World Down Syndrome Day

Ally - when she was about eight years old

Ally - always the encouraging one through my chemo and recovery

Ally - thirteen years old and a young lady

We were young, naive, eager, and enthusiastic.  Baby Ben was fifteen months old, learning to run, curious about everything, and finally a good sleeper.  I had completed my first semester teaching biology at the college level and was working part time in family practice.  Not-Yet-Farmer Husband had just completed his doctoral studies and dissertation and was preparing to begin his post doctorate fellowship.  It was time to move.  Move from our little basement apartment under a mansion in the big city and make our own home. 

After interviewing in several places Not-Yet-Farmer Husband was offered a post-doctorate residency fellowship at a private practice counseling setting about 200 miles west of the big city.  So we packed our bags, loaded the U-Haul (twice!), and moved into a fixer-upper-er with two and a half acres.  Our first home! The siding was wood pecker pocked, the carpeting stained, dirty and reeked of dog urine, the wall paper outdated and the drywall nails puckered through.  But it was sound and dry.  And overlooked a beautiful setting of trees, hills, and water. 

Day One of moving day we celebrated with a spaghetti dinner and ate around our little built-in orange laminate table.  Day Two began our fifteen year project of remodeling, building, and repairing.  Oh! The projects I could write about.  Tiling, painting, staining, insulating, drywall, mudding, hardscaping, siding, roofing, framing, window installation, deck remodeling, kitchen counters, resurfacing cabinets, carpeting, parquet flooring, custom molding, and bathroom creations.  Every room, every wall, every floor, every window.  We even jack hammered the old concrete and poured a new driveway.  We built and remodeled as though it would be our home on this earth until we passed.  I can’t even recall the hours and hours, weeks and months of work.  A labor of love – most of the time.  With memories of laughter, sweat, and tears.

And then we moved to the farm.

The “other house,” for which our remodeled home became known as, was not yet completely remodeled or completed when we moved to the farm.  So we went back and forth working on projects getting the home ready for sale. This took years.  Years.  But finally it was done.  We put it on the market.  First ourselves, then with a realtor.  But the house did not sell.  Common feedback was “It’s too big”.  And yes it was – it was now 4000 square feet, five bedrooms, four bathrooms with a master suite.  Empty, it took me over an hour just to vacuum.  

For almost two years it stood. 

Our prayer was that a Christian family or perhaps ministry would purchase it and be blessed by the size, design, and vastness. 

Then one day in mid-February an offer.  We closed last Thursday.

They are a young Christ-following couple purchasing their first home with a young beautiful and curious baby boy about a year old (sound familiar?).  Their passion and dream for the home and the ministry for their lives was to adopt children with special needs – either children with Down Syndrome or cerebral palsy. 

Oh, how my heart is filled with warmth and gratitude. This would be a perfect home! An answer to my heart's prayer - even when I didn't know it.

Happy World Down Syndrome Day! (How Do You See Me?)

"For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.  Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of earth.  Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none." (Psalm 139: 13-16 ESV)

Today’s Journey Joys: Ally-girl - our gifted child with three 21st chromosomes, breakfast with a dear friend, farm fresh eggs, pancakes with warm syrup, spring sprouts and tulips pushing through mulch, roosters crowing, bees flying, sun-shine warmth, aprons and cats curling.

Winter's Crust

“Cough, c-c-cough, cough…” the sounds rattle through my chest and generate what feels like loose gray matter resonating throughout my head and face. The productive results of this hacking is an unappealing expectorate resembling a combination between applesauce and vanilla yogurt.  My voice is deeply resonant with intermittent whispered high pitched squeaks.  Joints are rubbing. And the body is achy and weary.

It’s been 12 days with these cold symptoms.  And they’re not getting any better.   But I press on.

Longing for spring. 

Green buds, tiny shoots pushing through the soil. Fuzzy pussy willows swelling with expectation.  Lavender craving warmth  in anticipation.  Spreading its skinny leaves and stretching towards the growing sun in preparation for majestic purple blooms.

Could it be that the daffodils have punctured through winter’s crust?  

The lettuce, ornamental grasses, and flowers are maturing in the growing center of the basement. Soon it will be a jungle down there and plants will eventually be moved to the hardening center - a removable plastic cover over shelves just outside the front door - protected from spring's western winds and variable temperatures.

Over three hundred tomato plants placed strategically in their cells.  And peppers soon to follow.  The frenetic pace of soil preparation, seedling starts, spring debris and left over winter weeding, and hoop house preparation is fast approaching. Often overwhelming; but always exhilarating.

I truly believe that farming must be an activity in heaven.  It brings such joy. Such measure and pace. Such reliance and praise to the Creator. Yes, soon the warmth and sweetness of just turned soil and the freshness of green grasses mowed will be upon us once again. The sun will warm our backs and draw out the freckles. Jackets will be donned and coats and mittens put away until another cold restful season.

Today's Journey Joys: a hot, hot, steamy shower on achy joints and stuffy lungs, flowers, broccoli, cabbage sprouts, a pot of turkey soup and fresh baked bread, and negative findings on follow up tests for my eye.