My View

I will admit it. I'm a sucker for 30-day challenges. (Well, maybe not workout challenges, but all the rest.) I psych myself up, gather my supplies, make a cute countdown calendar, and anxiously await day one, until day one arrives... Then I'm usually paralyzed by fear or perfectionism or writer's block or I-forgot-and-now-it's-too-late-because-nobody-starts-a-30-day-challenge-on-day-2!! Or even better, I make it through Day 1 and 2 and 3 and maybe even 7 and Saturday comes and I forget or I don't want to or blah blah blah. I annoy myself, trust me!!
So this year, I did complete the 30 day Thanksgiving Scripture plan, albeit not all on the days that I was supposed to. I am feeling fabulous about that, so I downloaded a plan for the Christmas challenge. I also decided to do the #illustratedadvent Bible Journaling challenge, which has been a blast. But I digress. I saw where last year I had begun a 30 day photo challenge intended to help me savor the season. Oh, I started with good intentions friends. I think I made it to day 11, which was impressive. I thought, hey, why not add this in? So tonight's prompt was "My View." My little nephews and company were visiting, and while my sister was putting the little piranha fish W to bed, H and I were watching the Polar Express, munching on chocolate chip cookies, and decorating the tree. Sounds PERFECT right? Except that there was an orange cowboy boot (always a single, I don't know why), a Ninja turtle sock, a cat toy, a juice box and a towel in the floor. H wasn't wearing any pants and was walking around with my phone in one hand and a clutch of tiny treasures in the other, with chocolate chips smeared all over his face. There was a load of unfolded towels on the couch, a pile of books strewn under the tree, and every pair of shoes in this house piled by the door. One cat had knocked the blinds askew and the other was noisily slurping the nastiest smelling cat food ever while purring contentedly at the top of his lungs. H was chattering on about the movie we were watching and the "racecarsharkship" he wants for Christmas, except he really wants me to get it now, C'mon here's your keys, Oh my gosh look at that TRAIN! The washing machine was whirring, the heater was sending dust bunnies flying, and I was wearing the red dress tshirt I wore to school and snowflake blankie pajama pants. It was CHAOS to say the least. And it was absolutely perfect. So I will upload a beautiful-ish picture of my tree, which is sans all my WWII Shiny Brites and is fairly lopsidedly decorated, and remember

tonight. And I will give myself grace to enjoy and cherish this season of anticipation without the pressure and polish.