I'm hard-pressed to call much of anything I do "work" - not since my nursing career days, when I could deposit a nice paycheck in the bank every other week.
Don't misunderstand me - women {and men, for that matter} who don't work outside the home work hard. Very hard - often without the satisfaction that comes from a job well-done, because the work never ends, and seldom receive much honor or respect from those who think that a paycheck is what validates our work.
It's just that I love what I do.
I loved staying home with my children. I loved the pace and challenge of homeschooling and the opportunity to learn what I failed to learn when I was a student. Those years at home with my children full-time are a memory I treasure and hold close.
I loved caring for my bedridden mother - washing the feet of the saint who I loved more than any other woman and who did so much more for me than I could ever do for her. I loved washing her face, giving her a bath, rubbing lotion into her back and feet, brushing her hair, getting her dressed, changing her diapers, holding her hand - it was hard work, but I loved my mother and counted the opportunity to care for her in our home a gift.
I have loved being available to help {play with} my children by caring for my grandchildren, as well as the years I was healthy enough to help an elderly friend with bathing and minor chores once a week.
I love writing, whether I'm paid for it or not. So much so, that I keep forgetting to submit an invoice for my monthly ghost-writing gig. And no. We are not wealthy - far from it - more like lower middle-class. I've never had a housekeeper, a massage {though I was once given a certificate for one - thank you Nick and Kristin}, or had my nails done, but I love our small and modest home - a hodge-podge of hand-me-downs and thrifty finds - and because my beloved husband has been a faithful and wise manager of our income, it's a home we own outright.
I love photography and the challenge to improve my skills, and I love being able to share my photographs freely with others. As Ann Voskamp says, a gift is always a gift and never stops giving.
I love having the time to read good books and to dig deep into the study of God's Word. It's one of the greatest benefits of being a stay-at-home-mom {and mimi}. Even during the years that little ones were at our feet, my friend Barbara and I would meet weekly to pray and study while our children played around us. We'd stop momentarily to change a diaper or settle a squabble, and we even stopped once to take Nick to the ER for stitches, when he fell on a shard of glass in the empty lot next door where the older boys were playing. But we never stopped meeting - to encourage and spur each other on to the love and good deeds to which we have been called.
I love being available now to live out the call to be a Titus 2 woman in even small ways. With a few other women my age, I'm available to lead a group of young mothers in study while their children play around us - sometimes interrupting us with their needs. What a gift these women and their children are to me.
I love the Body of Christ everywhere and leading lifegroups with my husband in our church - as we crack open our own broken redeemed lives that we might comfort others with the comfort with which we have been comforted, and guide them in opening up the Word in fellowship and communion - that we might all grow more to love and live like Jesus.
my voice and my pleas for mercy.
Because he inclined his ear to me,
therefore I will call on him as long as I live.
Gracious is the Lord, and righteous;
our God is merciful.
Psalm 116.1-2, 5
