Brave, Anyway

Tag: thankfulness

  • June in Pictures

    June in Pictures

    June: in like a lion and out like a lamb, just like the weather in March.

    Ella is at Appalachia Service Project, serving in Dickenson County. Teams like the one she’s with travel to Central Appalachia from around the U.S. to repair homes in some of the most beautiful country in our land.

    She will never be the same – because of the opportunity to serve, because of the worship, because of the people and their stories, and because she’s never gone this long with limited cell service. I am so ridiculously proud of her.

    Ella and teammates working on flooring.

    Today, Audrey has been cancer-free for an entire decade. A decade. It was and is just an unbelievable glorious gigantic miraculous miracle.

    My favorite Facebook Memories moment.

    About a week ago, one of Ella’s pals shared a moment she captured on Ring Dance night that she forgot to send, and it’s just *the* most adorable thing. It was a really windy evening and this picture captures that, along with the looks of happiness that young people have on their first big night as kind-of adults.

    I love these smiles.

    At the trampoline park, Audrey encouraged a room full of kids to line up boys against girls for dodgeball – and then talked serious 5th/6th grade trash. I loved every minute of it. Girls won.

    That look!

    I had my mammogram this month, in the month I hate to have doctor appointments. There’s no picture of this. The follow-up letter informed me my breasts were dense but fine. I’m not sure how I feel about them being called dense, but I’m considering it a win that I didn’t get something in writing that called them saggy.

    June sky on one of those nights I was anxiously waiting for test results.

    My parents had their 50th wedding anniversary and we all celebrated under the big tree in my sister’s yard. I love that tree, and it’s lesson that deeply planted roots result in abundant life and growth.

    Two seconds later he gave her rabbit ears and she rolled her eyes.

    Pancakes played Fortnite from the pink gaming chair that is Audrey’s throne. She loves when the girls are home to play all day, but she gets far fewer treats now that Audrey is here all day monitoring my every move. Cute cuddly things need treats!

    Princess Pancakes Sassypants

    Even the cats got along this month. While Henry Fonda always loves Katherine Hepburn, Kate rarely loves Henry and generally delights in bullying him.

    A rare moment when Kate tolerates Henry’s affections.

    June was good. The angsty minefield month is finished, and it was really, really good. I am ridiculously blessed, and thankful to Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that I ask or think.

  • Go Go Go

    Go Go Go

    It was such a beautiful day today, even though I didn’t get to really see much of it. After 6 am Ancient Greece instruction for my 8-year old followed by a Food Lion run to secure TP and OJ followed by 9 meetings, I walked outside of the house – by myself – to our neighborhood circle, and just laid down in the grass.

    I didn’t care about allergies or mosquitos or wet earth on my hair and jeans or the people who walked by and tentatively asked if I was OK because they thought I was crazy. I just needed a few minutes of feeling not like a robot who must go go go.

    Go to help with school work. Go to work, even though it’s inside my house right now. Go to the market to keep the pantry stocked. Go to run errands for prescriptions and dry cleaning. Go to follow up on baths and teeth brushing. Go to prepare meals and do laundry and declutter and clean.

    Go. Go. Go.

    I already had a full schedule and now suddenly I am also not in the office where I’m organized as well as helping two children with distance learning. I am not patient or even that smart, and I don’t have any additional hours in the day.

    And in that maxed out moment today when I really wanted to give in to the desire to complain about all that’s on my plate, I reigned it in to focus on what all the GOing really means.

    I’m thankful to be able to work from home while my girls are out of school and while there’s so much uncertainty about sickness. I’m thankful all of my parents and my children are home and healthy and safe. I’m thankful to see my girls in the middle of the day and that they are always close by. I’m thankful that they share little musings and findings during the day, which is not something we normally can do. I’m thankful for made up games and pranks and dances and songs that make the girls giggle, and I’m thankful for the time to encourage culinary creativity.

    I’m thankful for technology that enables me to work remotely and that keeps us all occupied. I’m thankful for a stocked pantry. I’m thankful for my job and my work family. I’m thankful for messages and texts from friends and family near and far.

    I’m thankful for 20 minutes to myself today, to lay in the grass and feel alive and thankful again. And I’m guessing I will soon be thankful for Calamine and Benedryl. I’m thankful I take terrible selfies and can provide a source of laughter for teenagers.

    I’m thankful, thankful, thankful in all my go go go-ing.

  • Thankfulness: Change Starts Small

    Thankfulness: Change Starts Small

    Gratitude is a choice. A choice we make each day, each hour, each minute. And I fail at it sometimes. I may not feel gratitude in this or any specific moment, but I am still capable of choosing what I want my mind to focus on and expressing gratitude.

    Today I am grateful for mornings that feel like fall, and I’m reminded by one of my trees that change starts small. There may be only one leaf changing so far, but the leaf leading the way is the most beautiful one on the tree.