We’re home.  12 driving hours later and we’re back at our lovely Colorado home, so relieved to be out of the car.

How do we do it? I’m asked that question alot, so I thought I’d give you a look at our typical super-long driving day.

For those of you who travel like we do, maybe you’ll want to comment about what you do to keep your sanity. We’ll compare notes.

Leave at 4 in the morning.  We’re not drivers who easily stay awake in the wee hours, so we choose to get some sleep and wake up early. That way the girls still have about 3 hours of sleeping left to do in the car. This is the best time we make all day.

Once they’re awake, we dish out the chocolate donuts and apples.

Then, we get out the books. Ellie patiently reads for about 15 minutes.

Then we sing anything with hand motions–The Itsy-Bitsy Spider and Little Bunny Foo-Foo are sure-fire hits.

Usually by this time, Emma needs a bottle.  Tip: fill the bottle up with hot water before leaving, and then when it’s time to eat the water has cooled down enough. Fill with appropriate amount from the quick-load, the name Tim has affectionately given the formula-holder thing.  I think it has something to do with muzzleloading. This is far more convenient than stopping for water, mainly because you avoid having to explain to some well-meaning barista that luke-warm or room temperature water is made by mixing hot and cold water. For some reason, this does not seem to be something that everyone knows.

After that, toys. Tip: Do not have toys just strewn about the back seat.  We did this on this past trip and the girls were occupied for about 5 minutes.  Bringing the toys out on your own makes them a little more of a treat, especially if you make a big deal out of them. Warning: coloring books are great, but if crayons are left in a very hot car, they melt.

Then, usually after stopping somewhere for lunch where Ellie can run around for a little bit, we switch drivers and Tim faces the back and plays with the girls until he gets car sick.

Then, we break out the big guns: the special toys I bought just for when things start to get a little crazy. This is the point when I wish I had a DVD player.

Bringing a blanket and a tiny headrest for Ellie makes her very happy when she wants to get comfortable, but that doesn’t mean she’ll sleep.  Emma? Well she doesn’t really sleep either.

Be warned: there’s a point where it all falls apart and you just need to step on the gas and get there. We’re whining, we’re singing the theme songs to shows, we’re making up songs, we’re clapping, we’re doing little dances in our seats, we’re talking about who we’re going to see when we get to our destination.

If all goes well and we don’t lose a car part on the road, we should be pulling up to our destination in time for dinner.

Have you ever tried to edit a book with a two-year-old running around the house and a 5-month-old screaming in your ear? That’s what I’ve been doing for the past few days.  Sometimes I think it’d be better for me not to commit to do anything at all for the next 18 years, but now that wouldn’t be very fun for me, would it?

When Emma was 6 weeks old, I over-committed myself at a worship festival some friends and I were hosting in Divide, Colorado. Not only did I have my two girls–one brand new, let me remind you–but I also was invited to play on stage with every band that was on that day, and I had volunteered myself to be the hospitality house coordinator for the entire day as well. My husband warned that I was taking on too much, and he was right.  But I’ve got this thing I like to call my party-spirit.  It comes out when I think that a lot of my friends and people I love will be together doing things that are wonderful for us and for the kingdom of God, and I just can’t help myself.  I want to be a part of it.  I want to feel like I’m contributing in some way to the fun and to the love.

Well, probably needless to say, I didn’t get to play with my friends nor did I do a very good job at being hospitable, because I spent most of the day in tears, stressed and exhausted. I had to confess to my friends that my party-spirit had taken over and that it was too much for me to handle.  It’s a good thing they love me for who I am and not what I can do, because I didn’t do anything but cry and go home early.

And now here I am at 11:00 at night trying to keep my contacts from drying out as I stare at my computer screen, editing books for self-publishing people I love and believe in. My husband has gone to bed and I realize I’ve done it again and I ask myself, What was I thinking when I agreed to the quick deadline?

Again, it’s a good thing my people love me for who I am instead of for what I do since I clearly have needed more time.

I guess I am learning that having more than one kid and an overactive party-spirit means limiting myself to a few things: 1. a deadline that seems ridiculously far away;  2. only one or even a half of a thing to do other than parent, and that thing only once a week maybe; 3. grace and permission for myself not to do everything I want to in this season of having tiny children.

Here I am, even after two years of trying to balance motherhood and all the other things I love, and I still haven’t gotten the hang of it. Ugh.

I’m excited.

Tomorrow morning I get to go write songs with a friend of mine.  From 9-12 I will be at her house and I’ll be sipping coffee and she’ll be sipping whatever it is that people who don’t drink coffee sip, and we’ll be huddled together at the piano making up lyrics and melodies.  And I will have no babies with me.

I’m grateful to have a husband who recognizes the value in me getting some time away to do my own creative work.  It’s what we like to call “active rest.”  Like going to the zoo on family day instead of vegging out in front of the television (that’s called a recovery day in our house–more about that in a future post).  Tomorrow morning, a time for digging within myself for something to say that doesn’t have weird tickle noises attached to the end of it, will be a great way to have some good energy put back into me after having Tim gone for so long. I will get to play the guitar without babies trying to climb up my leg.  I will get to dream up lyrics without a little wonderful someone trying to write her own lyrics on my paper–or draw a heart or a circle, for that matter.

I’m excited. This is just the mani/pedi my heart needs at the moment.

Yesterday the girls and I picked Tim up from the airport. He had just completed a 10-day trip to Peru where he taught, led worship, and encouraged local pastors with our good friend Doug and was coming home both exhausted and exhilarated.

I have to admit, I was more than a little jealous of my well-traveled husband.

Two years ago we were invited to go on a similar trip and to bring Ellie, who was then 8 months old. Now, I know that there are many many of you women who have brought kids along and have had very successful, wonderful trips. For me, however, the thought of carrying around an 8-month-old on two huge travel days and then for 10 days of itinerant worship leading and teaching was just plain exhausting. I’m spent when we travel for 3 days here in the States where we have our pack n’ plays, strollers, and car seats! And talk about an exercise in frustration–I knew I wouldn’t have much availability to drop the kid and pick up a guitar or my fiddle. So I decided that for me–and who I am as a mom–it would be better if we stayed at my mom’s while Tim went on.

I have really struggled with this decision–everytime I make it–because my heart screams, GO!!, when I think about the travel and the work that we do when we’re gone. Furthermore, it’s been several years now since I’ve left the country and my travel bug is just not content anymore with hayrides and trips to the zoo. But there are two things I’m reminded of when I catch myself in a state like this, all up in knots like I have been the past few days.

First, this is only for a season. Soon I’ll be crying when Emma graduates to a big girl bed the same way I did with Ellie. In three years they will both be in school and I’ll probably cry then, too. I don’t want to miss these baby years by wishing we were past them or by wishing that I had all of the freedom I was used to before children.

Second, whether or not I get to go to Peru doesn’t tell me who I am. I don’t derive my worth or identity by how many mission trips I get to go on. That’s foolishness. That’s thinking like a slave who must continually strive to prove herself and her place in the Kingdom. I know my place and my worth as a daughter, and I’m not going to let the enemy rob me of this time with my girls by telling me I’m no good if I don’t go on mission trips.

I’ve got to rule those thoughts of mine. Whip them into shape. Embrace this season for what it is and enjoy the opportunity to fully pour myself into my daughters’ lives. So I’ll say again one of my favorite things our friend Doug has taught me: “Ha, Ha, Ha, on you, devil. You’re not going to steal my destiny.”

Lately I have been on a hard, beautiful, rewarding, and frustrating journey to find out who I am and how to balance my life as a musician, minister, pastor, traveler, major party-thrower and people lover with being a mommy of two little girls.

Last December my husband and I played a house concert at a home in Loveland.  I was pregnant with Emma (now 5 months), and I had just finished putting Ellie to bed in the pack n’ play in the host’s master bedroom.  I was exhausted from a day of traveling and from trying to contain my 18-month-old beauty at our host’s home for dinner.  The room was already filling up for the concert, and as I ran into the bathroom to change my shirt and slap some make-up on my face, I said to the Father, “Okay, now I’m going to try to remember the lyrics of songs and try to hear you for these folks and try not to rush through this thing.”  And so kindly, the Father told me this: that I don’t have to let go of my momminess when I’m “working,” and I don’t have to let go of my non-mommy self when I’m “mommy-ing.”  “You’re the gift,” he said so clearly in my head.  He said that what I had to give people–as little as that felt at the moment–was exactly what they needed from me that night.

So the hope for this little journal is that you moms–especially you moms who are in the midst of figuring out how the “you” you’ve always known fits into your life as a mommy–will find it, read it, and hear that same thing: You are the gift. You have inside you everything you need to be the woman God created you to be, no matter how chaotic and tiring this season of life is.  My hope is that you will get some family love and encouragement from the things the Father has been telling me and the other women here.

As we go on, I hope you’ll comment and make yourselves known so we can be in it together.