Lately I've noticed that my activities with James comprise a new element - he's been playing and interacting, goofing around in such a way that it's just fun to watch him have fun.

I can say now, "James, we're going to the park!" and see something click in his head. Going for his shoes, he knows he's in for a good time. Once he sees the playground, another light goes on in his little head. It's play time!

He's playing much more with "big kid" equipment. Climbing the steps in the tots play area, and going down the tiny slide. But it's all still completely novel, and he approaches it all with some awe and reticence.

He's also just a goofball. He likes to stand and stomp his feet in place, doing a little dance. When he sees something he's really excited about - a truck, or another kid maybe - he babbles some gibberish in an authoritative squawk and points to the sky with his right arm thrust up in the air, and keeps it there while walking toward the object of interest. He also prances around the kitchen now with his hands clasped behind his back, or just one tucked behind there - our little Napoleon.

It's a whole new thing to watch him having fun like this, and our activities are much more geared toward getting him out and letting him explore. No longer content with the limited movement the indoors' provide, he's a boy on the move. And, I suspect, the adventuring will only continue, reaching heights for which I'm not ready!

James "chasing birds" at the school field.

Nostalgia

Two weeks ago, Ted and I had the chance to "walk down memory lane" together. Actually, it's more like we ran laps around it!

The location for this nostalgic jog: Elk Grove Park, just about 35 minutes from Carmichael. The occasion: 105.3's free mega pet event Pet-a-Palooza.

Wait a second, you're rightly wondering. What does a pet event in Elk Grove have to do with YOU, Katharine Oswald?

On the surface, nothing. Except that the final flourish on Pet-a-Palooza's day-long event was a (free) concert by HANSON. Yep, as in the Hanson brothers, from Tulsa, OK: Isaac, Taylor, Zac. The three males that took up oodles of my time and creative energy in junior and high school :)

Sixteen years after ripping their posters off my bedroom wall, I got to revisit Hanson's music at an outdoor concert with my One and Only.  He good-naturedly went along, and we turned this into a outing that involved some special Oswald nostalgia to top it off.

First - Hanson. My obsession with the Tulsa trio lasted way too long and was infamous among close family and friends. I don't recall now how many times I saw them in concert (again, 16 years have passed), nor how many times I met them in person. (You could say I stalked them... if visiting their hometown and chasing them around L.A. counts as stalking...), but my immersion in the world of Hanson fandom was complete. I was a high school student by day, and a Hanson junkie by night (I built and curated my own Hanson fan website - 'nuff said :)

This is where the title of the post should be changed to "Confessions of a Former Hanson Fanatic." But, we'll save some of those soppy and hysterical details for another time. Suffice it to say, I had all their music memorized; I knew their birthdays by heart; their favorite colors, songs, etc. I loved them from Mmmbop (13 for me) till wedding bells chimed for their lead singer, Taylor (18), so it's no wonder that their music and personalities played a big role in my teenage "upbringing." It's also no wonder I needed a 16-year break to get "sober!"

But our afternoon in Elk Grove Park was a fun one. The music they write continues to be fun. It's got a lot more funk mixed in with the pop/rock. I told Ted that probably the biggest reason Hanson isn't considered "cool" is because they don't appear grungy, unhappy, or addicted to drugs. (That, and that they looked and sounded like girls when their first songs flew to the top of the charts worldwide. That's a hard image to shake.)

The park holds other memories near and dear to me. It's in this park, nearly 9 years ago, that Ted and I had our Faux Wedding celebration. Orchestrated by mother-in-law Lee Ann, it was a hilarious affair complete with washer wedding rings and a golden retriever "ring bearer." I wore a thrift store "wedding dress," and it was all just absolutely goofy.

More important to Ted's childhood is the location of the park. He ran through Elk Grove park as a teen, and his childhood home is just a mile or so away. Elk Grove Jr. High and High School, where he attended, are just across the street. We don't often get to visit this place as a a couple. But each time we have, it's been full of sweet and wacky reminiscences. 

A post-concert "selfie" at Elk Grove Park.

Our sweet boy

Well it's hard to believe; he's here! And he's changed our world completely. James Oswald was born May 1, 2017 at 12:59 a.m.

James Benedict Oswald, weighed 7 lbs 10 oz at birth, 21 inches long

Yesterday he turned 10 weeks old, and we commemorated this with an early photo shoot by Ted's brother P.J. who owns his own photography business.

Our sweet boy, who has gone by the epithet "Sweet Baby James" (from James Taylor's famous song) since birth, is smiling and changing a little all the time. It's amazing that the wild news we learned on a Friday night in Haiti 11 months ago has now been realized in the form of this beautiful guy.

Meet James!

(All photos by P.J. Oswald of Fits and Stops Photography)

Valentine

Happy Valentine's. Whether you have a partner to smooch, good friends to party with, or chocolates to indulge in, I sense God encouraging me to take stock of this past year and to be thankful for all the incredible, sweet moments He has offered us.

With love,

the Oswalds

(photo: Wedding Day, Aug. 15. 2009)

Walking through

I have been in transition for some time now. It started last September, when Ted and I found out we were pregnant, and I left Haiti less than two weeks later - saying au revoir to friends and co-workers for an indeterminate amount of time.

Yet we did know that our timeline was changing. Fast. I arrived in San Diego a bit in shock, running on the adrenaline of the very quick, very "adult"  decisions we had made in less than a week's time - a record for us. Since seeing our little one's ultrasound and hearing his heartbeat the Wednesday prior, we had decided that I would leave the country, and we would both end our term with MCC on December 23rd. It seemed like the wise, prudent thing to do since we knew we desired to have our baby and set up shop in the U.S. for this next "chapter."

And now we had three months ahead with us mostly being apart. Ted "held down the fort" with our work in Haiti. He enjoyed Sundays with our church community, read a lot, dove into new exploits like bread baking and crepe making. And I was thrust into the throes of  'transition' - sort of getting a grip on this whole 'culture shock' and 'values shock' thing as we awaited our ultimate reunion in late December.

The interim period held a lot of gems. (I will share about one of them soon here.) But my stress about the uncertainty of the future was like the ringmaster calling the shots on my activities in my day-to-day life.

Fast forward to today - February 13 - nearly 6 months later. I am in a very different place, emotionally, and I am starting to come to a new, less frantic look on our reality. Ted and I are together. He is now 7 weeks back from Haiti, and I know he is going through transitions of his own.

So 6 months of transition, and counting. You might say, so what? People have surely been through much longer times of uncertainty and even unemployment. Yet all the while I have this baby growing in me, inching along to a due date in late April. We have a new reality coming, and he's coming, ready or not! While we are thrilled, this adds a layer of stress to my day-to-day that makes the waiting, the uncertainty, very hard to maneuver.

Yet my solace comes in knowing that things will work out somehow. We may not know yet where our next steps will be - the job, the home - but we haven't been cast aside or overlooked by our Father.

Seeking Him.

Haiti in August (I may have been pregnant then without
realizing it.)

San Diego County (Cardiff), near where we are currently based.

Poetry: from the journal

I found this written in my journal about a year ago, after we had returned to Haiti for the start of the new year:

Bleach water in my hair,

sounds of roosters

hot, sticky.

That feeling of being on the frontier,

but in a cool, ceramic tile oasis

It is morning #1: back in Haiti.

And this, from my journal close to two years ago. Ted had encouraged me to be bold and to try to write down some poetry. I reflected on experiences with a neighborhood boy:

Instead of hope,

money.

Instead of a smile, or kinship

a "solution" offered.

I can't talk; I can't give you more.

Who am I? And what are we?

I guess, we are actually the same.

Tied by a line.

You are my brother; that is all.

We are family.

Kinship, explored.

Expounded.

Brought forth

into it's actual meaning.

So this is who we are, who I am.

Live, therefore.

Offer the smile,

Be brave.

Live in the light - whole,

not afraid.

When I first met Tanis, he asked me for a bike. Then he asked me to buy him a ball, a new phone, pay his school fees. I couldn't meet all of his needs, nor did I feel it was my place to do so. But he came by ever so often - knocked on the gate. And we would chat in the driveway. I know he has it rough. And I often struggled with what to do - what could I offer him? Besides a peanut butter sandwich, and some time? The question didn't always have to be as complicated as I made it to be. I think that simply chatting with him at times was the answer.

So, he came by and we would 'shoot the breeze.' The one neighbor we actually chatted with regularly over our first several months in Haiti.

From Nairobi to Haiti and Back

A reflection of mine from a few weeks back:

I feel very full at the moment, thinking how life has woven moments into memorable patterns over my adult life. About eight and a half years ago, I spent two formative months in Nairobi. (I know, “formative” is the label you put on something that you don’t know how to adequately describe; it communicates “it was complicated, but meant something beautiful.”) I spent a lot of this time on my own or in the company of a friend, Lisa's, dear daughter and her nanny. I traveled the city by matatu and walked for much of my daily commute. Lisa connected me with friends and ministries that I explored on my own over a two-month period. It was a time of introspection and processing for me.

View reflected in a mirror from our lodgings in Jacmel, Haiti (photo: Anna Vogt)

Ted and I have now lived in Haiti for two years, working with Mennonite Central Committee. In May, Ted and I spent two days in the beautiful seaside town of Jacmel, in Haiti’s south. We traveled there with two visiting MCC colleagues who wanted to explore more of Haitian geography after a full work week. We stayed at a charming bed and breakfast that we had heard about many times in the past 6 months from a friend in Port-au-Prince.

The bed and breakfast turned out to be more lovely than we could have imagined. Janet, the owner, put so much thought into the design and aesthetic of the space. She is also a wonderful chef, and presented us with a delicious breakfast spread both mornings.

Janet used to work with MCC in present day South Sudan. She also raised her kids in Haiti. Most recently, she worked with Save the Children in Sub-Saharan Africa. When I learned this, several things clicked at once. My good friend Lisa who hosted me in Nairobi also worked with Save the Children. I asked Janet, and it turns out she and Lisa are dear friends. I couldn’t believe it! Standing in Janet’s kitchen in a small town in southern Haiti, we make a connection that weaves together some very significant moments in my life.

With Janet at her beautiful Jacmel home and B&B

Back to today: I got an e-mail this morning from a colleague who heads an international organization here in Port-au-Prince; she is a friend who has collaborated with us on some significant projects since the start of our term with MCC. Apparently, she is in Nairobi at the moment, and she informed me via this e-mail that she “spent the morning walking through a forest in Nairobi” with Kristen and Wawa Chege.

Kristen and Wawa are the couple that held the advocacy position in Haiti before Ted and I started with MCC. They led our orientation in July 2014 when we were preparing to “take over” their roles. Wawa is Kenyan and they have lived in Nairobi with their two children since they left Haiti two years ago. I may be wrong, but if my hunch is right, our colleague would have been walking with them through the very arboretum that I frequented during my time in Nairobi, which is where Ted and I are pictured below:

My and Ted's reunion in Nairobi, after about 6 months apart
(December 2007)

So, through these few recent encounters we have traveled from Haiti to Nairobi and back again. Beautiful connections that wrap these parts of my life and the world together.

Mèsi.