What contentment looks like

For me, anyway.

It's been a rough few weeks, cramming things we missed earlier in the spring plus our usual late spring activities, plus the clean-up from my big painting project.

This weekend began with a bang. We had makeup soccer games from the early spring snows, plus the regular game, plus the end of season party for the big girls. (I do have to insert proud mommy moment. 9yo scored a goal! She usually plays in back and goal, and hardly ever gets a chance, so it was so fun to see her do it yesterday.) However, I was DETERMINED to get my living room and dining room back in order. But first, I needed to clean up the finish on the furniture. So I spent the whole day in the wind, got the mother of all sunburns, and came home to work. I got the furniture done and realized that not only did I need supplies to finish the room, but we had to go to Hobby Lobby for 9yo's school project due Monday. Hobby Lobby is closed Sunday. Since I also planned on planting our garden Sunday, I thought it'd be a good start to get our plants while we were out.

Dizzy yet?

I got up bright and early this morning to plant the garden. I spent most of the day in the garden, then got ready for soccer. Had a game, and a party (pizza party! Yay! Didn't have to cook!) then came back home to finish the garden. I finally got the last of what I needed to accomplish (no, the garden's not done yet, but I planned it that way- sorta) at about 8:00 p.m. Thank God for the sun being up so late. As I dusted myself off and staggered on to the porch, I thought about a suggestion my friend gave me on Facebook yesterday- to go relax on my porch.

My porch has been a mess since winter. It's covered, so it tends to collect everything from all of our projects. Currently, my paint project and the new electrical panel. All that mess is stressful, and I can't relax with it all there. So I cleaned my porch. I moved everything, and put it away, then I gave the porch a good sweeping, used the shop vac on the crevices, and let me tell you- I have a serviceable porch for sitting on.

I got myself a nice drink, sat on my seat, and enjoyed the cool evening breeze, the birds chirping, and watched the sun set over my newly planted garden. In that moment, I knew what perfect contentment feels like. Contentment was relaxing in a clean space that I'd made special just for me, not the mad dash of spiffing up for company, but because I want a nice place to sit for me. Contentment was knowing that I'd spent the past two days working hard, and though there is still a lot of work to be done, I'd done all I could do, and I'd done a good job. Contentment was having my freshly bathed little girls coming out to sit with me and reading books at dusk and enjoying the last bit of our day together.

So yeah, it's been a stressful couple of weeks. An even more stressful weekend. But tonight, sitting on my porch, it was worth it.