Of Kites and Muddy Shoes

Easter has come and gone. Would that I could upload a sweet video with my boys explaining the true meaning of Easter (if you want to see one, click here - Caden is adorable). Alas, that is not possible.

At lunch, my husband and I were trying to share memories of our Easters as a kid. His sounded very similar to mine (although, they included trips to this house in Indiana, where Hubby's grandmother lived). I'm betting, since my parents were ministers, that I had to get up even earlier than hubby did. After all, we usually had to be the first to arrive at the church.

My dad always held an Easter Sunrise Service. Then, we would enjoy a tasty breakfast in the fellowship hall and the kids would burn off some energy before Sunday School in the gym (almost all of our Salvation Army corps had a gym - one even had a bowling alley!). I remember one Easter Sunday, my youngest brother's arm got pulled from its socket when someone was swinging him around by his hands.

From that point on, it was a normal Sunday, with Sunday School and a morning service. Before my children came along, I was adamant to continue the tradition of attendance at a sunrise service. I remember being in England (I think it was my very last day there, when I lived there in 1987-88) and bemoaning the fact that our local S.A. corps didn't hold a sunrise service. My friends, the Mitchell family, took me to a beautiful sunrise service held atop a hill in Upper Norwood, London. I felt like crying because it was so beautiful and it helped me to uphold that tradition.

I think we still took ES to a sunrise service back when he was little. I remember attending several of them at Grandma's corps in Urbana, Illinois. However, once the little boys arrived on the scene, we haven't been to a sunrise service since. I keep praying we will resume the tradition. Even my husband admitted that, although going to bed early the night before and spending so many hours at church on Easter was difficult, it also made the day special and a whole lot of fun!

This afternoon, after the baskets were found (ES decided that the Easter Bunny was cheap this year. I decided that, in our house, teenagers won't be getting Easter baskets!), I told the little boys that I had bought them something special and hidden it, as well. They were really quite pathetic detectives, but thankfully ES was an eager helper. They discovered two kites.

YS received an awesome Buzz Lightyear kite made of durable nylon (which I picked up in January for a pittance) and MS received a ladybug plastic kite (even more cheaply made and priced, but for MS - "Mr. Saboteur" - that was fitting). I told them that ES would have to help both of them fly their kites.

ES put the Buzz kite together first. In true ES-impatient form, he decided that the kite was "crap" because it wouldn't stay upright. Thankfully, stepping out of true ES-impatient form, he didn't throw the thing. I picked it up and adjusted the strings and got it flying quite well in our meadow.

ES joined me and took over. I tried to get a video, but the kite seems very small. This is because ES let it out for the full length of 120 feet.

Of course, 120 feet is nothing to my 12 year old, so he insisted on running back to get MS's kite string and attaching it to the Buzz kite string. MS may have had a cheaper kite, but his string ended up being easily twice as long as the Buzz string. It was very cool. ES had that thing flying almost 400 feet up in the air. We had to move back into our neighbor's corn field. It was hard not to stumble over the corn shoots that haven't yet been fully plowed up for the coming soybean crop.

Unfortunately, ten minutes after I took control of the line, the kite began to swoop and spiral. It ended up stuck in a tree. I was convinced it was gone already (that seems to be our luck with kites, which is why I'll only buy them when they are a pittance). Amazingly, ES surprised me and managed to get the kite out of the tree.

Later that afternoon, he invited his friend over because he wanted to impress him with the incredible kite flight. Sadly, despite an all-wise mother standing right next to him and repeatedly reminding him that he should let it out slowly, ES let the line out really fast. Before the friend could appreciate the full scope of our magnificent kite flight, the kite was airborne. The boys chased it, but it flew far, far away. Someone on the other side of town will be finding something other than Easter eggs in the coming days.

Note to self: Must make small address labels which read, "If found, return to ..." listing our address. Then, must place these on items like new kites and coupon wallets. (Just realized that I never blogged about my lost coupon wallet: I had left it at Walgreens and was so happy to retrieve it, since it felt like losing real money.)

Needless to say, MS wasn't very happy when he realized that he couldn't get a turn to fly his ladybug kite because the string for his went with the Buzz kite off into thin air. No worries, next came ES's turn to feel less happy, when I informed him that he would be scrubbing the mud off one of his tennis shoes and both of his grandmother's tennis shoes.

We have instituted a new rule in our house. If the ground is wet, or has been wet recently, you must wear a designated pair of outdoor shoes. The little boys both have rain boots and they clean off quite easily. I shall have to find some (like the Wellingtons I used to wear on romps in England) for ES and myself.

This rule came after I spent much of Saturday scrubbing 12 and a half pairs of mud-caked shoes in our utility sink in the garage. Urghh! I completely understand the British love of Wellingtons. They are a must if you will be walking on muddy terrain.

Of course, ES's shoes were the absolute worst because he had fallen into the creek (while trying to retrieve that purple ball, which amazingly survived recent flood waters and was stuck in a beaver dam). He was muddy from head to toe Friday night.

I wasn't a very happy camper myself, when he returned from his fort on Saturday morning. I was almost done scrubbing the shoes. I was working hard on the worst shoe of all, when I looked down to discover that ES was wearing his grandmother's New Balance walking shoes. He was all out of suitable shoes (i.e., ones he didn't want to get trashed), and found this pair in the closet and assumed they were mine (after all, I had already let him trash my other old pair).

He completed his chore and set the shoes to dry on a towel. Even if they are dry by Wednesday, when his paternal grandmother comes for a visit, he will still have to explain the mistake to her and apologize. As for the lost kite and the muddy shoes, I am reminded of a phrase my father used to repeat to us ad nauseam: "You live and you learn." Let's hope, anyway. I am fed up of lost or broken kites (by the way, Mr. Saboteur tore the plastic on his kite while throwing it around in the garage, so no new string will be purchased) and muddy shoes!

Good News to Share

Perhaps I am just in an overly critical funk this weekend, but once again, I'm not going to post those Easter thoughts. Instead, I'm going to ramble from my stream-0f-consciousness (at least I think I'm conscious - some days, who knows) around the Easter theme.

My boys LOVE holidays. One boy talks about one specific holiday throughout the whole year (if you know me, you'll know which boy I mean, and hey, you've got a fifty-fifty chance since one of the three can't talk yet). So, I have been trying to make a point this week of explaining the spiritual reason we celebrate Easter. Last Sunday, my MS loved holding, waving and then (in the car) tearing apart the palm branch he was given in church. We talked, ever so briefly, about Jesus dying on the cross (since we've had some emotions about dying lately).

Today, the church where my MS goes for Parent's Day Out held an Easter egg hunt. I had noticed the open invitation on the sign, so, I decided to bundle up the two little guys and give it a go (it looked like both rain and snow, so I wasn't sure how it would go). I'm sure they had fun. I survived and I was glad they had fun.

I suppose my brain works in certain ways because I was a pastor's kid. When I saw the jam-packed parking lot, my first thought was, "Man, this was a clever outreach event." It brings to mind, my friend Kyle and thoughts he once shared about visiting the Circus Museum in Wisconsin. The circus used to go out to share their incredible acts and impressive sights. They rallied people into their tents, moving to where the people were, not holed up in a museum. His point was that we, as Christians, have good news to share and we shouldn't keep this good news under wraps for quiet inspection in a museum. We, too, should go out to proclaim it.

I guess I left just a little bit sad in my soul. Yes, my children had fun. And, maybe, I'm the only one who saw it this way, but man what a wasted opportunity. We entered, they took names for door prizes. I ushered MS and YS out the door to the playground area where the 3-5s were allowed to look for eggs. After the egg hunt, we headed back to the sanctuary for games and the door prizes. Then, unexpectedly, we were all invited to stay for a hot dog lunch in the fellowship hall. I commend this church for offering nourishment and great entertainment to the public.

However, my soul ached just a little bit as well. I suppose, I expected to receive something with information about the church (even though I already know their information), some sort of small message about why they were opening their doors, some hint that there was good news to share and some greater pull towards a community of believers. During the hot dog lunch, I sat at a table with my two little boys and noticed the (sadly typical) division in the room. Regular attenders were all on one end of the room, packed around tables conversing animatedly with one another. Then there were the patches of non-attenders - isolated families, eating alone.

I will admit that I spent a great deal of time chasing the two little guys (remember, they are 1 and 3 and too heavy to hold the whole time), so perhaps I was a difficult target to approach. But, we were there for an hour and a half and I approached two or three people. One was wearing a Rockford sweatshirt, and I just had to ask if she was from Rockford (which is near where we used to live). She said "No," and quickly looked away (who knows, maybe it was a thrift store purchase and she only bought it because she liked the color). The only people who approached me were the pastor, his wife, and the PDO director.

I know I am more keenly aware of this subject because I have recently moved, but I do want to encourage others to reach out when newcomers enter their church doors. I already know the good news. I already have received the gift. But, so many others, enter with their families to search for Easter eggs, hoping that someone will give them more than an Easter egg and a hot dog lunch. I don't want to seem like I am slamming this church. I am not. I grew up in The Salvation Army. We were all about meeting the physical needs as an introduction to meeting the spiritual needs in others. I merely hope to encourage other believers to use their outreach events to effectively reach out. I found myself wishing they had instructed their regular attenders to seek out four or five newcomers to greet and strike up a conversation with. Perhaps they did, and I merely fell through the cracks (while chasing my whirling dervishes).

And, in that same spirit, I wanted to share a fabulous story of reconciliation. I love books with that theme. I crave these kinds of stories again and again. My soul needs to hear them. If you would like to read a fine story of reconciliation please read this. I hope that I may be more about sharing the good news than I have been. It is too important to forget! We all need more than an Easter egg and a hot dog for today; we need the miracle of Easter and His nourishment for today, tomorrow and eternity!