Simple Summer Savorings...

Because Life is a Journey and not a Race...
And because Happiness is not a Destination, but a manner of travelling your way There...

 (Because we like to try and drown ourselves daily.....)

Because Life is full of a lot of the same...

Day after Day.
Diaper after diaper.
Meal after Meal.
Laundry Load after Laundry Load.

Wash, Rinse, Repeat....
Of such is all of Life....
Or, at least the life of a Mama...

Because of all of this...
It's good to remember some things....

"It is the Joy of the small that makes Life large...."  ~ Ann Voskamp

And it is in the counting of the small gifts that makes Life Full...
And Free...
And Life Giving.

Gardens growing.  Happiness.

Because Maine summers are the tiniest of blips in the course of our year...
And because living with Children teaches you how to Savor the Simple.

 Like plopping down on the grass and watching your lap get filled up with Love....

Or sneaking out to the back porch first thing in the morning with your Sister Friend ~

~ Bedhead, jammies, and all.... ~

Because

It's the little things.

The things we can miss if we do not choose to see.

Because Joy is never tied up into things you can buy...
And because He is the Source of it all.

Slow...
See the Sacred in the Chaos...

Somebody thinks she can just start walking all on her own....
No permission was given for this.

Count the Gifts.
Thank the Gift Giver....

~ My four little souls who remind me....day after day after day.
~ And for six little souls total...who fill own Home with Crazy...but our Hearts with Love...
~ Soul friends with which to walk life alongside.
~ Morning coffee on the back deck...gentle breezes...slow starts to the day.
~ A bed not big enough for the six of us first thing in the morning.
~ Simple days.  No agendas.
~ Learning to give myself grace.  And others.
~ Settling into "my best," as opposed to everyone else's.
~ Finding....finally, a whole year later...truly finding my rhythm as a Mama of four...
~ Learning...and re-learning...that "comparison destroys contentment."

~ Resting.  In His Grace.
~ Celebrating.  Summer and the pace that comes with it.
~ Accepting.  That "Life" is big.  And I am not...
~ Growing.  As a Mama.  As a perfectionist.  As one who likes her lists checked off....
~ Savoring.  Summer simplicity in our own backyard....
~ Finding Freedom.  In accepting that I cannot do it all.
~  Acknowledging.  My need for Him...in everything....
~  Finding Joy....in knowing that in Him...I am enough....
~ She and I...just us...first thing every morning.
~ He and I...just us...to end our every evening.

~ #5192-5211.  My Joy Journey...

"Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under the trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the blue sky, is by no means a waste of time."
~ Sir John Lubbock