State of the Union

At our house, a normal routine has set in. Ben has been teaching and coaching for about a month- his first real football game is tonight, actually! At first, his new schedule was a real transition for me. I missed having him home with me sometimes during the day (when he wasn't farming), but more so during the evenings. Coaching middle school, he has two game nights a week for his teams, and has to attend the high school game every Friday. I teach a girls bible study on another separate night of the week. There are so many people who have more time away from their husbands than I do, especially blog friends lately, but it was extremely difficult at first. I felt like I had finally mastered meal planning for our weeks, and we cherished times around our table together.

But here's what has made all of the difference... BEN LOVES HIS JOB! He doesn't come home drained and exhausted, he comes home filled up and encouraged by his time pouring into students and hanging out with the coaching staff. It's given me joy to know that not only is he feeling purposeful by providing for our family, but he genuinely enjoys all parts of what he is doing. I'm not naive enough to think that there won't be trials ahead with his job.. but Ben is incredible at handling conflict. I'm so excited for him as this new stage of life unfolds. Plus, I have summers with my mister! We're starting to plan a trip to Europe for next summer (eep!!) and other fun things. He'll get two weeks off for Christmas (with some basketball in there) and a full week for Thanksgiving. And a Spring Break. Oh my! Those days will be so much fun. The point is, I've been amazed at how the pang of hurt from being apart so much has become happy, simply because we know it's what God is calling him to do, and because his heart is loving it!

For me, during the day is filled with working from home (on a few different things that I'm not quite ready to share publicly yet!) and spending two days a week dedicated to maintaining our home and investing in friendships. If I have the blessing of a flexible schedule, I'm going to use it. I love being able to work my hiney off during the middle chunk of the week and spend Mondays and Fridays investing in ministry, friendships, cleaning, whatever. I'm truly so thankful. I'm also loving leading bible study with a sweet friend. I have already learned so much from trying to lead a bunch of youth girls and I'm excited to share more as that unfolds. The material we're going over is incredible, and I think women of any age would benefit from it.

That's just a little bit of what's going on with us. A random blog post, yes. But I got excited to share how God has been blessing us during this new stage of life. I feel like the "we're not in college anymore" shock has worn off.. and we're finally adjusting to real life. It's a sweet time.


How are things with y'all? Good weekends? Any fun changes happening? :)