the spirit of santa

to my most precious big girl,

tonight you joined daddy & me on team santa claus.  i always knew this day was coming, but to be honest, i didn't have a script already played out in my head.  [unlike the "how are babies made" conversations we've had where i had read, studied, & prayed to prepare for those]. because you see, whereas the latter are facts & matters of the head, santa claus, to me, is a matter of the heart.  santa is believing in the magic & goodness of christmas.  

when daddy & i decided that santa was going to come to our house, we thought long & hard about how santa would enhance your love & understanding of Jesus, not detract from it.  we knew we wanted santa to be simple, yet sensational.  we wanted santa to be special, yet second best.  we wanted santa to stir excitement, yet entice you more to the love of Jesus.  i have always been big on santa theology, meaning santa brings us gifts we don't earn or deserve to help us celebrate the birth of Christ.  we didn't use santa as a threat for behavior or as a bribe.  we openly discussed how you will get gifts regardless of your behavior because Jesus died for each one of us even though we are all still sinful.

you are at the age where your friends start "sharing what they know."  you have already had several friends from families who do not have santa tell you he is not real.  you have wrestled for a year with these comments.  i wanted you to arrive at your conclusion based on what you knew & what you believed.  i have seen this past year where your head knew santa could not be a single man in a red suit who circles the globe with flying reindeer in one night.  yet, i have seen your heart want to believe in the magic, the mystery, and the marvel of santa.  i would always answer your questions about "is he real?" "is it you & daddy?" with open ended questions back to you, letting you arrive at your own conclusions.

tonight felt different.  you pressed me really hard.  you were wavering in your belief about the man, santa.  you were searching for the truth, and that is something daddy & i always want you to know you will get from us.  so, i told you that the man santa wasn't real, but that the spirit of santa is very much alive.  we talked through all of the facts & myths & histories...through tears [from us both] & laughter.  we mourned the loss of the childhood belief in santa, & we cherished our new partnership in the spirit of santa.  you joined daddy & me on team s.c. [you said we needed a team name, so we came up with s.c...short for santa claus], & your joy & passion came back tenfold.

we talked about how we can find families to be santa for, & how we can go on a christmas shopping date [during school hours!] to shop for your brother's stocking.  your favorite revelation was that we got to eat the cookies [& you were shocked to learn we threw most of them away].  you now get to stay up & eat the cookies with us.  we get to brainstorm together who we can bless this Christmas season in the spirit of santa & out of our love of Christ.  you fell alseep with more excitement about santa than i've seen from you in a few years because for the first time, this year, you actually understand santa.

your pure spirit & genuine love for others is something i cherish & admire.  i have a renewed excitement this christmas season because i was again reminded about the real meaning of santa & of christmas.  

my prayer is you always, always keep your childlike wonder, inquisitive curiosity, & passion to seek the truth.  i am so grateful to be on your team, & i am so lucky to have you on mine!

i love you so very much, 

mommy

yes!

yes!  it's a word of endless possibility & open opportunity.  it's a word we often love to hear, we want to be told, & we want to say...yet it's also a word that requires our time, logistics, & sometimes money.

mark & i love to say yes.  there is a more seasoned couple whom we deeply admire, & they once told us that they want people to say of them, "you better mean it if you ask them to do something or go somewhere with you because they might just say yes!"  i love that.  we would love to be "yes" people--to opportunities, to new adventures, to showing up & being present.

the biggest "cost" of our yes is not money...it's time.  it's seemingly easy to say yes if you have the resources [or even if you don't].  think of our over stimulated & instant gratification society...all you have to do is click once & bam! you can buy & have most things.  the harder "yes" is the yes to time.  it's the currency most people at the end of their life reflect on--how it was spent, how much they had, & what they would have done differently with their time.  it's the gift most seasoned adults want most--with their grown kids, grandkids, & people they hold the most dear.

it's so easy to think of time & saying yes in the big picture & long term, but goodness can it be hard to realize the impact a simple yes during our everyday can be...especially to our kiddos.  parenting is the great paradox of life.  it's the only thing you learn as you go [& if you're lucky you have mentors that have gone before you & friends that are walking right along side you] & you want to teach your kiddos delayed gratification & boundaries with "no's," yet be fully present & engaged with a "yes."

growing up, i felt like my dad said yes as much as he could, & when he said no, he meant it.  there was no negotiation or changing his mind.  he truly said yes every time he could.  this was not to say we grew up getting our way...it was definitely my dad's house with my dad's rules [even into college], but we learned to ask for what we desired [spending the night out, new clothes, etc.] & that the worst thing to come of the question would be "no."

since i'm home with the kiddos everyday, it would be really easy to fall into either extreme of always saying yes because oftentimes that's the easiest in the short term or saying no all of the time because yeses can require more of me.  i've tried to adopt the "say yes as often as i can" approach, especially when the biggest cost is inconvenience for me.  i don't want to be a parent that only says yes when it's easy or convenient or works into my schedule or plan for the day.

i love to surprise & delight my kids.  i also love to reward them for asking questions; i don't want them to fear rejection or be scared of a "no," so i've trained ellie to ask for anything, all the time, & i might just say yes.  sometimes she'll start by saying, "i know you're going to say no because [junk food, time, money, etc.] but can i [insert treat, activity, purchase]?"  i typically respond with a no to these requests, but every so often, i say "yes!" and she is so thrilled.  i then follow that with, if you don't ask, you don't know what the answer will be.  no is the scariest answer to the question, & a no is not something to be scared of!

we also have an opportunity to make yeses work for us in our favor.  two nights ago, the kiddos asked for a "big, long bubble bath" before bed.  ellie even asked to bring a large majority of her play kitchen equipment, so they could "make" things in the tub.  if i would have been thinking of the potential mess of water, the fact that all of those toys would need to be rinsed & dried & put back, & the time it would require of me to be in the same room, it could have been an easy no.  instead, i said yes to it all--even the extra bubbles ellie poured in.  i got to sit on the floor of my bathroom & sort laundry, make mental lists of what needed to be done around the house, & even pull up a seat to the edge of the tub to order a coffee & treat. ellie talked about how that bubble bath was the best part of her day that night during family prayers, & i know that yes went a long way to fill her bucket.

let's look around us for opportunities to say yes whenever we can...not because it's easy or because we don't have boundaries, but because showing up for & with our families, our friends, & others teaches & gives us far more in return than the initial yes cost from us!

social media

hi friends!  if you're reading this, you're probably reading this because you clicked on my link either in instagram or facebook.  let me get it out there that i LOVE social media.  social media life is my best life.  literally...my social media is made up photos and words that represent the very best of my life.  my social media is my real life, but it is not ALL of my real life.  it is not the bad, not usually the sad, and not the annoying parts of life.  why am i telling you this?  well, i feel compelled as a consistent poster and user of social media, that i should share my what and why...much like i share and show ellie what i put on social media.

i am very sensitive to the fact that what i put on the internet will always be able to be found on the internet.  i have a few friends who do not post or rarely post photos of their kiddos for that reason.  i get it.  i am curating my kiddos' digital life by what i post.  so that being said, am i going to post photos or words describing them not at their best, having blow outs as babies, or not fully clothed [more on that in a minute]?  not a chance.  now hear me out because i am not trying to preach [i do love a good soap box though], and i am most definitely not judging what other parents do, but i am trying to share my method behind the madness of my social media.

i am a perfectionist in every form or fashion of the word.  because i am a perfectionist, i haven't started on ellie, lucy, or charlie's baby books [procrastination is perfectionism's best friend].  but you know what i can do?  i can take 87 photos of a moment and post the very best one...and guess what happens when i do that?!  i have a digital time stamp!  i use my social media as my own scrapbook for the moment until i can get my rear in gear to make the baby books and our family yearbooks.

now do i have photos of our not great moments?  absolutely.  i have the videos too!  i love sharing these over laughter with our family and our people.  there is nothing i love more than to grab a cup of coffee and talk all about parenting, families, values, intentionality, you name it face-to-face with my people.  i am so grateful to share my parenting struggles, mom fails, and challenges with my kiddos to those people i do life alongside.  i do not share our challenging moments on social media because i don't want those things on the internet for my kiddos to read about in ten, twenty, etc. years.

i recently took a course called the birds & bees [so so good and will chat about this in a future post], and this course was about teaching your kiddos about sex starting around ellie's age and how to keep the conversation going in a respectful and medical way.  from following the birds & bees on instagram, i heard about the book pictured in my post called good pictures bad pictures, jr. , and it is all about porn proofing your children.  well, they confirmed in the book what i had thought through in my social media life. on one of the pages of the book, it says, "bad pictures show the private parts of the body that we cover with a swimsuit."  BINGO!

ellie loves to take photos with my phone, and some of these photos are my favorite.  even though she is 4.5 years old, i know what i say, do, and expect lays the groundwork for her digital future.  she knows she is not allowed to take photos of anyone who is not fully clothed and that mommy will not post the super cute family photos of ellie & charlie in the bathtub!  don't get me wrong--the photos of littles with their bare hineys in the summer or in the tub are some of the quintessential photos of childhood, and they make me smile when i see them.  but, like my favorite parenting quote, "begin as you mean to go," i don't want to confuse ellie as to why i posted photos of her in the tub or with her shirt off when she was little when i fully expect her to not take nor post photos of her without a top on [since girls wear bathing suits covering their chest] when she is older.

now, i know i am a super deep thinker, and some may say over thinker [wink, wink], but it is just the way i'm wired.  even when my goal was to make all A's until college, my fifteen year old brain [y'all know i was born like forty years old] wanted to do well in school, so i could tell my future kiddos that i did that and expect them of that as well [thankfully my thirty year old brain knows that is such faulty logic because i will not expect them to do anything like me because "i did it, so you will too," but at least my heart was in the right spot?!] 

all of this train of thought to say...i think most people use social media to showcase their very best and favorite parts of life, and i love that!  i hope my kiddos understand [when they're twenty and get their first cell phone...ha!], that social media IS a highlight reel, but how fun that can be!  and that God puts incredible people in our daily lives to do the good, bad, and ugly with.  i also hope my kiddos hold on deeply to the meaning of the words in the children's bible song "to be careful little eyes what you see, etc." because what a powerful thing good and bad pictures are!  and even going beyond just pictures, i want them [and myself] to realize the power pictures and words have from the people we let ourselves follow on social media as well.  my goal for the next few months is to really ponder who and what i follow on social media and make sure it encourages, inspires, or brings joy to me.  if it doesn't, then it's got to go!

what are y'all's thoughts on that?  mommas who are ahead of me on parenting...how did and do you protect your kiddos in this digital age?

off to college

as y'all may have seen from my social media post on tuesday, the kiddos and i took a little trip to athens.  we had a ton of fun, and i captured precious photos of ellie and charlie living their best life right where they are...at 4.5 years old and almost 15 months old.  however, those of you that know me best know there was more going on in my brain than just "having a picnic on north campus." 

when we drove onto campus, we were joined by many parents and just-graduated high school seniors who were attending their college orientation.  i wish i could adequately describe the thoughts that were circling in my head, but i'll just give a brief overview of the "balance" hanging there and get on with my conclusion from the day! :)  it has been twelve summers since i had my freshman orientation at uga, and ellie will have her college orientation in fourteen summers.  so, we're almost at the halfway point between my college experience and hers.  how amazing is that?!  i was flooded with nostalgia as i was driving my kiddos around campus showing them [although only ellie got it] where "mommy and daddy lived in college, where we took classes, where daddy picked me up for our first date," etc.

as we were driving around campus, i couldn't help but look at all of the parent/young adult pairs and wondering what each one was thinking.  i, too, felt half like the girl going to college in the fall and half like the parent taking her daughter to college.  to say it was this weird paradox would be an understatement.  but it was awesome.  i just soaked in all of my observations, thoughts, and feelings.  on our drive home from athens, i was filled with excitement for our oldest knowing she was going to be our first to go off to college.

i feel challenged and charged to prepare her the best we can between today and that day in fourteen years when she is beyond giddy to be in college.  mark and i loved [& were "free" to love] college with every fiber of our being, and i think a large part of that was because of the wonderful parenting we both received.  i could write a whole book about the things i would love to emulate from my dad and mark's parents, but instead, i'll just leave you with the ten traits/characteristics that i hope our kiddos have when they step foot onto their college campus [go dawgs]!

my ten goals for my kiddos as they leave for college:

1. the world is your oyster.  i say this to my kiddos all the time.  i want them to dream big dreams and know the world is filled with unlimited possibility.  i want them to explore uncharted territory and do it with hope and excitement.  you get one life to live, and it's yours for the taking.
2. champion & celebrate.  i am borrowing this phrase from a sweet friend who used it to describe the way her daughter and ellie interact.  i love everything about this phrase.  i want my kiddos to know, love, and celebrate their friends.  i hope they come alongside them and cheer for them.  i hope they speak into their friends about what gifts they see in them.  i hope they are their biggest fans, even if--and especially if--their friend wins and they lose.
3. confident & secure. i want my kiddos to know who and whose they are.  i want them to know they are formed in the image of God to be uniquely them.  that they are wired in a way that is only for them; there is only ONE [insert kiddo name] in the world.  i hope to give them the myers briggs, enneagram, you-name-it test, so they are fully aware of how God created them and can leverage that to reach their full potential.
4. content & delay gratification.  this one is huge.  i always want my kiddos to dream about their future, but i want them to be fully alive in the present.  i don't want their goals and wishes to diminish what they have around them at any given time.  i want them to live within their means and save for the future, but not live in debt and pretend they have a life they cannot afford.  i want them to feel the satisfaction of buying that first piece of furniture for their almost empty home and know that their hard work brought their dreams to fruition.
5. want but not need.  i can use this phrase for many different situations, but my first thought was i want our young adult to want mark and me but not need us.  i want my young adult to go to college and knock it out of the park.  i don't want them to need me to help them get through things but merely want my advice in situations.  i want them to tell me that they found a house to share with roommates and that their share is within the budget we gave them, and me say, "okay!  can't wait to see it!"  my prayer is that our kiddos want to share their lives with us, but they don't feel obligated or like their life is my happiness.  i want them to want but not need.
6. cultivate friendships.  i want my kiddos to understand how to make and how to keep friends.  i want them to go to college having watched mark and me enjoy our college friendships and young married friendships well into decades long friendships.  i want them to know the qualities of a good friend, so that not only can they find them, but they can be them.  i hope they don't adopt the phrase "no new friends."  i hope they look for every opportunity to make connections and work hard to keep the treasures of friends they find.
7. good stewards of time, talent, & treasure.  this is the last line of the first "open" prayer we say with our kiddos at night.  i pray with everything in me that we raise young adults who number their days and become good stewards of all that God has given to them.  i want them to spend time wisely and enjoy each second--whether working or playing.  i want them to use their God-given gifts to glorify God and do great work.  i want them to take care of their earthly people and possessions to the best of their ability.
8. truth in love.  i pray my young adult leaves my home with the confidence to speak truth in love to those around them.  i hope they help their friends [or even just the person next to them in class] make wise choices.  i hope they call out those friends who are making choices that are different than who that person is.  i pray they are bold in their faith.
9. gracious & grateful. you know those words you hope your adult children use to describe you when you're no longer on the earth?  these are my two, and i hope and pray that i can instill being gracious and grateful into my kiddos.  i want them to go home with a friend for the weekend in college and send a thank you note to the parents who hosted them.  i want them to look for ways to bless their friends and family and to think of others first, always.  i want their mindset to be "what i can do for them not what can they do for me".
10. mentor minded.  you could also call this one ministry minded, but i see it as more of a legacy of sorts.  i want my young adult to go off to college and seek out mentors in every area [spiritual, family, professional, etc.].  aside from Jesus, i hope mark and i are the ultimate influencers in our kiddos' lives, but goodness do i pray they have many wise people in their corner.  i also want my young adult to realize they are mentoring others whether it was ever explicitly stated or not.  as my young adults go off to college, their younger siblings will look to them for guidance and example, and i pray they view this role as a privilege and not a burden.

i know i'll revise my "list" for my kiddos as they grow and as i grow, but these were my top thoughts that were swirling around in my head as i was driving around athens.  i am a firm believer in the mantra i first read in baby wise, which is begin as you mean to go. 

what are your goals/dreams for your kiddos as you prepare them for adulthood?  if you have adult kids, what were the things you did to ensure they graduated college as a confident and competent adult?

may moments

hey y'all!  i've recently been thinking a lot about the month of may, and all it contains for so many people and families.  like me, you may read many of the articles about surviving through the end of school; they are usually hilariously written, share oh-so-true feelings, and are words we can all relate to.  but also perhaps like me, you read them and laugh, yet you yearn to finish your school year differently.  i don't know about you, but i want to finish stronger than when i started.  i want to have loved better, to have been present more, and to have my cup be filled more when i head into summer with my kiddos than when we started the school year.

i've decided to adopt the mantra that "may turns moments into memories" versus our cultural "may is madness."  yes, may is filled with the end of the year...which often entails graduation of some level [kindergarten, fifth grade, high school, college...you name it].  if your kiddo isn't the one graduating, maybe it's a family member or close family friend, so you're still invited and involved in the festivities.  maybe you have weddings to attend in may [or you got married in may like me]! or maybe you *just* have preschoolers, babies, or kiddos in non-graduating grades, and the end the school year is just. a. lot.

i refuse to buy into the lie that says may has to be madness.  will may most likely be full?  absolutely.  there are gifts to buy, pictures to take, events and ceremonies to attend, but all of these things do not have to be done with your tank empty.  i firmly believe that less is more in terms of schedule and things.  i'll also give you a tip: mother's day is in may. every. single. year.  planning ahead helps me a ton.  i know who the women are who we get gifts/cards for mother's day.  i know how many teachers my kiddos have and who needs to be acknowledged at the end of the school year.  i also know our may birthdays and plan ahead for those.

i've been thinking a lot about may because it's the month in which little lucy passed away two years ago.  i was telling someone that while our schedule allows, we hope to go somewhere on lucy's heavenversary [or near it] to celebrate her life.  after those words left my mouth, i thought, we make our family schedule.  we can control whether we go or not and whether [to a large extent] we are overwhelmed or not. thus, i started channeling the thought that may is for moments that will turn into memories.

even though there is much to do in may, i do not want the doing to replace the being.  i want to be present for popsicles on the playground and chatting with new friends.  i want to go into summer excited to have the only schedule be the one i make for my little family.  i want my kiddos to come home on their last day of school with grand ideas for summer in their head and me be able to say "YES!" to their visions of grandeur [now, i may have a cup of coffee in my hand because it is may after all], but i want to be just as excited as them and be ready for the adventure and wonder of summer!

all of that to say...who's with me?!  praying for a summer of abundant sunshine, adventure, and energy for us all!

visual clutter is mental clutter

whew.  i had a huge lightbulb moment while catching up on one of my favorite instastories the other day!  the person i was following was discussing how visual clutter creates mental clutter to her, and though i feel the same way, i had never heard it put so perfectly.

i don't know about you, but i like to be in control.  there is so much of life that we cannot control, but i would challenge there is a good bit of life that we can control.  we can organize our stuff and contain the chaos of life. i cannot tell you how many homes i have walked into where you can feel the overwhelm and chaos the second you cross the threshold.  there is a burden carried on the shoulders of the adults that live in the home (especially the female, who whether she works inside or outside the home, is typically the one in charge of the home) and the stressful feeling is present.

i am not saying that homes have to picture perfect; they need to be lived in and a place of rest of those that live in the home.  i do not believe that people are okay living with stuff everywhere.  they may not want nor require a show ready home, but they want order.  God created us to crave and desire order.  He ordered the world, everything in it, and orders the days of our lives.

when homes and stuff get to the point of overwhelm, it is hard to even think about where to begin.  i wanted to offer up a few tricks and tools i use to get back to a place of peace and rest in my home.

i would start with a large cup of coffee.  put on good music [i like the ben rector pandora station or christmas jazz pandora].  grab a hamper or something to collect misplaced items in.  figure out your holding spot.  i would suggest using a guest bedroom or basement.  you need to select a room that you can close off while you're in the decluttering and placing process.

now you've got your mojo ready, walk around each room and take out what does not belong in that room.  in this step, do not put things where they belong in other rooms [for example, you have a hairbrush on the kitchen counter--do not put it in the bathroom, put it in the hamper and take to your holding room].  now you're done with step one, and all of your visual clutter is contained!

for your next step, make sure what has been left in each room truly belongs in that room and is in the object's best place.  don't know where something should go?  take it to the holding room.  now you should feel energized walking around your home bc you have taken all of the clutter and "things that don't belong" away.

now you can work in your holding room/spot.  first, look through the objects and put the ones away that already have a home [like the aforementioned hairbrush].  then think about your habits and home, and start to make piles of things in your holding room...like those things that should go in the kitchen, family room, bedroom, etc.  if you find things that you do not use and do not have a home, do not find a home for them in your home--give them away!  start a give away and trash pile right alongside your room piles in your holding room.

then steadily go through your holding room to return objects to where they should go.  put them in a spot in their new room--don't just take them and place them back on the floor.  collect like items,  and give some away if you realize you have four hammers but only need one.

continue this process until your belongings are in their place.  once all objects are in their place, you can further clean out/organize/come up with systems, but that can be done at a much slower pace.

over a matter of a few chunks of time, you will have just taken your house from overwhelming to restful without any fancy gear or spending any money.  it just takes some motivation, dedication, and perseverance,  but you will feel the weight lift off of your shoulders and be able to sit in peace on your couch without thinking of all that you could/should be doing!

preholidays is a great time to get this done, so that the new people and things that make their way into your home do not add to the overwhelm!  what are your thoughts on this?  what is your biggest hangup in starting an organizing project?

heaven's in my heart

"mommy? is heaven in my heart?" will be one of those moments that will be etched in my heart forever.  since lucy's passing, we have had MANY conversations about angels and heaven and Jesus and all of the beautiful promises about eternal life in our home.  and in case you're just tuning into my blog, i don't have a seminary degree, and i haven't read every word in the bible [or let's be real...anywhere close to that]; however, i've had the gift of my daughter lucy whose life [and death] has made me, as a believer, dig deep, think about big things, and answer deep questions.

we often discuss how lucy is an angel who lives in heaven with Jesus and how she is healthy and healed.  when loved ones have died since lucy's passing [or ellie learns of loved ones who passed away before lucy], we always talk about how they're in heaven with lucy and there's no more sickness or sadness for them.  and how when we're hopefully really old, we'll die and go to heaven too and then live with lucy and Jesus forever.

i don't pretend to have all of the answers about heaven [or otherwise for that matter] when i'm conversing with ellie.  oftentimes, i'll say, "i don't know.  that's a great question!  we'll have to find out when we live in heaven!" or "i don't know. that's a great question!  let's ask God when we get to heaven!"  these are great [and truthful] answers to the questions like...do we wear clothes in heaven, do we live in a house in heaven, etc.  i honestly haven't thought of many of the questions ellie poses...like if we still get older in heaven?  my answer: maybe we do and just keep getting older for eternity?  i tell her i like to think of lucy as having had her second birthday in august, and she'll always be between ellie and charlie in age.

ellie has gotten into drawing our family recently and had drawn a family picture with lucy in it as a little girl, and i told her lucy needed a halo and angel wings because she's an angel now.  these are her first two independent "lucys".  i keep the left one in my agenda because it is just a happy picture.  she drew the right one on her minnie magnetic drawing pad and said, "fly, lucy, fly!" after she finished it.  if those aren't the sweetest angels you've seen, i don't know what is!

heaven is an astonishing place and state to ponder.  truthfully, i haven't spent much time pondering heaven prior to lucy because i just took it in faith that as a christian, i'll go there and live eternally worshipping Jesus when i die...what more did i need to think about?  WELL...since lucy's passing, i will often just pause to picture her running around in heaven, or eating too much cake on her birthday, or popping by to say hello through her wind chimes.  mark and i even joke when our life is chaotic that lucy got out of the madness when she could and how she gets to live in glory until we're all reunited [and we truly believe heaven is unequivocally the most amazing place to be].

within the last year, i read a book by emily freeman called simply tuesday.  in her introduction, she says...

When Jesus said to seek first the kingdom of God, where did he intend for us to look?  And how will we know when we've found it? [. . .]

Someone once pointed out to me how, even though we always think of heaven as up--beyond the clouds, above the weather, and over the rainbow--it may not actually be far up.  

"What if," this person wondered, "heaven is simply one inch above the ground?"  

It's still up, but it's not so far away.  Instead the kingdom of God exists right here in the moments where we live.

i probably think about that concept daily...that heaven is all around us.  it has brought me great comfort and great joy!  but then, leave it to my sweet girl, to make heaven that much more present.  we were climbing into her bed one night for stories, songs, and snuggles, and she asked me if heaven was in her heart.  i had never thought about heaven being in my heart before, but thanks to emily freeman, i had begun to shift my thinking from heaven being "over the rainbow".

i told ellie that heaven could absolutely be in our heart.  Jesus [and the Holy Spirit] is in our heart, and so is lucy, and they live in heaven...so why couldn't heaven be in our heart?!  she seemed satisfied with this answer, and we moved on to our bedtime routine, but i will never forget the moment she made me think about heaven being in my heart.

so now, when i think about heaven...i like to think that heaven is in us, around us, above us...and always in our heart.  and that if we pause long enough to be still and to feel God's presence, we'll get a tiny sliver of a glimpse of heaven.