While my husband was alive, we came up with a great idea to write a story based on the wonder of raising our kids in the country. It seemed so right, like an apostolate. We knew we had been blessed in a mighty way, and that God had guided us to our little place and helped us to learn the amazing skills needed to garden and manage a mini-farm. John took to homesteading like a fish to water. Other homeschool dads used to call him “Our Amish Paul Bunyan.” So, it felt natural to share our joy and success with others. I wrote stories based on what we did everyday: meals, working our little garden, nurturing nature, loving kids… loving God. John was going to create the illustrations since he had a wonderful knack for drawing. Except he couldn’t. Leukemia intervened and that success was put off…forever it seemed.
After he passed away, I kept feeling tugged to see our project through to completion. But how? Well… God has ways. I’m not sure if John was whispering in anyone’s ear, but somehow or another I met up with a wonderful illustrator who knew exactly what we had imagined. She put her talents to work and the story unfolded, better than I had imagined. It’s just been published under the title: The Adventures of Tally-Ho. Tally-Ho was what John called our fourth daughter because she loved to gallop around the house on her imaginary horse. How we used to laugh about that. What a wonder imagination brings to life!
As I state in the dedication to the story, John’s love made the stories true. His vision is what made our real life family possible. As I contemplate the finished product, I wonder what God will do with this little book. Surely He has a plan. I very much doubt that it has anything to do with making money. I pray it has something to do with loving families.
I am studying Creative Writing for Entertainment in a Masters Program and I feel like I have been assaulted by the weirdness of our entertainment world. God have mercy on our souls for what we place in front of children as humorous or serious drama. There are wonderful writers out there – may God give them strength!
So Tally-Ho, like a newborn, has been placed on the amazingly huge Amazon shelf with some pretty odd stuff. I pray that it will be a light and joy to someone’s soul. Perhaps it will be a vision of what might be…a hope, a dream, a longing that yearns to be fulfilled. Real dreams don’t die…they grow.
I think John would agree.
As the hot sun beats down upon us, lush 9 foot corn stalks breathe out their earthy, green scent, and humongous humidity make me wonder if rural Illinois should be called the biggest-corn-growing-jungle-of-the-world, I am trying to wrap my mind around the fact that a new school year and all of winter’s thrills stands just before us. We best be ready.
I once heard someone say: “My grandparents could trust society to support their morals – today we are undermined at every step.”
Setting aside the fact that the one and only time I ever consider entering politics is under the inauspicious dream of ending the tyranny of our biannual time-change, I do look forward to seasonal changes. God knows us so well. Humanity needs change, yet we also need consistency. Somehow our Creator manages to address these concerns through the seasons which occur regularly yet are never mundane.
I like reading children’s books to my kids and we have recently enjoyed many a cozy afternoon reading through: The Little House stories of Laura Ingalls Wilder, Wind in the Willows by Kennneth Grahame, Across Five Aprils by Irene Hunt, Enemy Brothers by Constance Savery, The Borrowers series by Mary Norton, The Black Fox of Lorne by Marguerite De Angeli, and Adam of the Road by Elizabeth Janet Gray and several biographies of famous people including: Benjamin Franklin, Marie Antoinette, Elizabeth of Hungry, and Pope Pius the X. Now, I get to include a charming children’s book by an author I just met, virtually anyway, over the internet. As Sue lives in Australia and I live in the U.S., our meeting was one of those serendipitous joys of the modern world. We both love to write books and read great stories. Here is hers:
We home-school, but I would say that we respond to the vocational call of home-living also. It is not just about educating my kids in math, science, and literature though those things are invaluable but also about participating in life so that everything we do educates our hearts, souls, and minds. Home, school, and life all blend together in a harmony of existence where one does not end and the other begins.