When God gives you presents...

A few years ago I got the idea to ask God for birthday and Christmas presents. The idea was to get something that you just knew was from God. Once it was a dove outside my window singing the morning of my birthday. Another time I won a raffle to get the extended version of Lord of the Rings 1 (and I never win raffles). And of course one Christmas I got an engagement ring.

This year I got something special that wasn't even for my birthday or Christmas - yellow.

Yes, yellow. Alright, here comes the explanation:

When we were preparing for a baby room I cleared out our guestrooms and sold the furniture. Well, that left these two empty rooms that just reminded me of how I felt-empty. So, I furiously decorated thinking that getting those guest rooms back together would help me get back together and it did kind of help. The room that would have been the baby room is now blue, yellow and gray. For the past few months I just have been grabbing yellow things when I find them at resale shops and the room is coming together very nicely.

Sometimes you hear a song and it just reminds you of someone - maybe even for no apparent reason it just does. When the song "Yellow" came out by Coldplay I was in high school and it reminded me of Landon. I have no reason for that, it just did so when I heard it I thought of him. Weeks after the miscarriage I heard "Yellow" and for some reason it just reminded me of this baby that we lost. It almost blindsided me especially the line: "Your skin, oh yeah your skin and bones turn in to something beautiful and you know, you know I love you so, you know I love you so." Wow, so now my "Yellow" song is about this loss and this life.

A former student of ours went to Africa for 8 months. While he was in the field he found out we had a miscarriage and he was really sad for us. He told a member of our team and for some reason this other young man was very struck by it and he prayed for us and wrote us letters (he doesn't know us at all except through our student). He told me in his letter he saw a bright yellow sunflower called "Faith" and that God was growing it in my heart through this situation. Ironically I have a painting in my house that is a reflection of the garden of my heart and I paint new elements in it every time I learn something. I had just put pink gratitude flowers with lime green envy vines on. And I believe the yellow sunflower is the next thing to go on the canvas.

So, lately my eyes have been drawn to yellow and I love how happy it looks. This passed Friday my friend Kelly gave me a present. A yellow owl. Perfect! I wanted an owl piece because of my owl dream (to find out about that go back to the "Dreams" blog) and was hoping to spend some time in antique shops to find the perfect owl item and she got it! She really felt like it was the Holy Spirit and so did I. Also, this passed weekend was my original due date, Landon and I went to Austin to sort of remember this weekend in a new way and my friends and sister in law got me yellow flowers when we got back. And I managed to find an owl embroidery in Wimberly. The woman who owned the shop made it for her son about 40 years ago because he was afraid of the owl outside his window and so she made this to remind him not to fear.

So, yellow seems to be my reminder from God to have faith and to trust Him that He will turn mourning into dancing. My owls remind me to ask for wisdom and God will give it with generosity and all of these things remind me that God is very present in this time, He is very aware and He is near. So, thanks God for getting me presents, they mean a lot to me.