2017

I broke my resolution in 1 month

I took more than 15+ trips

Went to the beach 6 times

I loved the beach more every time I went

Learned about the beauty in a couple who's still in love 16 yrs later
Babies are my favourite companions

I learned how to switch the radio fuse in my car & fixed it more than 10x

Saw Matthew Mayfield live for the first time

I went to one of my bucket-list shows Les Mes and I cried the whole time

I hiked some new trails on Hanging Rock (1 pt)

The first Ywamers came to my house (2 pts. to Sam & Newell) 

Tried my first real Korean food with them (3pts for 3 new firsts with them)

Bought my first article of clothing online
I flew on 4 planes
Got a henna tattoo from a good friend
Babies, babies, babies

I started yoga and loving it

Experienced a 2nd babe blessing coming into the world (I also cried)

I learned some new constellations and I love them

Spent 3 weeks at my Grandparents in WA. It was 3 of the most relaxed weeks.

 (Grandma makes the best pancakes & bread. Which has everything to do with it)
My little Blondie from France came to America. We added our 5th country to our travels.

I wrote 8 new songs 

Nannied for the most polite 2yr old twins in the world, they inspired me to be like them

I nannied for the cutest baby girl on earth & found out I need to marry a black man to have beautiful mixed babies

I was assumed to be a Mom to my nieces, nephews, or my nanny kids more than 100x

Learned little more about racism & how much it still exists in the South, in the oldies, in people, in too many places
I learned about loving someone who doesn't love you as much 

I drank maté in the back of an underground coffee shop with my favourite French girl

Did my first corn maze and got verrr lost since I'm directionally challenged. 

    (We also still got the prize organic apple we didn't deserve since we didn't finish)

Watched the Lord of The Rings for the 1st time - all in one day and sit and sit and day
I converted to Coke over Dr.pepper (sorrynotsorry)

‎Drove the newest car I ever have (5weeks hott off the press)

Spent too much $$ on coffees & Chai Teas

‎Tasted a true Chinese appatizer (of eggplant) and I threw up in my mouth but made it look as casual as a person
     with eggplant in their mouth can.

‎Went to NYC and surprisingly enjoyed a lot of peace and quiet

‎Went to my first concert on water and I cried cause they played Vivaldi, Bach and Rossini over the NY skyline.
I smoked a cigar or two for a first time

‎Read more books than the last 2 years combined

I got to experience brand-spanking new life at it's first wee hours

I like Asheboro less & less to live, but its a hometown to come back to visit

‎Babies keep me sane & give me the most laughs

‎I consistently exercised more months out of the year than not (which is good for someone like myself)

‎I tried to do a handstand before Christmas: fail-ation
Went to the original Starbucks (NBD)
I spent a month+ at my sisters and it was my favourite part of the year
I slid down a waterfall 

‎My favourite buy of the year was a pair of sunglasses bigger than my face.
     (A real pair not that photo booth yellow fakeness)

I don't know anything about love

Some of the things I used to love

I used to love slides and colouring with the white crayon on a cream paper.
Tricycles, gel pens, and teddy grams, toe-socks, and everything about bears.
Obviously wearing bangs on my forehead for a phase (that was my Moms idea)
Going up and down an escalator 37x every time we went to the airport
McDonalds McChicken Sandwiches, the horn on my bicycle, asking how to spell things (still me)
Writing pen-pals, pretending I liked horses for a summer (didn't work).
The Toothbrush movie and Country Mouse&City Mouse,
Waving at people from the back of the van, playing the ABC game on road trips.
Corduroy the Bear books, Jonie B. Jones, and Amila Bedelia.
I used to love painting each toenail a different colour,
And hiding the ramon noodles above the cupboards.
I used to love polka dots,
And once I wore my pink frog pajamas every night for a year straight.

I can't name everything I used to love because I loved a lot of important and unimportant things.
All these things and more
I loved, and still love, or love a little less.
What I want to know is..
Can you lose your love?
or are you just outgrowing it.
Expanding it?
Is your love growing to better things, matured, meaningful things?
or is your mind losing its love for simplicity?
I used to love this little toy that would roll a ball back and forth
  Now its a baby toy I still own but never use. Did I lose my love?
I used to love capturing tadpoles and making mud pools for little froggers.
  Now I kinda squirm at frogs and still pretend they give me worts.. did I lose some love?
I used to love pretending I had to pee so I could get out of bed when I wasn't supposed to
  Now I love getting in bed and not getting out to pee... did I lose a little love?

And these are just the simple things.
The simple loves.
What about the deeper love?

If we lose the simple-love, do we also lose the deeper loves?
Loving to run to meet your Dad with hugs and kisses, or sitting on his lap reading a book,
taking your siblings to their favourite places, or making your Mom a MothersDay card,
washing someones dishes for them because you appreciate them,
taking family trips of hours & months spent together in a van,
making yourself look like a fool just to make someone laugh,
to cry because you feel pain, crying because the view is beautiful,
crying because you love something, crying because you love someone,
missing the sound of children running through the house,
fighting for your country, for your family,
dying in wars for what you believe,
standing up for someone else, standing up for your belief, dying for what you believe,
sharing something meaningful, telling someone they're beautiful,
giving your time for someone else, sacrificing your own priorities,
putting others first, showing humility in all that you do, putting Christ first in your life,
setting an example even when you don't feel like it, choosing to commit the rest of your life with one person until death, having a baby and forever putting their needs above yours,
making coffee for someone in the morning (maybe that's a simple love buts its pretty big for me ;)
and all the much much deeper loves, that these barely seem to scratch the surface

Levels of Love
Is it that love is a staircase and you have to start with beginning small steps
and the older you get the further your love can grow and expand
By learning from examples, others, experience, pains, lessons, trials...
From your mind and heart getting exposed to new levels of love, hate, the world?

Do people choose how far their love grows?
At some point you have these new steps ahead of you...
but you're stuck on the past of your failures, or how life has messed up everyone
so we choose to stay on that level and take no steps further in love
We choose to stop loving
and some of us choose to take steps back.
To downgrade our love to the years of closed-mindedness
or maybe to protect our own selves
from the deeper costs of a deeper love
and choose to stay with the simple love
maybe the simple love is easiest
maybe its nice cause you're not exposed to the hate in the world yet
....or exposed to the danger of deeper love

but also choosing to surface your love
you're missing out on the deepness of love
and the beauty it holds and gives
I ono Iono I don't know.
Somebody can tell me
Cause I don't know
I don't know anything about love except what I maybe knoww