How we love.

So I'm not sure how things work in your "neck of the woods" but here (in the sometimes the South) we love people with food. We celebrate births, heal the sick and broken, grieve for losses and all around "care" for the people we love with food. It is so common in our house to get a phone call in the evening asking me which day I'd like to provide dinner for a family, that I keep some things in the house just for such occasion.

This morning I found myself in my kitchen feeling overwhelmed by all the pain felt by so many people. Not just the pain in my world, where the current task was cooking for a family who suffered a great loss and an amazaing lady who had a bad fall, but all over. Now I'm sure many would say that muffins and cookies are not going to help a thing, but its what I know. It's what I can do, it's how I can help, it's how I love.

As I mixed a batch of Martha Stewart's Oatmeal cookies and then made muffins from her banana nut recipe I couldn't help but think about the people they would feed. I am a true believer that if you make food with love, the folks who eat it will feel that love. And I hope they feel some comfort from it. So as I mixed and measured, chopped and diced, I loved and prayed (and cried a little). Because this is how we love.
Later I will make a huge pot of Chicken soup and I will be given the chance to slow down and appreciate what I have. I will chop more veggies and tend to a pot of simmering soup while my healthy, happy (most of the time), warm, clothed, loved littles run around my house and through my kitchen. They will surely be loud and messy. Big sister will probably make baby sister cry.  I will stir, and chop, and pray, and love. How truely blessed am I?