Uncategorized – Page 28 – everything He gives

fifteen years

February 12, 2017 MarthaKimball1 Comment

I originally wrote this post last year, and many of you have heard my story of rescue. But for those who are new to my blog, or those who haven’t heard it before, this day is always a special day of memorial for me, and I wanted to share it with you.

everything He gives

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Fifteen years of undeserved life + breath. Fifteen years, a gift. We all know that each day we are alive is truly a gift, each new morning another day He has chosen to give us. But I remember laying in the freezing dark cold of that snow, wet and shivering, being fully aware that this might be my last day. We talked about it, my sister and I, as we clung to each other and to any semblance of warmth in that makeshift snowcave. We knew God would be good even if He chose to end our lives in this way, on this mountain, at the ages of 16 and 20 years old. He could have, but He didn’t. In the swirl of emotions following our rescue, the way it felt to see a helicopter with men smiling and waving over us, the way it felt to be helped onto that…

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yarn along

February 8, 2017 MarthaKimball4 Comments

Still knitting on my Lila sweater, about half way through the first sleeve. This yarn and pattern are pure comfort.

Still reading The Broken Way. I just read the part last night where Voskamp talks about Lark at Elizabeth’s funeral, so it was neat to hear that little mention of Ginny and her family.

Joining with Ginny today and her weekly yarn along where we share our current reads and knits, and also with Nicole of Frontier Dreams.
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yarn along

February 1, 2017 MarthaKimball3 Comments

I cast on for the Kingsley hat a few days ago and finished it up last night. I still need to block it and can’t wait to wear it. It fits perfectly and it’s the first hat I’ve knitted for myself. I really enjoyed the pattern and will definitely be knitting it again. I originally wanted to make the slouchy version of the hat but was using stashed yarn and ran out, but I still really like the way the fitted version fits. It’s still roomy enough for me, and I may add a pom pom as well. I’m still knitting on my Lila sweater and just about done with the body.

Still reading The Broken Way. Struck and sitting with the concept this week (from my reading) that God believes in me. It sounds cheesy to say, I realize. But it is gripping.

Joining with Ginny’s weekly yarn along today.
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all things new

January 31, 2017January 31, 2017 MarthaKimball7 Comments

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January slips by quiet. The world is all in a rage, my head spins with it all. My own little world hidden in these four walls spins, too. We begin packing. We are moving from this rental because our landlord plans to sell it to a friend next month. We plod along with schooling, with work on Phoebe’s health. It seems most days I can barely keep up with the demands. The kids and I have been sick for the last couple of weeks with a bad respiratory virus. We’ve been inside and home more than usual, letting them rest and heal. On the sunnier and warmer days, we’ve been out, walking our usual routes in the neighborhood. I’m saying goodbye in my own slow way, imprinting things in my memory, detaching, shifting. I’m thankful for some time left to do that.

For many years, since college really, I’ve leaned in close and quiet at the beginning and end of each year. Many people make goals and dream dreams, and I’m all for that, and often have a few quiet goals of my own. But the passing of each year heightens my awareness that time is slipping by, speeding onward. My life is being spent faster than I realize. What interests me most in the reflection on that is what the Lord is doing in these days. In the last weeks of December, I’m prayerfully asking Him to direct my steps in the coming year, specifically in the Scriptures. I seek a word form Him, usually a theme for the coming year, something He is going to teach me from scripture, something He wants me to attend to. Last year He led me to Psalm 93. He seemed to say that the coming year (2016) was going to feel a bit like being in a tumult of rising waters, but He reminded me that He sits enthroned above the waters. He is sovereign and mighty to save. That scripture ministered to me over and over again in the year as we faced one of the hardest years of our married lives. I think it’s what kept my head above water. I felt a bit of trepidation asking Him again this past December what He would say to me about 2017. The week of Christmas we received some of the worst and scariest news yet about Phoebe’s recovery/health and also flooded with medical bills we have no way to pay. At the same time, our landlord called to inform us we had two months to find a new place to live. I have cried a lot of tears. I have been brought low, back to the painful and sweet place where I remember that my God is sufficient, He is all I need, He is my strong refuge, my reward, my shield, the lifter of my head. It’s that place where whatever my heart is set upon gets sifted and my soul remembers its true end. I am made for God and nothing else will satisfy. Not even a secure home to live in. Not even the basic finances we need, or the health of my child. He is able to provide these things, and I am confident He will take care of us. But my heart cannot be set on my changing circumstances. They are fickle and uncertain.

In the tumult of these emotions and the quiet place of just being laid bare before the Lord, He spoke to me Revelation 21:5: “Behold, I am making all things new.” He kept speaking it to me everywhere I would turn, though my heart resisted it. Resisted hope. Hope is painful! It’s easier to brace for disappointment. It’s part of why it’s been hard for me to write about it on the blog–there’s a part of me still afraid to hope. What does He mean that He is making all things new? Will we see our girl finally turn a corner this year and truly and fully recover? Will we find a home that we love, a place to raise our little brood, a place to set down roots and live out the kingdom? Will we find some rest this year from the onslaught of difficulty? I can’t say. Maybe we will be made new, even as our difficulties continue.

We walk quiet through the familiar trails, children happy to be in the sun and fresh air. Everything seems colorless, bleak, brown. Winter. I breathe deep. It’s bleak and barren now, but spring is barely a whisper on the wind. It will burst into color soon enough. One way or another, all this death, destined for a resurrection.

yarn along

January 25, 2017January 25, 2017 MarthaKimball3 Comments

I set aside my Lila for a week or two because I thought I had knitted an extra 3 inches past the first side shaping. I was nervous to rip it back and also just frustrated. So I cast on a hat for Noah with the last skein of the Shelter yarn from his sweater. (He had asked for a green hat and sweater.) It was my first time doing cables and it was fun! I finished that up in a couple of days and then picked back up the Lila and with fresh eyes realized that I had only added about 2.5 inches and I was planning on adding about 2 inches in length anyway. So I just knitted on. Why do our brains do this to us?! I’m so happy to be back knitting it because it is the most relaxing knit. I’m needing something mindless lately, as life has been so full and overwhelming. Everyone here (except for Brandon) has been sick with a respiratory virus, and Philippa developed an ear infection to boot. I am prepping to begin packing up the house for our move. Etc., etc.

I’m still reading The Broken Way, and probably will be for awhile. It is so timely. I’ve been reading Watchman Nee’s old classic The Normal Christian Life as part of my morning study time for the last number of weeks (highly recommend), and it’s amazing how much it reverberates the same message about a cross-shaped life. The two books seem to be talking back and forth to one another. Isn’t that just how God works?

Joining with Ginny.
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looking back

January 19, 2017 MarthaKimballLeave a comment

I feel sort of silly posting about Christmas, but a blogger friend reminded me recently that we blog in part to keep a little family scrapbook. I sort of hate how quickly everything moves, everyone always looking ahead to the next thing. We can’t help it. In some ways it is our nature, our way of hurrying on ahead of the unpleasantness of the moment we’re currently in. Casting our eyes onto the hazy future that looks so much more appealing than this dreary now. Anyway.

So here are some snaps from our Christmas of 2016. A sweet little Christmas it was. Being that we have two kids’ birthdays that week, we try to keep things really slow and minimal in terms of festivities we are running around to. Brandon’s sister came to stay with us for Christmas weekend, which was a real treat for us and the kids! She surprised us with an awesome family gift of a telescope. We are really excited to play around with it more, especially as we talk about constellations soon in our homeschool co-op. We decided not to do any gift opening on Christmas Eve. We had a quiet evening together instead, and did a little singing by the candlelight. Christmas morning the kids slept in until maybe 8 am I think, until we finally went and woke them up. We hadn’t put any gifts out around the tree until after they were in bed on Christmas Eve so that little hands wouldn’t be messing with presents, and we hoped it would be a delight to them to see how full the tree was with presents. Brandon and I tried to buy each child only one main Christmas gift and then fill their stockings with little fun and practical things. They were completely showered by grandparents and aunties and uncles. Our parents absolutely spoiled Brandon and I, too. I know gift-giving gets a bad rap in our day and age, and in some ways we wrestle with that as well. How quickly our hearts make Christmas about someone giving us something! Or about getting that “perfect gift” for our kids. There may be some years ahead where we choose not to exchange gifts. For now, it is really the only time of year that we wrap up gifts for one another and it is such a joy to give to do so.

I was surprised this year with how well Christmas morning went. We had a Christmas a couple of years ago where everyone single one of us cried that morning at some point and it took us awhile to recover the day. We were bracing ourselves for lots of squabbling and grumpiness and dissatisfaction, but our children really enjoyed themselves and watching each other open gifts.

When the kids woke up we let them open stockings. Daddy read them the Christmas story from the bible. Then we had breakfast, a yummy gluten-free coffee cake with eggs and bacon.

We filled their stockings with some gluten-free chocolates and candies, new wooden brushes for the girls (because they are always stealing mine), a wooden snake for noah, new water bottles, a knitting fork for phoebe, a small set of blocks for philippa, a lacing toy each for phoebe and noah, and bonnets for the girls. Phoebe has loved hers, Philippa still won’t let me try hers on. She’s not a big fan of hats or hair ties. But I plan to use them a ton in the summer as they offer such great coverage!

After breakfast we began opening gifts. They received so many fun things from family members: new dresses and tights for the girls, a new sweater for noah, a toy plane and matchbox car semi truck for noah, lots of crafty things like a beginning knitters kit for phoebe and beeswax modeling sheets (since we can’t have play dough in the house). A toy drum and tea set for philippa. Some new books. Our gift to Phoebe was an indian dress-up costume and a nice bow and arrow set. She has been obsessed with playing “indians” (I’m sure that is not PC to say anymore) since reading Island of the Blue Dolphins and the Indian Captive earlier in the year. We gave Noah a big truck that carries a yellow excavator on the back. It was Brandon’s idea, I thought it was a bit redundant but he informed me that a boy can never have too many trucks. We gave Philippa a wooden dollhouse.

Brandon really loved the hat I knitted for him, and I’m relieved that it fit and that he likes the color and fit of the hat, being I wasn’t able to try it on him. My parents gave us a gorgeous pottery dish set made by a friend of theirs. Eight new plates, mugs, and bowls! It got me really excited about moving and hopefully buying our first home soon. I’ve packed them away for now, to wait until that day when we can open them in our new home.

As the Lord would have it, I was reading to the kids in our bible study time this morning from Luke chapter 2. We were reflecting back on the prophecy in Micah about a savior being born in the city of Bethlehem. Caesar Augustus ordered a census, which caused Mary and Joseph to have to make the long trek to the city of their family’s heritage. Bethlehem. Virgin Mary, pregnant with the Son of God. Making it to the city of Bethlehem just in time for that baby boy to be born. Because of the order of the Roman governor. According to the timeframe and perfect foreknowledge of our God. In the fulness of time, at just the right time (Gal. 4:4) the Savior was born. God’s time and way works within and through the circumstances of human history. It bends and obeys Him, unbeknownst to it.

So even know, with January well under way and my mind full with what is ahead in the year 2017, Christmas still teaches. In the fulness of time, at just the right time–God will work for you and for I in the very human circumstances of our lives.

yarn along

January 18, 2017 MarthaKimball2 Comments

It’s been a week of knitting consternation. This Lila sweater that I’m knitting for myself is so blissful to work on, I got a bit carried away and knitted three inches past where I was supposed to to begin side shaping. I’m nervous to rip back for fear I’ll cause more problems, but I can’t keep knitting on it and the whole thing is so frustrating that I’ve just set it aside for other projects. I cast on for a pair of simple house slippers for phoebe with some leftover yarn and ran out of yarn on the toe of the second slipper. She didn’t mind me using a different color for the toe, and I didn’t feel like ripping it out. I cast on for a bulky cowl for myself with some Rowan Biggy Print that someone gave me and about half way through decided I didn’t like the way the yarn and pattern were looking together. Grr. Rip rip rip.

I’ve been saving Ann Voskamp’s new release, The Broken Way, for the new year, and I’ve relished diving into it this week. Her words are resonating deeply, as they usually do, with where I find myself this January.

Bento bag pictured is from StacyZink on Etsy and I love it!

Joining with Ginny.
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every impulse to pray

January 12, 2017January 12, 2017 MarthaKimball2 Comments

“Always respond to every impulse to pray…Where does it come from? It is the work of the Holy Spirit (Phil. 2:12-13). This often leads to some of the most remarkable experiences in the life of the minister. So never resist, never postpone it, never push it aside because you are busy. Give yourself to it, yield to it; and you will find not only that you have not been wasting time with respect to the matter with which you are dealing but that actually it has helped you greatly in that respect…Such a call to prayer must never be regarded as a distraction; always respond to it immediately and thank God if it happens to you frequently.”

Martin Lloyd-Jones

I just wanted to write a quick post to thank so many of you for praying for our Phoebe girl, and asking you to continue. I read this quote last week in Missional Motherhood and have thought about it so often since. So many of you have contacted me and told me you are praying, and friends, it is helping! Phoebe has eaten some things this week that she hasn’t been willing to try since infancy (scrambled eggs! chicken!). But we need your prayers to continue, for her, for our family. So many pressing needs. It is with humility that I ask for your help by way of prayer, knowing so many of you are facing your own insurmountable challenges and heart aches! Sending much love and thanks to each of you. ❤

back in the swing of things

January 11, 2017January 11, 2017 MarthaKimball4 Comments

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It’s quiet enough in the house to hear the faint trickling of water in the gutters, snow melting from our rooftop after days of blanketing the ground. We don’t normally keep snow for a few consecutive days in these North Carolina mountains, but the temps have been low enough, giving us days of sledding and soggy peeled off boots and layers piled by the door. I haven’t posted yet about Christmas. I haven’t posted my new year reflections and hopes. I haven’t been reading much this week. I had a migraine that’s lasted for about four days. It seems to be on its way out today, just barely there. Phoebe has been on an extremely restricted diet as of Sunday, and my days and mental capacity have been filled with getting back into the swing of homeschooling and feeding her. I’m spending hours in the kitchen every day just trying to keep up and come up with ways to get her to eat. It’s going better than I expected, but it’s a lot of work, so not much margin left for other things. I miss this space and blogging and hope to catch up on those posts soon. Do any of you still care to even see Christmas pictures? 🙂

I have, however, been knitting because I crave knitting for my sanity! It is so peaceful, so unwinding. During the snowstorm I cast on a few new items. What is it about falling snow that makes one want to cast on and knit everything?? I’m trying to force myself to finish Noah’s sweater and stay focused. All it needs now is the buttonhole placket which I hope to finish tonight, then sewing on buttons. I have so so loved knitting with Shelter and have so loved this pattern that it is a little bittersweet to be on the last few rows of it. I plan to knit him a hat with the one leftover skein, as he requested. I can’t wait to wrap it up and let him open it. I really want to knit mitts and slippers for each of the kids, too. And cowls! And hats! Before winter is over! 🙂

Linking up with Ginny’s yarn along today to share what I’m currently knitting + reading.

yarn along

January 4, 2017 MarthaKimball2 Comments

I cast on for the Lila sweater (for myself!) last week and got about 2.5 inches into knitting before I realized there was a twist in the knitting. Grr. So I ripped back and now am back to where I was. I’m loving knitting with Shepherd’s wool! Still need to do the button placket on Noah’s sweater now that it’s finished blocking.

I have stopped pretty much all previous books I was reading to invest that time in reading up on some things for Phoebe’s health. I’m revisiting Breaking the Vicious Cycle to refamiliarize myself with the SCD diet. We have hit a pretty major roadblock as I shared a couple of posts back, and I am busy researching when I have a few moments here and there.

Linking up with Ginny’s weekly yarn along where we share what we’re currently reading and knitting.
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