the chicken story....well, one of them.

anyone who knows me, knows that i am, on most days, trying my very best to live a natural existence.  i make my own deodorant, my own lip balm, my own moisturizer.  i rarely use the microwave, artificial sweeteners may as well be called death in powder form, and the idea of cooking something in saran wrap makes my skin crawl.  

i started this journey many years ago.  it has led me to cloth diapers, glass containers, homemade everything, and an overall lack of trust in the FDA, CDC, and any other government entity that tells me something is great for me.....3 years before telling me it is going to kill me.  call me crazy, but, i don’t think they know.  

fast forward to today.  we have recently obtained a couple of chickens.  we had asked one of our pastor friends who raises chickens if he could spot us a couple of hens. so, a  few weeks ago he came over with two chickens.  we named them lucy and ethel.  unfortunately, it quickly became clear that ethel was more of a ricky.  bummer.  at first it was ok because he was quiet.  but then he wasn’t.  not at 4 am.  not at 5 am.  not at 6 am....you get the picture.  we needed to get rid of ricky.  the thing was, ricky and lucy loved each other.  they cuddled up in their basket together every night, they walked around the yard together everyday, they were close!  where ricky was...there was lucy.  and vice versa.   

so after a couple of weeks lucy started producing eggs.  beautiful eggs.  i was making homemade this and homemade that, with eggs from our very own chicken!  it was great...  but we needed more!  we are a family of six after all.  so we decided to get rid of ricky and replace him with a couple of more hens.  the decision was made.  today was the day.  we asked the lady who works for us if she wanted to take ricky home?  she seemed delighted to do so.  randy and i went out in pursuit of a couple of chickens.  

now, normally there are people selling chickens all over the sides of the road.  signs that read ‘chickens for sale’ are pretty much everywhere around swaziland.  we didn’t think we would be gone for long.  but an hour later...we were still looking for the suddenly elusive chicken!  what in the world?!?!  finally, a guy who sells chickens, but was currently out of chickens, told us where to go.  and so we did.  we found the road...the road with coops and coops full of chickens.  oddly enough, they didn’t look quite right.  they looked like they had lived hard lives.  i mean, really hard lives.  and when a chicken looks like it’s lived a hard life...there is pretty much no telling...‘cause you know, it’s a chicken...how great can any chicken’s life be? 

nonetheless, we brought them home.  this is where i got my first thorough glance.  i can’t even begin to describe the crazy look in these chickens’ eyes.  the red thing on top, i have no idea what it is called, but it looks like theirs have almost been ripped off.  their eyes aren’t even.  their heads are small.  they have wings with no feathers.  i can see their skeletal system....because of the lack of feathers!  i’m afraid they’re going to murder lucy!  after examining them, i decided i wanted to let them go.  but they don’t seem smart enough to find their way out of the coop.  i can only hope they’re gone tomorrow.  

anyway, back to ricky.  at one point this afternoon, i looked outside and saw olivia standing by the coop...with a weird grin/disturbed look on her face.  she came running in and whispered to me, “miss colleen did the deed.”  about that time, i turned to see colleen coming into the house with a big knife.  i guess it was an assumption that ricky would go home with her alive.  i was wrong.  suddenly, i now knew why the tea kettle was full of boiling water.  there was about to be some de-feathering.  olivia said she had to hold the neck for colleen while she went to collect the knife.  she said as soon as miss colleen came back, she ran to distract lucy from what was about to happen.  lucy proceeded to wonder about the yard calling for her beloved....but he never came.  ricky went to be with miss colleen today...in a plastic bag.  i guess like the real ricky and lucy...it just wasn’t meant to last.  

traumatic day #274

random thoughts...the good, the bad, the completely unimportant....

-i love the age of 5.  i can see griffin's mental motor turning.  i see a sense of truth and justice growing inside of him...and more importantly, the ability to articulate it.  he's making sense of things...and is completely intrigued by the world around him.  i love how he listens to the Bible story at night.  his eyes are wide and his curiosity is peaked.  he wants to know what happened after the story.  he has started coloring inside the lines!  i love the age of 5.

- i want to respect my heritage.  and even more than that, i want to make those who have gone before me proud.  i don't know if i always do that...but i want to.  i love the book of proverbs and all that it has to say about honoring our parents.  i think there is so much to life in that.  i love it.

-i need new concealer.  my friend, the wonderful makeup artist, donna, gave me some make up a few years back that i absolutely loved.  so i went online to find what she had given me.  it was in all these unusual colors.  unusual for concealer anyway.  i started having my doubts about how i had used this magical tube of makeup.  so i facebooked her.  she asked me if i had put it on or under my eyes.  this is when i knew i had not used this product correctly.  how is it that the best concealer i have ever used was actually meant for my eyelid?!?  i told her never mind that it was intended for eyelids,  just tell me what color one would need if someone were to hypothetically apply it as concealer.  she directed me to a different website.  

- our pastor talked about judging in church this past sunday.  basically he was talking about how people who are always feeling judged are usually the ones who are the most judgmental.  wow.  i could not agree with that more.  i think it's a valuable point to ponder.  perhaps we should consider how much we have been judging whenever we are feeling a little judged.   and maybe everyone could learn this so i don't have to read all those facebook statuses with sayings about how i need to walk in other people's shoes.  those are getting old.  except that one that says, "honey, i do not need to walk a mile in your shoes...i can see how messed up you are from all the way over here."  that one makes me laugh every time.  no haters, please.  i didn't say it, the facebook saying did.  it probably came from pinterest.

-speaking of pinterest.  ella got bit by a horrible ant that clinches down on your skin and stays inside you until you decapitate it.  she was screaming as i was pulling the ant out of her toe.  griffin said, "mom, you should look on pinterest and see what you can do to make her feel better!"  it's possible we have discussed pinterest too much.

-i need to get curriculum ordered and sent to my parents.  because they are coming in less than a month!!!!  whoo hoo   i'm so blessed because they have been able to come over and see us several times.  and i'm so blessed because this time they are also bringing my grandparents.  how cool is that?!

-i want to move to paris and go to school to become a pastry chef.

-i don't know if my career in naturopathy and pastry chef will coexist peacefully.

- i hate monkeys and i'm not sure how much more i can take.  they.creep.me.out.

-i need to get my hair done,  unfortunately,  i just do not have the time.  my roots are bad...really bad.  someone even made mention that perhaps i have gray hair, which i really am not sure of...since i haven't seen my real hair color since like 1998.  that is when i got the "rachel" hair cut and stopped perming my hair.  it was when i stopped perming my hair that we all found out, and by we, i mean randy and i, that it was that chemical process of perming that was giving me lighter colored hair.  poor guy, thought he married a natural blond.  there was nothing natural about those 90's perms...but whatever.... it's been a love affair with the bleach bottle ever since.

-i have a kid that is finishing up his first year of high school.  how can this possibly be?!?!

-i need to look into drivers ed.  how can this possibly be?  i just took drivers ed. like 7 years ago...

-i wonder if it was really noticeable that i wore eyelid makeup as concealer for that year and a half....

things i've learned so far this week...

-sundays are not my family’s best day...we seem to be extra cranky.  

-dessert hummus is gross.

-some cultures greet one another with a kiss on the cheek.

-some cultures greet one another with a kiss on each cheek. 

-i need to get the above right in order to avoid any more awkward situations.  

-hudson has become even more obsessed with the banjo.

-when ella decides she is done with pacis...she throws them away herself.  

-always wash the parts to the cappuccino machine before using them.

-ella licks the parts to the cappuccino machine when we are not looking.

-how to make english muffin toast.
-learned via facebook page that i have been calling someone the wrong name for almost 2 years.
-how to use curry.
-ella has hidden many pacis throughout the house that i was unaware of...
-that i am neither strong nor smart enough to unhook a trailer from the hitch of my car.
-i am completely grateful for having a 15 year old son to do the above when his father is out of the country.
-i've become so lazy that i no longer go through the tedious task of typing 'ok'...i now only type 'k'.
-when a family watches a copious amount of duck dynasty... the 3 year old starts calling people jack.
-don't wear work out clothes and eat donuts at the same time...it opens you up for criticism.

a very long week

-randy went to jo'burg to collect a team.
-griffin got a root canal.
-griffin accidentally ripped off his toe nail.
-ella got stung by a bee.
-ranger and maverick had an unbearably aggressive day where they practically held us hostage in the house.
-the kids started piano lessons again.
-the kids hated piano lessons.
-i decided to add a streusel to every muffin i ever make.
-i gained 2 pounds.
-we are really enjoying our team that is here right now.
-this team is loaded with really awesome people.  
-i ran out of cheese for pizza so i turned the rest of the crust dough into cinnamon rolls.
-i gained another pound.
-i ran 6k this week and walked another 12k.
-i would have gained more pounds if i had not done the above.
-i tried to make banana pudding for the team, but it was more like banana soup.
-i felt badly about the above.
-it's so hot i take cool baths every night before bed.
-i would rather be hot than cold.
-i am not ready for winter.
-winter, please do not come.
-i cleaned out the laundry room today.
-i found some things i have been in search of for quite some time.
-i should clean more often.
-i really have no intentions of cleaning more often....it's just something i say.
-i fed the dogs a whole bunch of banana soup.
-the dogs became very lethargic and we were finally able to leave our house.
-the kids finally started second semester.
-we are little behind in school....
-randy and the team put up a tabernacle for pastor eric.
-pastor eric gave us a watermelon.
-it's not like any watermelon i've ever seen.
-it's supposed to be mixed with porridge...and a little food coloring.
-i have so much to learn.
-the end.

a trip to the dentist

griffin has been suffering through the weekend with a toothache.  it was a tooth that we had already had filled once, but i suspected that the filling had come out.  he woke up screaming friday night, saying his cheek hurt.  i knew by the look of the tooth it wasn’t good.  but it was the weekend....all i could do was try to numb the pain until we could get to a dentist.  we have a dentist here that does ok work for simple things...but this wasn’t looking especially simple, and the work they had done before was clearly not working out to his advantage.  

so, tuesday morning around 8:30 am....i finally got an appointment with a dentist in south africa that could see him that day...at noon.  we are 2 1/2 hours from the dentist...and we have to cross the border...which can take 15 minutes or it can take an hour.  one never knows these things.  when i made the appointment i was still in my work out clothes, no make up, the little ones didn’t have their hair fixed, and the school day had just gotten in session about a half hour earlier.  we left the house and 8:50.  we have all looked better, but i had on makeup and the kids were wearing shoes, it was a success really...

the border went great.  there weren’t a bunch of slow cars on the road.  things were looking up.  until badplass that is..... i didn’t see a speed limit sign....but the police saw me.  i was unable to talk my way out of it.  although he did ask me to be his mom.  i’m not sure what that meant...and quite honestly i found it awkward.  i laughed nervously...he didn’t.  what  on earth did he mean?  did he want me to take him to the dentist like i took my son?  he was younger than me, but good grief!  he was no where near young enough to be my son!  anyway, from there on there were slow cars, slow trucks, road construction, finding private places to let children use the restroom in the great outdoors.  (public restrooms do no exist from swaziland to nelspruit south africa) we ended up parking the car in the dentist’s parking lot 3 minutes till our appointment time.  i felt good about my accomplishment.  minus the speeding ticket.  

once inside the doctor’s office, i met the dentist.  i don’t think he was actually old enough to be a dentist.  however, he didn’t ask me to be his mom, so i felt less weird about the situation.  griffin laid there like such a good boy.  that’s when i realized he had his shorts on backwards.  i’m such a good mom.  he is the best little dental patient i have ever seen...too bad he has had so much practice at it. :(  

griffin received a root canal and another giant filling.  he told me he was happy happy happy!  he felt better almost immediately....and so we went to mcdonalds.  

i’m not a huge fan of mcdonalds, but it is nice to have a large coke from time to time, so i ordered that, fries, and an apple pie.  they still fry the pies here.  i don’t think i like them fried as well as baked...but whatever.  they never have them ready to eat.  they always cook them after they are ordered.  every time.  no matter what, if you order one, they look at you all sad like and say, “it’s going to be 8 minutes.” almost trying to talk you out of it.  to which i always reply, “it’s ok, i will wait.”  i have nothing better to do after all.  so the kids ate, and then i sent hudson to get mine and olivia’s apple pies and order he and the little kids a mcflurry.  unfortunately for us, they had sold one of my pies, and the ice cream machine was broken.  this is typical.  and exhausting.  oddly enough, they told him it was going to take 10 minutes for the next apple pie.  i thought maybe it was going to be bigger since it was going to take longer....but it wasn’t.  and, since the ice cream machine was broken, my pie became even smaller when i had to share it with griffin and ella.  they got it all over themselves.  i may have yelled a little.  we were in the car by that point.....so while no one could hear me, i’m pretty sure they saw me raising my arms and opening my mouth really big.  i wasn’t mad because the kids got the pie all over them, i was mad because olivia was mad that i gave them pie.  and i was mad because hudson was mad that i gave them the pie.  it would be a lot easier to be a mom if i didn’t have other people telling me what to do all the time.  especially people who have no parenting experience.  

this brings me to something i need to get off my chest.  it is so much harder to parent little kids when older kids live in the same house!  glad i could get that out.  

anyway, while we were out and about doing this nonsense, randy was in johannesburg picking up a team.  we all made it back to swaziland in time for dinner together.  griffin is still happy happy happy, and his shorts are on the right way today.  all is well.  

     when i had my first baby, i was 22.  i had just finished college and had absolutely nothing to do but make this beautiful baby a guiding light for all other mothers to look to for the obvious way that all children should be.  he was an easy baby.  he slept all night for the first time at nine days old.  the only night he really cried was his first night in the hospital.  we are still not sure what all that was about.  perhaps he feels the same way about hospitals as his mother....  my labor with him was difficult and traumatic.  i really didn’t know what to expect in birthing a baby, but i can assure you, what happened in that delivery room was not it.  it was awful.  and i think i was much closer to death than what any of the medical personnel in the room were leading me to believe.  in retrospect, i should have taken a birthing class.  :) 

     hudson was my world!  he was chubby and happy and adorable.  i loved to kiss him, and he loved to suck on my face.  i dressed him like a little man....a little stylish man.   we read books, played blocks and built roads for his hot wheels.  when he was 2 and got a guitar and drums for christmas, we formed a band.  and we were good!  we would sing, he would play, and i would dance.  hudson never was much of a dancer.  i think my skills may have intimidated him.  i tried desperately to get him to join me, but the dirty looks he gave me for asking him to dance started quite early on in his life.  

     as hudson got older, his interests became geared towards things like spiderman, star wars, skateboarding, and dinosaurs.  oh my goodness, how could anyone who knows hudson forget the dinosaur years?!?!  i learned more about the t-rex than i had ever intended on learning.  i desperately attempted to answer questions about spiderman and the green goblin, and learn to just close my eyes as he would attempt trick after trick on his skateboard.  

     soon, he was off to school....and then a few minutes later, he was in junior high.  the speed at which it all has started to go is freaking me out a bit.  discussions of driving, when he can get his license in terms of when we are in the states.  discussions of what classes to take and when for graduation.  discussions of what he is going to do after high school...the where and the how.  

     i can honestly say that i have enjoyed every year of his life.  i can look back at the last 15 years and know that i tried my best to squeeze every second out of this experience of mothering my hudson.  except that i’ve known since the beginning that he wasn’t mine at all.  

i remember when hudson was about 6 years old, and one day as i was praying for him, the Holy Spirit led me to the piano.  i began to play and to sing a song from my heart of how God had given him to me, but i was to give him back to God.  like many parents i know, we had dedicated all of our children to Lord when they were babies.  we had prayed for direction and wisdom as we raised this child and our others.  we had recognized that he wasn’t ours in the first place.  but somehow, on this particular day, i suppose God needed to remind me that he was on loan.  that i had this awesome responsibility to raise a warrior.  that it was my mandate to protect him, to train him, to instruct him.  and whoa!!!  what a responsibility!  but more than that, i had stopped to realize that God had entrusted me with this most precious gift.  he entrusted me!!!  i love hudson, olivia, griffin and ella more than words can possibly say, and i can only imagine that God loves them that much more.  i often wonder if he is pleased as he looks at me and how i am parenting?  is he pleased with how i am handling these priceless gifts? 

     i know that i am not the only mom that sees her children this way.  i know i’m not the only mom that believes her children to be super special in the most super amazing way.  i believe that God wants us to see our children that way.  after all, that is how he sees them.  in fact, it’s how he sees us.  

     everyday i pray that my children seek wisdom, strength, and the character of God.  i pray that God would guide them, and that they would hear his voice.  i pray for boldness and courage to be who they’ve been called to be.   i pray that they make not only the right decisions, but righteous decisions.  

     so, on this day, the day we celebrate my firstborn, i want to tell him how proud of him that i am.  i want him to know that i am praying for him each and every day.  i want him to know that there has not been one day of his life that i was not so proud to be his mom that i didn’t get choked up just thinking about it.

     hudson, happy 15th!  i have loved watching who you have become and look forward to seeing all that God has for you to do.  i love you!