Attention: Blessings may be closer than they appear.

If I had to rank each day on a scale of difficulty, 1-10, with 10 being the type of day where I'd like to start chain smoking, yesterday was about a 12. As a whole, it wasn't like they formed a mob and rose up against me or anything, just a few things happened that nearly sent me over the edge. And, you should know, I'm not one that tarries particularly close to the edge. It really takes a lot.

It was cold, dark and rainy yesterday so we were stuck inside all day long. After half-a-day of this, the minions start getting restless and that's when trouble sometimes ensues. The baby (two-year-old) was all dreaming up sugar plums up in her bed; one child was watching a movie; one was parked at the kitchen table (coloring, I assumed); and the other was upstairs doing something, I don't know, blowing her nose for like 20 minutes. Since I appeared to have a break, I settled into my favorite couch with Pinterest open, some cozy pillows and a fall blend of oils diffusing to my left. All was well, I tell you. Then? The child who had been upstairs came down and says to me... "Mom, sprinkles are everywhere." I said, "ok, clean them up." Three minutes later, "mom, I can't." Odd from my quick-to-help child who LOVES to vacuum and sweep. I went in to inspect. 

The child who had been sitting quietly at the kitchen table somehow tossed? exploded? dropped? ...who knows... a bulk container of round sprinkles. My friends. In my almost eight-and-a-half years of mothering, I don't know if I have ever seen such a wide spread mess. Sprinkles filled every grout line, covered every tile, traveled to the next room and blanketed my yoga mat. Have mercy. To say there was a million of them was probably not much of an exaggeration. As we started vacuuming them up, the vacuum was spitting them back at me. I emptied the vacuum canister and, of course, spilled the contents of that back on the floor. Though annoyed, I remained pretty calm (I'm going to pin that on the oils I was diffusing...). About 45 minutes later, and one kid with peed-pants later, we got it mostly cleaned up though I don't doubt we will be finding sprinkles around for the next five years. 

I sent the kids upstairs to get socks and appropriate clothes on for dinner out and, in that time, they decided to get rowdy. And then I heard, "wahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh." The baby, who was dreaming every so fondly of sugar plums, was now awake...like an hour too early. I banished a kid to the couch and sent the other off to do chores while we waited on dad to get home - all cited with excessive noise violations during rest-time hours. Sigh. 

The rest of the evening was pretty status-quo. We had a couple of pre-bedtime meltdowns from kids who wanted ice cream and homemade cookies produced at 8:30pm. I wasn't about to get kids wired up again before I was home-free for the day. I sent the sprinkle-dropper upstairs to bed and I followed with her baby sister. After I had baby sister in bed, I went back downstairs to grab my computer and other things. I crawled into bed and settled in to Pinterest while waiting for everyone else to come up. When my husband came upstairs about 10 minutes later, I said..."have you seen #3 (sprinkle-dropper)?" He said, "No? Let me see where she is."

We couldn't find her. Anywhere. 

ANYWHERE. 

After we'd searched every hiding place in the house, we still couldn't find her. 

All of the worst things were going through my head now. We tore apart every bed. Threw open every drawer and closet door. Exploded every laundry pile. We yelled her name in every corner. Nothing. Not a sign. Not a trace. How could we lose a child in our house? We never heard any doors open, but could she have somehow gone outside? Surely she wouldn't go into the dark rainy abyss. I started feeling really sick and imagined someone taking off with her right from our home. What did the perp look like? What kind of car? What was she wearing? I wouldn't be able to explain any of it. I didn't know how we would explain this to the police, but I pictured the headlines and we have never been so close to calling them. 

Absolutely frantic, I went back into our bedroom and threw the covers off of our bed (where I was just laying moments before). 

This child. There she was, sleeping soundly - angelically even - fully covered in our blankets. 

She went upstairs and thought it would be fun get under our covers and hide so we'd be surprised to find her when we got into bed. Before we had a chance to find her, she fell asleep fully covered in blankets and had sunk in to the memory foam mattress a little, which is why I didn't notice her RIGHT NEXT TO ME as I laid in bed. Even my husband looked through our room three times and under the bed. We moved her, as she slept soundly never realizing that we almost called in the troops for her return. We praised JESUS over and over and over and I consider it a lesson learned. 

Sometimes our blessings come in ways unexpected, friends. Sometimes they are hard days and things that are there to teach us patience, mercy, forgiveness, etc. And, sometimes, they are right beside us and we get SO caught up in panic and mis-trust that we don't even notice them. I am STILL praising the Lord this morning that our child wasn't really missing. We are going to spend the morning doing some fun projects together and loving one another intentionally! 

Blessings are all around you, friends, and some may be unexpected and closer than you think. 

Giving thanks.

Okay, guys, I've had my stomach turned upside down more than once by reading overly descriptive details about someone's stomach virus via social media. So, I'll try to keep this tactful. About three this morning, I heard that noise - you know, that inhuman noise that comes from a small child who is suddenly sick in the middle of the night. That noise was followed by her tears and wailing, lots of laundry, and a trip to the tub over the next few hours.

Our poor babe. She was sick with a belly bug just a couple weeks ago, and she picked it up again. I was not pleased to be jolted awake; belly bugs put my OCD on overdrive; and I really would take a week of strep over getting sick to my stomach just once. I avoid it at all costs. It's so so horrible!!

Alas, I think the Lord put this on my plate (again) for a reason. See, I was the only parent home a
couple weeks ago when the child got sick repeatedly over a two-hour period. I followed her around with bleach while she felt bad. Though my hubs got up and help with the baby last night - rocking her and bathing her this morning - I knew this job was mostly on me, too. I'm rather slow to take this posture of grace when I see something I don't want to deal with (like this). Sometimes I just don't, even when I should. I feel sorry for myself. I complain. I retreat inward.

Alas, thinking on the sacrificial love of Christ makes it easier to deal with. It's getting easier as time goes on. Left to my own inward thoughts, I would rather be in my nice warm bed at 3 a.m. instead of trying to catch a wink or two camped out on our daughter's bedroom floor. I would have rather not had those ickies doing a sick dance around my head. I would have rather not made fifteen trips up and downstairs in the middle of the night. I would have rather not done extra laundry. I would have rather not had any part of it.

BUT. There in the middle of the night, Grace compelled me to be grateful. 

• Grateful that I could lay next to my daughter as she was sick, because she was probably very scared. 
• Grateful that we had two. Count 'em, TWO diapers left, and that was just enough to get through the night.
• Grateful that we have a bathtub to bathe her in and plenty of clean sheets and blankets to dress her bed with and keep her warm.
• Grateful for that glider and footstool I got a garage sale for $15. That thing has a million miles on it by now and it was great to rock her back to sleep last night.
• Grateful for my husband, who is a great dad, and got up to help without me saying a word.
• Grateful that the big kids slept until 8 this morning, so we at least caught up a little bit. 
• Grateful that the kids had today off school; no one wants to take a sick baby out in the cold.
• Grateful for our warm bed that was fabulous to sink back into after baby went back to sleep.
• Grateful for the sanitary cycle on our washer!
• Grateful that just last night, I bought a new scrubber for the bathtub. 
• Grateful that my husband's work schedule allowed for him to go grab a pack of diapers and return them to me before going in this morning. 
• Grateful for fuzzy slippers, a hoodie and leggings - my uniform for today. 
• Grateful to have more espresso than I can drink on-hand today.
• And, mostly, Grateful for a God who loves and loves and loves despite the fact that we are just filthy sinners.

Taking a posture of grace isn't always easy, but we are commanded to do it as believers and it makes life a whole lot more bearable. Is there something you need to act on, with grace, today?

Now, time for another latte. 

When things get ugly.

Look for the beauty marks. Apart from Christ, I'm a huge pessimist. Can you believe that? On this very blog, I often write about seeing good come from bad; I have often counseled others to look on the bright side and stay there. But, without GRACE, I wouldn't be able to do that. There's SO much bad in this world that I could easily be an unhappy, sulking, pity-party throwing soul - every. darn. day. My glass wouldn't only be half-empty, it would be thrown across the room in disgust. Yeah, I just said that. The older we get, the more difficult times seem to appear before us. Just when we think we've had our fill, and we've seen our share, it seems that something comes up again. Doesn't it? As someone who has a history of anxiety, I have to make a conscious effort NOT to fall into a defeating pattern of anxiety and doubt when these things happen around me, but to remember that God who's faithful when everything is right, is the very same God who is faithful when difficult times abound. Satan is always at work, believing friends. He wants to see us down and discouraged, but we must put on the full armor of God and fight back.

By GRACE, though, we can look for the beauty mark in each situation. We can look for the possibility of redemption for people involved or close by. I LOVE a good redemption story, don't you? We can look for positive situations that evolved out of bad ones; We can look for signs of roadblocks and u-turns founded by grace that may not have been there if the situation happened another way.

You and I, believing friends, have to be willing to see that God is good, even when we are uncomfortable with His plan. We have to be willing to see that God's mighty hand is at work in even the most desperate and trying situations. We must have hope. He can turn anything around and make it beautiful. Most importantly, He will triumph over all.

This song has been on my heart lately and I truly believe the words it says. He makes beautiful things out of dust, indeed. I pray you believe that, too.

PS. The tortilla soup rocked. That is all.