Exhaustion or Exhilaration

God has blessed my family with a new home. Yay! It has a bit more space, an extra bedroom and fit our price range exactly.

I love when this happens, when the creator of the universe coordinates seemingly unrelated events to execute a blessing in the lives of His children.

For those of you who don't know, we live in a small home, 2 bedrooms, and have ago long outgrown this situation. While we love our house and have enjoyed making memories here, we began to pray for a bigger, more suitable home for our family size. Since all four of my daughters share one bedroom, and have done so for years, we are a very close knit group with little privacy.  Our tiny home has been enjoyable for years and we have moments when we just scream inside that we are out of space. We have never been the couple that wanted a huge home, just room to put our feet up as we watch our girls live and grow around us. This newer home is that perfect solution for us. It has three bedrooms, a bigger living area and a beautiful sliding glass door in the eat-in kitchen.

 I can't wait until we can be there creating new memories.

During this transition, we moved into our camper and began the packing process. This was going to be a very short term temporary living arrangement, think 4-5 days, that went on for over a month. (I thought the old house was small aaahhhh)

This blessing has brought me to my knees. Literally in exhaustion and spiritually in prayer for energy to make it through,. 

One Sunday after service was over and we said our goodbyes to everyone, I sat at the computer in the church office to type in four short numbers for some record keeping tasks and fell asleep, as did my whole family. I didn't realize how tired I have become in all this back and forth, staying in the camper, continuing on our regular schedule and being faced with delay after delay in the process of actually getting into our new place.

While it is an exhilarating thought to have more living area I have to ask myself, "Am I really living?"

In between soccer practice, painting, organizing kids church classes, preparing camper meals, teaching art classes and all the other worthwhile causes, I have lost it again,. Every so often I have to take an inventory of my life and do some serious cuts to the things I love. There are so many great causes to get behind, endless activities for my children to join, and less and less of myself to give to these things. So I ask myself again, am I really living? This amazing new home will be a major blessing for my family, but at the moment all I can do is beg God for the energy to get out of bed and the grace to deal with my wonderful kids. 

All to often I am here, listing the obligations I have taken on. And each time I narrow down the number to a reasonable amount, I find myself living a life of beauty and grace. 

A life where God seems to be around every corner, under every blade of grass, in the eyes of my daughters and husband. 

When was the last time I felt that way, that God was right here and I had nothing blocking my communication with Him? So I pray for all of us in this busy lifestyle, where things are so easily added, that we can all make the right choice on what is and is not important. I pray that each of us can live life the way it is meant to be, not just piling on the "good stuff" to say we have it, but really looking at those in front of us, living and growing together. God is right here with us