Money Saving Mom®

As I got into the car last Saturday to head to the airport from the Florida Homeschool Conference, I got a text from my mom letting me know that one of my sister’s and brother-in-law’s really close friends had died in a tragic accident.

While I didn’t personally know this couple, my heart has hurt so much for this young wife and mom of four who lost her husband so unexpectedly and tragically. I cannot imagine the pain, the shock, the anguish, the gaping hole left by her husband’s death.

My mom told me today that his funeral on Wednesday was one of the most meaningful services she’d ever attended. Why? Because this man had lived wholeheartedly embracing every moment of life.

He had almost died from a serious illness a few years before. This illness took his eyesight, but instead of lamenting the fact that he had lost his sight, he spent the last few years of his life living every day to the fullest — pouring himself into people and loving people well.

One of my dear friends who just recently had surgery to remove part of her tongue and lymph nodes in an effort to beat her throat cancer told me (my paraphrase), “You can’t look death in the face and not be changed. You stop worrying about petty things. You stop letting misunderstandings and differences hurt relationships. And you start loving people well. Because you don’t know how many days you have left on this earth and you don’t want to waste a single one.”

Her example of living each day to its fullest has challenged me deeply. And it’s convicted me of how often I let busyness get in the way of loving well.

Moving to Tennessee was a major milestone for me. I drew a line in the sand and said, “From here on out, I want to wholeheartedly embrace the life God has given me. I’ve spent too many years stuffing problems under the rug instead of dealing with them in a healthy way. I’ve spent too many years of my life chasing productivity instead of making people and community a priority. I’ve spent too many years trying to please people instead of being who God has called me to be.”

It’s been a month of fully embracing life and I wouldn’t go back to my former self for anything. I’ve made deep relationships. I’ve become more spontaneous. I’ve laughed harder than I have in ages. And I’ve discovered that people are completely okay with my sometimes-messy, very imperfect self.

It’s been a beautiful journey and it’s only begun. Will you join me? Let’s fully embrace today… because we don’t know if there is a tomorrow.

P.S. Would you please join me in praying for this dear woman who has lost her husband and these four young children who have lost their daddy? If you want to do something to help this woman and her four children out practically or financially, please email me (crystal @ moneysavingmom.com) and I’ll share some specific ways you can help them out.

I’d also like ask for prayer for my sister, Gretchen, and her husband, as you can probably imagine how difficult this has been for them, too. She does a lot to make MoneySavingMom.com what it is — running the Stores Deals section and sharing her shopping trips and weekly menu plans — and I’d love it if we could all come around her and support her in this time of grief. If you’d like to send a note to her to let her know you’re praying for her, you can email it to me, as well (crystal @ moneysavingmom.com) and I’ll make sure she gets it. Thank you all so very much!

There have been so many thoughts swirling in my head this past week… and so much I want to share with you all. This is a long post, but I hope it helps to answer many of the questions I’ve been asked over and over again the past few months. Thank you for your patience as I waited to share these details until the time was right.

The Post I Was Scared to Publish

Four weeks ago, I came out and told you all that my heart was to get back to my blogging roots. I was scared to push publish on that post.

Scared because I had no idea what the response would be like. Scared because I’ve been pretty quiet when it comes to personal life stuff as a blogger the past few years. Scared because I knew that it was opening myself up and putting myself out there.

But I was also very settled about it. I knew it was the right move for me. I knew that’s where my heart was. So I was okay if some of my readers were disappointed by the decision.

Your overwhelmingly positive response has BLOWN. ME. AWAY.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. Your kind comments and cheering me on have blessed me more than words can say.

It’s Good to Be “Back”

It’s felt so good to be “back” to blogging. Back to sharing about my everyday life — the highs, the lows, the triumphs, the failures… the excitement and the mundane stuff. Thanks for joining me in the journey.

Also? Thank you for how you have supported our family in our move to Nashville. It was a BIG step for us and the way that you all have surrounded us with prayers and encouragement along the way means more than words can express.

There was a lot of sadness, grieving, and processing that went along with moving away from our family, friends, and the state we’ve always lived in. Many days, in the midst of all of that, I’d get an email or a comment from one of you that would be exactly what I needed to hear right then.

We Are So Grateful to Be in Nashville

It’s been a month since we moved and we are so very grateful to be here. Over and over, God has confirmed to us that this is exactly where we’re supposed to be.

We’ve been so blessed by our welcoming neighborhood. We’ve found a church that we feel our family is going to really grow and thrive in. We are loving getting to spend a lot more time with dear friends here we already knew before we moved. And we have also met other wonderful people who are fast becoming dear friends.

Yes, we miss our family and friends in Kansas. Yes, there have been adjustments being in this new city, new house, and new state. Yes, we don’t have everything completely organized and I have yet to get anything hung on the walls.

But we are happy and content. And deep in the core of our souls, we know that this is home.

Whether it’s home for forever or just a season, we don’t know. But we are throwing ourselves wholeheartedly into developing roots and relationships here because no one is guaranteed tomorrow. So we want to live today to the fullest.

Having a much more flexible schedule since Jesse is working from home instead of running a busy law firm has been a very welcome change for us. We are loving being home as a family more, loving having Jesse more involved in our every day lives, and loving a simpler pace of life where community and relationships are much more important than productivity and to-do lists.

Why We Moved to Nashville

Many of you have asked why we moved and/or what our long-term plans are. I’ve held off sharing details publicly because we were still processing them ourselves. But now that we’ve been here for a month, Jesse and I wanted you all to know where our decision to move came from.

It was much prayed over, thought over, talked over, mulled over, cried over, and counseled over. In fact, it’s a decision that’s been about three years in the making.

While there is a LONG list of reasons why we decided to move, here are three of the biggest reasons:

1. My husband needed a change.

In the past year, the light had gone out in my husband’s eyes. The passion from his heart. The spring in his step. Running his own demanding law firm had taken its toll and he was ready for something different.

He’s learned so much and grown so much in the past five years. It’s been exciting to see him take a dream and turn it into a successful reality. He’s gotten to help many, many people. And he’s grateful to have had the past five years. But the time had come to move on.

2. Our family needed a change.

We loved being close to family in Kansas. We loved being able to see them often, spend time with them, and build close relationships with them. And we miss them dearly. But we also felt like Jesse and I both having separate businesses was taking its toll on our family’s health.

We longed for a slower pace of life and more community — for our family’s growth and health — and after much prayer and thought, we ultimately felt that a sort of “starting over” of sorts in a new city would be a much more effective way to accomplish this. So far, it truly has been.

3. Our business needed a change.

MoneySavingMom.com has grown a LOT in the past few years. We’ve been grateful for the growth and excited at the possibilities and open doors, but it’s become much more than I could handle on my own.

Jesse and I (along with some of our team) felt like restructuring things internally to take some of the load off of my plate would be a wise move. We also wanted to free Jesse up to come on the team in a managerial role and help oversee all the legal/financial details of running MSM. He also had some legal/business ideas he wanted to pursue outside of MSM that have been on the back burner because he was too busy running his law firm.

The more we discussed these possibilities, the more we realized what a great fit this would be for everyone. And the more we prayed about it, the more excited we got about it.

But it was still a BIG, BIG leap for our family. In November of last year, Jesse and I came to Nashville to meet with people, talk in-depth to our friends here, check out the area, and pray hard for clear direction.

Truthfully, we prayed most of all for red lights and closed doors. We did not want to make this big move if we weren’t absolutely, 150% sure it was the right thing.

All we got were more green lights and open doors.

So we sat at the airport on the way home and both looked at each other and unanimously agreed, “We’re supposed to do this. And if we don’t jump out in faith, we’ll always wonder what we would have missed out on because we weren’t willing to step out of our comfort zone.”

We moved May 1 and not a day goes by that we don’t experience yet another confirmation that this is where we’re supposed to be. We don’t know what all the future holds, but we are grateful for how God has led us so far and we continue to trust Him to lead us in the future… one step at a time!