Soren Update April 2012

The way Soren pronounces the word "exist" makes it sound more like "resist."  ("Mommy?  Do foxes really resist?  In real life?")  This pronunciation is very fitting for a child who offers maximal resistance to much of his existence.  For example, for about a week or so he began declaring, every morning, that he didn't want to go to preschool.  He would cry, he would scream, he would flail, he would roll around on the floor like a penitent.  I checked to make sure nothing was going on at school to make him feel bad about going (there wasn't), and told him he could sit alone in his room during the time he would have been at school.  He did this for one day but still didn't want to go the next.  So, for three mornings in a row, I wrestled my five-year-old child into his clothes and physically carried him to school.  

What worries me is that Soren seems resistant to happiness.  If he doesn't have something that he wants, he makes himself miserable begging for it.  If he gets something he wants, he wants more of it.  He doesn't want to sit on half of my lap while Liam sits on the other half....he wants the whole lap.  He doesn't want one piece of candy, he wants two-- and he will throw away the one piece to protest not getting a second one.  At the end of the day I'll ask him about things that made him happy and he usually can't think of things.  Even when I offer ideas about things that might have made him happy during the day, he argues that the things weren't that good.  We've been trying to teach him about being grateful for what he has and finding happiness in little things, but I think this is a lesson he'll have to grow into.  I sure hope he grows into it.
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Just recently Soren started asking me questions about whether Jesus and Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny all knew each other.  Though dubious about the divinity of Jesus myself, I don't feel entirely comfortable with allowing my child to categorize holiday characters with religious figures.  So on Easter Sunday I pulled him onto my lap and we had The Talk.  "Soren," I asked, "Do you remember asking me about whether I thought Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny knew Jesus?"  He nodded.  "And then how today you asked me if Jesus really existed?"  He nodded again.  I then took a deep breath.  "Well, I wanted to talk to you about that."  "Okay."  So I explained to him that while opinions varied regarding who this Jesus fellow was, exactly, it was pretty certain that a person named Jesus had once lived on the earth.  I said that some people believed he was an important person who taught good things and that some people believed he was God's son.  I told him that most of the people at church thought that he was God's son and that he was resurrected and still lives and cares about everyone on the earth.  And then I told him that Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny were fun to talk about and pretend about, but that they didn't exist (or resist) in a real, physical way.  It ripped me into about fifty pieces to do this, having believed in Santa Claus myself until I was about twelve, but Soren took it gamely.  He asked me a few questions about where those Easter baskets and Christmas presents had come from and then asked if we could go have dinner.

A few days later he called me into the bathroom, where he was bathing.  "Mommy?  Do you remember those cookies I left out for Santa?"  I nodded.  "Did you eat those?"  I nodded again.  "That's what I fought," he said, and went back to playing with his bath toys.

Today he told me that he still believed that Santa was actually real.  I told him I could be wrong, and he nodded enthusiastically.  "I talked to Santa on the phone at Grandma's house," he informed me, "and he didn't sound at all wike you."  "You make a valid point," I told him.
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In other news in Soren's spiritual life, he continues to contemplate the Problem of Evil. ("Mommy?  Why did Jesus make tornadoes?  Why do people get killed by lions sometimes?") and he's been learning about how God sometimes says "no" in answer to prayers.  I came in to his bedroom one morning to find him sitting frustratedly on his top bunk. "Mommy," he told me, "I prayed and prayed that Bucky [his beloved stuffed rabbit] would come to wife but he didn't.  Why didn't it work?"  On the other hand, he told me one night that the wind blowing outside his window was "freaking him out."  I suggested he pray, which he did, and he was able to calm down and go to sleep.
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Soren has spent the past couple of months obsessing about stars.  We found several YouTube videos comparing the relative sizes of celestial objects and he was amazed by them.  We watched them all repeatedly.  As a result, he can name all of our solar system's planets in order of size and he can recognize several stars, too.  He favorite, of course, is VY Canis Majoris, the largest known star in the universe.   We also checked out several books from the library about the universe. One evening we were taking a stroll around the block and he pointed out a bright object in the night sky.  "Mommy?  Is that Canis Majoris?"  "No, sweetie," I said.  "I think it's Jupiter.  Or maybe Venus."  And then I asked, "Do you want to say the star light rhyme?"  "Yes," he said, and began:  "Venus or Jupiter light, Venus or Jupiter bright, first Venus or Jupiter I see tonight..."

He has told me that when he grows up he wants to be an astronomer and an inventor.  (He has also said he wants to be everything that a man wants to be..a farmer, a construction worker, a scientist, and a rocket ship pilot, among other things.)  He tells me that he will invent a machine so big it will be able to make new stars-- even new galaxies!  He spends a lot of time describing the immense size of this machine.
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Soren pronounces the word "downward," "downer," and the word "backwards," "backers."

Soren and Liam go downers.  

Soren lounges with Bucky and the bunny pillow pet he asked me to make him.  

Looking adorable between Grandma and Arielle at a birthday party.

He was so tired one afternoon he fell asleep on the floor and didn't move for a long time.

A fruit face he made as a snack.  

He wanted me to take a picture of the water he turned aquamarine using food-colored shaving cream. 

Putting together a letter to mail to a friend.

This is the church he built in his bedroom.

Soren took charge of decorating the house for Valentine's day this year.  He made several hearts to hang around the house.  We also made and decorated sugar cookies.

Soren is vigorous and strong-willed.  He is passionate and sensitive.  At his kindergarten screening, I was asked to use a list of adjectives to describe him.  It went something like, "Intense, kind, stubborn, loud, curious, persistent, easily frustrated, explosive, enthusiastic.  I hear that at school he is also cooperative, though I don't see much of that myself."   He can be very draining but I love him desperately anyway.  So glad he's my little boy.

Liam Update: April 2012

One night while tucking Liam into bed, I helped him say a little prayer.  Once his chubby little arms were folded across his chest and his eyes were scrunched shut, we began.

"Dear Heavenly Father..." I prompted.  

"Dear Heavenwy Fatho, Frankyoofrthsdaaay," he said.

"Thank you for Mommy..."

"Mommy," he repeated.

"And for Daddy..."

At this point he opened his eyes and grinned.  "No, not Daddy!"  he said.

"And for Soren..."

Still grinning mischievously he said, "No, not Soren!"
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Briar recently acquired a pet ferret (and before you all run off squealing, "Ewww!  Stinky!" I feel that you should know he's been deglanded is not any smellier than your favorite pet dog).  But anyway, Liam's first word to shout when he interacts with the ferret is "Mice!"  And thus was Briar's pet named.  So we now have a ferret named Mice.
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Liam's current favorite foods are Graham crackers, Ritz crackers, bananas, fruit snacks, and butter.
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Liam pronounces the word "bed," "dead."  So if he ever tells you, "I want to be dead," don't go calling the preschool suicide hotline.   Just give him a pillow and a blanket.
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Our little three-year-old is a compulsive apologizer.  He says "sorry" all the time: when he bumps into something, when you accidentally knock him over, when you're trying to cajole Soren into apologizing to him.  He's also very sweet about saying "thank you" (or "thank you, Mommy"-- which he'll say to anyone, not just to me.)
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Lum Yum Yum also really loves to go for walks.  He'll strut along happily in his signature wiggly way for an impressive length of time.  One morning we walked for about forty five minutes before he decided he needed to be carried.
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Liam loves to pretend.  My favorite is when he lies down and makes snoring noises.  "Dead!"  he'll say, lifting up his head and grinning.  "Dead!"  And then he'll put his head down and snore some more.
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The child becomes completely insane at night.  He runs around in circles and giggles until he falls over.  He'll sometimes sneak out of bed and quietly crawl down the stairs to visit Briar and Daddy.  He'll run back and forth between them and open and close doors, much to his own unmitigated mirth.
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Liam loves music.  He'll sing along to any kind of song.  He "plays" the piano with enthusiasm and expression.  He dances and wiggles adorably in the kitchen.
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I continue to fret about Liam's development, though he tested for the Special Education preschool and wasn't "behind" enough to qualify.  He really struggles to differentiate between opposites:  he's just as likely to say "cold" as he is to say "hot" when commenting on the temperature of food just taken out of the oven.  He uses "up" and "down" interchangeably.  He still hasn't quite mastered "Daddy" versus "Mommy."  

I wish I knew if this signified some bigger problem-- or if I should just relax and let him do his thing.

Playing at the park with his brother.

Getting ready for a winter walk.

Excited about the snow.

Looking rather regal in his television-watching throne.  

Happy to be in Grandma Hanson's arms.

Liam loves to read, of course.  He'll lie in the corner by the bookshelf and "read" stories out loud to himself sometimes.

Experiencing the joy of olive fingers for the first time.  

I adore this child.  He is the sweetest, easiest little guy to get along with.  I nearly fall over with joy and amazement every time I tell him "no" and he says, "Okay, Mommy."  He is super cuddly and I can't get enough of his sweet chubby cheeks.  He is my little angel and I am so thankful for his presence in our home.  

Love Journal: My Angels

I'm not as tough as some people. But don't worry-- I've come to terms with my wussiness. We are one, my wussiness and I. Some women can work full time while pursuing an advanced degree and raising a family. I can't. And this is okay.

However.

There's another thing I can't do alone-- and that's living my life. You know, the one where I work full-time and manage a household and do church things and love a husband and develop friendships and nurture two challenging children.

God knew this. So he sent me some angels to help make it work.

There's my Daddy, whom I called one frustrating Tuesday afternoon, sobbing like a child. I told him I was about to kill Soren and had no idea what business I had being a mother. Poor guy, he made a lot of empathetic noises, but you could tell-- even over the phone--that it was like he was fumbling around in a tuxedo at his first black tie affair, just not sure what to do with his hands. But then to my parenting rant I added, sobbingly, "...and I've been trying to take my dishwasher apart because I'm so sick of washing dishes by hand but the screws are weird and I can't even get it apart to see what's wrong!" (Wailing.)

In about ten minutes my dad was in the doorway with a tool box in hand. He solved my dishwasher problem and read a book about bugs to my boys. A little while later my mom showed up, having come home to a note on the kitchen whiteboard: "Rachel is in crisis. Needs her mama too."

There's Briar. She used to take Fridays off from work, just because she could. But then Abe finished his Master's degree and got a job and suddenly we needed a little extra help with babysitting. Without hesitating, Briar volunteered to watch the kids on her day off. So now Briar "takes a day off" each week from work to take care of our little guys for an often long and trying day. She does this for free. Without complaint.

Briar also always makes sure that we get to go on our Saturday night date. She'll come upstairs in the evening, scoop up a whining kid, and shoo us away. Every week. Without complaint. For free.

And then there's my Mom. And my sister Collette. They, too, provide mounds of free babysitting. For years they've watched our kiddos on varying schedules while Abe and I worked and/or went to school. When Abe's work schedule changed a few months ago, I called them each to let them know that we would only need babysitting one day every other week. Both of them, separately, responded like this: "But that's not enough! I need to see my little boys more often than that! Can I please keep watching them every week?"

I am so grateful that my children are loved and nurtured by so many good people. So thankful that I'm not expected to do this alone.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. All of you.

P.S. Dear Briar, I am sorry for the sappiness and publicity.

Tomorrow's Miracle

If you woke up tomorrow and a miracle had happened and your life were now exactly how you wanted it to be, what would it look like?

Last week I saw this question written on the white board in the office of one of the counselors I work with.

I've been thinking about this a lot. I guess part of the reason I was so struck by this question is that it runs counter to the psychological operation I'm trying to run in my own life, which is being happy with what I have--not making myself miserable by thinking about what I don't. Do what you can, with what you have, where you are is my motto. **

You can't go wrong with gratitude and resourcefulness, right? So is our counselor trying to make her clients miserable by teaching them to focus on what they don't have?

Maybe not. When I go into the kitchen to make something, I have an idea of what I want it to be...a cake, a casserole, a salad, a sandwich. I get out the ingredients I need for that particular kind of food and cook the item accordingly. If I went into the kitchen, pulled out a bowl, and just started randomly mixing whatever came into my hand-- a cup of flour, a cup of milk, a half an onion, a mango, dry pudding mix, a package of Ramen Noodles--the end product would probably be less-than-scrumptious. I might luck out and end up with something amazing, but more likely it would be an inedible glop.

And so it is with life. (Imagine that last sentence in a Motivational Speaker voice.) It's important to have an end in mind, even if it's a bit fuzzy, just so you don't end up mixing onions and chocolate pudding. Even if you enjoy every minute of blending the two together, you're still going to have to throw them out when you're done-- and then you will have wasted time, ingredients, and energy. I mean, at least you enjoyed it, but if you're going to cook, you might as well get to eat when you're done, eh?

I think it is key, even when identifying how things could be different, to maintain an appreciation for each moment of life. So much of life is about balance-- that "middle way"--between two extremes. Like finding a way to want/work towards good things while simultaneously choosing to enjoy the things you already have. Happiness should never be postponed for the perfect conditions.

So before I move on I do want you to know that I am keenly aware of the many good things in my life and that I am grateful for them: things like good friends, a good job, healthy children, a happy marriage. I'm blessed with parents and siblings and parents-in-law and siblings-in-law who offer us oodles of love and support. My health is good; Abe's health is good. We have plenty to eat. We live in a comfortable home. We have enough money to meet our needs and allow us to do a few extra things. We live in a place that is safe, not torn by war or violence, where we are granted freedom to choose to live as we see fit.

While I was thinking about what my "ideal life" would look like, I considered things like, "In my ideal life I would never, ever be tired." or "I would have spent three years in the peace corps after college," or "I would be married to a long-haired Brazilian sculptor babe who adores my every breath," or "The world would be healed of all cruelty, jealousy, and hatred and all people would live together in sweet communal harmony," or "I would live in a tree house in a jungle in South America."

Then I decided to go with a possible life that would exist here in the real world.

So, without further ado, here's my list:

1) I would get eight hours of uninterrupted sleep most nights.

2) I would be passionately in love with my husband. (Which isn't to say I'm not in love with my husband...but, you know, eight years in, kids to care for, finances to worry about...the fire's just not wildly ablaze...)

3) I would have a part-time job editing and/or be the proud owner of a wind chime shop.

4) I wouldn't be afraid to write and would be happily plugging away at a novel or a collection of essays or a volume of poetry.

5) I would genuinely love all human beings, be concerned for everyone's well-being, be honestly happy for everyone else's successes, and always know the right thing to say or do to help someone feel loved.

6) I would boldly pursue more adventure.

7) Abe would have a grown-up job in a university library and a 401K with a matching plan, excellent health/dental/vision insurance, and lots of paid time off. He would be paid enough to enable us to live debt-free on a single income, donate 20% of our income to charity, put 20% in savings, and use the remaining extra to take quarterly weekend getaways and one excellent family vacation every year.

8) We would live in a beautifully decorated Victorian-style house in the country on a big plot of land. We would have a big garden, a bunch of chickens, a goat, a cow that we shared with several neighbors, a horse, a dog that didn't bark, and a barnful of cats. The house would always be relatively clean.

9) I would run five miles a day four days a week, followed by yoga with a group of friends in a renovated barn in the neighborhood. I would be physically strong and confident.

10) We would sleep in on Saturdays and eat waffles with strawberries and whipped cream for breakfast.

11) I would have time for lots of reading-- fiction, poetry, history, science, art, religion, psychology, sociology. I would learn and learn and learn.

12) Soren wouldn't be insane; Liam wouldn't be behind. They wouldn't be perfect, but they would at least respond to positive healthy discipline in the way the books say they're supposed to. They would pick up their own messes without being prompted. There would be no whining for sugary snacks between meals. I would spend just the right amount of time with them. I would always know exactly what to do in every sticky parenting situation. I might even find the strength to have another child! (One that immediately slept through the night and didn't cry much, of course.)

13) I would have finally figured out my relationship with God and be busy cultivating it daily, gaining strength and guidance from a positive connection with the divine.

14) I would take dancing classes and piano lessons and karate lessons.

15) I wouldn't worry about whether or not people liked me. I would make friends easily and interact with others confidently. I would have many close friends from a variety of backgrounds with whom I felt comfortable just stopping by to chat, or visiting with while one of us hung out laundry. We would often have dinner at each others' homes. Our children would play together happily.

16) I would make lots of homemade things, like soap and candles and cheese and granola and warm nourishing bread.

Some of these things are unrealistic-- like hoping for my children to be different from how they are. Some of them are totally doable-- like making soap and becoming more confident. And others are future but not present possibilities-- sleeping in on Saturday, running five miles a ay. But it's kind of nice to lay it out there. To smack my hands down on the table of life and say without apologies, "This is what I want." (And then add, a little more meekly-- "But I'll be happy with what I have until I can get it.")

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**My sister, Collette, and I recently discovered this is a life motto we share. "Where did you get it?" she asked me when we discovered this commonality. "The scrolling marquee at Cox's Honey!" I told her, "Oh. I think I read it in the biography of Warren G. Harding," she said. And that, my friends, is the difference between me and my sister.

Christmas 2011

Three months late isn't too late for a Christmas post, is it?

For me, the best moment of Christmas this year was when Soren rushed into the front room on Christmas morning, stopped, spun around, and said, "What! Howy cow! Mommy, I know why Santa brought all this stuff! It's because he liked the picture I sent him!"

Liam opened his Zhu Zhu pet and was happy the remainder of the morning.

First Picnic of the Year

Family Goals

A while ago we decided to start teaching the kids about making goals. We did this really well for a couple of weeks but then someone (Mommy) slacked on her goal and we've never moved forward.

Nevertheless, these are our first goal charts. We all sat down together at Family Home Evening and everyone got to choose what they wanted to work on. (Liam may have gotten a little guidance from me.)

My goal was to either hang up my clothes or put them in the laundry basket at night when I took them off, rather than draping them in an ever-growing mound on the dresser. Daddy's goal was to make the bed every morning. Soren's goal was to pick up his toys twelve times. Liam's goal was to practice walking up and down the stairs ten times.

My favorite part is that Soren immediately turned his goal chart into a little person.

Once everyone meets their weekly goal the family gets to do something fun together. One week we had an indoor camping trip. Another time we went out for ice cream. It was a good thing-- while we were doing it.

Gotta get back on that train.

Celestial Zombie

"Mommy, a black hole is a dead star that eats other stars...."

"...It's like a zombie eating the brains of people who are alive."

-Soren (age 5)

(Soren's been very interested in the life cycle of a star lately.)

(Mommy's response was: "Where did you learn about zombies?")

Love Scrapbook: Siding Story

Today was like a little hurricane in Southeastern Idaho. The wind was blowing. Hard. When I walked between the car and my office I honestly feared that my earrings would be torn out of my ears. Debris was flying. Trees were uprooted. Power outages were reported all over town.

At home, Abe watched helplessly as the siding on the side of our house flapped wildly in the wind (the siding, it turns out, was never actually nailed or screwed to the house; just stuck together and attached at the corners). "We're going to lose siding off our house," he texted me, "and there's nothing I can do."

I sighed inside. We had already had an incident like this on a less windy day. That time I had shined a flashlight on the ice-covered side of the house while Abe had pushed the siding back into place. "It's not very steady," he had commented then, "but we'll have to hope it will hold until the weather will allow for some repairs." Thinking about this, I knew that bits of our house were going to be lost in today's gale. I wondered how much it would cost to replace the siding. I wondered how recently it had been put up. Was it still covered under a warranty? Who had done the siding? How could I get the contact information for the previous owners to find out?

A while later I texted him back. "Dumb wind. I'm sad about the siding."

His reply: "Since there is nothing I can do I just said a prayer and let God worry about it."

"Good plan," I wrote. I figured it would all work out. We would lose the siding but find a way to get it repaired.

When I came home tonight, the wind--which had gotten up to sixty miles per hour during the day-- had died down some. And the siding? It was entirely intact.

Homemade Laundry Soap

So I've been wanting to do this for months and finally took the plunge. It was SO EASY and I'm excited to use it in my laundry. From start to finish the whole process took about 10 minutes.

(All ingredients were purchased at the local Broulim's grocery store.)

Homemade Laundry Soap
1/3 bar Fels-Neptha soap, finely grated
1/2 cup borax
1/2 cup washing soda (not baking soda!)
1 2-gallon bucket (I used an empty Member's Mark laundry detergent container)
A lot of water

Heat six cups of water on the stove with the grated soap until the soap has melted. Add the borax and washing soda; cook and stir until dissolved. Put four cups of hot water in your bucket; add the soap and 22 more cups of water (1 gallon plus 6 cups). Stir. Let sit 24 hours. The texture will gel and be kind of drop-egg-soupy. Use 1/2 cup for a large load of laundry. (You can add 1 oz of essential oils for a scent if you want.)

I haven't double-checked the math on this, but the lady whose website I stole this recipe from claims the cost comes down to $.01 a load.

Celebrities I've Loved

When I was a five or six, I thought that Miguel (above far right) on 3-2-1 Contact was soooo dreamy. I'd be riveted whenever he was there to explain a scientific concept.

I also had a little thing for Macaulay Culkin. I may or may not have spent some time kissing the cover of my book copy of Home Alone.

Then I must have hit latency. I don't remember a lot of celebrity lovin' between the ages of six and twelve. But then, puberty.

At twelve, I borrowed my brother's Crossroads album and fell in love with Jon Bon Jovi. While jumping on the bed and singing along with "Livin' on a Prayer," I decided that he would join the Mormon church, edit his songs to conform with gospel standards, and take me to the temple.

At thirteen I watched Stargate and started having daydreams about Kurt Russell. I knew just how things with the two of us would go. He and I would be rehearsing for a movie together and he would reach over my shoulder to point out something on the script. I would turn to look at him. Our eyes would meet. Fireworks.

Good bye, Goldie Hahn.

At fourteen I watched Seven Years in Tibet and couldn't stop thinking about Brad Pitt. My friend Jamie informed me that, yuck, he was the same age as her dad. Someone else told me he never bathed. Nevertheless, I hoped that we would one day marry.

I still think he's real hot. And I'm pretty sure he bathes.

In high school my best friend Holly and I developed an unnatural obsession with a local band of acapella-singing brothers called The Standards. We followed them to concerts in Logan, UT and Twin Falls, Idaho. In Twin Falls we arrived early enough to drive slowly past their house and their Dad's chiropractic clinic. So you can bet that when they came to do an assembly at our very own high school, we abused our Russet newspaper press passes to the fullest extent. My favorite was the goofy beat-boxing bass, Nic. Here we are together, locked in an embrace. Oh, the ecstasy!

Today Abe and I share a crush on Hugh Jackman. He's so dreamy.

So who were/are your celebrity crushes?

Dead Chickens

"Mommy, what are those?" Soren asked one morning as I unwrapped a couple of whole roasting chickens and rinsed them in the kitchen sink.

"They're chickens, honey," I told him.

"Dead chickens?" asked Soren, looking horrified. He's used to the lively flock of hens and roosters who run around the yard at his cousins' house.

"Dead chickens," I confirmed, looking glumly at the empty hole where one of the chicken's neck had once been attached to its body.

Soren's eyes were wide. "Who killed them??"

"I don't know. A butcher, I guess. A butcher is somebody who cuts up animals so we can eat them. All meat comes from the bodies of dead animals."

"I don't fink it's very nice to KILL animals and then eat them," said Soren.

"I agree," I said, turning the chicken over and examining the hole where its guts had been ripped out. "Do you think we should stop eating meat?"

"Yes," said Soren.

"Me too."

This exchange took place three weeks ago aaaand...we're still eating meat.

However. Our conversation acted as a catalyst on a thought process that has been churning around in my brain since last year when I ordered a free vegetarian starter guide from PETA (the premiere unbiased resource on vegetarianism) and started thinking more about the ethical implications of eating meat and other animal products. Seriously, if you want to improve your ethics in just one area of your life, eating is a good place to start, seeing as how eating is something most people do every day, multiple times a day (or, if you're me, all day).

What I've decided is that the key to ethical eating is mindful eating-- eating with an awareness of the food you're eating, its source, its impact on the world, and how that impact aligns with your own values.

The truth is, most of us eat food without really thinking about where it comes from. When I eat a hamburger, I might briefly think, "Hamburger comes from a cow," but I don't really allow myself to absorb and understand the reality of that fact. If I did, I probably wouldn't eat the hamburger. This is largely a product of my tender-hearted personality: I don't like for any living creature to suffer or die. Seeing a dead skunk on the side of the road makes my heart hurt. Mouse traps upset me. I catch and release spiders that I find in my home. When someone carves on a tree, I grab their hand, press it against the bark, and gasp, "Can't you feel its pain?"

So if I stopped to really consider that the flesh ground up and mashed between the two pieces of white bread in my hands once belonged to a living creature-- that this food source had once had great big long eyelashes framing giant brown eyes, that it had spent his days lowing, moving like a mindless adolescent in groups of other cows, and flapping its tail around its manure-covered butt-- I'd probably set the burger back down. Especially if I thought about the day he (he!) was herded into a processing plant, shot in the head, gutted, skinned, and hacked into bloody pieces for my consumption.

This doesn't bother some people. And that's okay. My sweet beautiful little nieces, for example, happily shoot and butcher their own deer. But since I would have to be pretty darn hungry before I could find myself capable of going out and killing my own animals for food, I probably shouldn't eat them so readily and so casually.

But even if you're the sort not bothered by animal sacrifice, it's still important to be mindful of where your food has come from and cultivate an awareness of whether the dietary habits you pursue are making an impact on the world in a way that aligns with your values.

For example, a lot of people don't know about the horrible living conditions that many egg-laying hens and grown-for-meat chickens are subjected to throughout their sad, short, hormone-injected lives. I don't know about ya'll, but I have no desire to continue to contribute to an industry that abuses living creatures this way.

Another consideration we often stifle during our daily consumption of meat, eggs, and dairy products is the environmental impact of our diets. Did you know that in in America 1/3 of all annually used fossil fuels go to producing animal food products? That the crops grown to feed food animals deplete soil nutrients more quickly than crops grown to feed humans? That it takes 10 times more energy and land resources to produce a meat-based meal than a plant-based meal? The meat-heavy diet to which we have become accustomed is unsustainable.

Lastly, I don't care what you were told in school or what you read in Self magazine, animal products are really not all that healthy for you. Vegetarians who eschew all animal products are far less likely than their meat-eating peers to develop osteoporosis, heart disease, kidney stones, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, hypertension, certain cancers, strokes, and obesity.

So what I'm saying is, I'm thinking about going vegan.

But it's hard. I was a vegetarian for a couple years as a teen, but that's because I didn't really mind cutting an entire category of food from my diet. Now I'm a bit more attached to food and have moved past a single food-choosing criteria ("What diet will make me the skinniest?") to a longer and more complicated list of questions, such as:

-What foods will provide my body with the vitamins and nutrients it needs, increase energy, and promote overall health?

-What foods will my husband and children eat?

-Will this diet fit into our budget?

-Will at least one meal I prepare during the week be deemed consumable by Briar, who needs her dietary sugar content thinned by something at least mildly nutritious?

-What foods are convenient and easy to prepare?

-Which foods will keep me from getting hungry again within the hour?

-How will eating/not eating this food affect my relationship with the people around me?

-How will eating/not eating this food impact the overall quality of my life?

-How is my diet impacting the broader world?

I'm quite entrenched in my current dietary habits, so change might be incremental and slow-going. However, since my conversation with Soren I have switched to buying locally-produced milk and eggs. The dairy farm where the milk is produced is located almost directly across the street from my office. I can go look at the cows any time I want and as them how they're doing and about whether they've been offered a 401K and dental plan. The origin of the eggs I am less certain about-- the girl at the counter said they were brought in by a farmer in nearby Ririe. (I wanted, couldn't bring myself, to ask if they had been produced by a non-oppressed chicken population. So if any of ya'll have contacts in Ririe, maybe you could do some sleuth work for me?)

I promise I won't judge you if I see you eating a meaty cheesy omelette. Eating is such a personal thing and many, many factors go into our food choices. You don't have to go vegan to be a good person. However, I would encourage you to think through the broader impact that your diet makes on the world and find a small way to change and improve that impact.

Love Scrapbook

At times I hear stories and experiences about love-- people loving people, God loving people, people loving God-- that make me stop and say: Yes. That is true. That is real. The substance of that story reaches down into my core self and gives it a firm squeeze, like it wants to make sure that I know I am awake, that I'm not dreaming, and that this loving reality is not just my imagination-- that it's solid, substantial, important.

I am not a woman of great faith, but I want to be. I want to open up my heart and become more acquainted with this love. I want to trust in it. I want to walk in it. I want to allow love to guide my life-- to be my life-- because, in the end, all we have is love. There is nothing else. God himself (herself?) is love.

Which isn't to say that I understand God. I don't. I won't pretend to. I tear my hair out in frustration at times at what seems to me to be the unfairness of a world in which some mothers worry about organic vs. regular baby food and other mothers worry about finding food for their babies, period. But, despite my inability to understand it all, I believe that God is good.

For a long time I've contemplated creating a "Love" scrapbook. Whenever I hear about a person or an experience that set off my inner truth-o-meter, I think, "That is Real. That is Goodness. I should put that in my Love scrapbook." But I've never actually made one. Today it occurred to me that I could share my Love scrapbook entries on my blog, so I'm going to give it a try. Though I will still continue with my Regular Blog Stuff, I will also occasionally post Love Scrapbook entries. My entries will be random-- "little" stories mixing with "big" ones, posted as I hear them, or as they occur to me, or as the mood strikes.

I'll start today with the story of my week:

Let's just say it rough week at work. Very rough. I had unintentionally hurt someone's feelings and she was making sure I suffered, though she wouldn't even tell me what I had done. I was hurt. Sad. Angry. Tired. Tense.

But I was given some little gifts from the universe to help me get through it all:

First, at our company meeting Monday night it was announced that we would be losing a member of our office staff. She was an excellent employee and will be missed. Many people expressed their sadness at her leaving. And then someone (who was oblivious to the uncomfortable situation in the office) piped up, "But if Rachel goes, we all go!"

Then a friend (who had no idea what was going on) took me out for a surprise lunch.

Another friend (who did know what was going on) stopped by just to give me a hug.

A coworker friend happened to stop by with a question during a particularly rough time. He saw my tears and took me out of the situation long enough for me to talk it out and get myself under control.

Yesterday an old man at the bank stopped me and said, "I know why it's so sunny outside! It's from you walking around with that beautiful smile!"

Other co-workers, my boss, and my parents all also offered support while we waded through the Junior High-esque drama at work. My dad assured me the problem was rooted in the fact that I'm just so wonderful in every way. :)

Anyway, the week is over, and things are looking up, and I'm grateful I was given these little gifts to buoy me up through a difficult time. Thank you, Love.