Catching Up, Sort of - Late September to Late October

Late September: Sunday was still a very structured day of ice and elevating Mason's legs. We had church at home, which I love. Our lesson was about prophecies and restoration. 

Monday was the first day that really felt like our homeschool break week. Now that Mason was more than 72 hours out from surgery, it was time to see how much time he could spent sitting up without elevating his legs. His body did pretty well, lots of time sitting on the floor playing with Legos, some time sitting on the couch playing Go Fish or reading, some time in his wheelchair playing with thinking putty or other things at the table, and a few sessions laying with legs elevated. 

Fast forward a lot. . . keep going. . . almost there. . . 

Here we reach what I call the 'post surgery void'. It is the days and weeks where life continued on without any note taking. Fast forward almost six weeks and you reach today. Here is a recent family picture, only missing Makayla, who is away at college: 

My life is very full physically (lots of lifting Mason at 60+ pounds all day long, plus normal home life work) and very full mentally - lots of teaching with homeschooling a houseful of 9, alongside teaching seminary just after 6am every weekday to 11 teens over Zoom (I wish we were in person), the cooking and cleaning and the heart work of parenting a large family of always growing and changing children during a pandemic that has affected their daily life in major ways. I've hit my maximum capacity and moved well past it into overwhelm territory.  

There is no way I can juggle the varied needs of an extra large family alongside all of these good but hard work things. On my own, I would just lay on the floor and give up. It isn't possible to do everything I need to do. 

But God is amazing.

I see on a daily basis how God blesses and multiplies my efforts. He makes more time in my day, inspires me in my tasks, helps me understand things I need to learn, guides me to learn more quickly or work in a more organized way, and makes my limited hours of sleep enough. I fall into bed at night with not one shred of extra mental strength left. I'm emptied out. But when that alarm rings early in the dark hours of the morning I wake up with a song on my heart and a smile on my face. I'm so grateful. I am witnessing small miracles every single day in my life.