The Road to NOW

I'm starting a journey.

I think we're all usually on some kind of journey in life whether we realize it while it's happening or not. But this one that I'm about to embark on is very intentional and I'm aware of it and pretty excited about it.

I just recently finished reading the book "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp. It's an exceptional book about her personal journey through the lessons that brought her to a place in her life where she could be consistently grateful and content. Which is a HUGE feat. Let me disclaim that I personally HATE her writing style. It's all crazy and choppy and abstract and she straight up refuses to use pronouns like "my" or "his" or use her children's names which drives me absolutely bonkers. But once I got used to her style, I was able to enjoy it. It's like the Christian movie "Fireproof"...once you realize that nobody acting in that movie is about to be up for an Academy Award, you can actually relax and enjoy the story line instead of feeling awkward every time someone speaks.

Without going into too much detail recounting the book, Ann Voskamp basically describes all the ways that keeping a continual awareness of our blessings and maintaining an attitude of thankfulness is like a wellspring of deep joy for ALL situations, even the ones that are crappy. At first I was very skeptical like right, who's going to tackle this giant concept? Who REALLY gets this?? But by the end, I got it. It's like I just had to flip my thinking upside down. Once we realize that we're not OWED anything, we're not entitled to anything, and we don't deserve anything...EVERYTHING becomes a gift. Each moment is a blessing directly from God, even if that moment feels frustrating or annoying or exasperating. It's still what the Lord is choosing to give us and it's up to us to thank Him for what He knows is best.

Of course, that is easier said than done and it's easier in some moments than it is in others.

But even as someone who absolutely LOVES my life, I am so often just trying to make it through the days. Waste time until bedtime. Sometimes the days seem to drag on forever but then all of a sudden a month has gone by and I can't believe it.

Do I love my job as a mom?

Yes.

Do I adore my husband and children more than anything?

Yes.

Do I appreciate my life and my blessings?

Yes.

Do I find it immensely irritating when people ask themselves questions and then answer them?

You have no idea.

But still. I wake up WAY too many mornings just wondering what in the world I'm going to do to pass the time today without two toddlers going crazy in my house. And I hate that. I want to be present in every moment because I know these moments will be gone much too quickly. I want to appreciate my days for whatever they are, whether they're boring or stressful or tiring or crazy. So strategy to achieve that goal is to train my heart to become thankful in every moment and situation by thanking God for every blessing that I notice. I'm going to write them down in a journal (or two or three) and see if I can get to 1,000 (that's what Voskamp does in her book). And my hope is that by the time I get to 1,000 written blessings I will have obtained the heart habit of looking for and noticing God's gifts in the (seemingly) ordinary minutes and hours and days of my life, and therein turning the mundane to the miraculous.

My God is so good. I know that in my marrow, but it's about time I start noticing His goodness even when I'm frazzled and pissed. Can I get an Amen??

Ok, I might as well start right now, publicly. Here are my first five written blessings in no particular order and of no ranking importance:

1) Ella's sweet sweaty curls when she wakes up from a summer nap

2) A cool, breezy morning at the playground with good friends and our many offspring

3) The joy of watching friends' bellies swell with life

4) Buying a pair of size 8 jeans and actually zipping them

5) Smoothies made with fresh fruit from the market

Life is good, is it not? Thanks for taking my first steps with me.

Failure and Change

It's been recently brought to my attention that I am a total failure as a blogger. And I was neither shocked nor offended by this opinion. But let me explain the reason for my failure. The problem is that I am a total stuffer. As in, I stuff my thoughts and feelings so as to avoid drama and tough conversations. My entire upbringing was largely defined by drama and tough conversations, so my instinct is to avoid those shenanigans at all costs. So when it comes to blogging I always just figure that nothing's going on and I have nothing to say.

Well at this point nothing could be further from the truth. Actually, it's maybe 50% truth. EVERYTHING'S going on, and I have nothing to say. Welcome to my life.

Joe always says that the only two descriptive words I have in my vocabulary are "nice" and "good".

"What do you think about these?"

"Nice."

"How was your day?"

"Good."

"How do you feel about American politics with relevance to Christianity?"

"Good."

"What do you think is the solution to all the injustice going on the world today?"

"We should be nice."

You get the picture. So now I will attempt to explain the last 3 months of my life and use slightly more descriptive words to convey my feelings about it.

First, Joe quit his job. He was really good at what he did but it just wasn't his dream. I know this is probably true of most people with the job that they're in, and heck, it's a JOB. The purpose of having a job is to make money to be able to live and support a family. But it doesn't always have to end there. He's got so much talent and I'm continuously impressed by the way his mind works when it comes to business and entrepreneurship. So he talked about quitting for a long time and had made up his mind that he was going to do it but was feeling tentative about when and how. This went on for a few months and finally I just got a little fed up. I thought if he was going to leave me at home with two toddlers every damn day, then he better at least be doing good work! So I told him one morning "I feel like you leave for work every day but you're not actually working or accomplishing anything." And that day he quit. I assumed it was a largely selfish standpoint for me. As a family, we need him to make our income, so of course he should have a job. But I thought he better have a great reason for leaving us every day, not just a hum drum redundant thing.

So now people ask me what his new job is and I have to answer that I don't actually know. God's blessed us so much in that Joe is able to work along side his dad, which is something he's always wanted to do. But he's able to do his "own thing" (which I believe might actually be his job title). He's consulting for a lot of different companies (which I think means that they pay him to give them good advice??) and I know he sometimes sits in an office and then other times he goes to meetings. And I know I get pissed if he's home later than 5pm. I already said I was selfish.

Ok, so that happened. Big change.

Also, we're moving.

One day my sweet crazy husband came home and said "I have some people coming to look at the house at 6:00" (this was at about 4:30). And I said "what do you mean 'look at the house'?" And he said "like to buy it." Right after completely freaking out, I made dinner, cleaned the house, freaked out some more, got really crabby, and then pretended to be a gracious hostess while some people came to look through our house. Long story short, they bought the house and we had to hurry up and find a new one. There are, of course, many reasons why this whole thing actually made a lot of sense and why our marriage didn't crumble over it, but I will spare my lovely readers the details and just ask you to trust me. So it came down to the wire, but we found a new house in time and now we're just waiting to close on both houses. We'll be Penfield residents in about a month! I'm pumped.

Also, we have a baby on the way.

It is not the fruit of my womb, we've talked about this, we're still in the middle of our adoption. Sort of stuck stagnant lately and I don't want to talk about it. But we have a baby on the way and we don't know who and we don't know when and we don't know from where. But we know our God is TRUSTWORTHY and good and this was HIS idea so that is where we rest.

Also, my babies are turning two years old in a few weeks. Oh good grief, how did that happen?? I feel like their first year was definitely the longest year of my life but I don't even know where the last 12 months have gone. It feels so fast and I just want them to stay small forever but alas, they are growing rapidly and talking CONSTANTLY and continuing to capture my heart day by day. They are my sweetest blessing and I am working my dream job by raising them.

So we are in a season of change and unknowing. And honestly, it's good for my soul. I know most people say they hate change but I love it. In addition to the drama and tough conversations which plagued my childhood...that time of life was also characterized by a lot of unpredictability. So I reside very comfortably in an often-changing environment. I actually tend to feel like something is wrong if I've been in the same routine for too long. So I'm enjoying all this for the most part, it's kind of a rush.

And I promise to try to be less of a blogging failure in the future.