This Motherhood Thing

2016.

I love reading reflections and resolutions for a New Year filled with opportunity. However, I wasn't planning on posting about the New Year. I guess I felt that I didn't have much to add, or a strong reason to speak out. Our year wasn't filled with trips all over the world (though, I love living vicariously through those adventure seeking instagrammers). It wasn't full of blatant success, a new house, or new jobs. It was simply... steady.

God has been working on my heart over the past few weeks. I have been given a simple but glaring message by way of my devotional book, encouraging texts from friends, facebook posts, and worship songs. They all have the same message. One that he knows I need desperately as 2016 comes to an end...

It is simply that this motherhood thing is outstandingly important.

I know it, and I believe it. More experienced moms have offered it as encouragement, accompanied by a hug when I need to hear it most. But for some reason, it is so easy to be distracted with wanting to do something that feels more important.

I am immensely blessed to be doing the very job that I have always wanted to do. Still, sometimes I wonder why it doesn't feel like enough. I know the years of sticky juice spills, hunting for a lost binky, and endless bedtime stories are few and short. "This won't last long. Enjoy This." ... are phrases that play in my head like a broken record.

So as I come up with my list of goals for 2017, my number one goal is to continually find contentment in the roll that I love with all of my heart. The one that is important, but so often feels mundane, and unseen. The one that is filled with wiping noses, cleaning floors, and changing diapers. The one that flies by too quickly, and allows me the privilege of guiding little hearts as they grow. I want to remember that God sees the good days, and the long and hard days too. I want to use my here and now, right where he has me, in worship to him.

Here is to another beautiful, simple, steady, broken, wouldn't-change-it-for-the-world, year.

*A special thanks to my sister for taking these family photos. I am missing those late summer nights this time of year. And gosh, babies really do grow up too fast.