India. I wasn’t really sure what to expect but what I found was love and joy. The universal language of love, touch, of being held, and the simple pleasures like skipping rope, playing catch, and red nail polish kept smiles on all the beautiful faces. How do you reconcile your life when you come back? The simplicity of living with only your basic needs being met and of a life trusting God to provide. What is this kind of trust; a faith that releases you from fear and brings you freedom to live with joy in the simple?
How do you process a return to your ‘normal’? A life made complicated by financial responsibility, being over scheduled, mortgage. How do you return to simplicity? We all have the same basic needs right? Food, shelter, and also the need to feel like we matter, the need to feel loved unconditionally, to be touched and held; add the very human longing for a life of joy and peace. The conflict in today’s ‘first world’ society tosses between wanting to save the world by service and agenda and also trying to ‘have it your way.’ It can’t be both. We must first lose ourselves before giving ourselves away. Serving others, meaning even just the basics of loving them, hugging them, looking in their eyes, washing their feet…their joy and gratefulness, brings you joy and gratefulness and hope. It’s a start. 
to need so much(it’s all good of course). Vacation did a couple things for me, helped me relax but also made me miss home. The ache for home lives in all of us. The safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.~Maya Angelou My son just finished his first semester at college and came home a few days ago. It’s been great having him here awhile before I have to once again say good bye and let him go practice ‘adulting’ again. Like the quote says, home should be a safe place, a place where we feel loved, where we can be who we are with no judgement, where there is no fear (unless you’re talking about teenagers then yes, they should fear me…haha). Home should be that place that when you’re far away you think about and smile,that safe place where the people you love and care about the most, live or come back to; not just the location but the relationships. The people in it don’t have to be perfect, just honest, loving, and safe. I read the best quote published from an unknown 7 year old the other day, ‘Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents 
and listen.’ Isn’t that the greatest? I am so grateful to have grown up in a loving home and to have a loving home now. By the way, family doesn’t always mean by blood, my parents didn’t have blood relatives around initially so our friends became our family. ‘Family isn’t always blood. It’s the people in your life who want you in theirs; the ones who accept you for who you are. The ones who would do anything to see you smile and who love you no matter what.’~author unknown.
Are there only 2 sides? Is there really only fear and love? One or the other? Does perfect love cast out all fear?
does the same for my kids. He tries to be at most of the games and he drives them around too. Yes, a man of few words, but his actions speak volumes of his love and support.
are the struggles with our kids, the days when no amount of hair products or make up can camouflage a bad night’s sleep, the arguments with a boss or spouse, you know, real life. So on this Mother’s Day, I choose to let go of the constant struggle to keep up with the perfection I see on social media because the daily struggles of life, a job, and keeping up with teens is hard enough. The flowers, the candy, breakfast…all beautiful but for me the kids are a special gift from God and what I want most of all this mother’s day and really every day is for them to know without a doubt that they are loved from the depths of my heart and that I will always love them through~through pain, through struggles, through the good stuff and the bad. How can we expect to have perfect kids when we ourselves are imperfect?
older, start to get more self-sufficient, start to become more influenced by friends and media, then of course, start to talk back. Why is it that the most difficult time for raising a child happens at the exact time they are about to leave home?
there are others when I want to never let him go. He pretends to be fiercely independent but then will ask for something simple or say something which points to the fact that he is still young, a child. I think it’s more difficult with boys because somewhere around the age of 12/13 they start talking with one word answers while girls get more emotional but don’t really stop talking/yelling/whining and still communicating with you. I was told a long time ago that when boys leave home conversations become scarce until they find a wife or serious girlfriend who then becomes the central communicator between mom and son again.
My son’s been receiving college acceptance letters. When he got his first acceptance letter I was so happy for him but my heart dropped because reality showed itself. He is a young adult. He can vote, check into a hotel, maybe rent a car, he’s had a job for a couple years now, etc. yet in this last year he is home I want to hug him more, have him around me more, and kind of spoil him because it has gone way too fast. My first baby who was born 5 weeks early with giant eyes and the longest eyelashes is going to be my first to go. How can I be joyful and heartbroken at the same time?
Anna's Lipstick Journey 