Passing by so quickly

I'm really tired this evening. To be honest, I don't really feel like posting, but I was so encouraged by my stats (a new aspect of blogger that tells me how many people have seen this blog) that I suddenly feel energized for it.

Today was a long day. It had many good aspects of music lessons to teach, worship planning meeting, getting to fix a meal for some friends... but it also had many stressful aspects of sending multiple emails and texts and trying to keep up with so much information and not always communicating clearly. I realize more and more the extent of my humanity. I am just one person and I only use a small part of my brain and I have a sweet little 15-month-old who loves to be hugged and held.

Today as I was doing laundry I realized that I can just play with him as I do my chores. So as I folded things I threw the other stuff on his head and we laughed and giggled. As we were driving in the car a Sara Barielles song came on and we were totally rocking out and dancing to it. As I drove along and would glance back at him I thought, how boring would this car ride be without my little guy in the backseat squealing and moving his shoulders to the rhythm? His big smile on his face and his arms in the air... I love my life of being a mom.

I need to not let it pass me by.

I could let things get in the way of him, I really could. Even though I'm a "stay-at-home" there are still things I do outside the home such as volunteering at the Crisis Pregnancy Center, helping with the worship team at church, teaching a few piano and voice lessons here and there... I'm trying to find that delicate balance between letting my only identity be found in my child and just being a mom. Does that make sense? For sure he is my first priority, but how many times would I let emails, texts, Twitter, and just other little things keep me from having little moments with him? How often do I need to just look up from what I am doing and enjoy what he is doing right then?

Thankfully tomorrow holds less busyness.

I was thinking about how Levi is walking now and how it's almost like you don't even notice. I mean growth and development is so much a part of life with a baby that I feel like he's always been like this. I am surprised when he learns something new, and then I get used to it. I was thinking about how many moms say they can't wait until their child crawls or walks, and I was thinking, it only took 13 months for him to go from doing NOTHING to WALKING. That is crazy.

That's why I am so thankful I get to stay home. These years, I'm never going to get these years with him back. I'm not going to be able to hit a rewind button and get to hold him like this again, or have so much joy in a simple laundry game of peekaboo. I don't think I would trade it for all the money in the world. I know how privileged I am to have the financial ability to do this, I am well-aware of that. I scrimp and save as much as I can (I'm turning into my mom in that way). I figured, it's my job to make Ben's paycheck to go as far as possible :). Yes, it requires sacrifices, we don't eat out much, I clip coupons and cloth-diaper and don't buy clothes very often, but those sacrifices are worth it in the end.

That's just our story and how we are able to do things. I understand that others are in different places in their lives and have different callings. I understand that it is a struggle for some moms who have to go back to work because they would not make it otherwise. I'm not trying to guilt-trip anyone, I'm just sharing my own heart in mothering that the Lord has taught me.

Poverty

I was talking to some friends this evening about the book "Radical" by David Platt, what it represents and other books like "Don't Waste Your Life" by John Piper. Here we sit in America with our nice, pretty, clean, safe houses and cars with our computers, televisions, refrigerators full of food, soft beds, soft couches and all the comforts of life... At what point did we go wrong? When did we go too far? Are we really doing what Jesus said to do... "It is harder for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven."

I'm finding myself needing to re-evaluate my own thought, motivations and patterns and wonder how much of them are cultural, and how much of them are actually scriptural.

Later, as I was putting Levi to bed and began to think of a song by Jason Upton:

Poverty
There's a power in poverty that breaks principalities
brings the authorities down to their knees
There's a brewing frustration and an ageless temptation
to fight for control by some manipulation
but the God of the kingdom and the God of the nations
the God of creation sends this revelation
the homeless and penniless Jesus the Son
the poor will inherit the kingdom to come
where will we turn when our world falls apart
and all the treasures we've stored in our barns
can't buy the kingdom of God
and who will we praise when we praised all our lives
men who build kingdoms and men who build fame
but Heaven does not know their names
What will we fear when all that remains
is God on the throne with a child in His arms
and love in his eyes
the sound of his heart cry