The Simple Woman's Daybook {Entry 1}

{Linked to The Simple Woman's Daybook}

FOR TODAY

Outside my window...I cannot see, for I am living in a basement.  But I hear the cars go driving past...sounds much like the ocean waves.

I am thinking...about my little girl.  She is coming so soon and my heart yearns for her.

I am thankful...for quiet mornings and a routine that works.  It is a blessed thing to begin a day right by spending time with the Lord, writing praise, recording a journal entry, organizing and planning my day, and blogging.

From the learning rooms...we are focusing on the letter K, the number 11, and all things Fall.  We are also striving to develop kindness and peacemaking skills.  Last night we learned of obedience and all repeated in loud voices, "I will be obedient!"

In the kitchen...awaits apple cinnamon cheerios and minty-marshmallow hot chocolate.

I am wearing...old jeans and a striped green, blue, yellow, and white shirt that has lived with me through three pregnancies.  Topped with a soft white sweater.

I am creating...a sweet baby.  She is growing and I am growing too.  Not just physically, but in other ways too.  My heartstrings are lengthening.  My patience is increasing.  My love for her and my sweet boys is flourishing.  My life is widening to welcome her in.

I am going...shopping today.  To buy cans of food storage.  Christmas gifts for extended family.  Thank you cards for a lovely baby shower.  Gifts for the hostesses.  Christmas decor.  Washcloths and towels for our new home.

I am wondering...if I will have time to complete everything I want to do before my little grace comes.  She's coming soon and there's still oh so much to do on my to-do list.

I am reading...the Book of Mormon.  Issued a challenge in August to begin and complete the reading by the end of the year, I have been soaring through the pages, and the messages have been surging inside of me...changing me.  Making me more.  And full of grace.

I am hoping...that the labor and delivery goes smoothly and though I wonder, I know it will.  Because of a sweet blessing from a loving husband promising that it would be so.

I am looking forward to...holding my little girl for the first time.  Looking into her eyes and seeing heaven shining through.  Feeling her newborn fingers and kissing her cherubic cheek on that blessed day when she comes.

I am hearing...Tate's little voice talking to himself.  How I wish I could bottle up his tone and inflection and pronunciation.  His voice is angelic.

Around the house...remnants of things to move to our Farmhouse Cottage along with a scattering of pink baby things folded and ready for Sweet Pea.

I am pondering...on the grace of God.  His mercy, His kindness and long-suffering.  His deliverance of me from so many things.  How He is leading my life through green grass and springs of cool water.  How He is so good.  And so merciful.  My very best friend.  My Father.

One of my favorite things...is waking up in the morning these days.  I lie still in the lightening darkness and ponder on the excitement and plans of the day.  I run through my head the happiness awaiting me and picture the faces of my two sweet boys, while imagining the face of my sweet little girl.

A few plans for the rest of the week:

Packing the hospital and diaper bags

Typing more recipes and weekly shopping lists

Organizing everything into an album

Blogging

Imagining my baby

Journaling

Planning a romantic date night for my sweetheart

Scrawling the mercies the Lord is bestowing daily

Preschool

Reading to little ones

Walking and dancing and shopping

Here is picture for thought I am sharing...

{This is how I feel.  In a heavenly mist, on a path of red and orange strewn leaves.  Almost to a bench where I can rest and take in my surroundings.  Waiting in this lovely Autumn for my little girl to be in my arms.}

Countdown to our Shooting Star

Very soon a little angel, a shooting star from heaven, will enter our lives...and our hearts.  Our precious baby girl is due on December 5, 2011, and I can't even wait.  I have entered into the impatient stage of wondering when she will come and if I'm prepared and mourning every day that passes without her.

Praying to know what to do, I had the glimmer of an idea...a baby countdown.  I listed the days out in my composition book and then began filling in activities centered on my sweet pea.  Perhaps by completing this list I will be able to more patiently wait her arrival and prepare more thoroughly so I enjoy the day of her birth as much as utterly possible.  And here is the run-down on the countdown:

11/13  Make a list of hymns and scriptures to read during labor.
11/14  Prepare the hospital bag and diaper bag
11/15  Print Wish Lists.
11/16  Make a list of photos to capture on her birth day and hospital to-do's.
11/17  Write a letter to my Shooting Star with all of my excitement spilling from the words.
11/18  Write out her personality profile.
11/19  Write about the meaning of her name.
11/20  Write out a plan for your relationship with her as a baby and throughout her life.
11/21  Write about your first few days and weeks together (projecting them in the future).
11/22  Review and write about her first "schedule."  Make a plan.
11/23  Go to a mountain to ponder where you are, where you have been, and where you're going.
11/24  List reasons you've loved being pregnant with your sweet pea.
11/25  Read through all posts to and about her.
11/26  Pray for her on the hour--every hours.
11/27  Pamper yourself.  Paint your nails...etc.
11/28  Write out your "motherhood commitment."
11/29  Ponder about your Shooting Star for 30 minutes and imagine her with love and joy.

I would go on...but I'm hoping she either arrives a little early or I can convince our good doctor to induce me (for size reasons).  I  am still wondering when she will grace our home.  I wish I knew the exact day and time of her arrival.  It would give me a day to push towards and look forward to.  But for now, this countdown will have to do and I know I will so enjoy every minute of every activity...

And maybe just one more goal to add to the countdown.  A daily one...

*Think of her and imagine the day of her delivery at least five minutes every day...

My Secret.

Each night for the past month and a half (and many times inbetween), I have communed with God and pleaded with Him for a baby.

...a baby girl.

And heaven has answered too many times to count, in the affirmative.

But my self-doubting, human mind has questioned me--not Him of course, with thoughts of how this could be possible and how can I trust my feelings since they must be blurred by desire.

And yet deep within, I feel the burning. And the peace. And the hope alive and burning, glowing with truth.  I have felt close to her, so close. My heart aches for her as if I've lost her and yet it must be the ache of reuniting with someone I've missed for ever so long.

I await His timing knowing that last month must not have been right, but this month I think will be.  

We wondered if this month could be right when the due date would be only a few days after Thanksgiving.  And we will be moving only a few weeks later.  I doubted and felt nothing.  But my sweetheart received the heaven-sent revelation this time.  I cannot forget the way he smiled at me, telling me how wonderful it would be to hold our baby girl on Thanksgiving...in thanksgiving.  And my heart gasped for he didn't know that I had felt the very exact same thing only the night before.

And so we tried this month.

And if my intuition is indeed gleaming, we succeeded.

For when my sweetheart and I were peacefully watching a lovely movie, I felt the impression, the vision almost, that He was telling her it was almost time.  And tears stung my eyes and I stared at the pink blooming tulips on the vanity and willed her to being with all of my heart.  

And since that late night of visions and tulip-gazing my body is showing early signs and my heart is knowing yes this is the month.

So now I wait. We wait. Not in agony as last month, but in hopeful, knowing anticipation of the dawn that is just about to break.

Today I'm in love with...

Golden Retrievers

Someday I'm going to have one...actually two...and then maybe a dozen when the puppies come.

It's just a dream...but it's one that I hope will come true.

I think I've been in love with them ever since the day when we found Polly by a little pond in Driggs, Idaho...or was it Victor?

She spent the day retrieving stick after stick from the water and loyally stayed by our sides.  When it was dark, we still had not found her owner.  So we took her to our cabin.  The next day we called the Animal Shelter and reported her.  The lady told us to keep her because she was pretty positive no one would call in and claim her.  But we left our number just in case and then drove the 4 1/2 hours home with Polly in the back of our suburban.  Somewhere I have a picture of Polly with her head laid on my lap during the trip home.

And she was ours for a whole week.

~~~~

Until the Animal Shelter called us back and told us Polly's owner had called in.

So we met him halfway to give her back.  We found out her name was Blaze and we were quite disgusted, for to us, she was Polly.  She seemed happy to see her owner and even happier to see her companion male dog, but we still cried on the way home.

Not too much later, we got a dog of our own.  But that's another story for another day.

I loved Polly even though she was mine for only a week.  I loved her dark coat and soft fur.  I loved her loyalty and sweet demeanor.

I think it's because of you, Polly, that I want golden retrievers...for keeps.

And perhaps someday when we have our very own house and have room for a dog, we will find the ones that are meant to be ours.

And maybe someday this will be my little boy by our very own golden.

chasing butterflies...

Today my boys and I took Spring's delicious invitation to bask in the mid-morning sunshine.  There was a little butterfly...probably the first real, live butterfly that my oldest son has ever seen.  He was so excited.  He darted this way and that, squealing in pure delight as he tried to chase his butterfly.  He did well for a few minutes, until the butterfly decided to fly over the fence and into the neighbor's yard.  We tried to explain that the butterfly would be back, or maybe a different one.  It was just going to play somewhere else for a while.

His smile faded but he quickly found something else to explore.  A little later, here came another butterfly.  It was hard to tell if it was the same one or a different one.  Again the delightful chase began.  And as he stood by the old, white garden gate, watching the butterfly as it flitted off to yet another distant adventure, I began to see the parallel...

So many "butterflies" have fluttered through my life.  Dreams, they are--always beckoning, always beautiful.  But no matter how hard I try, I can never quite reach them, or grasp them, or hold them in my hands.  As I think about my current dream, my present little butterfly I am pursuing, I realize that my chase has been somewhat sluggish.  I dream and I wish and I hope, but I want it now, not later, not someday.  I get frustrated thinking that my dream is so far down the road.  But perhaps I can learn a lesson from my sweet little son (as I so often do).  Perhaps the joy is not in the getting.  Perhaps the joy is in the pursuing.