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I tasted dark, ripe fruits,

The plum-red stain dyed

Crimson on my tongue - rebelliously sweet,

Sweeter than honey

Dripping from the comb.

I bathed my face, my body in it-

But instead of Satisfaction-Craving;

It seeped into my bones

My marrow stank with it.

Enough! Enough! I cried

But once tasted Hunger cannot be sated-

The curse encompasses Touch

The cells know the Master

And they obey- they obey!

How strange-then- infant fruits shall grow

One morsel-Satisfaction find-

Once crushed upon the ground the curse confined-

The reek of rotting fruit-

The soil fertile grows-

And makes a ruby stain

That waters thirsty ground.

Jimmy

Today the world lost a superhero. Jimmy was a camper who represented the epitome of Camp Harkness. He lived passionately, taking time to enjoy the small moments like telling a joke or patting you on the back. When his car pulled up on Sunday afternoons counselors flocked to greet him and most likely they would hear him saying "Hi ya prick". Only Jimmy could get away with calling someone that. I'll always think of him sitting on the beach at Harkness in some perpetual summer.

Losing campers is always extraordinarily difficult. Something magical happens at Camp Harkness. Its a place where you can be who you want to be. It really is the one place on earth (in my experience) where it doesn't matter what your capabilities are, how you look, or how much money you have. What counts is learning to be ok with who you and your limitations, and learning to be ok with others. Its challenging work. You do 14 hour shifts, sometimes are awake for most of the night, only have two nights off a week, and do a lot of direct care, but its also where the rubber meets the road. Its meeting people when they are vulnerable and finding that in order to do so, you have to be vulnerable too. Its the day you wake up and realize that you have learned more from the people you are "serving" than they ever have from you that you "get" it. Its being ok with the chaos and learning to embrace it. Its finding out that someone who is 30 years older than you, has a developmental disability, and a completely different life history can be a good friend, can make you laugh harder than anyone else ever has, and really isn't so different from you after all.

Camp is my favorite place on earth and my campers some of the best people I know. Jimmy was one of those and I am grateful for the opportunity to have spent 4 summers with him, living life and figuring out exactly how I fit into it.

Do it yourself: snowglobes

I found Do It Yourself snow globe idea on another blog and thought it would be really fun and cute to make. If you nanny or have kids this would be a fun project to do with them. Although I have to admit that I sort of want to try one myself

http://theperfectpearpair.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2010-12-04T20%3A24%3A00-08%3A00

Fear

“you are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear”

I read this passage and thought about how many times in the past three months I have given way to fear. Fear that what God has for me is not what I want. Fear that what God has for me will be years from now before it is fulfilled.  Fear that I will never be able to love again. Fear that I will never be free from wanting what is not for me to have. I think of all these fears. How they swirl in my brain, one after the other taking prominence and then fading into the background as the next one steps forward to take its place. 

 I’ve always prided myself on not being and not doing the very attitudes and actions that have come to represent me in the past few months. Now I am afraid of the shift in my identity. Who am I now? What will I be when this is all over?

I am afraid of the past, of going back to that place where darkness reigns, where everything is hidden behind the veil and I am made of glass but won’t break.

I am afraid.

But I am also Sarah’s daughter. I am a child of the covenant. I am Christ’s sister.  I have an Advocate in the heavenly throne room. One who conquered fear and stands in defiance of it. One who will slay fear and put all his enemies to flight when He comes again with the hosts of heaven. I am his daughter and his sister. I am his and “no power of hell, no scheme of man can ever pluck me from his hand.” I stand justified and I am in the process of being sanctified.

Sanctification is what every Christian dreads and longs for. Holiness. He is too pure, too good for us and yet we long to be like him, to be free finally from all that entangles us. We long to taste his goodness to be as much like him as we possibly can regardless of the cost. Do I sometimes fear the cost? Of course I do. But somehow, I also know that by these sacrifices I make, I am coming closer to that day when I worship in the heavenly throne room, when the sacrifices and hardships and trials I have made here will be counted completely as loss compared with seeing Him who I long to see. Jesus crucified. Jesus glorified. Jesus king. Jesus master. Jesus.

Make me more ready for that day, Jesus. When I think of that day there is no more to fear. Fear, death and suffering have been outdone. They can harm me no more.  

I'll be honest and say I'm having an incredibly rough go of it the past three months. I feel as if my heart is being pulled in two opposite directions and I know what I must do, but that doesn't make the doing of it any easier. I want to do the right thing, but at the same time the right thing to do is also my least favorite option. The narrow gate and the narrow road have always been the hardest paths to stay on, and for good reason. God, grant me strength to face this test and when all is over to stand before you still.

Answers

excerpt from Till We Have Faces: "I ended my first book with the words no answer. I know now, Lord, why you utter no answer. You are yourself the answer. Before your face questions die away. What other answer would suffice?"

prettiness

No words -none.

They were stolen from my breath

Before my tongue formed them

My hands traced them

My body taught them.

They were small. So small.

And how could they withstand

The weight of silence

Its barreling force crushing in its path

Stolen moments from borrowed days

I could not give them back if I tried.

They were not mine to give or take

But they felt so right in my hands

Shivering with greed.

There were no words.

Broken fragments gathered from

The shattered bottle speak

But this

This is victory of a different kind.

I wish I didn't understand this

I cannot live with You-
It would be Life_
And Life is over there-
Behind the Shelf-

The Sexton keeps the Key to
Putting up
Our Life- His Porcelain_
Like a Cup-

Discarded of the Housewife-
Quaint - or Broke-
A newer Sevres pleases-
Old Ones crack-

I could not die-with You-
For One must wait
To shut the Other's Gaze down-
You- could not-

And I- Could I stand by
And see You -freeze-
Without my Right of Frost-
Death's privilege?

Nor could I rise-with You-
Because Your Face
Would put out Jesus'-
That New Grace

Grow plain-and foreign
On my homesick Eye-
Except that You than He
Shone closer by-

They'd just Us-How-
For You- served Heaven-
You know,
Or sought to-
I could not-

Because You saturated Sight-
And I had no more Eyes
For sordid excellence
As Paradise

And were You lost, I would be-
Though My Name
Rang loudest
On the Heavenly fame-

And were You- saved-
And I- condemned to be
Where You were not-
That self- were Hell to Me-

So We must meet apart-
You there- I - here-
With just the Door ajar
That Oceans are- and Prayer-
And that White Sustenance-
Despair-

Emily D.

covet worthy items II

This first wedding dress I would most definitely wear. I love the Edwardian era and this is a most exquisite piece. The second picture I like, not because I would wear the dress, but because the photographer did an excellent job of capturing another time. There's something about the lighting, the veil, and garden scene that conjures up images of an early 20th century fairy tale. I half expect an old ford automobile to come dashing around the corner and spatter mud everywhere.

covet worthy items

I found this first nightgown on ebay, but it cost too much money to buy. Isn't it absolutely stunning? I know it  might be a little awkward to post on a blog about the beauty of old-fashioned lingerie, but its just so elegant!

The second one is such cute fifties version. I would love to turn it into a dress, but unfortunately it too was much to expensive for me to purchase. 

Here's to wishing and hoping that someday I can come across more affordable versions!

Poem

I prayed the Rain to kiss his lips

The wind Caress his Cheek

And Sun- that yellow Orbit

All her golden Stores unleash.

Foolish- now I see-

 How Nature cannot Further grace

What screams out Life to me.

Outdone- Creation steals her own

And left am I- alone.

new creation

This is for my friend's brother. He likes horses and the color orange so I was commissioned to make him this. I still have to add his eyes and a tail, but isn't he cute?

The Lion of Judah

I stole this great quote off someone else's blog:

"We are constantly assured that the churches are empty because preachers insist too much upon doctrine — ‘dull dogma,’ as people call it. The fact is the precise opposite. It is the neglect of dogma that makes for dullness. The Christian faith is the most exciting drama that ever staggered the imagination of man — and the dogma is the drama…. This is the dogma we find so dull — this terrifying drama in which God is the victim and the hero. If this is dull, then what, in Heaven’s name, is worthy to be called exciting? The people who hanged Christ never, to do them justice, accused Him of being a bore — on the contrary; they thought Him too dynamic to be safe. It has been left for later generations to muffle up that shattering personality and surround Him with an atmosphere of tedium. We have very efficiently pared the claws of the Lion of Judah, certifying Him ‘meek and mild,’ and recommended Him as a fitting household pet for pale curates and pious old ladies."

— Dorothy Sayers

apron numero dos

This is the second apron I made following the same pattern. I almost like it better than the first one I made, but its for a wedding present so I can't keep it. shhh! don't tell!

losers and weddings

Two very different images but i love them both for very different reasons. The first is one of those old campaigns to end drug usage, which would not go over very well today in our pc culture (be wise not weird!) and the second is such a beautiful, classic wedding picture.

Camp Harkness 2010! In five weeks, I will be singing campfire songs, eating marshmellows, sleeping in a cabin with all my favorite camp friends, eating gross cafeteria food (think tuna casserole mass produced), swimming in the ocean, walking around the mansion, going to dunkin donuts and walmarts on nights off, recounting favorite camper memories, being with favorite campers, and doing 14 days. Such bliss.

I started with Camp Harkness 2007 and I was placed in cabin 5: special needs. For the past three summers I have worked with individuals with severe developmental disabilities and loved it. All the mid-night craziness, all the day-time craziness. Think well-organized chaos. Its beautiful. This summer I have a new role: administrative assistant. I've been promoted along with three of my friends and this means new adventures. Instead of working in a cabin, I will be over-seeing two cabins and making sure that the counselors in those cabins have the support they need. Along with that I'll have the task of helping to run camp itself during the week. I'm really excited to see a different angle on camp and get to work with some of my dear friends.

This will be my last summer at camp and I"m already sad thinking about it. I have so many wonderful summer time memories in that place: what will be four summers of memories. Its hard to imagine a summer without Camp Harkness, but I know its just around the bend. So this summer is all about making the most of the two months I have there, and storing up memories and friendships that will last a lifetime.

p.s. If anyone wants a summer job working with people with developmental disabilities....let me know!

This is what I would dress like every day if I could. I'm so sad that our American culture has lost the elegance and sweetness in its fashion. It seems like all we're good at is designing slutty clothing. sigh.

vintage apron

This is my latest creation. I  found some really cute material that looks mid-50's or 60's and I made an apron out of it.  I'm too afraid of getting it dirty so I think its going into my cedar chest until I have a special occasion to wear it.

Philippians

"Do everything without COMPLAINING or ARGUING, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold the word of life." (Philippians 2:14-15)


I was looking for a passage of comfort tonight in my devotions and whining to myself about insignificant things in my day, when I came across this passage. I memorized it a long time ago in high school when Mr. Hannula did a devotional on these verses. But I've clearly forgotten and ignored them. What a wake up call.

Do "EVERYTHING without arguing or complaining". That doesn't give me a whole lot of room for excuses: no "buts" and "why's" and "how comes". I wish I could find some way around it, that there was an exception because thinking of all the times I've complained in the last day alone shows my less than stellar track record. I'd be lying if I wanted to do this, but the pure in heart are those who will see God. And I want to see God. So please forgive me, Jesus, so that I might see your face, for as the Song of songs says, "your voice is sweet and your face is lovely."