Story About Hats

 Dear Kids, 

I was told once in a blessing to write down as much as I could about our family, our experiences, our parenting moments and all the in-between things that happen in our lives because we would be sharing them and looking back on them in order to teach others. 

Sometimes I'm better at writing than other times. There was a time in my parenting career when things would happen and I would know how to write the story down and I knew that needed to be the story to share for the day. But the last few years, things in parenting have seemed a little less "magical" in a way. Things aren't "new" anymore. It's like the weight of everything in life seems to cloud over the beauty of it in a lot of ways. 

But in this transition period of our lives, I know I need to be writing things down, very specifically again. I wrote a post on Facebook the other day that shared just a small moment from life yesterday that I wanted to copy and paste here:    

It's amazing to me how reliant on "stuff" we are in our society.

    We are in the middle of packing up all our "stuff". As I was putting hats into a box and leaving out "only TWO" of my favorite hats to use for the next indefinite period of time, I was all-of-a-sudden deeply breathing about it all, putting my hand on my heart, and trying to stay connected without going into the very human emotion of overwhelm. Even though I really only use two hats all the time that are my favorite, there is something stabilizing knowing there are "options".

    It's amazing how in a small moment like that all of the attachments that I have in this life just flooded over me. And also gave room in my soul for God to say, "Andrea, remember, all you need is ME. You really don't need all this stuff anyway."

    I have thought a lot about Jesus the last few days when He said that he had "no where to lay my head". The nomad life that He lived, and doing it all while serving, healing, and ministering all the time.

    While I was sitting there on my floor, deciding between what hats to keep (deciding on a baseball hat from Shayla and a sun hat - my two favorites), feeling such vulnerability while looking around my room and realizing that we are going to be getting rid of practically EVERYTHING for the next little while. And having the depth of emotion with understanding that everything I "own" is all HIS ANYWAY. None of it is mine. It is all a stewardship that He has given to me. And if He wants me to sell it, give it away, and put everything else in boxes, then so be it. It is all for my good.

    Oh how God uses the little moments, a small thing like deciding about hats, to teach such deep lessons. This lesson of stewardship is something that I keep learning over and over and over again. Creating space and purging literally EVERYTHING is going to be healing, vulnerable, strange, a little scary, and beautiful all at the same time.

This is exactly where we are right now - we are purging EVERYTHING. 

Joshua is having a really hard time with it. He keeps picking things up and saying, "Mom you can't sell this (with tears in his eyes) I still want to play with it." I know it feels very confusing to the kids and what is happening. 

We will look back on these moments of our lives and see the hand of God in ways that are unprecedented I think. I love you all so much.

Your Mom