I read that Tasha Tudor would design a catalog each year for her children, filled with detailed sketches:  dolls, puppets, animals, clothes for their dolls; and her children would spend hours looking over this catalog and deciding what to buy.  At the end of the year, they would invite neighbors and friends to come watch an elaborate puppet show that they spent months preparing and practicing for.

All the things in the catalog could only be bought with buttons.  Neighbors would give the children buttons for raking the leaves and things like that.  Steve and I have decided (after much discussion) not to "pay" the kids for chores, chores are part of being in a family, and when they start getting an allowance, it will be for the same reason.  So I have decided to use buttons, and it will be for extra special things like when I overhear kind words or find them doing acts of kindness, if I catch glimpses of strong character, etc.  I view it more like a big gold sticker that a teacher puts on a paper just to say "I noticed you are doing really well.  Here is something little to encourage you along the way".

I have already been doing the buttons for a couple of years, that is where the stuffed owl and rabbits and frogs have come from (pictured in previous posts).  We decided to have a big button party and I let it be democratically run.  They all voted on what to eat and what the decorations should look like. Once all of the plans were in place, I told them to keep checking under their pillow for the invitation that would tell them the day.

The kids asked if my Mom could be part of it, they want some of her creations added to the catalog, which made me happy.  Me and my five siblings didn't grow up with much and Christmas was filled with many homemade gifts, mostly crocheted animals that we loved even after they were worn and in tatters.  My kids have heard all my stories and want some of their own. So Mom came and brought some goodies and she also brought a bag of great things for me and kept giggling "Now, your Mommy can't have these, kids, unless she has earned some buttons.  What should I give her buttons for?"

In the picture above you can see the little boxes they painted to hold their buttons, and the animals Mom made, also in the windows we hung all the paper buttons we made for decorations. Below is a gift I gave them for free at the party, they painted their own boxes and filled it with laminated photos of friends and family so that they can each have a prayer box.  It is so much easier especially for the younger ones to have a face to go with the prayers, I divided the box so they can put the ones they have prayed for in the back and know where they left off.

I love these Spring days, I worked all morning cleaning the house until my back hurt and when I was resting I watched the light come in through the window and splash around the house.

Read outside for the first time this year, it was a beautiful day 62 and sunny, we saw our first robin. I live boxed in with houses on every side but am always amazed at what the Lord sends to me even here in the suburbs, like the two woodpeckers that live in our yard.  He knows that I love the country and sends me hints of it. I am so busy trying to teach the kids to be happy with simple things like homemade instead of store bought and find myself needing to learn that lesson on a daily basis. Coveteousness versus content.

Chloe was outside with me,  "Do you hear the cute little birdies, Mommy?", every once in a while I would look up and watch her busy with her doll in a stroller. She was making soup from sticks, last years leaves, and dried berries.

The days are getting longer, it was after 7 and I was sitting out back with Coco as she drew with chalk "Do you want to be a princess or a fairy Mommy?" wearing her rubber boots and a ponytail that was all messy from a day of hard play. She drew a picture of her and I holding hands as fairies.

I counted over 11 flocks of geese during the day flying north.  When Steve and I went to sleep at midnight we could hear them almost continuously, I stopped counting, everyone is coming back.

I have been thinking about all of the changes in our lives.  I was sitting out front with Chloe as she was running around with chalk I asked her what she was doing and she said with a big sweep of her hands "I am putting color on everything!"  and my thoughts turned to this season and how after a long winter God starts drawing color on every little thing. 

Etienne said the other day "The color that reminds me that I am Eti is 'sand color.'" That is the whole outside right now, it all seems tan and brown. When I was outside I took my camera and Chloe's hand and we went in search of green.

When the daffodils come up the bright green stems pierce right through the old leaves so that as they raise up with the stem and are worn like a brown necklace. 

We did find some green, small bursts of hope in such contrast.  Everything is changing, the colors and the seasons remind me of His love. It is change but it is consistent and by design.

When I was praying this morning, my heart was all in knots.  I prayed only praise and I remembered when my kids were younger, I would go through the house with musical instruments and we would have a "Praise parade".  We would sing out praises of things in each room, our eyes would fall on things that would remind us of His works. Thanking God this morning and repeating back to Him what He has done felt like looking for green with Chloe. When Chloe was younger and pouting I would put her on the bottom step until she could think of things to be happy about--there I was, with God forcing my rebellious immature mind to look at all He has done and given to me. 

Seasons of my life are past and a characteristic of mine is to be so goal-oriented and visionary that I don't stop and see life RIGHT NOW before it passes.  At this particular stage I will have a happy moment and then a pang which reminds me "You can't be happy.  You are supposed to be depressed and in a panic right now." and then I worry about all the unknowns and then the second wave reminds me that I am supposed to be focused on truth. My mind is such a battlefield right now, all weak and war-torn.

I was speaking with a friend a few days ago and she said looking back on the past 21 years of being a missionary she wishes she could go back and enjoy it more.  At each stage she would worry, she challenged me to Celebrate this new chapter, that the celebrating is a choice, and then she said this:

"You walk by fear which is unbelief

or you walk by faith

walk into this, say to yourself 'I know God is with me, I am going to have a wonderful time with this! I am going to enjoy the process.'"  

I had such a boring day. Not that having three kids is ever boring, but my "BIG" field trip where I actually put on make up during the week is going grocery shopping or going to church.  I am LOVING LOVING LOVING my slow days filled with laundry and meals and reading to the kids.  But it is boring in the sense that when people ask "what's new" I think "absolutely nothing" I am home, I am staying home and in that sense my life is calm. I am trying super hard to keep it this way, literally hibernating until my first wedding in May. I am saying no to everything I possibly can outside of the home.

I stood in the middle of the house and said "Who wants to be my picture of the day?" And Jeff was my first taker, I took about fifteen shots and this was the one he chose (above).  He says he looks tough in it, "Special Forces" tough, so I gave it to him. 

Made banana bread with Coco, she colored with chalk again, we were busy with the routines of the day.