Finding Rhythm

Summer is here and has brought it's full artillery of heat, humidity, UV rays, and mosquitoes. The activities of the season have picked up and swimming is on our list at least once a week, the movie theater once every two weeks (free summer kids series), the library weekly, stepped up church activities, and fairly frequent birthday parties.

It makes my head spin just thinking about it all.

It's not really as busy as it sounds, only amounting to two mornings and one evening out in any given week. I am quite grateful for the routine of it all, and the way it breaks up our week so that we are home plenty, and out just the other side of enough.

Plus, we do school four days a week throughout the summer, mostly because it allows a more relaxed schedule during the 'school year', but also to help alleviate too much time on their little hands to find mischief.

And laundry and dustbunnies and meal making and maintaining relationships and time spent in the Word and sleep and staying two steps ahead of the Munchkin Brigade and errands and, and, and, and, and...

It was a bit of a shock to me to step back into the routine today and find that the rhythm, though a much different pace than what I adjusted to last week, was a balm to my tender heart and over extended brain right now.

But now, in the quiet evening hours, my mind slows back down again and I find myself praying for those faces that have made their mark upon my heart and wondering what their days were like. I miss the evenings with the young orphan children creeping in on our team's space until they at last settled themselves beside us to contentedly play simple card games or to laugh lightly at each other as we tried to cross the language barrier to make ourselves understood.

By God's grace, I will wake up to the wonderful dance again tomorrow, and enjoy another day full of the blessings of my family. And I will do it with a new-found understanding of just how very good we have it. But even as I go about the day, my mind will continue to reflect on what all God has taught me and what He is still teaching me through my stay in Haiti. And I will pray...