encouragement for every season of life
If you were to poll my family members or friends I’m blessed to hang out with in my day-to-day life, they’d tell you I’m the type of person that has a hard time making a decision or jumping into something new all by my lonesome. Doing so feels vulnerable and scary, and…well, lonely. My second book, Back Roads to Belonging,…
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Here it is, mid-May, and I’m going back and forth between reading news on Meghan and Harry’s baby boy and remembering this time last year when two of my three kiddos graduated high school. Planning a graduation is in many ways like planning a wedding. Out of town guests? Check. Cake and a party? Check. Lots of bittersweet tears because…
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Last week, a friend and I talked over our foamy hot beverages about how we both struggle asking for help, about how the #1 worst, Most Dreaded Thing for both of us is being a burden to someone else. It’s a familiar song for military wives (she is one, I was one), and the enneagram 2 in me only picks…
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Oh yes, I know this familiar territory of struggling to find my place and my people–maybe you do, too? It’s coming up on the one-year anniversary of my daddy’s homegoing to heaven, so lately I’ve been thinking a lot about him. An avid storyteller, many stories he told my sisters and I began with his characteristic, “When I was a…
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If you see a small creature scampering in the woods or along a path during winter, you can bet the little guy has weighed the pros and cons of being seen. In my own corner of the Colorado pines, I don’t often see chipmunks this time of year. Painted black stripe across his back, the chipmunk leans towards sleeping more…
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Happy New Year, dear one! My daughter went back to school this week, and I had a hankering to sit down and write a blog post like it’s 2011 and just tell you what’s going on in my neck of the woods. So have a seat, dear one, and let’s chat. How was your Christmas? Glory be, Christmas break was…
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Looking back on these November weekends, my family spent a little time hootin’ and hollerin’ at the TV, watching our Alma Mater Oklahoma State’s football team win some and lose some. My girl and I have probably logged in too much time watching either the Great British Baking Show or any number of Hallmark Christmas movies. We’ve already had a few…
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As I readied myself for church on Sunday, I pulled a new pair of jeans from the closet — wide-legged jeans with a super high waist. They’re on trend, people, and I am here for them in every way. As I zipped up this blessed piece of clothing all the way north of my belly button, I thought, Where have…
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I swivel in my office chair, wrap my hands around my chai latte, and think to myself, “Now, if I could only wrap my head around this writing project due soon . . .” I move up to my desk and tap tap tap a couple sentences on my trusty laptop, then look up to stare outside the window. Tap, tap, tap, prop…
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I stand over the kitchen sink, eyeing several familiar Eskimo Joe’s cups in its open mouth. My son James, the one who brought the cups from his room some time ago, rummages through a cabinet. “Uh, James darlin’,” I say, pointing at the stacks of colorful plastic cups. “Do you plan to put these in the dishwasher or do you…
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As the sun slides behind the front range mountains of our Colorado town, my family of five slides into our seats for a late dinner at home. Over tasty Change Your Life Chicken, Ethan asks me to retell a story from his when-he-was-little years. I set my fork down, run my paper napkin across my mouth before placing it next…
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After moving to the sparsely landscaped Albuquerque, New Mexico, I discovered the most vibrant group of friends within a local church’s Mothers of Preschoolers (MOPS) group. When the day dawned on our second year in that arid desert town, I eagerly anticipated joining MOPS once again and connecting with those same awash-with-life mamas. The morning of our first gathering, I…
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