Tag Archives: birthday blessing

Happy 32nd Birthday to Dave~

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Thirty-two.

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;

I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.

He will call on me, and I will answer him;

I will be with him in trouble,

I will deliver him and honor him.

With long life I will satisfy him

and show him my salvation.” Psalms 91.14-16

You are smack-dab in the middle of the same age-years Jesus was /living/walking/defeating the kingdom of darkness (on His way to a cross) one miracle at a time. He was changing water to wine, chatting it up with children and healing the sick. And that is where you are, too, changing the spiritual landscape, fathering your boys and establishing the Kingdom.

I have called you a spiritual iconoclast, by which I meant

A person who is actively breaking down the religious traditions that suck the life from people and instead, is revealing a whole new landscape of the life and love of the Father towards His people. A Kingdom man. A creative visionary. A history-maker.

I think earlier spiritual iconoclasts were guys like Elijah and Elisha. Especially, though, maybe: Jeremiah. Before the building up, there is the matter of tearing down (see Jeremiah 1, The Message subtitles it: Demolish and Then Start Over).

I see this clearly about you, but am not always able to express it openly or well. So on the occasion of your birthday [note: oops-now a few days past], your very own proverbial mother-in-law (frightening title, to be sure), shall attempt to communicate the true and deep to one son-in-love. Please receive them from my heart

On your birthday, I wanted to say {I want you to always know}…

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him…”

So, it turns out I have known you for like, 33% of your life. And you have known me for almost 19% of mine. For a girl who was raised moving from city to city and church to church and leaving behind everyone I knew and starting over sooooooooooooo many times that even a 2-year friendship felt like a lifetime, that puts you and I in the 98.987-percentile of my longest-ever-running relationships. Kind of kidding. I just made up that last statistic, but it’s pretty true. You probably couldn’t have known that you would hold a place that high in my life, my stats/personal data, or my heart for so long. I didn’t know it. But here it is.

You are sort of stuck with me.

And I know so many times it would be so much easier not to be. But I can say at least for me, God knew what He was doing and He still has a plan and His glory will be seen, right?

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name…”

I think I mention this in every single birthday post I ever write to you (and this is #7, I believe), but I just love to hear you play and sing and worship the Lord.  Last month as we were re-painting the living room and had moved most everything out, save a few items in the middle covered with drop cloths, sound, once again had the ability to reverberate off the walls and ceilings and it took me back to when we first knew you, first moved into this house – before it had been “properly” appointed with lots of furniture and accessories.  You would come every weekend, guitar in hand and sing in that room and worship would resound and hit the walls and ascend to the ceiling and go on to heaven and come back and change the atmosphere.  Your worship in this house set a desired precedent for my heart and this place and when the acoustics are just so, I remember it.  And I miss that as life has gotten louder and busier and fuller.  I love being in a meeting with hundreds as you lead in worship, hearing your most amazing voice.  I enjoy watching the Rez Live-Stream when you and Tara are leading.  But you with your guitar and just a few of us right here: overwhelming goodness.  Way better!  You’re one of my all-time fav singers.  And always will be.

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will be with him in trouble…”

When you chose my amazing firstborn daughter to be your wife, and then the two of you blessed us with these cherished boys – oh, be still my heart.  You are such a wonderful husband to Tara and an incredible daddy to Hunter and Malakai.  I also love you for the sacrifices you have made to perpetuate the legacy of adoption in our family.  Because dad, who was adopted knew he was born to adopt Tara.  And when the two of you opened your heart to do the same with Baby-Kai, well, all of us are beginning to understand in a way we maybe hadn’t before, this whole spirit of adoption, of truly becoming sons of God, crying out to Him, ‘Abba, Father.”  The spiritual treasure of this in-the-natural adoption is changing our family. Thank-you for paying the cost and being obedient to welcoming this son into your family, into ours.  Our family DNA-chain is being forged unbreakable – what blessing it is going to be for so many through the generations…

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will deliver him and honor him…”

When you share your heart and the secrets of the Lord and reveal vision, it is life-giving.  Many times I have stood in the back of a room and as you spoke with such crystal clarity something I had already heard many times before, I would still be left breathless with the strength, the perspicuity of the message.  I always wondered, looking around, do the rest of you understand the power of what is happening here?  That is a gift of God in your life.  You have been given a strong gift of revealing, communicating.  Your words, falling like rain, will have the ability to change people and situations and lives and nations.

So I pray that all the God-given dreams of your heart will come to pass and that the Lord will send you mighty warriors to run with you, those who are strong in the Lord and in His mighty power.  And I pray that hopeless people will hear the vision and be energized to pick it up and take it to new levels you never dreamed possible (beyond all you could ask or imagine) and finally understand why they were born.  And I pray He sends you the weakest ones, too, for they are indispensable to the Body of Christ.  So may you be surrounded by those who will bring you all the help you need {to be all He has called you to be, and to do all He has called you to do} from the sanctuary.  There is great help available from the sanctuary.

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “With long life I will satisfy him…”

I deeply respect the strong call and anointing of God on your life. That God is opening doors to big rooms and your gift is bringing you before great men, that you have been set forth to shake nations and declare the Kingdom of God over regions is not in question.  But I maintain that you are never stronger in your anointing than the times you are releasing the light of the joy of the Lord over people.  For seriousness and heaviness need not be cultivated, as a rule.  Jesus didn’t say, “I have come that your worry, care, concern and apprehension would be appropriately full,” but rather that our JOY would be full.  And you have made me laugh so many times.  Your humor and ability to see the silly side of life have been a perfect foil to my desolation, as the enemy himself wishes to keep us from our very strength (the joy of the Lord) by causing us consternation, super-responsible trepidation, woe and worry.  So let the TV preachers work on bringing everybody down about the terrible times in which we live (as if the Word didn’t promise greater grace in these troubling times, and greater is He that is in us, for crying out loud) and you keep dispensing garments of praise for the spirit of heaviness and releasing the light and life of the love of the Father and be full of joy through the Holy Spirit (like Jesus was) and dispense it, too.  You are hilarious.  That is an anointing.

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will…show him my salvation.”

I love you most, maybe, because you love the LORD. That fact alone brings me peace no matter what happens – for His promises towards you will be true, and somehow we’ll all figure everything out and get lined back up.

We have been to heaven and back a few times in 10 years. Being your m-i-l, believe it or not, has been one of the greatest gifts of my life.  Seasons come and go. The way we interact or the actual time we’ll spend together has and will probably continue to change between us, but I will always thank God for you. I will always believe the best of you. I will never write you off or write you out of my story.  I will always be proud to say you are my son-in-love and the father of my grandsons and the beautiful man of my daughter’s dreams.

And with the exception of a few horrendous meetings and the bloody attack of the enemy against our unity last year, I would do it all again, with gratefulness for your love and openness for what I had to bring  {and I was honored to give anything/everything I could} – in spite of me being your “m-i-l.”  *faint smile

Have another wonderful, blessed year of favor. So many more to come, I just know it.  Don’t be afraid – because you love Him (you are covered)…  {me}

But p.s…I am voting against a duck-dynasty beard, puleeeeeeezzzzzze…

Happy Birthday, Tredessa, born on a perfect June day

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Which came first?  The perfect day?  Or the perfect baby being born to make a regular, old day so perfect?

Q: What do exotic eyes and head-full of thick, dark hair, a yellow-embroidered sun-suit with a yellow bonnet, ginger-molasses cookies from the grocery store bakery, my first “private room” at the hospital, water breaking at a church softball game while dad was in the outfield, being 11 days past my due date, a Scrabble game (which I still contend I was winning) and Howard Community Hospital in Kokomo, IN all have in common?

These are the bits and pieces of your arrival, your story, your birth, your place in the family history.  Tredessa Christine Rhoades Faaland: You made us mommy and daddy and 3 adorable girlies, the Rhoades Family, 1983.

Monday’s child is fair of face…

I have been re-living your beginnings so much this spring because of Bailey Sophia.  So many thing about her remind me of you, her hair, her kissable cheeks, her content and laid-back disposition.  June of 1983 was one of the most notable months of my life, the summer that followed memorable and lovely: your father was ordained, there were long afternoons in the backyard with your two sisters splashing in a pool, great music on the radio, and my little baby girl in a yellow carrier, right by my side in the green grass on sun-shiney days.

Dessa at 2 weeks 

Dessa at 6 weeks 

And now here we are, 30 years down the road – celebrating your extraordinary life, unable to fathom what we’d ever have done without the most-middle-child of them all.  You are a center-point, a bridge, an equidistant intermediary.  You are observant and intuitive; careful, but powerful.  You’re a challenging, but honoring daughter and your trust in God is an inspiration.

 

Dessa at 5

I am so pleased to see the life you are leading.  I am so happy God sent you love in a very good-looking, strong, humble package.  I am so thrilled that you have gotten to go to the nations in Jesus’ Name and serve selflessly in high-places for the glory of God.

More than anything this year, I am so excited with you and for you that you are with child, that you carry a dream within – as you have so longed to have children.  I am rejoicing with you and counting down the days.  Your child will be loved and adored and watched over with great zeal – because you have sown that into the lives of so many other children while you were waiting.  It will all come back to you.

For your 30th birthday, I pray and wish and bless you with this (my version of a birthday card):

So HAPPY 30th BIRTHDAY, Dessy-Poo.  Your momma loves you, girl.  You bless my heart and set me straight.  LOVE YOU BUNCHES!!! xxoo

Gavin hit the Double-Digits // Happy Birthday, my Little Man!

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Gavin just turned ten!

Gavin is the first grandchild I ever got and what a gift!  He changed my whole life forever – ten whole years ago this week.  I had no idea I’d be one of “those” grandmothers, thrilled with these darlings, my children’s-children, my very own, once-removed flesh and blood.

I looked down at Gavin in my arms, the first day of his life.  I had no idea who he was or how this would go.

But wow-o-wow.  I love my Little Man.  Red hair, freckles, bright eyes, always looking for something new, something wonderful.  He works hard (seriously loves hard work!), he protects his little sisters, he is sweet to animals, kind in general and a respectful, honoring grandson.  I am so blessed to be his Nonna!

So, my sweet, Gavin – allow me to tell you TEN THINGS I LOVE ABOUT YOU on the occasion of the continued celebration of your birth~

1.  I love that you started gardening alongside me when you were just a toddler.

2.  I love that even this year, you asked for tomato plants for your birthday (they are on your list every year) and that just yesterday at the Garden Center, you told me that even though you wanted to try growing all sorts of different things in your gardens each year of your life, you would always and forever have tomato plants, no matter what.  Are you my boy, or what?!?

And you have to know you melted my heart when you told me, after we had wandered through one garden place and then another, “I really like visiting garden centers and seeing all the plants  they have.  I like doing this every year.”  It is our annual date and joy of my June-heart!  I love you for loving it because I love it, too.

3.  You are so focused and goal-oriented.  I love that you saved up and  worked to earn money to buy your own iPod and that you will now sell it and work some more to upgrade with your eye on an iPad.  Your parents are teaching you well. You have business savvy, Little Man!

4.  You are such a good brother to your sisters.  I know they can get on your nerves at times, little girls that they are, but last week your mom shot of pic of you, school out, sitting with Gemma, teaching her to read and write.  What a wonderful big brother you are.

5.  And you’re a great example as the oldest of the cousins, too.  You love the babies, watch over the tiny ones and generally are considered the coolest guy to follow!

6.  Sandy-the-dog loves you so much.  Because no matter how busy you are, you always take time to pet her and give her the attention she needs.  I love you for loving the old family dog!

7.  I so love how you apply yourself to learning.  You are a skateboarder and gamer and a gardener and a musician and you make time to practice and perfect those things and find out more about everything. You’re such a savvy, intuitive smartie-pants, which I mean in the sweetest way!

8.  Which speaks to another thing I love about you: you have been full of wonder since you were a baby.  When you were even just a few months old, I noticed you were interested in everything around you.  And I love that you carry that trait on.  You are never bored, never expecting anyone to entertain you or cure monotony.  You look around and find fascination in everything life has to offer, in each circumstance and all situations.  What a wonderful attribute.  It will will make living amazing for you!

9.  You’re still so considerate about giving your Nonna big hugs and kisses when we meet up and when we part.  They are worth millions of dollars to me – more, really.  I’m so lucky, so blessed to be your Nonna.

10.  And I love what an honoring son you are to your parents.  Do you know why I love that?  Because the Bible promises this:

“’Honor your father and mother’ is the first commandment that has a promise attached to it, namely, ‘so you will live well and have a long life.’” Ephesians 6, The Message

And because I LOVE YOU sooooooo much and want {life} to go really well for you {really well}, and I want you to have a particularly spectacular life doing legendary, world-changing things for many, many {joyous and healthy} years ~ well, then, for this reason, I love that you honor your parents, who, by the way, are raising an extraordinary son.  Keep it up, kiddo!

You, my dear boy {the original grandbebe}, made me a “Nonna,” the greatest honor of my life.

I love you, Gav.  You know I do, right?  Please never forget. xxxooo {Nonni}

Happy Birthday, Stephanie-born-in-May

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What do Broccoli Cheese Soup at the Big Wheel, birthing classes at Howard Community with the Loftises on Thursday nights, Princess Diana, a really ornery Tilt-a-Whirl operator at Indiana Beach Amusement Park (now fancily called a resort), the song “He Means More to Me Today Because of Yesterday” by the Sounds of Happyness, and a beautiful morning in May with the lilacs in full bloom have in common?

My Stephanie.  Second child, only preemie, the teeny-tiniest babe who caused faith to rise in my heart as I prayed to God for her in the dark night, me in the hospital in Kokomo – her fighting to breathe at James Whitcomb Riley Hospital in Indianapolis.  Thirty-one years ago.

If an old friend lets you down

And a true love can’t be found

Till the blue skies come around

I’ll be right by your side

You weren’t due until June, very late June, very-very late June.  But you came in May and it was beautiful and it was a surprise and it was meant to be.  And every May since, we are reminded of the blessing and miracle and joy and completion and maturity and faith you brought with you, and what it caused in us.

No don’t forget me now that we’re apart

Just open up that great big loving heart

And you’ll always be

You’ll always be

You’ll always be a part… of me…

The name.

As middle names go, May wasn’t even on “the list,” and was perhaps a little old-fashioned for the times.  But we named you Stephanie because of one our favorite actresses at the time (Stephanie Powers) and because one of my all-time greatest Bible heroes is Stephen (see Acts chapter 6).  And May was for the month, the merry merry month of May.  Because it was a magical, lovely time in our lives – all was right and beautiful and exciting and we anticipated your birth with great energy and expectancy. And yet, you were actually so unexpected on that Friday, 5 1/2 weeks before your “due date.”

Take your time to embrace romance

Teach your children how to sing and dance

Love may hurt but it’s worth the chance

I’ll be right by your side…

And haven’t you been so many unexpected things things since?  Haven’t you just always done and became and created and produced and added to and on and surprised and delighted and shined and sang and wrote and been successful and just grown up to be an unexpected bundle on wondrousness?  Haven’t you?  Yes, you have.

Try to be the best you can

Show compassion to every man

And always take the higher ground

I’ll be right by your side

Journey far and travel safe

Make this world a better place

And keep that smile upon your face

I’ll be right by your side…

I wasn’t perfect this I would admit

I was always trying to make the pieces fit

Just know you’ll always be

You’ll always be

You’ll always be a part of me…

You’re a trailblazer and  a trendsetter. The family looks at you to confirm cool because if it isn’t, you’ll be the first to know.  Your children are awed by you, your husband reveres you.  Your siblings recognize your gifts and your parents are pleased with how you turned out and in seeing God’s favor and blessing on your life.

And so I bring you the gift of these words and my prayers and wishes for you.  The theme is this: I believe in you.  And I hope you will open that gift with fearlessness and abandon, knowing you’ll always be a part of me, the best part of me.

a birthday blessing for my daughter

Happy Birthday, Stephanie, amazing, blazing, sizzling daughter, strong woman and spirited girl.  Your life was ordained and has so much value.  I thank God for breathing into your lungs the breath of life, quickening your tiny mortal body 31 short years ago with the very power that raised Christ Jesus from the dead.  That healing will take you all the way to the end with great fire and presence.  Go get ’em, Steph! {love from your mom}

Don’t ask me how the time has gone

I’ve loved you since the minute you were born

So many times we have laughed and cried

I see you now it fills my heart with pride

You’ll always be

You’ll always be

You’ll always be a part… of me…*

*Pure Love, Rod Stewart

 

Joyous Birthday to the firstborn, my Tara Jean~

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To the girl who was deemed Liquid Joy {or Joy-bear} while she was growing up~

As the music at the banquet

As the wine before the meal

It was 5:55 a.m. The sun had just broken through bright and I felt the earth move.  Actually, probably less the earth moving than having that first, distinct contraction – that sign for which I had waited, wondering if I’d even know when you’d be coming.  But there it was – a new sensation, so marked and unambiguous, I knew everything was about to change forever.  I drank in the sun as it rose through my window.  I looked at the clock and my heart palpitated with wild excitement.

Today is the day.  This child for whom I have prepared and waited would arrive.  Today – this baby that had caused me to exercise daily and eat so many vegetables for its’ health – now we would see.

Boy or girl?  I didn’t know, but I was praying for a baby girl with blond hair and rosy cheeks (like the baby of one of my college Bible teachers).  I had a vision in mind…

No one but Grandma and I even knew.  It was our happy little secret all day as we went here or there.  I wrote down contraction times and when asked by friends and church family, “When are you going to have that baby?”  “Oh, maybe today, I’d tell them,” smiling so big inside about the best secret in the world.

5:55 a.m. and the clock spun wildly around until 5:55 p.m. when I told Grandma, “I need to go to the hospital now.”  I am not sure how I knew it except that I was packing my bag and when a contraction would come, I’d have to stop what I was doing to breath through it.  I was giddy with anticipation, feeling out of control.

But grandpa.  He wanted us to wait and drop him at the church.  So we left at 6:15 and drove {the almost opposite direction} to drop him at his office around 6:30 p.m. and then we were off to the hospital.  Okay-maybe I am being dramatic, as it was only about a 10 mile trip, but when you are in transition…

We pulled up to the doors at emergency so my mom could drop me off and I was met with a wheel chair at 6:48 p.m.  As we went over the bumpy grate going in, I said to my wheelchair-pusher, “Could you stop for a minute?  I am having a contraction and need to breathe.”

“Oh, honey,” she said with great disdain.  “You are never going to make it.  This is your first baby and you will be in labor for at least 20 hours and if you are acting like this now, you will never make it.”  I figured she was the expert and I thought if what she was telling me was true I would never be able to do this for 20 more hours. I was not going to make it.

But I also kind of wanted to hit her.

She delivered me to labor and delivery and you were born at 7:16 p.m. – just 28 minutes after my mom had delivered me to the door.  I have never gotten over the fact that I didn’t get to smack that wheelchair pusher.  I just never have.

As the firelight in the night

So are you to me

At two

And like so many other things in your life

You surprised me and showed right up and it was beautiful and mysterious and awe-inspiring and magical and spiritual and breath-taking and it was you and me, just us. And you looked at me, and I couldn’t quit looking at you and though we’d only just met, I felt so at home with your warm, fuzzy head. The smell of you, the contour of your face in the barely-lit room: proof of God’s love for me.  A gift straight from heaven!  I knew I was undeserving.  I knew no one, no one, but God could have, would have entrusted you to me.

At three

As the ruby in the setting

As the fruit upon the tree

Oh, love story of love stories – my baby, my own, a sweet tiny, pink-bundled girl.  Blonde-haired, blue-eyed, joy of joys.  I wondered if I was actually allowed to feel this happy –  because I was sure some one would take you away if they knew.

As the wind blows over the plains

So are you to me

 Read about Kai’s adoption story here

And now, joy-child, beautiful woman with two sons of your own {I learn so much from watching you mother them, love them} – it is a day to celebrate your birth, to remember and recall that day thirty-four years ago with gratefulness and thankfulness to a loving God who drew my heart to His with the most loving-kindess imaginable in the form of a girl, tender and sweet, now a woman – wise and lovely.  I do thank God for you.  I do.  So I wish for you (a prayer-wish, of course):

As the wind blows over the plains

So are you to me

So are you to me

Happy Birthday, firstborn and namesake.  Happy Birthday, daughter and friend.  I love you.

 

 

Our newest son

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Ryan.

Ryan Faaland.  I have only known him for a year and 6 days.  But all along he was being prepared, God was readying our family and preparing the way for him to be grafted into the Rhoades tribe.  He and Tredessa fell for each other quickly and I am pretty sure that his first huge family dinner with us made him like Tredessa even more.  Haha.

We asked him 10,872 questions.  And it was loud.  And we played Charades.  He laughed easy and he fit – just right.  Prepared.  A new son…

Happy 28th Birthday, Ryan!

Your parents raised a good son.  I know they are pleased with the man you have turned out to be.  You are a man of integrity and character.  You are caring and affectionate.  You are the tender love God wanted to bless Tredessa with.  You were prayed for and highly anticipated.  You were long-awaited and appointed to a place of high honor, that of the man of Tredessa’s dreams – a place so unique, so protected in its’ scope and future, 3 massive music festivals turned up dry, man-wise.  There was only one who would do…and it was you.

Just words.

Below is your “birthday card.”  It has a few of the words that describe you, things I see, things I was impressed by the Holy Spirit to impress upon you.  I hope you will know the deep, full meaning of each.  I pray your heart will resonate as these things confirm God’s call on your life, His plans for you, and His deep love for you, Ryan.

I wrote “You brought a part we didn’t know we were missing.”   And even though we were waiting for you and looking for you, the gift God gave was more than we could have hoped or asked.  We didn’t even know what we really needed.  But God is good and He knew.  And we love Him for the gift.  We love you!

{mom}

Happy Birthday to “our Jovanie”

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Rocky found a wife.

One boy.  One chance to get the right woman.  So many {{sooooo many}} volunteers for the position.  Haha.  But he looked around and saw Jovan, his “friend.”  And he is a smart kid.  He knew a good woman when he saw her.  And he chose well.  And we are so proud of him for loving her and marrying her.  And we are so grateful she loves him back with such zeal and dedicated fervor.  Together, they are creating one of the most beautiful families you will ever see.  Rocky + Jovan = Averi (3) and Amelie Belle (1 1/2) for now…but sweet d-i-l promises me there will be more.

A great addition to the fam

Jovan comes from 2 gorgeous parents (both with amazing hair and over-the-top good looks).  Italians from New York.  And 2 gorgeous sisters.  She comes from fervent Jesus followers and prayer warriors.  She comes from good people.  And she is proof to us that God loves us.  He blessed us so.

Light-reflector

Jovan sometimes models for www.maydae.com

Happy-happy-happy Birthday, Jovanie. On an All Hallow’d Eve’ so long ago, a day usually draped in black and night, a light was born.  Twenty-five years ago today, to be exact, a reflector of the love of Jesus Christ was born and the world can never again be as dark as it once was.  Shine on, sweet girl, godly woman, and gift-of-a-daughter you are.

Here is my birthday card for YOU.

I love you, girl!  I hope you will sense how much in the words on this “card.”  You have to look closely, but it is full of hope and love just for you!  (click to see larger)

Happy Birthday to the Man of the Kelley House

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Son.in.Law

Our very first son-in-law just drummed his way right into our hearts and and still keeps the beat, all these 10 years later, to the soundtrack that is our family-life.

Wow, we got spoiled.  We lucked out.  We got blessed.  We couldn’t have done it better if we’d spent years and years auditioning candidates.  God just knew.  He knew what we needed.  He knew what was missing for us, for you, too.  And He put you in our family, where you are looked up to as the big brother, the musical genius, the technological wizard, the guy who knows everything we need to find something out about.   Ask Tristan.  You’re like our very own, personal search engine.  AskTristanDotCom.  *smile

Happy Birthday to a man we are so grateful to call son, a man who loves our daughter and is raising three of the most amazing little kids ever.  You were born to be a part of us.  We are blessed.  Yes, happy-happy birthday, Tris!

That you are a good man, one for which we can thank God everyday, is evidenced by Stephanie’s success and deepening beauty.  That you are a trustworthy and righteous man is proven by the honoring and great-hearted children you are raising, so loved and so loving, each distinctively developing their own joy-bringing personalities.  Your family, Steph and the kids, look at you in a way that says: Tristan is in his element, right where God created him to be.

We so appreciate and admire your bravery and courageousness in providing for your family creatively.  We applaud the sacrifices you’ve made for the greater good and commend you for good choices in hard times.  Yours is a colorful, thriving, gorgeous family.  All you are doing right – shows.

Your parents got you at birth.  You are their son, the best of the best, the great product of the heritage they have given you.  But then God knew what we Rhoadeses would need.  And He sent you our way as a gift.  And that was a blessing for us.  So we celebrate your birth.  And we thank your parents for the way they raised you.  And we thank God for showing us His favor in this way.

Here is my birthday card for you, Tristan.  It’s a little of what I see and what makes me thank God for you.  Much love.  ~ The m-i-l.

She was born on an exquisite day just like today…

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Happy Birthday, Tredessa!

 

Dessy, Dessa, Tre-Tre, Dessy-Pooh-Pie – all names for the exotic, dark haired beauty who arrived just days before a most lovely summer in 1983.  You were christened and accessorized in a  wardrobe of sunshine-yellow and an earlier, milder form of Jeanie-green to set you apart, I suppose, from the lots-of-pink we already had in the family.  You were baby-girl-number-three (thus, Tre) and I knew from the first moment I had alone with you, something very different, quite extraordinary and alluring lay there in my arms.  The eyes, even at birth, showed an intensity of spirit; yet there seemed to reside in you, even as a tiny bundle, a quiescent repose, a knowing restfulness.

Everything about you has proven these inklings to be so.  You excel in so much, baby-girl.  The time God spent knitting you together in my womb, was a favor I cannot hope to comprehend.  So lucky you are mine.

             

You were born to…

We were kids.  You arrived before our second anniversary.  Dad was playing church softball and I was involved in women’s ministeries and of course youth group with dad.  There were family walks and bicycles-around-the-block.  1106 S Armstrong in Kokomo, so much love and ice cream in the charcoal-colored house.  So much togetherness.  Garage sales with Miss Faye and dressing you so cute with intense colors because your hair and complexion were sufficient for them.  Playing in the pool in the backyard.  Hot summer days and sweet nights with our little family.  You arrived to happiness and love and gratefulnes that you came.

Words for your birthday

This is your “birthday card” from your mama who loves you and really couldn’t fit all the words I want to say in a whole album of photos of you.  Love you, sweet-pea.  I hope this birthday is the best you have ever had…yet.

Tredessa Rhoades on her birthday

           

PS to Ryan ~ Do you realize how blessed you are to see what you see?  To know her as you do?  You must be very special to God, indeed.  You have found treasure!

Happy Birthday, Stephanie May {our little preemie}!

1 Christ is All, 2 Mi Familia, 3 Celebrations & Festive Events, Stuff I Actually Think, , , ,

Our second baby girl: ultra-tiny and way early.

I love you – yes, I do!  A  bushel and peck and a hug around the neck.  For almost your entire life, from such a young, young age, you’ve been a songstress, a singer, a psalmist.  You were the choreographing, twirling, flowing-fabric, scarf-dancing music track of the family ~ just skipping down the happy hallways of life.  Everything got a little more colorful and a little more ebullient when you came along.

 

Yes, I cropped Stormie (the other half of the trend-setting www.MayDae.com.  It Is not her birthday!  *smile

You were born to 

Heavy-with-flowers lilac bushes, your sister learning to wear “slip-slops” when she came to see you for the first time at the hospital,  purple irises lining established streets in Kokomo, a little charcoal gray house and a month with which you’re joined by name.   You were more than 5 weeks early and may have arrived because of a crazy carnival ride and took your first post-hospital nap atop an old pulpit in the corner of the fellowship hall while I taught a VBS class.  You were like a china doll, I was afraid to make noise.  We sewed and created and worked hard to prepare your space, we wanted everything to be just right –  and in that tiny pink and lace bassinet, you looked like a miniature. 

The rainbow–girl

God heals.  He is the Healer.  That is the blazing-across-the-skymessage of your life, Steph.  And the adversary gets no points in the battle for our baby girl.  With God’s blessing-kiss on the love between your dad and me, with your big sister praying to have a little sister all her own – you were sent.  But you know the enemy, he always tries to stop a miracle at its birth.  You live in the ranks of Moses, Jesus, even, with spiritual war- decrees against their very lives: Stop the miracle before it can begin to change the course of everything…

But God, who is faithful, healed you wholly and fully.  Breath.  That is what He gave you.  Unlike others who never had to struggle for air, you, like Adam, had to have a supernatural miracle of the very Ruach, the breath of God {the actual very Spirit of the Living God} breathed in to you.

And so, though I now see the miraculous in every day and can look back at the faithfulness of the One who created me and all the times He was saving me from myself and certain disaster, you were the very first miracle I ever really knew I needed.  And in the quiet, dark night following your birth, when your life hung precariously in a balance I didn’t even comprehend, when they’d taken you to James Whitcomb Riley Hospital in Indianapolis and you were not in my arms – I cried out for your life, and the Faithful One heard me and graciously granted my petition.

And though so much could have gone wrong, there could have been so many problems, later, He, by the driving force of His very breath in you, instilled so much color, so much texture and pattern and creativity and gifting and vivaciousness and animation.  His very Spirit filled your lungs and your heart and soul and personality and every rainbow has symbolized you since.

You are Rainbow Bear.  Always have been.  And it was confirmed by the laying on of hands more than once.  There is so much there.  May you always know in all things that you were created to declare in the heavenlies that God keeps His promise.

Happy Birthday, Stephanie.  I put some words together so you will know how & why I celebrate your birth and your life!

Happy Birthday, sweetie-pie.  With love from your momma