A Week of Gratitude, Day 3: Home, Sweet Home

Taking the WHOLE week off to spend time with my amazing family. Am auto-posting a series titled "A Week of Gratitude" while we're off doing cool stuff like baking, digging out the Christmas decorations, jumping in piles of leaves, making final visits to the playground before the weather gets too cold, visiting with the relatives, taking looooong drives all in one vehicle, singing songs loudly, and anything else we can think of. Be back in a few days! Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. This year, let's be glad of all we have...

A Week of Gratitude, Day 3: Home, Sweet Home

Believe it or not, it's been over a year and a half since our ill-fated flirtation with building another house and selling the one we currently own. Those were hard, hard times, mostly because trying to keep the house clean to that degree for that long will kill anybody, I don't care who you are.

But what it cost us is so little compared to what we learned. About our marriage. About our priorities. About our desires and dreams. About how to take two people who are driven to achieve and mesh their goals together to create a FAMILY. I guess every couple does that their own way and in their own time, but the whole house-selling-house-building experience was a huge crucible for us and really refined what we'd already discussed and knew in our hearts to be true:

Our home goes with us, and has nothing to do with our house.

Our house is the safe place that we call home, and cannot be disregarded in its importance.

Our desire for the home we dream of is only and always as strong as our desires for our family.

Our love for one another and our children is the driving force behind the goals we work toward each day.

Not too shabby for a year and a half, huh?