Personal Space

Anybody who has spent more than 10 minutes with a child under the age of 5 knows that they have no idea what personal space is. You know what I’m talking about! They have to sit right next to you, sleep right next to you, and when they say hello it’s two inches from your face.

My children seem to take particular delight in invading my personal space. Just when I think I’ve gotten comfortable on the couch, or in bed, or at the dinner table even, some little person wants to ‘be close to mommy’. There are times when I long to have them near me and other times when I just need a break.

I have however realized that they won’t always want to be close to me. As they grow up and start figuring things out for themselves, or so they think :-), they’ll distance themselves.

And you know…we do that same thing in our relationship with God. We go through phases where we yearn to be close to Him, beg to sit in His lap. As we figure things out for ourselves, so we think :-), we back off – distance ourselves.

But that’s why God is God. See unlike us, he wants us to be in His space…constantly. He wants us to always want to be close to Him, no matter how much we learn. He longs and yearns for us to sit with Him when we start to keep our distance, just like we do for our children.

It’s said that absence makes the heart grown fonder; but if you’re not careful that absence will make your spirit weaker.

Until next time…

After the Fall

The other day I decided to take the kids to the park. While walking through the mulch I stepped the wrong way and fell…flat on my face. I laid there for about ten seconds and realized that I had two options: lay there or hoist all these thighs and ample bottom up off the ground. Clearly I didn’t stay there but instead got up, dusted myself off, and moved on with the day.

The next day as I was retelling the story to someone they asked me if I had someone help me up. I was like, nope, got up on my own. At that moment I realized that I was a lot stronger than I thought I was.

Life is like that for me sometimes. It’s not until after the fall or the storm has passed that I realize just how strong I am. And let me clarify, it’s not ME that’s strong. It’s the Holy Spirit within me that’s strong. See Corliss is weak. Corliss would often rather lie down and just not deal with falls, storms, or anything else like that. But because of what I KNOW God has brought me through and His supernatural strength I’m not so quick to give up. 

I used to be deathly afraid of falling. I still have some fear (I don’t like pain) but now I know that even though there might be bumps and bruises, I can get back up. Now to find some BenGay and Advil. 

Until next time…

Let the Good Times Roll!

Anybody who’s spent more than five minutes with me knows that I talk about my kids a lot. The conversation is usually filled with sarcasm and vivid descriptions about their antics. An outsider looking in might think that I’m the worst mother in the world and that my kids drive me to drink. Fortunately neither one of those is entirely true.

My kids are awesome. Don’t get me wrong, they make my eye twitch and have given me one lone gray eyelash, but they bring so much color and life into our household. From one putting on singing and dancing shows (take a guess) and the other one blurting out random things like ‘I like pepper.’ there is rarely a dull moment in our household. Or restaurant…like just now when Jacob heard Daft Punk’s ‘Lose Yourself to Dance’ and started breaking it DOWN in the parking lot of BJ’s.

The truth is our life is FULL of nonstop shenanigans; it’s a life of controlled chaos. Some people have homes that are filled with quiet voices, classical music, and everything in its place. Mine is filled with everything from Kidz Bop to Yo-Yo Ma, constant use of outside voices, and random dirty underwear in the dryer (DON’T. EVEN. ASK.) Neither one is better than the other; it just is what it is.

One day my kids will move out (again, they have to because I want a pool) and it’ll be quiet again. In the meantime I’m going to enjoy the crazy days and the eerily peaceful nights (that’s when the kids are asleep, only when they are asleep) because it’ll all be over in a flash.

Until next time…

Net Worth

My husband and I use an app to track our finances. They send what seems like a gazillion emails a day, most of which I delete. Recently I decided to read one and at the bottom it listed our net worth. With a mortgage and student loans that number wasn’t very big…ha!

Here’s the thing though, I don’t care. You see if I based my worth on a dollar amount I’d spend my entire life trying to increase it and would never reach ‘the number’. I’m not saying that I shouldn’t be a good steward of my money but money and things aren’t what I’m worth.

When I die, I don’t want my friends and loved ones to remember my material possessions. I want them to remember my faith in God, my smile and corny jokes. I want them to know that I would do whatever I possibly could for each and every one of them, as long as it was good for them. I’d want them to remember that when they asked me to pray for them, I really did. 

You can put a value on ‘stuff’, but memories of how you treated someone with love, dignity, and respect are priceless. 

Until next time…

Don’t Hate

Have you ever been scrolling your Facebook Newsfeed and seen a picture of a cute kid with the caption, ‘If you’re not a hater, like this’? No? Just me? I find them hilarious but I usually click like because those are some cute kids!

But ask yourself this, ARE you a hater? Do you have a hard time telling another woman that her hair, dress, nails, talent, whatever is great? Do you find yourself PURPOSELY not giving compliments to other people? Sorry to break it to you, but you’re a hater. 

I love giving compliments to other people. There’s something about noticing something unique about another person that is personally freeing. I have some friends with great taste in fashion, make-up, etc. and I don’t mind telling them just how awesome I think they are. And guess what? It doesn’t diminish my awesomeness because it’s not about ME. 

OF COURSE I do find myself being a hater at times. Usually because I’m feeling bad about myself and I think that chick with the great handbag that I can’t afford should too. But as soon as I have that thought I usually trip over something or spill something on my clothes (God’s little reminder to quit hating). 

So friends, let’s try to minimize the hate. We’re just too good for that. And if you’re reading this…you’re AWESOME. 

Until next time…