“I don’t really want more time; I just want enough time. Time to breathe deep and time to see real and time to laugh long, time to give You glory and rest deep and sing joy and just enough time in a day not to feel hounded, pressed, driven, or wild to get it all done-yesterday.”
― Ann Voskamp

I sigh. It’s true. It isn’t that I need more time to breathe deep, or more time to laugh out loud, or more time to write. I just want more time that I don’t feel hounded, more time where I see real and rest deep. I don’t need MORE time. I just want to really experience all the things that are happening around me. My life right now is a kaleidoscope, quickly dancing from scene to scene, and I’m just like a little girl crying because it’s suddenly a new scene again, and I like it, but I know it will change again very soon, and change has never been my thing…

The other day, in the midst of this bewildering whirl of learning how to help adorable little humans be born, planning a wedding, buying our first home, and graduating from college, I wandered out to see the poppies in the garden. I realized, as I gazed through the jumble of profuse color that is my mom’s flower bed, that not one perky orange petal was left on the bare stems. Somehow in my abstraction, the poppies had finished blooming when I had only just realized (wasn’t it just yesterday?) that they had started blooming.

I want to freeze these moments. I don’t want to miss them because I have a lot on my mind and forgot to pay attention. I don’t want to look back later and wonder what I was thinking about on these beautiful summer days. The summer, I started panicking recently, is almost over already. But in reality, summer didn’t even start yet! In my unwillingness to trust God with each rapidly changing scene, I could allow myself to drown in anxiety and miss the time He has given me–time enough to love, time enough to breathe, time enough to let go of tomorrow and realize His grace is sufficient, now, in this moment, and it is a breath-taking, life-giving thing.

No, I don’t want more time. He has handed me just the right amount. Into the peace that comes with that realization, I take a deep breath, whisper thank you, and sit back to enjoy the moving magical moments, jumping jewels of color, laced with His light…

Kaleidoscope Moments

Pattern #1

I was tired after a day of work, as we left to meet our photographer for our engagement photo shoot. “I’m missing my smile,” I said.

“You’ll have to help her find it,” my mom told Ben, as we walked out the door.

And somehow, when I pasted on my best pretend smile and looked at Ben, all dressed up and smiling down at me, I felt the fake dissipate unneeded.

Pattern #2

On Memorial Day, my cousins and aunts and uncles gathered at Grandma’s house to work in her flower beds. I ran the lawn mower full speed, because it is the closest thing to a convertible I have ever driven. I smiled as the wind whipped the hair back from my face, and the sun kissed my nose.

One time someone started the lawn mower, and I suddenly waved my hand at them. “No, sshh.” I cocked my head and listened, then dug among my Grandma’s profusely growing plants, looking for the little voice I had heard. There, nestled in a green plant, was a tiny black-and-white kitten. It opened its mouth and squealed, a tiny little squeal, as though indignant that I had awakened it from its nap.

“Baby, what are you doing there?” I said, and snuggled it tight. At work I am learning first-hand how babies make their entrance into this world, and the possibility that that plant had grown a baby cat never even crossed my mind.

Pattern #3

The other day we went on a picnic. Ben practically suggested we use the picnic table, but I said that it wasn’t very romantic and found a little corner under a tree canopy with a carpet of petals. I smiled as I spread out my little picnic–lace tablecloth, candle, and flowered napkins. Ben, again, was perplexed when I asked if the water could please be on the tablecloth in front of us, instead of on the very sound stump behind us? With an artist’s understanding, though, he argued not at all when he realized I wanted to see my garnished water while we ate… And he even took pictures of my very girlish little feast and said that it was beautiful.

Pattern #4

As we stamped our invitation envelopes with little aqua wax hearts, we began to realize that some of our dreams take a little more effort than one might suppose. We stuck it out until the end, though, and then we went on a little journey to my friend’s house. At my friend’s house, eighteen puppies played in a pen. But after a while it was their bedtime, and a pile of fur babies went to sleep on my feet as dusk fell. Perfect aqua hearts or no, the evening was sealed as a good one.

Pattern #5

One morning recently, I met with my sister and a friend who is soon moving far away. There are big changes in the near future for all of us, but we enjoyed relaxing on couches in a cozy coffee-shop and sipping together from mugs like we’ve done so many times before. On the way home, I saw a yard sale, and, full of coffee-inspired impulses, stopped and bought a little table and chair set for $5. I renovated it, painting it the happiest colors you can imagine.

Not to worry, Mom, if we don’t quite have a house nailed down yet. At least we have a kiddie table and chair set colored like the sunrise!

P.S. I have been working at this post for quite a while. Maybe someday soon my life will take a deep breath, and words will once again start flowing from my pen, or rather, onto my laptop screen. For this summer, though, I want to spend more time enjoying the little things than stressing about my big to-do list… I would encourage each of you to do the same. Embrace the little things, because it’s funny how, when you look back at life, the little things were actually the big things. Love to each one of you who grace my blog with your time! <3