This has been a roller-coaster of a week with many reasons to be grateful.
My son is a terrific stay-at-home dad who manages the day-to-day lives of three little ones, all under the age of eight. He has just started selling real estate but it will be a while before that translates to an income. His wife has a degree in Energy Management from the University of Oklahoma and is in the oil and gas industry in Houston. As you can imagine, this has been an uncertain time for her industry and the expected lay-offs were due to happen this week.
Grace, true to her name, handled it all with a calmness that escaped her mother-in-law. She was confident that she had been doing the best job she could possibly do in her field and should the lay-offs include her, she knew God simply had another plan for her.
I, on the other hand, with an unusually large inherited capacity for worry, prayed and bargained and lost sleep.
Then I got this text…..”My job is safe.”
I cried, raised my eyes, and said a prayer of thankfulness. And then I had to apologize for not having enough trust.
My state of mind completely changed with those four words.
The calm that ensued immediately brought back to mind these photos, taken in 2008, on the top of a Swiss alp.
They were taken on a vacation I was on with my siblings. We were celebrating my 50th birthday by visiting our oldest sister, who had been living in Switzerland for over a decade without a visit from any of us. Our parents had passed away within two years of each other and this trip was made in their honor, just the four of us, spending an entire week together, for the first time in our adult lives.
I believe we were all in a state of mind that we’ll never forget. I’m thankful for the pictures that immediately bring it back, and I’m thankful for good news, simple little words in and of themselves, that came in the form of a text on my phone screen.
In the words of the priests at my church, just after delivering their sermons…”May God be praised.”
pauses&clicks 
This really choked me up. I love you Julie. Thank you for your steadfast prayers.
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I love you too Grace! And…am thankful you are a member of this family!
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What a beautiful post. I am so pleased for your daughter in law and the whole family. We had the same situation in January which also turned out well~thank the Lord indeed.
Your siblings and you look so relaxed and comfortable with each other. you are certainly blessed. And your photos are gorgeous. As you can see, I REALLY loved your post, it ,made me happy!
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Thank you for your kind words. I’m thankful your situation also turned out well! I just visited your blog and enjoyed the tour of Stratford on Avon. The first image that caught my attention was the snowdrops…I just discovered a clump of them in the woods near my home yesterday. Had to come home and look them up! Would love to spend more time in England as I’ve only been there briefly. In the meantime I’ll enjoy seeing it through your eyes and writing!
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When life is without challenges, it is easy to believe God is holding us close. It takes grace indeed to carry us though the uncertainty until we realize He never let us go in the first place. Thanks.
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I love this, Julie! This is a very timely reminder for me to “trust”, things will work out. This post really inspired me.
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So many thoughts and feelings, first being how beautiful your stories are, and how admirable your faith.
I have a “work at home” son, who just moved into my basement, with my grandsons.
I miss my sweet daughter-in-law, who I thought I would have forever. (She didn’t die. She left.)
And I miss my sisters. We have not been together since our Dad died in 2001…so sad, and a long story for another time.
Thanks for sharing so beautifully.
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I hope time makes everything okay for you. Eight years ago this particular son was also living our basement and his wife was about to give birth to our first grandchild. The circumstances weren’t perfect but both of them preserved and although we had some years when worry was all-consuming, it’s all good now. Faith and prayers and sheer determination got everyone through! In those hard moments sometimes prayer is all we have. Hold onto it and trust that there really is a plan and oftentimes it’s better than the one we had held onto so tightly.
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Thank you.
On another note, I am sometimes dismayed (generationally?) by the whole modern way of electronically communicating and all…but there really is something to be said for being able to read such a sweet post, by a complete stranger, on the other side of the country, respond to it and get an answer back in seconds.
Thanks again for that faith booster!
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Oh we of little faith! Very sweet story Thanks so much for sharing.
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