..."cock-a-doodle-do..."

My youngest has always been an early riser....


Our baby woke at 5:09 a.m. early one morning this week… only this time he isn’t an infant… he is now 6 years-old...


His kindergarten class had gotten chicken eggs and they were incubating them for a science experiemnt.  He wanted to be the first one in class so a chick might 'imprint' him....


You know how ducks & geese imprint? .... following around the first being they see, usually their mama... I suppose baby chicks can to.... he made me promise that if one imprints on him, he can bring it home at the end of the school year.... I worry that he may become hor dorves for the neighborhood felines....


What 6 year-old knows this much about imprinting?  My son has an amazing mind.... wise beyond his years....


A few weeks ago, I TeVo'd an old movie from 1996..."Fly Away Home" were a girl incubates Canadian geese eggs & teaches them to fly... eventually flying them in an ultra-light plane from Ontario, Canada to Florida.

What a precious little boy my youngest is...  to wish for a baby chick to imprint him & follow him everywhere….

The science experiement came from Purdue University, part of extension education…. Inside the incubator were a dozen or so chicken eggs.  What an amazing science lesson… what an amazing lesson in life…. A few eggs didn’t hatch… a few didn’t make it, dying within the first 24 hours of their short life…. This is the cycle of life… survival of the fittest…

Friday morning when my youngest woke with the sunrise…. He asked my husband if his mill-store-front sold chicken wire… we could see the wheels turning in his head… he wants a pet baby chick… I asked the kindergarten teacher what they were going to do with the chicks when school lets out…. “Adoption papers” are being sent home with every kindergartner.  We are going to be away from home a total of 5 cumulative weeks this summer…. We have coyotes in our neighborhood woods… a chick wouldn’t get the tender love and care they deserve and would need to survive on our ranch….

I stopped in the classroom Friday morning to give reading tests, the final reading tests of the year…. 

The class was huddled around the Rubbermaid tote, heat lamp shining on all of them… they are enamored with their classroom pets…  one child was telling me he had figured out where a certain chick was ticklish. They have been the caregivers... they have fed .... and watered... and loved those chicks.


Thinking of birds imprinting has me thinking about how maybe we should imprint the Lord...


He meets our every need.... He gives drink, earthly H2O and the living water... He gives us food, both to sustain our bodies and the bread of life for our souls... He placed a gigantic heat lamp in the sky to warm us, start and end our days and He have us the SON to light our hearts and lives...


So why don't we 'imprint' the Lord, as a baby bird does it's mother?  The Lord created us with a God shaped hole... it can only be filled by him, by pursuing a personal relationship with him... it can't be filled with food, clothing, houses, furniture, cars, boats, vacations, .... the list could go on and on....


As humans, it is in our nature to try to fill that void with things... with stuff... with too-much-too-much-ness... but what we really need is Him... what He really wants is for us to take the steps to be in a deeper relationship with Him...

So ... have you 'imprinted' the Lord? ... following Him ... being in His word? ... talking to Him in prayer... "listening"  (you don't dial the phone, rattle of a list of request & hang up on the person you called) ...


...letting Him guide you, all the days of your life? ....

..."there goes the neighborhood..."

I have had this idea rumbling around in my head.... my 9 year old and my Dad, his Grandpa, built a birdhouse together... maybe, 6 years ago...  we were on a spring time visit.... we used to do that before school... before routine.... life was a little more 'fly by the seat of your pants' back them...

So my oldest got the idea in his head that he wanted to build a bird house... my Dad looked at me with questioning eye.... we asked what sparked the idea.... he had seen it on a cartoon on PBS... a boy built a birdhouse with grandpa, so logically he would too.... I suggested a lean-to simple structure... they worked out in my Dad's quonset for a few hours... came into the house to ask Grandma what colors of spray paint she had on hand...

I am proud to say the birdhouse still hangs in our yard... housing a family of chick-a-dee's each spring.... this will be it's 7th spring as a 'casa' ...my cat frequently scales the tree to see if 'anybody's home' ...

I've been waiting for them to show up... soon to follow are the morning doves that wake me at 5:00 a.m. each summer... the blue jays that bully all the other birds... last summer I tried to bribe my boys into using the birds as target practice with their B-B guns... I have raised boys with big hearts... and their Dad has taught them well... to not shoot 'non-gaming' birds.... they wouldn't do it... not even for me....

Once the birds all show up, I know the chance of sleeping in .... will be slim to none....

Today I found a new 'neighbor'... and the direction of this 'tale' is swerving.....

Yesterday morning as I was raising the blinds in my bedroom... to let in a little sunshine... I spotted a bug.... I called for my oldest to bring me a paper towel..."You can't kill it Mom!" he replied.... "It is one of God's creatures you know."  ... So my youngest showed up in his under-roos with his bug habitat in hand... they wanted to 'cage' it...

They were successful in their mission while I backed up to a distance, watching my kindergartner nimbly wriggle between the wall & bed ... they laid out the 'insect identification guide' to see what it was... it appeared to be a black beetle... but his wiggling antennas has me fearful that it may be a more pesky pest... a pet famous for urban survival... a call was placed to the exterminator... rather promptly...

So my youngest begged and pleaded to take him to school... "He's never seen what kindergarten is like." ... so I relented, allowing the bug to be a stow-a-way in the backpack....

Today was visitation day at school... it is Christian Education Week, so our boys school has invited parents, grandparents, perspective families in to their walls to have a look..

I forgot about this when I allowed the bug...

So between morning errands I made my 'drop in'... to see the bug toted around, set next to the teacher for 'carpet time'... to know that he had been named.... something that now escapes my brain....

I was mortified... I had sent a bug, possibly a roach, to school on a day that all the other parents would see my son proudly parading it around.... I am a pretty down-to-earth type farm-girl... it takes a lot to 'ruffle my feathers'.... in my defense, I think the creature 'hitched a ride' in my husbands brief case.... we used to have a rule that the brief case stayed in the truck.... it must have slipped the radar....

So there goes the neighbor hood.... (insert a smile) ... the exterminator will come, the problem will be solved....

So this has me thinking... are there people or issues or trials in your life that you are struggling with? ... someone or something that you wish could easily be dealt with, kind of like the exterminator?

In the book of Romans the apostle Paul writes about trials...
Romans 5:3 (New Living Translation)
"3 We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance."

I should REJOICE in problems? ... REJOICE in trials? ..... they help to strengthen us... to give us stamina...  ENDURANCE.... the Lord wants me to sometimes be uncomfortable? ....

So the bug has been 'pardoned'... at least for a few day... he's a tough sucker, lasted 24 hours without food and water.... the boys added cat food & a little towel with water... he can live in the habitat out in the boys fort.... I keep reminding my brain that he was 'cute' in the movie Wall-E...

With the birds showing up, maybe the Lord has new 'morning plans' for me.... maybe He is conditioning me to wake early... with a joyful heart (that's a tough one)... maybe the Lord is training me for summer, when my boys will return to the house all day... leaving me with little free time....

... to spend my daily time with Him in the early morning light... with a choir of feathered friends to seranade me....