As we head into Father's Day Weekend, a few posts from the blogging world worth reading:

My friend and fellow blogger/author Margot Starbuck wrote a post for her.meneutics today: Searching for Abba on Father's Day. Margot describes her adoption as a young girl, the struggles ...

Penny will "graduate" from pre-school today. She'll sing songs and receive a diploma and give hugs to her friends and her teachers. And we'll feel a little silly that we're sitting through a pre-school graduation and a little nervous that kindergarten comes next and very proud ...

I wrote earlier this week that I would be taking Tuesday and Wednesday as spiritual retreat days. Some of you offered suggestions for how to spend that time. Others simply wished me well. Thank you!

I spent the past two days trying to avoid my phone (but still succumbing to temptation ...

"You should read your blog," Peter said.

"What do you mean?"  I asked. I had just told him about an hour on Sunday when I considered sitting on the porch and reading a book but ended up putting away clothes instead. He referred me to a post I had written about learning how to ...

As reporters and others cull through Sarah Palin's emails of the past few years, one has surfaced that demonstrates her thoughts and feelings before she gave birth to Trig, her youngest son, who was born with Down syndrome: "How Sarah Palin Imagined God Talking to Her..."

A recent ...

We aren't a dessert-every-night kind of family. In fact, we're more of a dessert-once-a-week-if-you're-lucky type. So it's a big deal when our kids get a cookie or a scoop of ice cream or a cupcake or what have you. A few nights back, they had been primed for chocolate cake. ...

Two articles about caring for the earth in the most recent issue of Christianity Today...

First, an interview by Andy Crouch with Eugene Peterson and Peter Harris, "The Joyful Environmentalists." It's not yet available online (I'll try to remember to post a link when it is), ...

I stayed up late every night this week reading The Story of Beautiful Girl by Rachel Simon. It's no great surprise that I loved it. The plot involves Lynnie, a young white woman with an intellectual disability, and Homan, an African-American deaf man. They fall in love ...

Anyone who reads this blog knows I'm someone who loves order and predictability and productivity and, well, balance. I've written before about my desire for balance and some of the holy disruptions that push me off-kilter. Having a newborn pushes me off kilter. Or perhaps I ...

I was only five years old when my cousin Ben was born. I do not remember exactly how I was told that he has Down Syndrome or what that really meant. I think my mom explained that "things are just going to be harder for Ben," or something to that effect. All I knew was that he ...

Yesterday two packages arrived. The first was a small box with five "Advanced Reading Copies" of my upcoming book, A Good and Perfect Gift: Faith, Expectations and a Little Girl Named Penny. The second were the "galleys" for that book, which is to say the final final draft. ...

Most nights before our kids go to bed, we have a family prayer time. It usually begins with William prostrate on the floor (who knows how he decided that the best way to pray is face to the ground and eyes closed). He usually says, "Thank you for our day. Thank you for our family." ...

For Mother's Day this year, my husband gave me one of those priceless gifts: the gift of time. The idea was that I would go away for two days and night to a retreat center. I'd have endless hours to think and pray and journal and get my spiritual house in order. Then the reality ...

Penny asks repetitive questions. So when, for instance, her dad was out of town last week, she persisted, "Where's Dad?"

"Pen, you know the answer to that."

"No I don't."

"Yes you do."

"Richmond."

"Right."

A few moments pass. "Mom, where's Dad?"

I finally figured out that she wasn't ...

Last week I was interviewed on the John and Kathy Show of Word FM, a Christian radio station in Pittsburgh. The interview came as a follow up to the award I received (along with my friend Ellen Painter Dollar) from the Evangelical Press Association in response to my article, ...