Reflections (so far) on our 6-week Sabbatical
We just said goodbye to our friends, they’re flying back to Oregon after spending 6 days with us here in Florida. We are on Day 25 of our 40-day road-trip Sabbatical, we’ve driven more than 5,000 miles so far, and we’ve only had three days so far that are just our family (and those were just all-day drive days across the south). Of course, it’s been awesome seeing so many wonderful friends and family. But I can feel myself exhale and slip into what my soul has been craving: Sabbath rest.
Of course Ben will wake up in 30 minutes so it’s a short rest. 😉 But of course as you know there’s a different energy when it’s just your family, and we’ve had some sort of housemates (which we love!) for the last 10+ years. It’s weird to think of building a house that will only be our family, but I’m excited about the possibility of being a host family for Safe Families, and Lord willing, our new space will allow us to do just that. And of course Dad’s next door so that’s the best of both worlds.
It’s been so good to be with so many different people and see so many different parts of this country, different cultures and family-cultures. I love that! I feel like I’m learning so much just by seeing different things and different people. Here are a few thoughts so far:
Hospitality is huge.
I’m usually the one on the hosting-end of hospitality, and it’s easy to just kind of get in a rut of serving dinners and having people over and not really thinking much about it. But being in so many people’s homes, and especially staying the night in so many people’s homes has been so incredibly impacting.
It is such a powerful thing to have someone prepare space for you. Call ahead and find out what you like in your coffee. Check in to see what kind of sleeping arrangements works best for your littles. See what your favorite drinks are. When you’ve been driving for 8 hours and you’re hot, sweaty, exhausted, and you have four tired kids with you, it’s AMAZING to walk into a home and see a delicious dinner on the table, a glass of cold water in your hand, clean beds all ready … I mean, maybe it’s just me. But this is incredible! Who wants a musty motel when you can have a HOME?
And to experience the kindness of other people setting aside their whole life for a day or two (or three–some of you!) to just be with you. To cook for you and show you around their town. It’s incredible. Our culture is so different now because we have hotels, but I’m really hoping in our new home to set it up in such a way that people will come stay. I think we should ditch friend sleepovers and start having family sleepovers!
I love having less stuff.
We each brought one carry-on sized suitcase for our 6 weeks. This needed to include beach clothes, swimsuits, hiking stuff, Washington DC clothes, church clothes, etc. It forced us to keep it REALLY simple, and I’ve been loving it!
When you only have running shoes, flip-flops, or Birkenstocks, it doesn’t take long to choose your shoes. So much less decision fatigue and time spend on figuring out clothing. We have our one travel mug, our water bottle, our snack cup. It’s just been so nice to have less stuff. It feels like a rest for my brain! It’s definitely make me want to even further declutter our lives and only keep what we actually love and use.
It’s good to get some distance from my daily life.
When we’re in the thick of it, the stuff our lives can be so all-consuming. It can feel like the whole world is all about whatever you’re concerned about. Everything revolves around your concerns or fears or issues or whatever. Oh man, it’s so good just to GET AWAY FROM YOUR LIFE. To get a little distance and see OTHER PEOPLE’s lives and concerns and stresses and worries and joys. Turns out, we are really small!
There’s another whole world out here, and it just helps so much to gain perspective, especially by spending time with people whose lives are very different from our own. I enjoy this about all three of my sisters-in-law. Our lives are very different, and it’s so helpful to spend time with them and realize how drastically different their stresses and fears and joys and sorrows may be.
I remember how much I love our life.
I’m sure this is true for everyone: Being away reminds me how much I love Oregon. I mean the Florida sun is great, Tennessee homes are gorgeous, Georgia peaches are like nothing else in the world, BUT…I love Oregon. The water alone is reason to love it there! 😉 The rain is rough, but the beauty is breath-taking, and the fresh, clean air, the oceans and mountains within a couple hours of each other, plus rivers and lakes and creeks and farms and OREGON IS AMAZING! And the same is true with our church and family and friends. Of course I know that our state and our community aren’t superior to others, but God has placed us there and given us a love for it. It’s HOME. There’s no place like it, right?? Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and it’s been great to get away and appreciate how much we love our life.
3 ways to make family vacations worthwhile
As I type these words we’re one-third the way through a 6-week, cross-country family road-trip, crossing 20 states and nearly 9,000 miles.
Our 15-, 13-, 3-, and 1-year-old kids are loving the adventure so far, and it’s brought us some clarity about the mission and vision for our family along the way.
Any type of vacation or excursion is costly, both in time and resources, so how do we decide what’s worth our time and money?
3 ways to make family vacations worthwhile
These are the three priorities we used to plan our course: (Read the rest over at Simple Homeschool…)
A Day in the Life of our Crazy 😉
Hey friends! As many of you know, every year we share a fun Day-in-the-Life post over at Simple Homeschool. This one had lots of opportunities for grace, forgiveness, and teachable moments. Head on over to Simple Homeschool to read the details. And don’t worry, I don’t usually serve food that’s been on the floor! 😉 LINK: https://simplehomeschool.net/kari2022/
Grateful
I wanted another happy day. After such a hard month, we’d finally had such a sweet day out in the sunshine, getting dirty gathering debris, Dad and me and kids and neighbors all together. No one had to say anything about the sadness. We knew it was there, and we also knew that it was good to be in the sunshine and it was good to run a chainsaw and it was good to set things on fire and then sit in Adirondack chairs and rest our tired muscles in the warmth. Our conversation ran from heaven and hospice to Dodger baseball and diesel.
The sun shone directly on our faces.
No one was out looking for joy or satisfaction, necessarily. Stuff needed to be burned. It was Saturday and sunny and that’s what you do out here. I toted Ben on my hip and made lunch and stood there breathing the cold, clean winter air, thinking how odd it is to feel so much grief and so much joy all at once.
I think about my mom all the time. I miss her every day. Logically, this perplexes me. She declined for so long, I thought I’d be emotionally prepared to have her gone. It’d been years since she was able to call me on the phone. It’s probably been a decade since she was able to email me. So I don’t understand how the missing can be so overwhelming. I love receiving messages from people who have specific memories of her. I love reading the books that she dog-eared and underlined. I love her hand-writing. I miss her smell.
I guess that’s what it is. I know all the stuff about heaven. I’m grateful for all the reminders about where she is and the hope that we have. I believe it all, I do! I just miss her.
I’m guessing many of you understand this. The constant ache of missing.
And today God reminded me that the relief, the joy, the satisfaction doesn’t come by chasing after it. After that good and happy day I just wanted another good and happy day. And today as we started out working together, splitting wood, the circumstances weren’t the same and I could feel that disappointment well up just a bit in my soul.
How easily I can become embittered!
The clouds were stubborn and the littles were cold so I took them into the house, and began prepping dinner while occupying them. NOT what I wanted to be doing. I wanted sunshine, I wanted to be working in the fresh air. And then I remembered what God had said in Hawaii:
If you look for relief, you won’t find it. If you look for gratitude, you will.
I had been so tired then too. It had felt like an army crawl across the finish line of Easter, when we finally flew away to Maui and I’d anticipated it so much and that first day so many hard things happened I realized I could be in paradise and still be sad. And as I prayed I sensed God ask, “What are you looking for?”
I tried to answer honestly: Well, God, I’m looking for relief.
Just some relief. I’m not asking for ecstasy or luxury or anything excessive. Just relief. But immediately I knew, if I came there looking for relief for myself I wouldn’t find it. Babies still cry in Hawaii. Toddlers still throw tantrums and couples miscommunicate and the whole thing can go sideways rather quickly if I’m in it solely for my own relief.
But if I look for gratitude, I will find relief.
I did. It turned out to be a tremendous trip. Not perfect, but filled with thanks and yes … relief.
Standing there at the counter shredding chicken, I remembered. Gratitude.
And service. How many meals did my mom dish up? How many lunches did she pack? A billion. She served and served and served and served. And had the most contented, joyful spirit.
I shredded the cheese, put Ben down for a nap, read a book to Justice.
The sun started breaking, just a bit, through the clouds.
By mid-afternoon it was full-sun, take-off-your-coat, push-up-your-sleeves weather and Ben woke up happy and as I smelled his sweet baby breath and sat with Justice in the sun I thought, There it is. That joy. It did come. The by-product of thanks-giving and serving. Felt fully and simultaneously with grief.
Missing Mom and being so glad I get to raise her grandchildren and do life with Dad and be her one and only daughter, her DNA woven into every part of me.
Grateful.