my christmas miracle

scheduled opening: jan. 11, 2008

to you and your kid

it's wyatt's turn to do a little christmas caroling, and he improvises a big finish as only a five year old boy can.

joy to the world

here's a bit of christmas caroling from seth. he got a little confused with the words, but never lost his trademark joy.

when i ask seth what he wants for christmas, i always get a different answer. the last time i asked him, he said: a cool soccer ball with a picture of fire on it. . .soccer shoes. . .presents, just presents. . .the sky to be beautiful. . .for tucker [our dog] to be cool. . .a new house. this was just a couple of days after i asked him what he would ask santa for at the mall. he thought for a moment and then said, "a hug." wyatt, our son whose desire is insatiable, has a list about five pages long. number one on the list is a four-wheeler. oh dear. i'm afraid santa isn't going to be able to bring that this year. or ever.

reading is my favorite

i've had it up to here with the neck and back pain i've felt for the past week. i simply turned to look at something last wednesday morning, fully expecting my neck to function as normal, when in a sudden act of rebellion, it locked up on me. the next day, the pain traveled down to the left side of my upper back, and now it seems to be spreading to the other side of my upper back and to my lower back. my muscles are in knots! i visited the doctor last week and almost wept with gratitude when he prescribed me some muscle relaxers. unfortunately, they are not working as well as one might hope. i'm afraid the doctor grossly underestimated how wound up and high-strung i am (i tend to come across as a calm, steady person) and prescribed me something a bit too mild. i've got a call in to his office. . .in the meantime, i am one cranky mama.

on another note, i've recently started re-reading one of my all-time favorite books: david copperfield by charles dickens. david is an old friend of mine. don't you feel like some of your most beloved books (along with the characters in them) are friends to you? there have been times in my life when these books have been a kind of lifeline to me, when they've kept my imagination alive, when they've given me words and images that helped me to interpret my life--the pain and sorrow, the joy and dreams--when they've whispered something of god to me that i wasn't hearing anywhere else at the time. so, i return to them again and again and get blissfully lost in their pages.

here are some of my most notable friends:

• david copperfield (david copperfield by charles dickens)
• jane eyre (jane eyre by charlotte bronte)
• scout (to kill a mockingbird by harper lee)
• ransom (c. s. lewis' space trilogy)
• lucy, edmund, peter, & susan (chronicles of narnia)
• anne lamott (as herself in her non-fiction books)

what about you?