The day, being what it is, has me thinking about independence. As I mentioned a few posts ago, there are all kinds of freedom wings being spread at our house. Baby Girl’s newfound joy (and speed) of crawling has added a whole new dimension to the other declarations of independence going on with her brothers. Her crawl usually involves moving with her left knee and her right foot so that she’s ready to sit back with the tiniest effort at a second’s notice to pop the latest find right into her mouth. Apparently, sitting is soooo 9-months. Her new-found independence at 10-months threatens to give Mommy a nervous breakdown, thinking of how infrequently I actually sweep and mop ALL the floors. Her independence has also injected a little wrinkle into Little Drummer Boy and Bug’s boy world of toys. It seems cars and trucks are just as interesting to Baby Girl as they are to her brothers, which can make the following realities problematic: 1) Coffee tables (even those found in barns) are just the right height for 10-month old standing; 2) Said coffee tables have heretofore been the domain of car races and tower building perpetrated by brothers; and 3) Where brothers are, Baby Girls should be. Two plus one equals three, and three can rock even the most lively of boy domains.

Yes, Little Drummer Boy and Bug are somewhat confused by their baby sister’s independent streak, half surprised that she’s suddenly popping up everywhere, and half perplexed that she doesn’t understand how to take turns. As for Hub and me, we’re just plain shocked (again) at how quickly day to day life changes. Much as we try to hold the reins and slow the gallop to a trot, time is still off to the races. While we take joy at seeing how each of them grows and gains new skills and develops new interests, we hold dearly those rare times when they are still so completely dependent on us, those times when we are their whole world–and they ours.

Independence. Its breaking free is a bittersweet moment. I remember that several months ago Little Drummer Boy went to AWANA all by himself for the first time. Hub normally helped the teachers with crowd control, but had another commitment that night. So, I dropped off LDB in his room and hoped for the best. He goes to preschool every day in the same building with a few of the same children. Still, the situation was different which makes LDB a little more sensitive. When I came back to pick him up about 10 minutes early, they were still having music time. I saw in his eyes that he was torn. It was his newfound independence confronted with the familiar security of Mommy. He was torn between doing his own thing with the songs and running to Mommy for a hug. What a jolt. My presence was actually deterring his independence, making him doubt himself.  He was suddenly self-conscious about doing the motions to Father Abraham, or opting out in favor of his own daydreams. There it was, the bittersweet reality of independence and the need for letting go that’s required to achieve it. His independence and my letting go.

I once had a conversation with LDB’s infant caregiver about the daily concerns of parenthood. I was a brand new parent and she was parenting a grandchild and a son who had made some wrong turns. Through our sharing of stories and sometimes tears, I remember commenting, “When I see him, I can hardly imagine him ever disappointing me. But, I know that one day he will. One day he’ll do something I don’t approve of, and that makes me cry just thinking about it.”

That day has long passed for us with Little Drummer Boy and Bug, and Baby Girl’s is coming. But, now I know that the bittersweet independence is tempered by a love that eclipses any disappointment, any white knuckle grip, any reluctance to fly, any insistence on soaring. Perhaps the best and most poignant metaphor for heart-rending independence is the father in Jesus’ story of the prodigal son, the father who freely and without hesitation gave an inheritance to be squandered. When the poverty of rebellion and forgetfulness came to fruition, he also freely and without hesitation gave acceptance–restoration to an independence gone astray. How I need that. How my babies need it. How we all need it.

The other day while I was making myself presentable to the outside world, I was privy to a little accidental dose of two-part harmony. Hub was in the bathroom brushing Bug’s teeth–an experience always ripe for chuckles. Bug is the kind of guy who picks up his honey mustard condiment cup to drink it.  I kid you not. He wants catsup on his plate so he can attempt to pick it up with his fork and eat it sans french fries, despite numerous attempts to offer a better solution. Pancakes translates as syrup and syrup with a side of bacon to Bug. I’m sure you’re getting the pattern here. He tends to have his own ideas about how things ought to be done. I wonder where he got that?

So, here’s how the two-part harmony normally plays out: a grown-up “aaah” paired with a Bug-sized “aaah” when we’re brushing the back teeth, and a grown-up “eeee” paired with a Bug-size when taking care of the front. Oddly enough, they’re almost always in near harmonious pitch. In this rendition, however, Daddy’s “aaah” was met with Bug’s much louder “eeee.” And vice versa. Several times. Bug was having way too much fun making his own sound to hear Daddy’s instructions.

Don’t you hate it when that happens? Sometimes I’m just too busy making my own melody to hear the right note.  Hub and I have noticed an increased harmony in our hearts and lives recently because we are finally getting on the same page with God in a few areas.  Home responsibilities, work schedules, parenting styles, church commitments, family time–we’re finally letting go of the “eeee” to embrace the “aaah” first. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not a huge overhaul, just a few little things (and mindsets) to start with that are making a big difference. It’s a good feeling.

Sometimes, like Bug, we want to do what God wants.  We’re on board with brushing our teeth.  It’s just a matter of who’s doing the brushing.  We want to call the shots.  So, maybe our intentions and desires are correct, but we need to yield to the one with the brush to achieve harmony and get there.  I find when I surrender the act of calling the shots, when I go with God for the “aaah” first, the “eeee” usually falls into place as I’d hoped. Maybe it’s not the path I would have taken, but the destination is the same and the ride was full of a lot more laughter and contentment… and harmony.

Well, they got the job done. When Hub finally got his attention, Bug was happy to join Daddy in the “aaah,” and impromptu two-part harmony was restored. Music to my ears. I got up from my seat with makeup fixed and this:

Harmony has a source and an order.  I can’t achieve it until I go to the source and submit to the proper heart hygiene.

Tiny messages God continues to include with our gifts — 2 little joys of boys and 1 little jewel of a girl, each with open eyes, open ears, open hearts, and much to teach. “Behold children are a gift of the Lord…” (psalm 127:1)

Sometimes at night when I’m tucking in Squiggle I like to tell him things I like about him, things I’m proud of him for doing. I do that with Little Drummer Boy, too, but Squiggle seems to need it more sometimes. I don’t know if it’s because he has been slower to use verbal skills and more prone to losing control of his little emotions, or if it’s simply because he has a brother who so easily (and rampantly) uses verbal skills and can just do more because he’s older. But, Squiggle sometimes seems wanting for affirmation. He has a sensitive and pondering spirit (when he’s not squealing) that tells me there is always a lot going on internally.

Through the parenting stages of teaching early boundaries, it’s easy to get caught up in discipline and correction. So, I sometimes use those tender bedtime moments to confirm his steps toward kindness and obedience, to acknowledge the new lessons and skills he’s learning and to encourage the blossoming of his lively spirit. At least that’s what I tell myself. I think sometimes I just don’t want the seemingly constant threat of a spanking to be what he thinks about as he drifts off to sleep.

I usually start with, “Mommy is so proud of you. You did a good job tonight of….” At that point, Squiggle invariably says, “colors upstairs.” It’s an odd reference, I know. First, it took me a while even to understand what he was saying. Then, it took a while to understand what he meant. We have lots of colors, but we don’t have an upstairs–unless you consider the 5 or 6 steps you go down to Daddy’s office, the laundry room and the back door to be the downstairs.

After a few repeated “colors upstairs,” I finally got it. At our preschool, Squiggle’s room is downstairs and Little Drummer Boy’s room is upstairs. Squiggle has walked the steps with me a few times to get LDB. On the wall above the steps is a cut-out “WELCOME” taped to the wall, and every letter is a different color. Each time he’s gone upstairs, Squiggle has proudly named each color in order as he’s climbed each step. And, I’m sure one of us exclaimed at what a good job he did.

It may be memorable to him because of the fact that he accomplished naming the colors while navigating the steps or because Mommy or Daddy made a big deal about it. Regardless, something about that experience stuck in his mind as a great accomplishment. So, when I start to enumerate the ways in which I’m proud of Squiggle, his interjection of the “colors upstairs” example serves to affirm something in his little spirit.

I’m continually amazed by the moments–seemingly mundane and insignificant–that stand out as important, even treasured in a child’s mind. And, it gives me pause to consider how such a routine, half-forgotten word of praise can have such long-lasting impact. My husband lost his father in an accident when he was just 6 years old. I could barely listen during the times he’s recounted the very few memories he has of his dad–brief flashes, a slight touch, a fleeting feeling–and how precious they are to him. I’m sure he thinks of them sometimes just to make sure he can still remember.

I don’t want my boys and Baby Girl to have to think hard as time marches on. If I’m blessed with a lifetime with each of them, I want to give an abundance of remembered praises and proud moments and congratulations for simple things like a “lellow” W. All too often, it’s easy to forget that secure, confident, hopeful children grow into secure, confident, hopeful grown-ups who can give the gifts of security, confidence and hope to others. Thus, the moment that begins on a walk upstairs next to colorful letters cut out of cardstock extends for generations.

Last week Little Drummer Boy lied to me about getting in trouble at school. He knew he lied, and he knew that I knew he lied. He cried about everything but that lie during the early evening.  When I asked him again if he’d gotten in trouble, he told me the truth. And, he was able to eventually tell me what happened.  The “trouble” was not an earth-shattering thing, just the consequences of speaking words he didn’t fully understand. I assured him that I was not going to spank him, that I would only spank him if he lied to me, if he did not tell me the truth. For me, the issue was over. Only a small reminder that “I’m counting on you to obey your teachers” remained, and was reserved for the next morning’s goodbye hug and kiss.

Later, just before bathtime during our nightly family prayer, he resolved the whole experience in his own spirit. He came to give me an unsolicited hug:

LDB: “I’m sorry I lied to you.”

Mommy: “It’s ok.”

LDB: “Please forgive me, Mommy.”

Mommy: “I will. I forgive you. It’s ok. I love you, sweet.”

He looked me straight in the eye the whole time he said he was sorry and asked for forgiveness.  A parent can see a sincere heart. It was so easy to forgive him, second nature–the impulse to draw him into my arms, to give him total restoration, to lay aside his guilt, to let him know his guilt was laid aside. To forget it and move on as if it never happened.

The forgiveness between a parent and her child comes easy at this age, with open eyes and open hearts staring at you, with new words and new concepts spoken in sincerity. I imagine it would easy at any age, I’m just not there yet. Right now, it’s effortless. How often we forget that ease at other times with other people.  But, with a beloved child, a tiny repentant heart laid bare, disappointment is forgotten, grievances assauged, correction laid aside.  Forgiveness is freely, quickly and gladly given–along with a full-hearted, open-armed embrace.

The forgiveness of God is such with His beloved creation, those whom He has knit and molded and labored. He sees the sincerity of heart, even when we can’t adequately express it. At the moment of our asking, He stands ready–no, runs ready–to embrace, to lay sin aside, to absolve and restore. At the moment of our asking, it’s already done. There is no payback, no process of forgiveness, no 12 steps, no tentative trusting of motives. God, in His all-powerful knowing of us, asks nothing more than to ask. He is sensitive to the tiniest turning of our hearts toward Him. He leaps at the chance to love at the slightest provocation.  Just as easy as it was to restore and embrace my son, His eagerness is barely contained.

Why do I shy away? Why do I resist His presence? His love embraces, ever steadied against the push of my resistance. Like the times I beg a busy or reluctant son to sit in my lap only to watch him melt into my arms as he finally gives in to hearing Mommy say how much love he deserves, how much love he has, how much pride he brings forth. Then, to see him bask in the security of that moment.  Why do I resist? Why do I shy away?

The tiny messages God continues to include with our gifts — 2 little joys of boys and 1 little jewel of a girl, each with open eyes, open ears, open hearts, and much to teach. “Behold children are a gift of the Lord…” (psalm 127:1)

I’d do almost anything.
Happy Birthday, Little Drummer Boy!

you opened my heart and laid it bare to be loved on May 2, 2005