Dancing with Daffodils

Last week was a dark and heavy week for me; not my usual "dancing with daffodils" kind of moment that I want to record but there is something I want to remember from last week. My sister texted me 10 days ago to tell me that her doctor had found an abnormal mass in her breast and that they were testing it. She asked us to pray for her, which we did. Monday we found out it was malignant and she had to wait until Friday to have an MRI done to see if the cancer had spread to her lymph nodes. All last week this information weighed on me. I was consumed with worry and sadness and felt like tar was running through my body instead of blood. My heart literally felt heavy to me and dark. I also had a friend get hurt by some really unkind words and then later in the week my daughter was upset about an incident at school when a kid in her class was rough with her for no reason. It sounds dramatic now but in the moment it felt like everyone I loved was being attacked and it crushed me....

Earlier this week marked a couple of anniversaries for me. The first was that it has now been 14 years since I've returned home from serving a mission for my church in Kiev, Ukraine. I remember that crazy last day where my two best friends and companions and I went to say goodbye to some of our favorite people. One of our quick stops was to see a family I was very close to and the father had made us beautiful wooden plant stands. They were gorgeous and are still floating around somewhere in Kiev because we were not allowed to bring them on the plane. I was heartbroken and when I went back to visit a few years later I told him the sad tale and he just handed me one from their home. It wasn't nearly as beautiful as the one that he had previously made me but I made sure to get it home this time and it still stands in my dining room as a wonderful reminder of my Ukrainian family. Lots of missionaries are kind of nervous to come home because there are big decisions to make and rea...