*My Someone, Your Someone*

This week, the last thing I do before I go to bed and the first thing I do when I wake up is kiss a baby cheek. It's one of the best feelings I've experienced in my entire life and it makes this Thanksgiving extra special! This is our very first Thanksgiving with a baby in the house and it's so much fun!! It's especially nice to have all the fun, but no responsibility. I'm soaking up this aunt thing for sure....I would be lying if some of the gory details of pregnancy didn't make me very able to wait on the Lord's timing!! That's one way to receive patience, let me tell ya. Most people go into having a baby with blinded bliss, but I am well aware. Twins know everything...nothing spared. I am praying for my future self a lot lately, haha. Fact.

I've been staying at my parents house since last Friday so I wouldn't miss out on anything with Sam which has been wonderful. My old room has definitely reminded me of a lot I have to be thankful for. The Jr. High photos of friends are filled with the same people that my pictures are now. Luckily, now we look a little different are are not as emotional so we don't fight over whose shampoo is the best. I am so thankful that I've kept my best friends over a long period of time. It's made me so thankful for true friendship that lasts for years. Friends that come into my life not just for a good time, but to live life with me. Friends that are with me through the ups and the downs, and I can trust not to stab me in the back. Friends that are always on my team no matter what. I have been so blessed to see the same faces pop into my room year after year. I don't need a lot of friends, but I do need a few deep ones and I am so thankful I have that.

The room also makes me think about how thankful I am to be born in the family that I am. Why me? Why did I get such great parents that never let me lack for anything? I have always been well taken care of and well loved. I have no idea why I was chosen to be in such a wonderful place in life, but I am so thankful. I can't thank the Lord enough for giving me to these people. They are such wonderful parents and have raised me well.

I've been thinking a lot lately about the people in my life in general. I read a book about how making a difference doesn't mean changing the whole world, but changing things for someone. It's too hard for one person to give clean water to everyone or feed every hungry mouth. I was struggling for a while because I felt like my life didn't look like it was making a huge different. I'm not in a distant land changing tribes or anything. I want to live a life that matters, and I wasn't sure living in the luxuries of this town was doing that. But the Lord has shown me that a lot of times being a difference maker just means changing a life for somebody, being there for those the Lord has put around me. I think that can be in ministry as in sponsoring a child, but also just in the people I look around and see in my life. I could have been placed anywhere, but the Lord chosen to put me here. He has chosen to put you in my life if you're reading this. I think He has a lot of purpose in that.

No matter if it's for a long period of time like my family or a short period of time like my students...it's all significant. We are all put together for a purpose. I try to soak up every minute with my kids at school because I know there's a very short window that I have to pour into their lives. The neat thing I've realized is that they pour into my life as well. They teach me and help me to see things about God and life that I've never noticed before. Of all the billions of people in the world, me and my kids were put together this year and I know that's something very important. It was not by mistake. There is so much purpose God has in that for each of us. There are people in my life I see everyday that were put there very purposefully. There is somebody for me everyday. There is someone I'm meant to notice and do something about. And on the other hand, I am the person maybe the Lord has put in your life. I know I have people who help me in ways words can't express on a daily basis. I am so thankful for that. You are changing my life and making a difference.

So, who is my somebody? Who is my someone? Those are questions I need to continually ask myself because I think it changes from year to year and month to month. It could possibly be day to day as well. Maybe carry around a $20 bill to be able to give to someone in need at the drop of a hat. Who knows what the someone for that day may look like? The somebody for our day may just drop in and out of our life for an instance, but it may make a huge difference. You never know!

The neat thing is, usually my someone is the same somebody who helps me. I think the thing I am most thankful for this Thanksgiving is the fact that I am right where the Lord wants me. I am surrounded by the people that I'm supposed to be and I can always guarantee that God will bring another "somebody" into my life. Every season brings new opportunities to become something important in another person's story. Who is your somebody right now? Who are you going out of your way for? Who has God graciously allowed you to bless right now?

I love that my main "someone" these days are my students at school. What a nice somebody to have because they are so much fun and adoring them comes so easily to me. I get to do something I love while hopefully making some kind of difference and being changed through them as well. Maybe that's where your somebody is...what do you love to do? Who is standing next to you when you do it? Maybe it's them.

We can't change the world, but maybe...just maybe with the help of the Lord we can change something for someone. Even if only for a day.