LIFE
Life. It's so wonderful, it's so hard. It's so beautiful, it's so bleak. It's so exciting, it's so exhausting. Life has been filling me with many different emotions lately. Through all the recent trials and triumphs the loudest feeling of all is gratitude. Life is precious.
Lately the day-to-day has been kicking my butt. And if I'm being completely honest, it's been that way since the end of last summer. My kids are all really young and so very dependent on me for every single little need. I find myself so drained at the end of each day and my thoughts are so foggy which leaves me feeling like half of a person. I rarely have a moment to think of myself or any of my needs. Thankfully my husband has taken on nightly kitchen duty and the kids prefer him as a play mate once he's home! But that leaves me to do laundry, clean the oatmeal off the walls and find the missing diaper that I smell under a piece of furniture.
This phase of life is the best. My kids love me and live to snuggle and play. The days when I ignore the mess completely and just lay on the floor playing games and tackling each other are my absolute favorite. I literally feel tears in my eyes as I cuddle with my three babies because of the gratitude that fills my heart. Those moments might be fleeting in comparison to the messes, tantrums and work that goes into keeping them all alive, but it far overpowers all of that junk. Life is the best.
Just over two weeks ago I was heading to our new home to see the freshly installed cabinets, and I was ridiculously giddy about the compartments that will hold our dishes. I dropped Scarlett off at tumbling and then started to head over to the house when I got the message from my dad that read "pray for Summer... There is something wrong with the baby's brain and it sounds serious". My heart sank and I tried calling every member of my family. No one seemed to know exactly what was going on but within the hour we heard back from Summer who was calm but distraught. She told us what they thought it was and within hours that was confirmed by a high risk doctor. My sweet nephew has anencephaly and will not survive more than a few hours of his mortal, precious life. As a family we are all devastated and so shaken by this news. Luckily we are strong believers in our faith and know that this is not the end. We have great faith that we will be reunited with our precious little buddy someday. His mommy and daddy are so strong and I am so proud of them and their faith. My sister intends to carry him to full term so she can enjoy feeling his movements and hug her sweet belly. None of us are ready to send him back to our maker. So nature will take it's course and in the meantime we will prepare to honor him and bear each other up... especially his incredible parents.
Life. It's not always easy. Even when you are so blessed and have so much to cherish I think it's okay to feel frustrated and exhausted with the day-to-day. But sometimes we do need some perspective and boy has life hit me hard with that this month. Family is what life is all about and that is why I'm pretty in love with my crazy life...
