Truth in Pictures

The above picture is from our Christmas cards this year. For me, this is the epitome of Home and Garden magazine perfect. What our photographer captured is everything I have ever dreamed my life to be...husband, dog, kid, nice house, beautiful Christmas decor, etc... I find myself working more and more everyday toward this type of perfect. The unattainable perfect. While there is definitely some truth in pictures...in our house it would look more like: Mommy - sweatpants, no make up (ummm, yikes), hair (unwashed) up in a clip and probably food and/or snot on my shirt. Daddy - Duck Dynasty shirt (wears everyday, regardless), sweat shorts and bed head. Ashley - onesie, pants, one sock on and one sock off, hair EVERYWHERE, banana in her hair and food on and in her shirt. Now, lucky for our friends and family that picture didn't grace our cards. But that picture is the truth. That is our life...for real. But everyday, I strive for perfection. The unattainable type.
This week we had some daycare drama.  Drama that has us considering a daycare change. That said, I've never felt the type of indecisive, gut checking feelings that this situation has faced us with. In truth, day care is a choice. If we had to or chose to we could live off one income. Our daycare is a choice, we could pull Ashley out and place her at a new facility. So in light of these choices, I feel guilt. Are we doing the right thing? are we being selfish? Now, by drama I am not talking our kid got beat up, abused, harmed, etc... Our expectations are not being met in her current class room; not in the educational or nurturing sense. Our director has expressed that their expectations are the same as ours and they will work on her classroom. Only time will tell. It's a horrible feeling thinking you are gambling on the welfare of your child. But are we really? are we being over zealous? WHY DIDN'T ANYONE TELL US PARENTING WAS SO HARD!? parenting pushes and pulls your heart and mind in ways they have never been pushed.
Perfection. It is the master to which we work everyday. Make more money, buy more cool things, do more in life. Money = better life. Daycare, the entity we pay to help us work harder for more money. Daycare, this place we expect to be equal to us day in and day out with 10x more kids. Daycare, our co-parent; the crutch that we lean on to help us to perfection. The unattainable kind.
2 Corinthians 12:9-10 "But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses. So that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong"
Our pastor said today "Shape your lens with truth or your circumstances will shape them for you" Isn't that the freaking truth. The more I seek perfection, the more I come up empty. I will never get there. Isn't that disappointing? or is it?  It has been in that disappointment; in that black hole of chasing that I found God. Because of course, a piece of the puzzle of this image is you go to Church like a good person. I am trusting God to lead us through this daycare dilemma. I am not trying not to let the insecurities of my weaknesses get the best of me. Ashley is an amazing kid and gift to us. I'm trying to let the perfect go so I don't bestow this lovely gift upon her.
Below is a picture of what really happened when we got our pictures taken...the ones that were (of course) not chosen to reflect our Home and Garden family....they are hilarious and I should have used them. Next year. There's always grace in the future. 

Ashley ran around like a crazy kid...well, she is one and a half. Maybe she is the one who will teach us grace. After all, she is the answer to so many prayers already.