“Trust in the LORD with all your heart; and lean not on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.”
Proverbs 3:5–6

Dearest Daughters,

Last week we discussed the beauty of becoming a mother, the change of identity. I would like to continue along the vein of new babies and new mommies.

Everything wonderful and beautiful comes with its challenges, and babies are no different. So let’s talk about the immediate postpartum phase for a minute here. What is going on in your body, and what is going on in your baby?

Physical recovery from a birth is not something that should be taken lightly or flippantly. Now, every birth isn’t the same, and some births certainly require more time for physical recovery than others. But in all of them, even the easiest births, you need to pay attention, because more is going on than you realize.

That amazing wonder organ, the placenta, that has been present in your body for the past nine months, has just left. And this has more of a bearing on you than you might think.

The placenta is a marvel. It functions as so many organs for the baby. It takes the place of the lungs. It’s also the filter, functioning for the kidneys and the liver. It’s feeding the baby and doing the work of the digestive tract.

But what it does for you is that it produces estrogen and progesterone, two of the primary female hormones. And when that organ evacuates your body, your body literally drops off of a hormonal cliff!

This can cause anxiousness, night sweats, painful cramps, and intense mood swings. You might find yourself crying over everything and nothing.

I had a beautiful birth. I love my baby. Why am I crying? I’m so happy, yet I can’t stop crying!

Your kids come to visit, and you’re convinced that they hate you, that they have completely backslidden from every bit of training you’ve poured into them. You may look at your own body and think it’s ugly. And you’ve just metamorphosed into the local Dairy Queen! All these things may be whirling through your mind.

The feelings are real; I’ll acknowledge that. We can expect them, because the hormonal waterfall has just dried up in an instant!

However, the perspectives are not real.

So don’t take your thoughts and feelings too seriously in those first days and even weeks after a birth. This is all part of the process and probably God’s way of helping us to rest a little more.

Because on top of the hormonal crash, you’re exhausted. You’re getting up all night. You’re quite sore. Your body has just gone through an enormous physical event, and you’ve got that little baby to care for, so don’t become overwhelmed and despondent.

The Scriptures tell us that a woman will be “saved through childbearing.” I think that Scripture can mean a lot of things, but one of the things I’ve thought about is that childbearing can teach us to trust in God and in others—anything besides our own perspective—and we all need to learn to do that!

Someday we’re going to be old and feeble. We will then need even more trust for others and God. Postpartum changes can provide a meaningful step along our journey of increasing trust, teaching us to surrender in a new way. So don’t become defeated when you feel those attitudes and moods. Say to yourself, That’s my hormones talking.

Those hormonal changes can produce what some call “the baby blues”: the crying, the mood swings, anxiousness, and emotional vulnerability that are frequent in the first days after birth. But if those feelings become severe, or continue rather than beginning to dissipate, reach out for help. Some of these health struggles are difficult, and asking for help is part of learning to trust and to allowing yourself to be loved.

We can fortify ourselves during this vulnerable time by being prepared, by trusting others, and by binding satan. He loves to ride in on our weaknesses, on our hormones, on our fatigue, and we don’t have to let him.

Allow yourself to be cared for and loved by your friends and family. Accept help and embrace relationships, both in that season of postpartum recovery and ahead of time in anticipation of it.

Don’t be shy to reach out for help if you need it, to hear another perspective and another angle.

Drinking plenty of water is also vital during this period of time as your body adjusts, recovers, and, if you’re breastfeeding, begins producing milk. Plenty of rest is an absolute necessity.

Give yourself to your baby, to lying down and snuggling and just observing your beautiful new infant. Pay attention to their needs, to the changes in them. Admire them openly and speak peace into your own heart and into theirs.

And what’s going on in your baby? They’re learning to acclimate to a world outside of the womb!

They’ve gone from living surrounded by water, receiving oxygen through the placenta, to living in air and breathing with their own lungs. Their nervous system is still immature, which is why they’re constantly moving, startling, flailing their little arms, and sometimes slugging themselves in the face.

They haven’t yet learned what is day and what is night, so don’t get in a rush.

Help them make this transition as gently as possible, giving them a peaceful, dark night, soothing music to put them to sleep, your voice to bring them comfort, and breastfeeding to nourish them, comfort them, and help protect their developing immune system.

It’s really a lovely season, but everything lovely comes with a price, and it only makes it more valuable.

So don’t get caught in the mire of the challenges!

Look forward to the brand-new and beautiful relationship that is just beginning.

With all my love,
Mom

Dearest Christopher,

I’ve always loved your unfiltered perspectives. Without fail, you have a way of saying aloud what everyone else is actually thinking.

Here’s the story that comes to mind.

The long-melted ice lay flat and flecked in the sweaty glasses like the last undesirable sip. I emptied each one into the porcelain sink, rinsed it, refilled it with ice from the growling, clunking ice maker, and finally filled it, this time, with water. The punch was long gone after so many refills.

I glanced at my watch: 11:30. Five-thirty in the morning was going to come very soon.

But the volume, the storytelling, from the living room was unremitting and undiminished. The flow of verbiage bounded through the house like an untamed mountain creek in springtime.

Christopher, you twirled and leaped behind me around the kitchen, bowing and bending, muttering indecipherable words and grunts under your breath. Suddenly you stopped at my elbow.

“Mom! These people…” you began.

“Sh!” I tried to hush you, but it was already too late as you blasted out your perspective at 900 decibels.

I’d worried about you earlier in the day as we prepared a feast for company. You’d seemed especially antsy, with lots of running, flapping, and bowing.

“Christopher,” I prepared you, “we’re having company tonight. They’ll be coming for dinner, and we’ll be eating quesadilla burgers.”

“Oh, we’re having company,” you repeated to the porch rail behind my shoulder.

“We’re not going to do lots of running while they’re here,” I went on.

“Oh, why can’t Christopher run?” you asked the porch rail.

“Sometimes company doesn’t know why you’re running, so it’s best not to do it the whole time,” I explained, though I was actually more concerned about the conversations you always carried on with yourself while you were running.

I wasn’t overly concerned. The couple had spent many years in Latin America and seemed the easygoing type. They were new friends, eager to get to know our family and church community. Unfortunately, we hadn’t really had a chance to prepare them for your situation, and during that season, that preparation was often needed.

Our family of nine pulled the extra leaf into the table, gathered long-leaf pine chairs and a bench around it, and dug into the quesadilla burgers. Banter passed back and forth as our new friends, Harry and Lisette, filled every lull with hilarious stories from their globe-trotting life—their children, their dog, border crossings, and adventures from years overseas.

Upon their arrival, Lisette greeted each of us with a kiss on both cheeks. Her graying hair was pulled back in a knot, and her eyes seemed to smile all the time. When she reached you, Christopher, you leaped backward, threw your arms behind you, and stared at her with your dark eyebrows raised so high they disappeared beneath your bangs. Smiling, I quietly stepped in front of you to receive my greeting just as she reached over to pinch your younger brother Nicolas’s cheek.

Otherwise, the evening went off without a hitch…

…until it didn’t.

I’d never heard so many stories in one evening! These people were funny! As we wandered down the winding pathways of their memories, we visited the schools their children had attended, their pet poodle back home, their children when they were young, a war they had been caught in…

The clock worked its way around hour after hour, and I began to wonder just how long they intended to stay as it crept closer and closer to midnight.

The sound of Texas cicadas reached through the windows, closed tight against the summer heat. Still the stories rollicked on.

Must be Latin culture, I thought. I’d have thought that at their age they’d be ready for bed.

I’d refilled the glasses six times. The last cookie crumbs had long since disappeared from the platter.

Repeatedly, you sprang from your chair, dashed behind the couch, and ran back and forth a time or two with a quick bow, your lips moving, fortunately without any audible sounds. I knew you were desperate to run. I’d lean forward to catch your eye, shake my head, and you’d reluctantly collapse back into your chair, rocking back and forth instead.

Finally, you followed me into the kitchen as I filled the glasses once again.

“Mom!” you bellowed. “These people are staying way too long! Why are they talking and talking and talking and talking? They are too loud!”

“Christopher!” I gasped.

The chatter in the living room stopped instantly.

“Oh, no.”

I peeked around the doorway.

Every eye in the room was already on me.

Then we all burst into laughter until we wiped tears from our eyes. The tension disappeared as quickly as it had come.

Harry stood, stretched, and grinned at you.

“Well,” he said, “I guess Christopher has spoken.”

Then, pointing toward the door, he laughed again.

“We’re leaving now! It’s the Latin culture coming through, but we like a man who speaks his mind.”

And just like that, they gathered their things, hugged everyone goodbye, forwent the kisses on your cheeks, and disappeared into the warm Texas night.

I smiled at Dad as you dashed into the dark for a little running before bed.

You had simply said what the rest of us had been thinking for the last hour. You were honest enough to say it out loud.

Love,

Mom

Dearest Daughters,

Well, today begins a new series! I’d like to spend the next few weeks talking about one of my favorite topics—babies!

The much loved Christmas song that we often sing says, A baby changes everything. I know it’s speaking of our Lord Jesus, but it’s drawn from what we all know is true of every baby.

I’d like to share something I wrote in A Time to Be Born about the life change I went through when you, Helen, were born:

And I was in love. But more than that, I felt like a window had opened, a light had come on, and I was seeing life and love in some ways for the first time. I was seeing myself for the first time—my own vulnerability, but also previously untapped strengths. I was seeing your dad—his empathy, his steadiness, his love—in ways I’d never seen before.

And every other identity seemed to shed off of me like an old skin. I was a mother.

In one moment, I had become a missionary, and the mission field was your heart, Helen. I had become a nurse, and my charge was to care for your little body and soul. I’d become a teacher, and my student was you. I’d become a prophetess, and the one who needed vision from me was you.

This was not the mundane drudgery I had once imagined motherhood to be, a thing you hurried through in your youth and strength so that someday you could go on to greater things. No, this was the GREAT thing. This was my calling, but even more, it had become who I was.

If I could say anything to mothers-to-be and brand-new moms, I would tell them: Embrace the identity.

Every time you cuddle that little infant, whisper to yourself, I am a mother. Every time you get up in the middle of the night for a feeding, let that sacrifice strip away every lesser identity as you enter into one of the highest callings He’s given humanity. Become your baby’s mother.

This brings me to a few practical thoughts.

Skin-to-skin contact is precious and important, especially in the first moments after birth. Hold your baby, and let them feel you, smell you, hear your heartbeat, and study your face. A newborn sees best at about fourteen to eighteen inches away, the perfect distance to gaze into the face of the one God has made to love them first—you!

Whenever possible, keep your newborn with you. You can swaddle them and hold them in your arms or carry them in a body wrap even while you accomplish other tasks. Those bonding hours are actually forming brain pathways, emotional security, and deep attachment that will shape their future life.

With you, Helen, I was never out of the same space with you until you were five months old. There have certainly been seasons with some of my other children when illness or circumstances required something different. Motherhood is full of unpredictable twists and turns, but as much as possible, I’ve tried to remain close to my babies, because I believe those hours together are among the most important (and wonderful) work we do.

Talk to your newborn from the very first day. Even though they don’t yet understand your words, they recognize your voice, understand your love, your delight, your comfort. Use different tones of voice. Laugh with them. Sing to them. Speak comfort and peace to them, and let them also hear joy in your voice. Even read to them! Long before they understand language, they are learning to love and be loved.

Breastfeeding is a wonderful bonding opportunity, so try not to miss a single feed. Notice their rooting and sucking cues. Even if they’re not hungry, they may be indicating that they need some bonding time.

Each cuddle, each feeding and each incoherent baby conversation is building the foundation of their little heart and their future life. You are constructing the emotional foundation upon which they will stand for the rest of their lives.

So try not rush through these early days! Hold them often, and speak to them constantly. Take immense joy in these brief moments of babyhood! And as you do, you are becoming their mother, just as they are growing into childhood.

With all my love,

Mom

Dear Mom,

I remember taking random books out of our big red-brown cedar library shelf parked against one of the deep blue walls of my bedroom. Sorting through the piles of books I had wheelbarrowed from the shelf, I was fishing for books about weather, geology, or even natural disasters from the world’s past or future predictions.

Read more

“Above all, keep loving one another earnestly… Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another.”1 Peter 4:8-10

Dearest Daughters,

As we bring our six-week focus on housekeeping tips to a close, I want to leave you with one more practical skill, but above all, with a few final perspectives on homemaking itself.

The practical skill is one I learned years ago from Sink Reflections by the FlyLady. I may have altered it a bit over the past two decades, but this is the way I adapted it in my own home. She had much good advice, some which fit my lifestyle and some did not. But this one has been part of my housekeeping ever since.

Take two bags, one for trash and one for giving away to charity, Goodwill, or a neighbor. You might even add a third bag for a garage sale or fundraiser. Then set a timer for ten or fifteen minutes and head into the closet, dresser, pantry, or storage area you want to tackle. See how full you can get those bags before the timer rings.

I especially loved doing this in the fall with the children’s toys. Christmas was coming, relatives would soon be sending gifts, and I wanted their toy bins to have room to not overflow! I’d quickly gather broken toys for the trash, toys they had long outgrown or no longer enjoyed for the giveaway bag, and occasionally a few nicer items for a garage sale.

It was amazing how much lighter the room felt simply from removing the excess!

Although I usually set the timer for only ten or fifteen minutes, I often found myself finishing the entire project, or at least accomplishing far more than I expected.

The same method worked beautifully with my own closet. Perhaps not the entire closet at once, but one section at a time. One day the dresser drawers. Another day the upper shelf. Another day the hanging clothes. Pull everything out, don’t be afraid of the temporary mess, and sort quickly into the three bags.

You’d be surprised how much can be accomplished in fifteen focused minutes. An entire child’s dresser can often be finished in that time. I found I could usually do about a quarter of my own closet, and since Dad and I share one closet, that meant nearly half of one person’s belongings. Two short sessions in a day, and most of the closet was finished.

I’ve even used this method in the pantry, the kitchen cupboards, and storage sheds. It’s a wonderfully refreshing way to declutter without feeling overwhelmed.

But now, let me leave you with what matters most. Do not look at housekeeping as a job to get through. Look at it as membership in a community of homemakers—a community you have the privilege of joining.

It may take a little Olympic training to reach your goals, but you made it into the club. Hallelujah!

Homemaking is not about who has the cleanest house or the prettiest decorations, but about who has created a home: a place of peace, love, welcome, and belonging.

Ironically, when that becomes your goal, your house often becomes cleaner as well. More importantly, it becomes a place where your husband can rest, your children can flourish, and your guests can find peace and friendship.

And please, never compare yourselves among yourselves. As I mentioned in an earlier letter, there are seasons when homes are naturally more cluttered than others. A house full of toddlers may stay tidy for only a few moments at a time, perhaps only while everyone is asleep. An empty nest may remain orderly for days, but both can be beautiful seasons.

Do not judge your sisters, and they will not judge you. Instead, build a sisterhood, a community of homemakers who encourage and support one another through every season of life.

I think of the words of that wonderful song:

“All of my life, in every season, You are still God. I have a reason to sing. I have a reason to worship.”

Let Him be Lord of every season, of the attitudes and the atmosphere of your home, and in time He will also become Lord of the tidiness, the meals, the schedule, and the countless ordinary tasks that make up a faithful life, because you are on a journey with Him, and the goal is up ahead!

I love you all.

I pray you discover the deep joy that can only be found in making a true home.

Welcome to the community of homemakers!

Love,
Mom

Dearest Christopher,

In my early years of reading about autism, studying everything I could get my hands on, and interrogating your doctor and speech therapist, I learned a great many things. Dad and I even took a ninety-hour course on the workings of the brain. I came away realizing one thing above all:

It’s a wonder anybody’s brain and body can function normally.

The workings of the brain are a miracle.

Among the many things we learned about were savant skills, or splinter skills, as they are sometimes called in the world of autism. Some autistic children seemed to possess remarkable gifts of math, art, memory or music. We wondered whether we would ever see anything like that in you.

We eventually did. The first hint came from music.

Once, on a road trip, I played a Bach piece I had downloaded, hoping the music would help soothe the long drive for you. It was intricate and beautiful, the kind of piece I simply enjoyed listening to without ever attempting to remember it.

A few minutes later, Daddy and I heard you quietly humming in the back seat. You gazed out the window at the blur of New Mexico landscape, as your voice lilted through movement after movement of the entire piece!

We looked at one another in amazement. Your musical memory was unlike anything the rest of us possessed.

As the years passed, your memory continued to surprise us.

When you were about eleven, I asked all the children to keep journals. As usual, yours turned out rather differently.

You had been fascinated by weather ever since you could talk. Wind, tornadoes, hurricanes, volcanoes—anything powerful completely filled your thoughts and imagination. Instead of writing about your day, you began making an elaborate weather handbook.

I still can picture you sitting at the dining room table, your sketchbook spread open, a handful of crayons rolling around beside your pencil as you bent over yet another page—on weather! The rest of us would pass by from time to time just to see what you were working on next.

Page after page appeared: fresh breezes, gales, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, each one carefully and beautifully illustrated and described.

Finally, curiosity got the better of me, and I pulled several weather books from the shelf and began checking your work.

“Christopher,” I thought, “you’re a little plagiarist!” Except you had never copied anything. Many of your descriptions were nearly word for word, even down to the punctuation, but they came from a variety of books you’d read months, perhaps years, before.

“Honey,” I finally called to Daddy, “I think Christopher may have some sort of photographic memory.”

We never completely solved that mystery. We simply learned to accept it, because the ability seemed to appear in some places but not all.

One spring afternoon, I saw it again. The Godsey’s, your second cousins and my first cousins, came over for one of our family writing workshops. We gathered beneath the cedar trees with the pungent scent of cedar mingling with the rich smell of damp spring earth. A gentle breeze stirred the branches overhead while you and Nicolas carried the big whiteboard out into the yard.

It was poetry day, so I copied a Robert Frost poem onto the board, and together we studied its rhythm and rhyme before trying our hand at writing something similar. We laughed over awkward meters and rather cheesy rhymes until finally I wrote a simpler poem on the board for everyone to imitate.

When your turn to read came, you read a lovely poem that left us all speechless.

“Wow, Christopher,” I said. “Did you really write that yourself?”

You looked at me with a furrow under your shock of dark hair.

“Well… I hope I did it right. But once I read this poem in a book, and it matches that.” You pointed at the poem on the board with your weathered pencil.

“What book?”

You couldn’t remember.

“One of the ones on the bookshelf.”

It followed the pattern perfectly.

“That’s wonderful,” I smiled, “but this time you were supposed to write one out of your own head.”

You threw back your head and laughed.

“I don’t have words like that in my head.”

We all laughed with you, but the reality was that you did. While the words most of us read flutter away like summer moths, somehow those beautiful lines had been engrave into your mysterious memory and waited there until this day when they were needed.

Christopher, though you have fought battles that most of us will never face, God has also entrusted you with gifts that most of us will never possess.

The same God who tucked melodies safely into your memory and preserved the words of poets you scarcely remembered reading also knew why He entrusted those gifts to you.

Cherish them, and use your music to glorify Him. Use your memory to bless His children.

Every gift He gives is meant to become a doorway through which someone else discovers His love.

Love,
Mom

“They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts.” Acts 2:46

Dearest Daughters,

Well, here we are at week five of our six weeks of housekeeping tips. Today I’d like to talk about meal planning.

Now, for me, cooking is an art, and one that I truly love. There have been many evenings when I’ve cooked simply because it relaxes me. As I’ve gotten older, standing for long periods has become a bit harder on my back, so I tend to cook in shorter bursts now. Even so, I recognize that my perspective may be different from someone who finds cooking intimidating or exhausting.

The truth is, I’ve had those times, too. There were seasons when I was homeschooling three children while simultaneously raising three preschoolers. During those years, simply getting everyone fed and through the day felt like an accomplishment. So today I’d especially like to speak to those seasons, because they are often the ones in which we need the most encouragement.

The first thing I want you to remember is this:

Meals are memories.

Yes, people may remember the savory soup or the fluffy, fresh bread. But far more than the food itself, they will remember the feeling around the table. Was there laughter? Was there peace? Did they feel welcomed and loved?

So make that your primary goal. Come to the table with joy even for beans and rice! Come with gratitude, when there are only PBJs! And if simplifying the meal allows you to preserve a peaceful spirit, then simplify the meal. A simple supper served with love is far better than a complicated feast served with frustration and anxiety.

After that, yes, make the food tasty. And make it beautiful if you’re able, because beauty is one of God’s gifts and an expression of Him. But those are secondary goals. Relationship and love come first.

Meal planning is essential, especially during busy school seasons.

Once a week, sit down and make a menu for that week. Even if you don’t follow it perfectly, you’ll know what ingredients you need and won’t spend every afternoon wondering what to make.

Personally, I like a little flexibility. I often planned only four meals and left the other three days open for leftovers, unexpected company, or whatever happened to be coming in from the garden. Whether you plan four days or seven, simply having a plan removes an enormous amount of daily stress.

Whenever possible, think about tomorrow’s meal the night before. Take meat out of the freezer. Grind your wheat if you mill your own flour. Prepare whatever you can ahead of time.

Then remember that preparing meals is also part of breaking bread together.

The Bible doesn’t simply tell us to eat together. It tells us to “break bread” together. There’s something beautiful about the family taking part in the preparation.

I love setting a toddler on the counter with a little lump of dough. My toddlers rolled out many funny-looking biscuits or pie crusts over the years, and although they certainly weren’t perfect, they were “helping,” and making memories. Another child could grate cheese, and another wash vegetables while another can stand at the sink and wash dishes.

While dinner was coming together, so were relationships!

Instead of asking, How can I get this meal finished as quickly as possible? maybe ask, How many memories can we make and relationships can we build while we prepare it?

A friend of mine recently suggested having a regular breakfast assigned to each day of the week—granola on Monday, bagels on Tuesday, waffles on Wednesday, and so on. I never fully adopted that system, but I think it’s an excellent idea.

We did have our traditions. Saturday was “Pancake Saturday.” When our church services were in the afternoon, Sunday was “Brunch Sunday.”

We kept breakfasts simple for school mornings: homemade granola with yogurt, oatmeal, or bagels with cream cheese. They were nourishing, quick to prepare, easy to clean up afterward, and simple enough that you children could gradually learn to make them yourselves.

Simple breakfasts make wonderful training grounds for young cooks! A child can learn to stir oatmeal, toast bagels, scramble eggs, or flip pancakes long before they’re ready to prepare an entire dinner.

When it comes to company meals, I enjoy putting in a little extra thought. This doesn’t necessarily mean making something complicated. In fact, I think simple meals are often the best for larger crowds.

A pot of chili becomes something special when served with warm corn muffins, a crisp green salad, a sprinkle of cheese and cilantro, a wedge of lime resting on the edge of the bowl, and perhaps a roasted pepper garnish adding a splash of color. Those little touches tell your guests, You mattered enough for me to think about this.

When cooking for a large crowd, don’t hesitate to let others help. People often enjoy contributing. Let them bring the simple, inexpensive parts of the meal so they don’t feel burdened, and allow yourself to receive their kindness. Hospitality isn’t always best carried on one set of shoulders!

Finally, add thoughtful details like lighting a candle. Perhaps lay a flower across the table. Fold your napkins nicely. Use cloth napkin rings if you have them. None of these things are expensive or difficult, but they communicate care. In the end, that’s what hospitality has always been about: building relationships and making memories.

This is breaking bread together. Don’t ever forget that!

I love you!

Mom

Read more

“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.” Ecclesiastes 3:1

Dearest Daughters,

As we continue our journey through housekeeping tips, tools, and graces, I thought I’d tackle a few more today: scheduling, deep cleaning closets and drawers, and quick cleanups with the kids.

When I first got married, I loved to schedule every minute of the day, every day of the week, and every week of the month. I think putting it all down on paper somehow made me feel in control of everything.

The problem is, when you schedule every fifteen minutes and you are a midwife, a pastor’s wife, growing a garden, raising animals, and raising lots of little children, you discover you’re a failure every fifteen minutes, because life doesn’t fit into fifteen-minute boxes!

There may be places and seasons for scheduling every fifteen minutes, but a full family life in an agrarian lifestyle doesn’t seem to be one of them, as far as I can tell.

As long as I had that schedule in place, I felt like a failure, and I also felt I was giving you children the impression that you were failures.

“It’s 8:15, and we don’t have the laundry on the next load yet.” Well, it wasn’t quite dry yet. And on and on it went.

One day I had a revelation. Our days really revolved around landmark moments. Breakfast at 8:00. Family devotions at 8:30. Lunch at 1:00. Dinner at 6:00. Bedtime at 8:30. Those were the anchors of the day. Instead of piecemeal scheduling, I began saying, “We want this much accomplished by breakfast.”

Everyone should come to breakfast with beds made, hair combed, teeth brushed, and animal chores finished. Everyone should come to family devotions with their places cleared from the table. By lunchtime, we accomplished family reading, Bible, math, and spelling.

During nap time, I worked one-on-one with the high school students. Before bed, we all tidied the rooms.

This method of scheduling brought so much more grace and flexibility to our home. It even gave the older children more responsibility to organize the spaces between those landmark moments in whatever way suited them best.

As they grew older, I would even give them entire weeks. As long as they appeared faithfully at those landmark moments and had completed a certain lesson in math or another assignment by week’s end, they could organize their time however they wished.

The more responsibility they demonstrated, the more responsibility I gave.

Another thing that brought grace to me was realizing that deep cleaning didn’t all have to happen twice a year in one exhausting marathon.

Instead, as we moved toward those seasons, I would look for opportunities to deep clean one drawer or one section of a closet.

As a midwife, healthcare provider, and pastor’s wife, I’ve spent a great deal of time on the phone, but I didn’t want that to deprive my housekeeping. So I would set the phone on speaker beside me on the bed, pull open a drawer, and dump out its contents while I talked. By the time the conversation ended, one little corner of the house had been restored to order.

It was a freeing realization that two good things could happen at once!

Another quick cleanup tool came recently from a dear friend of mine, Becca Groves.

Whenever she needed the kitchen, living room, or schoolroom picked up quickly, she would gather all the children together and secretly choose one item among the clutter to be the prize item. Whoever happened to pick up that item would receive a reward—a little money prize or some other treat. No one knew which object it was.

Was it the glue? The scissors? The notebook? The shoe? The sock?

Since no one knew, everyone eagerly picked up as many things as they possibly could.

At the end she would announce, “The prize item was the scissors!” or “The prize item was the notebook!” Whoever had picked it up won the prize.

I thought that was such a clever idea.

I’ve played similar games with you children over the years. Sometimes we’d simply see who could pick up the most things.

Other times I’d divide the jobs.

“Ari, you put away all the toys.”

“Nicolas, you put away all the laundry.”

“I’ll, gather all the books.”

Then we’d race to see who finished first.

Little games like these help make housekeeping feel more like family fun than chores, because after all, that’s really the goal. That we would be a family. That we would work together.

God has given us all these ordinary responsibilities as places where we can meet Him, connect one to another, and discover Him in His creation.

So let’s not forget what it’s all about.

With all my love,

Mom

Dearest Christopher,

I often wondered when you were young, How does a child who has such a hard time coming into relationship with his family, whom he can see, learn to have a relationship with God above, whom he cannot see?

This greatly concerned me, because my relationship with God is what had sustained me through many trials, even those that concerned you.

Fortunately, your dad felt strongly that this was going to happen in God’s own way and in God’s own time, and that we simply needed to trust Him to lead His little lamb. As usual, he was right.

I’d like to tell you a little about your journey.

In previous letters, I’ve told you about your character book and our attempts to communicate moral truths to you, like honesty and dishonesty, kindness and meanness, obedience and disobedience. We did this through abstract art, creating shapes, colors, and scenes that produced either peace or discordant feelings. We memorized Scripture together, but for many years I wondered whether any of it was really meant anything to your little mind.

Then, around the time you were ten, I began finding children’s Bible storybooks scattered around the house. Their pages worn and curled from being turned so many times. You’d sit with one finger tracing the pictures, muttering whispered comments as though you were stepping into the pictures themselves.

One of your favorite books illustrated the book of Acts. You loved Paul’s shipwreck, the snake that bit him without harming him, and so many other stories. You pored over those pages with question after question, bringing the stories alive—not only for yourself, but for the rest of us too.

Every morning you joined our family devotions. We always began by asking, “What is everyone thankful for?” We started with the youngest and worked our way up. Many days we simply skipped over you because you didn’t seem to know what we were talking about.

Then one evening you surprised us by saying, “I’m thankful that Sister Amy had her baby.”

A few eyebrows lifted around the room. I caught your dad’s eye, and then it dawned on me. We had all been praying for Sister Amy to have her baby.

While we prayed, you usually sat quietly with head cocked to the side, watching each face as though trying to understand the invisible conversation taking place around you. Sometimes I prayed specific prayers out loud for you to hear and understand. Other times I simply worshiped God or prayed from my own heart, but I never actually heard you pray.

You did, however, always have prayer requests.

Much of your childhood was overshadowed by my dad’s battle with cancer. After our thanksgivings we’d ask, “Does anyone have a prayer request?”

Nearly every day your voice came before anyone else’s.

“Can we pray for Granddaddy?” Sometimes your requests were wonderfully specific.

“Can we pray that Granddaddy will sleep tonight?”

And the next morning my dad called and said, “I had the best night’s sleep I’ve had in a month.”

I stood there holding the phone, remembering your request from the evening before and realizing that you seemed to have an intuition about these things sometimes.

The first time I experienced your prayers firsthand came shortly after I had injured my back. It had been debilitating. For weeks I could barely walk, and after countless exercises, visits to the chiropractor, and physical therapy, I was finally beginning to improve. Still, I dreaded the long hours we would soon spend riding in a borrowed RV on a family trip to the Northwest.

That Sunday there had been a powerful move of God in our meeting. The Lord gave us a new faith to pray with confidence.

“Mountain, be removed!”

I listened with faith rising in my heart for all kinds of things, but strangely enough, I never even thought about my own back. Many people received prayer and were touched that day.

After church we hurried home, gathering snacks, shoes, socks, and camping gear into the RV. Before long we were rolling down the highway. The constant chatter of you seven kids became a competition with the rattle of dishes inside the cupboards and the endless creaking of every joint in the RV. Outside the windows, fields slowly gave way to west Texas desert. Everyone buzzed with excitement over the relatives we would visit, the campfires we would build, and the adventures ahead.

Quietly, though, I wondered how my back would hold up. Suddenly I felt your warm breath on the back of my neck as you leaned forward between the seats.

“Mommy, is your back okay?”

“Well, it’s not well,” I answered, “but it’s feeling much better than it was a few weeks ago.”

You looked puzzled.

“Why didn’t you say, ‘Mountain be removed’?”

For a moment I was confused. Then I remembered the message from church only hours before.

“Well… I should have, shouldn’t I?”

Without another word, you reached forward and laid your hands on my back. Then you prayed the first prayer I’d ever heard you pray aloud.

“Mountain be removed. God, heal Mommy’s back. In Jesus’ name, amen.”

I looked over at your dad behind the wheel. Even behind his sunglasses I could see him wiping his eyes, and I swallowed down the tears myself.

At the next gas station, the Texas heat practically withered me as I climbed out of the motorhome. I stood upright without thinking, and stopped. The pain was gone from my back. I was standing straight for the first time in weeks!

When I told you, you weren’t surprised in the least. “Yes,” you said matter-of-factly. “I prayed, ‘Mountain be removed.’”

That evening, after we tucked you into bed, I paced beneath the stars in the campground while talking to my parents on the phone. Through the receiver I could hear them weeping, rejoicing, and thanking God. It would not be the first time, or the last, that God used your prayers.

A few months later Sister Bonnie called me, after she’d been taking you to sing in nursing homes for a few months.

There was a young woman there who was severely physically and mentally handicapped. She had never spoken or smiled. She couldn’t even keep her tongue inside her mouth and didn’t seem to notice people.

Wheelchairs lined the walls of the home, but when you saw her, you simply smiled and said,

“She is very cute.”

You leaned close enough that for her to hear your words and prayed for her. She smiled and tried to speak to you. As you sang Jesus Loves Me and I’ve Got Jesus on My Mind, and she began to sway and wiggle to the music with a great big smile on her face.

Watching you so easily believe, I began to wonder if perhaps children sometimes believe what the rest of us have spent years trying to understand, that God is good and that He does move mountains.

Just last year I saw that same faith again. Daddy was in Egypt, and I was waiting for three babies to be born. During family prayer time I asked, as usual,

“Does anyone have any thanksgivings?”

To my surprise you answered, “I’m thankful that Sister Teresa is going to have her baby on Saturday.” It was an unusual thanksgiving because she hadn’t had the baby yet!

“You think she’s going to have her baby on Saturday?” I asked.

With a sheepish smile you nodded, but didn’t elaborate. “I do.”

Saturday morning Teresa called to say she was in labor. As a midwife, my upcoming births are often part of our family prayers, so praying for her wasn’t unusual, but the timing sure was!

And, of course, she had her baby that Saturday.

May God give us all a childlike faith.

May you never lose yours, and may He continue to work miracles through the willing channel of your life.

With all my love,

Mom

By wisdom a house is built, and through understanding it is established; through knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures. Proverbs 24:3–4

Dearest Daughters,

As we continue our journey through housekeeping, solutions, and graces, I think there is a perspective that must change in each of us, and if it does, it greatly simplifies both family life and housekeeping.

To put it simply, running a household is not a linear thing. It’s a spatial and relational thing.

In other words, you can’t simply make a list numbered “one, two, three” and expect to accomplish everything in that order. If you look at your day that way, your list will stretch a mile long, and if you believe you must finish one thing before beginning the next, your work will never end.

A household simply doesn’t function like that, any more than a human body could function by lining up all its parts in a row. Everything works together.

I can’t tell you how many spelling tests or dictation lessons I’ve given while kneading a loaf of bread or chopping carrots. I don’t have to finish one before I begin the other.

In reality, far more than a spelling test and chopping vegetables are taking place. A relationship is growing between a mother and her child. The child may be subconsciously learning to cook. Methods of cleaning are being observed as I wipe down the counter. A toddler may be playing quietly at my feet, learning patience while I teach an older sibling. Meanwhile, a loaf of bread is already baking in the oven, and a pot of water is coming to a boil for noodles on the stove.

When we learn to see how many good things can happen simultaneously, life becomes simpler—much, much simpler.

So before I give you a few practical suggestions, stop for just a moment and ask yourself:

How many good things could be happening simultaneously in this very moment?

If you only have five minutes and company is coming, as has often happened to me, don’t panic. Dad’s office is only five minutes away, and more than once he has met someone, invited them to dinner or to stop in, on the spot, and then called to let me know they were on their way.

First, remember what I shared in my last letter. Try to keep your living room reasonably tidy. But even if it isn’t, don’t despair. Clear the floor. Wipe off the table. Fluff the couch cushions. Open the curtains. Slip into the bathroom and quickly wipe down the sink and toilet.

Your guests usually won’t notice perfection. They will notice peace or the absence of it. If your own heart is at peace and your home feels welcoming, that’s the impression they will leave with.

Another habit that has transformed my housekeeping is this: Never leave a room empty-handed.

I have intentionally trained myself to do this. Every time I enter a room, I glance around before I leave. If I walk into my bedroom, I straighten the pillows or smooth the throw. If laundry is waiting to be put away, I carry it with me. If I step into the bathroom and notice a toothbrush lying on the counter, I put it back. A pair of shoes, a cup, a book—these little things accumulate over time. But if you are constantly putting them away, they never become overwhelming. Instead, your house grows more orderly as the day goes on.

Simple habits truly can change your life.

Another little trick that has helped me tremendously is keeping the cleaning supplies I use most where I actually need them.

There were so many times I noticed the bathroom counter needed wiping, but because the cleaner or cloth wasn’t nearby, I simply moved on. So I started keeping Windex, a roll of paper towels, and a microfiber cloth under each bathroom sink. Now, whenever I notice the counter needs attention, I wipe it down immediately. It takes less than a minute, and the job is finished before it has time to become another item on my mental list.

Having the right tools in the right place often makes the difference between a job being done and a job waiting until tomorrow.

But above all, remember this: Your goal is peace, not perfection.

I remember a story an older sister shared at a ladies’ gathering when I was newly married. She told us about a marriage workshop she and her husband had attended early in their relationship. One of the questions asked of the husbands was something like this:

“Which would you rather come home to: clean floors, sparkling windows and dinner on the table, or your wife singing?”

She smiled as she told us that she had assumed her husband would choose the meal waiting on the table.

Instead, he chose his wife singing.

That story got my attention. Like her, I would have assumed that all the other things should come first. But over the years I discovered that it wasn’t really about singing. It was about joy.

When I intentionally prepared to welcome my husband home with a cheerful heart, I actually found that I also tended to accomplish the work more effectively throughout the day. But when I focused only on getting everything finished before he arrived, I often became hurried, anxious, and frustrated. Joy really did make the work lighter and faster! So focus first on your attitude! And, I would add, the attitudes of your children.

You may find that not only is your home more peaceful, but somehow your work becomes easier and more quickly accomplished as well.

With all my love,

Mom

Many of you have faithfully chosen to support my writing, even when you weren’t receiving anything exclusive in return. Your encouragement has meant more to me than you know, and I am deeply grateful.

But that has changed!

I’m excited to share something that no one else has seen yet—a sneak preview of the book that Christopher and I are writing together.

The book is made up of letters exchanged between the two of us. Some are letters I have written to him, and others are his responses back to me. It has become a beautiful journey of reflection, growth, and the grace of God at work through the years.

Today, I’d like to share one of Christopher’s letters in response to one I wrote to him.

Read more

“Moreover it is required in stewards, that a man be found faithful.” —1 Corinthians 4:2

Dearest Daughters,

Last week we talked about setting some clear housekeeping standards, particularly in terms of dishes, laundry, and the spaces we reserve for hospitality.

I think there’s an easy pattern that young mothers (including myself, at one time) often fall into. I’ll call it yo-yo housekeeping.

We know we can’t keep up with the house the way we’d like during a season of little children, so we allow things to pile up. We tell ourselves we’ll get to it later, and then at some point we can no longer stand it. The house feels completely out of control, and suddenly we launch into a cleaning frenzy—every closet, every drawer, every nook and cranny, and probably turmoil for the whole family.

And for a day or two everything feels wonderful. But then life happens again, the children continue being children, and before long we are right back where we started.

I’ve found this to be a fatal method of housekeeping because you spend most of your life feeling behind. The house is either in crisis or in recovery, but seldom at peace.

So what do you do?

I’m speaking particularly to the season when you have lots of little people in the house—little wreckers who seem capable of undoing twenty minutes of work in twenty seconds.

The important thing to realize is that everything doesn’t need to be perfect at all times. What matters is deciding what can and should be accomplished during this particular season of life and becoming consistent with that.

For me, one priority was always the living room. I wanted it to be a place where, if someone knocked on the door unexpectedly, I could happily invite them in without embarrassment. Being hospitable mattered to me because it’s by our love for one another that the world knows we follow Jesus, not by our housekeeping.

Did I expect the toddler’s bedroom to look like the living room all day? Not at all.

The standard I chose for that room in that season was simply this: once each day the room would be clean.

That one decision brought grace to me. Instead of feeling anxious every time I walked into a room strewn with toys, I accepted that children play. There would be messes in the toddler’s room, in the kitchen, and in the schoolroom. But every evening those rooms would once again become orderly.

Helen, you probably remember our nightly clean-up races. We’d gather every toy, tighten the beds, arrange the stuffed animals, and race to see who could finish first. The reward was story time with Mommy or Daddy. Cleaning became part of the family fun and rhythm of the day rather than a dreaded punishment.

I also didn’t expect you children to clean the room the way I would. About once a week I did a more thorough “Mommy cleaning,” and twice a year, usually in the spring and fall, we did a serious deep cleaning: moving furniture, changing seasonal clothes, reorganizing closets, and starting fresh.

The same principle applied to drawers. When I was first married, I wanted every drawer to stay perfectly folded and organized, but if I wanted my children to help put away the laundry, I had to make success attainable. So I lowered the standard without abandoning it.

Drawer dividers became wonderful little teachers. As long as the socks stayed in the sock section, the underwear in its section, and everything ended up in the correct drawer, I considered that a success.

As the children grew, the standard gradually rose. That, I think, is one of the great secrets of homemaking. Better to have a realistic standard and keep it, than no standard at all. Standards can always be raised. But when everything is random, disorder slowly becomes normal, and little by little the whole house begins to unravel. We must view our housekeeping as a journey, always getting closer to the goal.

One lesson that became vitally important to me throughout all my housekeeping years was this: never allow housekeeping and relationships to become opponents. Biblically, relationships are the priority. If we aren’t careful, we can become like Martha—so busy serving that we miss the greatest things. A clean house is important, but it should never come at the expense of the people living inside it.

The first time I truly learned this was while we were doing mission work in Brazil. You oldest three children were still very small. Helen, you were only five, and Blair and Andrew were younger still.

In those days, my method of cleaning was simple. I sent all of you outside to play while I swept, mopped, wiped, and straightened the house. Then, when you came back inside, I found myself scolding, scolding, scolding lest anyone touch what I had just cleaned.

During that season, a dear friend came with us to help while Dad and I were busy with Bible studies and teaching. She wasn’t merely a beloved babysitter; she became a treasured friend.

I began noticing the way she worked with you. She let you wipe windows, even though they often had to be wiped again afterward. She stood you on chairs to help wash dishes, even though an occasional plate still had food clinging to it. We had to wash our laundry by hand, and she would set little Andrew right into the washtub, where he splashed happily among the clothes while she washed.

Those kinds of messes would have made me cringe. But they also filled the house with laughter. Watching this young woman changed me.

Did the house get cleaner because you were “helping”? No. It probably wasn’t as spotless as when I did everything myself. But love was growing; memories were being made. You were learning skills that would stick with you for the rest of your lives. I realized that inviting children into the work of the home is often more important than accomplishing the work perfectly.

This is also why it is so important that we resist judging our friends and sisters by the appearance of their homes. We rarely know what season they are living in. We don’t know what burdens they are carrying, what lessons they are teaching, or what memories they are choosing to make. What may look like disorder to us may actually be a home filled with instruction, laughter, and love.

So when we step into another woman’s home, let us come as servants, not as judges. Let us be quick to encourage, quick to lend a hand, and slow to compare. Grace can strengthen weary hands far more than criticism ever will.

Don’t be discouraged because your home doesn’t yet look like the home of a woman whose youngest child is eighteen. Build the habits that fit today’s season. Be faithful there, and one day you’ll discover that the standards you practiced for years have grown and matured along with your family.

Faithfulness is built one ordinary day and one good habit at a time.

With all my love,

Mom

One memory always comes to mind.

How could someone not realize they had arms? I wondered as I watched my son sitting in his high chair. We were visiting Granddad and Grandma Karen, his daddy’s parents. He was almost three years old, and Grandma had served mashed potatoes from the garden with rich homemade gravy. As usual, everyone around the table was enjoying dinner.

He lowered his face into the bowl like a puppy and licked the potatoes. Sometimes his hands wandered into the bowl to help the food along, but just as often his face did all the work. I watched with a knot growing in my stomach. That afternoon another mother quietly pulled me aside in the kitchen.

“You really need to work on his table manners,” she suggested.

She meant well, but we didn’t yet know he had autism. I had raised four children before him and had taught them all to use forks and spoons. I had tried exactly the same things with him, but nothing seemed to work. Her words stung because I already felt like I was failing.

Just a few weeks later came the appointment that changed everything. The doctor looked kindly at me through thick bottle glasses.

“He is autistic,” she said. “Very autistic.”

Drawing a half-circle on a sheet of paper, she pointed. “It’s a spectrum,” she explained, indicating a place near one end. “I’d place him about here.”

Today that would be considered Level 3 autism. At the time, she estimated his cognitive abilities to be around those of a six-month-old. He was three.

The drive home was quiet as he slept peacefully in his car seat. My husband and I talked in low voices about the future—about therapies, possibilities, fears, and hopes. We didn’t know where this road would lead, but we knew we had to start walking it.

Suddenly so many things made sense. He couldn’t seem to color. He couldn’t manage utensils. He didn’t appear to understand what his own hands were for.

So we started working on connections—and then on his hands.

Every meal began the same way. After we prayed, instead of picking up my own fork, I walked around behind his chair. Slipping my arms beneath his, I wrapped his little fingers around his fork, covered his hands with mine, and together we lifted the food to his mouth…again and again and again. Every single meal.

Eventually I began loosening my grip, sliding my hands farther down his wrists until his fingers carried more of the work. One day I decided to wait. We finished praying, and everyone reached for their forks, but I stayed in my chair and watched him expectantly.

He frowned and squirmed. Then came the familiar warning.

“Do you hear that tractor?”

Those words almost always meant a meltdown was on the way. He lifted both hands into the air and waited with them suspended above his plate. My heart felt like dry ground waiting for rain, about to crack.

After a few moments, I walked around the table again, placed my hands over his, and together we ate. It wasn’t the victory I had hoped for, but it was still progress. Because now, as long as my hands rested lightly on his wrists, he would hold his own fork. So the next day I moved my hands to his elbows, and then to his forearms. Sometimes I let go for only a second before taking hold again.

Little by little, his hands were learning.

One meal, after the blessing, I remained seated once more. Steam rose from fresh green beans, and crusty bread lay freshly sliced on a homemade cutting board. He looked at me expectantly but quickly averted his eyes. Then he fussed, and his hands floated uncertainly over the table.

Then…he picked up his fork, speared a piece of chicken, and lifted it to his own mouth.

For a split second the whole table froze. Should we cheer? Would we scare him? But somebody couldn’t help it.

“Christopher!” We shouted.

The dining room erupted with applause. He glanced around in surprise and burst into laughter. Delighted, he dropped his fork on purpose, picked it back up, and fed himself again, hoping to keep producing the laughter. He loved making everyone laugh.

To discover your hands is no small thing. It’s certainly cause for celebration. But…if his hands could learn to feed him, perhaps someday they would learn to write and draw. Perhaps someday they would build or play music. Maybe even someday his mouth would find words too?

So we just kept practicing. Coloring came next. He didn’t understand crayons any better than forks, so again, he held his hands out for mine.

I bought a large whiteboard and dry-erase markers. Standing behind him, I wrapped my hands around his, and together we drew circles, squares, arrows, smiley faces, and simple lines every day. He loved it.

Truthfully, I think he loved the smell of the markers at least as much as drawing. He would lean close and sniff them with obvious delight, and he always seemed comforted by the firm pressure of my hands around his wrists. Deep pressure always settled his little nervous system.

Eventually preschool time would end each morning, and I needed to teach his older brothers and sister. One day, I sat working through grammar with Andrew while Christopher played quietly on the hardwood floor beside me. His favorite toys were blocks, so I dumped a pile for him to play in. He could sort and stack them for what seemed like hours.

As Andrew and I worked through his lesson, I glanced down, and there beside Christopher lay one of the small whiteboards his older siblings used for spelling. A dry-erase marker was clutched in his pudgy hand.

And on the board…was a tractor! A real tractor!

I stared at it. He had never drawn a single thing by himself! He hadn’t even made a single mark on a board without my hands guiding his. Grabbing my phone, I snapped a picture before it disappeared and sent it to my husband at work.

“Our son just did this!” I shrieked into the phone.

Original drawing from Christopher

Hardly believing what I was seeing, I wondered, how in the world had he gone from holding out his hands so I could help him draw a single line…to drawing an entire tractor? He looked up at me proudly.

“Do you hear that tractor?”

For so long that phrase had been nothing but the warning that a meltdown was coming, but that day, I felt that it meant something else. I truly believed he had seen something, imagined it, and had actually drawn it. And finally he had found those familiar words to share it.

Little by little, he was finding his hands. He was finding his feet. And hidden inside the mystery of his mind, the gifts God had placed there all along were beginning to emerge.

We’re still seeing that today.

“Let all things be done decently and in order.”
(1 Cor. 14:40)

Dearest Daughters,

Well, here we go, beginning a new year of Dearest Daughters letters. I thought I would start by talking about some of the tricks, tips, and helps I’ve learned in housekeeping over the years.

In my very first letter to you a year ago, I talked about how motherhood is like a dance. I really meant that. To me, it’s still the image that most captures what it means to be a wife, mother, homemaker, and all the other things God may call us to be. There are many steps in the dance, and no two are exactly alike. The rhythm may change, the song may change, and we must bow, bend, step to the side, step back, and step forward in time with the music.

Homemaking is much the same. There are seasons when it comes more easily and seasons when it doesn’t. As your families grow and your responsibilities expand, you will discover that keeping a home orderly is not simply a matter of wanting to do it. It requires patterns, habits, and systems that help carry the load when life becomes full.

I’m blessed to see all of you keeping your homes well, at least from the times I’ve spent with you. Some of you are better at it than I am, but there have certainly been seasons when I’ve done better and seasons when I’ve done worse. I love a clean home, an orderly home, and a beautiful home, and I really dislike clutter. When I got married, I confidently told myself that my house would never be messy or dirty. It was a lesson in humility to discover that good intentions alone do not keep a house!

I’ll tell you the story of when I first realized that simply deciding to do something was not enough.

Helen, you were only a week old.

I had nothing to wear that fit properly after your birth, and I was realizing that losing the baby weight did not necessarily mean fitting back into my pre-pregnancy clothes, at least not right away. Prior to your birth, I had kept an immaculate house. After you arrived, it seemed as though all I ever did was feed you, change you, prepare meals, clean them up, make laundry piles ten times larger than Dad and I had ever produced, and then try to find time to wash, fold, and put everything away again.

One day, right before lunch, I was trying to find something to wear because we had an event to attend. After trying on about the ninth outfit and tossing it onto the couch in frustration, I heard a knock at the door.

I nearly had a heart attack.

My hair was a mess. Nine outfits were draped across the couch. A load of unfolded laundry sat in a chair. Breakfast dishes were still in the sink.

Then the knock came again.

What do you do?

I gathered up the pile of clothes from the couch, wadded them into my arms, tossed them onto my bed, and hurried back to answer the door. It was my parents and some relatives of my dad’s. I couldn’t believe it!

“Sorry to drop in unannounced,” Dad said, “but we were driving by, and I thought they would enjoy seeing your wedding furniture.”

Several family members had made beautiful furniture for us as wedding gifts. Your Uncle Abraham and some of Dad’s friends had made our coffee table, rocking chair, bed, dresser, and nightstands. Your Uncle Philip had made our dining table and chairs.

Then Dad added the fatal words:

“I knew you always kept an immaculate house, so I figured it wouldn’t alarm you too much.”

I laughed weakly.

“A baby has changed that,” I said.

Everyone was gracious, but when they stepped inside, I could see the surprise on my parents’ faces. Not only did they tour the living room, but one of the ladies wanted to see the bedroom furniture as well. After they finally left, I flopped onto the couch and covered my face with my hand. Oh, no!

I was going to have to establish some patterns and rules for myself because this couldn’t happen again. I’m still cringing about it twenty-eight years later.

That day, I made a few decisions. First, I would not do laundry in the living room. The living room would remain a sanctuary. No piles of laundry. No household clutter.

Later this developed even further. I don’t generally allow children to play in the living room unless they are playing there with their parents. Toys belong in designated play spaces. The purpose of this rule isn’t rigidity but hospitality. I want to be able to welcome company into my living room without first needing thirty minutes to make it presentable.

Second, I made a rule that I would never go to bed with dirty dishes in the sink.

Third, I’d never leave the house with dirty dishes in the sink unless there was a genuine emergency.

Those simple habits helped me enormously.

The lesson was not really about laundry or dishes but that good intentions are rarely enough. Homes are generally not kept by inspiration but by patterns.

Scripture tells us that everything should be done decently and in order. It has always struck me that when the disciples entered the empty tomb, they found the grave clothes lying there and the face cloth folded separately. There was order even in the midst of the greatest miracle in history. I figured that if there could be order in an empty tomb on resurrection morning, there ought to be some order in my laundry basket as well.

During different seasons, I’ve handled laundry in different ways. As you children grew older, I taught you to fold and put away your own clothes. But during that season with a newborn, I folded everything immediately as it came off the clothesline or out of the dryer and placed it directly into a basket ready to carry to the drawers. It was one less pile to create and one less pile to conquer later.

Over the years I’ve learned dozens of little habits, tricks, and systems that have helped me care for a home and family. Some were learned from wise women; others came through trial and error. And some came through embarrassing moments such as the one I just told you about.

Over the next few months, I’d like to share more of these with you. Take what is useful, discard what is not, and adapt the rest to your own homes and personalities.

The goal is not perfection but to create a place of peace, welcome, beauty, and provision for the people God has entrusted to your care.

With all my love,

Mom

Many of you have faithfully chosen to support my writing, even when you weren’t receiving anything exclusive in return. Your encouragement has meant more to me than you know, and I am deeply grateful.

That is about to change.

I’m excited to begin sharing something that no one else has seen yet—a sneak preview of the book that Christopher and I are writing together.

The book is made up of letters exchanged between the two of us. Some are letters I have written to him, and others are his responses back to me. It has become a beautiful journey of reflection, growth, and the grace of God at work through the years.

Today, I’d like to share one of Christopher’s letters in response to one I wrote to him.

I hope you enjoy it, and thank you again for your continued support. It has helped make projects like this possible.

—Amanda

Read more

“One generation shall praise thy works to another, and shall declare thy mighty acts.”
(Ps 145:4)

Dearest daughters,

Well, this is the 52nd letter—an entire year of Dearest Daughters letters!

I hope these letters have been as much of a blessing to you as they have been to me. Taking my thoughts, putting them into words, and sharing them with you each week has been a transforming experience. As I write, I picture each of you and the different seasons you are walking through, and I hope that somewhere along the way these letters have been inspiring, encouraging, or helpful in your own journeys as wives and mothers.

I wanted to give you a little glimpse of what I am planning going forward.

I have begun the process of turning these first 52 letters into a devotional, which I hope you will enjoy. My vision is for it to be both a devotional and a prayer journal, a place for reflection as well as encouragement. Lord willing, it will be ready this fall, and I’m very excited about it.

As I look ahead to the next year of letters, I find myself wanting to move into some very practical areas of wifehood, motherhood, and homemaking.

My initial thought is to spend six weeks on practical homemaking, six weeks on newborn and baby care, six weeks on toddlers and preschoolers, six weeks on beginning school, six weeks on family schooling, six weeks on the teenage years, and six weeks on navigating relationships with married children.

That still leaves room for additional topics, and before I begin, I would love to hear from you.

What specific subjects would you like me to address within those categories? Are there other categories you would like included? What questions do you find yourself asking as wives, mothers, homemakers, and women seeking the kingdom of God in your homes?

Your feedback would be wonderful and would help shape the direction of the coming year’s letters.

I would also love to hear from other mothers who may eventually read these letters. If you feel comfortable, perhaps you could leave a comment on my Substack page beneath this letter and help get the conversation started. Of course, if you’d rather respond privately, that’s perfectly fine, too.

Before we close out this first year together, I want to leave you with a poem I wrote for you:

If You Are A Mother…

If you’ve awakened in the night
to the grunts of your baby,
fed them and turned them,
yet lingered a moment longer
because you couldn’t bear to lay them back down,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve stayed awake in wonder,
just to marvel,
just to weep over the wisps of breath
upon a silky cheek,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve picked up the messes,
wiped away the grime,
and still found yourself smiling
at some point each and every day,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve been vomited on and cried on,
plastered with slobbery kisses,
and simply wiped it off again with a laugh,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve embraced every moment—
the sunshine and play,
but also the chaos
that shatters your day—
then you are a mother.

If you’ve disciplined your child,
then hidden away to weep,
yet still kept doing
what would keep him safe,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve lain awake at night
repenting again and again,
yet risen in the morning
to do it all over once more,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve tried and you’ve tried
and you’ve failed,
yet left a trail—
even a broken one—
for those who come behind,
then you are a mother.

If you’ve loved beyond your strength,
prayed beyond your wisdom,
given more than you thought you had,
and risen each morning
to surrender once more,
then you are a mother.

Not because you did it perfectly.

Not because you never failed.

But because you loved.

You are a mother.

As I watch your lives unfold, I see that those of you who have children are becoming mothers, not simply by giving birth, but through the daily laying down of your lives in love.

And that brings joy to my soul more than I can adequately express.

With all my love,

Mom

The phone rang, and I looked at the number, surprised. It was a single guy whom I’ll call Bill. I couldn’t remember a time he’d ever called me before.

“Hello?” I said.

“Hi, Amanda. I just thought I would let you know that, well, you might want to know that your son is standing on the windowsill in his room, and he doesn’t have anything on. Like, nothing on. And he’s looking out the window.”

I groaned.

“Okay. Thank you very much,” I said, shaking my head.

Dashing back to Christopher’s room, I opened the door. Sure enough, he was standing on the windowsill again, but then the smell hit me like a tsunami.

What in the world?

This would not be the first time his room had smelled like this. Our toilet-training journey was not going well. Then I saw the window, the walls, and the shoes in the corner. All of them had been smeared and painted with unspeakable substances.

I grabbed my head in my hands.

“Oh no, Christopher. What did you do?” I asked.

He jerked and jumped off the windowsill where he had been standing.

“Come with Mommy,” I said.

I took him to my bathroom and turned on the water. I felt like taking him outside and spraying him off with a hose, but I knew that would cause even more alarm. After rinsing him off in the shower and settling him into a bath, I went back to clean and sterilize the room.

How were we ever going to overcome the toilet-training issues? We’d been at it for years! And not just the toilet-training issues, but the hatred-of-clothing issues as well.

I had tried softer clothes and cut every tag out of T-shirts, pants, and underwear. But there was always some problem. The second Christopher was out of sight, off came the clothes.

During nap times and while he was outside playing, we lost more shoes than I could count. Somehow they simply disappeared, but I reminded myself that this was a journey.

At least it seemed like we already had some victories behind us, like wetting. Now if we could just get victory with the big jobs and clothing.

Learning to use the potty had included sitting for entire days with him, reading books while he sat on the potty, or sitting beside him next to the adult toilet waiting and watching for success. As strange as it sounds, that turned out to be marvelously helpful because he loved watching water coming from any source. Watching it hit the water in the toilet was even more exciting.

Suddenly, we had a breakthrough, and I wished I’d known that trick before spending endless days and weeks sitting beside the little frog potty that a typical child would have learned on.

After Christopher got out of the tub that day, I brought him back into his room and showed him the pile of dirty rags, clothes, and ruined shoes.

I talked to him as if he could understand every word.

“Christopher, we never do this. That’s very dirty. It can make people sick.”

On and on I went.

I didn’t know if a hundred percent of my words were being understood, or three percent, or zero, but I kept talking. I showed him and let him smell the mess. I explained until I saw something registering in his big brown eyes.

“Oh, you don’t want to do that? Oh, you don’t want to do that?” he repeated in a high-pitched voice, nervously shaking his hands like wings.

Walking the fine line between disturbing him enough not to repeat the behavior and pushing him into a meltdown was always a balancing act.

“That’s right,” I said. “We’re not going to do that anymore.”

And amazingly, we didn’t.

That problem finally disappeared.

Now, the getting-naked issue was another story. At my daughter Helen’s sixteenth birthday party, she had several friends over to celebrate. The house was full of girlish laughter and chatter. Candles had been blown out, presents opened, and Helen was enjoying her special day.

Meanwhile, I had been working diligently on privacy lessons.

“We get dressed in private,” I explained again and again. “No one should see you getting undressed except a doctor or if Mommy is helping you.”

We practiced shutting the door and putting clothes on privately.

Then suddenly, in the midst of the party, Helen squealed.

“Mom!”

I turned around to see a very naked Christopher standing right in the middle of the room full of teenage girls.

“Christopher! What’s the problem?” I asked, rushing over to usher him out of the room.

“Nicolas invaded my privacy,” he announced indignantly, referring to his two-year-old brother, and using terms he’d heard me use in my explanations.

“I was getting dressed, and he opened the door.”

Well, at least part of the lesson had worked.

“Okay,” I said, trying not to laugh. “But let’s not come out here.”

I herded him back toward the bedroom while poor Helen turned bright red all the way to the roots of her hair.

“I’m sorry,” I told the girls. “Just think Adam and Eve. He doesn’t understand.”

The toilet training eventually became a success, and sometime later we were taking a family trip through the mountains of Utah.

We packed our lunch into backpacks and headed down a trail toward a beautiful river. After hiking for about half an hour, we found the perfect picnic spot.

The pine trees swayed in the wind. The scent of the forest drifted through the air, and the river rushed over the rocks beside us.

Carri Beth gathered pinecones in her skirt. Blair skipped rocks, and everyone settled in for a wonderful picnic.

Then suddenly Christopher began to dance.

“Do you need to go potty? Do you need to go potty?” he cried.

Which meant, of course, that he needed to go potty.

What followed was a complete disaster, or so I thought.

I took Christopher off to a private spot and carefully explained that there weren’t any potties in the wilderness, but that we could make do.

The moment I reached for the buckle on his bib overalls, however, he looked at me as though I had violated one of the Ten Commandments.

He dashed around the other side of the tree with a scream. I followed, but he darted around the opposite side, smearing sap on his clothes in the process. The cries escalated into shrieks. Soon we were headed straight into a full-blown meltdown.

Dan came over.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

“I don’t think I’m going to get him to do this.”

“Well, what do we do?”

“I’m afraid we’re going to have to take him all the way back.”

“Oh boy,” Dan said. “That’s a long walk.”

As the meltdown intensified, Dan scooped him up and began jogging back down the trail toward the trailhead where there was a porta-potty.

“He acted like you were murdering him,” Blair observed.

“He doesn’t understand the difference between a small deviation from normal and a terrible crime,” I said.

We laid out the turkey sandwiches, opened the chips, and sat down beside the beautiful mountain river, but our hearts were heavy.

“When’s Daddy getting back?” Zach asked.

“Hopefully soon,” I said.

We were packing up lunch with Christopher’s plate still sitting untouched on the picnic table when we finally saw them.

Dan walked up with a grin on his face. Then he sat down and patted the seat beside him. Christopher climbed onto the bench, picked up his sandwich, and took a huge bite.

Now that was a victory all by itself.

There had been a time when even eating away from home could cause a meltdown. New places, new routines, unfamiliar surroundings—any one of them could derail an entire day. Yet here he was, calmly eating lunch beside a mountain river as if nothing unusual had happened.

Then he looked around at all of us.

“Christopher was a big boy,” he announced proudly.

We smiled.

“He went potty.”

The family erupted into cheers. To anyone else, it might have sounded ridiculous. A family celebrating a trip to the bathroom, but to us it felt like standing on the summit of a mountain.

We knew how many tears stood behind those words. How many hours spent sitting beside little plastic potties. How many ruined pairs of shoes and loads of laundry. How many public embarrassments. How many moments of wondering whether he understood anything we were trying to teach him, and somehow, little by little, the lessons were taking root.

Raising Christopher taught our family to celebrate things we might never have noticed otherwise. A successful trip to the potty. Keeping clothes on all day. Respecting privacy. Eating a meal away from home.

To most people these would seem ordinary. To us they were hard-won triumphs.

There were many times when I wondered whether my words were reaching him at all. I wondered whether the constant explanations, the patient repetition, and the endless practice were accomplishing anything, but over and over again, Christopher surprised me.

Sometimes the victories came months after I expected them or arrived in forms I never anticipated. Sometimes what looked like a defeat in one area turned out to be a step forward in another.

That day in the Utah mountains seemed at first like another failure. We had interrupted the hike, disrupted the picnic, and sent poor Dan jogging down the trail with a screaming child in his arms. Yet by the end of the day, all any of us remembered was Christopher’s proud announcement.

“He went potty.”

We often measure progress by the battles we lose. God measures it by the ground we gain, and most of the ground is gained one small victory at a time.

Those small victories accumulated over months and years until one day we realized we have been utterly transformed into something much better than before.

The victories have become a life.

Dearest Daughters,

Scripture tells us, “This is the victory that overcomes the world—even our faith.” (1 John 5:4)

If faith is the victory that overcomes the world, then it seems that if we’re looking for victory in life, we ought to practice faith and come to a deeper understanding of what it truly means.

I believe that if faith is the victory that overcomes the world, then certainly it can also be the victory that overcomes fear, anxiety, discouragement, and the daily troubles of life.

Whenever I’m not feeling victory in some sphere of life, I often ask myself: Is this simply the challenges of life or is there a lack of faith?

If the house feels chaotic and lacking peace, perhaps I don’t have enough faith.

If there’s tension in my marriage, perhaps faith is running short.

If I seem unable to gain forward momentum with a toddler, where is the faith?

If I can’t seem to connect with a teenager, perhaps faith is the shortfall. When I encounter these difficulties, one of the first places I should look is whether I am responding in faith.

So let’s examine faith. I think the definition of faith in Christian circles is often diluted until it becomes little more than mental agreement that God is God. But biblical faith is quite different. Biblical faith always produces action. Hebrews 11 describes faith in vivid terms. Noah, having faith, built an ark. Abraham, having faith, left his country. Moses, having faith, chose to suffer with the people of God. Again and again, faith moved someone to act.

And when we look at the passage where the disciples ask the Lord, “Increase our faith,” in Luke 17, we find something very interesting.

Jesus has just told them that they must forgive—not merely once or twice, but over and over again. In response they cry out, “Lord, increase our faith!”

Jesus first tells them that if they have faith as a grain of mustard seed, they can say to a tree, “Be uprooted and planted in the sea,” and it will obey them.

But then He immediately tells what seems at first to be an unrelated parable. He speaks of a servant who has spent the day laboring in the field. When he returns home, the master does not tell him to sit down and rest. Instead, the servant prepares the master’s meal and continues serving. And after doing so, he simply says, “We are unprofitable servants. We have done only what was our duty to do.”

Somehow, this story is part of Jesus’ answer to their request for greater faith.

I have often thought about that. When I lie in bed at night after a long and taxing day, my mind wanders back through the hours. If I’ve simply done what I know was required of me before God as a wife, mother, homemaker, or friend, there’s a certain satisfaction in that.

But there is a different feeling altogether when I have responded to the prompting of the Holy Spirit.

When I have reached out to encourage someone.

When I have written a note.

When I have given a gift.

When I have made a meal or a phone call.

When I have gone beyond what was merely required of me.

Those are the days when I feel as though I have stepped into a rushing current. New ideas come. New energy comes, and above all, joy comes. And what is remarkable is that whenever I step beyond myself in faith, God often sends something back in return.

It’s like casting out a tiny seed and watching it spring up into a tree. The encouragement returned. There are unexpected blessings, and I find renewed sense of purpose. There is deep joy that comes from knowing God moved through me in some small way.

Faith seems to grow from faith and glory grows from glory. When you give faith away, it somehow reflects back to you. When you extend courage, hope, kindness, and love to others, the radiance of God shines both through you and then back upon you. Faith becomes contagious.

So if you find yourself falling short, if victory seems absent in some area of your life, ask the Lord as the disciples did:

“Lord, increase my faith.”

And then look for an opportunity to go beyond the call of duty. Do something that requires you to step outside of yourself. Encourage someone. Forgive someone. Serve someone. Bless someone. Take one small step of faith, and then watch what God does.

I challenge you to see whether you do not find more victory, more faith, and more momentum than you had yesterday. Let us walk in the victory that overcomes the world. The victory that overcomes fear. The victory that overcomes doubt. The victory that overcomes the cranky toddler. The victory that overcomes the despondent teenager. The victory that overcomes selfishness and brings the radiant glory of God into the world.

With all my love,

Mom

“Let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.” (Gal. 6:9)

Dearest daughters,

Today, Dad and I are celebrating twenty-nine years of marriage.

I remember this day vividly, twenty-nine years ago, the awe, the fear, even the trembling I felt in my soul as I prepared to make such a momentous, lifelong decision. Was my perspective truly right? Was my love what it needed to be? Above all, I did not want to let Dad or God down.

I knew Dad saw more in me than I even believed myself to be. And I knew God was counting on me to be a reflection of His love.

My mom was busy preparing my little sister for the wedding in my bedroom, so I spent that morning in my brother’s bedroom, praying, pacing the floor, getting down on my knees.

“God, help me to do this,” I prayed. “Help me to bring glory to You in this marriage. Don’t let my shortfalls change the trajectory You have for my life.”

There was such a weighty feeling that morning. But the moment I made that commitment with my mouth—“I do take this man to be my husband, for better, for worse, in sickness and in health”—it was as if those words cut through the cloud of heaviness, and I saw the light of love like never before.

Now, twenty-nine years later, I realize I was only barely seeing a glimmer of the shine our love would become. It has only grown brighter.

Not one single day has gone by that I have not repeatedly declared my love to your father, and he to me. And it is my wish and prayer that each of you will have a marriage like Dad and I have had.

Our marriage has far exceeded my expectations, and I owe this in part to my own father, who told me from the beginning, “Marriage will not be about you. If you go into it to see what you can get out of it, you will be disappointed. Marriage will be about God being made more visible through your union, through your overcoming, through the way you work through your trials. And it will take a lot of work.”

So I came into marriage expecting a challenge. And because of that, I found the challenges to be part of the adventure.

Let me give you an analogy.

If I go down to the car to leave, running late for church, and realize I have left my keys upstairs in the bedroom of our large farmhouse, I resent every step back through that house. I resent that my bedroom is upstairs. I resent every step back down. It all takes longer. It’s all an inconvenience to me getting on my way. The stairs and the house itself become adversaries to my purpose.

But if I am preparing to take a beautiful alpine mountain hike with your father in a month, I count every step. I am thrilled that my bedroom is upstairs and that our house sits at the top of a hill. I take every step as preparation, as a challenge making me more fit for my goal.

This is the attitude that will shape your marriage.

If our attitude is that everything is a hindrance to our own purposes, then every request, every difference of viewpoint, every need in our spouse or children will begin to feel like they’re in the way of our life and our agenda. And little by little, we will begin to resent our marriage.

But if we believe marriage is a chance to prove to the enemy that love triumphs, then every difference of opinion, every inconvenience, every sorrow becomes a chance, an exercise. It becomes a stairway to climb in preparation for standing on the mountain that declares love will triumph over hate, life over death, and that we are part of the winning team.

So may you view each day of your marriage as steps preparing you for the mountain view, not as inconveniences keeping you from the journey of your own independent life.

May you be blessed with a marriage like mine.

May you hear love from your spouse every day, and may you give it every hour, so that on your twenty-ninth anniversary, you can say with me:

I would do it all over again!

And though I was head over heels in love on day one, I barely knew what love was compared to what I feel today.

With all my love,
Mom