Morning nostalgia...

In the last few days I've spent more time outside moving than I have in a long time. It's weird when something very familiar becomes distant and then you begin to recondition or relearn how to do it. It's the last year of my twenties so I'm an obnoxious amount of nostalgic and oh what a ride it has been. 

My late teens were so destructive and setup the start of this last decade with hardship. At the time I thought it was the absolute best of times and I wanted it to go on forever. In my careless pursuit of self I indulged in too many things to list and trying to get my pain to subside I went also to food. If you knew me when I was twenty you know how bad that spiraled (go ahead a Facebook my oversized twin). 

Two months into my twentieth year of life I found out my girl friend of the time was expecting and we panicked. It was my biggest fear. How do you possibly know how to step up to something like that? It felt so impossible. Still I knew that there was no turning away from this level of responsibility. Thiele and I pressed in and decided we would let it shape us and let God mold us. 

If you have kids then you know the feeling you get when you first meet them. I can still see the look on Lyvi-Lou's face when she came barreling into our lives in the overnight hours just days before Christmas. She was perfect. You learn what unconditional love is when you have kids because it's not a love you choose. You learn how great Jesus love is for you and it reshapes your perspective. We were nineteen and twenty and we had no idea how this would work out. We came together and little by little we started living our lives differently. 

I experienced a healing I had never known. Alyvia saved me. She turned everything upside down but through her God rescued me from the destruction that was running rampant. Before she was six months we moved to Chicago and began to let our story unfold. I went from marathon eating McDonalds and binge drinking to running a marathon and having babies (lots of babies). 

Every year since I've learned something new but I continue to be amazed by the power of family. Now that the kids are getting older we're getting to experience a different kind of relationship and while it's testing it's incredible too! And so while I was out trying not to let my dad bod run rampant all of these feels came seeping through my heart. It's been an emotionally refreshing morning and it's not even 8am...