The Things that Happen in a Year

It's been over one year since I last updated this blog. I had every intention of sharing here more frequently in 2018 and it appears that was also my desire the year before and the year before that. My Instagram account has become a micro-blog of sorts but I do miss actual blogging and hope to utilize this space more in the coming months.

I do have valid excuses for the absence.

Around April of last year, I was asked to submit a book proposal. Authoring a book was not on my radar. It was unexpected, and at times I still scratch my head and wonder how it all happened. (The only answer to that is God.) I hesitate calling myself a writer. I know and work with authors whose sole focus is writing and have all the credentials. I enjoy the medium but it's never been a primary pursuit. I also am quite aware of my tendency to write in passive voice and stick, commas, in, all, the, wrong, places. ;) They tell me that is what editors are for, but the perfectionist in me still feels unworthy of the title.

Ethan deployed in June. We lived in Germany with him for a month, the kids and I spent a few weeks in Wisconsin and attended a family reunion. And then after prayerful consideration, we made a family decision and committed to a year of homeschooling. Kaiden still had soccer season, and I still had magazine making to do. By October, I signed a book deal and dedicated every last bit of free time to writing over the next six months. Those writing insecurities crippled me, and while I knew the task would be difficult, I didn't fully comprehend how hard it would be to break through the walls in my mind. God deserves all the praise for supplying me with all I needed to finish the task.

I submitted my manuscript March of 2019, and it's been on and off again, back and forth with edits since. The book publishes March of 2020. Maybe I will call myself a writer then, ha!

We wrapped up our homeschool year in June, launched issue 14 of Deeply Rooted, finished a young adults internship at our church, and just when I was looking forward to a slow Summer, we moved to Pensacola, Florida. We have been here only a few weeks.

Let me just set the record straight: busy is not always better.

However, even amidst a full schedule, we knew the Lord called us to a busy season and, oh, how it has stretched us and reminded us of our constant need of Him. We never imagined the changes He has called our family to. He took us around the world. He asked us to serve in unexpected ways. He closed doors, but He also opened other doors and uprooted us once more.

So here I am in a whole new season of life, ready to tackle some personal goals including blogging. I skimmed a few older entries and definitely cringed at some of the things I've written. Part of me wants to start fresh and archive it all, but I'm sure a year from now, I will feel the same way about this very post. This quote comes to mind:

“People throw away what they could have by insisting on perfection, which they cannot have, and looking for it where they will never find it."

- Edith Schaeffer

Through Jesus, I am being perfected, but I will not have perfection in this lifetime; therefore, I must lay down my impossible standards. My words are fallible. My execution is flawed. My consistency? Irregular. But I hope that this imperfect life testifies to my need for the Perfect One. So here goes yet another attempt at updating a little more regularly. Thanks for following along.

A Life Update and Some Sewing Fun

I've learned many things in the four years that the Lord has allowed me to run Deeply Rooted but one important lesson that I've only recently learned is how vital it is to make time for personal projects. It is so easy to get into a rhythm of deadlines, to-do lists, and serving others while neglecting time for the things I'm passionate about in the process. By the end of last year, I felt like a machine trying my hardest to care for my family and home well while juggling the craziness of DR sales that always come around Christmas time. While my goal was to be as efficient and productive as possible -- to be the best wife, mom, local church member, and business owner for the glory of God that I could be -- I wore myself thin. I must've forgotten that I am a person and not a robot. 😅 And so my husband encouraged me to enter into 2018 by taking some time off from Deeply Rooted and social media to recharge and reprioritize.It worked out well because we spent a few weeks in Wisconsin with my family and we remained away from home (the place where personal life and business life tend to blur.) We slowed down operations as much as we could for our team. I spent time focusing extra time on my relationship with God through consistent time in the Word and prayer. I was intentional about connecting deeper with the needs of my family. (I often have to check my heart to make sure that I'm not allowing the demands of DR to consume me and thereby neglect my first callings.) I also spent time getting back into hobbies that I love. This included visiting an art museum, studying art and writing books, studying nature, photographing for the sake of photographing, drawing, and using Pinterest as a tool to create mood boards for everything that inspired me. The result of this mini-"sabbatical" was a refreshed and nourished soul. During this time, the Lord revealed a lot of idols within my heart that I was clinging to and by His grace, He has helped me remove them one by one. Of course, I'm constantly finding new ones pop up but my goal was to get rid of anything in my life that makes me spiritually numb (which basically is anything that doesn't build me up or stir my affections for God.) Creatively speaking, this break led to fresh-vision for the look and feel of the next issue of Deeply Rooted. (It's going to be such an amazing issue!)In that process, my hopes for regular blog posting went out the window. Sharing things online, in general, has been something I've cut back on drastically for a number of reasons. However, the one thing that does remain is my desire to write for the glory of God. I want to share what He has been teaching me and what He is doing in my heart, but much more beyond that, I want to proclaim His glory and His Gospel. Biblical illiteracy within the Church has been an area of great weight in my heart and while I'm not sure what the Lord will do with that burden (outside of our mission with Deeply Rooted), I'm convicted all the more to study my Bible cover to cover.All this to say, I've been making time to get back into the things I love. The other day I dusted off my sewing machine to hem some curtains in our mudroom that were dragging on the ground. It was an easy project that has been on my to-do list since moving into this house and I'm glad to finally check that to-do off my list. I'm glad I did it because the process reignited my love for sewing. I make no claims to be a seamstress but my mom taught me some basic sewing machine skills when I was in high school. I dug out some old fabric and followed a free pattern I found online. I made Cora a dress out of some cheaper cotton fabric to test out the pattern. When I discovered the ease of it, I then tried it out on some beautiful mustard colored linen that I had purchased back when Skye was a baby. (Again, for another project that never happened, ha!) Linen is, hands down, my favorite material and I'm excited to play more around with it this year as I attempt some clothes for my kiddos and maybe even for myself.Here are a few shots that I took of the girls yesterday afternoon as they tried on their new clothes for the first time. ❤️ This was kind of a random life update but if you've been curious about what's going on in our corner of the world, there you go. Here's to dusting off the sewing machine and dusting off this blog (again.) 👍🏼

Our Assateague Island Camping Trip

We recently took a quick trip to Assateague Island. We were incredibly blessed to arrive on a 70-degree day, and we had so much fun spending some unplugged time together as a family. These are some pictures from the trip. Ethan came home one day with this fun pop up camper. He scored it for an incredible deal, and this was our first time using it. Naturally, I had to style a shot for Deeply Rooted. There are horses all over the island. It was pretty cool to see them, but the park rangers had to follow them around to make sure they wouldn't kick or bite anyone.Kaiden was trying to convince me that a dinosaur had been walking by, ha.Pardon the mess. :) I love that we could park right on the beach. Ethan's thoughts: "Annnnnd the waves are terrible today."