Apr 19, 2011 | Baby Photos, Stories
H appy Tuesday, lads and lassies! Today crept up on me! I suppose I am trying to avoid counting down the days, knowing that our dear sweet Agnes leaves tomorrow. {Pray for me.}
While she was off gallavanting in Cape Town over the weekend, we took a little field trip to a place just off the N2 called Dassiesfontein. Remember me introducing you to the delightful and mischievous dassies of Hermanus? Well, Dassiesfontein is Afrikaans for “Dassies fountain.” Unfortunately, there was not a fountain of dassies to be seen about the place, or even a couple, but there were a plethora of other visual delights and we picked up a wee gift for Agnes, which was the mission of the adventure anyway.
However.
The magically delightful photos are not yet uploaded, cropped, tidied, blow-dried or straightened. Okay, we don’t do those last couple of things to photos, but you get the idea: they ain’t ready yet.
So if you’ll pardon the slight delay, you can look forward to getting your non-Dassied Dassiesfontein fix tomorrow. Is Travelling Wednesday okay? Just doesn’t have the same ring to it. Sigh.
In case you just showed up for some photos today, I’ve aimed not to disappoint, and arranged a fairly comparable showcase for you, in the form of a safari, no less!
In this post, you may hunt for Bears and lions. And now you may begin…
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Look!
Did you see the Bear? And did you find the lions? 🙂
The Bear’s Surrogate Scottish Granny gave us this outfit when he was born, and it was one of my favourites. I was delighted to pull it out last week for Baby Brother’s enjoyment.
That’s the Bear, on the left at two months…Baby Brother on the right at six weeks! I think Baby Brother is a big boy. And fortunately, hasn’t lost as much hair.
Funny how life seems to begin and end with balding and incontinence. If I could set this post to music, the Lion King’s “Circle of Life” theme song would’ve popped up just now, when you read that last sentence. And you’d all pause and think…”I don’t get it. Oh wait, I do.” Good, we’re on the same page.
Moving swiftly on.
You’d think they were related.
Forgive me. I am finding these comparisons so. much. fun.
Hope you’ve had a great Tuesday! Hoping the delightful non-dassied Dassiesfontein will be ready for you tomorrow!
xCC
Apr 18, 2011 | The Good Word
S ometimes, I start to wish I could just keep the laughs coming like the Pioneer Woman. She takes beautiful pictures and has great style and will soon have her own cooking show and she is just a hoot!
I am not that funny.
I also wish I could creatively create like the Nester, or make adorable out of nothing at all like Ashley at the Handmade Home.
I wish I had the skills to encourage like the Gypsy Mama — she bravely calls people to pour their hearts and their gifts out without fear.
And it would be great if I could also keep it real like Kristen — her humility and honesty are something I generally prefer to shy away from.
Or if I could just create a space for souls to breathe like Emily, with well put, encouraging words and artful and interesting grammar choices, I suppose that’d be nice, too.
But I suppose if I could only choose one option, I’d want to be a weaver of words like Ann. Her words create a holy experience for me when I open my little Google Reader and swim through her posts. I want to take off my shoes.
Sometimes I find myself slipping into thinking this way — reading something I’ve written and subsconsciously thinking, how could it be more Pioneery? Or Emily-eqsue? Or Annish?
And it takes me a while to remember that if this is multiple choice, I am G, none of the above. And that’s good. And I remember that when you start trying to wear the wrong shoes you are often in for trouble. Try as I might to trod a road in someone else’s sassy ballet flats, I would be much better off walking my road, the way I was created to walk it. Probably wearing flip-flops.
I think we all sometimes long for someone else’s something.
So I wonder if you also need reminding:
You’ve got a gift.
You’re not second string, or B team, {as i realise I need to culturally contextualize that little idiom}.
And it would be better for all of us if you were a first-rate you than a second-string anybody else. Your purpose and the reason you were created is a part of the bigger story that no one else can live.
Let’s remember to celebrate each other — and even to celebrate ourselves. You were made for a great purpose and redeemed at a great cost. You have incalculable value.
In light of eternity, we are all incredibly small. But small acts with great kindness can change the world. And the only one who can do your acts is you.
xCC
Apr 16, 2011 | The Good Word
W hen I was a little girl, my family had a place at the beach. We’d head out on Friday afternoons for a weekend trip and I’d watch the world go by out the car window all over again as we made our way home on Sundays.
I loved to swim in the ocean. I loved diving through the waves, pretending to be a dolphin, and then riding one in without a board. Just me and the water, and usually the sand I collected in my bathing suit.
Every once in a while, a good set of waves would come in, and things would sometimes get a little scary. Big waves would come in, one after another, hard and fast. I’d dive under one, and as I came up for air, another was right in front of me, and I’d need to dive again. It was sometimes a little daunting — and even though I couldn’t see it, I had to trust that the set would come to an end and I’d get a chance to rest, or find a less threatening wave to ride in, soon.
Chatting with a friend the other day, I realised that sometimes life can feel like that. Some days…some weeks…even some years, you feel like the waves just keep coming. Your soul is like a little ship at sea, just trying to stay afloat through one more wave. And then another comes. And another.
Hebrews 6 has an interesting solution for those feeling out to sea and buffeted on every side. And it’s not faith or love or patience or even self-control. It’s hope.
Verse 19 describes hope as the anchor for our souls. It’s the thing that grounds our souls in high seas — keeps us from being tossed when the waves are high and they threaten to push us in the wrong direction or even tip us over.
Thinking back, the times when my “hope quotient” was low — when I forgot to believe that God has my future in His hands — have often been some of the toughest times of my life. Without hope, we often feel directionless, powerless, and unable to make any effort toward anything — it all seems pointless. Life seems like a waste of time. Every move is an exercise in futility.
We’ve heard this verse so many times before, but I think we can sometimes struggle to let it truly sink in and stay in:
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord. “Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you hope and a future.” {Jeremiah 29:11}
Why does He need to give us hope? Because the human heart cannot function for very long without it. Fyodor Dostoevsky once wrote, “If you want to utterly crush a man, just give him work that’s of a completely senseless, irrational nature.” When what we’re doing seems hopeless, we struggle to find a reason to exist.
The story is told of a concentration camp outside Hungary where prisoners were forced to move a pile of dirt from one end of the compound to the other, back and forth day after day. The exercise went on for weeks when an old man began sobbing uncontrollably. He was led away by his captors to be executed. Days later, another man who had survived in the camp for three years suddenly darted away from the group and threw himself on an electrified fence.*
Indeed, we need to feel that our life matters. That our existence has meaning. We need to have hope for our future. And regardless of what life might bring us, the little ship of ours — our souls at sea — are on a journey heavenbound. And the hope that will anchor us, sure and steadfast on the journey, is hope in Jesus Christ — the author and perfecter of our faith. It was out of hope — for the joy set before Him — that He endured the cross. And His finished work on that cross is the very hope of our salvation — that no matter how many waves crash upon us in this life, we know that in the life to come those waves will cease.
As Matthew Henry explains it, the believer’s anchor fixes upon Christ — he is the object, and the anchor-hold of the believer’s hope.
“As an unseen glory within the veil is what the believer is hoping for, so an unseen Jesus within the veil is the foundation of his hope; the free grace of God, the merits and mediation of Christ, and the powerful influences of his Spirit, are the grounds of his hope, and so it is a steadfast hope.”
Do you see a correlation between how you feel about life and what you believe about what’s ahead? If your life had a hope-ometer attached, what might it measure today?
xCC
*Cited in Dr. James Dobson’s Bringing Up Boys, p. 246 – 247.
Apr 15, 2011 | Baby Photos, The Parenthood
I ‘ve been a little on the tired side this week. {Can’t figure out why!?!} I woke up this morning after a strange dream in which I’d decided to die my hair cotton candy pink and I was using a follow the dots piece of paper I’d printed out at home to cut fresh layers in my hair instead of paying to have it cut properly. Holding up a piece of paper to a section of hair, with scissors, I don’t think it was going so well right around the time I woke up.
Weird, I know.
I realised this afternoon that it has rather been a bit of time since last I updated you on the howabouts and howgoings of the newest addition to the Collie clan. Not to be confused with the newest edition, which was a book by Alexander McCall Smith called the Unbearable Lightness of Scones. It was delightful, but I digress.
When you last received a series of shots and howgoings about Baby Brother, he had just turned one month young, and I am delighted to tell you that he is a bright and chipper seven-week-old now. {Meaning I’ve resisted the urge to post photos every other day.} He enjoys being whistled to and smiled at, he is gurgling and cooing, and he seems especially interested in the movements of his big brother, the Bear. And last week he proudly tipped the scales at 6.1kgs or 13 lbs and 7 oz! I’ll let Baby Brother update you on how it’s going…
It’s been a great few weeks since I saw you last! Hi! Look how happy I am!
I got my first picture of just me with my Mom and Dad. She was teary because I was smiling so sweet.
I’ve been watching my big brother build big towers (and colour on his face!)
He likes it when I cuddle up with him in his big boy bed!
I met my Uncle Vaughan for the first time! He brought me a cool hat and I’m looking forward to wearing it!
I’ve been getting extra cuddles from Agnes since she’s leaving soon. I’m gonna miss her.
Between all the excitement around here and working on my head control, I’m pretty pooped.
Hope your weekend is getting off to a good start!
xCC
Apr 13, 2011 | Guest Posts, South Africa, Stories
O ne day back in the late 80s, the Lord was in an especially good mood, and He created my dear friend Agnes. He had it in mind to bless a lot of people with joy, sunshine, some good laughs, a sweet friend and a listening ear among other things. And one of the folks blessed with the gift of Agnes was me!
When my feet landed for a good stay on Scottish soil six years ago, I had the privilege of meeting Agnes. We began meeting up over coffee, and talking about God and life and faith, over tasty Scottish treats with occasionally anxious waitresses. I was especially thankful for her friendship when a lot of the friends I’d made on the church plant team started heading on to new adventures after the first year or two in Edinburgh.
Look, here we are, hanging out when I was pregnant with the Bear!
When Agnes touched base with the idea of coming to visit for a wee while here in SA, I was delighted. And when she shared the dates she had in mind and I realised I’d be giving birth while she was here, I was ecstatic. If she hadn’t been here this labour story would be very different.
Next Wednesday, we’ll be taking Agnes to the airport, and she’ll be making her way back to our beloved Scotland. It has been an incredible joy and pleasure to have her here — and there will be many tears when we have to say goodbye! I asked Agnes if she’d like to share a little something with you dear friends and readers in summation of her time here in Mama Africa, and I’m so glad I did. Without further ado, I turn it over to the Bear’s new BFF!
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Hey, this is Agnes here. I’m the Scottish/Danish girl who has had the honour of living with the Collies for the last three months and had a few appearances in the past few blogs of Caroline’s. You could say that I am blog shy. Instead of writing a huge post, I have opted for a short list of the Top Ten moments during my time here in SA while sharing life for the last three months with the Collie Clan.
My Top Ten Moments in SA
1. BLAKE DARROW COLLIE – Allowing me to witness and hold a pure miracle by God. You may have been overdue, but my boy, you were fast!
2. Directly after that- Learning that baby poo is a luminous yellow the first few weeks. (Changing that nappy put me off my favourite dish- Honey Mustard Chicken! Thanks for noting that Caroline!)
3. Learning the SA motto- TIA (This is Africa), that never fails when you find yourself in an unexplainable/crazy/ hilarious situation….pretty much an everyday occurrence
4. That after 16 years in Scotland/Britain, I’d be lucky if my skin got burnt or even a slight pale roasted chicken coloured tone to it.
5. Hearing Asher sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, after just a few minutes of teaching him! And hearing him spell “stop” the right way after months of correcting him saying P.O.P = Stop.
6. Asher- Although stinky, cleaning up Asher’s poopy after a wee toilet disaster!
7. Realising that God is God wherever you are travelling. Even when I doubt Him and His goodness — He is always good and never has doubts about me.
8. The many bright, intense and fluffy, marshmallowy sunsets reflecting on to the waters surface.
9. Watching the movie “Faith Like Potatoes†and the next week having dinner with the lead lady and her husband at the Collie Household- Awesome and fun!
10. Abseiling 200ft down Table Mountain with Alan and puking up on the hike back. I’d recommend it to anyone, not the puking up part but the abseil is a great way to put a real scare in to your boots and see an awesome view!
So there you have it.
The most amazing part of my three month journey, is that it actually happened! Before I landed in Cape Town I promised God to be a blessing to Caroline and her family, in whatever way I could.
Turns out I am not a blessing — God is.
He sent me to the Collie Clan and showered me with time and sun. Probably the two most needed things in everyone’s lives, I know it was for me.
I would have to say that when Caroline asked if I would write for her blog, it was a sweet enough request but still quite daunting as I know the skill and talent which she has for writing. She is in that respect the complete opposite from me, I find writing a challenge and at times it frustrates me to be unable to put in words the moment or thoughts I have. However in the kindness of friendship I have found to ASK.
Let others help and always ASK. Ask about everything, for learning is the sweetest blessing there is.
I would really like to end this with a request for you. Join me in praying for this full-hearted, quirky, kind family, for blessing to be a continuing cover for them to walk under in this next season. Ta, Love Agnes x
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How delightful is she?
Dear Agnes, this is most definitely my most favourite guest post ever. Thank you so much for your kind words and your wonderful heart! You have been an INCREDIBLE blessing from God to us as we’ve transitioned from a family of three to a family of four. The next time I see two little lines on a stick I might be calling you again! 😉 In all seriousness, it has been an overwhelming blessing to have you in our home. “Thank you” seems insufficient, but Thank You! We love you and look forward to being together again somewhere around this big wide world soon. You are absolutely one-of-a-kind!
Now does anybody know another sweet Danish/Scottish dancing lassie who’s great with kids that can come stay with us for a while? I kid. But pray for me next Wednesday.
xCC
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