Isn't there some great quote about good intentions and plans?

Well, life doesn't always go as planned.

I'm sure we've all learned that by now.
In one way or another.

I shared about it before, but it was never our plan that Catherine would be our only child.


I don't want to offend or hurt others with sensitive topics, but at the same time, I want to write my thoughts.  So, if you are sensitive to the subjects of having children, only children, conceiving, pregnancy, or infertility and don't want to read or think about such things, feel free to skip this post.

I've started writing this post a few times in my head but never actually on the laptop.

Or the blog.
Where others can see it.

But I'm all about keeping it real lately.  I am encouraged when others do, so maybe my risk of vulnerability will be in some small way an encouragement to someone who needs it.

For the last few years I've created a grand Christmas card/letter/photo montage.

Yes, even when I was single.

I know the idea of doing such a thing is sometimes mocked, but I think it's great.  I'm always happy to get something like that from others in the mail and to keep up with friends from far away.  I also enjoy documenting a review of the year - maybe since my memory is so bad!

There may have been one year in there right after Catherine was born where it didn't happen because it was just too crazy of a time adjusting to life with a newborn, but I'm not sure (See:  I told you I had a bad memory).

For the last two years we've hired a photographer to take Family Photos for the purpose of including them in the annual Christmas card/letter/photo montage.

2012

2013

This year, however, I've just kept putting it off and putting it off and finding one excuse after another and finally having to accept the fact that Family Photos just might not happen this year.

And do you know why I haven't been so eager to make it happen?

Because this isn't the family I thought I would have this year.

Whoa.  I just wrote that.

Please please don't hear me saying that I'm not grateful for the family I have.  I am incredibly grateful for this family that God has put together.


But when I think about poses and I compare our family to other Family Pictures (it's quite hard to find families of three where the child isn't a baby), and then I find the families with a multitude of children. . .

It feels as if there should be another member to our family.

Oh man, this sounds ridiculous when I put it out there.  I know we have been blessed with our child, and I know there are those who would be happy with "just" one.  I am happy.

But it's been a process.  An adjustment.  And a letting go of my desires and my expectations (there's that word again) and my wants and the comparisons of others.

(Go ahead.  Insert the Frozen theme song here.)

And I guess I'm learning to do that.  To let go.

Because guess what:

It looks like we're actually getting Family Pictures taken this weekend.  Pray for me.  Pray for us.  Heck, pray for our photographer as he has to deal with us!

So, that's step one.

Step two will be actually choosing a photo to represent our family.

Step three will be ordering the photo cards and sharing them with our friends and family across the states.

And saying:  This is our family.  Our family of three.  That I am so blessed to have.  And so grateful for.  And I'm not going to love them any less if we are not blessed with more.

May I have that contentment.  May I have that peace.  May I have that joy.

Because this is so true:  "Comparison is the thief of joy."  - Theodore Roosevelt

I want to celebrate the crazy, silly family that we are.  Even if it doesn't look how we thought it would.  It it truly something to be thankful for!

Once upon a time there was a man who I thought I was going to marry.

I'll go ahead and ruin the ending for you:  I didn't.

There were painful and multiple breakups that led me down a path of great depression and loneliness.

An emptiness that only God could fill.

My battle cry during that period was that God was with me even if I couldn't feel His presence.  It was a daily reminder.

Time passed.  My heart healed.  And God brought someone else into my life who did indeed become my husband, for which I am so grateful.

But for a moment, let's go back to that former suitor.

One of the "red flag" warning signs for me that he was not my Mr. Right was seen every single time we went to church together:  He refused to sing.

The time of our church service where we gather to worship and sing praise to God together was often the most meaningful time of the service for me.  And then I would look over at him and see him standing there, just observing, and not participating.

But I'm not going to dwell on the negative.  Or the past.

So fast forward a few years to this point in time.

The man that God brought to me is a music teacher.  And he regularly serves on the Worship Team at our church.  Those are the people who sing on stage as a guide and model to others.

He sings.
He likes to sings.
He loves to sing.

Tomorrow, for the second time, he is filling in for our regular Worship Leader and leading the entire congregation in singing.


 This irony is not lost on me.

I'm glad I waited and did not settle for what was not God's best for me.

God is the giver of all good things, and I am rich from His blessings.  Thank you, God.