The Beauty | The Life Happening in Between * APILEOFASHES

Because even when life isn’t perfect, there’s still so much beauty in life worth celebrating.

I have seven children.

Which means that on any given day, someone is looking for a shoe, someone is hungry, someone is arguing with someone else, and someone has apparently forgotten how to do something they’ve been doing independently for years.

There’s laundry. Always laundry.

There are dishes that multiply when nobody is looking, groceries that disappear almost immediately after putting them away, and a calendar that occasionally makes me question whether we’ve accidentally signed up for three different lives. Plus I can never remember what day it actually was.

There are school mornings, sporting events, birthday parties, family dinners, holidays, and approximately a million little moments happening in between.

And somehow, right in the middle of all of it, there’s a life I really do love.

Not every minute of it, obviously.

I could do without the laundry.

But the life itself?

There’s so much beauty in life here.

And that’s what this part of A Pile of Ashes is about.

The Ordinary Things Are the Good Things

I think it’s easy to spend so much time looking forward to the next thing that we forget to enjoy what’s happening right now.

We’re waiting for the weekend.

Waiting for summer, waiting for the kids to get a little older, waiting until we have more money, more time, a cleaner house, or a less complicated schedule.

And then one day we realize that all those ordinary days we were trying to get through were actually our lives.

The kids won’t always be little and the house won’t always be loud.

There won’t always be two dozen pairs of shoes scattered by the door, someone calling for Mom from another room, or a family calendar packed with activities.

And while I certainly don’t think we need to cherish every spilled drink or sibling argument, I do want to appreciate the life happening around me.

Even when it’s loud, even when it’s inconvenient, even when someone gets all the way to school without their shoes.

Yes, that’s actually happened.

A Little Bit of Everything

If The Ashes is where we talk about life’s harder moments, and The After is where we learn and grow, then The Beauty is where we get to enjoy living.

This is the lifestyle side of A Pile of Ashes.

The place for recipes that actually feed a family, holiday traditions, decorating ideas, entertaining, family adventures, and the everyday things that make a house feel like home.e’ll talk about motherhood, too.

The funny stories, the things our children say, the school mornings that should qualify as an Olympic event, football games that leave us screaming in the stands.

Family dinners where everyone is talking at once and somebody inevitably spills something.

And yes, sometimes we’ll talk about clothes, personal style, home projects, and finding little ways to make our everyday lives feel more beautiful.

Because I like beautiful things.

I love a thoughtfully set table, a welcoming home, a good meal, fresh flowers, and the excitement of planning something special for the people I love.

I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wanting those things, I just don’t think we should have to wait until everything in life is perfect to enjoy them.

Making Room for Joy

One thing I’ve learned is that joy and difficulty aren’t always separated into different seasons.

They often exist in the very same day.

You can be worried about your finances and still laugh until your stomach hurts at something your child says.

Working through something difficult in your marriage and still enjoy a beautiful evening with your family.

Feel overwhelmed by motherhood and still be completely captivated by the little people who made you a mother.

Carry something heavy and still find yourself genuinely excited about decorating for Christmas.

One doesn’t cancel out the other.

And I think sometimes we forget that.

We feel guilty enjoying something good when other parts of life are hard.

As though we have to wait for every problem to be resolved before we’re allowed to be happy.

But I don’t believe God intended for us to put our lives on hold until everything falls perfectly into place.

There is goodness to be found in ordinary days.

And I want to notice more of it.

Creating a Life Worth Remembering

I want my children to remember a home filled with laughter.
I want them to remember the traditions, the meals, the celebrations, and the way we showed up for one another.
I want them to remember that we made things special, even when we didn’t have a lot of money to spend.
I want them to remember that our home was lived in, not just looked at.
And I want to remember those things, too.

Because somewhere between making the grocery lists, washing the uniforms, scheduling appointments, and trying to keep everyone where they’re supposed to be, it’s easy to forget that I’m not just managing a household.

I’m living a life, a life with people I love, a life filled with memories we’re making right now.

And I don’t want to miss all of it because I was too busy worrying about what still needed to be done.