My precious Lily

We just celebrated Lily's fourth birthday. It is hard to believe that we have had her with us for 4 whole years! She is so great with words and is able to express herself so well in English. She makes us laugh with her ideas, like when she tells me that she loves me SO much that she will marry me! And she is a great big sister. She helps Bella to get down from the cot, gives her books to read in the morning (sometimes a little bit too early Sigh!), she helps her to sit on her high chair and helps her to put shoes on. She loves singing and dancing and is able to create her own words for her tunes, which end up with quite amazing lyrics! She loves ALL kinds of animals, including the disgusting mouse that ruined our Saturday lunch with some friends. The only living creatures that she doesn't like are Ñamñamñas (which supposedly means arañas - spiders), she always runs to tell me about any spider that she has spotted! She loves going to kinder, specially when they celebrate parties. She loves lollies (although her mean mother doesn't let her eat them) and party bags full of goodies. She also adores playing with water in any form, shape and place... the worst time was when she decided to fill a wooden box with water and left it on her bed... She is into experimenting a lot...
She has always preferred eating broccoli and carrot but lately has delighted me telling me that she just LOVES the meatballs that I make for her (I certainly prefer this as a mother's day present than a card!)She loves Grandma Nola, Grandpa, Grandma Mena, Grandpa Arturo, tío Claudio, tía Mimí, tío Timo, tía Evy (our lovely neighbour), Ale and Fily (teenage friends that come to play with her), Gaby (an 8 year old girl to whom Lily look up to), Rexy (our german sheppard) and finally Cleo and Sabba (our two cats. Today she stood up on her stool while I was inventing brocoli soup and with tears in her eyes told me that she would like to have rabbits and that she would call them Cleo and Sabba. She is starting to feel the sadness of living this home. Lily arrived in Bolivia when she was 18 months. She has grown up eating empanadas blanqueadas (a form of pastry with egg white and sugar on top), quinoa soup, peanut soup, and "pollito" (chicken). She doesn't find strange to see street dogs everywhere, food being sold on the street, and skinny dogs begging for food inside our church. We are leaving Bolivia for good and she is starting to feel sad about it. She is only four so she can't sit down and explain to me her emotions. She can tell me though that she would like a pet that would remind her of her pets here. She knew that after her birthday party we were going to start packing things away. She loved her party but got really sick. So today she has been lying in bed calling me to be near her, telling me that she wants me to rub her back, to hug her. I think the months ahead will have a lot of this closeness. I pray that I would be aware of the way my little Lily needs me to survive and thrive home assignment and celebrate her fifth birthday in Punta Arenas Chile!

Lily and Bella painting together                                                       

Lily's surprise cake (she couldn't decide what she wanted!) simple but effective 

My lovely 4 years old Lily                                                            

Lily with friends Zoe, Jade and Gaby                                                   

 Lily enjoying the jumping castle despite the cold! 

                                       

Water or gasoline?

Oh well, I guess is time to blog again. I think this blog would be something like an annual blog! There are always tons of things that I would like to say but I always feel hesitant in sharing them. But this time, I will be brave.
I am taking an online distance course on Dynamics of Biblical Change. It has been a real blessing and it has pushed me to see my heart with a new light and to seek ways in which I can find a way to change. I have been struggling a lot with my girls disobedience and defiance. It gets really tiring and burdensome when Lily is unhappy about 98% of the things I offer her. And my natural response is to get upset and angry with her, to try to reason with her (bad idea!) and make her see that she is having another tantrum. Well, in watching my lectures and reading my readings and writing my assignments I have realised that what comes out in the difficult situations is not determined by the situation but by my heart. Dr Powlison uses the great image of a bottle of water, when it gets squashed what comes out is water, but if the bottle is full of gasoline, then it doesn't really matter what the situation is, when the bottle gets squashed what comes out is gasoline! So I was looking at my impatience and my anger and I got to the conclusion that what was coming out of my heart was pure gasoline. I felt sad and hopeless. I guess it is a little bit normal that when you are faced with the ugliness of your own heart you feel a little bit depressed. So I started to ask God how I could put something good inside my bottle so when it gets squashed by the circumstances what would come out is something that would bring honour to him. And God gave me the answer: prayer for my girls more. I decided that I am going to start the day presenting them and me before the Lord. I thought that if I pray for them and think about their weakness and sins I would be more compassionate to deal with them and love them well. Today was my first day! I sat down on my bed and prayed for them, gave thanks for their beautiful selves and pray for their temptations. When I got up I felt like I didn't have a burden on my shoulders! My lovely Lily was terrible during the morning but I managed to see her with different eyes. I still got cross with her, but I managed to express my love for her and not my anger. She was SO different during the afternoon. I am not doing this to twist her arm and change her, I am doing this to change MY heart because she will always push my buttons, that is what your own children do to you (I have discovered!) As my best friend says, I thought I was a nice lady until I had children.
I am grateful to my God that he doesn't let me stay in the ignorance of my own sin, but he shows it to me little by little and he empowers me to change for his sake.

My two precious reasons to change!