Love Grows in Little Houses

I've noticed an interesting trend during the past decade or two.  Houses keep getting bigger and bigger while families keep getting smaller and smaller. 

With the recent bubble and crash in the real estate market, I think more people are re-considering how much house they really need . . . a kind of less is more mentality. 

The size of our homes doesn't really matter.  What matters is the size of our hearts.  Years ago, my husband and I were absolutely thrilled with our first new home.  It was one of those manufactured dwellings built off site then shipped down the freeway to your building lot in two halves - pretty much a double wide trailer in size. 

This home felt like a castle to us.  Our previous place of residence was in a run-down hundred year old apartment with no bathtub and lots of mice.  I used to tape pictures above my kitchen sink and pretend I could see out because there were no windows.

When we finally moved into this home of our own, it felt like we were living like royalty.  Every morning I could look outside through windows and I was able to bathe my two babies in a real bathtub.  We had seven beautiful children fill our lives with joy in that house.  I'm sure we were living below the poverty level but we didn't feel poor.  Where there's love  . . . you always have enough. 

When we found out number eight was on the way, we didn't have any more floor space for another bed so we had to look for a larger house.  Then number nine and ten came along.  But I will always remember my first little house with great tenderness.  You see I know for myself that loves grows in little houses.  And where God sends his little lambs . . . green pastures follow.

             

Winter Wisdom

WINTER

After a particularly exasperating evening of repeated attempts

to get several of my jack-in-the-box children to go to sleep,

I tucked my son into bed

one more time with a sigh.

“What am I going to do with you?” I asked.

“Oh Moma, just hug me, and pretty soon I’ll grow up.”

And he did.

growing up and growing old

each year more dear and hard to hold

crystal bloom frosted with snow

we say goodbye before we say hello

submissive to the trust the seasons keep

watch and wait before we sleep

gentle earth beneath drifts of white

time of rebirth seeks the light

winter solstice

frost and ice

melting into pools of green

sunshine

resurrection

hope of spring

Cycle of living, season of song

embraces and whispers,

“Life goes on.”

Winter Fun at the Cabin

Sometimes I get mad at winter.  I get fed up with freezing cold weather, dangerous travel and snow to shovel. I think about moving to a warmer climate.  I grumble.  I wish I could hibernate like the bears and never leave my house until it's warm again. 

Then I hear my children say, "Let's go sleigh riding!" At first I'm not sure I want to go.  But I go along any way all the while worrying that I won't have any fun because I'll be SO cold.  And I hate being SO cold. 

Then it happens . . . I get myself bundled up and then . . . slowly . . . the child inside me comes back to life.  Lke the winter sun peeking through the clouded sky, I start laughing, shouting and throwing my hands up into the air.

Later I find myself whispering, "Thank you God.  Winter is so beautiful.  And by the way sleigh riding is so stinkin fun!" 

This blanket of white . . . this time of pausing . . . teaches me.  There is beauty and joy in every season . . . when we open our hearts and let it in.

Janene sleigh riding with gusto

Alisa making snow angels

John picking up speed

Alisa using the trusty foot stop maneuver

John's flying leap off the deck

Ross drinking icicles

John walking into the cabin in knee deep snow

My Daughter Alisa

                                                                       

When we say, "Oh, Yes!' God can fill our lives with joy.

My daughter Alisa is turning 11 years old this month.  I can not express in words the absolute joy she is to me.  Every day Alisa invites me to share in the miracle of life, the joy of creation and the wonder of simple things.  Sometimes when she is in bed at night I will tip-toe into her bedroom and watch her sleeping.  Every single day  I thank God for sending her to me.  The world tells us that we are rich when we have a lot of money.  But riches aren't found in money.  We are rich when we have children about us to love and cherish.  I love you Alisa.  You are an absolute joy to my soul.       

Alisa says, "Oh Yes!  Look at me Mom.  I'm so brave I can do anything."

Alisa says, "Oh yes!  I found a sand dollar and I'm rich."

Alisa says, "Oh yes!  If I jump high enough I might fly."

Alisa says, "Oh Yes!  There's so  many leaves I can jump in them."

Alisa says, "Oh yes.  It's starting to snow."

    When most women said, "Oh No!  Not  more children.  I'm am too old and tired to have any more children." . . . I said, "Oh Yes!   Dear God, I would love to have another child."

And so Alisa was born.

When we say, "Oh yes!"  God can fill our life with joy.

When Only A Hundred Hugs and a Kisses Will Do

My children have alwalys been my greatest teachers.  While we adults tend to hide our deepest desires for love and affection, children teach us to to be real - to talk about our fears and find solutions in a big kiss and hug  . . . and sometimes lots of kisses and hugs.

For example, when my son John started kindergarten I took him to his new school several times before the first day and let him try out the playground, meet his teacher and get familiar with the classroom. He knew where to hang his backpack and where to find the boy’s restroom. I followed John’s bus on the first day and went inside with him for a few moments to participate in a few fun activities the teacher had wisely planned. But when all the parents had to go, the look on John’s face was a maternal heartbreaker. When it came time for John to go to school the next day, he was so nervous he paced in circles around me on the kicthen floor while I made his lunch.

“What’s the matter, John?” I asked. “Worried about going to school today?”

“Yes,” he answered with his eyebrows lowered.

“What are you worried about John?” I asked.

John tried to hold back tears by rubbing his eyes with his fists before he blurted, “Mostly Mom – I’m just missing you.”

“Would it help if I kissed your hand? Then every time you starting missing me you could put your hand on your cheek and I’d be there kissing you?”

John thought for a long while, and then seriously replied, “No. That won’t work.”

So I tried again, “Remember when your sister Aubrey had to leave to go to school in Pennsylvania and she was a little scared and sad but she went anyway?” I asked. John nodded. “Remember when Aubrey said that when she gets lonely or sad, she thinks about something happy? What if I put a sucker in your backpack and every time you feel lonely or sad, you start thinking about that sucker?”

John thought for along while then seriously answered, “I don’t know. I’m not sure that will help, Mom.”

“What if I give you a hundred hugs and kisses before you go? Do you think that would work?” I asked again.

John didn’t have to think. He responded immediately, “Yes. That would definitely help, Mom.”

I found a sucker and tucked it away in a secret pocket of his backpack and then we started the hugging and kissing. John carefully counted until we reached a hundred.

The steps on a school bus are like scaling Mount Everest to a small five-year-old. Yet when the time came, John hesitantly braved the heights and found his seat on the bus without me. I waved and blew him kisses while he drove away.

Because John was my ninth child to start school, I knew how precious and fleeting childhood is. I also knew how much courage it takes to be a child, to welcome a child into your life and then let that child go.

I want to be like my children when I grow up. Children can teach us so much more than we can teach them. I believe we will find our way back to God if we allow children to be our guides.

There is Magic in Mushy Apples

A while back I gave my daughter-in-law a bag of just-picked apples from our orchard.  A month or so later she told me she forgot to put them in the refrigerator. 

"They got old and mushy so I had to throw them away." she said.

"Oh," I answered.  "Don't you know there is magic in old mushy apples.  "With a little work, sugar and cinnamon they turn into sweet applesause."

I'm getting older myself.  When I look in the mirror I wonder who that wrinkled woman is looking back at me.

Then I remember my wrinkled apples.  Perhaps the best we have to offer comes when it seems we are past our prime - only good for retirement  But there is still magic in this old heart.  There is a mellow sweetness that only comes with age. Even though I am wrinkled, I still have much to give - to nourish and delight.

Learning To See Each Other Through the Eyes of a Child

Adults have grown accustomed to ignoring each other. When we walk down a sidewalk and see a stranger coming the other way, most of us drop our eyes and say nothing as we pass. If we stand in an elevator with a fellow rider, most of us back into the farthest corner in steely silence avoiding touch, conversation and eye contact. At the check-out in the grocery store, most of us don’t even acknowledge or thank the cashier who is helping us, let alone smile. Babies and small children haven’t learned our cultural taboos or adult self-consciousness. Every week at church they make instant friends with the family sitting behind them by sharing their soggy treats, sticky books and toothless smiles. They wave at people in the grocery store and shout things like, “Hey, you want to see my new underwear?”


Once I was holding my young daughter’s hand while we passed an ill-kept homeless man on the street. He had long greasy hair, dirty clothes, and smelled of body odor, liquor and tobacco. I lowered my eyes and kept my distance, hoping he wouldn’t ask me for a handout. My young daughter, on the other hand, stopped and stood perfectly still, then stared reverently at this man in wide-eye awe.

“Look Mom! It’s Jesus!” she shouted excitedly.

The homeless man gently tilted his head in acknowledgement and smiled back at my little girl. Then he glanced up at me with a glimmer in his eyes. We were both humbled at the reverent way my daughter had seen him. When do we stop seeing the amazing beauty in the people around us? When do we stop being excited about our new underwear? When do we stop calling our friends on the telephone to ask if they can come out and play?

When we learn to see each other through the eyes of a child we will rediscover the infinite beauty and divine worth of each son or daughter of God.

Happy Birthday

My birthday is this week.  As a child I looked forward to presents and attention.  Now I feel the profound need  to thank God for the supernal gift of life. 

Everything I am and everything I do is a gift from my Father in Heaven who daily grants me the ability to see, speak, listen, move, work, love, share, create and pray.

So with the deepest gratitude I say:  Thank you.  Thank you.  Thank you.

Happy Birthday Caleb!

Caleb and the Prince

by

Janene Baadsgaard

alias Granny B.

(this is a special story written for my grandson Caleb on his 6th birthday)


Once there was a rich and powerful king who lay dying. In the quiet moments just before he took his last breath, he saw his life flash before him . . . and shuddered. He called for his son.

“Yes father?” the prince asked.

“Son, I am dying. It is too late for me,” the king said. “But it is not too late for you. Today I meet my Maker and I am terrified.”

“Terrified? Father you have never been afraid,” the prince answered.

“I’ve lived every day of my life in fear. My father left me his kingdom and I was terrified someone might try to take it from me. I could trust no one – not even your mother or brothers and sisters. I’ve forced the villagers to forge my swords, build my castles, amass my army and plunder my treasure so that I could remain king. But I was always painfully alone and afraid. I will not do to you what my father did to me. Denounce my kingdom. Choose a better one.”

“But I know no other way to live,” the prince answered.

“Then you must know this: From this day forward, evil men will desire all you have. You will spend the rest of your life fighting to preserve a kingdom that will ultimately fail you. You will loose your life fighting to save what I have left you. And I have left you only ashes. You will learn to trust no one, even your own wife and children. When you are about to die, you too will be afraid. You must know now that everything I leave you has been bought at the cost of other men’s lives. I took their labor. I took their gold. I took their fair sons. My subjects hate me and they will turn against you.”

“Why do you tell me all this now?” the prince asked. “What am I to do father?”

“Go into the village and find the aged mother of a bed-ridden son,” the king said. “She is my mother and her son, my brother, is the true king.  Long ago I made sure he would never reign.  Together they will teach you all you need to know.”

Then the king cried out in anguish, “Oh God, forgive me. Have mercy on my soul.”

At that moment, the king died and the prince was alone. He was not sad for he feared his father. His mother and brothers and sisters had all been beheaded by the king. He did not know he had a living grandmother and an uncle in the village.

Under the cloak of night the prince left the guarded castle and went to the village. He found the aged mother and her bed-ridden son in a small hut with a warm blazing fire.

When the prince’s grandmother saw him enter her home, she instantly recognized her grandson, smiled and embraced him. The prince had never been embraced and recoiled.

“Don’t be afraid,” his grandmother said. “You are safe here.” Then she invited him into the back room where his uncle rested in a fresh bed of straw. “This is your uncle. His name is Caleb. Though he can not see, hear, speak or move - he has many gifts.”

So the prince sat next to his uncle and waited. His father’s brother could not respond to the prince’s questions. Yet there was something about being in Caleb’s presence that made the prince feel at peace for the first time in his life.

“I have come to learn from you,” the prince said.

Caleb could not speak a word; yet as the prince reached out and touched the hand of his silent uncle, he felt a glimmer of tenderness fill his heart for the first time. Then as the moments turned into hours the prince felt his heart grow lighter and lighter and warmer and warmer.

Many weeks passed. Soon the prince’s grandmother asked him to help Caleb eat. Then she asked him to help his uncle sit up and stretch his muscles. Then she asked the prince to change his uncle’s soiled clothes and bedding. Soon the prince was providing all the care his uncle required.

One day the prince’s grandmother grew ill and could not raise her head from her bed. The prince was afraid. He went to his grandmother’s side in despair.

“Will you care for your uncle after I die?” the prince’s grandmother asked quietly.

“Yes,” the prince answered.

“Each time you willingly and joyfully take care of someone who can not take care of themselves you bring great light into this dark world. Each time you learn to love someone deeply an angel places one shining stone upon another in a higher kingdom you can not see. But you will go there some day. I go there now with great peace and anticipation. I will be there to greet you when you come home.”

“Aren’t you afraid?” the prince asked.

“No,” his grandmother answered. “Because of the love I have for Caleb I have felt the love of God. I know that God has prepared a grander kingdom for me with a blazing fire of warmth. There I will never be alone, afraid or sick again.”

Then as the prince embraced his grandmother, she took her last breath and relaxed into a smile with her eyes opened toward heaven. The prince wept until he could weep no more. Then he went to his uncle’s room and knelt by his side.

“Your mother is dead,” the prince said.

Next he picked up his uncle and brought him to his grandmother. The prince saw Caleb’s face soften into a radiant smile as he looked upon his mother. The prince held his uncle in his arms as they both went outside and looked up into the star-lit sky.

“She will be waiting for us when it is our turn,” the prince said as he stroked his uncle’s brow. Don’t be afraid. I’m here. I will never leave you. I will care for you. I love you Caleb.”

In the days that followed the prince opened his father’s treasure hoard and returned the riches to the villagers. He dispersed the army and sent the fair sons back to their mothers. He turned the dark castle into a loving home where he cared for Caleb and all the other sick or orphaned children in his valley.

When the people from the village were troubled, sick, or in despair they would come to the castle and sit with Caleb for a spell. Though no words were spoken, Caleb would fill their soul with light and hope. Then they could go back into the dark world with the warmth of his love burning brightly inside them.

Soon the prince married and had children of his own. He and his wife brought more and more children into their home and never turned any one away. No evil men desired the prince’s kingdom because they saw no gold or power to seize or destroy.

On the day Caleb was taking his last breath, the prince was at his side. When Caleb stopped breathing, the prince felt the room grow lighter and brighter until it appeared as the noon day sun. He saw a gleaming castle on a hill in the distance and his grandmother reaching out to her son. Caleb arose from his bed for the first time and ran into her arms.

“Someday I will be with you,” the prince said as the light slowly faded in the room. “Then we will all be home at last in each other’s love.”

I Have A New Book Coming Out in March!

I'm so happy to annouce that I have a new book coming out in March!



For Every Mother is a humorous and heart-warming book for all mothers at every age and stage of life.

Here's a peek at the front and back cover.

An Angel Among Us

Something happened that truly took my breath away this Christmas season.  Ever since my children were little we have acted out the Nativity story on Christmas Eve.  As our children have grown older, married and had children of their own we've always had a new baby to play the part of baby Jesus and our cast of characters is now filled with our children and grandchildren.  This year I pulled out two halos and sets of wings from our dress-up box and handed them to my son-in-law Dallan and my grandson Caleb.  Next I helped Mary, Joseph and all the shepards and wisemen to put on their robes.  Then I began reading the story from the Bible.  Joseph, Mary and baby Jesus entered on cue and soon the shephards made their appearance.  When it came time for the angels to say their part my son in law Dallan held Caleb high up in the air and spoke these words in a full deep rich male voice . . . "Fear not; for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people.  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord." 

The voice appeared to be coming from my grandson's mouth and we all caught our breath and looked up at him.  You see Caleb was born without a brain and has not been able to speak a word to us in the six years we have been blessed to have him with us.  Even though Caleb is not able to use his body like we can, we KNOW that the spirit inside his body is well and whole.  We KNOW that he is a beloved son of God . . . a true angel among us. 

"And suddenly there was with the angel a  multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." 

My Forest

When my husband and I moved into our present home twenty years ago, I told him I'd always dreamed of living by a forest.  We bought two acres along with this home but most of it was in pasture. 

We live in Utah where pine trees only grow in the mountains.  So if you want pine trees you have to plant them and carefully tend and water them because we don't get much rainfall.

My husband listened to my dream and found a way to make it come true.  One day he brought home a small box filled with what looked like small sticks.  He told me he was going to plant me a forest.  I didn't really believe those sticks were trees.  I thought he was teasing me.  But he carefully planted them and enlisted our children to help him keep them watered with buckets of water hand carried to each tree for a very long time. 

Now when I look out my kitchen window each day  - I see my forest . . . and I think about my husband taking care of those trees for twenty years just for me.  Every day I walk outside to my forest and breathe in the fresh pine scented air and think about how much my husband loves me.

Merry Christmas from the Baadsgaards

 HAPPY HOLIDAYS FROM THE BAADSGAARD FAMILY

 


Baadsgaard Christmas Nativity Program cast members

our angels . . . Caleb and April

Amy Graduates from BYU!!!!!

My daughter Amy just graduated from BYU with a degree in Special Education.  Though she will wait until April to walk at a graduation ceremony I want to congratulate her now.  Way to go Amy!!!

Amy is expecting her first child, a little girl, in March.  She is a fine harpist and a gentle, kind loving soul.  I am so blessed to have her for my daughter.

I love you Amy.

SNOW



My husband Ross trying to dig out so he can go to work.

Our back yard

Our patio table.

Our front yard pine tree

Alisa playing.

My daughter Alisa has been hoping and praying for snow on Christmas.  She got her wish.  School was cancelled today because we got SO MUCH SNOW! This is Utah where we know what to do with snow, where we never cancel school because of snow.  Alisa says grownups just don't know how to appreciate snow.  She's right.  Today I'm going to go outside without a shovel or broom and PLAY!