Who Are You?

Do you ever notice how certain people in your life seem just like a character in some book or movie?
Like the author or director must have known this person, because it is so accurate. Have they met them?

Happens to me all the time.

I am pretty sure I have met a few characters from Anne, a Cinderella, a Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head, Mr. Fezziwig, and a few other less well known characters in the course of my life.

The other day I found my fictional persona. It is not as flattering as I otherwise would have wished, and similarity had Roman struggling not to smile.

It's Rabbit.

It was going to be one of Rabbit's busy days. As soon as he woke up he felt important, as if everything depended upon him. It was just the sort of day for Organizing Something, of for Writing a Notice Signed Rabbit, or for Seeing What Everybody Else Thought About It.
It was a Captainish sort of day, when everybody said, "Yes, Rabbit" and "No, Rabbit," and waited until he had told them.
The House At Pooh Corner, A.A. Milne

And if I am Rabbit, my children are definitely Tigger. Incidentally, Ethan and Saoirse regularly pray the Tigger will not bounce and mess up Rabbit's garden. Why? I have no idea!

I may be a bit prone to "Captainish" attitudes, but on the bright side I can be depended on, just like Rabbit. 

Tired

Beneath the pools of blue run subtle threads of weariness,
And above hang heavy lashes. Hands reach back
To the rub the knots of stress to gentle slack,
Perchance it may revive a former zest.
Long days of dishes make a sticky mess
While crumbs seem yet more crumbiness attract
And piles of laundry ebb and flow in their attack,
Lists and plans and calendars and clocks onward press.
By night the circuits of the brain say "Cease."
Voice is soft and just a little hoarse in bedtime song.                
Darkness gathers to hide the pains of day
A cleansing for the soul that has begun to fray.
Unspoken prayers are lifted from between the sheets,
To still the busy hands and aching bones.

~Caitlin Mallery


Right now I am eight months pregnant and raising two energetic toddlers. Everyday is exhausting! Every decision takes effort. So many days there are things that must be left undone. Yet we are all fed, clothed, and usually happy. New mercies are that of patience and grace to make it through each day from sunrise to sunset! (And sometimes in the middle of the night as well.)

Prayer for Home and Family

Lord, behold our family assembled here. We thank Thee for this place in which we dwell; for the love that unites us; for the peace accorded to us this day; for the hope with which we expect the morrow; for the health, the work, the food, and the bright skies that make our lives delightful; for our friends in all parts of the earth.

Let peace abound in our small company. Purge out of every heart the lurking grudge. Give us grace and strength to forbear and to persevere. Offenders ourselves, give us the grace to accept and forgive offenders. Forgetful ourselves, help us to bear cheerfully the forgetfulness of others.

Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare to us our friends, soften to us our enemies. Bless us, if it may be, in all our endeavors. If it may not, give us the strength to encounter that which is to come, that we may be brave in peril, constant in tribulation, temperate in wrath and in all changes of fortune, and down to the gates of death, loyal and loving one to another.

As the clay to the potter, as the windmill to the wind, as the children of their sire, we beseech of Thee for this help and mercy for Christ's sake. Amen.

~Robert Louis Stevenson

Do you admire the heroes of Treasure Island and Kidnapped? You should do so all the more after reading the above prayer, because the strong character to admire in young Jim Hawkins and David Balfour were created by a man of prayer and action. This is truly great literature in the hands of any boy or girl.

On Ethan's second birthday

Ezra 10:4

Arise! For this matter is your responsibility, but we will be with you; be courageous and act. 

Romans 12:12

There is so much to learn from the Holy Word. As Alistair Begg says,

"It is not the things I don't understand that bother me; it's the things I do understand that trouble me."

Lessons must be practiced if they are ever to be learned.

He Works

To what greater end our struggles go,
What the result is only He knows.
So whatever trials I do receive
I'll trust Him through them patiently;
And in the end when earth is past,
I will in Christ be gold at last.

~ Caitlin Mallery