I don't quite have it all together yet this year.

Hey, remember last year, when I had it all together?  No?  Well, this school year isn't looking much better.  New teachers, a new grade level we've never been through before.  New position on the PTO board.  Do not ask me which day is library day for any of my children.  I have NO idea.  Michael says we grounded him earlier in the week, but I have no recollection of what for or from what!  About the time I start acclimating to the newness of things going on around me it will be the holidays and then God help us all...

It's a good lesson in life to know your own limits.  For example, when I wake up at 2am and can't go back to sleep because the thought pops into my head that I should re-learn Spanish.....I'm getting close.  Such evenings usually inspire me to go to the calendar first thing the next morning and see what I can thin out or reschedule.  Or, better yet, say no to before I begin.  You know, like team photos at the YMCA and exercise classes. 

But then there are the challenges we have to face, the ones there are no getting around.  Homework, illness, job responsibilities, Halloween.  For these I take comfort in knowing that God is already on the other side of them.

"For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will be no plowing and reaping.  But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance." Genesis 45:6-7

These are Joseph's words of forgiveness to his brothers when they were reunited years after he had been abandoned by them.  During the years in between Joseph endured slavery, prison and loneliness.  But the Lord was with Joseph not just in his present struggles, but in the future that lay ahead of him.  His trust in God not only allowed him to make it through the years of hardship, but helped him to forgive the family that betrayed him at the start of it all.  His story is one of redemption in its greatest form. 

So bring it on, I guess.  If Joseph can handle Egypt, I can handle the 4th grade. 

Heavenly Father, you are the God of my yesterday, my today and my tomorrow.  There is not an outcome that You don't already see, not a day You don't hold in your hand.  Help me to lean on Your assurances when the going gets tough, Lord.  For You are with us, now and always.

XOXO...Kelly

Here's one of our dogs, Miss Cordelia Drexel Biddle Long.  She doesn't quite have it all together yet either.  But her attitude is good.  :)