Is it just me or did July 4th wear you out?!?! I’m all about patriotism and family and fireworks and flags, but I’m flat whooped! If I didn’t have a whole house to clean in between the departure of my sister’s family of five and the arrival of a family of six who’s on the way, I’d crawl under the chair and nap with Aslan!
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As I move from room to room, making beds, cleaning bathrooms, wiping away handprints, I’m taking in the sweetness and the chaos of the last week. On thing’s for sure: there’s nothing like three toddler boys to show you how far you’ve come as a recovering perfectionist…and how far you still have to go! {And here I was thinking that perpetually dirty floors, smelly farm animals, a puppy in the house and chicken poop on the porches was enough to transform me!}
I could pretty much rewrite last year’s “I Choose Family” post….minus the poop on the curtains. This time it was chocolate smears on the white linen slipcovers, which I mindlessly washed a week before three toddler boys arrived. {Just for the record: I don’t recommend white linen slips until your children are older. Yes, they’re washable, but it takes all day, and getting them back on is about as exhausting as a wrestling match. All of my furniture is slipcovered, and I’m a huge fan. But white looks best when it’s clean, and with little ones, it doesn’t stand a chance!}
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I love my family, crazy as all of us can be when we get together, and I’m beyond grateful that they’d drive 13 long hours with three little boys in tow just to visit us. But staying under one roof for too many days in a row reveals my weaknesses and limitations. I’m never as free as I want to be, and it’s always crazier than I think it’s going to be. I pray for an overflow of grace and patience, and I always run dry. Why is it so hard to be the laid back auntie I want to be? Is it just the age? Is it boys? Differences in discipline and boundaries? Or is it that I still love a clean and peaceful home too much? I don’t know. All I do know is that God’s mercies are knew every morning! That and a good night of sleep go a long way!
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I’m pretty sure my sister has an invisible superhero cape on her back at all times. She handles toddlers {or any kind of crazy} with so much acceptance. She’s always had an unbelievably high tolerance for chaos…something I do not have, even all these years later. When we were teens, there were certain kids I just couldn’t babysit, but she found ways to bring out the best in every child. I’ve always admired that about her. And on top of wrangling three toddler boys {with the help of a very patient, helpful husband}, she also managed to tackle a huge project with me. We bleached and lime waxed my front doors. They look amazing thanks to her artistic abilities!
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And now that the house is quiet and I can hear the animal noises while swaying on the porch swing in peace, I’m able to extract the sweetness from the chaos. The wholehearted, abundant life is full of tension and opposing emotions. I’m thankful for yet another chance to practice holding two very different things in my heart at once.
Here’s some of the sweetness:
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And now it’s off to visit family in Maine and Vermont. Leaving the farm isn’t easy {so many animals and responsibilities}, but thankfully, there’s a family on the way who will stay here and care for all our animals while we’re away. We became friends when we were all newly married. Haven’t seen them in almost 10 years…long before they had 4 children. My hope and prayer is that in exchange for their care taking, they’ll experience the presence of God and life to the full here on Ten 10 Farm. The guest rooms are ready for them!
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{Cleaning was therapy for me. Time to process the sweetness and the chaos.}
Hope you’re having a great summer, my friends.
Blessings and love,
P.S. Right after I finished writing, I heard a soft cracking sound just off the front porch. New baby ducklings! More LIFE on Ten 10 Farm!!! Only had my phone and the light is low, but have to share the sweetness.
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Cheers to the things you notice when you’re still and quiet!
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{I’m getting pretty good at mixing herbal cocktails. Who knew it was so much fun?}
Okay. This post is over. Back to cleaning!
Don’t you just love summer? Long days of sunshine, lightning bugs flickering in the pasture, fresh herb cocktails, late night dinners on the grill, impromptu gatherings with friends…these are a few of my favorite things. But do you know what else I love about summer? Baseball. {It mimics life like you wouldn’t believe. If we had all day, I’d tell you how.}
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I don’t have boys, and my girls don’t play, but the game is in my blood. From age 8 to 18, I spent my summers on the pitcher’s mound. I wasn’t the fastest or strongest, but I threw six different pitches and could place the ball almost anywhere I wanted thanks to year-round practice, sheer determination and an intensely competitive spirit. And while I don’t play a sport of any kind these days, a good ball game still makes me come alive.
So here I was watching the College World Series at home, and freaking out because Vanderbilt made it for only the second time ever! {I can’t tell you what a big deal this is for a small school known more for its academics than athletics.} As we made it further into the tournament, I felt a strong desire to go to Omaha. Not exactly my dream vacation spot, but it’s where the College World Series is played.
So last Sunday, when it was clear Vanderbilt was going to the finals for the first time in history, my husband asked if I’d like to go. REALLY?!?! He doesn’t even like baseball! But he knows I do. And we needed some playful spontaneity in our marriage like a bird needs wings. So within a few hours, we booked our flights {to Kansas City, 3 hours from Omaha}, rented a car, reserved a hotel room, and pieced together coverage for the girls here on the farm.
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All of this fast, last-minute planning and unexpected travel was way out of my comfort zone. {Not that I’ve really found my comfort zone since leaving my hometown of Houston and moving to a farm!} But I knew we were supposed to go. And I knew it was about much more than baseball or Vanderbilt making history. Those two things were just icing on the cake!
I love watching all nine innings of baseball, while JD would prefer the highlight reel. But we both felt the same about one thing: this trip represented playfulness for us. It was a spontaneous, impractical, unplanned way for us to be kids together instead of adults who get all tangled up in work, responsibilities, tasks, projects, finances, decisions, etc.
The last two years of marriage have been hard ones for us. I don’t think I have enough perspective to process it all just yet, but I can say this: a major life change plus digging into our stories through counseling has turned us inside out. The ways God has been changing us are all good, but adjusting to those changes is a lot harder than we imagined. It’s like we’re doing this dance in marriage, and all of a sudden the music changed…which means our old dance moves no longer work, and we’re stepping all over each other’s toes! But we’re both confident that we’re going to learn to dance again, and that it’s going to be better than the old dance ever was. We’re committed to working at it…even when it’s hard, unfamiliar and uncomfortable.
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A year ago, a marriage counselor encouraged us to take a break from counseling and find ways to play together. That sounded good, but we had no idea how to play. The counselor made a few suggestions…hikes, bike rides, picnics…anything that didn’t feel like work. {We work HARD on the farm, and we enjoy most of it, so we forget that we still need to play.} To tell you the honest truth, a year went by and we were no better at playing than we were the first year we got here. When we tried, it felt forced…and often ended in tension. Maybe playful just isn’t our thing…so we thought.
Recently, my individual counselor asked me what it would look like if Little Linsey asked Little John David to play instead of getting all tangled up in a mess of old hurts and wounds, most of which are rooted in our childhood stories. {Unhealed pain always find its way back to the surface.} Being playful children sounds good, but how do two grown ups who’ve forgotten how to play invite each other to be playful? I had no idea, so I asked God to show us how to play. Little did I know, He’d answer with baseball just days later. {He knows me so well!}
When JD asked if I’d like to go to Omaha, I knew the answer was yes no matter what it cost…not just because I love baseball or because Vanderbilt was in the finals. And not because the College World Series was on my bucket list. {I don’t even have a bucket list.} I knew this was an invitation to play…to be youthful, spontaneous, unscripted and impractical. When you get right down to the heart of it, isn’t that what playfulness really is? Playfulness isn’t so much about what you do; it’s about how you do it.
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With the Vanderbilt win and a husband who took three days off to watch baseball by my side, you’d think all was perfect in my world. But there’s no such thing as perfect, remember? On the long trip back to Franklin, we stepped on a few emotional land mines with words that triggered old wounds, and the enemy had a field day. We went from victory to defeat in minutes…and stayed there for over half the day. I hate it when this happens! {When the good things of God are assaulted – marriage, playfulness, life to the full – you can bet there’s some spiritual warfare involved. Once we see it for what it is, half the battle is won. For more on the enemy’s tactics, I love C.S. Lewis’ The Screwtape Letters and Stasi and John Eldredge’s Love and War.}
I really wanted to come home and write about playfulness…and only playfulness. I was sure that’s what this trip was all about. As we struggled to converse and connect during our long trip back to Franklin, I was angry, hurt and confused. It seemed that playfulness had been stolen…that the whole point of the trip was ruined. Because all this time, I’ve believed that playfulness and pain can’t share space. It’s one or the other. What a lie! The truth is, you don’t trade pain for playfulness. You learn how to hold both in your heart. And sometimes, being fully alive in your heart and present to life means choosing playfulness in the presence of pain…instead of waiting until pain is fully resolved or healed. There’s room for both. Real life is both.
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Learning to hold opposing emotions in my heart has been one of the greatest lessons of our move. I never imagined beauty and brokenness or playfulness and pain could share the same space in my heart. I’m pretty sure I used to exhaust myself trying to prevent or avoid the pain and brokenness of life, and truth be told, I still don’t fully embrace it or want it. {Who does?} But I know this much is true: holding opposing emotions expands your heart’s capacity in every direction and allows you to experience life with all of your brave and beautiful heart.
Do you need an invitation to play in the midst of pain, struggle or imperfection today? And if the invitation comes, are you willing to drop everything and run after it like a child? Making messes along the way? What would it look like for you to say yes to playfulness today? It can be a small thing. The main thing is that you say yes. Go ahead. I give you permission! Blessings to you!
You know you’re a writer when…
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…your favorite thing about the beach is writing in the sand.
Writing has always been therapeutic for me, but there’s something especially satisfying about carving letters into wet sand…just close enough to the water’s edge for you to know the slate will be washed clean in minutes, and you can start all over again.
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Sometimes I doodle…
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…but mostly it’s just words.
Things stirring in my heart, words from God, or a song I’m singing.
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Words are a glimpse into the heart that holds them…
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…and to see a heart revealed is a gift to behold.
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Sometimes when you write a simple word, you see something for the first time:
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Beloved…be loved.
The last time I was scrawling my heart into the sand was two years ago. I wasn’t so much on a vacation as I was in a lost middle place. We didn’t plan to go to the beach in the middle of the move, but when we realized it was cheaper to go to the beach than to lease back our Houston house, we went for it. I remember feeling like I was in an emotional coma. I mostly just sat and stared at the ocean…believing that we were supposed to follow this Franklin dream, but aching over the emotional cost of it all. And yet too numb to cry.
I remember not wanting to the leave the beach two years ago…not because I’m crazy in love with the beach {my fair skin has its limits!}, but because I was terrified to head toward our new hometown. I was reeling from all the emotions of leaving and the lack of closure in the only hometown I had ever known. How would I ever be ready to embrace a new hometown? {Thankfully, I found my voice in the midst of the pain and learned how to hold beauty and brokenness together in my heart.}
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Fast forward two years to this beach trip, and I can honestly say I was ready to leave the beach and return HOME to the farm! The beach is nice, but a homebody is always happiest at home. And the farm now feels like home.
Sometimes you have to leave home to learn how much you love it. This time last year, I was swinging in the barn hammock day after day wishing we could go to the beach. I knew Franklin was where we were supposed to be, but all those Facebook vacation photos made me think we were the only ones stuck at home. And when you feel stuck, it’s hard to love where you are at the moment. {Don’t get me started on social media. I can go from happy to connect with an old friend to ditching the whole deal in a heartbeat!}
But in some ways, we were stuck. We didn’t have a paycheck the first year we were here…because we’re those crazy people who moved without a job…who left it all behind in Houston. But God…He doesn’t miss a thing. Two years later, my husband’s clinic schedule is full! Considering it took at least five years for that to happen in Houston, a huge city where we had lots of connections, I consider a full schedule in two years here to be a minor miracle! All that to say, I was beaming with gratitude about being able to go to the beach this year, but was happy to feel like Franklin was home when our week ended…instead of digging my heels in the sand and wishing we could stay.
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I think it’s safe to say I’m more of a farmgirl than a beach girl. My fair skin can only handle so much sun, and if I’m being really honest, all those tanned, toned and half-naked bodies make me feel like a fish out of water in a swimsuit. {I wear swim skirts, sun shirts, baseball caps…all kinds of cover ups!} But God had something for me in this place. On one of the last days, I took a long walk on the beach from our quiet little town of Grayton to the hot spots of Watercolor and Seaside. There were lots of mamas, but few signs of pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding. Where were the saggy boobs, stretch marks, loose skin and cellulite? Who gets to have a perfect body and children? I wanted to walk really fast so I could avoid my own insecurity, or worse, my judgment of the bikini-clad mamas, but the Lord slowed me way down. And with just a wee bit of openness in my heart {Jesus, what’s going on here? What am I believing about beauty right now?}, the Lord spoke truth. I came back from that walk with these words etched into my heart, and I think they might be for you, too:
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I’d love to unpack these words in a future post someday, but for now, they’re just simple words that I’m calling truth and choosing to believe.
You, my friends, bear a unique and particular beauty.
Be BRAVE with that beauty of yours!
Today was the day. Two years since I saw the familiar Houston skyline shrink in my rearview mirror. It’s the day we left our hometown and started our journey toward Franklin. We were nomads for a month, and it might take me about that long to process our transition. But this morning, something else captured my attention:
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An unexpected bloom on an okra plant! Apparently, the flower only lasts a single day. A reminder to live in the moment…one day at a time. Have you ever grown okra? I haven’t. And honestly, I’m not the biggest fan. But my husband has fond memories of eating okra right out of his grandparents’ garden in small town Iowa, so I picked up a wee little plant at Whole Foods.
And that surprise bloom inspired me to look around the rest of the garden. It just so happens that we have a lot of unexpected blooms! Probably because I’m not the best gardener. {Which is why it’s especially hysterical that my little wine box garden made it all the way around the world and back…even published in professional magazines and gardening blogs…as if I were some kind of gardening expert! HA! Far from it!} In some cases, flowering happens when you’ve let things overgrow. Oh, well. The beauty lover in me appreciates the overgrowth!
Arugula, lime basil and broccoli blooms:
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And then there are things that are supposed to flower. Some blooms are a sign that fruit or vegetable in on its way, as many of them grow right behind the flower. I love that beauty announces the arrival of otherwise ordinary food!
Behold the cantaloupe and zucchini flowers:
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And perhaps my favorite flower of the edible garden…lavender!
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And so I remember to water them, my Great Great Grandmother’s flowers sit are on the front edge of my garden boxes. They’ve just started blooming again. I’m in awe that these lilies have been blooming since the late 1800s…and in disbelief that anything that old and precious is in my care!
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And then there are the weeds. Because when you live in the country, the unplanned blooms are as beautiful as the plants you try hard to keep alive. I respect their resilience and beauty in this dry and rocky bedrock that we call our back yard.
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I have to say, when I lived in the heart of Houston, in a pristine upscale neighborhood, I didn’t appreciate weeds. And I certainly didn’t grow “random” things like okra. I only grew what was meticulous, sensible and beautiful. {Probably why my wine box garden went viral on Pinterest.}
I’ve come a long way in the last two years, my friends. How about you?
Here’s to finding beauty in unexpected places!
Happy last day of May, my friends! As we turn the page to June, I’m reminded of the giant shift in our lives two years ago. We packed up a lifetime in Houston and crammed it onto a moving truck headed for Franklin. I’m not quite ready to unpack my thoughts two years later, but I had to pop in and mark this day: the day we unpacked the last of our moving boxes!
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We can see the corner of our family room for the first time…thanks to my husband whose strong German roots kicked in. {Having an orderly task master in the house comes in handy sometimes!} Funny, with my love of beauty and interior design, you’d think I’d be the one who’d go crazy with the clutter, but the urge to unpack those last few boxes never kicked in for me. They became part of the scenery. Honestly, I stopped noticing them.
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The corner looks a little bare to me now. The same way it looks the day you remove the Christmas tree. You know that feeling…the one where you keep asking yourself, “What do I put in that empty space?” As I look at my family room sans boxes today, I feel a mix of relief and reflection. Who knows why I let them sit out in the open for so long instead of unpacking or hiding them in a closet? Maybe it was all a part of embracing the mess. Or maybe I wasn’t ready to let that last part of our beloved Houston home settle into our new Franklin home.
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If unpacking the last of your boxes two years later is a sign of settling in, then I’ll take it. But at the same time, I know there’s so much more settling to come. Unpacked boxes don’t settle the places in your heart that are still longing for deep connections and community. That only comes with time. And only God can unpack the places in our hearts that make room for our deep longings to be filled.
Here’s to a deeper kind of settling,
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Samantha - Please share some herbal cocktail recipes!
Bravehearted Beauty - That would be a fun post for sure! My mixes are very impromptu using what I have and no measurements. Tonight’s cocktail:
Tito’s vodka
organic lemonade
thyme simple syrup
squeeze of lemon
muddled mint
{garnished with fresh mint and thyme}
Linda - You survived, and everyone is better for the experience. The boys are a handful, but each one is so special in his own way. As for the chaos, who knows when it will end, but your sister deals with it on a daily basis and does it without going totally crazy. Yes, you girls are different and that’s why you love each other so much.
katie clooney - Great post. I, too, wish I was more laid back but when I am out of my routine I am at a loss and become a B@#**. My sister is laid back with 2 boys. I wonder if boys help to make Moms to become calmer… Anyway, have a wonderful vaca.
shannon kinna - beautiful pictures as always…would love to know how one bleaches and limes a front door..please share 🙂
Shannon