Leanne Shawler, Artist

A couple of days ago I posted about Mother's Day being a non-mother by choice. I shared the link on Facebook saying that the second title would be the one that's now the title of this post. A riff off the Christmas video from New Zealand.* I didn't expect that I would actually use it for a follow-up post. (Er, brilliant.) I wrote in that previous post that my church is pretty inclusive - we refer to mother figures on Mother's Day. Due to that tradition as well as being chair of the worship committee, I was part of the planning for today. I arrived early to help out and do some last minute logistics. As occasionally happens, plans had changed. Brilliant! I wasn't expecting that.  Well, it wasn't exactly a surprise as the committee had just finished talking about planning ahead and yet allowing the Holy Spirit to move with last minute inspiration. Chris preached  (link to mp3) on how God makes covenants with households from Abraham through to enti...

What to Expect When You're Not Expecting (and Never Will) awkward silence after they ask "how many kids do you have?" (Or other questions where children are assumed to exist in your household) swallowed tears after they ask "so when are you two having kids?" or swallowed anger or a sharp retort bursting out of your lips at the same question the rush of mooshiness (you know that's a word) on seeing a newborn and being glad that the emotion is no longer *really* bittersweet your pets will become as adored as if they were your flesh and blood children being able to travel whenever you want - at least until the pets come along... that one Sunday in the year that is super awkward because you chose to be childless. Yeah, you heard it right. Chose.   I did try to get pregnant for a while, but when it got down to fertility drugs and the concept of triplets, well that's when I bailed. The concept of being responsible for one child terrified m...

Today, my heart full with feeling for those caught up in yesterday's bombings in Boston, and after a session with my spiritual director, I walked down to the cliffs to see the ocean. Mainly, to take a breath (and I love the sea air and the brisk breeze promised that) and pause for a brief moment before continuing my day. As I walked, I saw a small group of pelicans fly north, over the houses, it looked like, instead of over the water. I had missed seeing them on my previous visits so once I got to the cliffs, I looked up and down the coast for more. There were more. It was the perfect gift and I quite greedily enjoyed it. I snapped a few photos but then instead of trying to get more pictures, I drank in the moment. OK, I have to be honest here. I was uploading one of the photos below using my 1000 Gifts app and had to wait for it to finish sending it to Twitter and Facebook before I could take any more photos. BUT. Then, I stopped of my own accord... I stood there, w...

Clearly, I needed to have gone into this with a plan, not thinking halfway through the Palm Sunday service that this would be a good idea. Because, you know, I could've actually put some thought into this, but noooo.... I took an old Holy Week bulletin from a previous year, glued some cream cardstock, front and back to make the covers, and covered the spine in black bookcloth tape. Then I had to let it dry some, before decorating the cover. (cross image from Ann Voskamp's Easter devotional) I glued the pages to each other inside, which made for a 6 page booklet to cover 8 days (I decided to include Easter). That had to dry. So I went off to research what actually happened between Palm Sunday and Maundy Thursday. For Palm Sunday, I sponged acrylic sponged over the text, added pictures from the internet and doodled some background stuff. For each day, I'm adding the gifts for that day on a "Smash" card, or similar. For Palm Sunday, I wrote down some favo...

Since the events in Newtown, CT, last year, I have been praying for an end to gun violence. This post is a little bit about that, but mostly not. (Just in case you're sick to death of the topic. I promise also to spare you the infographics, statistics, etc.) Yesterday, I read a story about the first American killed this year by a gun. He was about to graduate college when he died--and so the promise of his future years are now lost to us. I found it via Facebook and read a handful of comments that were hate-filled and fear-filled -- from both sides. From both sides. The article and the comments made me realize that the insane rate of gun-related deaths would not be fixed by legislation alone (although I believe still necessary) or by fixing the mental health system, but the problem stemmed from the inability of seeing anyone other than oneself as a human being. Oneself? I remembered a conversation from last night. My husband shared that some people thought t...