In a recent comment, Cami made a request. “I for one, would love to hear you talk about balancing a blogging career with kids and family.  I’m just getting mine rolling and I feel so overwhelmed at times.  You’ve been going at this longer and I would love to hear your ups and downs and ways to manage it all.  Balance.  The great juggling act of life! 😉  Thanks for all your words!” Oh, Cami.  You’re asking the blind to lead the blind.  Everyone who knows me even a little bit, knows that I struggle with balance. I struggle. I can manage okay when our routine is in motion, but when it’s off, because of a snow day, vacation, sickness, whatever, all of the balls I’ve managed to keep airborne, awkwardly at times, come falling down.  And it’s not the funny, slapstick routine where the balls fall down and the clown spastically tries to catch

On the way down to Atlanta and back last week, Kriste and I listened to the first two audio books in the Divergent series.  I’ve become a real fan of listening to “books on tape”, as I call them (and Jeff makes fun of me for it), when riding in the car for long periods of time.  It makes the trip so enjoyable. The story brought up a conversation… which faction would you be in?  Kriste answered without hesitation.  “I would be in the happy farming community one.”  Amity. I had to think about it for a minute. “I think I would be in Candor.” (And yes, I realize this whole conversation and the fact that I’m relaying it again on my blog, makes me a bit of a nerd at the moment, but hang in there with me!) Kriste raised her eyebrows.  “Really?”  The answer sort of surprised me, too.  In

…or, more specifically, what do you want from this blog?  From me? “Stop reading minds and start asking questions.” These words were up on one of the slides that Jon Acuff, the keynote speaker at Haven, presented.  His entire “talk” was awesome and encouraging.  Just what I needed.  But, those words were one of those inspirational nuggets that hit me like a ton of bricks. “…start asking questions.” No, no, no.  You don’t want to ask an open-ended question like that on a blog, because the answers might be…  well, hard to hear?  Not what you’re hoping for?  Maybe too raw and real and honest?  So, I don’t ask the question and I carry on with making assumptions about what my readers want from me.  And maybe I’m missing the mark. It’s been slowly creeping up on me – the realization that I don’t write like I used to.  I used