2018 has already been so very full – full of life, and joy, and challenge, and goodbye – and it is f-l-y-i-n-g by. I literally just pulled the Christmas cards off the wall, because how tacky is that, when Easter is next week? 

But hey, I’m so glad you’re here. Let’s sit a minute and catch up over coffee – everything is always better with coffee. Still recovering from Daylight Savings? Yeah, we are too…

Health & Care

We ended 2017 celebrating Mike’s graduation and a really wonderful holiday season marked most emphatically by the absence of our regular round-robin of winter illness. We’ve been pretty militant this flu season. I don’t know if it’s been by my own neurosis or God’s mercy, but we are so grateful our little brood has seemingly missed it this year.

It’s funny because, you’d think that would mean we haven’t been to the doctor much, but you’d be wrong in that assumption. We got new insurance at the end of last year and a new pediatrician – who we love – who is also exceptionally thorough. So much so, I have been buried under a mountain of parent homework trying to dig myself out enough to make it to the next appointment.

Replace all your fire alarms.
Find a new allergist.
Feed them less protein.
Secure all the medical records.
Find out if your Brita filters lead.
* Wait, what? *

Some of his suggestions I’ve taken, some I have flat out ignored for lack of time, but really what I am left with from this transition is an extreme sense of gratitude. For amazing insurance and a warm, welcoming, new medical home for my boys. For incredible in-network doctors that are literally minutes from my house. For a Grandma who loves her babies and is willing to take off work to help their momma out.

So much gratitude…and also so much exhaustion.

All together we have been through four unsuccessful ear cleanings (which deserves a post all on it’s own), three specialists, two ultrasounds, and one outpatient surgery. Add this to early intervention intake, weekly speech and developmental therapy sessions, the allergist I have *not* called, and the second out-patient procedure scheduled for next month, and there is my year-to-date.

I guess I don’t feel so bad about those Christmas cards after all.

Goodbye for now

My Great-Uncle John passed away in his sleep shortly after recovering from the flu (of all things) at the beginning of February. He missed his 96th birthday by nine days. Beside hearing loss and failing vision, he was actually very healthy, which makes his passing seem that much more surreal. I still drive by the nursing home several times a week and think it’s been a while since I last visited before I remember he’s gone.

His passing marks the end of an era for our family. My Grandma and Grandpa, and his brothers Joe and John, were always together. So much so, we lovingly referred to them as the Fab Four. Grandma passed away ten years ago, right before I got pregnant with Elijah, and Grandpa passed shortly after he was born. But Uncle Joe and Uncle John lived long enough, and healthy enough, to know my boys well.

And mourning is so different with kids. 

There’s all of my stuff to work through, and all of theirs too, and I find my heart broken by this for all different reasons. Of the Fab Four, my boys knew Uncle John the best, and his presence is missed. Initially, I want to scoop them up in my arms to shield them from all that is raw and real, but I know it would be such short-sighted protection. The harder thing, and what I want most, is to help them walk through this transition well – with perspective, and faith, and the hope we have in our resurrected Jesus – because that resurrection is for us too.

How incredible that we are just days away from celebrating Holy Week. 

I like to imagine the welcome Uncle John received from my Grandparents and Uncle Joe, and any sorrow I carry is quickly tempered by knowing our goodbyes are really just a “see you later.” I know I will see them again. Thanks be to God.

Celebrate & Thanks

Despite the transition and loss we’ve felt in the first few months of this year, there has been an equal amount of things to celebrate. Some have been party worthy like birthdays and anniversaries, and others have been more subtle – the kind of celebrating that comes only because you’re intentionally looking for it.

Taxes filed with a refund coming.
Mother-son dance at the park district.
Fitting into an old dress.
Paid projects that cover the exact amount of baseball registration.

I keep a note for every month of the year in Evernote to help me keep track of things I’ve accomplished, things I want to remember, and things I am grateful for. This is just a small way for me to keep perspective. Whenever I feel like I’m getting no where with my writing, I check the note and remember the progress I’ve made this year. Whenever I’m feeling a little unsettled and ungrateful, I look through my notes to take stock of all the blessings, both big and small, I have to be thankful for.

Such a small ritual makes such a huge difference in my heart.

And there are so many things we have to celebrate.

Writing Work & Heart Work

I’ve been a stay-at-home mom since Elijah was born in 2009, and started homeschooling in 2014, but I’ve never completely stopped working. For a while, I continued working for the District office in Carlinville remotely and picked up a variety of side jobs when they were available. It was a blessing, and it certainly served a purpose for that season, but it was never really plan A for that extra time in my day. I wanted to get paid for writing, and it felt like that dream might actually start taking off in 2015 with the release of my first self-published book, but I got pregnant and had another baby and put the dream on hold.

Then in the last year, we turned a corner as a family. Micah started sleeping better at night, the early parenting fog lifted from my brain, and we started setting aside Wednesday evenings for me to work (special thanks to Mike and my Mom for wrangling the kiddos for me). I started getting writing jobs – a paid post here, a custom script there. I updated my website and opened an online shop that actually has sales! While these little victories have not changed much for our family financially, they have made all the difference for my heart.

This thing I have always been reaching toward, praying for, believing could be possible, is slowly, finally happening.

It is so easy to praise God when the story is finished, when the project is done, when the loose ends are all tied up. But I want to be marked by my praise in the process – when the journey is hard, and messy, and still left unfinished. This is where I am today, and I want these moments to be marked with thankfulness, because God is so incredibly faithful.

Beyond what I can even imagine…

If all of that weren’t proof enough of God’s goodness during this season, He does more – the kind of more Paul talks about in Ephesians 3 – more than I could even ask or imagine.

When we moved from Chicago to Carlinville I left a staff position at a church doing work I loved in creative ministry. I treasured what we did in Carlinville, but it was different, and when I became a mom I pretty much believed everything I had left behind in my early twenties was over and gone. I started blogging and writing, and while I’ve found extreme fulfillment in my life as it is today, my desire to do creative ministry beyond my writing has never completely gone away.

It was never something I asked God for. I have prayed so many prayers over the last nine years for bigger things – family things, provision type things – that it never entered my mind to bring this one thing to Him.

But He still saw.
He still knew.
He still believed in the unspoken desires of my heart.

And He’s made a way where only He could.

Last December I was able to help with a video project for our Christmas Eve services (you can watch around minute 12). In March I led a breakout session for our women’s retreat. This Good Friday I’ll get to be part of our live services in a way I never thought would ever happen again.

The tears are flowing freely now because He has met even the most secret desires of my heart, and it increases my faith to believe Him for all of the other practical things we’ve been waiting for.

How are you?

How is God speaking to you lately?

Are you doing anything fun for spring break?

What are you most excited for this Easter?

We’ll talk soon…