1. Reconnected. I restored my iPhone. Do you know that I went 6 weeks without a phone at all in November and December, then almost 4 months with the cheapest most ghetto phone available. Crazy. Finally, I made some kind of peace with losing all of the many photos on my phone, (including newborn Selah), and much to my husband's delight, I asked him to finally restored it. I learned 3 things from this experience: a. Back up your photos regularly. (I know, duh right?) b. An iPhone is totally worth it - now that I have mine back I can't believe I went so long without it! Much easier to manage life, capture moments, communicate, and find your way around. :) Also, I'm slowly learning to love instagram. I recently just realized I had followers - ha. c. It's so sad to lose photos...any photos. But photos aren't the actual memories themselves. And because of this experience I have printed more pictures, paid attention to what I'm capturing, and learned the value of making new memories rather than dwell on what's been lost in the past. I also spent so much time remembering the photos lost that now they won't be easily forgotten.
2. Walking with Jesus. My husband is taking a two week Jesus study trip to Israel. It's a crazy story of how it all came to be, but God totally opened the door and made it happen. Kevin felt so led to pursue the possibility, and it's pretty incredible how it all came to be. We've never been apart for that long, in the entire 4 yrs. we've known each other. The sacrifice on my side is worth it...because I believe in what God wants to do in his heart and life. And I'm thrilled to see how his ministry and our family will be impacted for a lifetime. I would be so, so grateful if you would pray for his safety, his health, and that God does an amazing work in Kevin's heart and life while he's there. I'm so excited he gets to experience this...but please pray for my nerves and my heart as I pray for him and wait for him to come home!!
3. Blogging. No more empty 'returning to blog' promises. :) Of course once I claimed that on my last post, my baby girl took a sabbatical from napping. Thankfully, she has returned to happy sleeping times throughout the day. Good for mommy too! So who knows if I'll be frequent...it's always my hope. Though I assure you if I am, the posts will haphazard until I get any rhythm back. Or maybe forever. Whatever. Breastfeeding baby brain will get you every time if you ask me. ;)
4. Speaking of baby. We're still loving life with our little girl of course. I love being a mom. Don't get me wrong...I experience exhaustion, frustration, and self-induced mommy guilt with the best of them. I struggle with organization and keeping a clean house; with consistency and keeping up with schedules. But I also experience ridiculous and overwhelming joy and gratitude and fun in the mommy- hood. It's the most rewarding experience I've ever had. Sometimes I feel the freedom to live in grace; other times I allow the weight of the world's perceived expectations to overwhelm me. This is when I stay away from Pinterest, Facebook, beautifully kept blogs and homes, and anything else that I allow to get in my head and tempt me to look for my value anywhere but from God. At times I find joy in all these things...but at other times I just have to step away for a bit. Recently someone mentioned my blog and said, "I hope your joy is honest." I tried not to read too much into it, as it's always difficult to blog if you worry too much about what others think. For whatever reason it's become much more difficult since I had Selah for me to just put it all out there and not care. I guess the motherhood is a sensitive world. So different in so many ways for each of us. I don't want to apologize for having a positive perspective, or worry about judgment if I'm having a bad day and decide to wear my heart on my sleeve. Of course my blog is honest...it's one of my highest priorities for writing. But I will always view the world and my life from the perspective of living an undeserved life that I'm grateful for. Breathing itself is undeserved for us all...but by the grace of God he keeps letting us do it. I really believe that. Of course life itself is filled with sad days, happy days, depressed days and overjoyed ones as well. I prayed for years to be a mom...and I consider it an undeserved blessing and an overwhelming privilege. I will spend my years as one doing my very best to focus on the positive...even in the midst of crazy. My prayer is that God will draw me more and more away from what people think...because it's exhausting.
5. Army crawl and Velcro diapers. A couple weeks ago Selah and I got home from a girls' weekend with my friends from my old bible study in Cincinnati...right when I put her on the floor she decided to show me her new trick - she started army crawling!! It was so awesome to see her go where she wanted to go for the first time. And to watch my little fish propel herself across the floor. I of course am getting a whole new kind of workout, but it's still the cutest thing. Oh, and baby girl can now undo the velcro on the 4 or 5 velcro cloth diapers we have. So funny...and cute to see her so proud of herself when she realizes she just accomplished something, though she's not sure quite what. :) Either the pants need to be on or snaps it is.
