As For 2022
I set out to write a year-end review about a week ago. Since then, this post has turned into something entirely different than I intended. With the risk of sounding overly indulgent, I have decided to send it anyway. If you don’t read any further past this point, I want you to know that I have nothing but gratitude for you subscribing to my newsletter. I don’t take your time, attention, or support lightly. I plan to continue this coming year with these words in mind.
I remain confident of this:
I will see the goodness of the Lord
in the land of the living.Psalm 27:13
I hit publish on my first letter one year ago. Since then, 400 people have hit subscribe to have my letter delivered to their inbox. That's no small number. I suppose it's small compared to others, but it's rather significant to me. That's a lot of people trusting me with their time, and that is something I will never take lightly.
For some reason, Christmas cards showing up in our mailbox meant something different this year. I'm not sure I can tell you why, but I have displayed them in our home for the first time. They have spilled over from the refrigerator to the pantry door. I have especially loved the ones that included letters, finding myself reading over them with extra attention—the details of our lives matter.
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"Do not remember the past events;
pay no attention to things of old.
Look, I am about to do something new;
even now it is coming. Do you not see it?
Indeed, I will make a way in the wilderness,
rivers in the desert."
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These verses in Isaiah came to me on a run on New Year’s Eve, and they have directed my attention this entire year--maybe that's why the faces that showed up in the mailbox and the words on those pages mattered a little more to me. Each of those pieces of card stock tell a story.
As for 2022, at least for the Cannon family, we have had a lot of transition. After pouring over those letters, I thought I would recap a bit of our year, specifically around what I saw as I have been paying attention to the new things God has been doing in our family and around us.
JANUARY
January started with a heavy dose of wonder. We had two significant snowfalls, unusual amounts for where we live. Our daughter, who was scared of the sled just one year prior, took to the hills in full force. We spent an entire day together sledding down hills and enjoying the gift of a temporary playground. I'll never forget our lunch that day. As we sat and recounted the day, Crew looked at me and said in the purest way, "life is awesome, mommy." The kindness of God was wrapped in a snowfall. If you are longing to see something new, I highly recommend borrowing the eyes of a child one day. Their eyes are built to find wonder. It just might change you if you let it.
In my once-a-month (ish) newsletter in January, I reflected on what it means to embrace the winter.
Bit By Bit, The Days Are Getting Longer
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FEBRUARY
It seems the general consensus of many is that February is the worst month of the year. It also happens to be the one I was born. At this point, winter is no longer a welcomed guest. Stillness nags, the bitter cold attempting to tell us that spring is nowhere near. I resolved to pay attention at the beginning of the year, and I found that paying attention can sometimes hurt. I explored that idea in more depth here.
A big piece of this article revolved around the importance, and dare I say, the healing power of play. In 2020, we took up golf as a family, and it has taken us to places we never thought we would go and has given us the gift of time together. Chad and I were invited on a trip to Pinehurst, NC, by our friend Jeff who is building something special called The Restoration Club. We spent five days on some of the best courses in this game but, more importantly, building relationships that will last a lifetime.
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MARCH
In March, after returning from our North Carolina trip, I felt a nudge to share some parts of my story that have been mostly kept for my small circle of trusted friends: On Confession & Thirst & A Fully Attentive Life. It explores a bit of what it is like to come to the end of yourself.
Later in the month, our family entered into a season of significant transition. Some of it we saw coming, and some of it we did not. It seems fitting to share my reflections from a post I shared on Instagram on March 27.
I posted the other day that a new chapter would start soon in our lives. At that time, I only knew half of the story of what would transpire over the next few days.
I've been talking since the beginning of the year about sensing strongly that God was doing a new thing, stemming from these verses in Isaiah.
"Do not remember the past events, pay no attention to things of old. Look, I am about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it? Indeed, I will make a way in the wilderness, rivers in the desert." Isaiah 43:18-19
I was challenged by the question in the middle there. Do you not see it? In many ways, those five words shifted how I have been seeing this year. Daily, I look for something new, and I don't want to miss it. I have to say that this single lens has opened up a whole new world to me. God is at work, and I have never been more certain of it.
Today as I read over those verses again, these words caught my eye. "Even now, it is coming." That is to say, you may not see what "it" is, but I am making a way—rivers in the desert.
Our family is no stranger to transition. Many of these transitions we have chosen, and some we have not, but the newness that change brings always stretches us.
We are entering a new season, indeed. I want to really see the thing that God is doing. I want to be awake and aware of my surroundings. I want to enter into it with my whole heart and with the hearts of these two right here.
As I have glanced back over our lives, many of our transitions have come in the spring. We haven't planned it that way, but with each passing day as new life is budding outside, it reminds us of what the frozen grounds of winter have been preparing before we could see it burst forth in color.
Indeed I will make a way in the wilderness. That is a promise, friends. And one I don't want to miss.
Looking back, these two big moves shook some significant things loose in us. The next few months were full of high highs and low lows, volume turned up.
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APRIL
I could a write whole book on April of 2022. In fact, I might someday. It was a beautiful and brutal month. I wrote this post at the beginning of the month.
Transition is the process of adapting to change. It's safe to say that life is constantly changing, so the question is, how are we walking the path of transition? How are we adapting to change? Are we clay in the potter's hand?
It's easy when we define the terms of change and when we are in control. But what if our plans actually aren't the best laid? What if the better way is one that we surrender to? What if we have been running into a head-on wind ignoring the still, small voice that has been whispering, "turn around."
I haven't always transitioned well, and I'm not talking so much past tense as I am yesterday when I lost it over a wrongly placed water bottle. As much as we are comfortable with change, the process of transition is often uncomfortable and unknown. I wonder if a caterpillar knows it will soon become a butterfly. I'm beginning to see that those times hidden under a branch are necessary and significant if we want to emerge with spotted wings.
The other day Crew was telling me that it's almost butterfly season. When she gets up, we will talk about how a caterpillar becomes a butterfly and how that time in a cocoon forms the innermost parts of our souls. Then maybe we will go hunt some down because it's good to remind ourselves of the beauty, too.
It's almost butterfly season. Maybe she was on to something more than I originally thought.
April stretched us, revealing some shadows we are still working through. It took us to the end of ourselves and landed to in a coffee shop in Wichita, KS. God spoke to me that day through a hand-spun coffee scoop crafted by an 88-year-old man named John Buckner.
I tell the story here: Coffee Scoops, Wichita, Kansas, Forest Fires and Hearing God Speak
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MAY
On May 10, my dad turned 70 years old, and they closed on their new home in Spring Hill, TN, just twenty minutes down the road from us. Having them near has been a gift more than I could have ever asked or imagined. I often leave their home in tears. The brevity of life has been more at the forefront of my mind than ever. Knowing that our little girl has two sets of active, loving grandparents is irreplaceable. This is the month winter gave way to spring, the grass turned green, and the flowers bloomed. We celebrated marriage: one brand new and ours, now sixteen years old.
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JUNE
In June, we settled in. We rested. We played. We eased into the summer. Chad, as best he could entered into a Sabbatical. In March, he transitioned out of his job at Full Focus, formerly Michael Hyatt & Company, where he had spent the last six years. He is one of the most capable and hard-working people I know. Rest doesn't come easy, but as best we could, we took this time to settle into new rhythms.
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JULY
I have long been a sucker for the 4th of July. It's the heart center of summer. This year, we found God in the fireflies, the late-setting sun, and the kids playing way past their bedtime. It is the first year we haven't traveled out west to escape the heat. The dog days of summer, no doubt. The best days of summer, even still.
In July, I paused to reflect. I wrote about it here : How Do We Encourage Reflection?
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AUGUST
In August, we headed west. We stopped at Disney where we spent a special day with family in the happiest place on earth. Our next stop was Maui to be with some dear friends. Later in the month, we started a homeschool co-op. The summer ended with a bang, and our coming structured schedule was welcomed. We embraced our time to play in its fullness, ending the summer grateful and ready to work.
August was the month of photos worth a thousand words.
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SEPTEMBER
For the past two years, I have been meeting with a group of girls who have been an absolute lifeline. Perhaps more than anything else, they have shown me how to see God and life in an entirely new way. They came into my life when I was in the thick of grief. Heck, we were all grieving in different ways. We still are. I have come to learn that we likely aren't all deep in grief at the same time. That's how we remain strong. They have carried my deepest pain, and I have had the chance to carry theirs. The first weekend in September, we gathered. It took me an entire month to process just what they mean to me.
The gift of this group of women is that we not only see this but have a shared and clear picture of the one who created it all. Make no mistake, in some way, every person there has experienced profound loss and grief. They have understood exposure to the wind and the heat. Some are in the thick of the most heartbreaking and confusing seasons of their lives in such a way that they have nothing to give. The power of proximity during these times in our lives is hidden underground. What makes something beautiful? It is the knowledge that are places where we can bring what we have, and if that looks like grief finding its way out of our body, we are not alone.
The kindness of God is wrapped up in these women. I've never felt so simultaneously undeserving and yet, so utterly grateful.
I wrote about them, and the power of a Shared Root System.
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OCTOBER
In October, I was given the gift of space to process my story and work on my book. It came in the form of a mountain home in Colorado. This project has been a labor of love, a long process of unpacking my story, finding God in it, and putting it into words in a way that honors it all. This week in Colorado I faced the uncomfortable prick of silence and the very real headache of the mile-high air. Each morning I woke surrounded by what may as well be heaven—tall pine trees and, off in the distance, one of the most towering peaks of the Rockies. I wrestled, wrote, and walked away——wanting to give up. They say this is normal. The writers do.
I'm not sure there is a more grandiose picture of God's creation than the ruggedness of the Rockies. That wilderness is to be respected. On my last day there, my friend Michele whispered to me to come to the window. We looked down to see this. I had never been this close to a moose, and in case you didn't know, you wouldn't want to come face-to-face with one on the other side of the window. I watched her, and her calf graze for hours in awe of how God ordained a mother's job. It was a wink after what felt like a battle that week. Good things take time, and great things take a complete dissection of the heart. I hope that one that I will offer then. I hope to publish my book by the end of the year. I suppose it's time to pick it back up.
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NOVEMBER
Our lives changed for the far better six years ago in November. We got the call that we would be parents to a baby girl. Motherhood. I'm not sure anything has been more revealing of the absolute selfish nature of my flesh. It has also afforded me more moments of joy than I could have ever dreamed. It's a wild love, and this little girl is something special. This year we celebrated her 6th birthday with an early birthday trip to the beach and later in North Carolina with family. I tell her all the time how much she is loved. Adoption is layered, complicated, heartbreaking, and miraculous—all in one day.
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DECEMBER
Ah, December. Fresh on my mind. This month we took it slow. We embraced the season of Advent. We lingered longer over meals and stayed up later, watching movies. We eased into winter, and from where I sit, I don't plan on moving too quickly out of it. Here are a few photos of our month at home. It was welcomed, needed, and altogether lovely.
If you've made it this far, thank you. This ended up being something different than how it started. The truth is, I've never revisited a year quite like this. Looking through each month's photos allowed me to see what I had previously missed. I saw themes throughout, namely the one that I set out to find. That God is always doing a new thing. He's doing on the mountain, valley, and road in between.
I'll be moving into the coming slowly and with hope. I plan to spend the month of January observing the winter—allowing it to do it’s work. That is to say, to allow the things that need to die to be revealed in order to make room for something. I plan to write to you as the month is unfolding.
Your support in my writing journey has meant the world to me. If nothing else, I’m glad to be leaving this post as an artifact of how we saw the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living in 2022. My prayer is the same this year. For me and for you, too.
love getting peeks into your life and the beautiful lens through which you process it all. each word encourages and sets hope as a real expectation.
Julie you have the gift! Keep doing what you do and sharing your view of how God is unfolding every step you take. Your stories are such a breath of fresh air! Reflection! Love it.