I’m sorry. I’ve been pretty quiet on here for the past few weeks. I didn’t send Christmas cards. I didn’t go caroling or sign up for bell ringing with the Salvation Army. But you know what I did? I rested. I enjoyed my family. I cuddled up on the couch and baked cookies with my daughter (GASP!!!) and watched movies and thoroughly enjoyed Christmas. My soul needed a break from all the busy and the rush. This week we’ve eased back into it with only a few days of work and school. Next week, the boy goes back to college and dance starts back up as well as our life group and we will hit the ground running. But I think I’ll take a lesson from Christmas 2018 and make sure to build in time to pause, reflect, pray, and rest in 2019.
Before this blog gets away from me, and trust me it will… I have SO much to share with you all, let me show you the gift I gave Brian for Christmas:
So many friends had a hand in creating it. It’s a work of art. He and I had been dreaming of something to hang our medals on and couldn’t seem to find just the right thing when shopping online. I dreamed this up and worked with our good buddy Mo and some others to make it happen. Now we need to get to work on filling up those empty hooks!
I had some time before the new year to evaluate my 2018 resolutions and I’m pretty happy with what I was able to accomplish–or rather, what God was able to accomplish through me :).
So now, here are my goals for 2019.
The be active daily one is the one I feel like I’ll struggle with the most. I hate waking up early. I hate going to the gym after dark. I hate running outside on my own. So, I either need to find away around all of those things or just suck it up and do them. The waking up gets easier if I put myself to bed earlier. Half Marathon Training begins Monday… and folks. This girl has legit not ran in 3 weeks. Going out for a run in the morning to test my legs out… mad at myself for taking a break and yet, I felt like I needed it. I was in severe running burn out and now I’m so ready mentally to jump back in, but scared my body has lost it’s mojo… we shall see how I do!!!
So, the “be a better neighbor”… wow, there’s a long story there I don’t think I’ll get into. Let’s just say this. I don’t know my neighbors names and I don’t think they know mine. I say hi and make small talk from time to time, but that’s it. I had a very ugly, unfortunate experience with a neighbor down the street recently and it left me pretty shook up. And it was over–you guessed it!–their dog that chased me and tried to bite me as I walked down the street. Seems to be a recurring issue and we have a leash law people! Anyway, getting off topic. Satan wanted me to be the victim. Did you hear the names she called me? Did you hear the insults she threw out? Did you hear the drunken threats he made? I went to bed that night in tears and genuinely feeling justified in my wallowing. Then Jesus reminded me… “You think that’s bad? Try having an entire crowd of people turn on you and throw threats. And the names they called me? How about having to carry the cross I would be crucified on past all of those people as they yelled?” Yah… perspective is everything. I prayed for God to give me eyes to see my part and to soften their hearts. My part is that they didn’t know me. Perhaps if they knew me, they would have been embarrassed that their dog was running after me. Perhaps they would have apologized instead of being insulted when I told them we had a leash law. Perhaps if I had made the effort to know them, I could have seen there was something else going on that night… perhaps they had been fighting or were dealing with an issue… there’s no way the incident with their dog warranted the reaction they had… there had to be something else going on behind the scenes and if I were a better neighbor, I could have had more grace.
Anyway, I told you… I’ve been bottling up these thoughts to share for a while so they have just exploded! What about you? What resolutions to you have for 2019?
Not Today, MS 