Many Words, Few Minutes

 Hello!

As you can see, I never got around to an August Gallery post. September came and went in a rush, and in the midst of everything, I gave myself permission not to worry about it. Life lately has included:

-the truck breaking down

-the new urgency to find another car (this was the last straw with that old moneypit) 

-the moving around of money and the budgetary finagling in order that we can afford a car payment

-a dental checkup in which nine cavities were revealed, after which a certain frazzled wife cried on the phone to a certain very levelheaded husband who assured the aforementioned wife that the money in savings is specifically saved for things like this and encouraged her not to take dental issues so personally (let it be known that the wife in question does in fact take very good care of her teeth and simply needs to stop grinding her teeth in her sleep)

-Two separate appointments to then get those cavities filled

-Continual haggling with my bank to try and finally get my funds over to Riley's bank so all our money can actually be in the same pot (I've been on hold for 12 years now and am starting to think I just need to go in person and figure things out)

-Riley going to the doctor with concerns of dizziness, occasional nausea, eye twitching and headaches (after a full physical, including a checkup on his thyroid, he is medically completely fine and has been told he is just stressed. So now, we just need to figure out how to get him to slow down, which has always been difficult for him) 

-My own car making weird sounds and a trip to the mechanic (it's only the spark plugs needing to be replaced, thankfully)

-All of our usual family/social functions 

-Probably some other things I'm forgetting about

It has been a very adult, very spendy few weeks. When it rains, it pours! But Riley is a wonderful, wise manager of our money; we are blessed with sufficient savings and have not fallen on hard times. It has been a strengthening, somewhat fun challenge to practice buying only what we need at the grocery store on Saturdays. And I find myself much calmer in this season than I thought I would be in seasons of "pouring rain"; doing all of this with a strong leader and partner (who also happens to be my best friend) has made things seem much easier. By the grace of God, we are laughing through it, tired as we may be!

And though the last few weeks have been challenging and fast-paced, our life is also full of:

-Soup and bread

-Laughter every day and night

-Cats that sit outside the screen door every morning as I make breakfast

-Coffee and cigar smoke

-Excellent movies and comforting sitcoms

-Daily digestion of God's word (which must be the highest of all these things)

-Many wonderful brothers and sisters (both biological and blood-bought)

-A thrilling scent of approaching autumn in the air, the sun shining just a little differently, the trees beginning to drop a handful of leaves

-About a thousand other blessings and mercies of which we are not deserving. God is good!

I've come to realize that, while I am a "working woman", I may have to be content with a looser grasp on this blog. I have limited minutes every day; 480 of those minutes are spent working for the school, and when I come home, my laptop is certainly not the first place I go. Someday, when I can leave the workforce and stay at home, I may be able to carve out actual time every day to write a little and keep this up more frequently. But for now, it takes me multiple days to finish one short post, and that's alright! It's what I am afforded, and I am happy with it. 

With that, thank you for reading, and I'll see you in the next post, whenever that happens to be!