why i love catalogs...

things seem to be settling down...alex is doing well.  i miss him, but know that right now, it's what's best...

been thinking a lot lately about life and its many twists and turns...sort of like domino effect kinds of things...ever think about one thing and that leads to another and another and another...yeah, that kind of thinking...


i was taking clothes out of the dryer the other day and when i was trying to match socks, i remembered i needed to get the mail, which reminded me ask my sister-in-law if she got the box i sent, which reminded me that i was going to see the baby this weekend at my parents house, which reminded me to bring some catalogs for my mom...which reminded me of my dad...which ended up in this memory...


when i was young, my dad worked in alaska,  he first left when i was in second grade and worked there (in various places/jobs) until i was a senior in high school.  since he would save up his vacation time, he'd come home anywhere from one to three months each year...between phone calls and letters, he tried a variety of ways to keep connected to us...one of the things he did for me was so send away for a catalog called "the enchanted dollhouse"...i would pour over that thing from cover to cover and would save every issue...i was entranced by the number of dolls and doll accessories and especially the dollhouses...it was located in vermont, which was a LONG way from wisconsin, but i was determined that some day i would go there...


fast forward to the age of twenty-one...i had left college for a myriad of reasons and needed to find a job.  i had moved back home (yikes) and started babysitting for a friend of mine...all was well...then, one day, out of the blue, i was reading the sunday paper (can't remember if it was the duluth news-tribune or the st. paul pioneer press) and felt led to check out the want ads...in the midst of them all, i found an ad for a family in massachusetts looking for a nanny...since i'd always wanted to nanny, i checked it out...now, remember, this was before email or cell phones, so it took a few days to connect with the family...after a number of phone calls and reference checks, i took a job as a nanny!


i had never met these people in person...knew NO ONE in the state of mass.  and had never been on an airplane before...but, i was determined to do it...i left for my new home and family in july of 1988 and was fortunate enough to stay with them for two years...many awesome memories and "firsts" came from those days...


but, one of the biggest and best-est surprises was this...deb and jack (the parents) had a home in manchester, vermont...and the first time i went there with them, deb's sister allison and i went shopping...and we happened to go into this cool little store...THE ENCHANTED DOLLHOUSE...yup...it's true...the one place i'd always wanted to visit and here i was...standing right in the middle of it...amazing.


i think about all the things that had to happen in my life for me to have that moment of being in that store...having my dad be gone for the majority of my growing up (sucked, but he did it to give us a better life), i had to transfer colleges (and hate both), i had to move back home again (double yikes), but most of all, i had to take a chance...a chance on the unknown...a chance to try something new...

it makes me think about all the times that God has asked me to give something a shot...to try something new, to take a risk...i have yet to regret any of those times, i do however, regret the times i was too afraid or listened to someone else tell me i would fail, so i never tried...i am getting one of those feelings again that something huge is going to happen in my life and once again, i am going to take it on...full steam ahead, with no looking back...no regrets...i figure why not...God's seen me through everything so far...and every time i listen to Him, i have an adventure!


don't be afraid...life boldly...life freely...listen to what He's saying in those quiet moments...He already knows how it's going to turn out...just go for it...

glue...

i've been cleaning and rearranging my house for the past couple of weeks and i am still not done...i think it might have something to do with the fact that once it's done...it's done...finished...over...now, normally i'd be looking forward to the end of a project of this magnitude, but this time it's bittersweet...tess has moved into alex's room and i think that's why i'm not completely done yet...once i am, it means that he really isn't living here anymore...and that sucks.


in the process of me cleaning and rearranging, i found a lot of knick-knacks that i had stashed away a while ago.  always with the intention of having a garage sale or taking them to goodwill.  good thing i didn't, because my house if looking pretty good with the addition of these "lost" items!  

it started me thinking about all of the times that i've been "lost" and people had written me off or thought maybe i'd be better off being "thrown away"...or even when i thought i should throw myself away...what was it that kept me here?  what was it that made me rethink things and not jump into the abyss of darkness?  i believe it was God.  He knew how hard things were and instead of letting me throw it all away, he just tucked me away for a while, in the quiet, and brought me back out when i was ready and felt up to sitting on that new shelf...there's been many, many times that i've toppled off that shelf and crashed...hard...onto the solid cement floor...and many times that i've lost a piece of myself....but always....always...God is there to pick me up, gently brush me off and set me on another shelf...one that suits me better for this time...


as i put up a shelf today, i placed on it my two willow tree angels...not sure if you know what those are or not, but if not, you can google it!  one is of a mother and daughter and the other is of a mother and son...if you look very closely, you can see where the mother and son figurine has been mended...many times...ironically, the figurine has been broken once every year for the past five years...like one for each year of alex's addiction...but, amazingly, with super glue, i've been able to put it back together again, every time...and, unless you look really hard, you probably wouldn't even notice it...but, because it's mine, i can see the crack clearly...sort of like our relationship...but in this case, God is the super glue that holds us together and that is one glue that never quits!