An October Tradition

For the past two years, I go a bit pumpkin crazy during the first couple days of October and start baking the flavors of fall.  This year is no different!

I have always said I am in general a better cook than a baker, but when I find a great recipe that is tried and true, I will share it!  So enjoy my Amazing Pumpkin Bread!

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Amazing Pumpkin Bread
(makes 2 loaves or 3 dozen muffins)

Ingredients:
3 cups bread flour
1 TBSP pumpkin pie spice
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup butter, very soft (not melted!)
3 eggs
1 15 oz can pure canned pumpkin
1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts (optional)

Steps:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and grease either loaf pans or muffin tins.

2. In medium bowl, mix the flour, spices, salt, baking powder, and baking soda, and set aside.

3. In large bowl, beat together softened butter and sugars. Add the eggs. Beat for two minutes with mixer until fluffy (do not under beat!).

4. Add the pumpkin to butter/sugar/egg bowl and mix by hand until well combined.

5. In three batches, add the dry ingredients and mix gently by hand until each batch is just incorporated (scrape the sides between each batch). If desired, gently stir in nuts. Batter will be thick and fluffy, not liquid. Do not over mix!

6. Fill each loaf pan with half the batter, or fill muffin tins half full. Bake loaves about an hour, muffins about 20 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean and tops are golden. Cool in pan for ten minutes, then run a knife around the sides and finish cooling on wire rack.

7. Eat and enjoy!

I'm not always one to separate the dry and wet ingredients when I bake, but it does make a difference with this recipe, and keeps it from being very dense and crumbly. In addition, mixing the dry and wet together gently keeps this light and airy. It is worth it, though, and one of my guilty pleasures in the fall. My favorite way to eat it is with a light layer of cream cheese and a delicious cup of coffee (or apple cider!).

A Season of Loss

Why grieve death?  It is inevitable; we all die, and we all know that one day, our time with come.  Those who are not here and just that:  not here.  They don't see the tears, experience the heartache, shoulder the weight that settles so heavily.

The living grieve death.  Life cut short, gone from us from this present world.  The passing of time does not make the sadness of living without them any easier.  And so many reminders as of late.  Seven local students dead.  A college friend dying of cancer.  A child murdered.  My own daughter almost drowning just three months ago.  The miscarriage we just went through a month ago.

I know, I know, I'm being melancholy.  But it's October 1st again.

Don't get me wrong; I love fall.  Changing leaves and apple cider.  Cooler weather, breezy days.  But ever year since the year I turned eight, fall begins with death.

I can close my eyes and still see the pictures of our smashed mini-van, and his totaled pick-up.  I can still see her in her casket, feel her cold and dry skin; I can still remember the vow I took that day that I would not cry over her death again, and I didn't, for five long and hard years.  I still feel the rage bubble up at times, over his stupid and senseless driving after a day of fishing and drinking beer at the lake that resulted in the loss of two lives.  After so many years, I still want to scream at God at the senselessness at her death; she was only thirty-six and had four children who desperately needed her.

But I don't.

No, I don't scream.  The tears ceased falling some time ago.  Life in its own way moved on without her.  Somehow, we picked up the shattered pieces of our lives, clumsily glued them back together, and life continued.  Dad remarried.  Two more siblings.  High school graduation.  College.  Another graduation, this time with honors.  Boyfriends.  Heartaches.  Ministry.  Adulthood.  Marriage.  Two children of my own.

But I still grieve.

Beneath the surface, my heart still bleeds.  It weeps for things I never got to share with her.  A good exam.  My first kiss.  The rise and fall of the ministry with Wycliffe. All four of her childrens' weddings.  A cup of coffee.  Snuggling newborn grandchildren.  Late night phone calls.  Becoming the woman she wanted me to be.  Time.

I was robbed of time.

I may be days away from turning thirty, but I still yearn and long and ache for my mother as much as I did that fateful autumn day so many years ago.  God, will I ever understand why?

I miss you, Mom.

A Month Has Come & Gone

Looking at today's date, I realize it really has been a month since we miscarried Rogers' Baby #3.  It's hard to believe that if we hadn't, I would be creeping up to the end of our first trimester.

*sigh* 

I dislike reminders that there is no longer a child growing and thriving in my womb.

For those of you who have gone through this, or struggle with other battles such as infertility, I wanted to share a poem a dear friend, and our daughter's namesake, wrote:


A Flower for a Friend

I don’t know what you’re going through.

But I know how it feels

to grieve without a funeral,

to ask “why?” to the ceiling,

to miss someone you’ve never met.

I have felt the injustice

of reckless insensitivity

of comments that pierce like knives

of children abused, unwanted, abandoned.

I know what it means to carry around an invisible grief on your back every day,

a grief that feels

like it should disable you,

like you should be in a wheelchair.

I’ve memorized all the faces of suffering–anger, fear, jealousy, despair.

People say, “It will get better.”

Which isn’t exactly true.

But you will learn to live with it, like someone who’s lost his right arm learns to live with just the left.

Dear friend, I don’t know what you’re going through.

I’ve never walked the path you’re on.

But I have walked the one beside it.

-Emily Wilson

"When I Am Silent"

"Who will sing my song, when i am silent?
Who will count the colors of the dawn?
Who will follow the lark's flight,
Who will hear it's song,
when am I silent,
who will sing for me?

Who will scent the fragrance of a flower?
Who will laugh at snowflakes on the tongue?
Who will dance barefoot in the grass?
Spinning and twirling,
and spinning and twirling
to welcome the warmth of May.
Who will dance?

When I dance no more....

When I sing no more...

When I am silent, silent...

Who will cry for me?
Who will cry..."

By Joan C Varner; written after a trip to the Auschwitz concentration camp.

It is applicable and says what my heart feels today on the 10th anniversary of September 11th.

Picture by Leah Anderson Hartman

Focus on the Who

So in light that my husband just posted his 300^th blog, I was actually reminded that I have a blog.  It has been a busy time and a very long summer.  We’ve moved in June as Jonathan took a pastorate position in a small Baptist church in southern Georgia, nearly lost our 3 year-old daughter in a swimming accident over the 4^th of July, miscarried our 3^rd biological child in August, and somewhere in there are dealing with balancing marriage, parenting, ministry, a small business, home schooling, and a plethora of other things.

Truth be told?  My heart hurts.

I’m used to change; I’ve always craved it, as I have more than just a strong dash of wanderlust running in my veins.  Blame it on touring the country in our old Winnebago towing the race car as Dad became a successful drag racer, or family mission trips that turned into individual consecutive summer jaunts around the globe (I had been on 4 continents by the age of seventeen), but in the midst of the change swirling around us, I crave peace during the storm of change.

This summer has taken my relationship with God to another level… if you have known my struggles over the past 2 or 3 years, I have battled with feeling obligated to love Jesus, but how messed up is that?  Being duty-bound to love the sweet Savior of my soul?  So for over two years I have battled against it:

Gnawing at the bars of my internal cage,

Eager?  No.

Desperate.

Hammering my head,

My heart,

My soul,

Against the lock that has no key.

Why?

Where?

Fear.   

Choking and all-consuming fear.

Fear of intimate joy being forever gone.

That was a something I wrote awhile back describing the caged relationship I battled with regarding my personal relationship with God.  The honeymoon period long gone, and the daily war for peace, joy, and contentment was literally that:  war.  Every day.  Multiply times a day.  For one who feels so keenly, going through 2+ years of an emotional block with my Savior felt suicidal.  Yet in that, this summer I’ve started to see glimpses of light, the bars slowly starting to bend apart.  I’ve had a day-by-day lesson in faith and perseverance, to believe even when your heart does not feel.

 I struggle against questioning God.  Why?  What was the object to the last two years?  What lesson did you and are you wanting me to know through this?  But I am reminded of the tiny quote of wisdom a former professor counseled me with when God closed the doors on my future with Wyclife Bible Translators:

Don’t lose yourself in the battle of the why’s; instead focus on the Who.

The Who?  My Who… my sweet Savior… my Jesus… Alpha and Omega… Lord of Lords... Kings of Kings… my Papa God… Adonai… Yeshua.

God.

King.

Father.

A Little Bit of Poetry

Stumbled across some of the poetry I wrote back in high school over ten years ago; this was one of my favorites I did in response to this painting.






Hope
Frederic Church's Aurora Borealis


Alone
Lost and cold in a watery desert.
Icy waves slap against the ships bow
I shiver.
There is no hope.

A great desolate rock rises on the horizon
Contrasted by white glacier ice.
My crippled ship floats nearer;
My vessel wants me to be injured, too.
I panic;
Dash to the cold mahogany wheel.
Straining
She turns,
Slowly meandering away.

Tears of frustration course down my crimson cheeks.
Desperate
I drop to my knees.
Ready to beseech the heavens
My eyes imploringly turn to the vast expanse of space
And the lights of the aurora borealis
Are cast upon my tear stained face.
Illuminated streaks of soft pinks
Vivid reds
Bright blues
And glistening greens fill the sky.

Peace floods my devastated spirit
Soothing my inner core.
As I gaze at the phenomenal heavens
Perseverance surges through my veins,
Along with the hope to continue on.

A New Month and New Year!

So I didn’t even come close to my goal of 10,000 words in December.  I blame this on a few things.  First of all, an adorable little boy named Ethan, who is a newborn.  Second, going back to work only a week after having Ethan.  Third, being sick constantly!  I had a horrible cold/sinus infection, and then the stomach flu, then my wisdom teeth removed.  So no, I did not write as much as I wanted to in December.

However, not only is it a new month, it is a new year!  And a great way to start off a new year is with a clean slate.  For me, this includes a new month for writing, and hopefully, I can reach my goal of 10,000 words this month.

Speaking of a new year, however, always brings up the subject of resolutions.  I have mixed feelings about this.  On the plus side, I am all for having goals.  Without having goals written down and set, I rarely do anything.  In addition, I am a dreamer, and I love to dream of what I want to be and want to do.  However, that leads to the down side of resolutions; sometimes they are impossible to keep!  Many will plan resolutions and then a week later, completely throw in the towel because they got off track, and discouraged, and simply quit.

So I’ve been torn about what I want to set for myself this year.  Do I have dreams and plans for this year?  Absolutely!  I ran across a quote yesterday that I plan to use as a year “motivator” for me.  I often have a verse or saying that ends up describing the year, and I think this one is it:  

"Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will not die."  --Daniel H. Burnham

So I do not plan to make tiny plans, but big ones.  However, with big resolutions, one needs little, realistic steps to get there!  For instance, a big goal of mine is to lose weight.  And not just ten or twenty pounds.  I actually need to lose 75 pounds to get down to a healthy weight.  Losing 75 pounds in twelve months seems like such a huge number!  Yet when it is broken down into months, 75 pounds in a year comes down to 6.25 pounds in a month.  That is very realistic and that I know I can do.

Another resolution comes down to my business (for those of you who don’t know, we own a nanny agency).  I would like to see that grow enough to cover our “four walls” of bills every month.  This upcoming week will be spent goal-setting for the agency to try to achieve that by the end of year, though I’d prefer to see that by this summer!

I also want to see my walk with Jesus become a closer one.  These past two years I have really struggled with not only having joy with Jesus, but simply even having the desire to have intimacy and vulnerability with Christ.  One thing I’ve already started doing is reading through the Bible.  I don’t want to be legalistic about it, but as I look back, I can tell a difference in the years that I have done it and the years I have not, but I’ll write more about that later.  As for now, my 15 minutes is up and I need to get lunch going while a little guy of mine is napping.  Santa Fe Black Bean Soup, here I come!  :-)

Words: 620