Lost in Translation-Starting Over {again}

Hellooo!   
I have been away for some time, but I thought I would pop in and share an update about what has been happening in our family. 

Just to catch you up on how we ended up here- 

In October 2014, my dad passed away after a long battle with cancer. In November three of my kids{eldest is married and is still in Colorado} and I moved from Colorado to California to help my mom through this terribly sad time. When we arrived, it was with the intention of staying with her while we looked for our own place to rent close by. My mom and I are close, but I knew that us living together could be very stressful on our relationship and I wanted to help alleviate her stress, not cause it :-)

But through many different situations God has shown us that we are meant to live together through this season, so here we are at her house still, and we're doing okay!  

I have really been dragging my feet about doing an update post here. I have been quite out of my element as we are settling into a new kind of life, and I'm struggling a bit to figure out how it all translates into the future of this blog. I am certainly keeping my mind and heart open to see if God leads me to continue with it, change it.....or? 

So here's a bit of what's happening around here: 

In January we celebrated my youngest daughter Amelia's 11th birthday at the Aquarium of the Pacific, while my oldest daughter, Tess, was here from Colorado.
This summer my youngest, Silas, will be 8, and that tall, gorgeous redhead to my left {Mikayla} is turning 18! Whoa. 

I sure am missing my girl in Colorado :/

As you can guess, winter and spring in southern California is drastically different than Colorado! 

I really thought I would miss the snow, but....nope :-) 
Maybe I'll feel differently about it next year. Some of you might recall that I actually grew up in southern California, but I loved living in Colorado for 20 years. 

Last week we worked on an Easter Garden. I've been wanting to do one of these with the kids for the past few years, and it was really a sweet project to work on together as we spent time talking about the events leading up to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

The kids added some personal words on stones. 

My neice is getting married in May! I am very excited that I get to help work on some of the decor and crafting projects for the wedding. Think pallet wood, mason jars, burlap and lemons! I hope I'll get to share some of those projects with you all. 

We continue to homeschool, and the two youngest are looking forward to some fun music and art classes coming up through our local rec department. 

Here's a bit about our current home:

My mom's home has a living room (which has always been her space) and a large family room that has gone mostly unused for several years. She has graciously 'given' us the family room as our space, but it is still a giant (messy) work in progress! 

This is what it looked like before we arrived ^ My parents had purchased two futons for this room so we would have a place to sleep when we were here visiting from Colorado. 



Aaaand.....this was one of those "transition" sort of weeks. Oh dear. Most of our belongings are still in storage, but we are going to start emptying that in small batches at a time. 

We all slept together on the two futon sofas in this room for a few months. We just sort of pretended we were on vacation here, camping out. 

That's my big tip for dealing with huge life transitions- denial. {smile}

I am now sleeping on the futon in the room that was my dad's music room {also my childhood bedroom-so weird}. Clearly no staging in this photo. Sorry, this might be a little too "real" : )

No, it's not glamorous, but people let me tell you- just having the tiniest corner to go and shut the door at the end of the day feels like the most extravagant luxury right now. It's all in the perspective...

I'm in the process of changing it more into a bedroom space again, but I want to be sensitive to my mom and how painful it can be to see some of my dad's things get moved around and some go away. Just moving along in baby steps. 

The family room is currently being used for sleeping/ living space for the three kids. They had their own spaces at our previous home, so this is a huge change for them. I'm so very proud of the way they have just gone with the flow of things. They know it won't always be like this. Sure, they have their times of being irritated with each other, but there is a lot of laughter too!

This room is open to the dining room/ kitchen area, so last week my mom and I hung some inexpensive cotton canvas curtain panels to create a privacy screen when needed. My mom and I have talked about how fun it would be to do some sliding barn style doors here, but that will have to wait awhile.



Opposite the curtain is the fireplace wall. My dad and my uncle built this room about thirty years ago! It has high ceilings and lots of pretty light, and opens out to a newly covered patio and backyard area.
 I would really like to change (even if just with paint) the dated wood frame around the river rock. My mom really doesn't like my style, so I'll need to tread carefully!
If you can believe it, it has been in the 90's here recently, but I still like to light candles in the fireplace several nights a week.  

Just for fun-mixing the old with a few things that are new (to me): 

By the way, since we are officially making this more of a dorm space, this corner looks nothing like this now. The white farmhouse cabinet is in my room now, and the futon sofas have become full-time beds, until I get the girls' antique bed frames out of storage. 





Although we did get rid of a tremendous amount of our "stuff" before leaving Colorado, I managed to bring a few of my favorite vintage pieces here, like this piece below that I had previously turned into a DIY Vintage Dresser Island. 

I brought this vintage window that I've had for many years, and the piano panel that's hard to see behind it. Isn't it interesting the things you decide you can't part with? 

I kept the vintage trunk coffee table, which is currently filled with our dvds and videos in the family room. I gave away my antique iron bed and mattress shown in this photo when we moved.

Boy, do I miss climbing into that comfy old bed at the end of the day! 

I'm hoping I'll be able to start looking for a new {old} bed soon. 
I've picked up just a few new things here and there over the last 5 months. One other BIG difference here- being close to fun stores that we didn't have in our more rural area of Colorado! 

The wooden crate and caddy I picked up at a garage sale in our neighborhood. It's easier to justify things that can be used for storage, right? :) The old basket I found in my mom's garage. 

What is this large metal thing with the handle? A stucco tool? A giant potato masher? 
I don't know, but I loved it's rustic look. I got it at a Goodwill store for a couple of dollars. The chippy metal flowers came from the Shabbyology market. 

I also picked up this beautiful old window at Shabbyology. 



They are currently on and above the fireplace mantel. 

I picked up this cute driftwood wreath at TJ Maxx for under $20.00. This is the kind of thing I would usually DIY. What is happening to me?! haha

I picked up this rustic perpetual calendar at the same garage sale as the wooden crate and caddy. 

This huge vintage wire basket was a freebie when the garage sale was over! It's kinda silly, but I just have a thing for old metal baskets. 
And "free" ;-)

I'm guessing our current living situations sounds pretty unappealing to many of you. Trust me, a few months ago I would have felt the same way. 

As I've recently mentioned to a few friends, you know it's a God thing when the very thing you swore you'd never do, suddenly becomes the thing you want to do, and you have total peace about it. I have longed for years to feel settled. That word to me brings up feelings of safety, security, peacefulness and contentedness. I think I felt that settled was a destination, and once I was there, life would finally be.....right. 

But the older I get the more one thing becomes clear to me. My external circumstances aren't likely to feel settled, maybe ever! "Real life" isn't something that's going to happen "when and if...." 
It's happening right now. This is it, and I'm going to do the best I can to live the best I can right where God has me. 

I'm 50 years old, and I've been through a lot of tough things in my life. One of the refreshing results of that is being able to set aside worrying so much about what other people think and moving forward with what I know is right for my family. 

We all have a story and this is mine. 

In this chapter, I'm a 50 year old single mom who is living in her childhood bedroom, and guess what? I'm cool with that.

I guess as this translates to blogging, I no longer have a home that's mine to decorate and create in, in the same way I did before, nor do I have my own basement or garage space to work on projects to sell. 

Should I completely lay it to rest for this season? I am not sure yet, but I'm sincerely praying that God will show me what He would have me do with it. I've been given a rare gift of finally being able to mentally relax a little bit and see how it all unfolds. 

After all, I didn't come here to do exactly what I was doing in Colorado, I came here first and foremost to be helpful to my mom, and I'm honored to do that. 

Thanks so much for stopping by today, friends. Keep your eyes open to those stepping stones of grace! 

With love-

Jeanette

P.S. Come keep in touch me me over on my Facebook page!

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