Project Season

As I have said before, for some reason the month of November inspires Craig to begin home improvement projects. Not sure why. I have several theories, one of which is that Craig was struck by a rare home improvement virus in his teenage years that only flares up once a year before the holidays begin. We are still awaiting lab confirmation on that one.

This year's projects included covering our plain and lonely niche with pallet wood...

 painting a corner of the family room that I've had my eye on for quite a while for a gallery wall...

...and using the pallet wood again for a corner seating area in the family room as well. 

After that, I convinced this handsome bearded honey of mine that his services as a picture hanger-upper would be an excellent gift to me for Christmas. So, the day after Christmas, I pulled out all of my hoarded pictures and decor and we (Craig) got to work.

 Still needs a little work, but so far I am loving {loving} loving it.

Plus, did I mention the amazing and tear-jerking gift of beautiful string art that the girls and Craig gifted me for Christmas? I was beside myself with gratitude for all of the hard work that they put into such a thoughtful project. And more than a little ecstatic that they would be so perfect on this lovely wall of ours. (No wonder Craig wanted to wait until after Christmas to start hanging everything up.)

I love these wonderful babies of mine. Even the ones with beards on them.

P.S. Spencer has been hard at work on some projects of his own lately:

Project: Eat All the Chocolate Milk 

Project: Never Let Anyone Come Over, Ever 

Project: Chew All of Mommy's (Favorite, Limited Edition, Sold Only Once a Year) Gum

Needless to say, I like Craig's projects much better.

Do You Wanna Be a Snowman?

Julia's one Christmas wish was to become a snowman. Little did she know how painful the transformation would be once it had begun...

{I couldn't even begin to count how many towels we needed to mop her up in the warm car on the way home from California. We'll sure miss that girl.}

Squirty Squirters

Spencer, in all of his brilliant boyness, has come up with a game for him and I to play in the backyard on a warm day. It's called "Squirty Squirters." It is a game in which we repeatedly fill medicine syringes ("squirters") with water and shoot them at each other. We use the various furniture and other backyard accouterments to hide behind. Sometimes I try to miss him, depending on the outside temp. Spence squints his little eye tries his hardest to hit me but usually misses. And we laugh ourselves silly. 

As I am sure you can imagine, it's good stuff. I highly recommend that you play it with your household three-year-old, should you get the chance. If you happen to be short on household three-year-olds for any reason, you can borrow mine. I am confident that he would play this game with anyone.

I'm telling you. Squirty Squirters. It's where it's at.

Lights of Christmas

We had every intention of participating in our church's "Light the World" campaign this Christmas season, in which we were meant to choose a service activity to do each day of December in order to keep the focus of Christmas on Christ and not on ourselves. We had some great ideas and really tried for a few days at least...before the busyness and bustle of the season threw us off and many of our good intentions went unrealized. I know that we don't light the world automatically each day just because we are alive in it. I know that it takes time and effort and a purposeful resolve. But I also know that in trying to follow Christ, whether it be through a specific service campaign or in the quiet and often unseen choices of our individual lives, we can indeed show a concern and a love to others that can make a difference, however small, in the light that exists in the world.

I hope that Craig and I can foster in our children a deep desire to do good for others--both within our family and without--in order to fuel the light-making effort to fight the darkness and despair that at times seem to overwhelm the earth. I hope that we can make a year-long effort and commitment to be a light, in kindness, words, and actions, to all those who cross our paths.

Seeking Him

So so so so so much to catch up on here. Life hurtles ever forward at its unrelenting pace, and my to-do list for one day gets added on exponentially to the days ahead.

Time is a weird thing. Sometimes we think it will automatically change us. That magically we will be different--better--a week, a month, or a year from now.

But it doesn't.

Not without effort. Not without work. Not without a willingness to change ourselves, or to allow the Lord in to change our hearts. Not without a million "now" moments in which we do something now--that we don't want to do, or that we find difficult, or can find a hundred reasons to put off--in order to gain more willpower and strength for the next now moment and thus for the days and weeks ahead.

Sometimes I look back and think about whatever version of myself existed several weeks or months ago. Sometimes I am tempted to think, Wow, I really didn't know anything then, did I? But I did. Today's knowledge does not render yesterday's efforts utterly useless. Today's experience does not mean that we knew nothing before. We may not have known a particular thing, but that hardly means that we knew nothing.

The key is to try. To grow. To use each day's new knowledge and experience to be even smarter and better for the next day's challenges. It isn't about knowing everything right now. It is about learning in tiny, minuscule, sometimes imperceptible steps so that in a week, or month, or year from now we have changed and progressed. Not magically. But because we have had more moments where we were willing to work and try than moments where we put the important things off once again.

Oh I how I hope that the need to seek a power and a wisdom beyond my own can be planted and buried forever in my heart. I hope that I can try and try and try and manage to not get frustrated when my trying seems in vain. I want to trust that the Lord, if I can let Him, will make so much more of me than I can make of myself. I want to receive His wisdom, love, and approval...to give myself permission to learn and to grow as He has. To allow myself time to change. To see my own potential as He does.

 Wise men still seek Him. Every day, every hour, every minute.

Oh Lord, let us be wise.