The Valley

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The Valley's of our Lives. 

They teaches us, talks to us, and tenderly tells us, 

They won't be forever. 

They makes us wait, wonder, and cry out to be over. 

And then, miraculously, they instruct us how to stay.

To learn perseverance which builds character, and surprisingly, gives us hope. 

The valley is a low place, but you are not lowly when you find yourself here.   

And yet, its impossible to not look up. 

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To see the hills, the mountains, the ledges and spilling waterfalls. The higher levels. The seemingly better places. It seems like there is so much more life above, and that the valley is keeping you from it all. 

Oh the valley's of our lives. 

These seasons that I fight, and yet, learn, and most of all, grow from. 

You see, when I start settling in, and setting up camp in the "trenches" I find friends who are seated beside me, authenticity of conversation, and humility of heart. 

In the valley, I begin to slow down enough to admit my own brokenness, and admit the bondage I feel towards the entitlement to my way and my timeline. 

The valley breaks you, and longs to put you together again. 

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The valley's I have walked through have changed me.
And I don't categorize "change" here with some "cheesy" or "cheery" description, but with an-all-out seriousness, that what I have learned during the valley's have had eternal impact. Enough that I am learning that trying to fight them, or somehow escape, would be turning my back on the very thing I am supposed to learn.

There has been an intimacy developed in my relationship with the Lord in the valley.
A silent assurance that He saw the big picture, the big plan, and the big purpose behind the dryness of the season.
He doesn't waste valley's.
He hasn't wasted my sorrow, my pain, my hurt, and my disappointments. 

 He doesn't forget about me here. In fact, the longer the season lasted, the more I realized how He was luring me to listen, and remind me that, "He is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit". And that He longs to, "heal and bind up wounds" and be the one who makes me whole again.

Looking back on this winter- on waiting, looking back on miscarrying, looking back on struggling with addiction in our family for years now, what I find in my valley's are more of Him and less of Me.
Mike Eire, our old pastor used to say, "The reward of Jesus is Jesus". That's the funny thing about the upside down Kingdom of God. The victory I found in the valley wasn't answers, a mapped out timeline, some prize, or jazzy reward.
It was more of Jesus.
A deeper relationship, more trust and dependence on Him.
And that, my friends, was the best kind of victory.

xoxo
Mama 

Mama's Day Love

Mama's Day. 

Its almost here.

And I always get super sentimental. 

To my sweet Samantha, who made me a mama, you daily teach and lead me.
And by lead me, I truly mean, you are my little social butterfly, always making me new friends, and scheduling us playdates too. 

Your the very best gift.  

And in honor of mama's day {this Sunday!}, here is a quick little gift guide!

For the mama's in your life, I would love to suggest some lovely gifts, to celebrate them. 

Hey, motherhood, its hard work!

Lindsay Letters- Be True Bistro Mug 

I love coffee. Its no lie. But, my coffee these days is drank early morning, iced, with lots of half&half. NO judging. 

I do have a mild-tea obsession though. Hot, "sleepy-time-tea" right before bed, snuggled next to J, watching HGTV specifically Flip or Flop. That's a whole other issue, where I now think I am capable of flipping house's {I mean, come on, how hard could it be?!}. I think sipping tea in this cup would be divine. And maybe remind me to be true to myself, which might not involve flipping properties. But, I digress. 

Isn't this mug darling? I think some mama's in your life would love!

Jo Malone Orange Blossom 

Oh how I love Jo. I feel like were friends. My mama won a beautifully done breakfast at Bloomingdales a couple years ago, where we were introduced to the Jo Malone line, and sampled literally all of her scents. Since that day, I have fallen into Jo's British based roots, and can't stop spraying her perfume. Orange Blossom is my current favorite, a gorgeous smelling scent for summer. 

Sparkly Green Earrings 

Sparkly Green Earrings is a light and laugh-till-midnight read about motherhood. Its layered, and full of so much more- Melanie has a magical way of making you laugh, cry, all while wanting to go put on some fabulous earrings. I loved this story, by story read. A perfect gift for the mama's in your life in the trenches of day-to-day diapering, nose-cleaning, and homework helping. 

Surf & Sand Splashes & Spa 

Pull out the big guns, and send mama to the spa. 

I promise, she will love you forever. 

Surf & Sand, {my fav} is offering their super-duper lovely spa and splashes package. A 60 minute treatment, and a three-course-lunch at Splashes. 

Yum, Yes, Please. 

Happy Mama's Day to all you mama's out there. 

Its a career like no other, a sacrifice like something I have never known, and a love that well, takes your breath away. 

xoxo

Goodmama 

Bread & Wine Winner

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"This is what I want you to do: tell someone you love them, and that dinner's at six."

~Bread & Wine~

I love giveaways. Both winning them {hello St. Regis Spa Day} and giving things I love away. Bread & Wine is especially a special one to me, with its calling to live well, and to come back to the table. To be in community, and to stay in community. 

I am so excited to jump on amazon, and send you the book, 

Mrs. Cowgill :)
{Your Gonna Love IT!} 

It's been a whirlwind week. Lots of appointments, starting to come out of the 1st trimester daze {or doom} as I should label it, and looking forward to summer and all its sunny glory. 

Were knee deep {literally} in a backyard re-model, and my activities director {Samantha Grace} is running a tight ship. 

Two night's ago over dinner, Jordan & I gathered with some church friends, new ones, that have a heart for a similar ministry that we do. Totally informal, {were talking Islands here} we got filled in on how the ministry got its start in Chicago, and what it would look like to launch officially at our church. For me, it was my favorite moment this week around the table. It was exciting, humbling, and moving to hear stories of how God was at work, in our midst, even in the face of such sad situations. It reminded me that when we partner with God and his people, the things we can do together, by stepping outside of our comfort zone, are simply amazing.
It all got started around a bunch of surfboard's, french fries, and a plastic seat.
I love life around the table.

Oh, and that lovely picture of chilly, white wine at the top of this post? Yum. That's my long-lost-friend Contadino Pinot Grigio. Found at Trader's for under 5 dollars, it's a staple in my house.
I miss you. See you in 5 months.
Delic Friend.

xoxo
Goodmama 

Pushing to Stay Present

I feel like I have been perpetually rushing and wishing through so much of my life. Waiting for the next season to come, rushing to the next milestone, and aching for the next future adventure.

Next, Next, Next. 

College, to marriage, to children, to more children, here I am again, boldly staring my own insistent wishing in the eyes. Blue eyes they are, my own eyes, reflecting back at me my internal push for the next, the bigger, the greater.

And I'm tired. I'm tired of this pregnancy, and I'm only Weeks in. I'm tired of my own brokenness, and humanity, and hopelessness. My lack of perseverance. 

And I'm tired of being tired. And I'm struggling to stay present.
Stay now. Stay here. Push to be present. Push, push, push.

Samantha will be three in July, oh my, how these past three years have flown by with the speed of the rocket jet from Little Einsteins. Jordan and I will celebrate six years in September, both our ten year reunions in the fall, and were due with baby número two at the end of October.
Before I know it, I'm mentally in the fall, and decorating for Christmas.

I'm wrestling with this theme that re-plays in my own life of pondering and pontificating my life away. Of wanting everything quickly. On not having to wait. 

Of rushing, pulling, and pushing to get to the next great thing.  

And yet, here I am.

Pushing to Stay Present. 

In the nitty-gritty-grimness of the first trimester. 

 All day sickness and tiredness best described in my own life as a "hung-over-bear-hibernating for winter".

I'm irritable, and easily annoyed, I'm quickly frustrated, and craving endless amounts, copious handfuls of greasy food. I hated coffee until recently. I barely want to exercise, I hardly have enough mind-power to get through the day, to take care of my sweet Samantha, much less have interesting conversation, feel fabulous, and create margin to write. I'm a mess. 

Like a serious hot-mess, its up there with the intensity of a 100 degree plus desert heat. 

I'm pretty sure on some days you could fry an egg on my head. 

And I'm pressing. To stay here. To be here. To live in this season I have wanted desperately, prayerfully for so long, and stay strong.To laugh when Samantha drops her favorite binky in the toilet {and laugh harder when I admit she still DOES indeed have her "binks"}, to not get bothered by each and every little thing, to celebrate and sing in the midst of feeling like I'm going to puke. I'm here. 

And this is what pregnancy looks like for me. 

It's not glowing and glamorous. It's breakouts and breakdowns. And eating in-and-out for lunch three days in a row. It's asking for helping, and confessing to my husband I feel down and hormonal and so, oh so "off". It's allowing myself to be "off".
Grace I say to myself, grace I whisper out loud when the day, the moments of the minutes feel rough around the edges.

It's not wanting to miss the end of these terrible and terrific twos. Both the time out's and the tea parties. It's taking each day as it comes. One day, then the next. It's watching too much Sofia the First, and taking two hours to grocery shop at Trader Joes. 

And giving up control and letting your daughter eat her way isle by isle, row by row.

That's the way you do it, right?!

It's rejoicing in today, that this day, is easier than the last. Tomorrow might be a beast and a bear to handle, but here, today, yes, this is better. It's waking up and admitting that yup, this day is hard, icky, nearly impossible, and calling mom and letting her help. Its having take-out for dinner the third night in a row. From the same to-go-resturant I might add.
The one with the Golden Arches, yes. Yes. That one.

It's the opposite of being perfect in my world right now. It's being present, on the good, bad and hair-raisingly horrible days. It's hugs, snuggles, and subtle reminders that "this too will pass" and growing in the midst and muck of it all.

The present, it's like those "twos"- it's terrific and terrible, and Im trying to not wish it away with all my might. I'm holding on, pressing in, and giving myself permission- a high school-esque-hall-pass to stay. Stay for awhile I whisper to myself, stay in the grit and glory of it all.

Stay, Stay, Stay I shout out loud. It's not perfect. Its truly, the first-trimester-sickly-season, the furthest from. But, I am choosing to stay present. Yes, present, it's the best "present" that I could give literally give myself. It's a gift. This longed for pregnancy and much anticipated child. I'm settling in, offering myself grace, and unwrapping the love and joy in the midst of the grit and the glory of it all.

Bread & Wine {Part 2}

When I first started reading Bread & Wine, I had recently found out I was preggars. Hungry, happy, beyond words beaming with excitement and joy I read Shauna's words with a fresh outlook, after a season of growth and sadness. And just as quickly as I begun, I had to press pause. All of a sudden, I felt like I had been run over by a semi-truck. I could no longer think, much less read, think about eating or cooking, or basically anything other than surviving each day.
The first trimester and I went from fast friends, to arch enemies.

Finally able to pick up B&W as of late, I flew through the book, and as always with her words, I felt like I was home. A love letter to life around the table, our desire and need to be connected and in community, a book about hunger, shame, and squashing fear and living fully alive.

You merely need to read the first chapter to see that this book about cabernet and crusty baguette's isn't going to just satisfy you at meal time, but make you do some serious soul searching too.

In B&W Shauna talks about how food is our common ground- the currency we offer to one another, the thing we hold and handle when we enter into the lives of those we love. This book on entertaining in my home and the process of "redecorating my heart" made me want to swing wide my door in suburbia, dirty up my kitchen, and throw fabulous dinner parties. At the same time, it beckoned me to have more intimate conversation with friends, open those rusty areas of my life with others, be more vulnerable, honest, and authentic.

Basically, in the midst of a feeling physically, emotionally, and mentally not 100% myself,  B&W gave me the margin to snuggle into my fuzzy socks, and live vicariously through stories of a fellow life lover's travels, both in her home, her kitchen, her life, and most of all, my most treasured place to be allowed to see into, her heart.

Tales of victory, and defeat, and learning to throw off fear, and untangle doubt.
To live with a deep seated sense of "enough".

"Enough. I don't want to live like that anymore. And enough: I have enough....I want to cultivate a deep sense of gratitude, of groundedness, of enough, even when I am lounging for something more. The longing and the gratitude, both. I'm practing believing that God knows more than I know, that he sees what I can't, that's he's weaving a future that I can't even imagine from where I am sitting. Extraordinary indeed. More than enough."
Bread & Wine 
-Enough-

Memorable moments spent in the kitchen, new recipes that are dying to be whipped up, and a cooking club that I am aching to start. B&W urges you to start where you are. In every area of your life, not just in the kitchen. Shauna feels like a close friend. One who just "gets you". Over and over again I would underline her words, circle them, and write in the margin, "YES. THIS". As if she read my mind. I long for books like this. The ones I will read, re-read, and give away a thousand times over because in my heart of hearts, I want all my friends, family, and lets be honest, humanity to feel more secure, present, free, engaged, excited, loved, cherished, and adored. That's how I felt reading B&W.
That's how I want you to feel too.

I am giving away one copy of B&W.
Let's start where we are. Whatever area of life that might be.
Bread & Wine is a gift. To your heart, your kitchen, to your relationships, and yourself.

"How valuable it is to live the life in front of you, regardless of how tempting it is to press your face on the glass of other people's lives online, even though doing that is so much safer and so entirely addictive...We fragment our minds for a reason, of course-because we like the idea of being in sixty-seven other places instead of the one lame, lonely place we find ourselves on some days...I practice since that trip, being entirely where I am, glamorous or not, and what I find us that it's better to be in one place, wholly and full-hearted than a thousand splintery half places, glamorous as they may be".
Bread & Wine 
-Swimming in Silence-

To enter this giveaway, simply make a comment below, and share your favorite wine {nothing fancy necessary, my favorite bottle of italian white wine is $3.99!} or your favorite memory around the table this past month!

xoxo
OCGoodmama

*You have a week to enter! The giveaway will close next Wednesday night {May 1st at midnight}.
PPS- If your looking for a Mother's Day Gift for the Mama's in your life, This.IS.IT!

Bittersweet {Part 1}

In January, on the evening we miscarried, long after Samantha and Jordan had fallen asleep, I was still up. Mind racing, heart beating, tears still falling, I was unable to succumb to sweet dreams. 

Life felt raw and anything but sweet. 

I did what many of us do at our worst, I called on my trusty-friend google to guide me to good reads and comforting stories. Why do we use google as our doctor, counselor, and middle of the night friend? Is this just me?

Eek!

Sometimes I find myself diagnosing Samantha with a foreign disease or worrying about countless possibilities for for a rash on her leg.
Googling things is not always the best solution.  

This late night, I was actually comforted by where all my searching led. 

I was looking for resources, more accurately stories of woman of faith who had suffered from miscarriages. After a couple lame and not so comforting reads, I found an link to an article that Shauna Niequist wrote.

"On most days, for me, it's all right. We'll have another baby someday. I hope we do. But for today, for a minute, it's not all right. I understand that God is sovereign, that bodies are fragile and fallible. I understand that grief mellows over time, and that guarantees aren't part of human life, as much as we'd like them to be. But on this day, looking out at the harsh white sky of a Chicago winter, I'm crying just a little for what might have been …. No one might ever notice January 31, and what it means for me. But I'll always know."

As I read these words, I knew that I was not alone. That grief was going to be part of this season, that a day would always linger on the calendar for what could have been, and that my heart, this heart, would always beat for that baby that could have been.

The above was an excerpt from her book Bittersweet. I had heard about her books before. I remember friends recommending them to me, and it all came flooding back to me that late night in the beginning of January. You know how sometimes things just come at exactly the right timing? Yes, this was one of them. In a frenzy, I ordered both her books, Cold Tangerines and Bittersweet in that middle of the night misery. 

I downloaded the begining of the book on my iphone- and stayed up late into the night reading as much as I could get my hands on. 

I love these words in the prologue,
"Bittersweet is the idea that in all things there is both something broken and something beautiful, that there is a sliver of lightness on even the darkest of nights, a shadow of hope in every heartbreak, and that rejoicing is no less rich when it contains a splinter of sadness".

Yes. This. Is all I kept thinking.
There is hope, right now, in the middle of this gut-wrenchingly hard moment.
Always, there is hope and reasons to rejoice.   

Bittersweet carried me through January. Shauna's words gently guided me through that miscarriage with reminders that I was not alone, and that life was always going to be a mixture of bitter and sweet.

This week, Shauna released her third book, Bread & Wine. I just finished an advance copy of the book, and when I sat down to write this post, I was going to share with you all my favorite parts of her new release. Its amazing. Like, stop what your doing, and plan a dinner party tonight incredible. But, when I started writing away, I realized for me, without introducing how Bittersweet carried me through such a season, there would be no way to lead you into her story of  "life around the table".
That the beginning of my 2013 will always be marked as Bittersweet, and this book that gently, gracefully guided me to peace and more faith in God's plan.

So, next week, I will tell you all about why you must get your hands on Bread & Wine {ASAP!} and today, maybe, if you find yourself in a season of bitter, you will start Bittersweet too.
It made Bread & Wine that much sweeter for me.

Also, I am so excited about the deliciousness that is Bread & Wine, I will be giving away a copy next week here on the blog.
Its all about finding community and life around the table.
And that to me, is Why We Gather.

xoxoxo
Goodmama 

Our Shocking And Sweet Surprise

This Spring...Our Hearts Run Over!

Its been a little quiet around these parts.
Way, way, way to quiet I know.
I hate the quiet.
I have missed this space. This place, this harbor for my heart.
But, there is one gigantic reason for the silence.
Let's just say its been a surprising, rather shocking past eight weeks.

You see, shortly after we celebrated Valentine's Day, like 12 hours to be exact, I woke up and found out that we were pregnant. 

Again. 

Exactly a month after the miscarriage. 

People say it happens all the time, people even told me the high-probablity that it could happen to me too. 

I just didn't think it would happen to us. 

I wasn't in a million years planning on it happening to us. 

We were on this grand adventure, and I had surrendered to the script that God was writing, and it didn't involve pregnancy in the foreseeable future.
Or, so I thought. 

And to be honest, after all the sharing, searching, and surrendering I did during the month of January, the last thing I expected to happen was to wind up pregnant a month later. 

I mean, this happens to other people, but not to me, and not to us.
Or, so I thought. 

Such a shock. A Sweet Surprise. 
My shaking-hands grabbing that test out of the cabinet, the 5 a.m. YES!, the running upstairs in the dark, the waking Jordan up quickly, quickly, quickly as I started shouting.
And then, the look of disbelief in his eyes, the overwhelming emotion of intense gratitude we both shared, and the grabbing of each others hands and saying grace.
Yes, Lord, this is You, only you could pull this off. 
Thinking about this moment in time, this window of grace, this gift of life after loss will always leave me breathless.
I mean, this was amazing, incredible, unbelievable.
Pregnant. 

You see, just as I was giving over all sorts of surrender, and un-clinching my fists trying so desperately to control my life, I believe God was behind the scenes waiting to knock-my-socks-off.
I know He could have chosen to answer months or years down the road, but He answered in my life, in our families specific story in this timing, His timing.
One month. 

I kept coming back to this in my initial conversations with Jordan.
Why do you think it was so quick?
What do you think God is trying to show us?
Why did we wait so long, and then miscarry, just to turn around, and carry so quickly?
What, Where, When, How, Why.....
I was back here again. 

And the more Jordan and I began talking about it in the days following this incredible news, the more I kept coming to the conclusion of this: God loves this kind of stuff.
He is actually in the business of it.
His line of work specializes in shocking, scandalous surprises.
And you know what they do in our lives?
The show us His Glory, His Grace, and His Goodness. 
They remind us that it isn't about us.

He longs to surprise us by His Timing and Overwhelm us with His Power.
Because, with Him, all things are Possible.
And, to Him, Be All The Glory.


Even the winter won't last forever
We'll see the morning, we'll feel the sun
We'll wake up in April, ready and able
Sowing the seeds in the soil
of our love
What if the spring comes soon
and we're surprised?
What if the seasons help us realize,
some things are only proven over time?
You know
Even the darkness cannot disarm us
We'll break up the earth, because we know
that it's worth it
Sowing the seeds in the soil of our love.
-Even the Winter-
Audrey Assad 

Baby Goodman #2
Our Shocking & Sweet Surprise
Due on {or around} :)
October 22, 2013

xoxo
Goodmama