Christmas Day

Images from our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day (once again, forgot to bring our camera to the Winchells, so our Christmas Day afternoon is not shown here).


Photos: The "Kerr sisters" on Christmas Eve at Debby's condo overlooking the Boston skyline. Also, Orilus and Jackson pose in new Red Sox hats from Grandma at Aunt Debby's house Christmas Eve afternoon.

















Photos: Christmas Eve, and the boys don new Christmas pajamas before heading off to bed. Christmas morning and the lighting of the Christ candle after breakfast.
































Photos: Orilus and Jackson pose proudly in front of our Christmas tree with their new, authentic Kansas cowboy hats from Grandpa and Grandma. The boys show off their gift from Jason and me--Celtics tickets for a January game!

our Christmas letter

Snow Day

Today was the first snow day of the school year. This morning Jason and I were awoken by our boys’ timid knocks at our bedroom door, and the subsequent bouncing of excited third- and fourth-grade bodies on our bed. We decided to observe a snow day in the purest sense of the word—by choosing to play and to connect instead of checking items off our weekend to-do list (I’m sure it looks a lot like yours: pay the bills, mail belated birthday cards, wrap some gifts, catch up on our Inboxes, clean the house). So we dug our snowshoes out of the attic and piled into the car for nearby Lynn Woods.
The day did not disappoint. We were greeted by a pristine world of white (“It looks like Narnia!” Jackson said), and absolute stillness. As we crested the first hill, I realized suddenly what the trek meant to our family—the first time our sons had been able to use the snowshoes we purchased at a sale so many years ago, evidence of how absolutely free Orilüs is now from his sickle cell disease, and any post-transplant effects. “Look at us!” I exclaimed, and found it appropriate that our celebration was heard only by squirrels, and each other, and God. So much of our journey this year has been like that—quiet moments of great celebration that give us pause, and time for thanks.
In the rush of life this year, we have worked hard to choose “snow days”—moments for each other, out of the rush of life. In May we celebrated the one-year anniversary of Orilüs’ bone marrow transplant, which was marked by the end of his at-home isolation and his return to school, church, and the soccer field. We spent the summer enjoying the benefits of a healthy life—we made two trips to Kansas (sadly, one unexpectedly for my dear grandmother’s passing), celebrated our ten-year wedding anniversary in Vermont, went on our first family camping trip, and experienced an expense-paid Make-a-Wish trip to Orlando (the boys remarked that Kansas was way more fun, perhaps a tribute to the slowness they truly need to thrive). I was especially grateful to Jason and the boys for allowing me to travel for nearly three weeks in July to South Africa, which marked for me the finale of a long transplant year and did much to restore my spirit.
The beginning of the new school year brought with it a true transition back to life post-transplant, the first school year the four of us have begun together, and intend to finish together, in a long time. The transition has been more difficult than we anticipated (complicated by a mandate that Jason take three education courses, and by my new and challenging teaching role at our high school). We long for more snow days, and less busy days. We try to make them, limiting the boys’ extra-curricular involvements to one each (for Jackson, continued success in gymnastics, for Orilüs a new experience in a hip hop class), and trying hard to observe family traditions—an electricity-reduced night once a week, a weekend “Sabbath” day for play and rest, weekly family nights spent mostly on games and more rarely on movies, evening musical worship and Psalter readings, more regular times with extended family. We also took a sabbatical from involvement with Ripple Effect, our non-profit, this year, in a wise attempt to give us more room for family and for thinking about our family’s future. Like many of you, we long for more community in our lives, deeper relationships with our children and with family and friends, and feel the angst of our culture, which lures us into busyness and away from relationship. We pray for a life that is lived more like a snow day and less like a dizzying tick of a to-do list.
And so today, we have given thanks by plodding along on snowshoes, and eating fistfuls of snow, and making snow angels, and laughing in the cold. If life really is a frenzy of urgency, we surely would have been left behind at our pace today. But if life is what we expect—an opportunity to create and make snow days, to honor moments for connection, to be silent long enough to experience God’s grace—then today, we have lived well.
Wishing you the pause of a “snow day” during this season of God’s quiet love,
Melissa for Team Winchell

recuperating

Today I spent recuperating from yesterday's surgery...yes, for those of you who knew I was having surgery, I'm fine. A little sore--I'm pretty sure that whichever way they had me positioned on the table yesterday was NOT natural, as I feel I got beat up entirely. My chest hurts. My throat hurts (intubation fun). My back hurts. My legs hurt. Oh, and yes, my bum hurts. Let's hear it for colon surgery!

However, the surgery went as well as can be expected, and I'm certainly glad, after 4 months of waiting, to have this phase 2 of 2 over and done with. Now my job is to lie low--lie, or sit--for a few weeks so that I can heal properly. Pray with me for complete healing--if I don't heal, then I would need another (and very major) surgery. NOT going to happen.

So the rest of the family were all back at school today (snow day on Monday, too, and then Jason had accompanied me to the hospital yesterday). Tomorrow the boys have early release for Christmas break, and Jason will finish the week at 2:30 on Friday. We're looking forward to it, and our Advent card, and magnets, and candles, are helping us to count down to Christmas. One of my favorite times of year.

The house is already quiet--the boys wanting to turn in early tonight. We are all feeling so tired. These dark nights sure make you feel like it's much later than it actually is. Which reminds me...winter solstice is coming this week, and the "longest night of the year." Some of my friends will be attending solstice services (held at many parishes and churches on that night) to grieve, and to find ways to express the loss of loved ones--a metaphor for the longest, darkest night gradually giving way to less darkness, and more light. This week, I, too, will mourn with and for my friends, and for my MeeMaw, who I still miss daily. Speaking of which, deleting her address from my Christmas card database was about the saddest part of my week this week. Certainly appropriate the solstice is followed by Christmas, a Reason for hope. My MeeMaw would agree with that life-rhythm entirely.

photos from last Friday's snow day!

Friday's snow day!

Our family spent hours in and around Lynn Woods...snowshoeing (doesn't Jackson look a little surprised by the experience? I think he was! Meanwhile, Orilus was running on snowshoes!) and sledding (Jackson, as usual, screaming his high-pitched bloodcurdling scream which he does even when he is NOT scared, and Orilus looking more timid by his descent to the bottom of a large hill, which left him spilled out of his sled).

thinking well of you

This morning I had one of the best swims ever--a 1.5 km swim that was rhythmic, and smooth, and strong. I think what made my day was the elderly gentleman I met while walking in to the YMCA this morning. He seemed like one of the down-and-out guys who might live in the Y residence, and again (you think by now I'd be used to this), I found that the blessings of Jesus are so often given me from people I might otherwise ignore. I held open the door for him while he crossed the icy sidewalk, and he broke into a smile, and said, "May the good Lord think well of you!" And I felt immediately like all of my recent musings on grace and love, and the scandalous acceptance of Christ, were being spoken through this man: God thinks well of me today. Is there anything more beautiful than that? I felt the grace of Jesus all around me today as I swam, and felt buoyed by love and surrounded by joy.

Needless to say, I am receiving all I can in these recent days, as there is so much threatening to steal the grace of Christ from my spirit each day. Ongoing struggles with our kids that are painful but a necessary part of their healing and growth. A painful decision by my school's administration to move 8 of my students to our other building, separating me from a group of Burmese refugees I have come to care for deeply. A friend struggling in a marriage relationship. Another friend devastated by news that her son is ill with a rare sickness. A surgery coming for me on Tuesday, followed by 2 weeks of home-rest, and 6 weeks of limited activity.

So today was my last swim for quite some time (February, probably). Since swimming is one of the ways I best care for myself, and my spirit, I am going to miss the water, and the silence of a 45-minute swim. It is meditation for me. And I guess that's why today's swim was a special gift; I felt that God gave me this swim to remember the nearness of His presence in the coming weeks, the rhythms of grace, the gentle breathings of Spirit, the quick turn-arounds at the hard walls of life that can send us swimming off in a new and lovely direction.

So thankful for a weekend of reminders...a snow day yesterday (a lovely time to re-connect as a family out in the winter weather), and a day today for swimming, and Christmas letter-writing (yes, friends, the letters are coming). We need your prayers in the coming weeks, as more of God's sweet presence is needed in our home, for the healing of my body, and the healing of our family's hearts. For our good Lord surely DOES think well of us, and will show up again tomorrow. Good Lord, we need you.

the start of Advent

So much I wish I had recorded here in the last weeks--so much fullness about life recently.

Thanksgiving Day was spent in a truly memorable fashion. My colleague and I (along with Jason and the boys) walked a handful of the refugee students to our high school football game. We spent the morning explaining (in broken English, no less) the rules of football and laughing at the antics of the mascots (trying explaining WHY we have a person dressed as a Ram pretend-fighting with a person dressed as a Bulldog to someone who doesn't understand much English yet). Man, it was truly good times. Afterwards, two of my colleagues and I visited some homes--in one morning/early afternoon, we sat in a Liberian home, a few Burmese homes (including one home church!), and a Muslim Burundi home. What a richness there is to life here in the city; I was so struck by the resource that these families are to our community...resources of wisdom, and contentment, and spirit, and resolve, and peace. I know I was particularly touched by the Burmese house church we stumbled upon. They sang (in English, we weren't sure if this was for our benefit) a familiar church chorus: "Let the weak say I am strong, let the poor say I am rich, because of what the Lord has done for us...give thanks." Looking around the 2 living rooms, over 50 Karen Burmese refugees seated on the floor in a makeshift, but strong, faith community, I realized again how little I know of true gratitude. I thought of this scene often through my own family Thanksgivings in the days that followed, where "richness" abounded (furniture, for one).

The Friday after Thanksgiving we spent at our house, hosting all my sisters, their husbands, my mom, my buddy Val, and a new friend from Camden Brent. It's always a great day when my sisters are around. Now that we are all scattering further and further apart, these days are fewer, and more precious. The highlight of the day for me was our Thanskgiving meal, a gourmet meal of my husband's grand design (pumpkin cheesecake...from REAL pumpkins, no less), and at the start of that meal, a family communion--the first communion for my sons. Really cool.

Saturday we shared Thanksgiving with the Winchell family at Mom and Dad's (by that time, I was so tired, I forgot our camera!)...a beautiful day together, which revived me from near-exhaustion (not sure why, since I did so little of Friday's cooking). :)

Sunday was my 31st birthday, which passed in a lovely way...church, and then out to lunch with some good friends. Very quiet, but marked nonetheless (and if you know me well, you know that marking time is important to me). The boys and Jason gave me a new suit (my work uniform of choice daily), and renewed my gym membership.

Last week continued to be a connective week for me. I was with Val on Tuesday (we went to see Rob Bell in Boston...such a summative time of this season of my life, actually), Wednesday with my good friend Audra (with whom tears are always in order, such a dear and lovely friendship we share), and Thursday a reunion with my long-lost friend Susanna. I survived the week with very little sleep, as you can tell, and was relieved that Saturday was my long-scheduled quarterly "retreat day." I spent it first at the gym (it felt like heaven after a couple months away...aahhh, the pool!), and then Barnes and Noble, journaling, reading, praying, meditating. Much more could be said about all I learned this week about this past quarter of my life (a very difficult season, but one from which I am harvesting much, in the true spirit of fall, I suppose).

Today we welcomed the first Sunday of Advent with a candle-lighting in our home, as well as in church with Mom and Dad Winchell. Our Christmas tree is up and lit as I write this at the dining room table. Our boys are long since asleep. Jason sits here with me, also typing (did I mention he continues to plug away at his three grad courses?). The smell of pine. The quietness of evening. The calm of family and togetherness. And yet my thoughts tonight are with one of our sons--for whom peace and togetherness seem so elusive lately. In this Advent season, may all of us experience again the wide grace of Jesus...but especially, this Christmas, I'm praying for those, like our children, who need His healing particularly much. It's a particular angst, to be loved by the God of the universe, and feel it not. Jesus, save us all this Advent from that mistrusting confusion!

"And He shall be called Prince of Peace."