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Dear Friend Who Doesn’t Like Mother’s Day,

by with 2 Comments BlogFaithFamily

Dear Friend Who Doesn’t Like Mother’s Day,

The greeting card aisle is going to be packed this week at the grocery store- dozen of folks swarmed around to find just the right words to stick in an envelope. It’s coming Sunday: Mother’s Day. This is the day we set aside to celebrate moms and all they mean to us.  Seventy-five percent of all the flower sales in the U.S. each year happen THIS weekend.  That’s a lot of roses, ya’ll.    For many moms and their children this is a beautiful day filled with family and flowers, good food and gifts.  We will smile and thank our families and share a meal, and it will be restful. I anticipate it will be that way for me. But this is far from reality for many.

Because sometimes there are no words and no bouquets.

For some Mother’s Day can be a brutal-reminder kind of day. The day that points out to a woman all the holes, the tattered places, the loss. There is a vacant seat at the table, an empty mailbox, or a painful place in our hearts.

Because this broken world can mean wayward children and less-than-perfect relationships.  Often there is no card that can be purchased that says just the right thing from a daughter who carries too much pain and distance between herself and her mom.  Or Sunday might be a day that a daughter just sits with memories of her mother, lost from this world because of cancer, a lifetime cut way too short.

Or maybe a mother sits surrounded by photographs hung on the walls of her children, her table empty, no visitors to welcome. Maybe she’s lost a child to death or to a prodigal path.  Maybe there’s just silence these days.  Maybe she has given up that she will ever hug them again.

These are not Hallmark moments.

So to all the moms or daughters who feel a little broken this Mother’s Day… I see you.  This Sunday might be a time of mending for you, or it might just be a day to sit with the feelings.  I don’t know. I  only know that I have  a little gift for you, to remind you that regardless of your circumstances, you are beloved.

I created these reminders for myself: 18 scriptures printed on a page that speak truth to me.  I  framed them, right there here where I can see them daily.

They contain words like:

You are loved.  You are beautiful. You are special.  You are cared for. 

Words from a Father who knew that we would need them. Words just maybe for such a time as this- a day that comes with mixed feelings and lonely places.

So to moms or daughters that find this weekend hard, these are for you.  I’d send you roses and daisies from my yard too if I could. You are not alone.

You can download the below printable here.

 

Happy Mother’s Day.

 

 

 

 

 

acorn

The Stage of Letting Go That Might Kill You (or make you grow)

by with No Comment BlogParenting

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The girl that I have known before she took her first breath is preparing to leave.

She is nearly eighteen and preparing for college and my sophomore boy is taller than me, carrying bravery around like his battered backpack. They are both braver than me most days.

The thick-panes of my upstairs bedroom window frame the bare tree as I think about this season. From my view just one red leaf is still hanging on in the late day sun.

It is late autumn and the leaves have all turned crimson and gold.  Some accepted change before others. It’s a wide, glorious display before the winter snow piles high over them and they become nothing but compost for spring flowers. This one tree seems stubborn.

That single crimson leaf seems ready to let go, veined and wrinkled.

I wonder why that leaf is holding on when there are so many are there on the ground, waiting to cushion her fall. The autumn outside my window swirls like the emotions in this mama’s heart and there is no denying this season.

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I know that all of these changes will make me grow, just like that tree. Another ring will form this year. But I’m not quite ready.

Read the rest here…

(I’ve got a guest-post over at my friend Tammy’s this week…join me there?)

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Laying Down Idols Like Bad 80’s Hair

by with No Comment BlogCommunity

Those of us who are old enough to remember the 80’s know one thing for certain:

We loved our hair.

When I was 16 Madonna was in “Vogue.” Cyndi Lauper identified my “True Colors” and Depeche Mode was helping me find my “Personal Jesus.”

We pegged up our high-waisted, acid wash jeans, listened to a few cassettes on the Walkman and applied teal blue eyeliner before school.  I would have crimped my hair but it was already curly enough so I just spritzed on  “Poison” perfume and hit the door in my combat boots and lace tights. Vans and legwarmers also lined my closet.

There are many versions of 80’s hair~ one to suit every personality.
Most involved Aqua Net. 

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This particular number was taken at Glamour Shots circa 1987. (If you don’t know what that is you can hang out with my daughter~ I’m fine with that.)  Glamour Shots were photograpy places in malls.  And very cool.  The props were mainly boas and anything that might be worn on the t.v. shows “Dallas” or Dynasty.”

It seemed like a really good idea to us 80’s girls at the time.  All. Of. It.
The hair, the big earrings, the parachute pants, legwarmers, acid-wash and neon colors.
But today we look back and all the hairspray, crimping irons and banana clips make us cringe.  Maybe they were a terrible idea after all.

We feel kind of foolish.

Idols are like that.
Each way we crave to be seen and known seems timeless, or maybe a bit rebellious.  The things we think define us come in many forms so we pick our combination from a long list that seem attractive. “Everybody’s doing it.” we tell ouselves.
So we make idols out of:

Accomplishments
Awards
Recognition
Praise
Words from others
Finances
Possessions
Ministry
Our children
Other people
Places

Some things we even obsess over are GOOD things.  And they seem to fill us up for awhile.

But the idols lie to us, just like bad 80’s hairstyles.
There is nothing timeless about them.
They are held up by little more than aerosol hairspray and popular opinion.
It’s time to call a spade a spade and a Glamour Shot a Glamour Shot.
It’s time to step away from the mirage that is nothing more than angled mirrors, harsh lighting, costumes, and big earrings.

The hair used to be cute.  But it’s time to get some “Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific” and get a handle on that mess.

We don’t need any of it.  We are way more beautiful without the Aqua Net and aqua eyeliner, the accomplishments and the awards.
In the mirror of God’s words we are:

Beloved
Chosen
Forgiven
Redeemed
Holy
Loved
Beautiful
Daughters

HIS.

There’s a little revolution about all this happening~
It’s a laying down of idols. And I’d love for you to join in.

I recently read Jennifer Dukes Lee’s beautiful book “Love Idol: Letting go of your need for approval . . . and seeing yourself through God’s eyes.”  and then I shared it with my 16-year old daughter.  We’re both so excited that this book is now available everywhere~ releasing one week early!  I encourage you to pick up a copy and then to share it with a friend or in a small group discussion.

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 You’ll find these gems:

“Dear God, help me get over myself today.” ~ Jennifer Dukes Lee

Personal strength is not necessarily a virtue. Neither is got-it-togetherness.  ~ Jennifer

We tell each other that it’s safe to be authentic, but are we making unthreatening places for people to be less than perfect?  ~Jennifer

RUN get this book.
And if you still have any acid-wash jeans?  Um, it’s time for those to GO, and your idols with them.  Good riddens.

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To keep this 80’s Love Idol train going, I’m joining a sista over here because we are laying down our Aqua Net and quest for approval to know we are preapproved.

So go visit Tammy at If Meadows Speak.
And she’s rocking the acid wash floral today and  “Laying Down Idols Like an 80’s Legwarmer.”
In all seriousness, order Jennifer’s book here and join the Love Idol Movement.

And have you seen the 2 minute video of beautiful truth below? You are preapproved!

 

 

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When You Give a Girl a Red Marker

by with No Comment BlogFaith

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(photo courtesy of Cindee Snider Re)

That morning we had shoveled the driveway to help dad get to work and I had felt important. But that feeling didn’t last.  Given a little time alone, insecurity had crept back into me and bled out through the red marker that I held in my hand.

I was 10 years old when I wrote the first sentence I was really proud of.

I was sitting behind the Christmas tree and the colored bulbs were glowing through the tinsel.  They were the kind of lights that got hot after shining awhile, so I licked my pinkie and touched them to hear the sizzle. I twirled a curly strand of hair around my index finger while I doodled and wrote.  My eyes were fixed on that Frazier fir next to the snow-covered picture window. I had spotted a cardinal among the flurries that day and it was the most beautiful bird I had ever seen~ a brilliant red against pure white. I wrote a sentence describing it and for a moment I thought it was the most lovely thing I had ever read. The next moment I doubted it was ever worth sharing.  I balled the paper up and threw it into the fireplace.

I thought about things, sitting there by the tree. Things like how I hated my frizzy hair and how Julie Sanders’ was straight and blond.  And how I wished I was her.  Because everybody noticed Julie, especially Steve Hoskins.  I thought about how I seldom spoke out loud but how I had so much I wanted to say.  I also pondered how I might just march onto that cafeteria stage at St. Mary’s Catholic School one random day and make a proclamation.
If I wasn’t so afraid of my own voice.

I wrote all that down.  I penned out the wounding words twisted on myself and then I tucked the pages under my pillow, hidden. I was trying hard to be invisible and invincible all at once. I never spoke to adults at that age, and seldom to my peers.  I was nearly mute.  My mom had to explain more than once to others that I wasn’t being rude.  I was simply the “s” word: SHY.  But the truth behind the shyness was deep insecurity.

I looked down a lot and that’s where I began to notice dandelions in the cracks of pavement, snowflake patterns, and how when people’s shoelaces were untied they felt uncomfortable even before they noticed they were undone. Looking down I saw things that others missed. It’s where I started to become a writer.
It’s part of my story, the looking-down.

Shy followed me like a shadow into my 20’s, punctuated with brief seasons of brave.
The calendar has spun several decades since all that insecurity.

Let me be clear: this is a confession.
I still go mute sometimes. And I compare. And look down when I should be looking up.
I’m not sure if it’s fear of not being perfect or too much pride.  Or a whole lot of both.

I have used my own voice to beat myself up and to doubt what God says about me.  I’ve spent way too much time listening to the voices in my head.  Too dang much time criticizing everything from my hair, my writing, my life, and other people instead of knowing that I have been pre-approved by Savior who created me just the way I am for such a time as this.
So have you.

It’s time to take back the voices: The ones that lie.

Because the truth is that HE gave me {and you} a brave, strong voice capable of compassion and empathy.  A voice to speak love and truth and grace into the day-to-day of mothering or ministry or mountains of problems. We own courageous voices of encouragement made solely to carry HIS message to those around us.  To tell better stories, especially to OURSELVES.

 

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