a month in a blur

January has come to an end, at least tomorrow my calendar says it does. The month goes down in history as a bit of blur much like after first having a baby. Actually, the past few months go down as a bit of a blur. Coming down with every kind of sickness floating around and fighting it off seems to have been my motto a couple weeks prior to the holidays and even thereafter.

I'm still in blur mode as I continue to now, with the help of antibiotics, finish dealing with a sinus infection that most likely is having a hard time being warded off altogether naturally due to at this point a completely run down immune system. A first day without needing to do the neti pot to find some kind of relief speaks volumes that there is light at that end of this tunnel and a full recovery is well on its way. I have longed for good health now for what seems longer than I have ever had to deal with, and yet still, I know it is nothing compared to what others face on a chronic level.

I am grateful.

Grateful for grace. Grateful for the Holy Spirit and days run completely on Him and by Him. I am grateful for my husband. I am grateful for kids, lots of them, still needing me, but really just needing to sit for a hug and a long cuddle. That always remains my best strength even in the midst of less than what I know to be my best. I still have exactly what they need, when they need it.

I still find miraculous grace to make dinner most every night, aside from when others have so graciously and timely dropped something off. This amazes...ME! Especially just moments after I text to Gabe, "I'm so sorry. I have nothing for dinner prepared and I may need to lay down as soon as you get home." Somehow, he has a warm and tasty meal to walk in the door to after a long hard day. I think, Where did I even come up with that one? That was actually really good!

Grace.

I have marked on the calendar school for each day, Monday-Friday. When did we even do that? But alas, there it stands marked with an S for school and there the books sit filled.  Asher is rather independent with book work at this point. Reading we snuggle up on the couch and most 'learning' is done under blankets by the fire. Should it really be done any other way?!

Somewhere in the month I celebrated 28 years of life. And although I was in the thick of a full blown head cold, I was just that, happy for my life as I felt very much alive and aware of my living body. Gifts of grace along the way.

The kids play and find themselves busy on their own accord. Liam has become completely engulfed most hours of the day doing puzzles and Legos. Sophia, I often find up in my room, in my closet to be exact. I find her lost in another world with my high heeled boots on and I love it. I remember days in my own mother's closet looking for the very same thing. Boots, with heels, high ones. Hers were sky blue with fur along the top and I LOVED them! 'Setting up the paints' has become her latest thing for the afternoons. Thanks to a mom who let us discover and make messes has helped to aid in my own, for the most part, 'absolutely' kind of attitude and response.

Asher, with his first pick to draw over pretty much anything else, now enjoys sharing his spare time and the room! with his piano practices. Formal lessons started 2 weeks ago and he'd like to become a legend! I love this child and his whole hearted ambition.

Boaz has been my 'bit of a stretch' for me through all of this. Still needing constant supervision unless the first 10 minutes of a video is playing, sick here and there himself, and not exactly 10 out of 10 on the obeying right away scale (more like 1 out of 10 and usually with a hesitant debating in his little mind kind of response) has kept me up and down from the couch more than I would like.

Upward started for Gabe and Asher which is always an exciting though busy time of life. He never left the house or held a meeting here until babes were bathed, in pajamas with teeth brushed, awaiting just a prayer and tuck in from me after a special movie that kept their attention that hour before bedtime. He still makes sure I am all set come Tuesday nights and he blesses me in ways that meet the need at hand.

So while the snow comes and then goes and then comes and goes again, one thing remains the same, always. God is faithful. This season is one I look forward to saying goodbye to altogether and yet it's completely infused all up in and around with grace and moments where I just needed to bask in, Be still and know that I am GOD. Do I wish those moments away? Hardly. They have been the cornerstone of my saving grace during this season of looming sickness and there is much to learn from this God I call my God. Knowing the One True God still sits on the throne has simply been, in the hardest of moments, enough for me. I have tasted of this grace on very practical levels these past few months and even what has seemed virtually impossible from a man's point of view in other seasons of life. Whatever the situation, His grace has gone deeper still.

His faithfulness remains.

Asher is always designing and making up games for his siblings to play. He is rather creative!
 Way more fun and funnier (the reasoning!) than Candy Land.

Sophia is creative in the kitchen and needs little instruction from me. She is precise and efficient. 

Saturdays it's been me and Li while Bo naps and Daddy and the others are at Upward.

 This one! Such a ham.

time...

...you can slow down.

 

seasons and a new year...

The New Year found us home and celebrating with Gabe's parents, dog, and the socially handicapped gentleman who currently lives with them. That night nestled warm in pajamas by the fire, after family left and the house felt altogether too quiet, we poured hearts out while Gabe tip-tapped away on his lap top each of our own personal lists of resolutions for the brand new year. The kids were precious. Two categories. Things we'd like to learn, though I kept thinking to myself, "Now, when will I have the time and energy to do that?!" And the other for areas we want to see growth, deliverance, and victory. The kids quickly came on board after just a few examples. We really need Jesus here, but he's faithful and I was reminded of the power we have over these sins and struggles altogether. It's not a lost hopeless reckless year we have to enter into. I'm thankful. I'm excited to see how God takes this list and transforms the lives of my children, my husband, and me.

I had just a few good days of what it truly felt to be healthy again. It was wonderful! I realized it was 11 am and I hadn't needed to take Tylenol yet. It was the day Gabe returned to work and the day I was alone to tackle picking up the pieces of no routine and starting back up again. Now the familiar signs and symptoms of a full blown head cold have made its unwelcome return as of yesterday. Or is it allergies? I'm new to them and not exactly sure when peak seasons are. Though I'm hopeful it's just a season and will pass quickly, the kids are ever faithful to pray over me, for our baby, and all thanks to and reinforced by a simple verse they learned in Sunday school 'A prayer offered in faith will make a sick person well.'

New baby kicks and moves more noticeably these days. I am certain the first of which was felt around 13 weeks which comes as no surprise seeing as I know this thing by now as well exhibiting the design of a thinner frame. Keeping up with new baby, sickness that loomed over the span of before Thanksgiving to just up until this recent as of yesterday cold, to nursing a small giant started to take its toll on someone other than me. After several mornings of crisp dry diapers, not much to boot during the day, and a fussy lethargic leech in the meantime we ended our nursing days and have moved onto brighter and better days! Though always tough to say goodbye to days that seem to somehow hold onto newborn ways, we welcome change for this season and still manage to squeeze in a nurse here and there for comfort purposes, 'pretend nursing' as we joke. I am still the center of number 4's world and when we wake in the night, whereas before nursing was the preferred choice, now we hug and cuddle and I preform hand massages that by the low light of the hallway night light I can see eyes closed as tight as can be with the biggest grin showing this love chunk of mine melting away into baby hand massage heaven. I laugh! Would someone please give me a hand massage at 2:30 am? I am thankful for what new seasons bring and that it doesn't mean I'm done being mama and comforter though nostalgia and flesh at times would tell me otherwise. It's just different and that's OK.

Asher is steady at the books. Steady on the questions and sometimes rather hard ones where I just have to respond, "Let me think about that one." A most recent special endeavor is hearing him read from Proverbs each morning. When you can read the Bible, WOW, I think we accomplished it! 'Learn to read. Read to learn' never seemed so profound. He's got the whole book at his finger tips now, still needing help with those big words and names but so do I at times. God's own breathed words. It's almost magical you could say. And he's able at any point to make this thing more his own.

Sophia and Liam play and bond, play and bond. I forget they are are my closest in age and the older girl-boy combo is an awesome and very complimenting thing to see. A little A lot of mothering going on with a boy who likes to be mothered! Wha-la! Tea parties, usually damsel in distress, dress-up of some sort. It's no wonder Liam proclaims "I want to be a daddy when I grow up!" "With this many babies" holding up all 10 fingers.

We are ALL back to early bed times, quiet days inside, loving Gabe's special returns home, well thought out and prepared meals just us, and as one of my resolutions stands/stood now that I 'was' feeling better meals to share with others again. It's a go go go kind of season (inside) so when my calendar for the week tells me I have NO WHERE to go from Monday-Friday I sigh BIG sighs of relief. I do! I was made to be home and while this season permits it I will praise Him mightily for it!

first debut...

I do believe I just made a switch! And while this seems altogether strange with new things to figure out, I am enjoying the simplicity of it. 

An Ockrin Occasion has actually been around for years! I started it, unsure why now, and never got further than giving it what seemed the most fitting name for us. I still feel the same! In the midst of the mundane, the chaos, the simple, and at times the most complex it was a goal then, as it is now, to make special 'occasions' along the way. Sometimes the mere fact of realizing it's as simple as (and because so, easy to overlook) the things that make us who we are! What we like to do. Who we worship. Even what we like to eat. There is life going on in these parts and it's the essence of what we do with it that matters the most.

While it's tempting to wish the afternoon/early evening hours along in hopes of Gabe's long awaited arrival home, I'm painstakingly aware of opportunity missed bombarded with unrealistic expectations. Run solely on exhaustion and an absolute choice NOT to die to self, it's something that never comes to any good fruition  because it's self motivated and self seeking. It's really rather painful to see, I imagine. It feels painful in the moment. How about that dinner or bedtime hour? Same thing.

Faith is much more strengthened when you have experienced something that you gave to Him in a broken state, maybe even handed over edged with skepticism, whereby He moved and GRACE stands to be proclaimed that it was ONLY by His hand. And as it stands, He proves himself trustworthy, maybe as that first precious ever to remember marker put in place for all subsequent experiences to follow after, maybe faithfully, again and again. He proves to be that place and fortress that is written of on the pages of my Bible, except now it's etched on the scrolls of my own personal heart.

So while these occasions are really just our simple and vapor like lives being lived out, it's absolutely in every way an opportunity and choice to experience the love of Jesus and show that same love to others. I can enjoy the simple and lovely things along the way. I'm told to and that's OK. And I do! I love candles and a meal lit by one. I like tea in the mornings and afternoons, decaf now. I like to decorate, with a minimalistic yet homey flare (so I'm told). I like burn your flesh off hot kinds of showers (as Gabe calls them). I like white walls with dark floors. And I like NO clutter. But I can also look ahead and beyond to occasions come what may, and I really mean come what may, only knowing this about them; never without grace to walk them out. How amazingly comforting.

That's just the kind of promises written on my heart and being reflected upon today.

 Psalm 91
He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High
Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
² I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress;
My God, in Him I will trust.”

³ Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler
And from the perilous pestilence.
⁴ He shall cover you with His feathers,
And under His wings you shall take refuge;
His truth shall be your shield and buckler.
⁵ You shall not be afraid of the terror by night,
Nor of the arrow that flies by day,
⁶ Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness,
Nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday.

⁷ A thousand may fall at your side,
And ten thousand at your right hand;
But it shall not come near you.
⁸ Only with your eyes shall you look,
And see the reward of the wicked.

⁹ Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge,
Even the Most High, your dwelling place,
¹⁰ No evil shall befall you,
Nor shall any plague come near your dwelling;
¹¹ For He shall give His angels charge over you,
To keep you in all your ways.
¹² In their hands they shall bear you up,
Lest you dash your foot against a stone.
¹³ You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra,
The young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot.

¹⁴ “Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him;
I will set him on high, because he has known My name.
¹⁵ He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble;
I will deliver him and honor him.
¹⁶ With long life I will satisfy him,
And show him My salvation.”