Give Me Faith

Last week Hudson, Wilson and I went to South Carolina for the week. We enjoyed being away for a little while to catch our breath. We even got to have some extended alone time in Asheville while Wilson stayed with my parents. We lost our minds for a split second and thought we had spare money to spend on the Grove Park Inn...but it was totally worth it!

Hudson and I talked on our car ride back and agreed that our favorite part of the week wasn't the fancy dinner at the Grove Park or even the awesome breakfast at Tupelo Honey Cafe but instead our Thursday night dinner in Spartanburg before heading back to Nashville the next morning.

Hudson and I got to have dinner with some of his siblings and their spouses sans kids. I believe that might have been a first since everyone started having kids. Typically our interactions are scattered and very staccato whilst the 10 grandkids weave in-between us and crawl over us with their eye on the awesome toys at Ammi and Baba's house. We love those exchanges, too but it was so nice to have extended conversations and really feel like we had some quality time.

We were exchanging stories about what mornings look like at our individual houses. Hudson is a solo parent in the morning with me leaving at 6:30 to head to school. Hudson is great at many, many things but not great with food preparation- so breakfast is pretty comical during the week: fruit, cinnamon toast and a Big Bird granola bar (no other will work). But it gets the job done and I'm thankful for that! It looks quite different at Hudson's brother Kam's house- his wife, Emily, is a machine in the morning with basically her own restaurant in business complete with eggs, smoothies, pancakes and waffles.

We talked about how sometimes mornings are the hardest, yet most important part of the day. Mornings seem to set the stage for how the rest of the day will go. If kids are grumpy, it can change your outlook of the day really quickly. Whether you're corralling a wanna-be independent 2 year old out the door on your own or cooking a ginormous breakfast for 3 ravenous boys, or trying to get 2 girls dressed with the right outfit on (the Lord knew I wasn't ready for a girl- not sure I'm made for that)...mornings can be tough.

Since we've been back in town, I've tried to start my morning off in a more intentional way. A year or so ago, Hudson introduced me to a song by Elevation Worship called "Give Me Faith." It has some great lyrics to it and for me has been a great intro to the day. I listen to it every morning as I drive to school. It's been awesome this past week with the combination of these lyrics and the amazing sunrises we've had.

Here are some of the lyrics:

Give me faith to trust what You say
That You're good, and Your love is great.


And one of those awesome sunrises: