a hint of hot water

Until recently, our kitchen sink sprayed out hot, violent water. upon moving in (last june) we (let's be real, it was me) noticed that the kitchen faucet has one of two spray options. none or A TON. and it couldn't be spraying just luke-warm water, no sir, it was scorching.

(side note: while at bible school in England my dear friend and room mate at the time, Bonnie and i would wake up around 5:30am for hot showers. they were a luxury in those conference hall rooms. we figured out that if we got up before everyone else we would have hot showers. and who doesn't love a hot shower? okay, not everyone, but in a northern England winter, we did. we would then go back to sleep until we had to get up. we were desperate to stay warm. the times we didn't get up at 5:30? oh yeah, freezing showers.)

last week my man installed a new faucet. and it's beautiful and works right and cleans the dishes well. however, i am so used to blazing hot water that i still find myself scorching my fingers.

(second side note: I love our little night routine. John typically gives jack a bath (he may or may not include a podcast in that part of his evening) and I turn up my fav-music-of-the-moment and clean the dishes. And by clean, I mean, I take my time cleaning the dishes. I guess I didn’t realize that routine included me trying my very best not to touch the too hot water.

"There are those who think that I'm strange
They would box me up and tell me to change
But You hold me close and softly say
That You wouldn't have me any other way."

 mindy glendhill - anchor

Tonight when I realized I was unnecessarily letting the water run too warm I thought about how the hot water is kind of like life at this moment. Though painful, the water needs to be really hot to effectively clean the dirty dishes. That doesn’t keep it from hurting sometimes. things seem kind of like hot water lately. it's good because God is using it to purify and cleanse, but it hurts too. a good kind of hurt (because, wouldn't you know i don't mind hot water on my hands? after 8 months I'm a little used to it.) the water is hot, but I know He keeps cleaning the dishes. He's using life to teach me how to adjust. i prayed for it. 

His way is good. His plan is perfect. My heart rejoices. Even when I don't understand.

++

On Friday, my mom came up north to help me with a project. She's a real go-getter, that mother of mine. Mind you, I inherited more of my dad's personality and although I like to accomplish tasks, I also love to watch a good movie, roam around Target for a couple hours and blog. Obviously. But mom wanted a project and a project I would have for her. And we have a grand time doing projects together. So, once she walked in the door I thought of something for us to do.

this was Jack, attacking the camera one step at a time.

We reorganized our laundry room and transformed it into a usable playroom. Since we moved it's been mostly a storage room/mud room/where I stash everything I don't want Jack to get to. With the exposed heater and water heater (one of Jack's favorite obsessions) I was always nervous to let him play around them. Well, this was nothing for my mom and it took her about five minutes to find a solution for that...and everything else. Four hours later we had reorganized our garage, laundry room and rearranged our furniture in our family room. My.mom.is.incredible. (told you she's a go getter. I try to learn all I can.) Personally, I could keep it this way for a few years. I know mom will be back and eager to have another project. Let her come, I'll find somethin'.