while mary is off gallivanting in italy, her family takes care of each other. based on his face, ian couldn’t be happier…. 🙂

it is much different than riding my car. suddenly things that were unseen are seen and can be smelled and almost felt. like the fragrant apple trees that line the sidewalk that i pass and the family name on the mailbox on that one back road. the house that was converted to have a ramp and a van that looks like ours. the smell of all the neighbors cutting their grass and the woman running the daycare who’s life looks really fun but i’m sure still has days of feeling meaningless. i can’t see these from my car but they’re always there. and i wonder if this seeing is what life would be like to live with gratefulness. colossians 3 says simply “and be thankful.” if i’m practicing gratefulness, will my eyes be opened to all that is around me, as they are on my bike rides? will the world somehow become different to me? if so, i need to be within the small “thanks,” because the big ones just feel impossible.

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

i have spent the first year of marriage trying to create a new life for, a happier world for ian. we’ve tried to learn to love god more, we’ve surrounded ourselves with beautiful friends, ive worked to decorate our home with loveliness, have spent countless hours with our loving families. we live in a great house that right now is covered by a beautiful breeze and is surrounded by green trees and grass. and it feels right and full and good. but at the end of the day, the home that i want to create for ian is an impossible task. the life that we want to have, free of disabilities and therapy and deficiencies is not up to us at all. and the One who could change it, hasn’t.

so i’m left with a great task. to keep digging for contentment, digging, digging and digging.

and as i share my heart with my wonderful husband, his words are “i’m so glad that god gave me a wife.” such simple gratefulness. maybe i’ll catch up with him someday.

thanks for praying

laris

spending a week at the lake with our lovely family!

only great friends like this could pull a western party together in two days and look this good

WOW have i been awful at writing on here! life has been crazy, including a few days of filming at our house for a small project that we’re part of, plus the usual and fun summer activities and sunburns. thank you all who are still praying for and following us. i hope to post something more meaningful soon

My very dear child, What shall I say! A holy and good God has covered us with a dark cloud. O that we may kiss the rod, and lay our hands upon our mouths! The Lord has done it. He has made me adore his goodness, that we had [your father] so long. But my God lives; and he has my heart. O what a legacy my husband, and your father, has left us! We are all given to God; and there I am, and love to be. Your affectionate mother, Sarah Edwards. (Marriage to a Difficult Man, by Elizabeth Dodds, p. 196)

happy father’s day to the two best dad’s in the universe, one of which we miss dearly. no one could love us better than you two.

“The Lord Jesus is a deep sea of joy: my soul shall dive therein, shall be swallowed up in the delights of His society.” -spurgeon