An Excerpt......

I've been reading through my journal from the past year.  It's been a first for me........keeping a journal of any sorts.  It has been the journal of a lazy journalist........mostly a list, a list of things for which I am thankful.  The journal has cut outs from old magazines, mostly of homey type things - food, cooking, flowers, children, scenery from farms.  It has scripture written throughout.  It has drawings from the children, scribblings from Francesca and more detailed ones from the two oldest.   I am so grateful that I have a record, however sparse, of our life this past year.  It's amazing what a list can convey, what my own ramblings tell me, will tell my children or anyone who might find these papers filled with my thoughts.

I wanted to share something I wrote all the way back in April because it came to my attention this past weekend that maybe I might be helping someone with my words.  It's absurd what a little praise can do to a person.  I always feel so silly that I have a "blog".  I mean who has a blog?  It seems slightly conceited to think that anyone would want to read my words, know my life and hear endless stories about my children.  But this person said she sent my blog on to 10 of her friends and that my stories are the stories of motherhood but few are willing to admit to being the crazy mom shouting to her kids in the morning while wearing fuzzy pajamas and hair all wild.  That she and her friend laughed and laughed to read that one post.  And, well, there have been others who have been voices of encouragement.  It's good.  It feels good.

So I share with you something I wrote.  Something I wrote in my journal, in the midst of my abundant, grace-filled life.   This life I have that is filled with good health, a wonderful husband, giggly children, a home filled with warmth and love.  You can have all that and still...............

Lord, it's been awhile....I have taken a break from reading YOUR word and daily stillness in YOU.  I've taken a break from basking in YOU, from journaling my praise and thanks.  I've taken a break from knowing YOU and it's almost broken me..............I've been adrift and frustrated and sleepless and irritable and, just, lost, Lord.  I need YOU. I cry out to you, Lord, to open my eyes, open my heart, let me see you..........right next to me, as I know You are.  I turn from you and I sink into my own pleasures and past times hoping for relief but all I find is momentary escape replaced by an emptiness that I cannot fill.  FILL ME, Lord.  Fill me up so that I can overflow with Your love - thereby pouring into the lives of those around me.  Let me see You, feel You, hear You, O Lord.


Just this.  This is what I needed to be reminded of today.......that I need His word, that I need stillness in Him.  Daily.  I'm actually going to stop all my work right now - I am trying to get Joe's Christmas gift together, all made and worked out and wrapped and packaged just so but I need that stillness, that outlet of writing, of thankfulness, of His word.  Maybe sometime over the next few days you might need to stop, to be still, to take a moment.  That's ok.  All else will wait.  I promise you'll feel better and more able to attend to the tasks at hand.  Thank you for the encouragement, my friends!

Oh, and I am SO INCREDIBLY curious to know............who are you?  Out there in Russia........in Germany that read this blog, this blog from a woman in Canton, Ohio?  I would love to know you and how on earth you found this space.......................