A Book Summary...And A Request for Feedback

Since I haven't written much about my book lately, I thought I'd post a little update.  The past few months, I've continued working on my book, doing interviews, drafting, and revising, but I've also been focused on getting a book proposal together, one I can send out to prospective agents and publishers.  What follows below is a short summary of my vision for the book that I plan to include as part of my proposal.  I'd love to hear some feedback from you all:  What resonates with you?  What doesn't?  What am I missing?  What is unclear?  How could it be better?

* * *

In the long months of waiting to conceive my first child and in the dark season following the miscarriage of my second, I felt many things:  fear, sadness, despair, and confusion among them.  But above all, I felt alone.  Everywhere I looked, I saw swelling bellies and smiling newborns, and I felt the ache of my own emptiness more deeply in my perceived isolation.

If I’d taken the time to push past the surface images of childbearing ease around me, I would have known I was far from alone.  According to the Centers for Disease Control, roughly 10 percent of American women ages 15-44, about 6.1 million people, have difficulty conceiving and/or carrying pregnancies to term.  The trouble is that unlike pregnant stomachs and cuddly infants, the experiences of infertility and miscarriage are often silent and hidden, leading people like me to feel alone even when our stories are not at all uncommon.

In the absence of a close friend who’d experienced either infertility or miscarriage, I often wished I could read a book that would help me feel less alone, a book that would validate my fears and grief, a book that would also offer some measure of comfort and hope.  As a student and writer of creative nonfiction, I wanted a book that told rich and beautiful stories.  I found plenty of books where the authors used interviews or personal experience to back up their larger points about grief or healing, but I wanted the stories themselves to be the focus, any sort of epiphany being conveyed through the climaxes and resolutions of real lives.  As a Christian, I also wanted to read a book that wrestled with the kinds of deep, probing questions about God that reproductive loss stirs in the soul.  I found plenty of books on the theology of grief, suffering, and loss, but none that walked those questions out in the experiences of real people who’d experienced infertility, miscarriage, and stillbirth.

In short, I couldn’t find the kind of book I wanted to read, so I decided to write it.  My book is part-memoir; it chronicles a year in my life, beginning nine months after my miscarriage as my husband and I simultaneously continue to grieve the loss of our daughter and begin trying to get pregnant again.  The book is also part-interview; each chapter focuses on the story of one family who has experienced infertility, miscarriage, and/or stillbirth and describes both their loss and their experience of God in it.  Most of all, the book is about the interplay between my own story and the stories of others, about the God who is writing both the ultimate Story and the smaller narratives of each of our lives, and about realizing I was never as alone as I thought I was. 

Even Without Quiettimes, God Speaks

Note:  For those unfamiliar with evangelical subculture, "quiettime" is a word used to describe the daily time a Christian spends with God in prayer, worship, Bible reading, etc.

I haven't had more than a handful of quiettimes these past few months.  Admitting this to the world makes me uncomfortable, and I want to spend the rest of this paragraph justifying my failures with a lengthy list of the resasons I've been too busy.  But the fact is I've managed to check Facebook, take a shower, and read People magazine regularly during this time period; if I'd really wanted to spend a few minutes with God each day, I could have made the time.

For as long as I can remember, I've considered quiettimes one of the essential disciplines of the Christian life.  As a child, I knew my pastor-father woke up before dawn every morning to retreat to his office, read his Bible, and pray.  At the urging of my parents, I started my own version of quiettimes as a pre-schooler.  While my brothers napped, I lined up my stuffed animals in front of my Bible and eventually, as I grew older, started reading the Bible myself, beginning with Genesis 1 and forging my way bravely ahead.  In college, I was part of a Navigators campus ministry where the practice of daily quiettimes was emphasized and expected.  If you were a good Christian, I came to believe, you had regular, preferably lengthy quiettimes which resulted in spiritual insights you could record in your journal and point to as a measure of God's presence and activity in your life.

For the record, I still think that quiettimes are a good and important practice, that reading Scripture and praying matter and can be used by God in powerful ways.  In fact, I think they matter so much that my husband and I recently came up with a plan to get ourselves back on track in this area, a plan that involves discipline and a schedule and waking up earlier and the whole bit.  

But I want to say too that I've learned something surprising these past few months in the midst of my undisciplined wandering:  even without quiettimes, God speaks.  It shouldn't be surprising really, probably isn't to many of you who understand grace a little bit better than I do.  But for me, it's been so freeing.

I've long been taught that God's activity in our lives isn't dependent on our performance, but as the consummate achiever, I find that hard to truly believe.  If it's indeed true that spending time with God is important to our Christian walk, I tend to think failure to do so will equal failed opportunities to hear God's voice and subsequent failure as a Christian.  

And I'm sure that these past months, I have missed opportunities to hear from God and to grow.  But the funny thing is I feel more aware of God's presence and activity in my life than I have in a long time.  I can't tell you particular verses that have been meaningful to me lately or a specific prayer God has answered this month, but I can tell you this:  I see God's hand all over my life, in places I haven't been able to see Him for a long time.  I have renewed confidence that He has a good plan for me and that even when neither He Himself or His plan can be seen in the darkness, He's there all the same.  

I still struggle with plenty of unanswered questions about those dark places, but the truth of God's presence in them is settled more deeply and firmly in my soul and, for me, that is real spiritual growth.  And the fact that this growth didn't happen through discipline or plans or my own successes tells me I've been learning something else about God too. 

He's bigger than me.  He doesn't need me and my neat little systems for relating to Him.  And He speaks, in spite of and even through my failures.

My First Guest Post

A few months ago, my friend Alyssa, who also happens to be talented photographer behind most of my favorite shots of Ellie, asked me to consider writing a guest post on her blog.  She's doing a wonderful series this summer called Together Through Pain, which features a host of guest bloggers describing how to care for people walking through various trials including unexpected death, childhood trauma, and chronic illness.  I've so benefited from reading the series and am very honored to be included.  As you may have guessed, my post is about miscarriage and how to care for a friend who's lost a baby.  You can read it here.  And while you're there, check out the other posts in the series; they're worth your time.

One Year Ago

I remember what I was wearing a year ago today, not because the outfit itself was anything special, but because the doctor complimented me on it minutes before she told me you had died.  I remember a lot of things about that day:  splashing in the baby pool with your sister in the morning, when everything seemed bright and cheerful and pleasantly normal; the tissues somebody at the doctor's office handed me, crumpled into sodden balls in my hands; and the long drive home alone to find your Daddy and sister, knowing I'd have to tell them that you were gone.

It's been a long year, a year full of grieving and questioning, of medical tests and procedures, a year of watching your sister grow up, of thinking oh-so-often of what it would be like if you were here with her, with all of us.  It's been a hard year.  There were many months where I missed you so much that I wondered if I'd ever truly be able to feel joy again.  Today, I want you to know that I have, that with time, the grief has lessened a bit, created little spaces for joy to grow.

But I also want you to know that though grieving no longer defines each of my days, my love for you has not lessened.  I wish this post was about your six month birthday, about the delight (or perhaps horror) on your face when I stuck your tiny toes in the baby pool for the first time, about your first tastes of solid food.  I wish this post was about the knowing of you instead of the hole that not knowing you has left.

I miss you Avaleen.  I trust what I cannot understand, that somehow goodness triumphs even in your death, that someday we will see how even our pain is part of a beautiful story bigger than either of us.  I believe this, but I still miss the delight I know it would've been to watch you grow.  I'm so sorry I never got to hold you.  One day, I hope, one day.

Two

You are two.

Everyone talks about the terrible twos, and already, I see glimpses of what they mean.  For you, being two means regular meltdowns about things that just won't go your way:  blocks that won't fit together just as you'd planned, a piece of furniture you can't move, toy ice cubes that won't line up just so in your cup.  I see these moments coming, but you don't want help.  "I do by self!" you cry, flapping your arms in frustration.  Usually things escalate to the point where you throw the offending toy to the ground and run away crying.

I'm not sure exactly how to handle these moments.  We're working on asking for help, on not running away, on picking up the things you've thrown, on saying you're sorry.  But it's hard for you, and I think I understand that.  Life rarely fits together the way we think it should, and sometimes, no amount of help or perseverance can fix that.  It's been a hard lesson for me too, still is, in fact.

Sometimes, these moments I'm describing feel pretty terrible to you and to me too.  I guess that's why they call them the terrible twos.  But I want you to know, someday when you read this, perhaps when you have a two year-old of your own, that I see a lot more to your two year-old self than terrible tantrums.

I see creativity.  For a long time now, you've liked the song, "The Wheels on the Bus," and to keep you entertained in the car, I've been adding extra verses about the Daddys on the bus who say "Go Ravens Go" and the Aunt Jens on the bus who say "We love Ellie" and so on.  Well just this week, you've started adding verses of your own.  Last night at dinner you said, "Sing about the water on the bus."  "What does the water say?" I asked.  "It says, 'Drink me Ellie,'" you fired back confidently.  You were proud of yourself, and I was proud of you, proud to see you building on what you've been taught, creating your own part in our silly little family song.

I also see enthusiasm.  Often, when I am getting you dressed in the morning, you ask, "Who come to our house today?" or "Where we go today?"  You love people, and you love to go, to do, to explore.  At the suggestion of putting on rain boots and going to jump in puddles, you dance giddy circles around the living room.  When Daddy tells you he's taking you on a Daddy-daughter date, you run around excitedly gathering things to take:  your milk, your "purple Cheerios," your baby doll.  For you, life is an adventure to be embraced.  You wake up expecting fun and excitement and joy, even though you don't know the specific plan, and because of you, I get to live a little bit that way too.

Finally, I see love.  You've figured out what the word family means, and you talk to me about our little family:  "Mommy, Daddy, Ellie."  On weekend mornings, your Daddy gets you out of your crib and brings you to our bedroom, and we lie there together the three of us, giggling and tickling and talking.  You know that you belong with us, and you're starting to use language to express that.  "I love you Mommy," you said the other day, unprompted, eyes sparkling with joy.  

"I love you too, sweetheart," I said, my heart full.  And I do, my Ellie girl, so much more than you can know.  On terrible days.  On beautiful days.  On average, ordinary days two-year-old days too.  

My Book

So I told you almost a month ago that I'm writing a book.  Now that I've left you hanging for a few weeks, I'm ready to tell you a little bit more about it.

It's not a book I would have chosen to write, but it's a book I need to write, one I believe will be helpful to people like me.  It's a book about infertility, miscarriage, and stillbirth and about where God can be found in these circumstances.  It's a book about my own story, but it's also a book about the stories of other families I'm interviewing who've walked through one or more of these trials.  It's a book of creative nonfiction that wrestles with some hard theological questions.

I am not writing this book because my story is particularly unusual or notable.  Most of the families featured in the book have endured loss more profound and extensive than my own.  I am not writing this book because I know how to walk through pain and loss or because I've figured out exactly how to discover God in the midst of it.  

I'm writing this book because I'm right in the middle of grief and hope and uncertainty and disappointments, trying to grow our family, not knowing if or when that will happen.  I'm writing this book because every day is a struggle for me to trust God, because I often fail to do so, because I desperately need the stories of others who've met God in their own pain related to having children. 

I'm writing this book because I believe God asked me to, and already, His fingertips are all over this project.  I'm only a few chapters in, have many words and challenges ahead of me, but I have a lot of faith that this book will one day be. 

Twenty-Three Months

There are many things in my life that haven't turned out the way I've expected.  I'm an idealist, a dreamer.  I create rosy pictures in my head of how things should be:  composites of magazine photos, people I've observed, and Pinterest ideas blended into one harmonious, unrealistic whole.  Over the years, I've gotten better at recognizing this about myself, better at realizing that just because things aren't what I expected doesn't mean they're wrong or bad.

But I have to say Ellie girl, being your Mommy has lately been exactly what I expected when I dreamed of having small children.  We snuggle and read books.  We color and play with PlayDough. We go to the playground.  We bake muffins.  We sing silly songs.  You take long naps and play at my feet while I make dinner.

I'm not saying you're perfect.  You have your moments.  I have mine too.  But I can honestly say that being your Mommy, which has always been a privilege, has lately been an absolute delight.

I love watching you learn new words and question your world.  "Where dat come from?" you say, and I tell you.  "What dat called?" you ask, and I name it for you.  You make me laugh with your Ellie-isms, calling your Grandpa "old man" on his birthday, exclaiming with delight that the teddy bears are "nakey!" or that Tiny Baby needs a tissue for a "booger."

I love watching you learn to play in new ways and with new things.  We are entering the worlds of dollhouses and felt boards, of jigsaw puzzles and stamps.  You explore, create, imagine.  I help, sit back, watch your amazing little mind at work.

We're in a sweet spot, our tiny family of three.  I try to remember this even as I feel the gap where your sister should be.  I long for the chaos and clutter, the squabbles and stress I know another child would bring to our lives.  I pray they will come.  Soon.  But in spite of what has been lost, in spite of what I hope will someday be, there is goodness here.  Right now.  With you.

Writing News

I am writing a book.  I am sitting in Starbucks, watching snow flurries fall and eavesdropping on conversations about life and love and God and sipping my rather boring decaf.

So far I've read the introduction to a book related to my topic, re-read the notes from my first interview, highlighting the parts that stand out, and checked on a few blogs that have absolutely nothing to do with my topic.  Why is it sometimes so hard to do anything but write an actual sentence?

Well, I will start with this one:  I am writing a book.  I've gradually been telling friends and family that this is true, that I have an idea and a plan, that I feel like God has made it clear that I am supposed to do this now.  Each time I've told someone, I've felt a little bit scared.  I hate not meeting my goals.  I hate even more when others know I'm not meeting my goals.

But now, I'm telling the world, or at least the very small fragment of the world that might happen to read or stumble upon my blog.  I'm really, truly trying to write a book.

I know that I've never written a book before.  I know that my knowledge of proposals and agents and publishers is limited at best.  I know I don't have the best history with writing goals.  As you may have noted, my Thirty Pieces series on this blog, designed to capture thirty parts of my life in words before I turned thirty, is still stuck at #27, even though I'm getting close to 33.

I know that I have a one year-old and a busy life and that we hope to have more children.  I know that in the rare quiet moments, I usually just want to crawl into bed or watch an episode of Parenthood, or best of all, do both.

But somehow, in spite of all of that, I have faith to write a book.  I don't say this often and I really can't explain it, but I believe God wants me to do this.  I have faith that He will make it happen.  So I'm just taking it one step, one interview, one decaf, one sentence at a time.  I can't wait to tell you more about it soon.

Twenty-Two Months

I see more and more of myself in you.

You share my obsession with order, preferring cabinet doors shut, toys back in their particular place, hands wiped clean of crumbs in between bites.  Like me, you love to read, content to curl up in my lap at several points throughout the day as we work our way through book after book.  You like learning your letters and the way that words sound, "gooey" being a current particular favorite.

You seem to be an introvert too, just like your momma.  You get nervous around new people and large groups, burying your face into my shoulder.  It takes you time to get comfortable and warm up to a new experience.  You recently spent your first two music classes in my arms, refusing to participate, even though you're now dancing around the room unabashedly.

These resemblances between us surprise me because for so long, I felt like I couldn't understand you.  And everyone said you looked like your Daddy.  I felt a little sad then, as much as I love Daddy, because I worried that there was no part of me in you.

I don't worry that anymore.  In fact, I worry sometimes that there's too much of me in you, that my compulsions and guardedness will be your's too.

But you have your Daddy's sense of humor, I think, and his fascination with the way things work.  The truth is we don't know yet who exactly you will be, how the personality we see now will change and develop.

Today though and for as long as it lasts, I am enjoying the companionship we find in our mutual passions:   your little broom beside me sweeping up crumbs after meals, the shared pleasure of a delightful word and a good book, the freedom to dance together in places where we feel safe and known.

This Gift

A few months ago, I sat in my friend's living room, feet tucked up underneath me on her couch.  We were catching up, talking about my miscarriage.  I don't remember the particulars of what she asked me or what I was saying in response, but I do remember this:  all of the sudden, mid-sentence, I caught myself with the phrase "this gift" on the tip of my tongue.  

I stopped, wondering where the words had come from, questioning whether or not I wanted to actually speak them out loud.  How could the loss of my baby girl be a gift?  How could there be blessing in something that had left me wondering if I'd ever experience another moment without at least a twinge of sadness?

I didn't know, couldn't find an answer.  But I turned to my friend and let the words roll off my tongue as tears brimmed...this gift.  It felt sweet to say.  It felt right.

Ephesians 2:8-9 says, "For it is by grace we have been saved through faith, and this not of ourselves, it is a gift from God, not by works so that no one can boast." I've been taught that this verse means saving faith is a gift God gives us, that even the one thing that saves us is not something we can muster up on our own.

But I'm starting to realize that all faith is like this, a gift.  The faith that saves, the faith that allows me to embrace God's plan for me, these are both gifts.  

The fact that words would bubble up within me, words recognizing God's goodness even in a death I cannot understand, this is not of myself.  I know this because there are many, many moments when I do not see or feel that my loss is a gift at all, when self-pity curls me inward, when despair simmers inside me all day long.  

I need help to get out of these places, help to see the gifts hidden in the pain, help to trust that they're there even when I cannot see at all.  I need the gift of faith.

I Do Not Understand

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, 

declares the Lord." - Isaiah 55:8

I was talking to someone recently about losing a baby, someone who knew because she'd walked through it herself many years ago, and she said, "We just can't understand what God's doing...We can try to, but we're not ever going to figure this out."

When she said it, I cringed inside.  Oh how desperately I want to know, to figure it out.  Somehow it seems to me that if I knew why we had to lose our baby, if God would just tell me, I would be able to trust Him better, more willing to submit to His plan.

I've spent more time than I care to admit speculating.  Maybe God allowed this to happen because He wanted me to be able to write about it, to minister to others in a way I wouldn't be able to otherwise.  Maybe I will know God in a way I couldn't have otherwise.

Maybe one or both of those statements are true.  Maybe.  But the truth is that, even if they are, it's not enough.  It's not enough to somehow make our loss okay, to justify the absence of our little baby girl.  It's not enough to make me stop hurting.

So I'm forced to agree.  I will never figure this out. I've tried.  I will probably keep trying.  The appeal of somehow rationalizing the pain away is so strong.  But in the end, I must simply say:  I cannot understand.  I will never understand, not this side of heaven.  But I trust. 

It's a humble place, a hard place for an educated, relatively affluent American like myself.  I don't like it one bit.  I want a God I can understand, control even.  

But even I, who wants so badly to know, can see that a God I can figure out, a God who has to explain Himself to me would not really be God.  I have no choice.  I must worship even when I don't understand, especially when I don't understand.  I must worship the God who's been faithful, the God who I believe is writing my story, the God who will one day wipe away every tear and make all things right.

Twenty One Months

I thought we had three more months until you became two.  I thought we had three more months until you had opinions about everything, until phrases like "big girl" and "Ellie do by self" entered your vocabulary.

It's not surprising, I guess.  You had opinions from the beginning; you fought feedings and naps you didn't think you needed.  You stood and walked early.  You wanted your independence fiercely even then.

But we had this nice stretch of a few months where you were so amenable.  When I asked you a question, you generally said yes, happy to simply have your opinion considered.  Now, I've stopped asking if you want eggs for breakfast or turkey and cheese for lunch because even though you love these foods, you will tell me no, simply because you can.

I'm glad that you are becoming your own little person.  It's normal and natural and right.  But it's unnerving sometimes to see how much will there is in you, how strongly you protest doing what you should.  I see places you will need to change and grow and mature, and I can feel overwhelmed at the prospect of parenting you in those places.

But the process of you becoming your own little person is also delightful, for parenting is not simply about correction and discipline.  It is also about developing and nuturing your God-given gifts and abilities, the interests and strengths He's built into you that I am starting to see a little more clearly these days:  your love of Irish dancing and puzzles of all sorts, your observant and verbal nature.

I guess what I am trying to say, my Ellie girl, is that I'm seeing more and more that you are human.  You are weak and you are strong.  You amaze me and you horrify me.  You have been made in God's image, and you fall far short of His glory.  And I love you, all of you, even the almost-two parts of you.

A Moment Lost

The other week, Ellie and I were leaving our Gymboree class when she caught sight of a classmate's baby brother.  Her animated pointing and talking about the "tiny baby" caught her teacher's ear, and she turned to me.  "I think she's trying to give you a hint," she smiled.  My eyes welled with tears, and I had to leave quickly.  

You see, my little girl loves babies.  She has five baby dolls at last count:  Tiny Baby, Blue Baby, Yellow Baby, Green Baby, and one with a rattle inside that has yet to be named.   She totes them with her around the house, to the playground, and on errands, feeds them and wraps them up to make them "toasty," and sleeps with them at night.  She will spend at least half-an-hour looking at baby pictures of herself, proclaiming with pride on page after page, "Baby Eh-ee."  When we see a baby at church or while running errands, she smiles and points:  "Baby!" She is not happy until we get as close as is socially acceptable, closer still if she has anything to do with it.

One of the greatest griefs of this miscarriage is that Ellie is missing out on the chance to be a big sister.  I know that having two children 20 months apart would have been chaotic and taxing in many ways, but I also know that Ellie would have loved her baby sister with every part of her little self, that she would have smothered and loved on little Avaleen with pure delight.

I pray that one day Ellie will still get the chance to be a big sister, but I know that even if she does, it will be different.  She will be older.  The gap between her and her sibling will be larger.  She lost the chance to live life with the sister she wouldn't have remembered being without.

The other day I was scrolling through my Facebook news feed when a picture of a newborn baby appeared.  I didn't even know the baby's family; it was one of those photos of a friend's friend that sometimes show up on my screen.  But it didn't matter to Ellie.  She squealed with joy:  "Baby!" and leaned down to press her cheek against the screen, as if she were giving the baby a hug.

And all I could think about was what was lost - the real-life moment that might have been Ellie hugging her newborn sister in the hospital.  No matter how many more babies join our family, no matter how many siblings Ellie has, we will never get to experience that moment.  It, like so many other moments that might have been, part of the loss I feel, the grief I carry.

She Lived

I have two daughters.  One of them, Elliana Grace, is a busy, chatty toddler whose antics have made up more than half the contents of this blog since she was born some 19 months ago.  The other, Avaleen Hope, was supposed to be born this week, but we lost her in late May, at around 14.5 weeks gestation.

Though most of the writing I've been doing these past six months has been about the baby I will never hold, I haven't been ready to introduce you to her until now.  I've needed time to grieve alone, with my husband, and with family and close friends.  I've needed time to pray and cry and ask for God to heal me.  I'm still doing all of these things, still think about Avaleen multiple times every day, still miss her fiercely, but I think I'm ready to share the story of her life and death with a broader audience.

It feels a bit crazy even to me.  I've always thought that if I had a miscarriage, I'd want it to be a private thing.  That's part of why I didn't announce my first pregnancy on Facebook until almost 20 weeks, part of why I hadn't announced the second to the world even though I was in my second trimester, a few weeks past the point where the pregnancy was supposed to be safe.

But now that I have had a miscarriage, I see it differently.  To me, Avaleen is not just a setback in our pursuit of growing our family.  She is my daughter.  She lived.  She grew.  I heard her heart beat.  And she changed me, by living and by dying.  Even though I never got to hold her or kiss her forehead, I am different because of her.

So if I want to write honestly, to tell the story of my life and of the God who carries me through it, I feel I must tell Avaleen's story.  I cannot ignore it or pretend it didn't happen because, quite simply, it did.  And I believe with every fiber of my being that her life, short and quiet as it was, matters.

To be honest, I am a bit terrified.  I hesitate to write so publicly about pain that is still so very present in my heart.  I am not sure how readers will react, how their reactions will make me feel.  I know too that by introducing you to Avaleen, my public identity will shift.  I will no longer be simply a wife, mother, writer, teacher; I am also identifying myself as a grieving mother, a woman who's miscarried.  Unlike the previous titles, these aren't labels I ever would have chosen.  Part of me rebels against being associated with them or defined by them, would rather be linked to happier terms.

But the truth is, I have two daughters.  I hear one of them breathing softly over the baby monitor while I write.  I feel the absence of the other in my flat stomach, my empty arms, in the fact that I am able to travel for Thanksgiving this week.

I wish this post was Avaleen's birth announcement, that I was telling you how much she weighed, how her delivery went.  Instead, I simply want to tell you that she lived.

Nineteen Months

I feel like you've changed so much these past few weeks.  I've been saying it for months now, but it really is finally true.  You are no longer a baby; you are a full-fledged, i-want-what-i-want-and-i-want-it-now, opinionated-about-everything toddler.

You want to do it all yourself:  put on your pants, walk down the steps, make your babies "toasty" by covering them up with a blanket.

You love music, especiallly "The Wheels on the Bus" and "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," which have both been played or sung on repeat upwards of ten times in a row in recent days.

When you're really excited about a song or just about life in general, you spin in a circle stomping one foot and bouncing on the other while you go.  It doesn't matter if you're in our playroom, the middle of the mall, or on a walk.  You just dance.

You understand bargains and consequences, willingly polishing off peas for the promise of applesauce.

You talk all the time, processing your world with an ever-growing repertoire of words.  My current favorites are "peet-a-boo," "tat" (for cat), and "puppy dawg" with that drawn-out drawl you picked up from who knows where.

You are pushing your boundaries, trying to stand on any "seat" in sight, dropping your food and utensils on the floor right after I've told you not to.

I'm not sure where we go from here exactly, what kind of little girl you are becoming, how I can best help you get there.  You are learning.  I am learning.  I'm grateful for the adventure we're on, that we get to grow together.

We Pray

On our camping trip last weekend, after trying for over an hour to get our baby girl to fall asleep in the strange confines of a tent and sleeping bag, I started praying.  Out loud.  While I held my squirming, crying, over-tired little girl in my arms.

Laying down with her hadn't worked.  Neither had singing or sitting by the campfire quietly or anything else we could think of.

I was desperate, so I prayed.

And immediately, she stilled in my arms.  I prayed for a few moments, asking God for a good night's sleep, for Ellie to feel safe and loved.  When I said "Amen," Ellie's little head popped up off my shoulder, and she gave the sign for "more," pushing her little fingers together in front of her.

"You want me to pray more?" I asked, surprised.

"Yeah," she said.

And so I prayed.  I prayed for our friends, for people who wanted to have babies and for people who were sad.  I prayed for her grandparents.  I prayed for our small group.  She lay still with her head on my shoulder, and her breathing slowed, her body became heavier.  I lowered my voice to a whisper, but I kept praying.

I prayed my baby to sleep.  Praying calmed her like nothing else had.

It was a sweet, sacred moment in our tiny tent in a little Virginia campground.  Outside, children laughed and campfires danced.  Inside, a weary Mommy and a frantically tired baby prayed their way to peace.

Eighteen Months

You are a year and a half old today.  I don't know how this is possible.

You are learning your colors.  Purple was the first one you said and seems to be your favorite, but you know blue and green too.

You are learning new words almost every day.  This week so far:  "cooking" and "call."

You are learning to put together phrases.  You say "Bye-bye, Daddy!" when he leaves for work in the morning.  You say "Pee-pee, poo-poo" when I tell you it's time for a diaper change.  You walk around the house repeating "Baby daddy" over and over again for reasons I can't understand.  You make me smile.

You love to eat, especially hummus, applesauce, sweet potato fries, yogurt.

You still love to be outside, but your attention span for indoor play is increasing too.  You like to stack blocks into small towers, to take the lid on and off my lipstick while I blowdry my hair in the mornings, to pat your baby dolls "night-night," to flip through the pages of books by yourself.

I love watching you learn, the grin that lights up your face when you say a new word for the first time, the pride you feel when you master a new toy or piece of playground equipment.

When I took you to the doctor today for your 18 month appointment, they told me that you were in the 90th perecentile or higher for all of your measurements.  You are growing so fast, my big and yet still so little girl.

There are moments when I catch glimpses of your babyhood, mostly during the rare times you are asleep in my arms, but there is very little baby left in you.  You are a child, a curious, opinionated, chatty little girl, a delightful companion on errands and outings, a fearless explorer of playgrounds, a lover of dogs and toes and spinning around in circles.

I miss who you were.  I love who you are.  I can't wait to see who you will become.

Seventeen Months

Today is Labor Day.  We celebrate the contributions of hard working people to our country. Seventeen months ago was another sort of labor day, a day of contractions and surgery and overwhelming fatigue, but a day that was, at its core, a celebration of you and the gift of your life.

Back then, on the day of your birth, you were unknown to me in so many ways.  You were a cute, sweet, sleepy baby, not so different in size from the doll babies you carry everywhere with you these days.  I couldn't have imagined you as you are now - running, talking, requesting activities ("poool...poool"), eating nearly as much as I do at some meals.

I am beginning to understand now why grandmothers always talk about how raising small children was the best time of their lives.  I am already forgetting so many of the hard things about your earliest days - the hours and hours you'd scream and refuse to eat, the spit-up that you regularly spewed in giant puddles, the days where your longest nap was 25 minutes, the terrible, horrible sleep training cry fests.  I remember these facts, but I am losing my sense of the emotional reality that went with them.  It no longer seems so terrible as I know it felt then.

We still have our challenges for sure - the tears that arise when your babies can't join you at the dinner table or in the bath tub, the way you sometimes bite and hit in anger, your clinginess - and I know there will be more to come.  Life is hard and messy.  I know that life with you will always have hard and messy elements.

But today, this Labor Day, we visited our pool one last time.  We sat together in the baby pool, side by side.  I blew bubbles in the water over and over, just to see your little face break into a giant smile and to hear you say with delight, "Mommy. Bubbles." because you wanted me to do it again.

Laboring to bring you into the world and laboring through the challenges that came along with you has been so worth it, Ellie Girl.  It has been labor:  real, tough, hard labor.  But it has also been celebration:  rich, deep, vibrant celebration.

Sixteen Months

You are growing so fast now.  I reread blog posts from just a few months ago and realize I'd already forgotten what seemed unforgettable when I was writing it. 

I don't want to forget you at sixteen months.

I don't want to forget how most of your favorite words have "o" sounds:  go-go, no, uh oh, i dunno,  toe, nose, here-you-go, Joel, Ro-Ro (your cousin).  For you, "hole" is "h-ooooo-le" and "dog" is "d-ooooo-g," your lips pursed in a little circle for as long as you can manage.

I don't want to forget how you think it's funny to stick one leg up in the air while holding on to a couch or table, how you think it's hilarious when I do the same thing.

I don't want to forget how much you love your DaDa, how you ask about him all day long, how your face breaks out in a full-on smile when you see him walking up the sidewalk or hear him opening the door.

I don't want to forget how you particularly like to pour pool and bath water on your toes.

I don't want to forget you spinning in a circle until you're so dizzy you fall over or bouncing to music, grinning from ear to ear.

I don't want to forget you with your baby dolls, how you love to feed them with your tiny pink plastic spoon. 

There are a few things I probably wouldn't mind forgetting - your OCD tendencies which require your hands to be cleaned multiple times each meal, the way you whine when I'm trying to make dinner and you feel I'm not paying you enough attention. 

But even these annoyances are part of you, part of the gift.  I'm so glad you're our's.

Being a Neighbor

A policeman knocked on my front door this afternoon. He came to tell me that a neighbor a few townhouses down from us had apparently committed suicide over the weekend, to ask me a few questions about him.

I wasn't much help to him as I hadn't seen or heard anything unusual, didn't know the man or anything about him really. I knew so little about him that I couldn't remember if he had a dog or a son or if I was thinking of another neighbor I didn't know well either. I had only a hazy image of him in my mind, way too vague for a man I've lived a few feet away from for over four years.

After the policeman left, continuing to work his way around our little court of townhouses, knocking on door after door, I watched him through our kitchen window and allowed myself to feel the horror of it. Sometime this weekend (was it when we were out to dinner with CJ's parents Saturday night? While we were sitting in our basement watching the Olympics? While we slept?), this man had shot himself, and he had died. Just a few houses away from us. He had been alone, and he had decided that his life was no longer worth living. And most likely, we were just a few steps away.

I wish I had talked to him at least once, wish I had tried to get to know his story, wish I hadn't just assumed that he was a man who didn't have time for or interest in me. The reality is I didn't take an interest in him, didn't have time for him. I'm not saying I'm to blame for his suicide in any way, just that it makes me wish I thought of people differently, that I thought of them first instead of myself, didn't assume that if they didn't reach out to me, I shouldn't reach out to them.

I make excuses for myself, tell myself that I don't want to bother people or interfere, but the truth is that I am selfish with my time and energy, that reaching out toward others exhausts me, that sometimes I'd rather just get my kid and my groceries into my house than stop to talk to my neighbor, to really care about him.

But Jesus calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves, and if i were hurting or lonely or thinking about suicide, I would want someone, anyone, to care, to take initiative, to reach out to me even if I didn't know how to reach out to them. I know this because I've been in dark places, know what it feels like to not know how to even ask for help, know how it is literally life when someone shows they care.

Today I mourn the loss of the neighbor whose name I don't even know, and I grieve the reality of my own selfish heart.