How about a great verse for the cupboard over your kitchen sink, or the mirror in your bathroom, or taped right in front of your speedometer? (You pick; here’s the verse:)

When my anxious thoughts multiply with in me, Your consolations delight my soul. —psalm 94.19

December 13.

This season always goes too quickly, in my estimation. It’s funny; I have memories of waiting for weeks and weeks for the big day when finally all of those presents under the tree would be fair game–whatever happened to all of those weeks? Could it be that they were swallowed up with adult responsibilities and pragmatism? Yes, it could be.

Our apartment looks wonderfully festive. It’s been fun for me to create our own little winter wonderland with snowflakes and garlands, candles and boughs–and of course, music. We sit in the evening and just soak it all in. It blesses him, and that blesses me.

But it’s not quite what my heart was expecting. It’s enjoying the chubby snowman sitting in the window and all, but what about the house with the red roof? Where are all of the kids? And why is that one tin of cookies lasting so long? Where are all of the people hanging out each night? Aren’t there any little boys here who squeal each time there’s a new gift slipped under the decorated branches?

Yes, there are fun things and there are hard things. Lots of fun things… but, some hard things.

Tonight I’m hoping to slip over to that red-roofed home and watch a Hallmark movie with my mom and sisters. It’ll be fun, sitting on a familiar couch with familiar sights and sounds and siblings.

And then I’ll come back to this little apartment, and I’ll probably notice this: I might miss the red roof, but my heart is learning. This is home.

Home.

Feels like I’ve been gone for a good portion of forever–and in reality, only two weeks or so. Portland, Cortland, Williamsburg… lots of miles, lots of sitting, but lots of memories.

My first Thanksgiving away. (Thanksgiving seems another lifetime gone by now. How do twinkly lights so quickly relegate the memory of turkey to the back corner of the mind?) I did okay and had fun. My only tears were when I talked to my dad after dinner.

We were in Cortland for 24 hours. Ryan came to drop me off, and away I went the next morning, down, down, down to Williamsburg. I slept in a room with my sister, took walks with MW, kissed chubby faces and squeezed lots of hands, and took in the sights and sounds and smells of a bygone era. My family loves living history–and recorded history, and written history, and, well, we love it all. We heard Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson (actors so convincing that you walked away slightly confused as to whether or not that really was him). We toured house after shop after palace after courthouse, saw working kitchens full of fattening foods, went to a concert of wooden flutes and gut-stringed violins, and stood with 30,000 others to see the Grand Illumination as Williamsburg, in perfect sychronization, “put on” Christmas. Beautiful. Moving. Thought-provoking. Inspiring.

And last night, home again. My home. My piano, my comfy bed, my kitchen, my candle-lit windows. Home. My home where Christmas needs to be invited in with music, smells, and decor, and I am responsible for the first time. I have ideas and hopes; we’ll see what actually happens! This morning, we cut our first tree. It’ll probably be a little sparse, but it will smell heavenly and bring the magic of holiday excitement to our little tiny home.

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Home, yes, home. It’s comforting and safe and all of those things.

And yet, not.

I’m not really Home yet. Not really. I ache for that day when I’ll see Him face to face. Then I’ll be Home.