Life in Photos

my beautiful tiny girl at seven weeks

oaxacaborn - baby girl Aveline Alenka - 7 weeks old

this is my tiny girl at seven weeks old, hanging out with her daddy. isn’t she gorgeous? i’m madly in love with her.

i love staying at home with her. we’re falling into quite a regular little routine here, and it’s been wonderful. with all the changes to our lives within the first few weeks of her life, routine has been a long time coming. but now our lives are swaying in a gentle rhythm, a gentle groove, and i’m savoring every single moment. every thing she does captivates me. i can’t stop praising God for our Aveline, our little wished-for child.

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Life in Photos

some moments feel like this

some moments feel like this:

but i am deliriously happy. unbelievably happy. sleepless nights, shirts covered in spit up, eating meals slowly with one hand while balancing baby in the other…

i love our miraculous baby. she is an answer to so many prayers. she is, as her name means, our longed-for child.

and when her little tiny fingers grab on to my shirt, and i bend down and kiss her head and breathe in that sweet aroma, i am pretty sure nothing on earth could be closer to heaven.

Poetry & Words

a different kind of valentine’s day

this morning dawned grey and brooding, with thick clouds drawn tightly over the sky, pulling down wind and rain through the tousled treetops.

it had all the ingredients that could have made for a really bad day. monday. exhaustion. valentine’s day. a night of restless, fitful sleep on an air mattress on my in-laws’ living room floor. a fussy baby. all our stuff on a moving truck. husband putting the last few items in his suitcase to leave for florida. me staying behind for two more weeks.

yes, i cried.

but then, my baby smiled at me.

and my husband brought me lilies and roses while i was still in bed.

and God gave me peace.

wonderful, deep, incredible peace.

that doesn’t mean i didn’t cry any more after that. after all, it’s still overwhelming. i still physically don’t feel good, and i am still ridiculously tired (although my recent diagnosis of anemia explains that. hello, iron supplements!)

but i am at peace. i am content. happy. excited about this next chapter. excited to see what God has in store. madly in love with my husband and with my miraculous daughter and with this wild and beautiful life.

Poetry & Words

we’re moving again

the whole United States, it seems, is being swallowed up by ever-falling snow. but here in my favourite comfortable corner of the world–NorCal–it’s warm, sunny, and bright. i could stay here forever, you know. i love it here. the high skies, the dry air, the perfectly majestic california live oaks, the way the sunsets dance purple and yellow, casting long shadows across the white Sierra Nevada peaks…

i could stay here forever.

but i can’t.

you know that pillar of fire? it’s moving now, and we have to follow. it’s been parked here for almost a year and a half (a veritable record, as far as the last 11 years of my life are concerned), but now it’s time to move on.

as hard as this is, i am at peace about it.

Josiah and i have been praying–for the past year and a half–for full-time work. hundreds of resumes later, it was starting to feel like a drought. there was still daily bread and there were still new mercies, but there were no open doors.

and then suddenly, this.

not even two weeks after Aveline was born, Josiah received a job offer from a company he used to work for. it was sudden job offer, with an even more sudden start date.

Aveline Alenka - 2 weeks old - handmade crochet hat - cotton gauze baby swaddling cloth by Living Textiles

and that, my friends, is how this grand adventure called 2011 begins. we’re packing up the house now…wrapping up the insane amount of loose ends…trying to get sleep in between stacking boxes and waking up in the middle of the night with our tiny little daughter.

and in less than two weeks, we’ll be on the road to Orlando with a wee baby and a dog in tow.

as with countless other life events, i’m once again singing along with rich mullins. his music is the soundtrack to my soul. “sometimes i think of Abraham, and how one star he saw was lit for me. he was a stranger in this land, and i am that no less than he.” -rich mullins

so call us crazy. sojourners. gypsies. we wouldn’t have it any other way.

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Life in Photos

welcome baby aveline alenka!

AVELINE (IRISH: ăv-ä-lēn) WISHED FOR CHILD; ALENKA (SLOVENE:  ä-lĕn-kä) LIGHT, RADIANCE

Oaxacaborn welcomes Aveline Alenka

if we’re not connected on facebook or twitter, then you may have missed the big news. baby munsey is finally here! aveline alenka made her debut on wednesday, january 19th at 2:13am, weighing 6 pounds, 12 ounces, and measuring 20 inches long. i can’t stop thinking about what one of the nurses said when she looked down at aveline —

well, hello, little one! and what have you come to teach us?

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Poetry & Words

for now, i want to stay

just a little preview of an upcoming project… (remember the pendant inspiration i blogged about last month?)

pendant flags

now back to the laundry and the dishes. (why do these two things multiply so quickly? and it’s only the dirty piles that grow. the clean piles never, ever do.)  but, it’s ok. the dog is snoozing, my husband is working on an art test, and the music of josh rouse fills the house. a rather peaceful november night.

I know somewhere there is a party going down.
Interesting people; conversation to be found.
I’ve lived in cities where there is no solitude
Made some friends there that I hope I’ll never lose.
But, for now, I want to stay in this quiet town. -Josh Rouse

Poetry & Words

ramblin’ girl

it’s late.  the only light in this room is the cool, unblinking light of the sleek iMac screen.  my fingers tap a subtly methodical dance across the plastic keys.  i notice that each each sentence is separated by the dull staccato of the double space.

from the adjoining room, i hear the sound of water trickling over paint brushes, then the soft padding of stocking feet over hardwoord floor. i listen to the couch squeak as my love sits back down in front of his paints, clean brushes in hand.

my cough rattles my chest cage, and then this room.  the cough deepens as the night grows on, the cough that reminds me i’ve missed two of the five very first days at a new job this week.  the cough that reminds me i am not invincible, and i cannot control every circumstance.  i cannot always be perfect.  i cannot ever be perfect.  but that’s another story for another time.

his voice cuts through the silence, comforting and warm.  his voice sounds just like the way it feels to be curled up next to him on the couch, my head on his chest, tracing the pattern of his graphic tee with my painted fingernail.  today, it was white clouds on dark cotton, and the outline of a vw bus.

today it was white clouds on dark cotton. i like that.  i think in life, i tend to focus too much on the dark, and not quite enough on the white, bright clouds.

tonight, though, i’m daydreaming of the shapes in those clouds.  wondering where the wind will blow us next. we’re still walking underneath this sky, together,  pushing forward on this long road.

and Your Love lies our salvation.

listen: orange sky | alexi murdoch