kar0ling

Some by herself One with Auntie Karla And one more of Peach, showing her new sister the love

What is asked of us is that we faithfully use and develop the gifts and talents we are given. We are not measured by the same standard as everyone else; our success is assessed on the basis of the tools which were at our disposal. This sounds very postmodern, I'm sure, and very Western and individualistic. But is it not also biblical, yea, even "Jesus-esque"? He, and Paul after Him, go on about the Law which was both necessary to give and necessary to abolish, because while morality is helpful to provide a guide, it so quickly becomes rigid and arbitrary, killing those upright and holy characteristics which its regulations attempt to encourage. Jesus said He came as the fulfillment of the law. He came to bring life again, so we could put the law behind us, and govern ourselves by a living example instead of codified rules which do not account for extenuating circumstances. This is not to say that morality is bad per se . The entire Old Testament was lived under a strict m...

These girls are too cute! Peach can't get enough of the little one--as you'll note it's hard to get a photo of Mai without her. As for nicknames... Mai-Anh is a little veggie, a squash or a gourd, bearing a striking resemblance to Mr. Lunt (VeggieTales). I don't think that nickname will last but it's pretty fun to call her that right now.

I awoke this morning to the sound of my phone ringing. It wasn't the first time the bells and whistles had attempted to pull me from my slumber so I knew it meant one of two things: either I'd overslept and my boss was calling to find out where I was, or the much anticipated baby had announced her intention to make an entrance. Felicitously, it was the latter. After a lightning fast labour lasting a mere 2 hours, Mai-Anh Esther made her entry into the world at 8:35 am (the preferred interval for Braun babies. Jon, Rebecca, and I were all born between 8 and 8:30 in the morning while Lien was born around 8 in the evening.) She is a hearty 9 lbs 2 oz and 20 1/2 inches long. "She's already got more hair than Lien does!" was the first comment made by both Jon and me. She's a perfectly contented, sleepy little girl who's hardly opened her eyes once, even to let mommy see them, and she had no objection to being passed from person to person all evening, nor to Li...

It's the Friesens' appointment with US immigration regarding Joshua's citizenship today. Please pray that everything will go smoothly, all the proper permissions will be granted, and that all of the following paperwork will fly through their respective channels so they can have this settled already.

Karen Connelly won the Orange Prize for New Writers for The Lizard Cage , a beautiful, contemplative (if that adjective can be applied to books) story about a political prisoner and a prison-raised child in Burma (Myanmar). The setting is fascinating, the characters are compelling, and the net effect is uplifting despite the mean and injust situation they find themselves in. The book grabbed my attention because it was about Burma but I didn't buckle down to read it until a friend of mine who is from Burma mentioned she thought it was really good, and that it spoke to the current political situation. Though the author is a Canadian, I'm sufficiently convinced she's well-versed enough in her subject to represent it faithfully. She's had a long love affair with that part of Asia, having won the Governor General's award for non-fiction at the record-setting age of 24 for Touch the Dragon, her memoir of a Rotary year spent in Thailand. The book is permeated with Buddhis...

Thank God for answered prayers! Dan and Lisa have finally gotten an immigration appointment with the U.S. Embassy for Joshua, the Cameroonian boy they're adopting. So, the appointment is made for June 12. Please keep praying that all will go well, that there will be no delays or problems with processing Joshua's citizenship.