In This House

Summer break is in full swing. The end of the school year came fast and I had mixed emotions about it all. I took extra time off from work to attend activities for our fifth grader knowing that our days in elementary school were coming to an end. We had kids and more kids at our house in the days that followed. It was a blast watching them enjoy the outdoor paradise we’ve created. I was grateful for the time off, but ready to go back to work to rest up. Hats off to my stay at home mom friends!

At the end of the school year I like to go through the kids’ folders and notebooks after they’ve cleaned out their backpacks. We have a couple writers and artists in our family so I love seeing what they wrote about and created at school. My heart melted when I read one of the things our youngest (Peachy aka Birdie) wrote this year. I’ve always said she has an old soul and is great at articulating her feelings.

Blending our family has been an adventure I can’t always put into words. We try to stay rooted in God, we try to respect each other’s strengths and weaknesses, we practice forgiveness, and we love each other unconditionally. So much of this marriage and parenting journey is about not doing it perfectly. And this whole idea of perfection has been a life long struggle for me. But to see that the imperfection and unconditional love are things our daughter recognizes and likes about our family confirms we are right where we’re supposed to be.

A couple months ago I heard a song where the lyrics really resonated with me. Our oldest recently shared she likes country music because it tells a story. That is also one of the reasons I love country music. Here are some of the lyrics I love from In This House by Granger Smith.

In this house we live in, we all give forgiveness
Try our best but we still fall sometimes yeah
No it ain’t always sunshine, but it’s a beautiful ride
Got a million memories only you can find yeah
On a quarter acre corner lot, ain’t gotta knock the door’s unlocked
No there ain’t no place like home
In this house

We just celebrated our two year wedding anniversary. It was around this time two years ago my husband found this house and we dreamed of making it our own. Now more than ever I love this house – for the home it has become for our family and so many others. For all of the imperfect moments and beautiful chaos that exists here.