I Owe It All to Dubyah

Ok, so time to get back to the beginning and explain how I came to embrace the concept of voluntary simplicity. 

Honestly, a decade ago I had never heard of such a thing.  If I had heard the phrase, I would have had no ability to define it.  At that time, I was a well-educated, professional working insane hours, married to a professional who had his own insane hours at his job, and we had a lovely home in a gated golf course community in the suburbs of a major urban center.  I was fairly early in my career, and my husband and I were both busy on the treadmill of the corporate world.  In the little free time we had, we were busy with a bunch of church activities and trying to maintain our home.  There was little time to stop and breath--let alone think about the big picture.  We were just trying to keep our heads above water with all that we had on our plates.

Then the 2004 presidential election was held and I was devastated by the results.  (Ok, my conservative friends, this is the time I warned you about.  Stay with me, keep reading despite the next several paragraphs.)

In 2004, I was deeply concerned about the direction in which our country had been going.  In the course of the first term of George W. Bush, we'd suffered devastating attacks on our country.  Instead of using that traumatic tragedy to build on the solidarity felt for our country domestically (and internationally), our president and his advisers stoked fear and exploited it.  They exploited our feelings of vulnerability and promulgated untruths, which resulted in imprudent military actions that caused us to be quagmired in two long wars on foreign soil.  Instead of showing international leadership and maintaining the moral highroad, we had become a pariah nation whose credibility was shot.  My husband and I both worked in the energy industry at the time, and consequently felt certain (due to our professional insights) that the invasion of Iraq had been a thinly veiled attempt to secure better access and control over that nation's petroleum resources.  It was never about WMDs.  It was demoralizing to us that most of the country--who were not in the energy sector--did not realize this or call the administration on their charade. 

I had never been a big fan of John Kerry.  Another Massachusetts liberal running for president?  That didn't seem like a winning ticket to me.  But in my mind, he was better than the alternative.  As a Christian, I take Jesus's teachings very seriously and the reckless engagement in wars of questionable legitimacy were alarming to say the least.  In the late summer and early fall of 2004, it appeared that Senator Kerry had a strong shot at winning the election, and I was hopeful that he might turn things around despite the horrible mess our country had gotten itself in. 

Even on election day, things seemed to be going well.  Then came Ohio.  Apparently, Senator Kerry did well in the urban areas, but in rural communities there had been an unprecedented drive to get people to the polls.  That year, Karl Rove and his team had exploited voter initiatives on same-sex marriage in many states to encourage conservative voters to get to the polls despite their waning enthusiasm for President Bush.  In essence, they exploited another type of fear--homophobia--in order to squeak past Senator Kerry in key states. 

And sadly, it worked.  When the results became final and Senator Kerry conceded, I was incredulous and deflated.  I couldn't believe that we were stuck with another four years of one of the more disastrous presidencies in recent memory.  I couldn't believe that the military quagmire would show no signs of improvement.  It might even get worse.

And as a Christian, I was also distraught that the way the election was won ended up crystalizing even more in the minds of non-Christians the concept of Christian homophobic bigotry.  We were not known for our love, but our hate.  We were not sharing God's love with a hurting world, but judging and condemning in ways Jesus warned us against.

As a Christian, I couldn't believe God would let all this happen.  (OK, my non-religious friends, this is the time I warned you about.  Stick with me for the next few paragraphs even if you don't agree with my faith perspective.)

I had felt so certain that the offensive wars, in which we were engaged, were a moral outrage that God would remedy with a domestic regime change.  A decorated soldier with a distinguished history of public service and the backing of so many military leaders.  Surely this was God's plan to help end the wars and the anguishing human suffering it engendered.  I had felt confident that God's apparent plan would work out.  Then Senator Kerry conceded and President Bush declared victory.  What the heck happened?!!?  It was surreal.  There must have been a mistake.

I was so distraught.  I remember closing my office door--despite our "open door" policy--and listening to Senator Kerry's speech in secret so none of my Republican co-workers would hear.  I just sat there in disbelief as tears rolled down my cheeks.  I even left work earlier than normal.  I just couldn't focus on anything and couldn't hold back my tears.  I didn't know what else to do, so I went to a Christian book store not far from my office. 

I didn't really know what I was even looking for.  But I already was kicking myself for having thought that I could so easily discern God's plans and that he cared as much about politics as I had.  I was already vowing that I should not get so invested in secular politics, but should renew myself spiritually.  Among other things, I vowed to start reading the Bible more regularly.  But I also had a vague thought that maybe at the Christian book store, I might find a book to help me mend my broken heart and allay my concern for our nation.  I wandered up and down the aisles.  Nothing was really calling out to me.  But then I saw a book that somehow caught my attention.

The book was called Simpler Living, Compassionate Life: A Christian Perspective edited and compiled by Michael Schut.  The cover was off-white with medium blue font.  There was a photo of a straw hat, flowers and some worn leather clogs.  Visually it was very pleasant and soothing.

The back cover included praise from people I had not yet heard of: Elaine St. James, Jim Wallis and Vicki Robin.  The back cover also included a summary that began:

Not enough time?  Money?  Peace?  Can less really be more?  What really matters to you?  This powerful resource can help you find the questions that challenge you, and the answers that help. . . A diversity of voices and a helpful study guide make this an effective tool for individuals and groups ready to consider alternatives to the high-price, high-stress 'Good Life': the riches of simplicity and compassion.

Honestly, I did not fully understand at the time what all this meant.  But it sounded good.  It sounded like exactly what was really ailing me at the time.  It wasn't just my disappointment over the election and my concern about our nation's questionable wars. 

I had been on a treadmill of stress and competition at work.  I had so little life outside my job.  This was not what I felt I really wanted, but the "high-price, high-stress 'Good Life'" was what everyone in our social circle was chasing.  You went to college, went off to work in the corporate world, bought your lovely home in the 'burbs where you could show off your furniture and play golf.  If everyone else is doing it, it must be right.  It never occurred to us there might be another path.

The reality was that my husband and I didn't even play golf and had no desire to begin doing so.  We did not particularly care about having a fancy house.  Initially, we'd just wanted to be comfortable in a home we would enjoy.  It wasn't about keeping up with the Joneses.  But whenever our neighbors had a party, I'd feel that we weren't keeping up and needed to spend time on getting closer to the ideal in the magazines.  However, we never really had time to do that.  We were always working.  And when we did get a couple days off, we liked to travel and see different places.  We enjoyed experiences, not so much things.

We'll get more into all that later.  But the bottom line is I owe my epiphany to Dubyah.  Had I not been so disgusted with his first term, and so devastated by his winning of a second term, I would not have been inspired to embark on a spiritual renewal.  I would have continued reading the Bible only sporadically instead of devoting myself anew to a daily study of Scripture.  I also would not have felt inspired to go to the Christian book store that fateful day.  That post-election disappointment and sadness were what prompted me to look for a book on a spiritual topic that would help me find a new path in life.  One that was much more grounded in my true values and ultimately much more sustainable.

Simply Sunday #6

Hello and happy Sunday!

This week I'll just share one thing we did this week in an effort to simplify.  We had a "Papa's Home" party.  A bit of background is needed for this to make sense. 

My husband's job has really been a drain lately.  They are understaffed and there has been a lot of pressure to work overtime.  As a result, he's had to work 5-7 days every week for quite a while.  This means we only have him awake for a couple hours every day.  Major bummer.

This past week he had Tuesday off and we made the most of it.  We were going to go out to eat.  (We had a gift card that someone had kindly given us.)  But ultimately we decided against going out. Instead we stayed in and had a "party." 

I use quotation marks to signal that our family tends to have a broader definition of the term than many others.  I guess that is part of embracing simple living.  We try to see a feast in every meal, a party in every bit of recreation.

We had a great time this past Tuesday at our "party"! 

We began with a veritable feast of frozen pizza and snack chips.  We rarely eat such things, so this is a real treat.  I keep them on hand in case of an opportunity to "party."  We enjoyed them mightily.

After our feast, we declared it "family game night."  We began with a rousing game of Dora the Explorer charades.  Each child was paired with a parent.  It was pretty hysterical because the kids are not all that great at miming clues.  And the parents were not too hip on the Dora characters, so we were all at a disadvantage in various ways.  We laughed hysterically.  It was more about the fun than the competition.

Later we got out the "Operation" game.  Our kids were gifted that last Christmas, but we've only played it once or twice so far.  The kids were actually pretty steady-handed!

Our party went on for quite a while until it was late and we were tired.  But we didn't want to stop the festivities, so we slowed things down with a cartoon before calling it a night.

What a great time we all had!  It is so important to take those times to build relationship and just laugh together.  We need to stop and smell the roses sometimes.

Simply Sunday #5

Hello and happy Sunday!  Hope you are having a great one.

In no particular order, I've got a few things I did this week in my effort to simplify life:

I took time to enjoy a monarch butterfly while helping my daughter practice volleyball.  It was hot and we had a lot to do, but butterflies don't come along our path that often and they are beautiful.  We stopped and watched for a few minutes as it went from plant to plant.

I had things I needed to do the other night when my daughter came to me and asked me to read to her.  I put those things aside, we got in my bed, cuddled and I read a book to her that she's read before but really likes.  (What an honor to be asked to read a book that she already knows and can read herself!)  It was so much fun that when we were done, she asked if she could show me another book she likes about bug-themed crafts. How could I refuse?

The other night I spontaneously made a chocolate cheesecake with my daughters.  I had made something with heavy cream, an ingredient I rarely have in the fridge.  I still had some left over and was trying to think of how to use it up.  I hate to waste anything.  My daughters are wild about cheesecake, but get it infrequently, so on a whim I decided to make a chocolate cheesecake!  We didn't even have all the ingredients.  With only 1/3 of the amount of cream cheese the recipe called for, I improvised by substituting sour cream and adding two more eggs.  It was amazing!!!  You'd have never known I didn't have all the ingredients.  Wow!!

My daughters and I saw two classic films I love this week.  I borrowed Chariots of Fire from the library.  That is one of my all-time favorite films.  I've seen it a cajillion times, but not in many years.  They loved it too and have been talking about it all week.  Then last night, we went to Grandma's retirement community to see An Affair to Remember.  It was a great night!

Enjoy your Sunday!!

One More Thing

Ok, I've now flagged a couple things about me that will come through in my posts that could be polarizing:  politics and faith.  I wanted to give a heads up so no one is caught off guard.  No surprises. 

And I wanted to be up-front about these things because if you disagree with my politics or my theology, you might be inclined to write me off and not read any more of this blog.  I've encouraged you to not do that and to look for common ground.  In my experience, most of us have more common ground than we might initially imagine.

I've thought of one other thing about myself that is likely to come through on posts about voluntary simplicity and that might be polarizing:  My husband and I homeschool our kids.

I know this decision can be very controversial.  Like many homeschooling families, we've learned to not lead with this tidbit.  We don't lie or hide the truth, but we don't necessarily advertise the fact that we homeschool.  When questions come up about where our kids go to school and we have to explain, we've gotten a wide range of reactions over the years. 

I'll start on a positive note.  Some folks are impressed.  They say things like "God bless you, that is wonderful!" 

Alternatively, if they have kids too, they often (without any provocation) become defensive to some degree.  They explain they think homeschooling is ideal, but then they feel compelled to justify why they aren't homeschool.  There are a number of reasons cited typically.  They could never do it because they don't have the patience, knowledge and/or financial resources to do so. 

I always try to make such parents know I believe that education is not a one-size-fits-all sort of thing.  Each child is unique.  Every family has its own dynamics.  Different educational approaches are best for different kids and different families.

On a less positive note, other folks we encounter have much less favorable reactions to the disclosure that we homeschool.  Most just seem to stare blankly at us like a deer in headlights.  They seem to not know what to say.  It is as if we've just disclosed that we live on the moon and we summer on Jupiter.  I often get the impression that such folks are thinking, "Wow, you seemed so normal, I had no idea you were deranged.  How do I politely get as far from you as possible?"  Maybe I'm wrong and these folks are not thinking such things.  Maybe they are just socially awkward.  Not sure, but we get this sort of reaction a lot.  To such people, I often wish I could console them that we don't live on a "compound" or carry firearms.  Nothing to fear.  But I figure that would freak them out all the more, so I just smile pleasantly.

A handful of people, upon learning that we homeschool, have had negative reactions that they've shared with us in fairly rude ways. 

One dear friend frowned and said bluntly, "I don't believe in that, kids need to be in schools."  She had no kids of her own and had never even worked with kids.  But clearly her own educational experience was what everyone else needed. 

Years ago, a fellow soccer mom with a kid on my daughter's team replied, "Well, I guess that is ok if you don't care about standards.  For me, I'd rather know my child is learning what she is supposed to."  That mom was very hung up on standardized tests and the modern trend of teaching to the test.  She didn't trust an educational approach that was different.  Her assumption was we were setting our kids up for a life of poverty because they would be unqualified for better jobs. 

I don't try to show off, but to allay any such concerns, dear reader, let me assure you my kids are doing fine.  My 5th grader is half-way through 7th grade math and my 3rd grader is almost done with 5th grade math curriculum.  They are both avid readers.  They are good kids, but my older child sometimes smuggles books into her bed to read them after bedtime or first thing when she wakes up.  We are currently reading Romeo and Juliet together, which is a hoot because my kids keep attempting English accents when they read their assigned roles.  My 5th grader is also reading Pride and Prejudice and a book about the fall of Troy, while my 3rd grader is reading A Little Princess and The Odyssey.  They are both learning to type and to play the piano.  One has been in soccer and basketball leagues.  The other has studied folk dancing and has been on both soccer and volleyball teams.  Both my kids want to go to college. My older daughter wants to be a scientist, and my younger daughter vacillates between wanting to be a dentist and an artist.

However, if you still sympathize more with the folks who've had negative reactions to homeschooling, I recognize this point may be a real turn-off to what otherwise may have seemed like a promising blog.  I encourage you to not write me off, but to consider a few things.

First, about 10 years ago, I would have had the same reaction as you. 

My husband and I both come from a family of public school teachers.  Not only was grade school teaching the family business, but both my husband and I were educated K though college in public schools.  It worked out pretty well for us. 

And I began my career as a grade school teacher where I did not have a favorable impression of homeschoolers.  The only ones I met were the antagonistic families who eventually pulled their kids out of our public school to homeschool--after they insisted we were promoting a "satanic curriculum" by teaching stories like "The Three Billy Goats Gruff" and "Jack and the Beanstalk."  As most of my colleagues and I were devout Christians, this accusation seemed a bit odd to us. 

Additionally, I lived in a community where there was a high profile murder case where a psychotic mom killed all her young children.  They were homeschooling Christians, so this seemed to confirm my impression at the time that homeschoolers were strange and delusional.

Happily, when we adopted our first child, we met some other adopting families who already had older kids whom they homeschooled.  Like many homeschoolers, they kept a low profile about their educational choice.  So, I got to know them and their children beforehand without forming negative prejudgments due to my own bias against homeschooling. 

These families had teenage kids who were so articulate and polite.  The families seem to work well together.  They pitched in to get things done and to care for younger siblings.  No whining or foot dragging.  They also loved to read and were good at entertaining themselves.  They didn't ever seem to get bored.  I finally asked one of the moms what their secret was to raising such amazing kids.  The answer was homeschooling.  I was beyond surprised but I tried to keep an open mind. 

I asked a lot of questions and learned a lot more about homeschooling from these moms.  They also recommended that I read up on the topic and attend a homeschooling convention.  The more I learned, the more I was impressed and realized my prior impressions of homeschooling were not all that accurate.  Instead, my husband and I became more excited about the notion of one day homeschooling our own child, though at the time she was still a baby.

Like many parents, we already had worries about the school we'd eventually send our daughter.  Bullying, the quality of the education, trying to instill our family's values, peer pressure.  There are so many issues.  Like many middle class parents, we had already bought a home in a suburban area with well-resourced schools with the assumption that we'd send her to our local public school when she was old enough.  But we'd already heard from neighbors that things were not necessarily as rosy in the local schools as we had thought.  The local schools had problems, so we'd preliminarily looked into private schools.  Those schools were not only pricy, but they often had their own issues.  Among other things, private schools were not regulated in our state, so it was hard to gauge quality from one to another.  But as we learned about homeschooling, it seemed to be a solution to many of the concerns we had about public and private schooling.

As it turned out, there were also some exciting bonuses to homeschooling that we came to realize as we researched the topic.  First, a homeschooling family spends so much more time together that relationships become strong and the family works well as a unit.  Second, instead of being at the mercy of whichever teacher our child was assigned each year, we could take her education into our own hands to ensure a high level of quality.  Third, we could help instill a love of learning by letting our kids follow their interests more by tailoring our curriculum and spending more time on some topics.  Finally, such tailoring also allows homeschooling families to go faster on topics that kids find easy so they don't get bored.  But if they ran into topics they found particularly difficult, we could slow down until they mastered them.  I know first hand as a grade school teacher, that kind of tailoring is not possible in modern institutional schools where the whole class has to cover the same topics in the same sequence and at the same time.

So, in sum, I flag that we homeschool not because I'm proselytizing.  I respect every family's right to educational autonomy.  What works for one family is not best for another.  But homeschooling is a core aspect of our family life, which is going to come out in my blog posts.  We spend a lot of our days homeschooling.  And we spend a lot more time with our kids than we would otherwise because they are not away at school.  Further, we're all at the house a lot more than if we were all gone during the day at jobs and school.  The fact that we homeschool explains all that. 

Simply Sunday #4

Hello and happy Sunday! 

Sometimes--perhaps many times--more is not more.  Actually less can be more.  At least with the right attitude.

So, with that in mind, here is one thing I did this week in my on-going journey to simplify life:  I watched the rain. 

Yes, it rained this week!  In our part of the country, this is a rarity. 

And the rain was such a beautiful rain.  It was not the sudden, violent kind we often get that blows trees, outdoor furniture and toys all over the place. 

But it was also not that anemic sort of rain that we get sometimes that is teasingly disappointing.  The kind where we get all excited that rain is coming, but then only a few drops actually fall. 

This week we got a steady, soaking rain.  No intense winds.  It cooled everything down for a while.  Gave our few plants a good drink.  And made little temporary rivers in our backyard along the paths where our doggies tend to run to get to the side gate.

The whole thing was so exquisite that I pushed back the blinds and curtains to just stare at it for a while. My kids were excited too.  They watched with me for a bit, but they are too frenetic to stay put for long.  Eventually I pulled up a kitchen chair, opened the sliding glass door to our backyard and closed the screen to just take it all in. 

To understand why this was a big deal, you should know I am a real Type A sort of person.  I am not good at that contemplative, quiet stuff.  Nonetheless, I tried to be mindful of all I was experiencing to really enjoy the moment.

I sat down on my kitchen chair, and was just amazed by the whole event.  The breeze felt so refreshing on my skin.  The cool dampness smelled lovely.  Very wholesome and earthy.

I looked around at all I saw from my perch inside my kitchen by the screen.  The poor crickets were freaking out, hopping to the refuge of our small concrete patio.  The river rocks that pave our backyard were so lovely as they glistened from their bath. 

Our back neighbors' huge palm trees were swaying in the breeze.  It was funny because at one point, a single palm tree was swaying pretty intensely while the others were almost still.  I'm assuming a micro-gust caught the swaying one.  It was strange to watch.

The sky was gray, but it wasn't a depressing shade.  I grew up in a part of the country where there is a lot of rain, where the sky was often overcast and made everything look sad.  The gray sky during the rain this week was not a dark color, it was light and almost cheery.  It was optimistic.

What a glorious rain!

Simply Sunday #3

Happy Sunday!  Hope you've been having a great one.

Here are a couple of random things I did (or did not do) this week in my on-going effort to simplify:

First, I decided to limit myself to checking e-mail and social media to just once a day.  This was huge!  When I was in the rat race, the nature of my job required me to be in fairly constant communication in case someone needed me or there was an emergency.  It became such a constant focus, I never felt off-duty.  No matter where I was or what I did, I felt compelled to check e-mail every few hours.  When I began this new phase of my life, however, I realized that I was still obsessively checking my personal e-mail and social media throughout the day.  But it was highly unlikely that anyone would contact me with an urgent item via my personal e-mail account.  So this obsessiveness was silly.  And I realized it was becoming a real time suck.  While I was checking e-mail, I often figured I should check social media too.  Instead of being present with my family or doing all the things I needed to get done around the house, I was wasting too much time on e-mail and social media.  This week I decided I would check those things once every day and only for a limited time.  It is liberating!

Second, I am reading a novel.  I'm actually on my second one since stepping down from my paid gig.  This is really unusual for me.  I always read a lot, but typically I read non-fiction.  A lot of that has to do with my job, which required me to keep abreast of certain legal and policy issues.  I enjoyed that kind of reading, but I came to view fiction as almost decadent.  And for years I just didn't have enough time in my busy day for it.  I'm still reading non-fiction, but I've deliberately opted to read fiction recently.  This week I began Victor Hugo's Les Misérables. I had always wanted to read it.  The novel has a lot more detail than the Broadway musical!

Finally, our family took a short road trip.  This was really a big deal too.  Our family hasn't had a vacation in a year and a half.  We've been trying to hit certain financial goals associated with eliminating debt, so we've really tightened our financial belts and travel was out of the question.  We have now come within striking distance of our financial goals.  And we're exhausted because we've been keeping up a frenetic pace for about a year.  This was the first break we've had in all that time.  We went out of town.  Nothing fancy.  Nothing that most would find exciting.  We just had downtime for a couple days.   We swam, slept late, watched TV in bed, walked around to see sights and ate lots of yummy food.  We had a blast!

Hope you're enjoying your Sunday.

But You're a Suburbanite!

OK, so we've addressed head-on some of the key aspects about me that will become apparent as this blog comes together:  my politics, my faith.  But another thing that is going to come through in my blog posts is that I am a suburbanite.  As we'll explore at a later date, most devotees of voluntary simplicity would not think suburbia meshes well with that concept.  As I'll explain later, I appreciate that preconception, but don't necessarily agree.

So here goes. 

I live on the edge of a sprawling urban metropolis.  Ten years ago, most of the land currently occupied by our suburban municipality was either farm land or left in its natural state.  Now it is quite developed.  Lots of roads, lots of buildings, lots of human beings.

My family and I live in a large single family home with a big backyard.  Our subdivision is full of other such homes with similar architecture.  It is managed by a fairly aggressive HOA that threatens fines and legal action if you don't have the right number of trees in the front yard or if your weeds get unsightly.  Most of our neighbors have minor children.  The only people on our block during week days are a few moms with preschool age kids.  Everyone else is either off at school or earning a living.

All the families in our neighborhood have cars.  At least two.  Sometimes more.  That is the nature of where we live.  Public transportation is virtually unheard of in our neck of the woods.  Some of the year the weather is too harsh to safely walk or bike very far.  People die from exertion during such extreme weather.  So we get in our cars to get around protected from the elements.

If you drive 5-10 minutes from our neighborhood, you'll be out of the residential area and run into lots of churches, restaurants and shopping opportunities.  There are also four different terrific public libraries within a 10-15 minute drive.  But if you want to explore other cultural offerings such as theaters or museums, you have to get on the highway and drive at least 30 minutes--depending on where you are going and the time of day.

Our family has lived in our home for about five years.  When we first moved to this metropolis, we considered buying a home in the city center near the museums and closer to my job.  In an ideal world, we'd be in the car less and closer to the amenities of the big city. 

We looked hard, but there were several reasons we ultimately opted to not buy a home in the city center. 

First, the housing stock was a lot more expensive closer to the city center.  Even small homes in need of TLC in neighborhoods with graffiti and potholes were pricey.  For the cost of one of those, we could get a bigger, newer home in our current neighborhood. 

Second, quite frankly most of the homes that were anywhere near our price range in the city center were in need of significant TLC.  They were older homes.  They had been through a lot.  Roofs and/or air conditioning units were going to need replacing before long.  Mold was sometimes lurking behind walls.  The wiring was old.  Sometimes it was of questionable safety.  Other times, it may not have been able to support constant use of computers and other gadgets of our modern lifestyle.

And because many of the homes were older, there were frankly concerns about the health of our children.  The homes we might have afforded were built in the era of lead paint.  Some of them might have also had asbestos.  Those types of contaminants have extremely serious health consequences and they are not easily remedied.  They impact the home itself, as well as the surrounding yard.  Children are particularly vulnerable to such contaminants. 

Parenthetically, living in the city center also poses other potential problems for children's health.  Like many sprawling metropolitan areas, ours has serious air quality issues.  When we first moved to this area, I heard a radio report about it and the corollaries to childhood asthma.  I've had anecdotal confirmation of these corollaries.  A significant number of my friends who live in the city center have kids with asthma and other respiratory problems.  Those issues are much less prevalent in our suburban area where we're away from the worst of the pollution.

The next major reason we opted for the 'burbs is we needed a fair amount of space.  We are in our home a lot.  At the time, I did a lot of work from home, so I needed a dedicated home office to take care of business.  My husband went back to school a couple years ago, so he also needed room to spread out his books and study.  We homeschool our children, so we're home most of the day.  Unlike many families who aren't in their homes most weekdays, we get a lot of use out of this space.  If we had a smaller home in the city center, we'd be on top of each other and feeling cramped.

Finally, we aspire to adopt more children or become foster parents.  When you grow your family in that manner, there are inflexible rules about the size of your home.  In particular, you have to have enough bedrooms.  And the bedrooms each have to be large enough per the rules for the number of children you will have.  Many families have aspired to become foster parents, but find out too late they don't have a home that will satisfy the rules.  They either attempt to add on to their home, move to a larger one or give up on the dream of foster parenting.  We didn't want to be in that situation.

Simply Sunday #2

Hello!  Here comes the second installment of Simply Sundays. 

The following are some of the things I did (and didn't do) to embrace voluntary simplicity:

I took a first pass through my closets (yes, plural!) to bag up shoes and clothes I don't need.  For my paid gig, I've had so many professional clothes, many of which I wasn't even wearing.  But until now, I never had time to go through what I had to whittle it down to a more manageable amount.

Not only did I pull together a bunch of shoes and clothes, I also took them to donate at a local thrift.  Hopefully, it will help the charity make some money, some buyer will get good use of the items, and it will keep the items out of the landfill for the time being.

I said "no" several times to invitations to participation in church activities.  I actually feel guilty about this, but I carefully considered them and they were not a good fit.  I wouldn't have been all that helpful in those activities, and those commitments would have spread me too thin.

Instead of watching TV before bed, I read books.  I finished one, and have made headways on another.  It is fun to read books I've heard about for so long.

Finally, I attended a free concert with my mom in her retirement community.  One of the residents sang with great gusto a bunch of songs from the 60s and 70s including John Denver, Neil Diamond and Joni Mitchell.  They had an ice cream social and grandma brought sandwiches for me and my daughters.  It was a feast!  We all had a great time.  The finale was "Sweet Caroline," and we all swung our arms in the air in time to the music.  When I'm a retiree, I hope I have as much passion for life as the lovely gentleman who gave the concert.  Though I'm not musically talented, he reminded me of the pure joy of singing.

Hope you are having a terrific Sunday!  Be well.