"I just don’t feel right,” the post-partum mom told me as we waited together outside the classroom to pick up our preschoolers. She’d just had her third C-section three weeks earlier and her incision wasn’t healing well. She also shared with me that she’d had an IUD placed during the C-section. “I don’t do hormones, so this was our only option,” she said. She had three children spaced closely and her body needed a break. But she was worried and uncomfortable about what the IUD might be doing to her body, in addition to her other post-partum complications. “Have you heard of natural family planning?” I asked her. “NFP is completely healthy, with no side effects. It’s highly effective, and it’s good for your relationship as well.” She was interested and asked me to bring her more information next time we met outside the preschool door. 

Several years ago our family took a leap of faith and went to Disneyland. This required well over a year of saving to afford the airfare, park tickets and a room in the Disneyland Hotel. Arriving at the hotel in the late afternoon, our girls burst into our room inspecting the Disney themed art that assured them they were, in fact, in Disneyland.

In the late 1930s, Nikolaas Tinbergen demonstrated a new concept in biology: “supernormal stimulus.” Introducing plaster eggs larger and more brightly colored than ordinary eggs into birds’ nests, he found that birds could be tricked into neglecting their real eggs in favor of the fake ones. Similarly, he used models, larger and more brightly colored than ordinary butterflies, to lure male butterflies away from real females. Animals can’t always tell the difference between a counterfeit and the real thing.

Practical steps to take even before you meet The One

Dinner together as a family was a given growing up. It was a part of our daily routine, a time when our parents would check in with us and we would see one another. As an adult, I appreciate this routine as having been a foundation to my desire for, and expectations and practice of, the great gift of Christian community.

“When all the land of Egypt became hungry and the people cried to Pharaoh for food, Pharaoh said to all the Egyptians: ‘Go to Joseph and do whatever he tells you.’” - Genesis 41:55

Create a ‘Jesus tree’ to teach your kids about the Lord during Lent

Follow Mary’s example when dealing with inevitable family conflict