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We are meant to be emptied.

Posted on July 15, 2015 by Andrea

Do you remember this post, If You Still Have Breath, by my friend Christi Gee? It’s been one of the favorites here at EPFH. It’s also gotten so many funny spam comments promoting all sorts of smoking paraphernalia. Christi and I had a good laugh about that. Aside from the unintended and undesired, her post is encouraging and inspiring and a must read if you haven’t read it already and worth a second read if you have. Christi writes over at The Cheerio Trail and has branched out into the world of podcasting. Her words are great, but you’ve got to go listen to her sweet Southern voice. Her creativity and crazy tech skilz blow me away!

Her brother, Steven, is just as creative and encouraging as his sister. He draws art on coffee cups offering us more than just caffeine for our morning intake. I’ve been following his FaceBook page for a while now and every morning he posts something encouraging, inspiring or just flat out comical that helps get my day started off right. And I don’t have to keep putting this cup in the microwave to reheat it!

Today he posted this one and I had to share it here because THIS IS WHAT THIS BLOG IS ALL ABOUT.

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Steven has graciously given me permission to share his creative coffee musings here with you. I promised him that I would encourage you to go check out his FaceBook page and give it a “like”. I promise you won’t regret it. You’ll see that his daily creation somehow manages to hit your screen just when you’re drinking in your first sips of coffee in the morning. He’ll fill your cup while you empty yours. It’s a win-win!

So can I encourage you to go check out his FaceBook page? ThinkWells Thoughts. Like, now?? And “LIKE” it? Please???

“Whether it is love, or a struggle, or warning or message of hope, what I hold inside was not meant to remain there forever. What you have can be used to serve others.” Steven Wells

From one temporary container to another, we were meant to be emptied.

~Andrea

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Running On Empty

Posted on March 7, 2015 by Andrea

8:20am and I’m sitting in bed barely able to keep my eyes open as I feed my kiddo. See…we’ve hit a 4 month sleep regression wall BIG time, at least that’s what Google tells me. Call it what you may but we’re not getting much sleep around here and this momma is fighting to climb over the wall. Tears, tossing and turning and waking every few minutes have been my life the last two weeks and last night I decided it was time to put on my gear and conquer this. I rocked little man back to sleep a million times, each time laying him back down in his bed knowing he’d be up again in a few minutes to an hour. Spent all night reading up and racking my brain for every way possible to help my baby sleep.

Talk about running on empty…

But I did it and I’ll do it again and again, because MY sleep is no longer the most important thing to me. My baby’s sleep and his ability to be a good sleeper as he grows up has trumped every bit of rest I may get for who knows how long.

Little man is almost 5 months old and in that 5 months I have spent more time “tired and empty” in a physical sense than ever before. Lack of sleep. Constant worry and guilt that I’m screwing this whole thing up. A nagging fear just wanting to make sure that my kid is safe and healthy and that I’m doing everything right to protect him.

But here’s the thing…these days empty for me means my baby is full and taken care of. My husband and I…we’re parenting and not giving up on the hard stuff. We’re loving our kid even when sometimes that means tough love. We have years and years ahead of us of hard parenting decisions and tough stuff but we will do it because we love our kid more than “easy”. And even though that drains me, it fills me. I’m emptying myself to invest in and fill my son’s. That’s worth it.

I feel exhausted and can’t think straight a lot these days – “empty”. But my kid is safe. Somewhere deep down (some days much deeper than others) I know I’m not totally screwing this up. My kid is happy and he couldn’t care one lick about the mom guilt I feel. He’s got a big beautiful smile to prove it. My kid is thriving and we’re raising him to be a good, godly, balanced young man, even at 5 months old…or at least trying to.

Today I will roll my tired, running on empty self out of bed. Pour myself a HUGE cup of coffee (that I will have to heat up 12 times before its gone) and invest everything I have into my kid’s life. Before I know it he’ll be doing the same for his kids and I’ll be getting all the sleep I want. I want to know I gave him everything I could of me while he was still little.

I’m empty in the best of ways these days and seeing my son grow before my eyes is more than enough to show me I’m investing into one of the greatest gifts I’ve ever been given. And honestly, that is one of the most fulfilling things I get to do.

Keep it up tired mommas. We’re doing just fine.

~Tori

“Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart.” Proverbs 29:17

…see even the bible says we will get sleep again eventually.