Josu loves going to school. always. he loves it.
except
for
today.
As we walked out the door this morning, he grabbed my hand and said "Josu need Mama".
Now, as much was we work hard to distinguish between needs and wants around here, when Josu says that he "needs Mama",
my heart
just
melts.
So Malachai took over the stroller pushing, and I picked up my weepy boy and told him that he would, indeed, go to school ("with Malachai!"), but that when I picked him up for lunch, I would snuggle with him and read him a book
or two
or
three.
And Josu said "Malachai go school. Josu go casa and Mama read Bible!"
and I just fell to pieces;
but I took him to school. and he went - - crying.
and my heart was
very
very
sad.

the event, documented

several days prior: have Rachel bake a pie; make Selma beg her for some.
the birth-day - - it's been one year!:
in wee morning hours: spend a few minutes daydreaming about the day Selma was born - - remembering the way she came out with just two little pushes ("not even any crazy pushing faces", Joshua told me); amazing at how much we loved her from the very beginning . . .
that afternoon:
go to the toy store to pick out a gift; do other fun things while we're at it
find the thirty minute time slot in the afternoon when every one is home and awake; stick a candle (one, of course!) in the last piece of apple pie, and sing a happy birthday song!
then go to bed. The day after, have Selma play hard with the the sweet-awesome gifts that she scored from all the people wanting to celebrate her.

fusion

when truth number 1 (I must, must, must make a chocolate stout cake tonight!) collides with truth number 2 (Joshua is far, far away, and has taken the car with him):

well, Joshua is home, and life seems a lot more cheery and hopeful (even on a dreary day like today); I can face life with a glimmer in my eye and a spring in my step . . . you know how it goes . . . I mean, look at me:

here I am drinking tea and sitting in front of my laptop while Joshua entertains the rowdy brood (captivating them with the legends of Zelda - - it's totally, totally educational; they have to do like, problem solving and stuff)

so check out this little hat that came as a gift to Josu when he was born. he really didn't get to wear it much (I'm not sure why I didn't force it on him; it's as cute as all get out!), but we did our part making up for it when we took the family out for a walk and down to the pasteleria this morning. It got passed around and we all got a share of the wooly hat goodness.

(click on Malachai's picture to get a close-up of the fantastic smattering of freckles on that cute nose!)(Josu - - a bit miffed that I made him take off his superhero cape for the picture. I'm still cool with my quirky sweet wearing it everywhere he goes, but, hey now son, there is a fine line between quirky-fun and quirky-obnoxious; let's limit the cape's presence in photos, ok?) (even Rachel tried to join in on the fun)

wine country

Malachai was waiting for me out in the hallway to take him back to his post-siesta classes this afternoon when I overheard this chitchat going on with our next door neighbor, Ana:
Malachai: "I'm taking some grapes to share with my class"
Ana: "oh! of course! it's the vendimia!"
me: "wha? . . .
Malachai: "yeah, the vendimia - - the first day of the grape harvesting; did you know, Ana, that the grape harvest this year wasn't as abundant as it was last year?"
Ana: "yes, but the quality of the grapes is better"
Malachai: "it's because we didn't get as much rain as we did in 2007 . . . "
aaaahhhhh. the vendimia. that explains his passionate plea for me to buy his class some grapes when we passed by the market earlier today.
explains it perfectly!

So when I picked him up from class, I asked him if his classmates enjoyed the grapes. "no! we didn't eat them!" he told me
"oh no?" I asked "what did you do with them?"
"we're saving them for later so that we can stomp on them with our bare feet to make wine!"
nice.

the one in which my perfectly designed gift number two is used by God to refine me

our landlord came by today to pick up this month's rent. I wondered if he would notice the recently added "toasty orange" wall in our living room.
he didn't.
it may have been because of Josu (stationed in my bedroom "until the man leaves") screaming "I need go poo-poo!" over and over and over again.
yeah. I'm thinking that was it.
he just looked compassionately at me and said, "the transition from two to three kids is rough, isn't it?"

smooch. squeeze. sniff.

I sent Joshua off early this morning - - with a smooch and a butt cheek squeeze (you know, the squeeze that communicates "I'm sorry for being such a grouch last night" ?- - I'm pretty sure it did the trick)
he's headed to Hungary for nine days for a church planting conference. I have a list of things to do while he is gone:
1. tame the craziness in the boys room
2. tame the craziness in our room
(that's a short list you say? ha! you haven't seen the craziness! it's in the same family as this craziness - -
which has, since this picture was taken, been put back into order, thank you very much)
besides, whenever Joshua goes away I tend to get this insane notion that I'll be able to get more stuff done than usual, and then he actually leaves and I realize:
1. he helps me a ton with the kids and house, and when he's not around, I don't have more time and energy, I have less time and energy!
and
2. really cool people (like our Christian community, and my friend Ana) know that I will be home without Joshua and so they make a huge effort to get together with me so that I don't get lonely. so I really don't have time to get stuff done; it's awesome. I love it. but I just have to keep the list short, you know?

perfectly designed gifts

Look at him! isn't he cute? God carefully crafted and designed him; and then gave him to us for us to raise him!

and our Josu!
and this wee lassie!
God is good.

Last night, on the News

Bob (as we'll call him): "well, as you know, Spain is the only European country that allows even its 'respectable' newspapers to include adds for prostitution! Isn't that right, Sue?"
Sue (as we'll call her): "that's right Bob!"
Bob: "not only are there pages and pages of these adds in our newspapers, but often, these adds are accompanied by scandalous, explicit photographs!"
Sue (wagging her head appropriately at this outrageous national shame): "that's right, Bob, in fact we are going to show you some of those very images right here, right now . . . "

aaaaaand that's when my good husband changed the channel.
it's good to know, though, that public tv is doing its part to put an end to such inappropriate images in other mediums of public media. tremendously noble. really.

No, there are no pictures for this post. that wouldn't be right now, would it?

do remember that thing about Rachel? well, she did it again, look what she brought me back from a junk shop in England:
Once, when Joshua was trying to snuggle with me, one of the earrings almost poked his eye out; and another time, when we woke up in the morning, there was a little earring shaped hickey on Joshua's shoulder right where I had laid my head on him. And every time I take my sweater off, it gets caught on the little hook on the back of the earring, and I have to roll on the ground for several minutes to try and wrestle it off. well, all of that and I'm still keeping them! I like them that much!

by the way, Rachel, I do wish that you would come back from that little trip you are taking. Two weeks is way too long for you to be gone from us. Sure, it's nice that Selma can sleep in your room (and we don't have to deny ourselves our late night snacks or our mid-morning second breakfasts like we normally have to when her crib is set up in the kitchen) but it's not really worth it to us. and seriously, how often do you clean that bathroom between your bedroom and the boy's bedroom so that it doesn't smell like an elementary school boy's bathroom all the time? like, five times a day?

p.s. mostly, I miss you, but I also miss the 70% Belgian chocolate that you keep stashed in our kitchen cabinet! come home soon!

compliments. kind of. the mystery solved.

ha! you'll never guess what just happened to me!
we were having a bit of an afternoon stroll around the park, when a kindly older gentleman struck up a conversation with Selma; and we chatted it up about redheads
me: "yeah, I have three of them, can you believe it?"
kindly older gentleman: "in the pueblo that I grew up in, there was a whole family of redheads!"
me: "that must have been one good looking family"
. . . and the conversation continued on for a bit like that . . . and then he said it - - "and they don't have freckles!"
so I did my part - - "well, I have freckles, so you never know . . ."
and then he said - - "noooooo . . . you don't have freckles . . . you may have some zits, but you don't have freckles . . ."

well now, that explains it all.
and I'm taking it as a compliment.
on a completely unrelated note, I'm off to wash my face.
a picture of Selma, looking far into her future when people will think that all her freckles are just zits

compliments. kind of.

it is not unusual for us to be stopped by random strangers who dote on our redheads; it happens all the time. we don't mind - - it's fun, really. almost everyone has a story to share about a redhead in their family, or a redhead that they once knew or dated . . . we like the stories!

and not all the time, but often, I'll have someone nod approvingly and say something like "and your redheads have beautiful white skin - - they aren't the freckled kind"
and I - - my children's very freckled mama, smile and nod and say something like "well, my freckles really didn't start coming in till I was about five, and if they do get freckles, we really won't mind too much!"

what I like about you. #1 in a series of about a billion

on the days when I'm all tired and worn out from the ever-so-important duties of keeping this home a well oiled machine, you pull out the Chocolate Crunch cereal (the crunch cereal that has been sitting in the shelf for about six months and is all chewy and stuck together and that you recently swore to never eat again because of its general disgustingness)and are like - - "no really babe, don't fix me dinner; I really want to eat crunch cereal"
sigh.

we were walking down to the pasteleria this afternoon to buy milk when Malachai (who recently started taking some classes in Euskera - - the Basque language) told me "did you know that burdea means 'animal buns' in Euskera?"

me: "really? that's kind of a weird thing to learn to say in Euskera"

Malachai: "I know mama, the thing is that the Basques say really crazy things"

me: "oh"
(really, what else could I say? well, other than - - "come on now, son, a little respect please . . ." )

a day in the life of us living a day with Dawn

Our super cool friend Dawn was here visiting last week. While she was here we took a little jaunt up to France (you can do that when you live in northern Spain) where we did fun things like walk on a French beach (averting our eyes from the occasional French nudie), eat French crepes, check French mail slots for French bad guys,
and peer into French shops and wonder about the moral implications of spending ungodly amounts of money on French children's fashion.
p.s. how hard do you think it would be to draft up a pattern for that little jacket?

go ahead and touch, but please don't pull

Selma found her earrings today; let's hope she doesn't rip those little suckers out of her lobes.
Sometimes she makes this face and then it gets stuck there. really.

portrait of a scratcher

uh, what's that, Josu? what do you want me to do? why are you scratching your head? pointing at the camera?
scratch, point. scratch, point.
oh. you want me to take a picture of you scratching your head. of course - - it makes perfect sense that you would want that. alright, go ahead and stand there and scratch.
well now, that turned out nicely.

oh, and Yesterday we found out from Malachai that his English teacher speaks "half English, half gibberish" . . . . interesting . . . .

off to school, my boys! be educated!

people worry. often, people worry about their own kids. Sometimes people worry about other people's kids. I think that in our neighborhood a lot of people worry about my kids; they worry that since they don't go to preschool at age two, that they will be permanently scarred - - unable to socialize or fit into group activities or learn how to share.

we heard good news from Josu's teacher today as she delightedly told us that she was surprised at how well Josu had done on his first day of school; especially since he had never been to preschool!

good job little man; good job!

purposeful re-integration - - the ugly side of it.

well, two days back now, and I'm working hard to jump right back into life - - I'm excited about meeting up with friends and contacts here in my neighborhood; I'm looking forward to seeing what "strangers" might be willing to greet or be greeted after our summer's absence (it happens - - have you ever noticed? someone who you see on a regular basis, but who you're not quite on greeting terms with, is more ready to say hello or to respond to a hello after you haven't seen each other for a while; it's true! try it! try it! try it!)

So I was thinking about all this purposeful re-integration this morning, and as I was in my local coffee shop, I ran into a girl that I might consider a casual aquaintence. our friendly interaction went a bit like this:

me:"heeeeeeyy! how are you? where is your little boy this morning?"

her:"oh, he's not with me this morning. . . . he's with his mumble mumble

(I couldn't quite catch this last bit- - it's kind of loud in the pasteleria and I'm still clouded with jet lag; I assume that the gist of what she is saying is that she left her boy back home with her husband so that she could calmly read the newspaper and drink her coffee - - a common treat for many of the moms with small children that I know)

me: (with a warm, genuine smile) "ooohh that is so nice!"

her: "uhhh, I'm divorced. that's why I said he was with his 'son of a **** father' - - the one who cheated on me when I was still pregnant . . . ."

oh shoot. oh shoot. oh shoot oh shoot oh shoot!

so, as calmly and carefully as I could, I communicated my most heartfelt apologies - - both for her suffering was well as for the complete idiot I had been to her. and she was gracious, but obviously pained.

I will keep an eye out for this girl, and I will be praying for a clear way to communicate love and care to her. pray with me, if you think of it.

the joy of knowing that you're not the hot stuff you once thought you were

I realized something the other day.

I realized that sometimes, I think that we're some the best parents we know. (do I sicken you? keep reading, keep reading, my friend!)

so these past couple of months we have been traveling around, and have been invited into the homes and lives of so many wonderful families; and all of a sudden we're not the best anymore; there are people out there that are doing such an outstanding, bang-up job of parenting that it puts me to shame.

oh, it's fantastic!

isn't the church wonderful that way? I really am convinced that that is part of God's purpose in the Church - - that as we see other Christians living faithfully, we realize that we're not that great after all. yes. I like the church. I don't mind not being the best, and I'm excited about being better.

"I woke up this morning and decided that I want to follow Jesus - - wherever he leads, because he is so mighty; AND I want to be baptized"

it's what he announced all day long to us, to Josu, to our cashier at the grocery store, to the little lady serving us lunch at the Chinese restaurant (who kept saying, "oh sure, whatever you want; whatever you say . . . "), to any friend or family or any remotely friendly looking person who we happened to run across

and I've been thinking about it, and I feel:
OVERJOYED: to think about my boy now, and eternally, enjoying and serving the God who made him.

GLAD: that he was so confident about it all (previous to this, he would tell us that he was trying to follow Jesus) and that it came out of the blue (well, kind of, I guess - - we are always talking about following Jesus - - I mean, it's who we are and what we're all about, right? ) and that he was so insistent and excited about it all day long.

CAUTIOUS: about ever allowing Malachai to assume that because today he decided to follow Jesus, and that today he obeyed in baptism, that it's "over and taken care of"; I want to be careful to communicate that while true discipleship begins with a choice to follow, it is a lifetime of faithfulness and perseverance that God calls him to.

BLESSED: to have a church family who was willing to drop all previous plans for the evening and to join us in a heartbeat for Malachai's baptism, to genuinely rejoice with us, to insist on celebrating the Lords Table together (even when they know that the way we most enjoy celebrating the Lord's Table is as an entire meal!) and then go out to ice cream with us!

A TEENY BIT DISAPPOINTED: that we aren't in Spain, and that Malachai wasn't able to share his share his exuberance with our friends and neighbors there.

. . . and I'll wait, and I'll watch, and I'll keep loving and teaching . . .

a cakestand, a suitcase, and free flowers

I got a cake stand for my birthday . . . isn't it pretty? Rachel has an uncanny ability to get you the gift you've been longing for for years - - and she usually ups it a notch too - - choosing, for example, a cake stand ten times classier than the one you yourself had imagined:
Malachai and I went to the trastero ( our 10x10 storage room down in the garage) yesterday to pull out one more suitcase, and on our way we saw these geraniums that one of our neighbors had thrown down onto the sidewalk - - cleaning out the shabby ones, I guess. They weren't too shabby for us, though (we're easy to please); we picked them right up and stuck them on on our table. We don't need them to last too long anyways;
just a couple of days . . .
Tuesday we drive to Madrid to fly to Dallas

you know how on the Iron chef, when the panel of judges taste the contestant's culinary creations, and the princess of Japan says things like "oooooohhhh! this is so exquisite - - like a rainbow exploding into a million dazzling pieces in my mouth!"
and then you (the show viewer) just kind of snort and snicker, and roll your eyes that anyone could possibly talk that way about
food . . .

well, it happened to me.
yep, here - - all night long Joshua and I were saying absurd things like - - "this is so good, I feel like I am going to cry!" and "the combination of textures is unexpected and masterfully juxtaposed" and "the flavor is so deep and complex, and yet so clean!" . . .

Really - - the food was that good.
the best part, though, was Joshua - - and me - - and Joshua and me married for NINE YEARS!
it gets better every year, baby.

something you need to know . . .

if you want to be a two year old with any social standing whatsoever in our local park, it is necessary - - absolutely necessary to own one of these little plastic motorcycles (called motos); everyone who is anyone has one.
if your parents don't want to dish out the fifty bucks to buy you your own moto, make sure that you know someone who does own one (in this plaza it tends to be the lovely little Jaquelyn); stand next to it, eying it wistfully and reaching out a longing hand towards it until the mother of the moto-blessed friend pushes it towards you and urges you to get on and do a little loop.

because teeth should be celebrated:

this post is dedicated to Selma.

and her new teeth.

we found this little guy (yes, we know it's a guy; he's clearly defined as such) tossed next to our dumpster this week. the poor baby had been marked up - - probably with every pen its household of origin contained; he was a wreck. we pulled him out - - he's such a nice size and shape, and doesn't have hair (I'm strangely, strongly opinionated about hair on dolls) - - hoping that his markings would come off with a good scrubbing. I've tried a variety of cleaning solutions and, while he looks better, the majority of the markings refuse to go. I have a feeling that he will make his way into the bag that goes next week to our local second hand shop (count on a Spanish woman to know an ink-removing trick that I don't!)

the cheeky cheese guy

we trekked down to Pamplona's farmer's market on Sunday morning.
I asked the cheese guy if I could try some cheese. "oh yes" he told me "you can try it - - and you are going to love it!"
we did try it, and we did love it; and we came home with a pound of artisan castilian sheep cheese.

Joshua likes to throw parties. you did know that about him, right? If you didn't, it's probably important that you do - - it's an essential part of who he is. I assure you, if you haven't been invited to one of his parties yet, there is a good chance that you will be; just hang around us long enough . . .
the first Joshua party I attended was perhaps the one headed up by his roommate Bill Clifton in College - -space lounge 2o10; they lined their entire room with tin foil and make made their guests sign a guest book with their planet of origin; and then there was his 25th birthday superhero party; we had Robin, Super girl, Wonder Woman, Poison Ivy, the Hulk, Mr. Furious, Spock (Spock? Spock?! you have to admit, Frank, Spock isn't really a superhero) show up to that one. And October, 2001 - - our Invasion of the Body Snatchers party - - guests had to come dressed as someone else they knew. March 2006 - - birthday again - - this time golden tickets went out, and a special request for guests to bring a something to eat that looked like something that should not be eaten. It's possible that the the Willy-Wonka trivia went a little bit long . . . but you should have seen the food! ah yes! you should have seen the food . . . there was everything from pretzel butterflies to an entire living room made of cheese and sausage!

So tomorrow we (Joshua, really, is the mastermind behind it, of course) throw another party.
At this party, titled Beloved Ecuador (because all really good parties have titles, you know), we will celebrate the roots of our Ecuadorian friends Jaime and Miriam, and prepare and eat Ecuadorian food and then watch End of the Spear
tomorrow morning I will go for a coffee and see who I run into; Maybe Ana and Miguel might want to join us . . . we'll invite them . . .

on raising boys in Spain

So. the June Cleaver of Spain doesn't have chocolate chip cookies and a glass of ice cold milk waiting for her boy when he comes home from school;
It has come to my attention recently that the Spanish mom that's really on top of it greets her boy at the end of his school day with a fat bocadillo de chorizo (that's right - - a piece of nice crusty baguette with a few slices of our favorite cured pork sausage tucked insde).
I'm slowly figuring these things out; it's hard work learning how to be a perfect mama in two cultures.

paella - - the way we like it

well, to break the monotony of the "gee! my kids are so terribly clever and cute and, don't they say the darndest things?" blog entries, I figured I would dish you all up some culinary inspiration with a paella recipe
Like a good gazpacho recipe, a good paella recipe is never exactly like any other Spanish woman's recipe - - you throw in bits of this and that, and you have a little secret something that you add in to make it your very own - - superb to any other paella about town. but not me; nope, uh-uuuuh. I got this Paella recipe from Janet Davis (she and her family were missionaries in Zaragoza, Spain when we first came to Spain) and I'm not changing it. it's perfect the way she gave it to me. It's not the most traditional Paella recipe you may come across, but it is our favorite (and it may very well become yours!)

in a paella pan (or a large shallow saucepan that can go stove-top as well as oven) fry the following in a bit of olive oil:
three boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into thirds, salted and peppered and browned just slightly. (take out of pan and set aside)
one diced red pepper - - sauteed until just soft (take out of pan and set aside)
1/2 link of Spanish chorizo (buy it, along with any other of your authentic Spanish food needs, here), cut into rounds and just barely browned (take out of pan and set aside)

in the same pan, add:
1/4 c. olive oil
one can of diced tomatoes
2c. fresh or frozen green beans (preferably flat) cut into 2 inch strips
a couple of sprigs of fresh rosemary
a few cloves of garlic, diced
a teaspoon or so of salt
cook this up for about five minutes and add:
1.5 c. short grain rice
the set aside peppers
the set aside chorizo
with a wooden spoon, smooth the top of the rice mixture and press the chicken pieces into it. pour 3 c. boiling chicken broth over the top. do not stir. cook on medium heat for about 15 minutes, and then place into a preheated 350 degree oven for another 15 minutes. cover with a clean dishtowel and let sit for 10 minutes. serve it up with lemon wedges, a crusty baguette, and a nice Spanish salad (it's easy - - lettuce, tomato wedges, sweet onion wedges and green olives - - dressed with extra virgin olive oil, vinegar, and salt.)
sigh.
perfect.