hello.hello.hola.

Dear Gabrielle,

do you remember that conversation we had in my kitchen, right before you left?  The one about being kind to our children?

I have that conversation tucked away into my pocket.

Sometimes it's so tucked away that it remains there, forgotten.

Sometimes I put my hand into my pocket and my fingers wrap around it, and I am prompted to set down my dishrag and go into the other room where my boy is screaming at me to come check out his new, amazing block tower . . . *

Sometimes I pull it out of my pocket and turn it around and around in my hand - examining it from every angle. . .  I think about how being a fun mama (or a sporty mama, or a healthy mama, or a creative mama) is ok, but what I really want is to be a kind mama; I think about how being kind isn't just the absence of rudeness or harshness, but instead the presence of something actively good. I think about how my ability to show kindness to my kids is limited if I'm not enjoying Jesus - the Creator of love.  I think about how kindness, planted into the hearts of my family, will produce life and beauty.

And then I put it back into my pocket again.
I'll keep pulling it out; I think this will do me some good.

This week, Gabrielle and I agreed to somehow include the color green into our shared blogging series. In her blog post, she found a way to seamlessly transition from cod liver oil to the green pastures of Psalm 23.  She's good, I tell you . . .  
I posted green pictures. (that counts, right?)

 *also, not to brag or anything, but this week, when Malachai came into my room at 3am, doubled over with the pain of a tummy ache, I snuggled up with him on the couch and rubbed his back instead of calmly telling him that I couldn't do anything to make his tummy ache go away and that really, he should leave me alone so that at least one of us could get a good night's rest (which I may or may not have done the last time he interrupted my sleep with a tummy ache).