'Home is where your story begins'
We have a little sign on a book shelf with this written on it. 'Home' is such an important thing, it's where the building or house that you live in becomes something so much more.
Yesterday we arrived home after a very long day of travelling ... and a very long month that didn't go at all as we had planned. We did get to catch up with some of our friends which was great but with my Grandma dying and then a collection of viruses between us in our final week, which got worse rather than better before we were due to fly back, we were so pleased to arrive safely home last night! In fact, although totally and utterly exhausted (and no, that is not an exaggeration), there was a little smile in my heart and lightness in my spirit to know we'd finally made it home.
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| Our Home in America |
After the first week of so of our trip Abigail kept saying 'I want to go home'. Everything was so up in the air, nothing familiar and no routine. Even I was thinking something similar and I didn't have the excuse of being 3 years old. Occasionally my response would be 'So do I sweetheart'!! A friend of mine complimented me when I was sharing what Abigail had been saying. She said that we'd obviously created a really great home atmosphere where Abigail felt secure and happy and that wanting to be there showed a strength in our parenting. A perspective I hadn't considered before but not one that got us back any quicker!
One of the downsides of being a missionary is moving around every few years, often to different countries and cultures and then having to make it home. As a single girl 10 years ago, teaching in Tanzania, it was a lot easier ... all I had to think about was myself and adjusting things for me. Now it is different ... making wherever we live home for us as family and keeping things as familiar as possible for the girls, at the same time as embracing the new culture.
My husband and I don't want to be shipping all our worldly possessions from place to place and we don't want to be overly extravagant in the way we live and what we own. We do think it's important however to have little things that are familiar to us and the girls that make which ever houses we live in 'ours' for the time we are there. For every individual and family these things are going to be different ... but wherever you go they are must take things.
I used to think that the title 'homemaker' was almost a derogatory term. People can often mistake it for someone who sits at home doing whatever takes their fancy. Now, being a mother of two and moving our family from one place to the next, I see the importance of what a 'home maker' really is and what hard work it involves especially when you're fitting into new cultures, creating that safe place to come back to at the end of the day for the whole family. It requires time, thought and effort ... but now I'm proud to be a known as a 'homemaker' and think I do pretty good job of it too!
My husband and I don't want to be shipping all our worldly possessions from place to place and we don't want to be overly extravagant in the way we live and what we own. We do think it's important however to have little things that are familiar to us and the girls that make which ever houses we live in 'ours' for the time we are there. For every individual and family these things are going to be different ... but wherever you go they are must take things.
I used to think that the title 'homemaker' was almost a derogatory term. People can often mistake it for someone who sits at home doing whatever takes their fancy. Now, being a mother of two and moving our family from one place to the next, I see the importance of what a 'home maker' really is and what hard work it involves especially when you're fitting into new cultures, creating that safe place to come back to at the end of the day for the whole family. It requires time, thought and effort ... but now I'm proud to be a known as a 'homemaker' and think I do pretty good job of it too!
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