Hopes for my future child

There are a lot of mom blogs out there and I read them all. It's helped me sift through what matters and what doesn't, for me at least. Maybe things will change in a few years, but right now, these are the most important hopes I have for my future kids.


I hope you love something and are really bad at it. I hope you're third string defensive lineman, choir ballerina, cover the absenteeism policy for the school newspaper. And I hope you do it anyway. 

I hope you love animals and are kind to them. I hope you beg me to go back for the dog on the highway when we're going to the school dance.

I hope you seek peace, even when you're in middle school and people strive on strife. I hope you keep seeking peace when it doesn't make you popular.

I hope you will be brave in your own way. Whether that means jumping off the high dive, trying out for a team, or spending a semester abroad in Italy. 

I hope you love books and the stories they tell. I hope you can get lost in the stories of biographies and memories and fiction when the world is too much.

I hope you love Jesus and trust in His promise to you, even when you're tired and don't feel like you deserve His grace. 

I hope you're not disappointed in the lack of toys and organized play you'll have. I hope you'll be grateful for the time you spent creating your own fun, perhaps pretending you're one of the boxcar children in a trailer in the backyard.

I hope you get in trouble for reading too much.

I hope you'll never beg us for a new phone, a new car. I hope you'll be grateful and have a contented heart. 

And dear one, who is not yet conceived, I hope you know how much I love you. I hope that you know that you're decisions have consequences, and although we can't take them for you, we'll take them with you. I hope you'll always be coming home.