Missing the Forrest for the Trees

See the above image? My soldier's the one getting ready to walk down the stairs.  I remember thinking that day how it always seems like forever when they are gone, but once they are off that plane it is just over ... just like that.  Funny how so quickly it all seems to just come to an end!

Tonight was the first night since his return to us, that he was gone again.  Just a quick day trip, so nothing major.

  While in the kitchen getting dinner ready after our early evening soccer practice, it hit me that there was absolutely no adjustment whatsoever to him being gone again.  We all just sort of knew how to adjust our routine and the night was pretty peaceful.  

I thought about that a while after all the girls went to bed and I was left alone in the quiet. 

And maybe, just maybe I am going to have to work a little harder on my heart to remember what the most important things are in my life.  Maybe, just maybe I've been a little too preoccupied lately with little details that really don't mean that much, but that can completely steal the joy away from what I care about most.  

Tonight Kate said when I turned out her light, "I wish Daddy was here to tell me goodnight."  

She was fine, not heartbroken at all, just matter of fact and honest.  

There is so much that I worry over about trying to make her life and her sister's lives as spectacular as can be, but when it all comes down to it, all she cares about is having her Daddy home to tell her goodnight.  She doesn't need him to make her life amazing ... she just needs him.  

She notices when he's home, and she notices when he's not.

Tonight I noticed that lately I've been so busy noticing all kinds of other trivial things around The House on Grant, that I've forgotten to notice ... to really soak in that a certain soldier comes home to it each night.  Not that I haven't appreciated him being here, but it has been so easily consuming trying to catch up on life missed, that the life I  have right now has lost a little value.

God is always working in our hearts, isn't He?! 

I am grateful that He uses such sweet little people to gently remind me of where my heart needs to be.

We are still really oh so blessed to have our soldier home.