Upcoming weekend.

Well, we are down to one last game. One last game of 20. We went from an 11 game season to a 20 game season overnight. Needless to say Dave is exhausted and I am ready to have a partner again :).

But I wouldn't mind waiting one extra week. Really wouldn't mind.

http://www.seahawks.com/news/articles/article-1/Mission-impossible/4e90e8c9-9372-4fc9-b165-25b1534abb1a

Go Hawks.

Quiet Morning...

Amidst the craziness of the Holidays, Football season, and having a child under 1 year of age, life can suddenly feel like it is slipping through the cracks. I woke up this morning and realized we had forgotten to take out the trash. So I jumped out of bed, asked my sister to come lay down with the baby, and ran outside to move the cars and take the cans to the curb.

Needless to say I am now wide awake with a threatening sore throat and cold.

I have been really reflective this past month despite traveling to Portland, Los Angeles, having people in town, and going through weeks of football that seem to fly by faster and faster as the days go. Thinking about how much time I have wasted trying to be somewhere that I am not, something that I am not, or covering up who I really am. It's not that I think who I have projected myself to be is much different than the real Lizzy, its more that I have always felt uncomfortable in my own skin and situation.

Which gets desperately exhausting.

I will be eternally grateful to my beautiful daughter Ashby for her life as it has stopped all of that nonsense dead in its tracks. Suddenly I had a reason not to go on living this way. Suddenly I had a person who was going to be all up in every aspect of my world all that time and would be scrutinizing every move I make as her way of discovering who she is made to be. Holy responsibility. Holy reason to stop with futile attempts to avoid fear, avoid insecurity, avoid pain, and avoid all of the other difficult things that really just mean avoid healing.

I realize now how much $ I have wasted trying to create a beautiful outside when I really felt like a mess inside. I realize how many times I have eaten another cookie or another plate of food, or even justified eating complete junk knowing that it would bring a temporary satisfaction and comfort in an otherwise uncomfortable internal world. I am reading this amazing book called "When food is love" by Geneen Roth, and she confronts the very reasons why we compulsively do anything (eat, shop, clean, exercise etc) as an attempt to avoid the raw and gritty parts of life and how quickly that compulsion becomes the focus. Our brains are really quite adept at survival. Especially emotional survival.

This last year of my life has been like a scene from Where the Wild Things Are. I finally said "enough" to the distractions from the reality. I am insecure. I am afraid of not being enough. I am afraid I will not have enough. In some regards I have always felt like I have "too much" and therefore need to become less so as to be able to actually keep friends. Yep, I said it. In fact, I feel like I have actually begun to make friends with these demons. Instead of running from them at a breakneck pace, I stopped and turned around so quickly they ran right into me. And we all collapsed into a big pile, staring bewildered at each other.

I think what I am realizing this quiet morning, with my cup of echinachea throat coat tea (I will not get sick, I will not get sick...) is this:

All along my biggest problem has been running away from these things because they are so scary. But the reality is these things are a part of me. They are and will be my biggest teachers and my tools for healing. If I am not willing to just stop and get all tangled up with them, I will never be released from them. And in an effort to give my daughter the best possible chance at a life free or at least freer, from these things, I am willing to turn around and look. To ask God to reveal to me where these things come from, to understand where they have a stronghold in my life, and to not go anywhere (or shop, eat, run etc...fill in the blank) when I feel uncomfortable having them stare me down.

I believe God is changing me. I believe at my core the chaos and fear and anxiety is beginning to abate. I believe I will come through this a more authentic and confident version of myself. And I believe this ABSOLUTELY has to happen in each of us and as long as we fight it, we will go on decaying further and further from who we are made to be.

This Christmas, thank you Jesus for coming to us, for being born in an animal feeding trough in a barn so that I did not have to be outcast. What more do I ever need than that.

Thank you beautiful, sweet, daring Ashby for wanting to be with me all the time and opening my eyes to how much more growth God has in store for me.

What are you running from?...

Weekend Adventure

Ashby, Mom and I went to Yakima this weekend. Saw Lisa Lou who's kind family donated wood from their Orchard for our wood stove! So cool and literally very warm (I can feel the heat from the fire across the room.) We got away just for a day, but it was amazing to just be with one of my BEST friends. Lisa has a kitten. Lets just say that Ashby and Mal are sort of new best friends. He really likes to run up behind her and parkour off her diaper. Wondering what that means? Watch the office. Here are a few fun pictures.

I think she tuckered him out a little bit.

And my baby's new 2 front teeth!

In other news...Lisa and I were super vigilant about not getting spiders in the back of my car, so we put each piece of wood into a sealable bin, 1 piece at a time. We even inspected for spiders as we picked the wood (which made the process take incredibly too long!) Well, we must not have been that great because on my drive home, going 70 miles an hour downhill on the freeway, I noticed a ROGUE spider crawling towards me on the dashboard. I had a momentary heart attack, tried to decide if I could kill it and not kill the three of us in the car. I immediately pulled onto the side of the freeway, managed to pull myself together in time to watch the spider JUMP on to the door! It took everything in me to kill that sucker (sorry but I don't consider spiders to be animals but Satan's minions.)

I was a little jumpy the rest of the way home.

And I vacuumed the entire car wearing gloves.

Fall News..

A lot has been going on around here. I have a job...(2 days a week nannying, Ashby helps me :)

Here is a quick pictorial review of the last few months..

Auntie Kate moved up to Seattle....and in with us!!! (I am so thankful, especially after an exceptionally long, daddy-less night.)

Ashby started crawling...timidly at first, but now she is all over the place.

 Her first Halloween came and went. We decided to have her be a giraffe. Her dad said its because she has a long neck..

 She didn't really eat the candy, but it made for some really cute pictures.

And she was a very cute little giraffe...

 And what giraffe should not have a tutu when they are 8 1/2 months old?

 We have actually had a fall. I forgot how beautiful the fall is here. This is from the blueberry farm down the hill from my house and along the trail that Ashby, Kuma, Kate and I walk.

 We went to visit the family in LA, and took the kids to the pumpkin patch.

 She still looks just like her daddy.

 She discovered that she absolutely loves the swing!! Loves the swing...and stays in it for as long as I will push her.

And finally, it is officially time to start baby proofing.

Tuesday nights the Seahawks let the families come and have dinner at the facility. Bonus because Dave gets to see daddy in the daylight, and I get a night off from cooking.

This is just a peek. But I feel proud to have even done this much. Happy October...

A girl and her daddy..

I am not jealous of her relationship with her daddy.

I am still mommy, and I am usually the preferred one especially in the case of tired or hungry, but man I LOVE watching Ashby when her daddy is home.

She is soooo happy when she is around him.

She makes this hilarious sound something like this "hata hata" but its barely above a whisper.

So here are some pictures from the past few months of the twins.

Blinded by Love

We travelers, walking towards the sun, can’t see


Ahead, but looking back the very light

That blinded us shows us the way we came,

Along which blessings now appear, risen

As if from sightlessness to sight, and we,

By blessings brightly lit, keep going toward

That blessed light that yet to us is dark.

-Wendell Berry

Great Blog.

It has been CRAZY around here! I had visitors for the last 2 weeks. My little sissy and then 9 members of my SO CAL family all came and stayed here at our house!!! It was chaotic and so sweet to have my nephews here and my brothers and sisters. Loved it.

I have been reading this awesome blog of one of my aunt's good friends. I love it. He is very honest and very reflective. It is nice when it is crazy to have someone else speak the words you wish you had time to hear in your own head. Here is an experpt from one of his most recent posts.

Sweet Darkness

by David Whyte

When your eyes are tired
the world is tired also.
When your vision has gone
no part of the world can find you.
Time to go into the dark
where the night has eyes
to recognize its own.
There you can be sure
you are not beyond love.

The dark will be your womb
tonight.

The night will give you a horizon
further than you can see.

You must learn one thing.
The world was meant to be free in.

Give up all the other worlds
except the one to which you belong.
Sometimes it take darkness and the sweet
confinement of your aloneness
to learn anything or anyone
that does not bring you alive
is too small for you.


I like the idea that this darkness and difficulty is your safest place and your best teacher. If it is hard for you in your life right now, that is because that is the best and most important place you can grow. It will not always be that way. But if you had all the answers and if it was comfortable, would you grow? Would you become all that God created you to be? Would you ever have to truly trust God? Would you ever truly learn to trust yourself and your potential become actual??

Sink into the darkness and do not become lost in it, but allow it to change you. Don't run from it. The bible says when Darkness comes to light, it becomes light. Praise Jesus.

In other news... this is what I found when I got out of the shower yesterday. I left her sitting in her boppy playing with toys.

Not quite a crawl. But how far off could it be??

Football Season

We are in full swing! Dave is back to 7 days a week and I am back to only having to make meals for myself and now for Ashby. While the schedule is demanding, it is also very fun. Every week flys by, and every Saturday feels slightly epic (and exhausting). Here are a few pictures of the new season.

Yes, they actually protect her ears!

Very far away daddy at a training camp practice.

Happy Monday

HOT WEEKEND

It was HOT this weekend!!!!

Fortunately we live by a lake and can cool off whenever we need to

 eating more avocado

 Enatai beach...

 cooling off

 in a pink bikini

 yay!! she loves it

happily eating some peaches after a good day in the water

Avocados and a win!

Ashby tried her first solids. She likes Avocados. I think more she likes the idea of being able to use a spoon and put stuff in her mouth like mom and dad. Here are some pictures of the first trial run.

Trying to figure out what it was we gave her...and surprised that we actually gave her something.

Little trial taste test

We quickly realized this was not a good idea because she was going for it.

She wanted to feed herself.

First big bite

Not really sure...

My turn!!!

Maybe I'll try the bowl..

I think she likes it!!!

It was Daddy's first Seahawks games this weekend. And it was 95 degrees outside. It ended up being the perfect football day. We even got some time with Dave mid-day before the game and we went to the Issaquah farmers market. It was great.

View of the Port of Seattle from the top of the stadium.

Ashby, Auntie Clare and I sweating our little tootsies off

My parent's neighbors, Dave and Tina came too.

Watching the game after she slept through the first 2 quarters... can you say football baby??!!

Proud of daddy after the big win..and really ready for bed.