Five-and-a-half

We have a five year old in our house who is just dying to be five-and-a-half! He’s been asking wih eager anticipation now for months and we’ve basically had a count down until that day arrives… Because obviously five-and-a-half sounds so much bigger than just five!

I remember so many things about November 15^th, 2014. For just an ordinary day, I can recite what we did almost hour by hour.  But sometime that afternoon I pulled our oldest up onto my lap and I said with excitement, guess what tomorrow is?!? It’s YOUR half-birthday! That means you’ll be exactly five-and-a-half! She squealed with excitement.

We don’t necessarily celebrate our half-birthdays, but we do get excited about them…at least the kids’! Milestones are the best when you’re a kid. They make you feel old and extra special, and it seemed so old to think about my biggest baby being five and a half already!!!

Little did I know that that day would be marked by much more than just a half-birthday. It would come and go without me ever exclaiming with excitement, You’re five-and-a-half! It would be a half-birthday forever marked by the sting of death.

So as we ease up to Emmitt’s half-birthday, the same half-birthday that marked such tragedy for Madi, there’s a part of me that gasps a little with the thought of Emmitt reaching this milestone. Could my second possibly be this big already? Has time really just kept marching by?  Will February 24^th be another catastrophic landmark in my life or just another half-birthday in the books?

The thoughts are all over the board and the sentiment is high. Emmitt was so little when his brother died, just barely over three, but he’s always been the chattiest about Zekey. He often exclaims how he wants him back again and just this week he asked me with deep sincerity, “Mom would Zekey be playing Legos with me if he was still here?” The disappointment of that reality stung a little as I assured him he probably would be.

Yesterday my almost-five-and-a-half-year-old was taking pictures and videos of his baby brother on his watch when he exclaimed, “Mom, I should keep these ones, huh? Cause that way when Asher dies before I do, and I’m still alive, I’ll have pictures and videos to remember him with!” and I whispered, yeah baby, keep those pictures.

Five-and-a-half is here, and I’m excited to celebrate you, Emmitt Matthew!

Death - Oh Your Sting

Today marks two. Two. Whole. Years. Two years since the air hasn’t smelled the same. Two years since the leaves started crunching a little different. Two years since my heart was broken -- shattered, into tiny little pieces.  I’ll never forget that morning, or all the things I did that week leading up to that day-when all things came to a screeching halt.

Death.  It doesn’t just sting. It downright hurts. It comes and it takes and gives nothing in return. It robs us not just of what we had, but of what we thought we had.  All the future memories. Gone.  The birthdays we were going to celebrate, all the Halloweens we had left to dress up. Death takes it all, and replaces it with tears. Buckets and buckets of salty tears.  And two years ago today marks two years since death came and it stung hard.  It tore away the baby in my arms and it left me gasping for air. It burned. It gouged. It was more than a sting.

So today we just sat and reminisced. We reminisced the burn, because today, today it’s just a sting. We reminisced the memories, and we reminisced the memories that came instead. The ones I never planned--not the birthdays that didn’t happen--but the relationships that DID. The tears that have been spilt, and the conversations that have come. The friends that have stood --stood tall like oaks, and the family that has been faithful. The love that has been poured, poured all over us, because of the sting.  

And just like that we celebrate being closer, TWO YEARS CLOSER to eternity. Two years closer to having every tear wiped away. Every. Salty. Tear.  There’s a song I can’t sing without crying and it goes, “When we arrive at eternity’s shore, where death is just a memory and TEARS ARE NO LONGER. We’ll enter in as the wedding bells ring. You’re bride will come together and we’ll sing YOU’RE BEAUTIFUL.” And like clockwork the tears pour, because my tiny little soul can hardly imagine a day where death will be just a memory. It can hardly believe a day when the tears will never come. It can hardly believe a day when the STING will be GONE!

"'He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death, or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.' He who was seated on the throne said, 'I am making everything new!' Then he said, 'Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.'" 

Revelation 21:4-5

141...again

Today, I'm having my very first "guest blogger", and he doesn't even know it! :)

My dad sent this to me first thing this morning. It is beautiful and captures so much, so perfectly. I don't know how to encapsulate this day, besides to say I'm happy to see it come and go. Although there's a part of me that feels a twinge of jealousy and guilt to see my little Asher soar past this milestone, it is exactly what I want, all at the same time. Thank you, Jesus for 141 days...again. We love you and miss you, oh so much, Ezekiel James. We love you and celebrate you, oh so much, Asher David.

From my dad...

Asher at 141

Woke-up sometime after 5:00 AM as I did for so many months.

Asher is clueless today, to what this means, to what he reminds us of.

A celebration that this day has come, and that it is going.

Like the Angels in Heaven celebrating for the one lost soul that is redeemed but doesn’t know that a joyous party is going on. A day with a huge hole in our lives, now still a wound, but getting smaller.

Emmitt’s words when learning of a new baby brother: “This Baby is NOT going to die!”

The events of the day we lost Zekey are simply dreadful to recount. The 2:00 AM call. The anguished cries in that hospital room of our beautiful daughter and wonderful son-in-law. “He’s perfect!” She cried as the waves of grief crashed over them and into us.

And so he was, and is still, ever perfect in the arms of a Loving God. The same one who entrusted him to them and to all of us from the start.

But fear and grief want to say, to whisper, “It could happen again."

But it didn’t. Not this time. Not today. It could have. Yes, there is a risk in living that leaves us vulnerable to devastating injuries. The God-created antidote, the medicine, is turning to, not away from, the great healer, Jesus. He was for a time in Palestine a health-care machine, and is so today.

Thankfulness to our God, gratefulness is the Rx with love and time for this wound. Reach too far, stretch in the wrong way, and the wound re-opens. Grief is always waiting in ambush when least expected and least wanted. Sometimes we know it is coming, waiting for us and we are in anguish in anticipation of another smaller Tsunami of feelings. Christ is our Breakwater. Thankfulness is our response, because it turns us to Him and puts our loss, my loss, in His perspective, where it is appropriate.

This is it. Today is it. Gratefully we live through it. Saying again to the High King of Heaven, "Thank you for Ezekiel James Olson, and thank you for Asher David Olson.”

Thank you Emmitt, because you are right. This baby is not going to die. He’s not going to Heaven too. Not yet.

Asher will never know what he, and this day mean to all of us. He is at once a reminder of the sting and the ointment. 

So… smile today. Laugh for us to hear. Cry for your needs as you do so well. Remind us. Help us to say again, aloud, "Thank you Lord for 141 days! Twice."

A Christmas Letter From The Olsons

Dear Friends & Family,

            We hope you had a merry Christmas, friends! By the time you’re reading this letter, you’ve probably already started tucking the tinsel away for next year.  I usually have an epiphany moment every December when my thoughts finally feel clear enough to sit down and write. This year that day felt like it was never going to come, but alas the Christmas letter lives on…

            Matt’s still enjoying his job at Stayton Middle school where he does his best to keep kids outta trouble…or get kids in trouble, I suppose it depends on whose perspective we’re talking about. A few weeks ago Emmitt and Madi started to get into a fight and I overheard Emmitt tell his sister, “It’s okay. I’ll just tell dad when he gets home cause he’s REALLY good at getting kids in trouble. That’s his JOB!” I figure it might be time for me to go back to work, because prior to that comment I was pretty sure that was my job too and that I was pretty good at it, but alas Dad pulls the trump card.

            Madi’s had a super busy year losing teeth, and attempting to regrow them. We’ve had every situation imaginable from, mom, mom, Emmitt just kicked out my tooth! To a half-asleep child stumbling into our room and saying, Dad my tooth fell out and I can’t find it! The tally is up to NINE and our dentist has assured us that there’s nothing abnormal about our lifestyle, teeth just don’t last very long around here.  Cue the look of an orthodontist rubbing hands together with excitement…

Our sweet girl continues to be the BEST big sister. She’s usually found playing school at home and kindly but firmly giving orders to her brother. She still loves to dance and performed in her third Nutcracker this month. Her latest accomplishment of a straight-leg-and-pointy-toed-cartwheel can be seen just about anywhere, including the grocery store if you’re there on a good day.  Please don’t do a cartwheel in the middle of the store. Is just another one of those statements I can add to the list of things I never thought I’d hear myself saying. We’re so thankful for our big six-year-old and all the JOY that she brings to our lives.

Emmitt has grown so much in the last year! He still loves all things sports and since he is still too young to play any organized sports he’s chosen to use his knowledge by telling his sister EXACTLY how she’s supposed to do things. (She takes it like most first-borns do – she already knew that!) We spent lots of time in the water this summer and our four year old has added swimming to his list of accomplishments. However, he still likes to argue with me about how deep a body of water needs to be before he could drowned in it, to which I ALWAYS reply, ANYbody can drowned in ANY water. So please feel free to reiterate my statement whenever you see my son.

When this boy is not burning calories, or saying, mom, I’m hungry (which has been calculated at an average of 15x/day), he absolutely loves to talk about heaven. Last week he came running into the living room at my parents’ house with anger all over his face, Mom, Jude is LYING! He thinks we’re gonna live in heaven forever and that’s NOT true! We’re gonna live on the new earth again AFTER we go to heaven!  We assured the boys that in theory they were both right, heaven will just move TO the restored earth. They both seemed satisfied and went right back to playing. We’re trying to encourage more grace in his conversations, but obviously we have a ways to go…

Our latest addition to the family, Asher David, arrived on September 19^th and has brought lots of screaming (mostly on his part), but even more JOY to the family. He’s extra spicey and seems to like things to be done in a timely fashion. He’s also equally sweet and always needs to be right in the middle of whatever is happening. We love everything about him.  We chose his name because it means “happy” and “blessed” and the smiles he has brought have been irreplaceable.

I struggled with writing the Christmas letter this year because I hated the idea of not painting reality in the midst of highlighting our highpoints this year. The Christmas season came upon us in a hurry and my initial thought was to curl up in a ball and hide until it was all over.  For some reason it feels like pain is magnified when happy is all around me, no matter how hard I try to fight it.

Thankfully, the anticipation our children had for Christmas was Off. The. Charts. And as I stood back and watched their excitement unfold, my heart began to mirror their anticipation, not just for Christmas, but for the reality of what the first Christmas really brought…Christ coming again, not as a baby, but to take us home forever.

We sat around the breakfast table the day after Christmas and Emmitt said, Mom, Dad, is Christmas over? All those days leading up to the 25^th, the days where he asked seven or eight times how many days it was until Christmas. The days that he begged with all that was in him to open just one present. The days he could hardly fall asleep at night because he wanted it to be Christmas so bad. They were over and it was obvious he found himself somewhat dissatisfied.  We took that moment to explain to him how much our hearts long for the day of seeing Jesus face to face and how we will have absolutely NO disappointment on that day. None. I love these children, and I love how the Lord uses them to mirror our relationship with our Jesus.

We hope you found yourselves just a little bit restless at the end of this Christmas season. Not because your day wasn’t wonderful and filled with the love of family and friends celebrating Jesus’ birth, but because we really do have something even bigger to anticipate.  Merry (late) Christmas, Friends!

With Love,

The Olsons

A different kind of Fall...

Fall has always been my favorite. Always. I even have my kiddos trained to notice every tree that's turning colors. We ooh and ahh every Wednesday as we drive to ballet over our favorite street that is lined with the most gorgeous array of yellows, reds, oranges, and greens. The sunsets and the sunrises speak thousands of words in just one glimpse. There's no doubt of our faithful Heavenly Father's hands as He seems to speak the loudest through all of His creation during these days. I love it. 

Every year as summer wraps up, and the air outside begins to change scent, a mix of first rains, burn piles, and cold crisp dew, we get excited about the festivities of Fall. Talks of trips to the pumpkin patch and picking apples at the farm begin to bloom. Football games, hot cocoa and homemade caramel corn never sound so inviting.

This year, the beauty has been at an all time high. Or maybe my senses have just been tuned lately. The overwhelming sunrises seem to come at just the right time, taking our breath away before we've even gotten up for the day. The sun has been dropping right outside our kitchen window leaving an incredible evening sky, night after night. My memories drift to years past and all the trips to Beilke Farms that we've taken. I've picked apples there since before Madi turned one and every year we've come home with at least a bucket more than the previous year. Hours and hours are then poured into chopping, coring, and boiling apples until they've magically evolved into smooth warm sauce. Smells that bring me back to my own childhood and the excitement of helping my mom smash apples through a metal sieve.

But for the first time in over half a dozen years, we didn't take a trip to the apple farm. We didn't take a trip to the pumpkin patch. And although we went to a handful of football games, it wasn't the usual dozen.

Don't worry, we've started in on new traditions, like raking 5,000,000,000 leaves (number not exaggerated) into endless piles and bounding into them. And I suppose we'll work our way back up to our traditions of years past, but for now I'm reveling in memories. In memories that were made before these sunsets seemed to scream so loudly. In memories made when I thought I had control over this life. 

I'm thankful for my memories, and for these beautiful fall colors, and I don't find it ironic one bit that the Lord took our boy home during this most beautiful time of the year. Our last memories with him include doing some of our most favorite things, during the most gorgeous season, and that, that was planned.

So when I glance out the back window and catch a glimpse of purples, oranges, and a hundred other shades of gorgeous, I smile to think that sunrises must be even more gorgeous in heaven... and the most gorgeous when this earth has been transformed to perfection one day.

My Birthday Boy

I think it's a mom thing. Every child's birthday that comes around takes us down memory lane of the first day we ever laid eyes on our baby. I still do it with our oldest and we've celebrated six birthdays with her.  So this week wasn't any different.  I sat this afternoon and poured out to a friend every detail of Zekey's birth story... my nauseousness the night before--wondering if I was crazy or if I was REALLY going to have a baby a week before my due date; our dog running away and me hauling two small children around the neighborhood with a leash in hand, knocking on doors trying to hunt him down; my water breaking in the garage and my only concern being that my husband finish vacuuming out the car before we left for the hospital because I couldn't do it myself. I remember it all plain as day, and I'm hopeful I always will.  Because it's the little moments leading up to the big moments that encompassed what now feels like one of the shortest windows in my life...my sweet Ezekiel James.

The only difference about this birthday is that my walk down memory lane didn't end with me squeezing my baby and whispering in his ear to stop growing so fast before I laid him down to sleep. Instead of watching him toddle around, I spotted strangers' babies and tried guessing how old they were in my head.  I've dreaded this day for a long time. A long, long time.  I read in a grief book that milestones can be so hard, but to remember that they're only 24 hours and eventually the 24 hours will be over and it'll be a new day.  Unfortunately it felt like the seven days of 24 hours leading up to these 24 hours were actually the hardest.  My arms want him to be here.  My ears long for his voice and my heart, my heart will never be the same.

So last night as Matt and I laid in bed, we scrolled through every picture of Zekey boy that we have on our phones. We watched every video with his coos and cries and we cried. We cried and we cried and we cried, just like we did every night this week that led up to this one. And then, then I had this overwhelming feeling of peace. Peace. I knew in my heart that as badly as I want my boy back, my life has changed and having him back wouldn't be the exact same life, plus him. It would be different altogether. I wouldn't have these eyes. These eyes that see things differently. These eyes that ache for eternity, for the life we were truly created for. And that peace, that peace gave me this overwhelming feeling that I could still celebrate my boy today because he is still alive. He's more alive than I am and his short little life is still worth celebrating. He's changed me and he's changed lots and lots of other people and even though it was short, his life has served, not just served, but completed its purpose just as much as if he had 89 birthdays before he died.

I love you, Zekey boy. I would say, I love you more than you will ever know, like I always tell your brother and sister, but you're whole already, completely WHOLE, so maybe you actually do know how much I love you?!?! It's a LOT.

Sweet Conversations...

I awoke last week like I do most nights, with a kink in my neck and a sweaty little boy pressed as closely to me as possible. I climbed over him and out of bed, scooped him up and and began the trek back to his bedroom, but not before glancing at the clock that glowed 3:25. As I tucked Emmitt back into bed he turned his head toward me and whispered without ever opening his eyes, "Mama, I miss Zekiel."
"I know baby, so do I." I replied.
"But we're getting a new baby," he mumbled.
"Yes, but that doesn't mean we won't miss Zekiel. He'll always be our baby."
He nodded gently with his eyes still squeezed shut, "I just wuv him so much!"
"Me too, buddy. Me too."

Emmitt rolled to his left, pulled his blanket up by his cheek and the conversation ended as sweetly as it began. It had been exactly five months since I'd held my sweet baby, since I kissed him goodbye: I laid there squeezing him even tighter than before as the tears rolled down my cheeks. His innocence is so pure, so sweet.

The thought of his pain wrecks me. Sometimes, most of the time, I wish I could just bare it all for  my children and let them go on living life, without the pain, or the sadness. Without the hole of someone always missing. I convince myself that if it was just me it would be different, just me that felt the ache. But it's not, and it won't be. I wonder what this memory will be like for them in five years, ten or even as grown adults. I pray it doesn't fill them with bitterness.

One of my favorite authors, Ann Voskamp, wrote that her very first memory... ever, was at the age of four - watching her sister get ran over by a truck. Will that be my son? MY son? Will the first thing he can ever recall of his life be of paramedics swarming our living room and cradling his baby brother away? I ache to fix it. To mend every tainted memory and replace them with roses and butterflies. To wipe tears and replace them with laughter. To let him see his brother crawl, and pull up, and for goodness sake, even walk. Emmitt has wanted to see his brother walk from the day he was born.

But I can't, I can't take it away. I can't make it disappear. Nothing has made me feel more helpless than raising children. And they aren't even raised yet! They're still just babes, tiny little souls with blank canvases ahead of them. I wish I could sacrifice everything so that I knew their souls were guaranteed eternity with our creator.

I've always been good at algorithms. I can follow steps like a mad-woman. If only there was a simple equation, even a complex one-I'd master that! Anything to guarantee their hearts knew our creator, knew His love for them!

And so I sit, with my arms tied behind my back and I cry out to my Lord, please Jesus, grab hold of their souls. Woo them to You-no matter what it takes. May they see Your creation all around them and not be able to deny Your goodness, Your faithfulness, Your undeniable love. 

141 Days...

I've known for a long time that this weekend marked this painful milestone for me, for us.  The one where our baby has officially been gone for as many days as we held him.  I found it ironic that we'll secretly celebrate that Zekey has been in heaven for 141 days on the same day we will joyfully celebrate our savior rising up to save us. Not only will we remember tomorrow as the most significant day in history (go ahead, argue it...), but we'll celebrate it as I ponder without a shadow of a doubt what it will be like to be there.  To be perfect. To be whole. To be loved without the possibility of disappointment or pain.

There are so many ways my life has changed over the last 141 days. So many. But the most significant is the way I perceive my world. It's different. It's tainted. It's like I'm stuck in a long hallway with air that's just musty enough to notice it.  Every wall and even the ceiling is covered in glass windows. I can see the beautiful sky, and gorgeous mountains surrounding me so clearly that I can almost, almost, smell the clean crisp scent.  But getting out, it's is next to impossible.

I think about heaven everyday. Everyday. The present heaven, the future heaven, when the Lord comes down and restores this earth to perfection and we live forever and ever, without counting our days. I WILL get out and smell the clean crisp air. I can practically taste it. Practically.

I'm thankful for tomorrow. For a day to celebrate Our Savior and His ultimate plan playing out. And I'm thankful for 141 days of perfect sweet baby, even if it did turn into 141 days of unending tears because I have new eyes, new eyes! And I will smell that air someday...

Heaven...

It's been a month since we kissed our sweet boy goodbye. My memories are still so fresh and I fear them ever getting farther away. As I held him for the last time, I couldn't stop saying how perfect he was. I wanted to hold him forever. I thanked Jesus over and over for giving him to us. I told Matt a few days later I used to stare at him and wonder how long I would have him. I had no idea at the time that it was Jesus gently preparing my heart.  It sounds so strange, but I never remember having those thoughts with my other babies. His life was so perfect. He was loved and snuggled for four and half months and then whisked off to heaven...heaven, FOREVER.

I recently listened to a podcast of a pastor who had lost his five year old daughter. He made an analogy of having four arrows (four daughters) and said that he'd already gotten one in the target. My heart can totally relate. As much as I miss my sweet baby, I also long to know my other kids are safe in the arms of Jesus. It hurts to think about the earthly pains that Madi and Emmitt will face. I want them to know Jesus' love for them. I want them to be held tightly in His arms. I rejoice knowing my Zekey bug is there.

Hebrews 11:1
"Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."

Thank you, Jesus for holding my baby for me.

5 Months...

Today you would have been five months old, FIVE months! Madi had been anticipating for weeks that your next "birthday" was the day after Thanksgiving and she woke up this morning and said, "If Zekey were here he'd be five today!"

It was harder than I thought it was going to be. Maybe I just didn't prepare myself well enough, maybe I shouldn't have sat and pictured your sweet cheeks for as long as I did, or maybe it's just going to get harder before it ever gets easier. But I couldn't help but wonder if you were still here if you'd be sitting up and balancing on your little belly at all, or if you would be pushing up on all fours like your brother was at this age. I couldn't help but try and listen really hard for your sweet cooing and giggles you mostly gave out to your big brother and sister.

I know in my heart of hearts that you were never created to be here with us at five months old.  You were never going to be here to celebrate your first Thanksgiving with us and you were never even going to spend 142 days on this earth. I know God's plan was to snatch you back to heaven, but I can't help but wonder what today would have been like with you in my arms.

I love you my sweet angel baby!