The fog is lying like a thin muslin swaddling blanket over the fields out the window to my right.  I wish you could see it...the grass an impossibly bright shade of green for November...but then that's not unusual with our wet, rainy winters.  I can't wait until they put the sheep out to pasture again.  At least, they did last year and I hope they do again, because there is something so peaceful about waking up every morning to look out the window and see the sheep grazing. 

   The girls are napping so it's a perfect moment to grab my afternoon coffee and  catch up on some old pictures and my poor neglected blog.  These pictures were from a lovely morning when Jocelyn was all ready to ride with daddy to Grandma's house and we were all having breakfast together before they left.  As you can see it was still dark (!!) but mornings start kind of early around here. 

   I haven't been blogging much lately.  We have been. So. Busy.  And I hate saying that because that just seems like the thing to say, or the thing to be, and I try so hard not to fall prey to the "glorification of busy" (thank-you, Pinterest) but I so often do.  But all theorizing aside, it's just what we are and have been.  Busy. 



   Randy has work, which is sort of three different things right now: working at the mill for his dad, running his own RS feed, and co-owning/operating(?) the trucking for Smucker Pelleting.  Of course he is energetic and entrepreneurial and wise in business in ways I could only dream of, but of course he's also human and has his limits too.  Then there is being a youth leader, Sunday school teacher, and Sunday evening committee member, so his days seem to fill up pretty quickly.  And then of course there's the occasional dish-washing and breakfast-making that he does for his wife, like he is in these photos.  What a hero.

   I am also helping with the youth group, as well as the Christmas pageant this year, and attend the women's Bible study, aka LIFELINE.  We are going through Beth Moore's  "Believing God" and it couldn't be more timely in my life.  Then of course there is the wife/mama realm, and hosting friends, scheduling our calendar, and just the day-to-day to-dos.  

All such GOOD things to be doing.


   But sometimes I get a little lost in the midst of it all, and wonder if I'm missing out on this stage, somehow.  My girls are only tiny once, and I so hope I do not miss it in the whirlwind that is my life these days.  I am grateful to be a part of such wonderful family, friends and church, but I also feel the need to simplify my life somehow...I probably need that most in the areas of social media, but I'm just not sure what exactly that all will look like yet.  Still mulling....One thing IS clear, I need more of Him and more of the Word.  I have felt thirsty for it lately.  And something that sporadically just jumps into my brain every now and then could be the mantra for my entire life these days...."Lead me to the Rock that is higher than I."  


  I just cannot emphasize that enough.  That there needs to be something more than myself filling this cup, or this cup will run dry.  The 'Well of Myself' is certainly not a bottomless one.  And I have found myself scraping bottom more than once for that one last burst of energy, one last nighttime story, one last goodnight kiss, just BARELY enough left to tumble into bed myself and drag my feet back out in the morning.  But I want more than that.  I want more than that for my children, for my husband, and for myself.  I want to be filled to overflowing, enough to pass around, and with more left to spare. And really, there's only one way to be that.  There's only One person who can give that to us.  And I am trying to remember that I can't, CANNOT do it alone.

  Switching subjects, but can someone please just tell me HOW in the world my little cherub is tall enough to reach the counter-tops, and will be Two with a capital "T" NEXT MONTH?!!!  Freaking out here! 

   Snagged a few pictures of the babies on a Saturday when they guys went to the football game, and the wives stayed in the warm indoors with the kiddos, and watched it on tv.:)  Here we have Charlotte and her buddy Grayson, turning on the charm. 


  Such little darlings.  I wonder how old they can be before we have to stop calling them that, especially boys?  I'm guessing 22.

Well, it's been real, but there are clothes to launder, and bathrooms to clean.  Toodles.