my favorite wild place

Good morning, dear ones. 

The kids and I got safely home from Oregon Monday night, yesterday was Lily's first day of her junior year, and today the kids and I start ninth, fifth and second grade.

I could never boil down all the pictures and all the thoughts, but here's how I did it for Facebook.

From the moment we headed to Haiti at 22 and 23, Matt and I heard more stories than I can count of two places that seemed almost too uniquely special to be accurate : Aunt Sharon’s river, and Uncle Dave’s farm.

A few summers ago, at a particularly thirsty time in my life, I finally took the kids to “the river”, and the Lord did a work in my heart and soul on it’s banks. And the family there all gathers and churns ice cream and float the currents again and again as they have for generations. And they let us in. Living water.

This past March in Haiti, we traveled in and out with Uncle Dave. “I know I’ve said it a million times,” I told him as we headed in, “but one day I AM gonna get out to your family farm, and I want to sit with Aunt Marilyn.”

“Common” he said simply. “We won’t be there forever,” and that simple truth settled into me. If it was time….I was going. All the reasons against aside…it was time.

So we woke up in Jackson, had lunch in Dallas with Uncle Martin and Aunt Sharon, and all had dinner on the Oregon coast. Having family to family with makes all the difference, even if none of the family has you in their trees.

And in a particularly monotonous time in my life, hand to the plow, daily, gritty, tired faithful…He takes my breath away with His mighty handiwork in Oregon, and I am so thankful for this good gift.

He makes such beautiful, hilarious, intricate and wild things! Watching the fisherman unload tuna in the foggy salt air, stumbling upon sea lions, picking crabs and urchins out of icy tide pools, black round rocks and vibrant seaweeds and anemones, precious wide-eyes and laughter and memories. We remember how VAST He creates and rules and loves!

Whale watching, dark forest paths leading to breathtaking beaches, out-of-this-world chowder and views, more sea lions and jellyfish and bull kelp, precious kids and precious time with people who care about them….I’m feeling incredibly grateful for the way new places raise your eyes new ways.

Morning walks and devotions on the skyline. Roasting marshmallows on the Pacific coast and building driftwood forts. Finding vibrant flowers in every stony corner. It would all beat every beauty I’ve ever seen… except…I LOVE the stories of His children most.

For so many Haiti years, Uncle Dave and Aunt Marilyn invested in us. Shared themselves and their stories with us. Uncle Dave bounced every baby I had to sleep. Aunt Marilyn would take my thousand words of turmoil and return them a few precious words of wisdom. And by sharing themselves, they also shared their children, and their mint/ blueberry/ hazelnut/ seed farm, and their grandchildren and their great grandchildren and their years of Haiti and years of Russia and years of Africa and years of Oregon and years with JESUS.

To walk physically into that story today was sacred.

None of what you give of yourself for another is ever wasted in God’s kingdom. None of what you hold out to Him, none of what you invite others into, none of what you truly trust Him with is ever. gonna. end. there.

If you don’t see it right now…invest on.

It’s just not every day that you hike to six breathtaking waterfalls with your kiddos…that you follow an 89 year old friend 5+ miles through the Oregon firs…that you have beautiful dinner with old Haiti friends who live 2000+ miles from your home….that you have lunch by a river with Uncle Dave and Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Martin and Aunt Sharon. It’s not everyday sweetness, but it sure is sweetness I am cherishing. every. drop.

At the far corner of our country, in the middle of a fragrant field of mint down a path paved with hazelnut shells, there is a faithful little family.

They are not perfect and share often stories of mistakes and mishaps and growth and grace, but they love the Lord and others WELL, they sow seeds at home and afar and to the ends of the earth, they pray on for what they cannot plow nor plant nor harvest…and I am deeply encouraged and reminded again from Abraham to Moses to Mary to Oregon what God can do in and through a faithful little family.

They seem to be His favorite way to work.

And faithful families are my favorite way to see Him.

A lot of people noted that I was brave (you may have actually said crazy) to take five kids across the country by myself.

I didn’t.

Aunt Sharon carefully and thoughtfully planned every adventure…and Uncle Martin carried a toddler, wrestled a Ben, or chauffeured the teenagers and bore their music choices and sarcasm through every single one of them.

I took a walk on the Pacific coast BY MYSELF because they played ball in the sand. I got to watch whales with Ben and Nora because Sharon held a sleeping baby. I did not worry about the details of our lives for five whole days because Aunt Sharon did. I had company on all our 6 am adventures (one day these littles will sleep in!) because Uncle Martin was ready to go. I finally got to make this Oregon dream come true because of Matt’s blessing, mountain of frequent flyer miles, and because I begged the Mishler’s to go with me…and they did.

I know that that’s just what grandparents do, but not normally for grandkids not their own. I know this is what parents happily adventure, but not normally for a daughter they didn’t raise!

Sharon always says that being our sacrificial, on-call, adventurous and longsuffering family is a JOY, and she doesn’t lie to me. But when I try to come up with my own words for them loving us WELL and at their own sacrifice again and again, when we are lovely and when we are cranky, when we are sassy and when we are loud, hemming us in when they. don’t. have to….those words always stick in my throat and cloud up my eyes and make me think of Jesus.

I have so many reflections back on the other end...but I am off to be teacher mommy today.  Oregon reminded me that I DO have time to do things just for ME for a minute here and there, and writing is one of the things I have missed most.