I would like to say Happy Mother's Day to all of my family members and friends who have been given the blessing of children.  This day is my first Mother's Day with a child outside the womb.  It's a lovely day, and it's nice that so many people stop to wish me a happy Mother's Day.  For the first time in four years, I had the blessing of being with my own mother for a few hours on this day.  

Today, I can't help but think of all of my friends for whom this day is more painful than joyful.  I have so many friends who have lost children or desire to have children and yet cannot.  My heart aches for these women.  I can't fully understand your pain because I have not experienced such grief.  I can't pretend to know how deeply you long to hold your children in your arms.  I can't understand why God has allowed this pain in your life.  I won't try to explain it away with nice fluffy phrases.  

I also have many friends whose children have been stricken by awful diseases, ailments, and sicknesses.  These women tirelessly and lovingly tend to their families with little time left to care for themselves.  They pour their very souls into caring for their little ones, and their hearts break to see their sweet children in such pain.  

Others of my friends have physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual burdens themselves, sometimes directly related to having children.  Severe morning sickness, post-partum depression, various pregnancy-related issues, severe sleep deprivation.... the list goes on and on.  Every day presents new challenges and there is little reprieve from the symptoms of these maladies.   

All of you are heavy on my heart this day.  I wish I could fix your situation and make it better.  I wish I could be with all of you, hold your hand, listen to you, cry with you, talk with you, and show you how much I care.  I want to help you bear your burden.  Distance separates us right now, but I can give you something that will mean more than a Hallmark card or a cup of Starbucks.  

Whatever you are facing in life right now is not a surprise to God.  I will not tell you to hold on to Him, because when we are so weakened by our circumstances in life, it is hard to do even that.  He, too, knows what it is like to see a child suffer.  Take heart, dear sisters:  he holds you tenderly and tightly to Himself.  You may struggle to feel like it most days, but the beauty of Christ's promise does not depend on your ability to feel His presence.  He is with you.  He will not leave you.  You can put your hope in this promise.  Return to it daily.  Hourly.  Minute-by-minute.  Cry out to Him in your distress.  He hears you.  

I pray for you especially today.  God be with you.

"He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
    and made me cower in ashes;
my soul is bereft of peace;
    I have forgotten what happiness is;
so I say, “My endurance has perished;
    so has my hope from the Lord.”

Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
    the wormwood and the gall!
My soul continually remembers it
    and is bowed down within me.
But this I call to mind,
    and therefore I have hope:

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
    his mercies never come to an end;
 they are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.
“The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
    “therefore I will hope in him.”"
-Lamentations 3:19-24

This is really one of the best ideas ever.  Every Lutheran should know about this.  I never had to memorize the Small Catechism since I was confirmed as an adult, so I don't know what it was like for you.  Memorization for me is awful.  I think I just have a mental block.  

Someone else must have shared my dilemma, and decided to set the Small Catechism to music. Genius.  For seven measly dollars, you too can own this awesome resource.  (No, CPH is not paying me to say this.)  Whenever we are in the car, I pop this bad boy in and, BAM!  Catechism!  I ripped it onto my laptop (after buying it, of course), and we use it for morning devotions sometimes.  I know more catechism than I ever have before.  

Turns out they also sell the song book, but I don't have that.  I just kind of hum along until I know the words and music well enough to sing with it.  The great part is that I don't intently listen to it ever.  I have it on in the background sometimes, and it just plants itself in my head.  

Now, if you asked me to recite the explanation to the third article of the Apostle's Creed, I'd have to sing it back to you.  But I could do it, and that's what's important.  

P.S.  Don't get me wrong- we listen to other stuff too.  Like the Book of Concord on tape.  Just kidding. 

Navigating the craziness of this world as a young Lutheran family can be a challenge.  To us, teaching our children the joys of the faith and showing them how it is essential to our very lives is our most important job as parents.  We don't want to leave their catechesis up to strangers or reserve it only for Sunday mornings.  After all, there are six other days of the week wherein we have trials and temptations.  It is also important to us that we cultivate a Lutheran identity in this family.  We love our confession of faith, and we are proud of our Lutheran heritage.  We want to raise our children distinctly Lutheran... intentionally!  Accidental parenting is not an option where teaching the faith is concerned.  And we start them young.  Super young.  Teach a child the way he should go, right?  I have scoured the internet for good resources, as to prevent myself from reinventing the wheel, but have been coming up with very little.  Maybe my Google skills are lacking, but it seems to me that there is not much out there.  I'm certain there are many faithful parents out there who are doing a bang-up job of home catechesis, and just not posting it on the internet for me to borrow.  I will be adding some resources as I come up with them later.  So now's your chance!  Share what you do as a family, or just with the kids.  How do you teach them the faith?   

Once upon a time I started a blog.  I posted about cutesy things I did and made, and felt very proud of myself for being so awesome.  Then my life changed.  A lot.  I had a kid.  I stopped working outside the home.  I moved to a different state.  So mostly my days are full of diapers, laundry, cooking, baby food making, breastfeeding, and more diapers.  (The kid just started eating solid food, so you know.  Lots of diapers.)  Anyway, now that I don't have an 8-5 office job, I get asked a lot of questions about how I spend my day. I used to resent it, but now I can understand.  I had wayyyyyy different ideas about how this would go before Junior got here.  The transition has been extremely difficult and very rewarding.  So I will share some tidbits that help me get through those days where you can't see past the mountain of laundry/dishes/diapers.  Or I might just use this as an outlet to whine, too.  You've been warned.

This is my attempt to provide a voice, some encouragement, and a laugh or two for those of us who live the day-to-day lives as women, wives, and mothers.  Nothing glamorous, and sometimes mundane, but always full of love in our intentions to fulfill our various vocations.