I’m working to practically make the changes in my life that I feel are necessary to live out the intentional living that I’ve been speaking of the last few weeks.  After reading Notes from a Blue Bike by Tsh Oxenreider (and convincing my husband to read it as well – he devoured it in 2 days, by the way) I am left with a laundry list of changes that I want to see made in our family’s life, but no direct map on how to get those completed.

Some areas that I want to see change in:

-Being more intentional with how we spend our time & resources
-Choosing to say “no” to things so that we may say “yes” to others
-Spending more time exploring as a family
-Choosing to live simply
-Enjoying travel more
-Less time spent in front of a screen, more time spent being creative or enjoying surroundings

These are changes that we will slowly implement (failing lots, I’m sure).  I’ve started putting my money where my mouth is with these & it’s felt really great.  There have been a few times the last few weeks that I have dropped whatever I felt like I needed to go (sit on my rear surfing Facebook namely) to take the kids out to explore.  This last weekend, we took them hiking & to a creek.  They had SO. MUCH. FUN.  And you know what else?  It was surprisingly relaxing for my husband & I.  Of course I was a little stressed about a kid falling on a rock or slipping in the water, but overall, they were so content with picking up rocks and throwing them in the creek (over and over and over again) that I was able to sit down, put my toes in the water & breathe in deep.  No one asking me for anything.  Nature was giving them all they needed.  And bonus?  It was free.  #simpleliving

I’ve also been working to get rid of unnecessary STUFF.  We just have SO much stuff!  It’s frankly a really overwhelming project to take on because I don’t even know where to start.  I’m committing to “hold myself to a standard of grace, not perfection” on this one because although I want this done overnight, I know it will take a long time.  I worked on just the kids toys that are on the first floor of the house yesterday & it took 3 hours.  That’s NOT including their bedrooms or the actual “toy room” which is saying A LOT about how much excess there is.

We are committed to enjoying more of LIFE and less of STUFF, which for us also includes traveling more.  I am admittedly a culture junkie, so international travel is important to me.  I am not naive enough to think that I can do it frequently or luxuriously with my 4 littles in tote (especially at their current ages), but it is something I am making a game plan for.  After traveling internationally for missions work for years “in the days of my youth” I have greatly missed getting out & seeing the world.  I recently went to Italy for a work project & it renewed that sense of wanderlust that I’ve tucked away for all of these years.  I’m currently scheming with a friend to make my next international trip happen soon-ish.

We are also looking forward to traveling more with our kids, which for now for us means staying state-side.  We have an upcoming trip to Lake Michigan which we are looking forward to, and planning our next family adventure after that.  It is important to us that our kids get out & see the world around them.  And as old as it may make me sound to say this, I feel that is MORE important now in this day and age when people are substituting experience for a pretty Pinterest photo & calling it a day.