Grace for the morning

It was one of those moments... everything broke down and we were all left in tears. Mommy, big girl, and baby.  I'm crying out for God to cover the brokenness, the disobedience, the sickness as we all cry; and I'm left asking myself "how did we get to this point?"  I can list a handful of things - the morning started to abruptly, Daddy left for work after being home a couple of days, stress, sickness, fatigue.  And while all of these things may have contributed to our chaotic start, none of those things were the root.  What if I had sought out my Father first thing, rather than a hot shower?  What if I had given thanks for a new dawn, instead of focusing  on the "to do's" of the day.  What if I had embraced redemption, sought out grace, chosen joy?  And so my prayer ushered in a new beginning, a do-over for our morning thanks to the redemption, grace, and joy of our King.  Now we have peace for the moment, and God's presence and forgiveness to cover the rest.  It's a good morning.

My Kitchen Floor

I could maybe write a book about my kitchen floor, with all the time I've put into despising it, cleaning it, standing on it, cleaning it again, despising it some more. The thing is, I'm pretty sure it doesn't deserve so much thought. Now the things I've learned while dealing with the kitchen floor maybe deserve more attention. I cleaned it today, like swept all the dirt up and then got down on my hands and knees and scrubbed that thing clean. I always feel so accomplished after I do that. Then the great tomato juice debacle happened (another story for another day). Oh well. The moral of the story is that it's just a floor, an old, white floor. And while I agree that it's probably sanitary to continue washing it every so often, it probably doesn't deserve so much of my attention ("don't walk on my clean floor with those shoes", "do not spill that milk", "ugh, there's milk on my clean floor", etc.) Lesson trying to be learned....

Here's a picture of my used to be spotless floor. There's a lot of life lived in this house - I would have to say that's more important.