Sometimes I Write

It’s been awhile. I thought I should check in, and reassure you – and myself that I can in fact type even when not under a deadline. So what’s been happening here?

The flu, the common cold, maybe Ebola, I don’t know. Some serious germs have been permeating our home for the last month. It’s ridiculous. We’ve prayed, rested, drank gallons of water and orange juice, rested, slept, watched a lot of Netflix, rested. You know, sick people activities.

I’m also recovering from foot surgery. I’ve had a cyst the size of a super ball on the inside of my ankle for over a year. I finally went to the doctor and was referred to a surgeon. Three weeks ago (while we were having a moment of health in our home) I had surgery. I have 2-3 more weeks of recovery time ahead of me, but if you think that has given me lots of time to sit around doing nothing, think again. I’m homeschooling three children. Right now we’re behind schedule and trying to catch up due to all of that sick people activity.

Yes, I said three. Will, the boy who has been living with us since last April, moved out in January. We did our very best to love him while he was with us, and I worked my ass off to help him graduate in May, but he decided he didn’t want to be here. I am still heartbroken over how things ended. He’s not speaking to us. I pray for him and hope he gets his head on straight and realizes how loved he is. In my pain, I feel like I failed some great task I had been given. I think I did the best I could, but he needed more than I could offer. And that just sucks.

We announced that 2013 is a Sabbath year for SEVENS. That means a lot of things, and you can read about here on our SEVENS blog. We’ve yet to start anything because of the illness we’ve been passing around, so our year is starting off with forced rest. Oh the irony. 😉 We are on the mend and figuring out what Sabbath looks like when it’s lived out in practical ways.

Some wonderful family from our church donated a minivan to us, and we are SO thankful to be a 2-car family again! We had been borrowing a car from our friends Zack and Melody for a few months. We’re blessed to know so many generous people. To Zack and Melody, and the mystery family, whoever you are, if you eventually happen upon this blog post:

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

Trevor, Chris, and Allen are the creative gurus over at Sacred Margins, and occasionally invite me to participate in the process of writing about walking out one’s faith. They are working their way through the liturgical calendar, something none of us have done before because it wasn’t part of the faith tradition we grew up in. Anyway, my latest post was about Revealing Light which focuses on Luke 4/Isaiah 61 as part of the last week of Epiphany. I have not been able to let it go. I am blown away by these passages and didn’t get to share everything I wanted to, so I’m working on a second part that I’ll post here soon.

Speaking of writing, my friend Luke (also a blogger extraordinaire) gave me an amazing book to read. The WAR of ART by Steven Pressfield is exactly what I’ve needed these past few years. Have you read it? If you are a creative soul, you should! Luke said so.

I never did update about my reading challenge last year. My goal was 104 books. I managed to read about 60, not including the children’s books I read with my kids. If I included all of those, I blew my goal out of the water! My goal for this year is the same. On average, 2 books a week. We’ll see how it goes.

Do you have a reading goal for the year? What’s new with you? Let’s reconnect.