You're stressed out. You're overwhelmed. You're running to catch up. You're amazed that there is yet another load of laundry to fold. Or maybe I should be writing this in the first person. Here's the scenario of our past few days: Our babysitter is sick. William threw up (not only did he throw up, but ...

Marilee (pronounced "merrily") turns one today. As I wrote in our Christmas letter:

Her name fits her well, as she is the happiest baby we've ever known. We often remark that she must sneak out at night and take classes in how to be cute. She claps readily, giggles at her older brother and sister, coos ...

Yesterday William looked out the window and said, "Mom, why did Jesus decide to make it rain this morning?"

I cocked my head. Not only was I unsure how to answer him, I also wondered where the question came from. "Well, I guess Jesus just thought it was a good day for rain." Right. Sure. William seemed ...

Over the course of the next few weeks, I'm going to run a series of posts that offer thoughts for cultivating "religious spirituality" in the midst of our busy everyday lives. These thoughts are meant to serve as a companion (or maybe, for those of you who haven't read it, as an introduction) to my ...

I don't want to share the series of bad parenting moments I experienced this weekend. The times I cursed my children under my breath, the times I yelled, the times my whole body felt fraught with tension and anger and exhaustion. I don't want to share the story of feeling discouraged by Penny's horrible ...

On the morning of Penny's birthday last Friday, I picked up my "prayer card" for her. It's a record of my hopes and dreams for her from the past year. It includes a verse from Psalm 1 that I've prayed for her more or less since she was born:

Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wickedor ...

I used to think that infancy was the only time when sleep was a problem for parents. I was ready for a few months of getting up every few hours. I wasn't ready for years on end of interrupted slumber because someone has a cold or needs water or needs help going potty or is just not tired even though ...

I wanted to write a lyrical essay about our week in New Orleans for Thanksgiving. Something about the humidity and the colors on the houses and the Spanish moss and the streetcars. Something about laughter and good food and going to the zoo and family. Something about why travel is worth it even when ...

A few final words, in the wake of the essays and discussion surrounding Christians who are pro-life and pro-choice, respectively. First of all, a big thank you to Karen and Ellen for the time and effort you both put into writing these pieces, engaging comments, and then following up with further answers ...

What restrictions would you put on reproductive choice?

Fervent pro-choice advocates face a dilemma as reproductive technologies such as prenatal diagnosis, IVF, PGD, and surrogacy become more sophisticated and ubiquitous. The ability of parents to select the gender of their children, via either preimplantation ...

We have three more posts related to abortion–Ellen Painter Dollar's answers to my questions, which will appear here this morning and this afternoon (and, in longer form, on Ellen's blog Choices That Matter). And then tomorrow morning I will post a summary of what I've learned from this exchange. For ...

Two weeks ago, I posted two essays about abortion. In the first one, Karen Swallow Prior articulated "Why I Am Pro-Life." In the second, Ellen Painter Dollar wrote "Why I Am Pro-Choice." Both of these women are friends and colleagues, and I am very grateful to them and to those of you who read this ...

I had an interview with Stephanie Riggs of Divine Calling in Denver last week. We had a chance to talk about what makes life interesting, the hard things that other people say, and how Penny is doing in kindergarten, among other topics. You can listen to the whole interview here.

I'm thankful for God's sweetness to us, which sounds very cheesy, but I use the word "sweet" because it is unnecessary and yet so kind of God to make sure we know we are loved. It has happened this year through answered prayer, through other people's words, through songs and Bible verses, and unexpected ...

Much thanks to Ellen Painter Dollar and Karen Swallow Prior for their posts last week on Why I Am Pro-Life (Karen) and Why I Am Pro-Choice (Ellen). And great thanks to all of you who read and commented with respect, thoughtfulness, and genuine concern for both the women and children involved in this ...

I became interested in reproductive ethics for very personal reasons: Nine years ago, my husband and I underwent preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD, which is in vitro fertilization with genetic screening) to try to conceive a child who would not inherit my disabling bone disorder. In an e-mail discussion ...

I am a Christian. And I am pro-life.

These two labels don't always or necessarily go together. They certainly don't always go together in practice: I know both pro-choice Christians and pro-life secularists. And for many people, the labels don't necessarily bond in theory since about ...

Abortion has been legal across the United States for forty years now, and yet the debate continues about both the ethics and the legality of the deliberate action to end the life of a fetus in the womb. There have been casualties, literally, on both sides. Last month, two workers in an abortion clinic ...

For the first time in I don't know how long, we spent the weekend as a family. We didn't visit anyone else. We didn't run any errands. We even skipped swimming lessons on Saturday mornings because we realized that they provoke so much stress for Peter as he tries to cajole Penny into a shower that it ...

I wrote last week about our upcoming move to a small boarding school in Connecticut, and I wrote about my fears related to that move, fears which focused upon Penny's schooling. As we were contemplating the move, a friend said, "I don't think you want to have a Penny-centered family." We don't want ...