We Need YOU to Become a Midwife - Kendra Adkisson

   
This is so awesome!!! Sorry if some find it a bit inappropriate...but if you know midwives or are a midwife, you will understand. :) 

Happy Birthday....

Guess what? My birthday is in just 31 days!!! March 25 to be exact. And I'll be celebrating with two of my classmates, one of the Filipino midwives, and Emmaus (Georgia's oldest boy) who all have birthdays in March. It's gonna be a pretty fun birthday with all those people to share it with!!

This brings me to my birthday request...I would love to have an overflowing mailbox for my birthday!! Letters and cards and packages, oh my!! Would you help to make my birthday wonderful by sending a letter, card or package? A letter/card cost approximately 98 ¢. With packages, it's best to send one of the Priority Mail flat rate boxes. We've never had a problem getting them and they are usually cheaper than if you pack just a random box. As far as filling out the customs form...the less you put the better. Any edible things should just be listed as "confections".

Now, how about some suggestions for packages...

• COFFEE!!! Beans or ground...regular or flavored...
• Chocolate...dark...with almonds....with cherries....toffee... hey, chocolate is  chocolate
• Dried fruits....especially blueberries, strawberries, cherries, peaches, apricots, raspberries...
•  Reece's Pieces/cups
• Nuts...pecans, almonds, walnuts, macaroons, cashews....
• Beef (or deer works too!!) jerky
• Pepperoni
• Twin bings (for those who live in the Sioux City area)
• Fun baking things...we will be needing to make a FABULOUS cake since we've got so many people with birthdays!! 

These are just a few ideas, feel free to use you imagination. Now for the address...

Sara Zellmer
c/o Abundant Grace of God Maternity Center
Magsaysay, Tabuk City, Kalinga 3800
PHILIPPINES

Thanks for all your prayers and encouragement while I've been here learning how to be a midwife!!
~sara~

Worry

Anxiety has been my natural posture, my default stiffness. The way I curl my toes up, tight retreat. How I angle my jaw, braced, chisel the brow with the lines of distrust. How I don't fold my hands in prayer...weld them into tight fists of control. Always control--pseudopower from the pit. How I refuse to relinquish worry, babe a mother won't forsake, an identity. Do I hold worry close as this ruse of control, this pretense that I'm the one who will determine the course of events as I stir and churn and ruminate? Worry is the facade of taking action when prayer really is. And stressed, this pitched word that punctuates every conversation, is it really my attempt to prove how indispensable I am? Or is it more? Maybe disguising my deep fears as stress seems braver somehow. 


As I read One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp this morning I was struck by this paragraph. My friend teases me that I don't worry. But that's not true. She doesn't see it because I just do it internally, not externally. I think that if I keep all my worry on the inside...put up a facade of control, that everything will be ok. And then when things blow up I feel like a complete failure. I beat myself up on the inside, letting the enemy taking advantage of it...telling me how worthless I am because I couldn't get everything done.

This morning I read in 2 Corinthians 3:5-6 Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God, who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life. 


God has given me all that I need to acomplish each days tasks. By myself, I can do nothing. My giant to-do list will always remain just that, giant. Unless I stop worrying, and give it to God. I almost skipped my quiet time today, thinking I've got too much to do today...maybe tonight I'll read my Bible. But I'm so glad I didn't.

My to-do list is still just as big as it was before, and it still seems daunting...I don't know how I'm going to get all that I still have to do done...but you know what? Worrying will not do anything to that list!! God has made me adequate to start knocking things off that list one by one.

So, today when I begin to worry I will open my tight fists of control, take the hand of God and pray. I will tell Him of my worries, let Him take them onto His shoulders. Because really, His are stronger than mine. He has the strength to carry them...not me.

What helps you when you feel that you can't go on any more? When all you want to do is give up? When your life seems to be imploding around you? How do you open your tight fists of control?

Babies all growed up...part one

Every once in a while I get the beautiful privilege to see one of the babies I've previously caught. The next few post will be of the babies I've caught, followed by a picture or two of them all "growed" up!! Some will be when they are a month or so old, while others I've got to see when they are almost a year or more. :)

Catch # 6

This is Noralyne, so excited to be a mama!!

She named her baby after her midwife...me!! Sara was born on January 27, 2011 

was 51 cm long and weighed 3.09 kilos. Such a sweet baby!!

Here is Sara and her mama at 9 months old. Isn't she a beautiful little lady?

 Little Sara and her midwife Sara. We make quite the pair, huh? :)

 Just look into those eyes and try and tell her no.

It is so much fun seeing these babies grow up. 
Keep an eye out for more updates like this one!!

Tastes like....

So, while Tianne and I were in the market today we saw some Filipino...um...delicacies, shall we say. I was calmly and happily selecting my fruit when I heard Tianne exclaim, "What are those? Are those bats?!?!" I looked over and sure enough, half a dozen bats are hanging on strings.

For just 200 pesos I could buy myself a bat!!

 And what might you do with a bat you ask?

Eat it of course!! They taste like wild boar... or so this guy says.

Doesn't he look tasty?

They remind me of the black bats in the Black Forest....gotta love Ted Dekker!!

Fun Poem!!

I wish I was a fetus
I never would be bored
Sitting in my uterus
Swinging on my cord.

To worry granny midwives
I'd be a proper beast
I'd change position on the hour
Transverse, oblique then breech.

To student midwives I'd present
A mystifying case
I'd hide myself inside the os
And leave an empty space.

I'd tie my cord into a knot
And wave it through the cervix
I'd give the midwives such a shock
And laugh off all my vernix.

And when my membranes rupture
I'd be a right old pest
Presenting large diameters
I'd transversely arrest.

I'd tell my pal placenta
To get himself detached
To theatre then the lot of us
Would pronto be dispatched.

And when they start to caesar
I'd laugh and think "Tee hee!'
When no one else is looking
I'll come vaginally.

~*~ Author Unknown~*~

Beautiful Babies

One of the things I love most about my job is getting to see such beautiful babies. Below are just a few of my favorites...

Shanaiah born January 18, 2011weighing 3.27 kilos

Jael Grace born March 20, 2011 weighing 3.33 kilos

Ben Renz born September 9, 2011 weighing 2.61

Tarren born October 26, 2011 weighing 3.32 kilos

Crisha Loise born December 8, 2011 weighing 2.73 kilos

Zenrhan born December 21, 2011 weighing 3.04 kilos

Gabriel born December 25, 2011 weighing 2.45 kilos

Adrinne Kane born December 31, 2011 weighing 2.98 kilos