busy house, exhausted feet…grateful heart

Our 3 bedroom townhouse in the inner city burbs of Brisbane was certainly a hustling and bustling home this weekend gone.

4 sets of little feet littered our space over the course of 2 days along with 7 sets of big feet, all helping build, eat, clean and entertain!

Come Monday, after a weekend full of entertaining children, adults and non stop cooking, a work day is the last thing you want.  But now, late Monday night and absolutely exhausted from our busy weekend,  I am incredibly grateful!

Grateful to have had my 3 year old nephew and 5 year old niece stay the night while my sister and her husband enjoy time to themselves!

Grateful to hear my husband take our little nephew to bed way past his bedtime on Saturday night, read him a story and have him fall asleep straight away – after I had previously tried!

Grateful that my beautiful niece was so filled with excitement while making Valentine’s gifts of heart shaped cookies and painted hearts for a gift when her mum and dad got home!

And absolutely loving the fact that my 3 year old nephew thought Kookaburra’s laughing sounded like “monkey birds”…..which is just so EXACTLY what they sound like.  The world through the fresh wide eyed view of a little kid!

Completely grateful that now, exhausted, its a weekend that was full, with an untidy house, multiple bouts of vacuuming, sweatiness, a day where I had no time to even think about how I looked – but time that I got to spend (in our house!) with nearly all our families!!!

Now time for sleep 😉

that girl that cries in the car

It’s a strange thing fear.  It can make you scared, frozen and uncertain about the future.

I’ve been feeling a lot of that this week.   A fear of the “what ifs”.

What if i don’t get a positive health report when I go to the doctor next.  What if there is no way for us to naturally have children?  What if i am living a life that is half hearted when it could be so much more?

Its these things that have been confronting me as I hear more and more and know more and more people who have been diagnosed with cancer.  And its breaking my heart to think about what these people are going through, both physically and mentally.   It must be incredibly overwhelming.

The fear then starts to make you look at yourself and begin to question what is happening with your own life. What if that was you? What would you do?  How would you feel? What would you change in your life because of this?  It begins to question what you have right now and whether it is enough.

But why do you have to wait for something bad to happen!!! Why couldn’t you just change your situation now? What is stopping me at looking at what I would change in my life now? Because life could change in a second tomorrow?

So driving home, a million thoughts going through my head about what I would do.  What would I change?  What have I been putting off?  Should we look further into adoption.   Should we look at fostering.  Do we sell our house and move out bush to a more relaxed,  homegrown lifestyle away from the hustle and bustle of the city?

With all these thoughts racing through my head, one soft still voice cut through it, interrupting the mess, “Seek first the kingdom of God”.

And little tears started flowing.   All these thoughts going through my head of how I can change my own situation, so easily shifting my focus away from what I know I should be concentrating on – the big guy upstairs!!

It’s so easy to get distracted by the what ifs.  But my gentle reminder was pretty clear –  stop, life will go on – but ALWAYS seek first His kingdom. His word.  The rest will fall into place to exactly how it should be because your focus is on His will!

It’s easy to get caught up in worry and fear and when there is terrible things happening to those you love.  It’s incredibly hard not to be swept up in those feelings!  But there is already an answer that will help you….its written for everyone to read!

I know at times I will still get scared, I know that there is always a fear of the unknown and I know I will probably over analyse it and write a raw, heavy post!    I’ve been that way ever since I was little and also into my teens. Scared of death and running into my mum and dads room in the middle of the night, anxious and in tears.  But I know now where to look and where to seek comfort, beyond the here and now – its just a matter of continually knowing that thats where the answers are, and to push all my worries into prayer and cling to Him.

Serve only the Lord your God and fear him alone. Obey his commands, listen to his voice, and cling to him.

Deuteronomy 13:4 NLT

colourful spring

This Spring, for the first time, I feel like I’ve actually seen the season change.

I feel like there is just so much more colour out there this year.  Its the oddest thing to notice.  Don’t get me wrong its beautiful but I feel like I just haven’t spent previous years ‘noticing’ the Spring colours like I have this year.

Perhaps my eyes are more open than they ever have been before in my life – and for many reasons than just literally.  But its such a lovely thing.

I’m not the biggest outdoors person but this Spring and coming into Summer in December,  I am purposely spending more time outside.  So this definitely has something to do with my eyes feeling more open to the colours.  I also never realised that there were so many of these gorgeous yellow trees around in my suburb and surrounding suburbs.  They are just the most beautiful thing.  Especially against that blue sky!

It is funny though how you stay stuck in your little shell.  In your little comfort zone without even realising.  Going to the same shops, work and then home, markets every weekend, same shopping centres, same day for cleaning, same toothpaste, same route to work etc etc.    It’s a good thing to catch yourself noticing when it happens.

So now, this Spring, I’m really enjoying purposefully getting out of my comfort zone and seeing this beautiful world.  A world that was created in the most clever and intentional way possible! 

When the seasons change it seems like just the natural thing for the world to do, but its so much more than that! It’s spiritually made.  Every ounce of earth, animal, wind (i’m starting to sound like a power ranger here!) rain, storms, alldeliberately created and perfectly intertwined!  

Thanks for being so colourful Spring! You’ve brightened up my week!!!

8 Comments

Jesslink

08/10/2014 11:41pm

Gorgeous photo! Yes, life can get in the way of enjoying God’s beauty all around us! I, too, have to make a point to get outside more, and it’s so worth it!

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Finleylink

10/10/2014 8:06am

Thanks Jess!!! It’s so worth it! I spend so much of my time inside at a computer its ridiculous!!!

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Carolinelink

09/10/2014 6:56am

Love that you are getting to spend more time outside – way to step out of your comfort zone! It sure is rewarding when you get gorgeous pictures like the one in the post!

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FInleylink

10/10/2014 8:08am

Same! Sometimes it seems like an effort but the moments where I step outside of my comfort zone always seem to be the ones I love the most 😀

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Susannahlink

11/10/2014 6:02am

I was SO confused there for a little while about why you were talking about spring until I realized that, duh, you’re in Australia! 🙂 I’m so glad this season is showing you its beauty. 🙂

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Finleylink

14/10/2014 9:08pm

haha Susannah – gotcha 😀

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Caitlin | belong with wildflowerslink

13/10/2014 6:09am

That’s such a lovely photo, and I love this post! I love when suddenly our eyes feel more open + we start to see the “big picture” of nature 🙂

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Finleylink

14/10/2014 9:09pm

it’s funny isn’t it! I’m sure every year these flowers/trees especially are doing their thang…but this year, I saw them! So beautiful to catch that moment!!! Thanks caitlin x