This painting may have no significance to you, but it has so much meaning to me. It hangs on my wall, and it’s a reminder of my grandmother who lived in this house and has since passed on.

This house no longer exists. Years of wear and tear on its old wooden bones have made it only a memory in a painting.  It’s interesting how things that have meaning and significance have nothing to do with concrete items. Sometimes it takes death or a lifetime to figure this out, but as they say a picture (or painting) is worth a thousand words.

I recently read a book that discussed the importance of older generations fostering relationships with younger generations. I immediately thought about my relationship with my grandmother. I looked at this house and thought about all the little details and why she was so special in my life. It was a modest house, and if a home could have the attribute of humility then this little white house had plenty of it. My grandmother raised eleven children (yes, 11) in this humble home. She always hung her clothes out to dry on the clothesline. She quite often would be seen sweeping the rail-less porch or tending to her pretty pansies. This house never had many modern conveniences, and yet, this home had so much meaning in my life. It was a place of family and love.

My grandmother lived far away from me, so visits with her were not often, but growing up I looked forward to them. Later on in my life, I had the opportunity to bring my children to visit my Grammie. I have a picture of four generations together in this humble home. My grandmother raised her children and then reached out to her grandchildren and great-grandchildren with love. It might have been in simple ways like her home-cooked meals, her crocheted items, or even her little handwritten cards. However, it is the simple things that show love and devotion. She truly cherished her family.

Perhaps, you too, have a symbol of family you can recall in your life. This painting is a beautiful reflection of love for me, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. I know there were both sad and happy occasions that were tied to this home. Family is about the good, the bad, and even the ugly— at times.

Sometimes, I think we are losing sight of the importance of family. Our busy schedules and our success-driven lives are clouding our perspective. Divorce and estranged family relationships can cause so much emotional damage. Older generations are not mentoring the younger ones and children are rarely taught to respect their elders. It is as if there is this growing disconnect between generations instead of the bonding that creates a family.

I didn’t have the opportunity to spend great amounts of time with my grandmother. However, she invested in me by spending the time she did have and letting me know she cared and loved me. During this Christmas season, I am reminded of what is really important in life. If you are blessed, like me, to have a family—cherish them. Let your children spend time with their grandparents. Never forget that you are never too old to keep on loving and nurturing your children in whatever stage of life they are in.

God intended for us to be families and for generations to mentor each other. Houses, things, and careers come and go, but investing in the lives of our children and even our children’s children is the most significant thing you can do in your life.

I will always cherish my Grammie and how much she instilled a sense of family in her children. Now I realize it is up to me to do the same in my family. There is a cliché that says, “Home is where the heart is.” I am not one to use clichés, but this painting has it written all over it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

School has started up again and the thing I dread most in the back to school process is buying the school supplies. Three kids, three different class lists and you can’t just get any notebook. No, it has to be Mead, wide ruled and a weird size that no one really ever paid attention to before. Oh, I miss the olden days when spiral notebooks came only in one size and there was only Elmer’s white glue and no such thing as glue sticks. Don’t even get me started on the fact that I have to also provide a gallon size bottle of hand sanitizer or boxes of tissues. (Where does our tax dollars go?) Okay, I protest too much but seriously these are things my home schooling friends don’t have to deal with.

My oldest is going into 8th grade and I can’t believe it. Time goes by fast. Our decision to not home school or to not send our kids to private school has been right for us. It hasn’t always been easy but I feel we made the right choice. I could go on about the pros and cons of why we made our decision but that would bore you and me. All I know is that I am more convinced every day that education begins at home.  I am proud of friends who have chosen to home school and stick with it. I am glad we have private institutions that also educate children and choices we can make. If there is one thing I have learned about education it is that one size does not fit all. I also am more convinced that our children learn the most by the example we lead and the advice we give them.

I might not teach my children all of the content areas at home but their Dad and I strive to teach them how to react to the information they are given. I love that my 8th grader has challenged her science class about evolution or recognizes that teacher who goes out of his or her way to talk about creation in a subtle but honest manner. I am proud of my second grader who draws a picture of the cross during Easter time.  I am happy to have family discussions around the dinner table about how taking God out of our history lessons deletes so much American history that cannot be denied.  I laugh when my 6th grader says ever so logically, “So first we are told that everything comes from something (matter) and then all of a sudden the world came out of nothing.  That makes perfect sense to me.” (I love her sarcasm.) They are getting an education from public schools but we are working ever so hard to give them the Christian viewpoint.

I support all school choices. I even get many of my preschool teaching ideas from some awesome home school teachers.  I am in awe of how homeschooling has grown and I will be one of the first people to fight for home schoolers if their choice is ever taken away. However, I do hope home school families don’t neglect the Christians who have decided to send their kids to public schools. We need your support too.  We believe education begins at home as well. The only difference is our kids go somewhere during the day and then we reflect and mold what they have learned at night.

I love that God gives us freedom in our lives to make choices and when we align them with His will, they turn out for the good. Public school has been that for my family. I have to be a pro-active parent but my children are learning some valuable lessons of living a Christian life in a secular world. There are some negatives and positives but I know God has been in our prayerful decision we made about 9 years ago. Education does begin at home but sometimes it branches out but the root of it will always be at home and with your family!

 

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Remember in Snow White, when the evil queen says, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” What a blow to her self-image to learn that the fairest was Snow White.

We have all been like that queen, looking in the mirror for answers. I think it is accurate to say that we are the most critical about ourselves when we are looking in the mirror. When I was a new mother, I learned a valuable lesson about my self-image and looking for answers from my reflection.

As a teenager and into my twenties, I struggled with my looks and my confidence. I never liked what I saw in the mirror and was always trying to find ways to improve how I looked. I don’t know if a day would go by when I didn’t think about my weight, my hair, my clothes, and my need to feel worthy of the image I set in my mind of how I should look. It was a daily obsession.

I know many people can relate to this struggle. It is exhausting to live with— as a person struggling and with those witnessing it, daily, with you. My husband could only take so much of my constant questioning on how I looked, and one day he set me straight. I was having one of my many insecure days and complaining about my looks. My husband said to me, “Every day that you question yourself and me about how you look, you chip away at the confidence and self-worth of your two daughters.”

Wow! It was like the light bulb finally turned on in my head. It was one thing for me to feel personally insecure, but I definitely did not want to teach my daughters to see themselves through my insecurity. I also realized that not only was I driving my husband crazy, but I was dishonoring God, who created me. I started to understand that God sees me the same way I look upon my children.

Mothers often view their children with biased eyes. Each child has a little bit of the physical appearance of the mother and the father, and are unique in their own way. There is nothing you’d want to change about that individual, distinct appearance of your child. God is biased, too. He wouldn’t change a thing about you because he made you in His image. I realized that I wasn’t only chipping away at my own self-confidence, but I was separating myself from fully feeling the love of Christ.

I am raising my children in a society that tends to value appearance above character. They are learning that the world around them focuses on beauty, weight, fitness, and popularity. In the age of social media and selfies, it seems we can’t escape self-obsession.  If there is one thing that I can do right by my children, it is to look on myself with confidence and be proud of who God created me to be.  This might mean I have to grin and bear it when I put on a few extra pounds. I might have to realize that I will never have hair that can be advertised on a shampoo bottle. There may be days that I look in the mirror, and I don’t like what I see. However, I have learned that it isn’t about me. It is about my children who need to feel loved and confident. It is about my relationship with Christ and feeling worthy of the honor of His creation—ME!

My children will have days of doubt and insecurity. We all do on occasion. But I know NOW that I do not want to be an example of insecurity for my kids. I want them to know that Mom is happy in her own skin— in who God created her to be— and they should be too.

I no longer dwell on the things I cannot change, so that my children will realize they were created with a purpose— both inside and out.