hooking up the hose

After several suggestions that I start my own blog, I'm doing it. As I sit here and hyperventilate about the fact that my words, my heart, my thoughts, are going to be out there on the internet for anyone to find and critique, I am hesitantly stepping forward, bound by a promise I made to my 9-year old daughter that I would publish this before I went to bed tonight! 

My life is full. I've been married to my high school sweetheart (cue "awww") for 13 years, and we have 4 beautiful, bright kids. Girl, boy, boy, boy. Lots of lightsabers and swords at our house! Our first 3 babies were born within 4 years of each other, but we waited another 4 years for our last. 

I love reading, journaling, good coffee, and heart connections with friends. I love God, and knowing Him is the greatest joy in my life. Since I was a little girl, my dream has been to stay home with my kids, and I've been livin' the dream for almost 10 years now. It's a fun, exhausting, wildly rewarding job, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. 

I'm totally new to this blogging thing. I don't know how to link to a picture, or to another website, or anything. (and what's a linky party?) But I do feel like I have a story to tell, even if only to a few. Where do I start? 

So, the name. I'll start with the name.

We all know the quote, "The grass is greener on the other side of the fence." For a long time, I've believed it. But it's a lie. The grass isn't greener on the other side. 

The grass is greener where you water it. 

If you don't water your grass, what do you get?

Dead grass.

If I'm really honest, most of my life I've envied other people's grass, their lives. Insecurity kept me from appreciating what I had, and all I could do was secretly wish I had what "they" had.

"That" husband, or "that" life, or "that" family, or "that" easy baby, or "that" much financial flexibility. 

Or even deeper, I wished for their giftings...their talents...their strengths, that seemed so much "more" than mine. More creative. More organized. More fun. My own grass, my life, dried up and all but died while I wasted time wishing for something other than the life the Lord had given me.

No more.

I am done. Done with dragging through life, unaware of the blessings I've been given. Done with wishing I had someone else's anything. Done with wishing I was like someone else. Done with the ingratitude.

Ingratitude is a lying thief. It's stolen moments and days and years of incredible gifts given. It's kept me busy with comparing (please tell me someone else struggles with this) and judging my life based on those around me, and has ultimately made me unhappy with myself. My life is whizzing by, and I've been sitting in a tollbooth, watching it happen, on a stool of ingratitude. 

The real truth? I am blessed beyond anything I deserve. My life is full of incredible beauty and gifts. And not just my husband, kids, and family, although they're amazing. Not just our health, or our laughter, or anything material that we possess, though it's plentiful. 

Everything. All things in life, the good and the bad. The easy and the hard. Being thankful doesn't mean being thankful only for the good stuff. It means being thankful for it all. 

For the mountain of laundry. 

For the never-ending dishes. 

For the challenges with friends. 

For the temper-tantruming two-year-old. 

Rejoice, pray, and in all things, give thanks...not just in the obvious blessings, but in ALL things...because it's all been through His hands before it hits my plate. 

It feels like I'm just waking up to my life...to my own gifts, to my own unique place in my little world, to the blessings, to the reality that I GET to live this life, I GET to have these kids, this house, this husband...I GET to!!! They are a gift, not a burden! THIS is my life, not the imaginary one I have dreamed up in my head. THIS is my life...this is MY grass. 

Time to hook up the hose. :)