Laying Up Sweetness

Soft purple scent captures me
Bees hum their diligent
honey making humming
laying up your sweetness
in perfect combs
Face in your blossoms, I, like the bees
tuck your memory away for winter
Sixteen years from tiny twig to high bush
Sixteen summers since the day we planted you,
the one who loves my face and I
You will bloom and cast your perfume
when we no longer stand upon this ground
but linger in the honeyed hearts
friendship has combed.

Laying Up Sweetness
Kat Cavanaugh LaMantia

Several years ago when John had to go ahead of our family to take a new position I greatly missed him. One Saturday found me standing in his closet, face buried in a black wool jacket, inhaling his sent. I was home.

Our wonderful old dog, Jazz, did the same thing with our son's boots during his tours overseas.

My front door is a riot of lilacs and lavender. The scent wraps itself around you cocooning you in perfumed delight. I found myself, face buried in blossoms, just like that old jacket, inhaling the telltale fragrance of His own scent the Creator breathed into His creation. Home. Be it done on earth, home.

We were meant to remember and to celebrate in remembering the One who is unforgettable. The One whose mercy, love and beauty were just made for us. Made to be saved up and savored and shared.

There are lilacs filling every room today. Mostly they are filling me with the sweetness He saved just for today.

His miracles are unforgettable. The Lord is kind and merciful. Psalm 111:4 NCV

Hint: To my pregnant family and friends, treat the baby to lilacs, roses, honeysuckle and anything else that is delightful. It will fill up your womb with unutterable sweetness and bring the joys of summer to your baby.

http://www.sharecare.com/question/when-smell-develop-in-fetus

"It used to be that scientists believed fetuses had about as much of a sense of smell as they had a sense of fashion; that's because smelling typically depends on such basics as air and breathing. Now, though, it's believed that amniotic fluid jets though the nasal and oral cavities to actually help a fetus smell. That ability starts at about 30 weeks; before that time, tissues plug up the nasal cavities.

The sense of smell begins developing much earlier, as olfactory epithelial cells form in a fetus at 9 weeks along with nostrils. These cells connect to molecules that bind with the olfactory nerve (which leads to the brain).

After your baby develops a sense of smell, he can actually smell everything that you eat or inhale. The lesson: Mom should eat what she wants her baby to like to smell."

You: Having a Baby The Owners Manuel To A Happy Healthy Pregnancy by Michael Roisen, M.D.

Tea With Rhonda

I am blog-surfing and loving it.

Have resisted writing to do some other needful things and I am eating at the table of friends in the interim. Yummy!

Had to pass this wonderful piece along from a golden friend.

Grab a tissue and fill your heart with the least of these.

kl

http://soulspanting.blogspot.com/2012/05/we-are-like-birds-so-fragile-and.html

His Favor Lasts a Lifetime

One does not have to be in active ministry to be aware of just how frequently you hear someone say, "If only I had made a different choice." One does not have to be a Catholic priest to feel you are sitting in the Confessional listening to, "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned." Across a lunch table at work, over coffee, in desperate midnight phone calls come those words of opportunity lost, "If only..."

How many times have I said it to myself with regret and clung to the comfort of Christ's words from the Cross, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do."

But the fact is I usually did know and made a choice to ignore the flashing lights that said the bridge was out, or failed to weigh all the options before making a life changing decision or ignored the wisdom of God's Word, or took the feelings of a friend or loved one for granted. The result is always grief and loss.

The jails are full of "If only" stories. So are the scriptures. So are we all but there is small comfort in thinking that everyone has made the same mistakes you have. That is the logic the dark side applies to keep you writing another chapter in your "If only..." story and to make sure it does not have a happy ending.

The merciful love of God is confrontational and at the same time relational. This is no impersonal judge handing out mandatory sentences. This is someone who has made an investment in us.

When I was a student nurse I was on a hospital floor and the chief of the surgical services happened to be in the nurses station. He looked at my name tag and said, "Cavanaugh. I know you. I made an investment in your family."

It turns out that 15 years earlier when he was a resident and my mother lay dying on an operating table, having gone through all of the available blood of her type, that same doctor gave her a pint of his own as a direct transfusion. It helped to saved her life.

The Son of God gave us all He had to give on Calvary so that we could one day know all He had to share with us in Eternity. Eternity starts here and it is vast enough to out weigh all the "What if , if only, coulda, woulda, shouldas that could ever be spoken.

Consider this verse:

For his anger lasts only a moment, but his favor lasts a lifetime; weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning. Psalm 30:5

As I looked at that scripture in a devotional on Psalms John has been reading, what stood out to me was the part that says, "His favor lasts a lifetime." The blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin. No exception for stupid, thoughtless sin. All sin. All our sin goes into the sea that God forgot. All the "What ifs" belong there as well.

That sea has a "NO FISHING" sign posted so we should quit trying to bait the hook. Can we just "Take God at His naked word," as Spurgeon calls it and soak up the truth of that scripture?

His favor lasts a lifetime. His favor lasts a lifetime. His favor lasts your lifetime, my lifetime. God's favor. We live and move inside His grace and good will all the days of our lives. His favor out lives our sins and errors and it certainly out lasts our "What ifs."

Need proof. Look at David. He always comes to mind when I think of a soul-jarring example of "How could you?" We know he looked where he was not supposed to look and took what he dared then murdered an innocent husband in a shameful cover up that enlisted the help of subordinates to pull it off.

If you look further you read that 19 soldiers in all died in the pull back that killed the husband. 19 mothers in Israel lost sons to the passion and cowardice of its King. Yet Christ was not ashamed to be the Son of David. David's confession, repentance and renewal points the way to a joyful morning with its sure mercies.

Titus 3:4-6 (The Message):

"But when God, our kind and loving Savior God, stepped in, he saved us from all that. It was all his doing; we had nothing to do with it. He gave us a good bath, and we came out of it new people, washed inside and out by the Holy Spirit. Our Savior Jesus poured out new life so generously. God's gift has restored our relationship with him and given us back our lives. And there's more life to come—an eternity of life! You can count on this."

The favor of God trumps it all for us and makes today brim over with new opportunities, new adventures, new possibilities, new broken-bone dance steps to learn.

He has made an investment in us.

His favor lasts a lifetime!

"What if" we believed it?




(Re-posted from an earlier date)

Spring Cleaning

Spring Clean Up In Alaska

Empty pots stare open mouthed from the shed
"Feed us." They demand, "And work the flowerbed!"
Bee balm and lavender are not close at hand
in our flower-famished northern land

Winter has overstayed the spring
and wears a dirty snow covering
Wind-snapped branches fill the yard
Spring does not come sweetly here- but hard

Our Winter season falls deep and cold
only the spruce and fur are bold
Spring life lies burrowed deeper still
Time to coax it out if it will
Time to come out and play from seed
and bloom the life span of fireweed.

The roses demur, refusing to grow
but dinner-plate dahlias bloom just so
and red burnet, the color of wine,
peeks around the columbine
to show off next to pink pussy toes
and snub the chocolate lilies (hold your nose!)
Shooting stars and iris, quite a lot
beg to be remembered to forget-me-not

If I'm to have color I'll need to get busy
I'll shovel the moose poop and mulch till I'm dizzy
In my mushy old yard you'll see me slogging
and understand well why I am not blogging!

Kat Cavanaugh LaMantia


In a land where it is light in the summer almost around the clock it makes up a bit for having six months of winter. Time for me to fill the pots and hang the baskets.

I am going to disappear (except to scratch and occasional itch) to tidy the yard, work at illustrating a book I finished, dig into Creating a Life with God by Daniel Wolpert and read some of your past blogs and offerings. I also promised John we would empty the garage of 39 years of unnecessary life we have been dragging around. That will be even more daunting than the moose poop in the yard.

I wish you sweet, green spring days and the juicy fruits of summer and long evening walks with the One who brings it all to us year in and year out. The One who is Faithful. The One who comes sweetly.

Now where are my yard boots? Don't tell me...this could slow things down...they are in the garage!

-Kat

http://www.adn.com/2012/03/13/2368355/reader-submitted-gardening-2012.html#id=2528834&view=large_view

Alaskan Wildflowers and locations (images, except the poop, are from this link)
http://www.turtlepuddle.org/alaskan/wild/flowers-2.html

The Spring I Wish I Had

Spring
-By Karla Kuskin

I’m shouting
I’m singing
I’m swinging through trees
I’m winging skyhigh
With the buzzing black bees.
I’m the sun
I’m the moon
I’m the dew on the rose.
I’m a rabbit
Whose habit
Is twitching his nose.
I’m lively
I’m lovely
I’m kicking my heels.
I’m crying “Come Dance”
To the fresh water eels.
I’m racing through meadows
Without any coat
I’m a gamboling lamb
I’m a light leaping goat
I’m a bud
I’m a bloom
I’m a dove on the wing.
I’m running on rooftops
And welcoming spring!

Karla Kuskin, "Spring" from In the Middle of the Trees.

AHHHHH! Spring. New things. We get spring in Alaska. It just comes late and dirty like a nine year old called in for supper.

I saw this poem, made peach tea, pulled the vase of Mother's Day flowers my own mother sent to me closer until their fragrance was competing with the steam from the cup...and just became 'bud and bloom' for a few minutes.

I wrote a poem of my own for spring. Nothing like this beauty as you will see for yourselves tomorrow. But spring needs a "Hello. What took you so long?" Spring needs to push up green shoots of new moments and new possibilities. Spring needs to declutter and let the roses breathe. Those outside the door roses (that are hard to grow here) and also the roses blooming heartside.

Take some time. Say "hello" to spring and welcome the One who brought it into your life again this year.

-Kat

"Summer and winter, and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above,
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love."

Vivaldi Spring
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pmOwlf99V64&feature=related

Where The Heart Is

The Nest

Today I found an empty nest.
I looked long, deep inside.
I looked below, I looked above
wondering where her birds hide.

Had they gone south to Mexico?
Had they flown north to Nome?
Did they ever give a backward glance
to the nest that had been home?

I had a little bird you see,
my love had kept him warm
and held him safe on the highest branch
through sun or sudden storm.

He flew away to find his life,
and that's as it should be.
Snug in his heart you'll find a nest
and in that nest lives me.

-Kat Cavanaugh LaMantia


A book on mother-love made a statement I could not deny when it observed that once you have a child, your heart will forever walk the earth outside of your body. That is one of the great truths of Creation. It is true for this mother's heart and it is also true for the One who started it all. "Let's make a man who looks like us."

What was He thinking? Unlike the rest of us who had no real grasp of how bruised and exulted parenthood could be, God knew everything before there was anything. He saw what would happen to the house when we left the playpen- but He took the understanding and eternal part of the Trinity and the soil from the Garden and made us. What a risk. What a hope.

There is a song I enjoy that says, "Everything rides on hope now." Indeed it does. Every baby is born into it. Every mother who longs to make someone who looks like her, seeds her womb with hope, like the robin who builds her hope out of mud, spit and twigs.

Faith, hope and love. They are the nest builders. They are the world builders. They make us look like the One whose heart is our nest.

To all the mothers old and new and to all women living in anticipation, I bless you and wish you a Mother's Day that is happy and hopeful and above all grateful.

To John David who made me a taxi-driver, cupcake-baker, story-teller, medic, frog-catcher and devil-fighter, I will love you forever and a mile beyond. You are the silver my life has sent on ahead.

He flew away to find his life,
and that's as it should be.
Snug in his heart you'll find a nest
and in that nest lives me.

Blessings!
-Kat

Robin's nest pastel by me. "Hope Counts To Three"


Treat yourself to wise words over @ A Holy Experience.

Set Your Face Toward Beautiful

I have a friend that God once described to me as a "Builder and a mother of builders" and she is just that.

If you are a mom you build. Inside your own body and then outside of it. You build life and rebuild the world around that life one prayer, one gesture, one encouragement at a time. Or...if your own world has been broken, maybe you take that life and dash it to pieces, twist it and bend it into a shape of no use to the Kingdom of God.

If you need to change, if you need to build better, the good news is you can!* The Kingdom is also about change and resurrection and God is a trustworthy and accomplished parent who has written wisdom into a book. Such a special book.

I heard it said that the Bible is the only book that, in addition to you reading it- it reads you. Does it ever. Love and redemption are there. Soul searching is there. Cleansing and a fresh start are there. How to build a home and a life are there. All the nest making materials you could ever want are in one place.

Encourage yourself and unroll the blueprints.

By wisdom a house is built,
And by understanding it is established;
And by knowledge the rooms are filled
With all precious and pleasant riches
Proverbs 24:3-4

Motherhood is not about one day in your life. It is not about one season. It is a new opportunity every day as the days stretch on ahead. Growth is added in small, almost imperceptible, increments until one day you realize that the things that drive new moms or the moms of toddlers or teens to despair are easy for you.

You know the scripture that promises 'He is making everything beautiful in its time'? It is no lie. There is a country called Beautiful and you have land there. You have water rights and mineral rights and the right to build as grand as you can and to fill every room with pleasantness. It takes wisdom and here is the very best part- Jesus has been made wisdom for us. (1 Corinthians 1:30)

We are on the eve of another celebration of Mother's Day. Your Beautiful land may be cutting her own hair or the dog's with round edge scissors. Your Beautiful land may have flushed all the Playdoh down the toilet. Simple stuff- or your Beautiful land may be oppositional with a 'No Trespassing' sign posted for your benefit. Your Beautiful land may have another detention or have to go to summer school or do community service. Your Beautiful land may be unmarried and in her sixth month of an unplanned pregnancy. Your Beautiful land may be in rehab. Your Beautiful land may ignore you tomorrow and forget you the day after. Take heart. He who is the Faithful One is making everything beautiful.


Tomorrow would be a good day to embrace hope.

Tomorrow would be a good day to let courage chart a new course if need be.

Tomorrow would be a good day to set your face toward Beautiful.

-Kat

*If you are not yet a Christ follower you may appreciate that is a good place to begin a journey to better parenting. This link may help.
http://www.intouch.org/resources/all-things-are-new/content/topic/how_do_i_accept_jesus_as_my_savior_all_things


Parenting tips.
http://www.aholyexperience.com/10-points-of-joyful-parenting-printable/


Personal/Family Counseling
http://fatherhood.about.com/od/parentingadvice/a/family_therapy.htm