Moving, Changing, Creating, Resolutions of a Wayward Time Me

My hopes for the new year come fast and furious...I have resolved not to make a resolution.
But I will get my passport.
Not a big deal to some, but a huge step for me.
I want to travel, my heart leaps, I get butterflies in my tummy, and a lump in my throat when I think about seeing the world. I do not long for the tourist experience or extravagance. Instead, I hope for going to neighborhoods, villages, homes, grocery stories and hole in the wall diners in places I have never been. The world is big and I need to see it.
As it stands traveling in this way is out of my socioeconomic reach, but we must all take a first step to our dreams.
My first step is a passport.
My second step is a dollar in a jar....
Micro-movements, that is what I am aiming for.
I do not believe this is out of my reach, in fact, I can almost put the tip of my longest finger on it.

The first time we visited the ocean, just a few years ago, I could taste before my eyes hit it, then I could smell it and feel it in the air, finally I could hear it, ultimately seeing it. In fact we ran to it with clothes on in February air on Clearwater Beach, Florida.
That was a chance trip that took us to Tampa Bay where I drove up and down the beach side drive, while frantically making phone calls (in order to not turn around on a quick overnight business trip), finding money from any account I had. They were phone calls of a woman with a need....to see things bigger than herself, outside of herself, but still a part of me.
Now I know what a daydream is.

I can not explain the burning in me that says we, our family, is meant for more than what we are doing, or being where we are, but it is there.
This year I will fan the flame, I will allow myself to feel it burning in my heart.
I will not push this to the side for fear of not seeing it come to fruition, instead, I will expect it to happen, make plans for it to happen, make small movements in the direction of it happening and not be surprised when I am at a different door step of the world watching it happen.
This is about me, about a desire I can't explain.
This part of my story is part I am actually afraid of.
This part of my story comes from the same place in soul, my spirit, my mind that wants to drag out the paints and the sketch books and cameras.
This part of my life story is to be continued, but enjoyed more than imagined.
This is some crazy creative part of me that I am not used to or feel comfortable with so I must embrace this, not push it away.
My story in this way is selfish-all about me and how this will play out, but I know deep in my cells that it will change the story of our family, our home, this part of my story if I don't fear the creative, exploring, adventurous part of my heart to move, will move us to a better place.
I will answer this call in my heart this year.
I will get a passport in 2009.

Home At Midnight and Refreshed

We didn't get home till Midnight.
That sentence alone makes me wonder what kind of Christmas miracle has come to pass in my life, that I Suzanne, the momma of 6 was okay with that.
We took all the children, to family friends, didn't eat till 9pm (so worth it, we were late getting there almost 8), played until 11:30, watched our husbands watch a stupid movie and didn't leave actually until Midnight.
Wow what a character stretch.
When all my babies were little in what seems like not so long ago we were all in cozies by 5:30, dinner eaten, heads washed, teeth brushed and ready for bedtime stories. I was tired.
I am still tired, but it is a different tired. I love watching my children late at night with family friends as we all navigate this crazy season of our lives.
It is the crazy that is our children are growing and we are changing, it is also the changing economy, family dynamics, gas prices, house sizes and pay checks. We are all in this together and so many of our stories are the same on the inside though looking so different on the outside.
There are some joys and struggles that it is nice to know that another mom and dad share.
The fact that so many wonder where Christmas gifts will come from and utilities will get paid is difficult, but lasagna with friends and a rowdy game of outside hide and seek in really cold weather makes it easier to bear and understand. AT midnight on the way home I realized that we are so much the same as generations before us, struggling to make ends meet, but not regretful about the families we have. Our family is not much the same as any other family we have around us, we have 6 kids, sometimes we are loud, the kids don't always match, our faith isn't in a box....but there is this family who has also stepped back and seen having 6 children a blessing (crazy I know), not having money for any of them, eating lots of cheap food....and on this night, last night sharing.
We got home at midnight and I was refreshed.

Old Friends Still Growing Up Together

Above-Laughing till I cried
Below-Momma Cain Toasting her Oldest Son

Bubba's Youth being Buried

Below-Bubba in his glittery Homecoming Sash

Below-
Sammi and Johnna

Above: Sammi Cain- The Love of Bubba's life and an old/new
friend I have grown to cherish as a homeschool co heart and teller of tales
from a shared long distance past.




Below:
Our Sweet Bubba Cain 22 years after our first encounter
When he was still the oldest kid in the crowd and I was in
9th and 10th grade.

I have some old friends...not old in age (maybe), but old in years known....22 years to be exact in this case. We are now spending time together....at 40th birthday parties. We laughed until we cried, we told old stories and a bunch of women with grown up bodies....stretch marks, tummies that are not as flat as years before, and a confidence that is more different than ever, danced until we were sore (which was a lot sooner than when we were 16 years old). We were all wrapping up by midnight instead of getting ready to leave for the after party.
It was all just as it should be.
I am grateful for my old friends, they knew me in my freshman year when I was gawky and in trouble.
My old friends knew me when my story was young and yes, painful.
They didn't know the pain then, but these friends were my people, I found something in them and now I have the rare opportunity of saying thanks.
Thank you old friends for being the crowd that wasn't what most thought of us, but instead kind long movies, late Saturday nights full of laughter, tears through the breakups, hope through our young marriages, giggles till we cried at 40th birthdays.
Thanks for being the kids that I got in trouble with, found hope in and now fuss about my kids to.
I didn't know that I missed you, until you found me, I didn't know that I needed you until you showed up and NOW is really the best times of our growing up together ever.

Life is Perfect...Stand Don't Sit..Find it Don't Wait on How You Feel

YES! I sit SQUARELY in the seat of a perfect life.
The children fight, I have late readers, a tired husband, a checkbook in the red, a dirty house, a very sick mother, a past with a badly dressed reputation, some old addictions, bad choices, angry voices, too much therapy, a once bad marriage (sometimes tough marriage)....but life is perfect, my life is perfect. I am embracing all of that. It makes me who I am. There is no sarcasm in my saying my life is perfect....one would understand if you really knew what it could of been.
It could have been lonely, illegitimate children, still a woman of bad reputation, drug use, depression....constant loss.
Everyday, however I gain....hope perspective, love, encouragement.
Everyday I see grace, God's and other's for me, a sweet husband, growing children that I am learning to parent and love better, my mom is a surprise joy to every morning in my home, our home, it is a perfect life.
I do not stand ashamed at this or wondering if it is okay to say it, but instead thankful...
God has and will redeemed the years the locust stole....He has, He is, He will continue to.
This is our story.....good, bad, in different, it is my perfect story.
I am Cinderella, in a messy house, with lots of messy kids, with a life that doesn't always line up to the story books, but it is my story, and I LOVE it and embrace it and wouldn't trade it.
Find perfection in your life today, you are loved with an Everlasting PERFECT love.
It doesn't matter if your house or husband or wife or children or car or checkbook or, or, or, or.....anything feels perfect...WE ALL are loved with a PERFECT love and that is where I find identity, hope and breath, every breath that I think I can't take next can be taken in that thought.
Stand in that Christmas Light, that Perfect Life, HIS Perfect Love in YOU, ME....your messy family and Stand don't Sit in that
Christmas LIFE and Light.