Reasons

Church + lunch afterward prompted some thoughts, ranging from Election Day to parenting. So in an effort to free my mind of too many thoughts, I'm going to touch on parenting this afternoon ...

Everybody has their ways of doing things. Even not doing something is doing something. This is particularly true with parenting. I definitely don't claim to be an expert because I've only been doing this for 18 months. But I know I have my opinions and philosophies, some of which were developed before Cate was ever born and others that have been added as we realize we need to do something.

I have dear, dear friends who do things differently. They have their reasons. And that's completely fine. (Actually, that's the same idea I was thinking about regarding the election. Voting is good. As long as you have reasons for your opinion, I don't care if we disagree. But if you're an uninformed voter and say "eenie-meenie-minie-mo" in the voter booth, don't even bother. That's not the point of the process.)

Anyway, some of friends who are parents do things differently. And I've just recently been realizing how that can be a challenge when our kids are around each other. So far it's only be small things, but I've been thinking about how one day it will probably be bigger. I don't know what this bigger challenge will be, but as parents I'm sure we'll face a conflicting parenting style among people we love.

All of this to say: I pray we have wisdom as we make little + big parenting decisions, confidence to stand by what we've decided (because, you know, we have our reasons ...), and faith to realize God is bigger than us (and this election, by the way ...).