Thoughts for a New Year

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Each year between Christmas and New Year I end up in a bit of a funk, a post-christmas haze.  Its more than being unwell as I recover from the the long intense lead up to the 25^th. It’s a definite lingering gloomy feeling, almost of dread.  I’m absolutely certain its not a prolonged hangover, …….I don’t drink.

Its worse this year as we are not off camping as usual and we are still living out of suitcases.  To top things off Blake is back at work already.  The school holidays seem to loom ahead of us like the second half of a long winter.  My energy levels are at an all time low and I wonder how we’ll get through.

...one lonely crochet ball...

Thankfully, although it seems endless, the funk doesn’t last . I do eventually feel better  with sleep and rest and consequently my mood lifts in time for the start of a new year.  Physical and mental health are so closely linked.  It takes a huge amount of courage to keep going when you are faced with either one letting you down, though I wonder if poor mental health isn’t harder to bear in the end? 

 For us the 2013 is full of HOPE, as every year is.  We will have one little one in grade 3 and one at Kindy, my last year with her at my side. I’ll teach RE for one more year and Blake has some big building contracts lined up (once our own abode is habitable!).  I’ll probably mention wanting another child for a few days each month and Blake will shake his head and remind me how sick pregnancy makes me and it’ll get easier each time to forget about and instead be grateful for our beautiful girls, as I am daily. 

We’ll open our home up again to the kids who walk past with our 7 year old before and after school or the ones who live nearby. There’ll be more room to play inside and our girls will be even more ‘free-range’ than last year as they grow in confidence and I loosen the already fairly lax constraints.  

Apart from having a ‘new home’ to finish and move into this coming year we’ll also be heading off on an adventure with a new church plant.  A small number of us have been waiting for this for at least two years. Its finally beginning. Its exciting and scary. And totally in God’s hands.

AND

Blake and I will celebrate 10 years of marriage in May, and we plan to celebrate in style! I’ll be sure to share details.

...his and mine...

There’ll be a new bunch of kids born at the farm, we’ll go camping and possibly fly to Cairns for our annual visit.  I’ll consider finishing my School Chaplaincy study and probably leave it until the littlest is at school, we will make new friends and spend time with old ones.

And another year will fly by.

If I can stop often enough and for long enough to reflect and plan and mostly just ‘be’ I know it will go a teeny bit slower :)

Happy New Year my friends!

xoxo