butterfly. babies. love.

pictures and pictures and pictures.  some blurred by the swift movement of spontaneous laughter or sudden change in direction. some lit by bright eyes and wide smiles. some accidentally taken, by sticky-fingered sneaky hands. some grabbing the complexity of layers upon layers of color in the sky over Kerala and transforming it into tangible glory. some capturing the simplistic joy of running through the green grass of our backyard. some embodying the dreams of my parents and the faithfulness of a Mighty Creator. some attempting to freeze the exact moment i see a world of hope in the dark pupils of a small child's gaze in a busy village. some are posed and orchestrated to include all participants' best smiles and angles, all in coordinating colors. some are candid and realistic, no pattern or planning, just life.  some of these photographs will never be shared or rediscovered; some of them will not be looked at in the near future, maybe not for years and ye...

happy mother's day.... to the women who love their children from the moment they are born, and for the ones who slowly fall in love with their sweet little ones, like a beautiful slow waltz. to the women who have given birth, when things went just as planned, and to those whose entire pregnancy went against all odds, sometimes scary and sometimes trying, but working towards the perfect crescendo. to the women who prayed for a miracle and got it, and for those who are still praying, and still waiting. to the women who believed that life with children would be one way, and were shocked when it wasn't, and to the women who were somehow realistic with their expectations from the beginning, but were still surprised by the challenges and the beauty. to the women who have adopted or fostered, to the ones who have the special heart to love a child as their own, and the wisdom to know that when she has the ability to do that, that child truly is her own. to all the women who...

days have passed and seasons have turned and my children are growing... the past months have been filled with laughter brought on by joy, tears brought on by circumstance, decisions brought on by demand, and change brought on by necessity.  from the time i last posted, much has changed, shifted, or rearranged in our lives.  my two brave four-year-old children who entered private kindergarten were bombarded by one undesirable scenario after another and we were forced to pull them from their school. my still brave, resilient, and bright five-year-old girls are now thriving in a private pre-k that seems to be preparing them for their first year of public school kindergarten in the "big building" come august.  my littlest bubba is now walking and clapping and inserting herself into her older sisters' activities. she is independent most of the time, entertaining herself and priding herself on silly antics that make us laugh and cheer. she is headstrong, undeniably...

tomorrow my oldest girls start kindergarten. they will venture off into the world of formal education and begin a very special journey. along with learning about letters and numbers and other incredibly important basic concepts, they will begin to learn about the resilience of their character and the strength of their work ethic. i attempted to share small pieces of advice as they picked out their dresses and started filling their backpacks. as they grabbed their snacks and helped make their signs, i continued to talk about the important things. my advice fell into 4 main categories. for my girls, as they start kindergarten.... 1. be kind. personally, i feel that being nice is not that hard. it does not take too much commitment. it can last a few seconds and it is sometimes, simply, a sweet gesture at face value. you should be nice, of course, and you should always aim to be polite and make a good impression. but kindness requires a deep heartfelt choice. kindness demands act...

as the school year comes to a close, i think about what i would like to teach my girls... On Education: girls, i hope that the wide-eyed wonder with which you seem to approach every book these days, stays with you as you navigate through the educational institutions you attend on your journey. i pray that your curiosity grows with each course and each subject matter, that you investigate and explore and research and discover. i hope that you construct knowledge in your own unique ways and that you realize that knowledge is not absolute. i hope you always love literature and that you embrace the power of the written word. i hope that you find yourself through your own writings and awaken passions to travel and to study culture and to explore the world through great stories and poetry and treasured rhetoric. i hope that you acknowledge the beauty and complexity of science and math and history and other fields of study also. please respect your teachers. know that they h...

as i begin to write this entry, i look down on my lap to see a 15 week old beauty, nestled so sweetly and perfectly in a blanket, sleeping ever so peacefully on my lap. i am moved constantly by her delightful sounds and giggles, her undeniable cuteness, and the way her little mouth purses to attempt to speak, and then to pout, and then to smile and attempt to speak again. she has moved me by her pure innocence and her helplessness and her resilience, by her need to be near me and to hold me and to feel my skin and to hear my heartbeat. i think of her sisters and how often they have made me shed tears of joy and of wonder also. how they have moved me simply with one word, often said at just the right time or the awfully wrong time, and how their complex personalities and intense love often make my heart feel like bursting. i am moved by their passion for all that is good, and their intrigue about why things are wrong, their prayers and their screaming arguments, their logical banter ...

2015 will be a year of penning suggestions, prayers, advice for my girls. on love: love is not something simple. love is complex and it is most definitely worth waiting for. waiting is difficult, but it is necessary because you gain much knowledge and learn many lessons, all the while holding onto your own sense of independence and understanding of your unique place in this world. your daddy says that although it seems incredibly hard to wait for love, once you have it, you will see why it was so important. but, yes, it is hard when you are on the other side. i can tell you, with all honesty and sincerity, that love from a man is not something that you should be rushing towards; you should not move in that direction until you know your own value and your own worth, not until you understand that you are not defined by this world's standards of beauty or success or belonging. love can be once in a lifetime and it should be something that you pray about and fight for and wo...