Homemaking- our remodel revealed

I married an artist.
He married a nester.
Between the two of us we can't leave good enough alone. Every unattractive things makes us almost giddy. We are fixer-uppers. Ugly is just a chance for transformation. He wields the power tools. I nod and point, like I am being helpful.
I tell him what colors and textures will work. He doubts me until he agrees with me.
We are having fun doing something completely impractical.
This isn't about resale.
This isn't about entertaining.
This isn't about portfolios or bottoms lines.
This is about high-fiving each other at the end of the day and saying, "I love this home we built together."
And that, really, has very little to do with the colors or textures or power tools. That is all about the people and the love in our four walls.
But while we're working on building the love, we're working on building the style, too.

How we found it six years ago:

Buying a home takes vision. We had to erase everything we saw and just keep the walls. Okay, most of the walls. The home we chose was beautiful and pristine and well kept. It was lovely. It just wasn't... us. And when you just can't leave well enough alone you have to make something your own.

Our home the day we moved in 2009:

Traditional kitchen circa 2009:

traditional living room circa 2009:

The front room that is supposed to be a dining room but we don't do dining rooms so we didn't know what it was circa 2009:

Fast Forward to 2015:

Kitchen:

We took out the old oak planks, put down six inch hickory floors, painted the cabinets, installed frosted glass in the front of the upper cabinets, installed stainless steel countertops, a rock backsplash, new lighting fixtures, and a bank of floating, live edge shelves for our every day dishes.

Our Living Room:

We tore out the fireplace wall, did a solid stone wall, painted, and put in hickory floors

Our non-dining room:

There is nothing formal about us. We walk around the block barefoot and kiss other people's babies. We love eating our meals in the kitchen and want our guests to feel like one of the family. In the old dining room we tore up the white carpet, installed hickory floors, painted the walls, and turned it into a living room with a television and piano for our little ones and a cat tower for our four legged family member.

We still have a huge to-do list of projects remaining: bathrooms, staircase, landscaping, basement. But it is all just for fun. We do it because the feeling of seeing potential where others don't, making beauty where others wouldn't, is just a little addictive. There are a million things I can't do- sew button holes, quilt, make gourmet jams, get my eyeliner right- but  for me, this is one thing I feel like I can get right if I keep trying. 

 It's not a fashionable title to say you are a homemaker. You don't get  any sexy points or looks of admiration, but I honestly don't understand why.

In my book there is nothing we crave more than a true home. A place where we belong. A place we understand. A place where we feel safe. A homemaker is someone who creates that out of nothing. Someone who transforms sawdust and wires and cement into memories and birthday parties and family dinners and bedtime stories. For every moment I spend trying to make my home look good,  I hope I spend a thousand moments making it feel good. And if you are doing that, I think your home is beautiful! 
And to tell the complete truth, I would take a one room sod house in a heart beat if this was what I came home to every day:

What I wish I'd known about colic...

I met a beautiful, young mother today who is going through the agony of raising a baby with severe colic. I write this post for her. Just a few words exchanged between us and our eyes were wet because... we know.
If you've never had a baby with true colic this won't interest you. It might even horrify you.
If your baby only cried for a few hours at a time, or slept more than four nights in his or her first year of life, this just won't make sense.
Because babies cry, right?
Man up and be a mom, right?
Every mom has a baby who cries. Don't try to make everyone feel sorry for you. Right?
I might have thought that was right.
Until I came up against this monster that they call colic. Or as a specialist explained it to us- a five letter word for "we don't know."

It's hard to see all the medication on the counter in this picture. It is difficult to describe how hard it was to open the pedialite, measure out the medications, make a bottle, all with one hand while she shrieked into my ear, wetting my shoulder with her spit and pain. This picture doesn't show the way she would suddenly arch backward with all her strength and scream and the medicine bottles went tumbling across the counter. It doesn't show how I knocked everything over in my desperate attempt to keep her from throwing herself out of my arm onto the hard tile floor or crying while I put her on those hard tiles because I had to right the medicine bottle before it was all gone. It doesn't show that this scene was identical four hours later and four hours after that and four days after that and four months after that, except the baby got bigger (huge, really) and harder to save when she jerked and screamed.
It doesn't show the forty pounds I lost ( forty pounds from my PRE-baby weight) until I was a walking stick or the time I took her to urgent care (again!) and the nurse put the thermometer in my mouth instead of hers. I tried to protest until she told me I was running a fever of a 104 from mastitis. I had no idea because every moment of every day felt like a fever of 104. I was in the refiner's fire. And let me say, I wasn't burning alone. My husband was in there with me and our little family seemed to be crumbling to ashes before our sleepless eyes.

So, here is what I wish I had known. What I want to say to every very tired, very confused mother.

Your child loves you. 

She can't tell you right now because her life is hard, but she loves you. You are everything to her. She will stop crying and she will adore you. You will be her best friend. I know this. I know this is true. I know because my baby grew up and out of all her tears and she loves me. We have a bond that is unbreakable because we started from the bottom and fought for every single victory. Every good day. And we never let go of each other. Now I know we never will.

You don't really hate your baby.

I know you've felt it and it scared you. How can anyone hate a baby? How can a mother?! The answer is that you don't. You are so tired, and the screaming is so loud, and your life is in such a free fall that you want to scream and cry back. You hate the trauma and the uncertainty, and the deep feelings of inadequacy and the fire in the middle of your soul that seems to be killing you. And somewhere behind that mask of agony and noise is your daughter. Your daughter. You made her. What a miracle you both are. The shocking part is not the "hating." The shocking part is being able to love right through the hate when every cell of you is screaming to fight back, run away, protect yourself. But what do you do? You hold her while she scream at you. Who has love like that? You do. That's amazing.

This is the hardest time of your mothering life.

Let me repeat that. This. is. the. hardest. time.

The cruelest (unintentionally, of course) thing ever said to me during our two years of colic was a mother who slapped my back and said, "If you think this is hard, wait until they are teenagers. You ain't seen nothing yet."
She walked away laughing and I sat in shock because there was no longer a reason to live.
If it got harder, if it got worse, if I would think this was easy, then death was the only thing left to wish for.
I know. Dramatic much, Tapper?
Yeah, well, you see how you feel when you haven't slept in 11 months. Not bad sleep like we have to nurse every few hours. Bad sleep like we regularly had to walk the block at 1 and 3 in the morning because the screams echoing off the walls were making parts of my brain melt. There comes a time when you think, "Forget freedom. Give me sleep or give me death."
Every month of every year has gotten easier and easier since colic. When mothers talk to me now I say, "I have no complaints. My life is ridiculously easy. I think pre-teen girls are awesome."
I slept last night. My child says I love you. I am a normal body weight because I can eat food again. Every little problem is just that- so, so little. After colic, you think you are cheating because everything else feels easy.

You are the mother she needed.

No one took of picture of me crying over the yellow pages looking up adoption agencies- not for my sake, but for hers. I couldn't help my child. Every day, all day, and all night, my child begged me to help her. And every day, every hour, and every night, I failed. I let her suffer. I let her scream. It didn't matter that I tried with all my strength and faculty- I failed and she suffered. There are no words to describe what that does to a mother's soul and heart. I thought she deserved a real mother. A better mother. Because a real mother would know how to help her child. A real mother would have the magic touch. A real mother would comfort her.

I took this picture at two in the morning one night after a bout of screaming. Eventually she quieted and took great interest in a hat and a stuffed animal. Because there were so few quiet moments of play for us, I pulled out all of her hats and all of her stuffed animals and helped her accessorize each and every one. 

We worked on it for about forty five minutes, yawning and whispering, until at last she fell asleep in my arms, where I walked her for another hour because every time I tried to put her down she would begin to scream again. I didn't realize it at the time, but I was her real mother. I was the better mother. I was who she needed. And she was who I needed. We survived each other and came out of the experience deeply appreciative of our moments together.

To all mothers who think they are not "real", or think they are failing, who cannot fix the problem or the heartache, just hold on! Hold on them. Your hands are magic. Your hands are the ones they need. You are the only one with the ferocity and tenacity and power to love her this much.

And here's the bonus:

You will come to realize that all those times you were holding a screaming baby, you were really holding your best friend.

( and no- she isn't holding a dead chicken. That is our cat. And it isn't hairless. It is nearly hairless. That is another post.)

Easter without Eggs

I've had some interest from friends about a family tradition we've been practicing for five years now.
It all started when my oldest daughter was about seven.
We noticed that as Easter approached the conversation was constantly about dying eggs, hiding eggs, chocolate bunnies, real bunnies, fluffy chicks and new dresses. When I talked about Jesus she would nod and quickly return to her real concern- hunting for candy hidden inside little plastic eggs.
Hunting for candy is great. I fully support it. I wish our world was more like Willy Wonka and we could just go around licking trees. But candy doesn't sustain you. It doesn't give you hope. It doesn't make you hold on when you've lost the strength to hold on. It doesn't love you, or help you or teach you. Only the Lord does all of that.
So we decided not to let anything hijack Easter- not even adorable baby chickens and lop-eared rabbits.
(Or rabbits who are apparently minions of the underworld like this one- seriously, we only took this picture because we found this bunny equally horrifying and hilarious.)

Loving the tradition and holiness of Passover practiced by our Jewish friends, I decided to start a tradition to help us remember the life and mission of Jesus Christ.
(Don't worry- we still do eggs and bunnies.
On Saturday.
On Saturday we celebrate Spring and flowers and new dresses and baby animals. We celebrate our heads off.)
And on Sunday we wake up in an attitude of awe and reverence. We go to church, we pray and we talk as a family about the miracle of the day.
When evening begins to fall we prepare for our Easter Feast.

We begin by having each member of the family wash another member's feet. We speak of the dusty roads of Jerusalem, the sandals, the friendship between Jesus and his apostles, and how difficult it must have been for them to watch Him kneel before them.

We enter quietly into our sun room where everything is set with white dishes and plates. We light candles and take our seats. Our entire meal consists only of foods mentioned in the Bible. As we eat we take turns discussing each items on our plate, its meaning, symbolism or the stories where it appears.
So this is our menu and the references we discuss concerning each dish:
Fish: The fisher of men, the fish overflowing the nets, the fish with the coin in its mouth, the two fishes multiplied to feed over 5,000, the fish and honeycomb the resurrected Lord ate with his apostles.
Loaf of rustic bread: the bread of life, the bread of the first sacrament, the bread multiplied to feed over 5,000.
Flatbread (unleavened bread): the flight of the Children of Israel out of Egypt, the passover
Olive oil:  The Garden of Gethsemane (an olive vineyard), the olive branch of peace, the olive branch of promise for Noah, the parable of the olive vineyard, the oil of anointing
Vinegar: The sponge they offered to Jesus when he thirsted on the cross
Water: The living water, the Samaritan woman at the well, the pool of Bethesda, the Jordan River, the turning of water into wine, walking on water, calming the waves of the storm
Grape Juice (to signify wine): The first sacrament, the first miracle (the turning of water into wine), the grapes of wrath, the fruits of the spirit
Figs: The story of the withered fig tree where Jesus instructs Peter to believe.
Salt: The salt of the earth
Bitter herbs: the bitterness of Israel's enslavement, the spices brought to Jesus as a baby, the spices used to bury him
Two small birds: The parable of the hen gathering her chickens, the offering of Joseph and Mary at the temple when Jesus was born, the promise that God knows every sparrow and we are much more to Him than birds
Corn:  The story of the apostles picking corn on the Sabbath day as they passed through a field
Tabbouleh (wheat salad): The parable of the wheat and the tares, the field is white and ready to harvest

It is something that has given Easter very special and personal significance to our family. It has come to be one of our favorite family times together, despite the lack of sugar and games. This year as I listened to my girls tell their favorite stories of Jesus, as they interrupted each other with their favorite details, and held up their waving hands, desperate to say what they know, I felt immense gratitude for being their mother and for the precious gift of being able to teach them that they are Children of God. I am thankful to know of God's love and be able to teach them the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.