydiving. Skydiving will not be on any of my lists. Ever.

This year could be the Fierce 40 List. Fierce as in Tyra Banks's use of the word - unique, expressive, extreme - not fierce as in perimenopausal cranky fierce.

Or the Fab 40 List. But that makes me think of the Beatles. Ringo Starr turns 70 this month!

Freaky 40 might work, too, since this phase of life includes such anomalies as wrinkles and pimples together on the same face. Do you know how hard it is to pop zits on wrinkly skin?

Or I could just go with Fun 40. Or Finally 40. Hmm. If I ever come up with a name for my list, I might be able to put some things on it!

The world's crustaceans are on drugs. Excreted antidepressants which have entered the oceans via the sewage system are affecting the behavior of certain crustacean populations, shrimp, in particular.

British researchers have determined that shrimp exposed to fluoxetine (aka Prozac) are five times more likely to swim toward the light rather than away from it. This sparks several questions that bear consideration.

Who pays for these scientists to test the effect of drugs on our planet's lower life forms? If my taxpayer dollars are paying to get insects, arachnids, and crustaceans high, I want to know about it!

Remember Sea Monkeys? The advertisements were a wee bit deceptive, to say the least. Who wasn't disappointed when their Sea Monkeys turned out to be brine shrimp and not tiny creatures with familial bonds and bows in their hair? Now it looks like the Sea Monkey world needs a series of PSAs about the dangers of marinating in drug-filled waters.

One of the scariest movies ever made was "Poltergeist," with Craig T. Shelton and that weird little psychic medium lady with the helium voice. Nowadays ghost whisperers have to be "hot," like Jennifer Love Hewitt. Back when clowns were scary, not so much. Hey, if I were a shrimp (or other sea creature), with gargantuan oil spills looming, I think I'd be swimming toward the light just as quick as my little arms (do shrimp have arms?) would carry me.

Maybe it's not the antidepressants. Maybe the shrimp are just smarter than we are.


For more (scientific-type) information: Science Daily
Photo Credit: via Science Daily. Dr. Alex Ford with live shrimp specimens. (Image courtesy of University of Portsmouth), Sea Monkey ad via spacepotato@Flickr,  Poltergeist on Blu-Ray via Film.com

I love carnivals, with their subtle aura of danger and "sleight-of-hand" atmosphere. I'd rather go to a carnival than one of our fancy new theme parks with their perfectly manicured flower beds. Carnivals have, for lack of a better word, character.

The word carnival is taken from the Spanish word for meat - carne. In Greek, the word is sarx, and refers to flesh. A carnival is, literally, a festival for the flesh. The blinking lights, the smell of cotton candy and popcorn, the brightly colored toys and prizes, and the sounds of game hawkers and tinny recorded music are designed to entice and attract all five senses. And there's an important lesson we can learn from our carnival excursions, one that will help us the rest of the year if we'll just keep it in mind.

Have you ever taken kids to a carnival? They never have enough tickets to ride all the rides as many times as they want. There's never enough money to play the games long enough to win the giant stuffed Dalmation that won't fit in your car. They'll eat sweets and chug soda until the centrifugal force generated by the spinning rides catches up to their tummies. And then beg for "one more ride."

Have you ever gotten home with one of those cheesy stuffed animals with stickers for eyes and fur that fuzzes off in your hands only to realize you just paid $63 for a $2 toy?  But you couldn't stop playing until you won, right? Even though you knew the game was rigged. Even though you knew the carnie behind the counter was an expert in triggering your pride, getting you to try to knock over those stupid milk bottles "just one more time."
What happens to us in that carnival atmosphere? Overwhelmed by the assault on our senses, we become "carnivally minded," so caught up in the thrill of the moment we forget about the consequences and live for a five-second (or five-cent) reward.

"Oh, but that never happens to ME."

Oh yeah? How about the last time you went to a really good clearance sale and spent three times as much as you planned because "it was on sale"? Or the time you stopped at the car dealership on the way home to pick up a replacement bulb for your license plate and drove home in a brand new car, because the sales guy was really good at what he did? Or how about that time you got all stressed out when your in-laws came to visit, and then you burned the dinner and had a complete fit of carnality (aka flesh fit) in front of your entire family and the neighbors from across the street? That's "carnivally" - or carnally - minded. Shall I continue?

The world around us -- God's creation -- is truly a sensory delight, a carnival for the senses. Unfortunately, in the same way your momma used to warn you about those "carnies" at the carnival, there's an entity in the world that would like to suck you into that carnival and keep you there.

Paul wrote to the church at Rome, "For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace."



Rome was a lot like a perpetual carnival in those days. Rome might have coined the "what happens in Rome, stays in Rome" motto. Paul was trying to teach the believers there that giving in to their flesh all the time would result in death and destruction, while God's plan, to be "spiritually minded," would instead bring life and peace.

So what is being spiritually minded? Well, it's not becoming a Stoic, or living an ascetic life for the sake of achieving holiness, wandering around smacking yourself in the head with beads or whatever strange religious ritual folks come up with. Being spiritually minded is a lot like what happens when parents mature and take their kiddos to the carnival. You eventually learn to say "no" when that little chunk of flesh you share your name with starts screaming in the stroller, demanding MORE.

Why can you say no? Because you, as an adult, see beyond that present moment. You can see bedtime interrupted by tummyaches, and tears when the overpriced balloon pops in the car on the way home. You've stepped outside of the urgency of "right now" and are aware of something more, something better.

And so it is with us as we navigate the carnival of life. Be aware of that inward witness that is the Spirit of God in the Christ follower, listen when that witness pipes up in there and says, "no." He won't lead you astray. You can still enjoy the carnival, partake of the fun and games, but if you'll listen to the Holy Spirit, you won't go home with an empty wallet or in need of barf bag.

Sixteen years ago today I was enormous. My third baby was due July 10. It was the hottest summer Colorado had experienced in 30 years. It hadn't rained in weeks, and everyone was parched, edgy, and irritable.

On the evening of July 2, I lumbered my small cottage-sized body off to bed, only to be awakened by thunder and lightning in the hours before dawn. I remember thinking, "Finally! Maybe it will cool off!" Moments later I heard our Lab mutt attempting to break through the screened kitchen window to escape the thunder. Since hubby is notorious for sleeping through nighttime emergencies, I hurled myself out of bed and race-waddled into the kitchen. I didn't want the darned dog to shred the window screen. I let the dog come inside before traipsing back to bed, hotter and sweatier and more tired than before. I woke up in labor.

Lucas Cameron Turner made his entrance into the world at Aspen Valley Hospital in Aspen, Colo., a little after 1 p.m. He was a whopping 21-1/2" long, 8 lb-13 oz. baby boy - the largest of my four. The midwife and delivery room nurse commented on his long, dark eyelashes. He had the neck and shoulders of an NFL linebacker. We couldn't even snap the top snap of his Pooh Bear sleeper. Apparently, my intense craving for ice cream sandwiches during my pregnancy was his fault.

"Lukey" was a sweet baby. Mostly quiet and generally peaceful, with the occasional vindictive streak. A vile round of ear infections during his first and second year nearly threw us all for a loop, but God prevailed, and we all survived.

Tomorrow Luke turns 16. He's bigger than me, bigger than his big brother, and almost bigger than his dad. He's a computer whiz, and consistently amazes me with his ability to teach himself complicated computer jargon, and then apply it to fix people's computers. He's also an immensely talented drummer, playing on our church praise team and in a band with his brother.

The quiet, peaceable child has grown into a remarkable young man. He's our peacemaker, sibling counselor, and an incredible writer. His wit, dry humor, and ability to debate an issue with the best are a source of parental  pride, occasional frustration, and frequent raised eyebrows.

I'm so very proud of you, Luke! May this next year be full of blessings for you in every area!
Love you,
Mom