A Bowl Full of Cherries

Life really is a bowl full of cherries around here.

I was looking back at photos I have taken in the past week and I have so much to be thankful for.

Here's my top ten list of favorite memories in the past week:

#10 The service project we did with our homeschool co-op...planting small trees and plants in front of our church with my kids.  It was a lot of hard work but also rewarding showing the kids that it is good to give back.

#9 Spending many special moments on a retreat with this sweet girl.

 

#8  Finding four comfy pairs of shoes on sale...and getting two of them for FREE!

 

#7  Jamie playing MY SONG for his students and their parents at the recital on Tuesday night.

#6  Little Man's first piano recital.

 

#5  Watching him teach her to play "all the songs I know"!

#4  The song he wrote for me... (just like his dad).

 

#3  This ladybug.

 

#2  Picking (and eating) these lovelies in my own front yard with my kids.

 

#1  Promises from a loving God.

Hotel Living

I'm writing today from the lovely Hyatt Place Hotel in south Santa Fe.  Why?  Just a little getaway for my oldest daughter and I.  It has been a great trip for us.  The main reason for the trip has been to go through a rite of passage ceremony   ritual sacrifice service   purity curriculum.  We also did a little shopping!  And eating (food which I did not have to cook).

I have to say, telling someone (my own daughter) about some of the hard things in life  is much easier when you push the play button and let someone else on a cd do it for you and then do a little follow-up.  That sounds a little bit lazy but I have been dreading this conversation for some time.  They don't give you this info when you bring that tiny wriggling being home from the hospital.  You somehow have to figure it all out on your own, or worse, throw them to the wolves let their peers inform them.  It could get MESSY!

I'm not going to share all the details of this experience with you...or anyone...for that matter.  It has been a special bonding time with her that I would not trade and would recommend to anyone facing a daughter of this age.  We have had some beautifully candid conversations.  And more than anything, I've gotten to hang out with my oldest daughter for two days without her siblings and she felt special.

Plus, I got a really cute purse!  Enough said!

Have a fantastic Memorial Day Weekend!

Inside... Outside... Upside Down

Life feels a little bit like something out of a Dr. Seuss book around here right now. I'm doing surprisingly well with it.  I suppose living with four other people who are seriously MESSY will tend to either drive you crazy or help you conform to their way of living.  I guess lately, I've chosen to give up the fight and give in to my inner-messiness. (Not that I was ever the cleanest person in the world but I do have some standards!)  We've had a lot going on so this is just the best way to deal with it for me.

There's a Crib in My Living Room

I hate it when I can't find things.  Most recently, we were having a garage sale so I decided it was time to sell the crib.  It is a great crib and has been super for the last two of our kids but I am not attached to it.  As far as I know, there will be no more babies born to us and we are great with that.  The Little Man would really like a brother of any kind but for now that is not in the plan and hopefully never from my body.  Back to losing things though, I got ready to sell the crib...pulled it all outside for the yard sale and decided it might sell better if it were put together.  Guess what! No hardware could be found for the crib.  Who really wants a crib with no hardware?  All the bolts to hold the bed together were nowhere to be found and I didn't have time, hours before the sale, to search.  So we brought it all back inside.  Unfortunately (and fortunately) I had listed the crib in my newspaper ad for the sale.  A lady came by asking about it and I explained the whole story to her.  She wanted it anyway.  Fantastic! I figured I would finish the sale and be able to look for the missing pieces.  And believe me, I tried.  And tried. And tried.  I have looked everywhere for that bag of bolts.  They are not here.  I have no idea where they could be.  And, you can't just buy crib parts at the local hardware store...they are special.

Thank goodness for the internet!  What did we ever do without it?  I googled replacement crib parts...and Voila, there they were.  I chose one of the sites to inquire about my crib pieces and talked on the phone to the nicest "southern gal" named Paula who quickly sent me all the parts...only they weren't the right ones.  PAULA!!! I called Paula to fix the problem and I've now returned the first set and am waiting to see if the second set will work before handing all the crib parts over to the nice (patient) lady from my sale.  In the meantime, the crib sits (in pieces), for all to see, in the middle of my living room.  Thankfully, the people who would mind don't matter and the ones who matter don't mind...and not too many people have been over to worry about it anyway. 

There's Also a Toilet in My Bathtub

We are getting ready to sell our home of the past ten years.  A fact, that some people in our family are having a hard time with.  I waiver between wanting to cry over it, because of all the memories we have here, and wanting to throw my own personal party.  Being a homeowner is hard work!  Hopefully it will be on the market sometime this summer.  So, Jamie has been doing many home projects in order to maximize the value of our cute little house on a beautiful canyon with soon to be a lovely-mostly-remodeled bathroom and hopefully a spanking new roof due to hail damage!  Not to mention, that any day, it will have a new paint job (outside) and other new features.  Any takers? A lot of these repairs and re-dos are projects we've been talking about doing for several years.  I'm finding it ironic and a little bit sad that we are making our house beautiful for someone else to live in it.  Oh well.  Anyway, there is a toilet in my bathtub (not the same toilet from my Superman post)because Jamie has most recently been working on the bathroom floor, which is looking great btw.  I'm hoping that the toilet will make it back to its appropriate location soon because both it and the tub are a little hard to use this way.  Oh the places we'll go!

I know that these aren't the only things that are upside down in my world, because when you look at life,  isn't it  really a little bit like a Seuss book everyday?  They are, however, the easy things to laugh about.  Everyone needs a little more laughter in their life. 

What is upside down in your world today?

Disclaimer:  When I said 4 messy people live here + me, I really shouldn't have lumped my son into that group...for the most part, he is incredibly clean and organized for a seven year old boy...he does leave his stuff lying around and grunts about picking it up but compared to everyone else, he is a clean freak!  And this mom loves that about him!

Judgement vs. Mercy

...judgement without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful.  Mercy triumphs over judgement!  (James 2:13)

Have you ever taken one of those spiritual gifts tests?  It has been a long time since  I've done any kind of written exam and several years since I've taken one of those inventories, mostly because they always gave me the same answer. All the other gifts fall by the wayside for me and I always score incredibly high in the gift of Mercy.  A lot of people who have known me over the years would nod their heads and say "of course, that explains all the tears and hugging".

Gift or Curse?
About five years ago I had been working hard to get rid of my "gift".  I found that the gift of mercy led me to feel too much...too much pain, too much heartache, too much empathy.  Too many tears and too much caring.  Who really needs all that? 

Guess what?...I do. I had become very adept at pushing back my emotions, telling myself that things weren't as bad as they seemed, people were just being dramatic, or even worse they were just trying to get attention or money or they were just super messed up and that was their problem.   Instead of feeling mercy and caring about people, I began to judge everyone.  Maybe some of the people warranted their judgements but most did not, and regardless, it is not my place to judge them.  I traded my "gift" for something worse...apathy and a critical spirit.  I traded my tears for a hard heart. 

Why am I telling you this?  Well, anyone who may be reading this might say, "I never knew".  It's not like I was super loud about it or anything.  I didn't verbally abuse anyone...okay maybe a couple people. Sorry!  I guess I'm sharing this as a warning to other people who may be feeling like me. 

Being the wife of a pastor is always interesting.  People have expectations of you that may or may not be fair (that is a whole other post entirely) and we "get" to see a lot of hard things.  My aim and my heart is to be as transparent as I can be without putting my family at risk or hurting someone else with my life.  Recently, we've been facing some difficult situations...some challenging and exciting, others just plain hard.  Today I was reminded again that it is not my job to judge anyone.  It is my job to love them...to use my gift (s) and my talents to make life easier for someone or to walk alongside them in a difficult time, regardless of whether I like how it makes me feel. 

After having a hard conversation today, I got in my car and the guy on the radio read the verse above.  I don't remember reading that verse before but it spoke truth into my heart and life today.  It couldn't have come at a better time for me.  My God works like that. 

Today I choose Mercy.