Some thoughts on Advent

*WARNING: contains strong feelings regarding Elf on the Shelf:  if you have a deep love of this tradition, do not read

As a cradle Episcopalian and now lay minister in the church my life is marked by the color of linens and liturgical rhythm that structures our year.  As a person living in America and a mother of a toddler in the age of Pinterest my life is also inundated by the ways that others structure their own seasons; how they shop, how they celebrate, how they 'do life' and how it looks in comparison to my own.

It's an odd space to be in; a mom who ministers to teenagers and spends the entirety of my life thinking either of others' children or my own... the lenses I see the world through allow me to spend more time than the average mom thinking about faith formation.  I live and breathe it.  Each children's book becomes retreat material, each youth ministry book a parenting manual.  The greatest blessing to my ministry has been motherhood.  The greatest blessing to my motherhood has been, without a doubt, my ministry.  

This past weekend as I worked online to organize our family's 2014 Advent plans I came across what has become Advent in America... Elf on the Shelf.  If you know nothing about it, Google it, and become utterly exhausted for all parents.  In a nutshell a little elf moves in to your home the month leading up to Christmas and reports back to Santa nightly regarding your child's good or bad behavior (whether they are on the nice or naughty list).  

When the month leading up to Christmas becomes about the sum of our good or bad works Christmas becomes judgement day... recorded by a small elf who has invaded our homes we have, without a doubt, left Christ out of Christmas.  Christ, in fact, came to save us from the elf on the shelf.  

There is no more tally.  

There is no works salvation. 

There is nothing we can do that cuts us out of the eternal celebration if we chose to accept the invitation.  

There is no naughty or nice list.  

There is only the gift of GRACE.  

Grace (noun) in Christian belief: the free and unmerited favor of God, as manifested in the salvation of sinners and the bestowal of blessings

What we do with our kids matters.  What we teach them, both explicitly and implicitly, about God makes a difference.  The month leading up to Christmas should be full of excitement, anticipation, and joy.  There are amazing resources out there to help moms and dads and grandmas and grandpas and aunts and uncles make Advent a time of holy preparation that readies our children for the life altering gift that is Christ's birth.  

• I have learned so much from my sweet friend Christine that I was blessed to meet on a retreat in North Carolina and now I just stalk via Facebook.  She writes about how she celebrates Advent with her family on her blog These Stones.  You will also get lost in her awesomeness, go ahead... I do it, too. 
•  If you are a lover of finding mass amount of information in one place as I am, go ahead and start a Family Advent Board on Pinterest.  Don't start comparing yourself, aint no body got time for that.
• Looking for a great way to teach your children about St. Nicholas? (HURRY!  St. Nicholas day is December 6th!) Watch the Veggie Tales movie on Netflix!
• Jesse Tree.  Just get all up in your research mode and figure out how you can make that happen for your family.  It's the thread, it's the ah-ha! It's beautiful to behold.  My little ones are not quite there yet but I am anxious to make this new book by Ann Voskamp what our Advent is about... HURRY UP AND GROW UP ALREADY I WANT TO DO THIS

We can spend our time moving an elf around as she/he creates nightly havoc on our homes and instils faulty theological ideas of Christ's birth in our children or we can put that energy into forming our children's faith in ways that will sustain them past the magic years.  I need my children to know about, feel, accept, and cling to God's GRACE.  There are Christmas' ahead of them that will be sad, lonely, where they will mourn.  There will be others where they will feel as they do now, where the magic of it all will be too much but no because of a list or an elf or a gift but because of LOVE.  

"For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders.  And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." -Isaiah 9:6

So this is 30...

As my birthday quickly approached this summer I kept hearing the same thing over and over again…

I loved 30! The 30's are the best years of your life!

I have only been on this planet for 30 years but I already have a few take-aways…things that as I move through this decade I can be confident in:

1.  There is no best year.  There is no best decade.  Dickens had it right… it is the best of times and the worst of times.  I have put a lot of pressure on best in my life.  Best is ridden with comparison and aint no body got time for that.  Comparison has ripped me of too much joy in this life.  I'm sure there will be great things that happen in my 30's and I am also sure there will be a lot of crap to go with it.  See #2.

2.  People I love are going to die while I'm in my 30s.  Some of which I am acutely aware of at this moment.  Some of which will be sudden.  I'm hoping and praying I make it through but I am also aware that there is no guarantee for me.  Thirty means I am past the age where the only people who die are grandparents and other people's people.  I am going to lose some of my people.  I feel an ache for those losses already.

3.  That my children will drive me bat-shit crazy and I will like them more than any other being on the planet-- all within a five minute time period.  Deac is probably our last baby.  My loins are not quite ready to own that one but it may be our reality.  The other night as I turned off the lights and picked up Deac's onesie from the day I found myself burring my nose in his dirty baby clothes.  I just needed to smell him.  I needed to lock that smell somewhere deep within me.  That smell is love and comfort and mama-can-make-it-better.  For a minute I wondered if I kept it hidden in a rubbermaid somewhere and pulled it out in 16 years… would it smell the same?  My instincts tell me no but my heart tells me try it anyway.

4.  I will struggle with my weight.  This battle has been mine since the 2nd grade.  I am now facing losing the same health-affecting 50 pounds I have lost twice before and the other 20 that's just so I fit in to that one pair of jeans from that one time when all I did was workout and eat Subway.  I no longer struggle with the things I did surrounding my weight as a child or a teenager or even as a young adult (when I fit those prior mentioned jeans).  There is no longer relentless teasing on the playground or crude comments.  I'm not trying to catch me a man.  The people I am surrounded by could care less about my weight.  They see ME.  They see my heart, for better or worse, and are in no way concerned about my jean size.  That's all me.  Since at the moment NONE of my adorable jeans fit I am feeling defeated and all yoga-panty.  This battle is my own but how I fight it demonstrates to my daughter what it means to love herself.  The line between vanity and health can be thin for me.  I will walk it carefully in my 30's… striving to always stay on the side of health because I know Aubrey is watching.

5. My marriage will get better and harder.  Two nights ago I pulled out the scrapbook of memories and plans I made for Jay on our second Christmas together.  I was 21.  I carefully created this book that looked perfect.  I had cute quotes and lists of the things 'to do before babies' and 'to do after babies'.  I had all the cards I had written him while we lived apart carefully glued in to pages.  I knew this was something that would fill with our dreams and history (only it all had to be in my handwriting because his was too messy) but it now sits very empty.  There was too much pressure on the book and we never wrote in it after the first week.  Right there would be the root issue of that.  I have given up on perfect in our marriage. I know that planning a perfect life does not guarantee it. I am working on giving up my own control issues and desire for perfection.  I know in this next decade there will be times that I think I can do better.  There will be times I believe that he should do better.  There will be moments I look at him and fall in love all over again and times I look at him and think really… 50 more years of this?  My sweet boss has said a million times to me (when I get all judgey and say to him How are those two married?) that there is grace in every marriage.  There has never been anything so true.  It has taken me 10 years together to know that we are probably not going to get divorced.  That he is not going to be a recreation of my dad.  And that I am enough for him and he is enough for me.  Note:  can someone please remind me of this when he buys his 8th truck since moving to C'ville, which will happen sooner than I am comfortable with, I'm sure.

6.  There is nothing more important than good friends.  I have been blessed with a best friend.  A person who knows me better than I know myself.  The other day she yelled at me for 4 minutes on the phone while I ugly cried.  She has never, in our 16 years of friendship, raised her voice to me.  She screamed and ranted and cried as she did it and informed me, in no uncertain way, that I needed to stop apologizing for being happy. There is oh-so-much back story of how we got to this point in the conversation that will all reveal itself in time but I needed to ugly cry and she needed to yell and we needed to do it together.  She is my therapy.  She is my other life partner.  When I moved across the country I was terrified that I would not make more friends.  It took a while.  In the past 2 months God has shown me that She will never leave me without close girlfriends because She knows that is my life-line.  Last month when I got some big, scary, life-shaking news (I'm fine, the kids are fine, Jay is fine but it's just not time for it to be internet published) my sweet Jodi did what she does best.  She read books about the thing and is reporting back what I should read and not read (because it's just too much right now).  Things I should think about and begin to work through.  She is making a plan when my heart won't let me but my reality needs me to.  She is my person here.  It's like I can breathe again.  How people survive without girlfriends is beyond me.


So this is 30... The only thing I am 100% sure of is that it will surprise me.

Note:  This adorable picture in which my children are cute and I am dressed to go out for my birthday with all my friends with a gin & tonic in hand... it looks like life is great, right?  45 seconds later Deac puked all over my linen pants (the only nice thing that fits) and I said words that a toddler shouldn't hear come from my mouth.  THAT is 30.

Sam Winslow's Guest Post... What if?

As a minister I am privileged to hold the secrets and the stories and the hurts and the triumphs of the families I serve.  To be present for the most painful, confusing, joyful, and surprising parts of people's lives is a gift. To hold space with them, to listen, to be a safe space, to be a non-judgmental companion as they walk through the hard parts of this life may be the aspect of ministry that fills my heart with the Holy like nothing else can.  Those moments shared are precious to me.  For the most part, they are mine (and ours for who I am with). No one knows what is spoken over coffee or hospital beds or emergency Bodos dates.   

Today, I get to share with you a story that is dear to me.  A story that Sam and his family wanted to share.  A story they wanted to spill out to all parents and kids and those who feel alone.  Sam is beyond precious to me, to our youth community, to our parish.  He is a man who knows how to make others feel complete love and worth.  And he is smart.  Like scary crazy smart.  He sat on my search committee as a sweet skinny tall 10th grade boy.  He is now a senior in college and eloquent and funny and brave.  The way his peers feel about him is how I hope every kid gets to feel.

These words are Sam's.  This story is his.  This truth is universal and real and needs to be heard.

What if…?

It’s a small enough question, isn’t it? It’s just two simple words. Now add a few more.

What if my child is gay?

In the struggle to come to terms with my sexuality, the biggest barrier to coming out was not the rest of the world, nor was it my parents. The person I dreaded telling most was myself. After all, wasn’t I supposed to end up with a woman? My whole life I had had a plan. I’ll go to college. Maybe I’ll pursue a graduate degree. Then I’ll get a job. Relationships would surely follow, ostensibly with women, and then a marriage, kids, and a happy life. If everything was going according to plan, then why wasn’t I happy?

When thoughts of being attracted to men first started crossing my mind, I felt guilty. Every time I gave leash to the idea of desiring a man, a deep shame shadowed my mind. Beat it down, Sam. Hide it. Bury it inside you. Those are forbidden thoughts.

For a long time, I had tried to convince myself that maybe I was just bisexual. Yeah, that seems alright in my conscience. Have your little ‘ideas,’ but you’ll still end up with a woman. Freud would have had a field day with that one. It took more time to stop trying to justify my own mind and accept myself. But why did it take so long?

When going to tell my parents that I’m gay, I called my parents into the room, asking if I could talk to them about something. They thought I had scratched the car. When I told them I’m gay, they were dumbfounded. It didn’t make any sense. Here’s our son, he’s perfectly normal. Gay guys aren’t like our son. This is all wrong.

And so I return to the original question, what if my child is gay? I am not a parent. I am not a sage crone, speaking from years of life experience. I’m merely a 21 year old college student, out of the closet for barely 6 months. But I know one thing, if that question had crossed my parents’ minds for 30 seconds out of the 21 years of my life, then the 10 seconds of eternity following telling my parents I’m gay would have been filled with love, not silence. Have you ever heard true silence? There is quiet, and then there is silence. The latter is infinitely scarier than the first, for it carries all the fear of walking into the dark. I sat there, not knowing what they would say. I begged, implored my parents to say something. “Do you love me,” I had to ask.

I’m one of the lucky ones. The weeks following my coming out were filled with questions, doubts, and fears, but through it all a desire to redo those first 10 seconds. And in fact, we’ve learned things about our family and breaking down emotional barriers that never would have happened without the discussions we had in those first weeks.

But what about all the other sons and daughters out there? What about the kids whose parents sit there saying how disgusted they are with the direction the country is headed? How do they even consider the possibility of imagining a time when they are happily comfortable with themselves, and know that their family stands behind them? How can they be helped?

I am not saying that every parent in the world needs to cater to the possibility of their child being gay by painting the house in rainbows. But please, let the question “what if my child is gay?” cross your mind for 30 seconds. Tell yourself that if that time comes, that you know your initial reaction will be one of love. Hug your child. The world is full of people who are quick to judge, eager to condemn others at the slightest excuse. Perhaps your child is doing that to themselves, already. What would you do if your child told you they had totaled the car? What if they were pregnant? How scared do you think they would be of telling you, only then to find out that their fears were justified? Now to whom do they turn?

My mother told me that her initial hesitation when I came out to her was one of fear. She grew up in the ‘80s. She was my age during the AIDS crisis. She knows that the world truly is a scary place. All she wants is for me to be safe, and to protect me. How cruel it is, then, that her maternal instincts came across as being distanced in those first few seconds. How could I sit there, staring into the silence, and not cry out of sheer terror, curled into a ball so tight I had hoped I could disappear. No, I was not kicked out of the house. No, I was not disowned. No, I have never injured myself, or contemplated suicide. I’ve been lucky.

If you are a parent, if you are a grandparent, an aunt, uncle, sibling, cousin, or friend, hear my plea. Pause. Stop. Think. If somebody you know comes out to you, rest assured that they are more terrified than you could ever be. Comfort them. Your initial reaction will determine the trajectory of the future of your relationship. You can aim for the dirt, or you can aim for the sky. Do the hard work now and let your mind consider the possibility of “what if?” Then all that need follow later is love.

In this, and in all things, I wish you every happiness,

Sam Winslow

Back at it. {an EYC Update}

This is what the past 3 months has looked like for me... pretty darn cute, huh?  This morning as they laid in our bed while I got dressed (a new concept for me lately. I'm sure the teachers at Aubrey's school were a little shocked!) my sweet little world of mommy-ing and home began to crack open.

Welcome to real life, I thought.  You can do hard things.  I keep reminding myself that the to-do list will get shorter (haha!) and that being without my little man will have joys along with the sting of not having his chubby hand grab for mine all day.  And already, 5 hours in, the joys are appearing.  I am beyond excited for our mission trip in July.  I had breakfast this morning with our high schoolers just because I missed them. Nothing has changed: they are still brutally honest and make me laugh more that I'd like to admit.  I was welcomed back with breakfast from the staff and flowers.  *Yes, that is double breakfast... be jealous*

When I came back to work after having Aubrey I was afraid of how I'd get it all done.  This time I know, I won't.  I can't do all.the.things.  as much as I desperately wish I could.  I'm not the 25 year old youth minister with nothing but time who could go to every everything that ever happened on a campus.  Now I'm the *gulp* almost 30 year old youth minister with two kids, play dates, friends, and a house who can't be everywhere but who can be far more authentic than I was 5 years ago. Who can speak the hard truth and hold up the mirror to show my students their beauty and worth.  The realness of Christ's movement through my ministry... the way that being a mom has taken time away from my students but given me a heart for them that only a parent can have, it has changed the game for me.

I used to want to give our students the joy of the life I had in high school by living withing a strong Christian community.  Now, I want to make sure that each and every one of our students knows that they are worthy.  That nothing they do or say or accomplish can make God love them any more or less.  That the world needs their unique beautiful selves unfiltered (via Instagram or their peers) and by living into THAT they will know true community and perfect love.

You.  Are.  His.  Beloved.  

and so am I.  

A cooler on the porch.

Our sweet church does this amazing thing.  They FEED you when you have a baby.

Like desserts every night.  Already cleaned fruit.  Covered dish.  Full belly.  Feed you.

And they leave your meal in a cooler on your porch.

Thank.  The.  Good.  Lord.

Because while some people struggle with being pregnant or that whole baby transitioning through a ridiculously small opening thing, I struggle with 5pm.  After giving birth to two little humans the worst hardest most scary part is the sun setting.

And sadly, that also collides with the time that people bring you dinner.

On more than one occasion (I would say on MOST occasions) each time some sweet family was creeping up our steps to slip a meal in to our camping cooler I was sitting on the other side of the door on the couch crying.  There was usually one or two other small people crying with me.  All I wanted to do was get to those desserts and feed the feeling of

whatthehellhaveidone
howdoidothis
whenwillieversleepagain

Those are clinical names.

And those signs covering my windows; they were sort of so you couldn't see me breastfeeding but they were mostly so you couldn't see me crying.

With each baby I have found myself googling 'at what point do I see a doctor for psychosis?'  I also find Jay googling 'how do I deal with my wife who just had a baby'

You have to wait two weeks before you even go in for depression, the psychosis diagnosis is FAR later.  I know.  I've called my OB and asked.  Jay has not called my OB but has learned to just keep bringing me brownies.

I am always convinced I'm the only one.  I'm the only one who has such a hard time with feeding this small human.  I'm the only one who cries because this new family member is beautiful and oh-so-freaking-needy!  I'm the only one who is morose because they didn't appreciate that last good night of sleep.

Yet, I know I'm not.  The OB, my friends, and my meal-providers told me!  Loneliness may be the next worst feeling to 5pm because on top of it all you don't want the world to think you just can't handle being a mom so you close the door, put out the cooler, and cover the windows.

God and I are struggling with why such a cruel thing happens-- not only does your whole life turn upside down when having a baby but you are also stripped of having the mental capacity and emotional control to deal with it in a level-headed way.

I've begun to think of it as baby boot camp.  The worst happens at the start so you know as you look back it's only getting better.  Even if your little dude isn't sleeping through the night at least you didn't cry at dinner tonight!  Even if you have to wear yoga pants to every.  gosh.  darn.  outing.  because buttons are the devil you are aware that you have survived the meconium poop so things are looking up.

Those first two weeks are hell, mamas.  You know it.  I know it.  We all know it.  You may love that little baby so much it hurts (or you may hope you do because nothing is for sure in the haze of baby boot camp) but it's a different level of hard.  It's "can I actually do this??" hard.  That kind of hard is scary.  But 5pm passes.  The sun rises again.  The days pass and before you know it boot camp is over and you look back on those weeks with fond memories that must be placed there by God Herself because they are not real but the human race would not survive if we remembered what it was really like.

Also.  Dessert with your coffee in the morning will give you something to live for.

Oh… and this face!