My Crazy Yet Beautiful Life

Below are things that I learned and remembered in 2020. Life in 2020 was hard but let's remember that there was still some good in it.  1. God says to live for today. Matthew 6:34 says, "Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each days has enough trouble of its own." I don't always live into this but this has helped me with stress at work when I'm crazy busy. 2. There is still so much beauty in the world. People are still having babies. The flowers still bloomed, and were so beautiful. Lastly, don't get me started on the beautiful fall Michigan had this year. The fall colors had me excited for over a month. I am so excited that my favorite season lasted more than a week this year. I got to see color over our anniversary on September 30th, and through the end of October. I didn't read a lot on our road trip up north because the colors were just so good this year. So, 2020 has my favorite season looking so beautiful leading up to ...

I turn 29 this weekend. I am not ashamed of telling people my age because honestly, no one believes me anyway. Outside of some smile lines showing up and bags under my eyes, I don't look much different than I did in high school. I wanted to share 29 things I've learned up until now. Most people do this starting out a new decade of their life but why not start the last year of my 20's celebrating everything I have learned from various people and experiences? 1. My identity isn't rooted in the titles of my life (daughter, granddaughter, sister, wife, aunt, or report coordinator). Those are great things but above all, my identity is rooted in God  2. God is good, and it's not an easy to explain to people when they question why bad things happen to good people. Still learning more and more about who God is. 3. Don't sweat the small stuff because it's all small stuff. 4. Respect is earned. If someone doesn't respect me, they don't earn my respect back. Ho...

2020 has been a year of despair for so many, and I am not excluded from experiencing some. I lost my grandpa and an uncle within a few weeks of each other in the spring. I was finally getting used to my job and the people I worked with. When corona hit, they all decided to work full time from home. I decided to work part time on site and part time from home since I was given the choice, and with that choice came the want to keep something "normal". Ha! Normal is a word I will never use the same again. The isolation I felt coming into work those first few months was unbearable. I am now thankfully used to it, like so many other things. It's easier now but there are definitely days that it's still extremely hard. However, I am still thankful for so much and I meant to write this post a week ago but life happened, so here I am in week 2 of November, getting part 1 of my thankfulness out into the world. I'm very thankful that I still have a job and was able to work al...

My Grandma Chaffin passed away last year in February. I remember getting an email at work from Caleb to call him. I was working in the lab at the time, and I was in a study room by myself working on food. I don't know why this is so vivid in my memory but it is. So, I go out to the hallway to call him, somewhat knowing what was to come. I didn't know how hard it would hit me. I finished my work day after talking to my boss, and I was very thankful to go the funeral.  My last memory with her is in June of 2018, Caleb emailed me to call him. Again, this is such a vivid memory. Receiving an email to call him as I'm doing food in a study and so I called him. He told me that everyone thinks she's going to pass on and that if I want to say good bye, I should come home. I asked a manager if I could leave since mine was out of the office that day. I was going up north for Big Ticket Festival for the rest of that week so I didn't have to worry about coming back. I finished m...

It's been a while but I thought a lot about what I want to share on here about my crazy yet beautiful life and finding beauty in the world. Before I write more about my life I should introduced myself a little for context in future posts. Below are 11 facts that sum me up but just know there are many layers to who I am. 1. I am first a follower of Christ. I love God and some of my writing will be faith based. I will never try throw it in your face because I've seen first hand how that doesn't work. I want my blog posts to be honest and about love but that doesn't mean I won't throw in scripture every so often.  2. I love my husband and our beagle very much. A lot of my stories revolve around them. Caleb found our Bella girl in December of 2016, and we made it work financially to keep her. We can't explain what led us to keep her but we sure are glad we did. She makes us better people in so many ways.  3. I love music and going to concerts. This year has been tou...

Perfection. It's what many of us strive for, practically live for, and desire to have in our lives. But no one outside of God is perfect. So, why do we all strive for something that will never truly exist here on earth? I don't have that answer and it's not why I'm writing this out for you. I'm here to write about my need for perfection and how I've found ways to combat it, especially this year. Owning a house is something so exciting but learning new routines in cleaning and completing projects has brought on a sense of overwhelm in my life that has made 2020 even harder than expected. I want my house to look clean and perfect, and that is just not life. Some days are just plain hard, and the worst chore is dishes. We don't have a dishwasher so a sink full of dishes after a full day of work sometimes doesn't get done, even though I strive to wash them every night. Some weeks are great. I do the dishes, shower, relax and go to bed. Most weeks are not lik...