Practicing Gratitude

My friend  texted me last night and asked if I could keep her toddler while she attended an older child's wrestling event.....my answer was easy and quick.  "Bring him on over".  I was kind of laughing to myself because it's been a crazy chaotic holiday here.  We got Precious a puppy.  We had family here from out of town, we did respite care for a toddler and the fam ran into some bad weather so she stayed longer.  They boys went out to push snow the other night and then brought a couch to a family in need before they crashed to sleep this morning.....and I've been slowly trying to clean up and put away after our Christmas parties and gifting....and people..my garbage is insanely full and overflowing.....and so is my heart. Claire and her long-standing boyfriend Jonah got engaged the day after Christmas and I was invited to participate in the surprise.....my heart is so, so full.  Our little foster love this weekend is showing me how fragile the h...

I'm thinking tonight about sacred spaces.  The dictionary calls them:  defined places, a space distinguished from other spaces....a sacred place focuses attention on the forms, objects and actions in it and reveals them as bearers of religious meaning.  (dictionary.com) Today I found myself in several different sacred spaces. I knew that they were sacred because I was moved there.  I was changed.  I understood something new and deep about someone else that caused me to know God better.  Several times.  Today.  How lucky am I?  How grateful am I to get to live a life that takes me to sacred spaces over and over again.....do you get to go there too?  If not, please figure out how to live this life too.  It is so worth it. Here are just a few of the sacred spaces I found today. 1.  Tonight we cleaned out Spike the Bearded Dragon's tank.  It was pretty nasty....and Roger and I tackled it together.  Once cleaned, we ...

Today I took a phone call from a friend.  She works at a second hand store and was helping someone (another friend, actually) look for a nice, second-hand Christmas tree.  My friend couldn't remember what the social media page was that had posted a tree to be gifted.....so we discussed how the site had a new name and so she was gonna try again.  I was driving so I couldn't check.  We hung up and I wondered for a moment why my other friend was shopping for a tree again.  You see, I had given her one just Sunday evening.  She had a client who wanted to put up a Christmas tree this year but didn't have free money to buy one.  I happened to have an extra.  I had purchased some small trees from Walmart a few weeks ago to put in the kids' rooms....and I had one left.  Turns out Isaac didn't want a tree in his room.  I also had some ornaments that I didn't put on any of the little trees.  I bagged up these things and she picked them up....

I thought writing about gratitude would be easier....because each day I can come up with a nice list of what I am grateful for.....but I am learning to appreciate the discipline of gratitude.  I'm learning to move beyond the elementary list of thankfuls (family, food, shelter, life, health) into some more subtle and in-between the crevices kinds of gratitude.  It takes discipline.  Don't get me wrong, I am grateful for my family, for food, shelter, life health.....but to be honest..... I am gut-wrenchingly grateful that I have a husband.  I interact with single moms every day and their work is so much harder than mine.  If I have had enough of my work as a parent, I can just tell Roger I'm done for the day and no matter what he is doing or how tired he is, he will cowboy up and finish the parenting day.  I am so, so grateful to be married to him.  I would be a terrible single mom.  I am also grateful to know so many mothers who do this great an...