If I had to take a moment to give my best description of life as it feels at the moment, I’d probably say “There’s a lot I’m processing.” If you’ve been reading around here you may have noticed that sometimes when there’s “a lot I’m processing” there’s a little less that I tend to say. Because sometimes I have to get to the other side of something I’m figuring out — or maybe I have to get to the other side of a beam I feel like I’m balancing and tiptoeing across, before I can look up and say, “Well this is what was going through my mind while I was wondering whether or not I was going to fall.”

In case you’re keen to know, being a mother of three is something I’m processing. And not just while cutting through the girls’ clothing section at Walmart to try and find some tights to wear to the wedding before we leave Thursday. (I’m also processing what needs to happen before that departure.) How different is three going to be from two? Will I maintain my sanity? Can the fact that I haven’t had the horrific nausea I had in the first two pregnancies be a strong enough indication that I can start buying clothing with pink ruffles and sparkle?

And in processing of a different nature, I’ll expand on that little opportunity I mentioned briefly on April Fool’s Day, before the big news. A few weeks ago, the Hubs discovered a gallery space available inside the Inner Banks Artisans’ Center, a large building that houses multiple smaller galleries and a coffee shop at the back, here in wee Washington. {You know I mean Washington, NC, right?} For lots of reasons which you might find interesting, but you might find boring, this space really seems like a God-send of an opportunity for us.

{I’m not sure this little shell relates to anything in this post. I just saw him again when we were working on this fine art portfolio for Quiver Tree Photography and I remembered how much I do like him.}

Inside the 21 x 15 foot space, we’re planning to sell prints and canvases of the Hubs’ work, do custom canvas and photo printing, sell other photo-related goods, maybe some things of a more crafty nature, and perhaps even a few partridges which would come with their own pear trees. I guess we’ll make the pear trees optional. HH will be able to host photography workshops from the coffee shop, and we might set up a little studio space upstairs for some photo shoots, and the location makes it seem like a really good place for advertising that there’s a new portrait/wedding/family photographer in town, since the only other studio in downtown Washington is turning into Spa La La this summer.

Sorry, I don’t know.

So we’re taking a leap – but it honestly doesn’t feel like a very big one, with small overheads and the fact that we don’t actually have to be present for the things we have for sale to sell. I haven’t wanted to whine or complain about the fact that our finances have been tight since we returned to the States (pretty much just like they were before we returned to the States, except tighter) but this opportunity has me very hopeful that a little change could be coming our way, soon.

But on that note I want to make sure that I tell you that God is a faithful God. Do you believe me? I hope you do.

Over the last two months, (and many times before these last two) we have started out the month looking at our bills and looking at our expected income and saying, “Something is going to have to happen in order for us to be able to make it.” But by the end of it, a special gift has arrived — $400, $500 — and that is how the ends meet. {And I hope you guys aren’t thinking we’re living high on the hog and that’s why we’re strapped. We are tight-portioned, peanut-butter-and-jelly-eating, if-the-money-is-not-in-the-bank-for-the-gas-then-we’re-not-going kind of folk.}

But we are so rich, and throughout the months we’ve lived this way I’ve experienced that truth more and more fully.

And on more than just those two occasions, God has answered our prayers. Besides when a special gift arrives “out of the blue” and we break even. A work opportunity comes up or I sell an advertising space or my Mama just decides that she needs to capitalize on every single buy one get one free deal at the grocery store and bring me “the free one.” God provides.

We are so rich.

It reminds me of Paul, speaking about his hardships to the Corinthians:

We put no stumbling block in anyone’s path, so that our ministry will not be discredited. Rather as servants of God we commend ourselves in every way: in great endurance, in troubles, hardships and distresses…in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love, in truthful speech and in the power of God… through glory and dishonor, bad report and good report; genuine, yet regarded as impostors…sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; poor, yet making many rich; having nothing and yet possessing everything. We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians, and opened wide our hearts to you. {2 Corinthians 6:3-11, abbreviated}

And praise the patient Lord who keeps helping me see the incredible glorious truth of this:

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. {2 Peter 1:3}

How sweet it is. And how true.

There will be more to say about Quiver Tree Photography’s store opening, and perhaps you’ll be along for the ride as I process the new adventure in motherhood {bless your heart} but more than all that, please take this with you today:

The Lord! Our God! He is faithful and true! Even the hardships are gifts — and you can trust the process — He is able to work it all out for your good, His glory. And that is glorious!

xCC