I was mowing the meadow last weekend.  The meadow is a one-acre section surrounded about 280 - 300 degrees by trees.  It's a special place, anchored on the north side by a gorgeous, stalwart, oak tree that I named "Kimberly".  I determined to mow the meadow once or twice per year to control the encroachment of undesirable trees and shrubs upon the grasses and flowers that it should be characterized by.

After circling the meadow several times, cutting a ring about 20 feet in from the perimeter, I noticed a pile of eggs in the stubble just inches from my tractor tire.  I immediately discerned they must be turkey eggs due to their size, either that or Madagascar Elephant Birds, which I'm pretty sure are extinct.  They were not chicken, quail, pheasant nor any other bird in these parts.  Dismounting, I saw that I had crushed one, but that six remained intact.  I did not smell a foul odor emanating from the crushed egg, so I expected that they had a hen turkey sitting on them until I started mowing.  I carefully gathered them and fast-walked to the house, quite exicted to surprise and delight my wife.

She was excited with me as we opened up the incubator and readied it for its newest treasures.  Once it was plugged-in, watered, and the eggs carefully placed, I took Kim back to the meadow to evaluate the nest and the crushed egg; to check the embryo.  Kim agreed that the eggs are alive and, judging by the state of development of the embryo, that they may have 10 or so days before they hatch.  Hopefully, we'll have up to six wild turkeys to raise, saved from certain death.  There is no way momma would come back to sit on them.  She'd have been totally exposed to the raccoon's, opossum's, and coyotes that skulk about by the light of the moon.

It promises to be a fun adventure.  I'll keep you posted.

I’ve only done this once since becoming a Xanga member; copied and pasted content I did not write, but this has to be on my site for you.

Ryan and Lora Kesselhon are friends who are involved in full-time ministry through Campus Crusade for Christ.  They serve on college campuses and live in Duluth, MN.  They are two of the most awesome people I know, awesome in their total devotion to Christ and their courageous, yielded willingness to live for Him, to take up Chist's causes, to be truly His disciples.  (That's the direction I'm headed, prayerfully.) 

Anyhow, several months pregnant with their third child, Lora learns she has a severe, deadly cancer...a blood cancer that has settled in her brain.  The chemical therapy which would be most likely to save her live would probably take yet-born baby Ruth's life.  So they have decided that Lora will start meds that will not attack the cancer, but might cause it to "tread water", while they gain precious weeks of life inside her momma to allow Ruth to grow stronger before she is delivered C-section.  The story if Ryan and Lora is worth reading from the start...amazing they way they peacefully trust God and rely on Him...but this last entry of Lora's was especially a blessing to me.  I hope you enjoy it too.

I guess it was the reduced amount of steroids that they had me on the other day that allowed for the full night sleep, because here I am again, back to my 4am schedule. Thats ok, it gives me time to connect with all of you.

Ryan is leaving to go to Duluth today, Thursday. He will be able to do our taxes and other odds and ends, and then attend his grandfather's funeral on Saturday in East Troy, WI. My mom and both of my sisters will be here to help me with the girls until he returns on Sunday.

I think that Phil one of the residents [R & L take in borders...folks who have no where else to go...and charge them nothing] at our house is going to be especially glad to see Ryan. He misses us a lot. We had gotten a family picture taken with him when he first moved in, and we made sure that he had it up in his room after we were gone, so that he wouldn't get so lonely for us. He is so sweet and probably misses the girls above all.

Speaking of the girls, yesterday was so precious to me. I had all of these unexpected little special times with each Hava and Maren. They stuck out as such unique, beautiful, little girls to me that it was hard for me to hide my tears from them as we were snugglling or playing. It was a weird day with Ryan's grandpa dying and my own strange physical changes, that the thoughts on my mind were straying to wondering if I would be able to be their mommy all their lives and what that would look like for them. How that would affect them as girls to have had their mom die before they could really remember her, and having only heard stories or seen pictures, really did a number on me. Even now the thought sends hot tears down my face. But I know that I cannot go there quite yet. There are still so many things in our favor with regards to my treatment going well and with all of you praying for me to such a great and compassionate God, I continue to just take one day at a time and trust Him as I have learned to do over the last 12 years.

Speaking of trust, someone reminded me of a kindof embarrasing story involving trust from Ryan and I's early days of dating that I thought I'd share this morning.

We were at Living Water's Bible Camp in Westby, WI for a Campus Crusade Spring Retreat. It was kinda early in our relationship, and most people didn't really know we were dating. After all of the events of the day were done, Ryan and I were walking outside holding hands talking about the titles girlfriend and boyfriend. I told him that I didn't really like those names becuase to me they sounded like they were going to end. Ryan in his witty mind interpreted (girlfri"end"), thinking I was talking of the spelling, not so much the social context. So he said, well we could be "boyfri and girlfri so there'll be no "end", and here it was born, our new official titles that we still call eachother to this day.

So your wondering where is the embarrisng part? Well only moments later of this sweet bonding moment, one of the guys that Ryan was discipling came walking towards us. Ryan dropped my hand! Oooo.... I was immediatly shocked! The guy didn't know we were dating, but did it matter? Oooo... he could of just introduced us. I went back to my cabin and stewed. To think, I thought this guy was the one. Its over! Now wait, I took a deep breath and talked with the Lord. Everyone can make mistakes, I'll just pray that the Lord convicts him of his mistake, and if he appologizes with out me saying anything, then I'll know that he is still the one and we'll continue. Pretty gutsty. So the next morning the speaker said everything that I wanted to say to Ryan about our "incident" in his talk about relationships. I was pretty pleased with myself as I sat there wondering what Ryan was thinking of what he was saying and hopefully applying it to the last night's episode. Later on during break time we went to watch people playing paint ball and Ryan confessed his lack of manlyhood by dropping my hand in front of the guy. And deeply asked my forgiveness. Of course you know I did with smile, and it has been a funny story ever since.

The thing I learned then and so many times after that was that I could bring any concern, thought, or frustration to God before handling it myself, and He ALWAYS works it out. And not only does he just work it out, but with some amazingly better style than I could have ever pulled off. So I trust Him, there is no one else who has proved themselves so faithful.

Seize the day! love, Lora

Disciples of Christ are somehow "other" than Christ followers.  Christ calls all of humanity to "follow me".  Some do, and choose to become Christian.  Others, however, take the next steps, and really adopt Christ's agenda...the agenda that He lived...and died for.  That's for me.  R & L are so transparent, so awesome in letting who they are as man and woman show, and in letting who they are in Whom they serve show; disciples called to a big calling, that being active servants of the Living God.  It's radical.  I love it.  Again, that's for me.

(Ryan and Lora Kesselhon's journal can be found in http://www.caringbridge.org)