in need of...

suzanne disilvestri is a mother of seven beautiful children, ages 1-12. she was recently diagnosed with stage IV breast cancer that has metastasized to both her bones and her liver. she and her family are in need of help... support, prayer, meals, love. you can follow her story here.

if you live in the l.a. area and are interested in lending your support in some way other than keeping her and her family in your prayers, you can let me know... or just stay posted for news on a fundraising party coming soon to help provide for childcare for her babes while she is in treatment.

please join us in praying for a miracle for this family.

-the kiddos, last christmas.

the coming of Love

after baths we put up our jesse tree ornaments from the past few days that we had missed for one reason or another. the girls were in footsie jammies and i watched them scramble over kirby to reach the branches as i tried to tell short and interesting versions of each of the symbols. afterward we lit the second candle on our advent wreath, prayed a short prayer and sang a verse of 'o come, o come Emmanuel.' together, in the dark of our dining room, with two candles burning and two wide eyed girls watching it struck me (again, for the millionth time) how amazing it is to be given the privilege of parenting. these kids can't sing along with a christmas carol yet, they cant understand the depth of the Story, what it means to rejoice because He came to ransom us... but i get to show it to them. i get the creative freedom, the ability to establish beautiful and meaningful traditions in our home, i get to teach them, to point them to Him, to help to stir up an anticipation- an anticipation that now is excited only by christmas lights and the idea that someone named santa might drop off a princess bike on christmas morning... but also that a Baby was born on a still, cold night and there was a moment that changed everything. i don't think there is a better job on earth than mine.

this is why i love advent... it is so easy to talk about how important it is to remember what christmas is 'really about.' but without advent, we would only have one day to do that. one day to remember, be thankful, rejoice, reflect. and while that would be fine it it were all we had, advent allows us to stoke the flames, to pay attention to the lyrics in the songs we are singing, to really get excited and to remember why. it's the most beautiful time for me and i love seeing it come to life in the eyes of my babies. it reminds me of the magic that we should all feel right now.


i loved this reflection in a little advent journal made by a friend of mine-

"Are you ready for the coming of Love? Behold, He comes in the womb of a woman. You will catch your first glimpse of Love on the straw of a stable. There He is, emptying Himself, the Lord of Hosts; out of love He became a child."

mary dancing

and then there were five

april 10, 2010.


maybe this will get me back in the blogging spirit!

moved

so we are here...moved. i feel like the past few weeks have flown by. i have never moved with two kids before. and there are lots of lessons to be learned in that. lesson number one - your home simply will not be finished in the time frame you wish it to be. lesson number two - don't just hunker down and unpack for two weeks straight. it will make you feel like a crazy person.

so i have been changing my style a bit... doing a little unpacking, a little organizing, lots of seeing friends, lots of making friends, and fending off stressful feelings. this has made life easier, it seems...and the transition a bit smoother.

as for being in a new town, i really think we will love it here. i mean, we already love it... but i think we will grow to really love it. last night my mom and i took hero to her first movie at the theater downtown. it has one screen and the show is every night at 7. we walked there... it took about 4 minutes. that, to me (and compared to living in the sfv) is happiness in a can. we walked back at dusk and all i could see all around us was the black of the mountains against the bluish sky and i really saw for the first time, how small our new town was. we left central ave (which is our main st) and turned the corner and it was dark! it made me really happy and it made me happy for the babes, to grow up experiencing a little town like this.

as for the socializing we had an impromptu bbq for the 4th because our great friend brad and his incredible girlfriend, katrina, where in town visiting. fireworks are legal in fillmore, so we figured it was the perfect opportunity to introduce some friends to our new town. needless to say, it was awesome. we even took some family portraits to commemorate the awesomeness.


as you can see, country living suits us fine.

one of those kids

i got to spend saturday celebrating baby titus' coming with lindy and her family.

and at one point in the day, i discovered mary like this.


i am resigned to the fact that mary is just one of those kids.

(this is not, poop, by the way)

we are going to see coldplay in july

i wonder if any of these guys will be there?