2013 Word in Review

2013 was a wonderful, tough, exhausting, amazing, joyful, love-filled year. In the last year we have seen love grow leaps and bounds in the ever changing, quickly growing, little blessing we call Ella. Our hearts have been filled to bursting with the love, joy, and pride that comes with watching your child grow from a totally dependent infant into an ever-increasingly independent toddler. What a year it has been!

Last New Years instead of committing to a resolution that I was sure to break and stress/guilt trip over, I chose one word to be my focus for the year. I let it permeate my life - sometimes at the forefront of my thoughts, sometimes in the back of my mind. No guilt over constantly doing or not doing something. Just letting that one word be part of who I am. 

My one word for 2013 was love. My main focuses were to fall more deeply in love with my Savior, for my family to always feel and know my love, and to learn to love my career again.  

The hardest of these was the last one. I have struggled greatly (though rarely vocalised it) with my career in the 20 months that my sweet Ella has been around. Don't get me wrong, I believe whole-heartedly that God led me into this career and it is very fulfilling to be able to use my gifts and my passions in ways that impact so many young lives. But with Ella, my priorities and passion shifted to include her, and I have had a hard time reconciling my heart with the amount of time my job requires verses the amount of time I desperately want to spend with her (which is pretty much every minute I can). Add to that being in a totally new school and some student and coworker issues that I have never experienced before (some that came just weeks after my resolve to fall in love with my job again) and you can imagine the mess my heart and mind were in. 

I can say now that I am finally finding my way back to loving my job. The summer was a welcomed reprieve and with the help of some other coworkers, mentors, and good friends (and lots of prayer) I was able to jump into this school year in a better state of mind. This past semester has been sooo much better and much more rewarding. I still struggle with being a working mom but I'm starting to accept that this struggle is one on-going area of my life where God's grace is going to have to shine the brightest. 

All in all, I'd call my one word and focus for 2013 a success. So much so that I'm going to do it again. My one word for 2014 is . . .

My One Word 2013, pt 1

I'm not a fan of New Years resolutions. I don't like feeling obligated to add one more thing to my very full plate and I don't like the guilt that I put on myself if and when I fall short of that goal. I know now that I probably won't blog or even journal consistently, I may or may not run another 5K this year, I'm not even aiming to lose weight (though if I could drop these last five baby pounds I'd be really excited!). If I do any or all of those things then good for me, but I'm not going to stress over whether or not they happen.

For the last couple of years a few of my friends have tried a different approach to their "resolutions" - a one word sum- up of what they want to be/look like/work on in the coming year. You can find the man who started it all, Mike Ashcroft, here and see a few of my friends (personal and/or blog buddies) and their One Word for the Year here, here, and here.

My former pastor, Andy Wood, says that most people he knows that choose "one word" for the year seem to know what their word will be almost immediately. When I first started mulling over my "one word" I actually had three words come to mind - time, trust, and love. Over the last few days I've come to realize that my thoughts and goals relating to time and trust are really wrapped up in my "one word", LOVE.

I can see this word playing out in three distinct areas of my life - my family, my relationship with God, and my job.

Since I tend to be a little long winded when I write, I will break each of these down into separate posts and hope I carry it through.  We'll see.  :)

Here is the first.

1) My Immediate Family: 2012 was the most amazing year of my life. I became a mommy to the most beautiful baby girl in the world. My heart grew leaps and bounds before I ever even set eyes on her and my love for her grows even bigger each day. I'm constantly learning and relearning what true love is through this precious little one. I am eager to continue this mommyhood journey this year as I watch her grow.

One of the greatest joys of becoming a mommy has been watching my husband become a daddy. I've seen a side of him that I never knew he had. I love seeing him fall in love with our little girl, and each time I catch a glimpse of that, I fall more in love with him. We are stronger, closer, and more in love today than the day we were married (5 years ago this year!).

My prayer for my little family is twofold - that I am able to find more ways to show and express my love so that Brandon and Ella will always feel secure in my love and that God will use me to continue to show His love to them.