Quarantined Together

Dear Lily and Evie,

It's weird out there girls.  In a matter of 2 weeks, our lives have changed dramatically in light of  the Corona virus.  Never in my life did I ever think that 2020 Pandemic was going to be a part of your story.

But it is.

The same way your Daddy and I lived through the terror that was 9/11, you are living through this.  Its weird, its rough, its hard, and its scary.  People are dying. We are doing things we never planned to do.  You are homeschooled now.  We spend most of our days indoors.  We turn down seeing people.  We live 6 feet apart from those we love.  We don't travel. We live solely in the moment. Everything that has become a part of our life is changed.  And it keeps changing.

BUT
You are okay.
You are safe.
You are loved.
and
YOUR FUTURE IS STILL VERY BRIGHT.

I wish I could tell you that this will be the only upset to your life, but I can't.  Life is going to be full of unplanned detours, full of things that come up and change everything.  Jesus truly is going to be the only unchanging force in your life.  I am so glad that you two know Him.  He has promised to never forsake you and girls, HE IS GOOD.

So for now we will let go of all the things we cannot control and embrace what we can.  We will turn the negative voices down and listen to the still small voice whispering, "I have not given you a spirit of fear."  And we will lean into each other.

What a special time we have been given.  All that we have lost is so small compared to what we have gained.  All the things, the striving, the busy, the planning, and the doing has been replaced by the simple, being together.  Our family gets to do life completely without distraction, we get to lean in, and girls I am loving it.

You two are amazing. While I never really wanted to be a homeschool Mom, I am really enjoying curating our day and incorporating learning. I love that we hike together, ride bikes together, play games together (how about that 4 person Mancala we got 3 years ago?).  We do crafts and create (so loving this part!) we sing, we do yoga, and we read.

Our house is clean and we are getting good at working together.  We are helping each other more, and finding ways to make our little postage stamp in this world a little more joyful.  In the midst of a global pandemic, our house is peaceful, our house shines bright.

So as we continue to embrace this new normal.  As more and more things get taken from us and we embrace staying put always remember that joy and peace in the midst of chaos is a choice.  Your attitude is everything.  And when all else fails, lean in to those around you, and trust in the One who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

I love you both and am looking forward to all of the memories we will make, quarantined together in our little corner of this great big world.

Do not fear, but go in love.

Mom

She Did.

What strange times we are living in right now.  I have a couple of blogs that I want to write about our experiences living in quarantine because of COVID-19, but I won't lie, I am struggling to write them.  I want to be sure that when I write them and make them forever part of this blog that I write not of the reality of what we have lost, but the beauty of what we have gained.  I will write them, sometime.

But today I am going to share with you about my virtual half marathon and the victory of running that distance.  My foot and health has been arduous and never ending.  I seem to gain one thing only to lose something else, and I won't lie, I am tired of feeling the next "thing" in my body.  Its been disheartening to be sure.  

6 months ago, as my foot was improving, I set out to run another half marathon.  It had been well over a year since that distance was even possible.  I was so excited.  Then came the mono diagnosis and all that changed. Thankfully the race director allowed for a virtual race option and I jumped at the opportunity to still earn the medal......just on my own time.

While getting back into running, and upping my mileage, I have had a really hard time breaking the 10 mile mark.  Be it time, or physical strength, it has been a major roadblock for me.  When I set out to run this half marathon a couple weekends ago, I still had not broken that barrier.  I had run 9, I had run a 6 and 4 mile combined day, but never had I hit that consistent 10 mile mark.  So lets face it, I wasn't really trained to run 13.1 miles let alone on the trails, but C'est La Vie.  I am so glad I did.

I needed to.  For a lot of reasons, I just needed to do something really hard that had eluded me.  So Ellie and I began with a glorious 7 mile journey out on the Hawes trail system.  

Ellie gets tired and starts to lag around the 8 mile mark so I came back home, dropped her off and picked up Bob.  I knew I was going to need some camaraderie to make it the last half of the race.

I am so glad that I had him because right at the 10 mile mark, I hit the doubting phase.  I was tired and the trails are technical and challenging.  Even going slow, its a lot of work.  But the desert is simply beautiful this time of year, and it provides energy in ways I can't quite express.  So we carried on.

The end required more effort than I am ultimately proud of, BUT the victory of finishing was truly sweet.  I did it.  I ran a half marathon again.  I CAN, I WILL, and I DID.

It felt really good to unbox my medal and hang it around my neck.  Its such a beautiful medal and it really makes me happy.

Sometimes you just gotta do hard things because you can.  Sometimes you have no idea how drastically your life will change in a minute.  Don't wait to do big things, go out, and do them.  Even if recovery lasts a little longer than you remember.  Heres to looking with hope towards the next races!