Turns Out: Grad School Is Pretty Time Consuming

I've been doing a lot of writing lately, just not of the creative sort. I have only two weeks left in my first semester of grad school and I feel as though I've already aged about 5 years. No, I'm not being dramatic, it's true. I have a brand new patch of grey hair right in my very unkempt side part, my "squinting" wrinkles have deepened considerably, and I've developed a case of full blown adult acne that has led me to spend more money at Sephora than I care to admit.

But: I'm happy. I feel alive and productive and fulfilled. I have had to reconfigure my schedule and adjust to the serious lack of sleep and relearn that damn blessed APA format but I'm doing it! One week at a time, one paper after another, chapter after chapter (after chapter) of nonfiction scientific scholarly information: it's happening! I'm a grad student!

And somehow, in the midst of all this studying and writing and working, I am still living life as a wife and mother. Because what is any of this without this little tribe I am so blessed to call my own? We have been busy living the family life: celebrating Isabelle's 11th birthday, softball games, running together as a family, gardening. Shawn and I have vowed to just enjoy the journey and not to stress our way through it. Two parents in school with three busy little kids is no easy feat. It's also not the hardest thing we've ever done, either, so we're trying to keep a good perspective on the whole thing. We are learning to be patient, to overlook the small stuff (like a clean house, a concept that now seems very foreign to us), and using good time management so that we can be good students, good parents, good spouses, good runners: you catch my drift.

In between all of the craziness, the azaleas bloomed. One of my favorite parts of spring.

We also managed to squeeze in an Easter weekend roadtrip to see our family in north Louisiana. I got the big 'ole batch of boiled crawfish I had been waiting the whole Lenten season for, enjoyed a run along the river with my sweet friend Lauren, had a girls only shopping day, went out for a night on the town with my cousins, and enjoyed Easter Sunday with a house full of family. It was exactly the get away weekend we needed to recharge.

It's been a good couple of months and this spring time weather just makes you feel full of hope, right? Like anything is possible and maybe, just maybe, we might even muster up the energy to make that anything happen. Peace and love, my friends. Read more, clean less, and run every chance you get. That's my motto these days.