I do a lot of sewing. It started when I was a child, making dolls’ clothes, and continued as a teenager, making my own clothes. It then progressed to designing and making costumes, becoming more complex as the professional requirements of my ballet company and dance academy grew. As life moved on from the needs of the stage and studio, I  now not only sew alterations for “normal” people, but I also love altering and redesigning wedding gowns. The wedding gowns are by far the most challenging, because what you see is by far not what you get! What may look like a flowing vision of white fabric, with or without sparkles, can actually be multiple layers of different weaves, different weights, different lengths, and even different colors, all to facilitate the singular look that everyone sees wafting down the aisle on the big day. And, of course, each layer must be measured and hemmed separately to compliment the top outermost layer but not be seen peeking out below it. And keep the bride smiling. It can be a complicated process, but when the finished look is completed and adding to the glow of the bride’s face as she tenderly marches into her future, then every stitch, every pricked finger, every desperate attempt to wash the resulting blood off the dress, every “measuring twice or more to cut only once” is worth all the hours of tedious, laborious work.

         Interesting. When we have a vision and get our hearts set on a desire, when we are impatient for the results of a long-awaited prayer, or when we’re working through a hope that seems deferred, we want that finished picture sooner than yesterday. Brides are anxious for the finished gown and the big day. But we forget that there are often many layers that need to fall into perfect place in order for the last, top layer to shine to it’s full extent . . . to it’s designed, intended extent.

         As God prepares us for the culmination of His purpose for us, there are many layers that must be in place first, and He will neither rush nor delay His perfect creations. Can it be frustrating and very discouraging for us to have to deal with all those layers? Yes. Can it be disheartening, even painful? YES. And the more excellently those layers are made, they will never be seen by anyone else. However, those meticulously designed layers are responsible for the beautiful, final reveal of the spectacular creation that God has always planned for each one of us. What no one sees is that each layer is basically a support and building system; they keep the finished creation smooth and give it the shape that it was originally designed to have.

         How many of us truly appreciate the difficult and wearisome under-layers of our lives? Like lifting heavy weights to strengthen our muscles, the weights we carry  through painful days and circumstances strengthen our character, teach us how to overcome, and allow God to mold us into the people He has created us to be. Each layer, no matter how seemingly insignificant or pointless in our own eyes, is like a heavy barbell that we are learning to lift to prepare us for our future.

         God says He has plans for our future that are not to harm us but are for our ultimate welfare ( Jeremiah 29:11), no matter how it feels at the time. He already sees us as His gloriously resplendent children, even when all we see is the prep work, because He is the only one who knows the future.

         Let’s remember, as we are digging and working through the many layers, that the work is not pointless, it is not a mistake, and God ALWAYS finishes what He started. “Therefore, let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we shall reap if we do not give up” – Galatians 6:9

There is a fierce winter storm going on outside as I write this. I have prepared really well; I have flashlights with extra batteries at the ready. I have a huge pot of chili prepared, all my electronic devices have been charged, and I bought a power bank in case the power goes out. My laundry has been done, I have lined up indoor activities and movies to watch if the power stays on. However, no matter how high I set my thermostat or my gas fireplace, I am still needing to wear two sweatshirts and fleece socks. I went to make yet another cup of very hot coffee, and as I stood by the coffeemaker, I felt a little breeze coming out of the wall. To my surprise (and homeowner’s ignorance), I discovered cold air coming through the electrical outlet. I went on a journey of discovery throughout my house, and I realized that cold air was coming through every outlet on an outside wall! I thought I was so conscientious and had prepared so well, yet I was still caught off guard and freezing! When my children were toddlers, I plugged up every single unused outlet in the house to keep them from sticking dangerous items in the holes; it never occurred to me that I needed to guard the holes to keep the good stuff in. I quickly got some tape to cover the holes, and my house was warmer within thirty minutes. The storm is still raging on the outside, but every access point in my home has denied the storm’s entrance into my place of comfort and safety.

I wonder what access points in my heart have inadvertently been left open to the threats to my peace. I obviously have missed a few, because I still experience fear, anger, and anxiety. I can’t control the storms, and when I forget Who actually does, I am helpless. God says to “Guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” – Proverbs 4:23. I can’t guard it by cowering in a corner and covering my head, but I also can’t guard it by fighting under my own power. I didn’t realize that freezing air was entering my house through tiny little holes in the walls. Even easier to miss are the unguarded areas of my heart that allow the storms of life to seep in –storms that I am so quick to blame on someone else. When I remember that the Lord is the One who lives with me and in me, and that He is my refuge and my fortress (Psalm 91:2), then the holes in my heart are safely plugged up, despite the storms that rage outside. The storm cannot get in, and the warmth cannot get out.

 I am safe, no matter what.

Sirens in the night

chills travelling up my neck

panic through my heart

Sirens causing fear

screaming within the darkness

pulling hope away

God is a siren

proclaiming help is close by

rescue is now here

Panic steals the peace

different hearts have different fears

this sound has stories

His peace is within

His voice calling from afar

summoning the help

Sirens have meant pain

they summon so much anger

echoing for days

Their voice has now changed

sirens did not cause the fear

fear tries to ambush

The louder His voice

the deeper His comfort feels

His siren brings rest

Cries all around us

is evil going to win

evil is so loud

Loud pries our focus

loud does not mean power

loud has its own fear

God has the power

yet our own anger wants it

trying to own it

Man tries to posture

assuming authority

presuming knowledge

God’s patience is vast

even when we break His heart

He waits for ours

How long will God pause

when will His patience be done

will He say, “enough!”

God’s word does not change

but our hearts are so fickle

we care less and less  

Until our hate kills

without pause we will destroy

and claim to be just

God sheds tears for us

as we kill His creations

and put ourselves first

Do we not yet see

how our way is not working

how our hate still grows

We water God’s seeds

but our water is poison

that wilts His blossoms

We were the blossoms  

we were to tend His garden

do we prefer death

How long will God wait

we should have been the blossoms 

what do we do now?

            Do you have a child who seems anxious? I don’t mean first-day-of school, or going-to-the-doctor, or even giving their first speech in public nervousness. I mean chronic sleep disturbances, uncontrolled emotions, perhaps some nervous habits or ticks. Anxiety roots can dig pretty deep. The child can’t calm down enough to think of strategies or solutions, and they are maybe chastised frequently to “JUST CALM DOWN!” Sometimes internal panic has taken over without obvious outward signs, and the child begins to believe they are the problem and there is no solution in sight. And parents feel helpless.

            Every problem truly does have a solution. However, a child who has been diagnosed with anxiety or ADHD or both, hears the word “diagnosis” and immediately feels tagged with a disease or serious condition. Then they feel their future, their dreams, their plans, and their options are gone. That word kind of puts a punctuation on their future, and that causes — guess what – more anxiety! They may think their dreams are gone, but nothing could be further from the truth! Anyone who has grown from a child with anxiety or ADHD into a thriving, motivated adult can tell you that part of their success in achieving their dreams is because of their ADHD or anxiety. With coaching from a good Kids’ Life Coach, a child can learn that their passion and ability to hyperfocus is a superpower that pushes them up every mountain and helps them do things and discover joys that they never thought possible! They learn to channel their energy and use their gifts, rather than feel frustrated and isolated.

            “Why could a child possibly suffer anxiety?” you might ask. “Their lives are pretty happy, I take care of their needs, and love them unconditionally.” That’s almost a rhetorical question these days. Kids are shockingly aware of the world news, anger about politics, changing culture, epidemics, pandemics . . . you can fill in the rest. And in the effort to always tell children the truth, their tiny shoulders are bearing burdens that are much too heavy from them to carry at such a young age. Small children are wearing tracking devices so parents will know if their child has been kidnapped (even preschoolers have figured out why), and families are spending less time together discussing their child’s daily highs and lows at the dinner table every night. Children are taking a barrage of tests and interviews just to get into preschool (not Harvard). The pressure is on to learn more and more at younger and younger ages. Video game addictions are isolating kids more and more and creating huge gaps in opportunities for social interactions; their creativity is being stunted because the video screen either tells the child how to do everything or just does it for them. Discovery is now left to the convenience of the electronic tablet so that the busy parents can get “important stuff done”. This generation of kids has learned that unless the toy beeps, lights up, or talks, it is useless. And after a full day, children try to settle down for a good night’s sleep, carrying all of this into the next day to start again.

Remember when kids spent hours in hands-on discovery, building with blocks or Tinker Toys? The kids were actually learning to peacefully handle frustration and disappointment, but they were also learning success, creativity, and pride in their work – no charging cord needed! 

            All of these pressures are obviously not going away, so kids need to learn how to process today’s world without developing sleep issues, stomachaches, headaches, and emotional outbursts. Parents are so tired at the end of the day that they, too, are having sleep issues, headaches, stomachaches, and emotional outbursts, just from not knowing how to help their children!

 Enter: a Kids’ Life Coach. A qualified and experienced coach can help the child and frustrated parents navigate their boat through the choppy waters so everyone gets to their destination successfully, happily, and with a sense of triumph. Perspectives can change, the home climate can change, and peace can blanket even the busiest of homes. Then everyone can settle into a restful sleep at night, ready to take on the world in the morning!

Learn from the kids.

                                                         ©2025   4/20/2025

“Love the least of these”

do we not see who they are

those without a home

Their hearts are not warm

they crave their cold companions

they feel so alone

The least are hungry

they thrive on the nourishment

that false praise feeds them 

They are in great pain

that is weakening their hearts

sapping their soul’s strength

The least are needy

they need assurance of love

they hide all their pain

Who seeks out the least

He who knows the heart sees them

He welcomes them in

The least shun the great

the least will not share their lives

their love is not shared

The least have nothing

nothing of useful value

yet they feel wealthy

We deceive our hearts

the least believe they stand tall

they mock true servants

The least do not see

they do not see their folly

they do not look up

Those who were thought tall

have become the least of all

we must love the least

The least raise themselves

the humble live to bow down

God raises His own

Those who judge the least 

are truly themselves the least

pride will betray them

The truth of God is love

His love will raise His children

their hearts remain full

They once were empty

yet God filled them with His seeds

seeds that bear His fruit

Haughty hearts are full

full of self-inflated worth

no room for God’s voice

Humble hearts want God

they always yearn to hear Him

they empty their cares

They know their great need

God will fill the empty heart

He fills it with Him

When all is complete

when His redemption is sealed

our hearts will be one

We pray for the least

we dig into our own hearts

and we discover

We are all the least

we have always needed Him

we are His children      

03/08/2025 – “The Errant Flower”

            I went outside to my front yard after a huge windstorm, just to see how many broken branches had been tossed around and were lying on the ground, or if my empty plastic flowerpots had rolled like tumbleweed into my neighbor’s yard. There was still a remnant of last year’s mulch packed down into former flowerbeds that was so old and compressed it hadn’t even budged in the wind.

            As I looked around, what caught my eye was one lonely, purple crocus waving at me in the afternoon’s breeze. It was almost as if it was saying, “Don’t worry, new life is beginning, spring is almost here, things that seemed dead are stirring and waking up!”

            There really isn’t anything surprising about a crocus spontaneously popping up after a few early warm days – nothing surprising at all. It’s nice to have that reminder that gentle days are coming. The surprise is . . . I have never planted any crocuses. Ever. I have no idea where it came from. It’s not the first of last year’s flowers that was anxious to pop back up. No one gave me a bouquet of flowers that dried up eventually and had shed some seeds. This little stranger was deliberately pushing itself up through dry, packed clay dirt and very thin, dry mulch. There had been no rain for weeks, and I had not watered flowers since the end of summer. This little flower stranger was a volunteer visitor with no family, no relatives, no relationship to the stark, hibernating emptiness all around it.

            How many times have we felt surrounded by dry, infertile land with opportunities that have either dried up or have not had the chance to start? Have we felt that the best is over, we have to start building from scratch (if at all), or what’s the point?

            There is a point. God does not need our input, our experience, our expertise, or even our past to create our future out of nothing. I have never planted anything in my yard other than begonias, azaleas, a peony bush, and a tree. I do put out pots of chrysanthemums. That’s it. I have never planted a crocus in the middle of a very weather-worn yard. But God intended for it to be there. I had nothing to do with it

            God has plans for every one of us, whether we think so or not. Whatever you think really has little to do with it. Sometimes our past can be used to guide our path; often we learn from our hardships and use them as strengths for what’s up ahead. But nothing that happens in life is a surprise to God, because He designed our lives to be our unique fingerprint in the world. We might continue on in a similar way as we go, or we might jump into another boat. We can plan arrange, manipulate, even put a deposit on a time-share, but we absolutely cannot create a life from where there was none. Only God, the Creator, can defy our own finite sense of logic to speak something into being that is beyond our most imaginative expectations.

            Only God creates a beautiful flower out of dead, dry land where we have never thought to plant any seeds.

Dance on.

I was having a conversation with a little boy about emotions and how to handle them. In our conversation, the word “loneliness” came up, and I asked him what he thought it meant. He was holding a little stress ball at the time, and without taking the tiniest moment to think about it, he immediately threw the ball into an upholstered chair filled with pillows and said, “tossed away where no one can find you and no one is looking.”

Just sit and let that sink in for a minute – a little boy who has such profound depth of thought and has apparently way too much experience in feeling lonely. Oh, and he has several siblings; he’s not an only child.

We often think that loneliness is reserved for nursing homes or senior residences. Sometimes we’re lonely when moving to a new city, or a new job and have yet to find friends. Big changes can make us feel lonely for a while. We also remember loneliness as being rampant during the Covid pandemic when we were all on lockdown. Loneliness is considered temporary and fixable. But when loneliness, not boredom, is so readily expressed in a young child, it demonstrates the principle of cause and effect with chilling clarity.

The political and social climate of fear and attack has caused our children to tread unsuccessfully through a mine field of hate that is blowing up in their faces and into their hearts. They are aware of the posts on social media, even if they’re too young to have accounts, because they hear their older siblings talk or rant about it. They hear the news, and they hear their friends echoing what their parents are saying. Everyone is yelling, “Peace! Peace!”, and in the same sentence they are publicly saying horrific proclamations and dire predictions about those on the other side of their own beliefs and convictions. Strong feelings are running amuck. Everyone has a right to their beliefs and convictions. But show our children how to act like an adult. And if the other person can’t, show some integrity and model it yourself.

 Fight for what you believe but be aware of where your bombs are landing. In all of everyone’s self-righteousness, on every side, our precious children with acute hearing and moldable hearts are being “tossed away where no one can find them, and no one is looking.”

Learn from the kids.

In reading the psalms in the Bible, King David states his trust in God over and over. He also states and enumerates his enemies’ attacks and how weak and beaten down he feels. Then David goes on to admit all of his horrific mistakes and abhorrent behavior. But this powerful king always humbly circles back to his trust in God and His endless power, love, grace, and mercy.

            I don’t think there are too many of us who have armies seeking to destroy us, forcing us to hide out in caves and on mountains. But we all have our own scary monsters that chase us no matter how hard or where we try to hide.

            Do you ever think “Oh yeah, I trust God,” but then lie awake at night in anxiety and fear? Perhaps you are stepping into the waters of trust with one trepidatious toe at a time. Yes, the water may be too hot, or way too cold, or too choppy. Well, life is all of that. We think we don’t need trust when everything is the calm, easy waters we want them to be.

            When I was a little girl, my parents would take us swimming at the local pool. I would stand on the edge and jump into my dad’s waiting arms, trusting him to catch me. Did I really? I was wearing an inner tube around my waist, water wings on my arms, eye goggles, nose plugs, and ear plugs. I was prepared for any disaster in case I slipped out of his arms.

            We don’t need all that stuff if we are truly trusting God. He is all that stuff. He is already in the water, He has never dropped us, and He never will. We can trust Him wholly and completely, rather than trying to take control one step at a time. We will never slip through; we are safely tucked in.

            Come on in, the water’s fine! 

.

2/23/2022 –  “It’s Okay, I Trust You!”

Out of their innocence, little children are so profound and often wise. One day

when preschool classes were over, I was waiting with one last little boy for his mother to pick him up. We were standing at the edge of the parking lot where there were still many remaining, tempting little piles of filthy snow and ice leftover from a previous storm. This little boy was bored, so he pulled his knitted hat down over his eyes and proceeded to climb, blind, on a large ice hill, yelling, “Hey, look at me!” As I ran over to him to pull his hat off of his eyes, saying, “That’s not safe, you need to get down,” he called out, “No, no, It’s okay! I trust you!”

Wait…WHAT?? The other parents standing around caught the humor and laughed, and so did I; but there was something so much deeper in what he said. How wonderful to know that someone who loves you is always, unfailingly, in control and won’t let anything bad happen to you, no matter what mistakes you make or what you want to try.

Yes, how wonderful, and yet, dangerous. I was so warmed by the fact that he thought he could trust me, even though he hopped over the border into presumption. I am only human and can only leap so far to catch a child in mid-air. However, I thought, “Do I, have the capacity to have the faith of a child and trust that blindly? One minute this little boy will say he loves me with an angelic smile and spontaneous hug. Five minutes later I have to pull him out of the classroom into the hallway to deliver a stern lecture on why he can’t hit other kids. He starts to cry and yell at me that I’m not being fair, because “that other boy was playing too long with the red car after the timer went off!” Then, later that afternoon he decides to climb Mount Freeze-and-Fall while blindfolded because he knows I love him and will save him.

Wow, he has such confident love. Do we?  Do we know that we are loved back unconditionally, even when we have just showered our anger onto the one we trust? No, no, it’s okay. Does that cute little boy trust me?

Somehow, when we become adults, we presume that when our own plans don’t work out, or when life presents more closed doors that opened ones, it’s because nobody cares, we’re all alone, and the world is nothing but a horrible place that constantly seeks to knock us down. We can’t trust anyone. Maybe, sometimes, our great ideas, like climbing blindly on an ice hill, are not so great. Maybe our protests amid crying and shaking our fist at God show that we don’t know the end of the story.

When I was a child, I protested with many tears when I was told “no.” When my own children were growing up, they also protested quite loudly when their dad and I said “no.” Even now, as we go through our lives we protest vehemently when God says ”no.” I guess we feel we don’t need guidance anymore and should be allowed to make our own decisions. Partly true. We do make our own decisions, but when things don’t work out we blame other people. Proverbs 3:12 says, “For the Lord corrects those He loves, just as a father corrects a child in whom he delights.” Hebrews 12:6 says, “For the Lord disciplines those He loves and punishes each one He accepts as a child.” Unfortunately, we have developed an odd philosophy that entitlement shows love and denying our children nothing is more nurturing than teaching them the reality of life

None of us wants to be controlled or denied by the time we reach adulthood. But God’s motives in His discipline are strictly to bring us up to our full potential. There is no question that we can trust His love, even when we do something stupid. Hey, if you feel strongly that God told you to climb on the ice with your hat over your eyes, then He will see you through it. I knew for certain that my kids would fall down often as they learned to walk, but they had to go through it (with child-guard cushions on sharp corners). I still loved them desperately as they learned, even though they had to get some bumps and bruises. The only way to learn balance is to lose it occasionally.

God also knows for certain we will fall as we navigate the path He has set before us. And just like the curly-headed moppet in my class, no matter what icy hill I’m climbing, blindly, I know that if God put it there, I can say, to Him, “It’s okay! I trust You!”

Dance on.

            One of the very first things my husband and I would do when moving into a new apartment or house was hang our paintings and pictures on the walls. The hammer and nails were always at the ready in the front seat of my car on moving day. As soon as those paintings were up on the walls, they immediately created the comfort of familiarity, and our personalities took over every room. It was a way of planting our flag and making the new place ours. Even our friends who helped us move in would say, “Wow, you look like you’ve been living here for months, and you just moved in today!”

             Because of that need for instant familiarity, every move ended up with the same living room pictures in the new living room, the same bedroom pictures in the new bedrooms (slight changes as we had more children), the kitchens looked similar, and even the hallways and bathrooms looked like home in a matter of hours! Ahhh, our comfortable home!

            As the years have gone by, big changes occurred, the house is empty, and the pictures on the walls have remained the same. But somehow, they are not really the same. The familiarity has stopped, and the same comfort has changed. As a matter of fact, there has been a kind of sadness in that the familiarity and comfort can’t be shared the same way, sort of a melancholy mist that has been trying to settle. But read on, things get better.

            This reflective revelation came to me as I was hanging some new paintings in my home. I was running out of wall space, because the familiar had to stay put, otherwise the room was not familiar, right? I was trapped, like being in a tiny prison, and I didn’t know who had the key. But I found it.

            God uses every single experience in our past to build our future. As I looked at all the pictures my family had accumulated over the decades, I saw how each one occupied a huge part of my past. I loved my past. People whom I adored are all in my past. But God does not see me as my past; He sees me, all of us, as our future. He doesn’t wipe away and nullify the past just because I am now moving into the future, and I’m not supposed to forget it. All of those experiences have paved the way towards where I’m supposed to go. My life has not been taken away – it is being multiplied. God says in Job 8:7 – “And though you started with little, you will end in much.”  He’s not talking about finishing my life with more things, or even more pictures on the wall. Good grief, who needs more stuff?! When we allow it, God will increase our faith, increase our significance through our gifts, increase our influence, and ultimately increase our knowledge of Him and how even the seemingly hopeless times in our lives can hold the keys to getting out of that “prison of the familiar”.

            So, I am not taking away my familiar pictures. I am going to rearrange them, because they are still part of my home – part of me. But I have cleared the walls to put new pictures at eye level. My past pictures are now the outline that will support the pictures of my future. Those future pictures will be in my line of sight.

            Excuse me, I have some redecorating to do.

            Dance on.