4 November

Another phone post tonight after a day that was just one of those days. It wasn't bad, it wasn't good, it was just kind of indifferent. I was sore, John was cranky, the children spent time cleaning their rooms and playing independently of each other, my husband touched up some paint and worked on installing baseboards. The weather was cold but not particularly noteworthy. Later I taught lessons which wasn't fun considering cello is an instrument that is played seated and sitting is a "pain" for me right now.

Anyway, after all that, I went to make this post and was thinking, "What will I write about?" Four days into the month and I'm already a bit unprepared. Well, not totally, I just don't have photos ready to go. And then these words of Blessed John Paul II, in his Letter to Artists, came to my mind: "All men and women are entrusted with the task of crafting their own life: in a certain sense, they are to make of it a work of art, a masterpiece."

As a musician, decent amateur photographer, and dollmaker, I do consider myself an artist. But even when we are not artists, or just don't feel like it, or a particular day didn't seem to offer any inspiration at all, we are still crafting our lives. I know I've written about this some time ago, somewhere, but I can't find it right now and can't add links from the phone app anyway. But it's something I've thought about a lot over these last 11 years of spending most of my time raising my children. Crafting our home, making mindful decisions in my parenting, all of this is part if crafting this life. I'm not at all sure I've reached "masterpiece" level yet, but I'm certainly trying.

I firmly believe that being conscious of how we live, having the goal of a life lived as a masterpiece to strive for, is a very beautiful and worthy endeavor.

Here's to another day spent working on that masterpiece.