The Best of Times: 20 Top Moments & Blessings of 2020

2020. I don’t know how it’s possible to simultaneously have both the worst year of your life and the best year of your life. But I suppose if it was possible for Charles Dickens, maybe it was possible for me.

I’m a tad disappointed that, should the opportunity ever again present itself to play some sort of non-alcoholic NEVER HAVE I EVER drinking game, I’ll have a LOT less content. I can no longer say that Never Have I Ever…

• Broken three bones at once
• Spent my anniversary in the emergency room
• Broken a bone while out of town
• Had surgery while out of town
• Spent almost three months on my couch
• Not left my house for weeks
• Waited for two hours in an unairconditioned vehicle to have a long q-tip shoved up my nose
• Caught and recovered from a new disease that was ravaging the world
• Cried over canceled plans (yes, as an introvert)
• Refrained from taking my children to the park for FIVE MONTHS
• Been cursed at in front of my children by a complete stranger

I mean, 2020 has been a year of a lot of firsts. And not the good kind of firsts.

That said, 2020 has also held some of the highest highlights of my entire life. They vary from silly to personal to beautiful to those with eternal significance.

We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love is way too much to give us lesser things

‘Cause what if your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You’re near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
We cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt your goodness, we doubt your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
All the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we’d have faith to believe

When friends betray us
When darkness seems to win
We know that pain reminds this heart
That this is not our home

What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
What if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are your mercies in disguise

Blessings by Laura Story

It is my hope and prayer that you are encouraged by the 20 2020 stories I will tell in this series. I hope that they will make you smile. I hope they will remind you of God’s amazing faithfulness.

_____

My 20 Top Moments & Blessings of 2020:

1 & 2: #USCHAMPS2020: The 2020 US Figure Skating Championships

3: A Fresh Pursuit of God in 2020: The Bible, Faith, and Spiritual Growth

4. Three weeks with my parents: another unexpected gift of 2020

5. Becoming a read-aloud family (& tips for reading aloud to wild boys!)

6. SPACE X LAUNCH and our fun astronomy homeschooling science unit

7. 3rd Grade Homeschooling End-of-Year Recap & Review

8. Momma went back to school & graduated from college during a pandemic

9-10. My Son’s Redemption & Baptism Story

11. My baby’s first decade

12. Our 10th Birthday Trip to Colonial Williamsburg

13. Festival of Parks

14. When a family loses a therapist

15. When Grown-Up, Big Boys Cook Thanksgiving Dinner

16. A more capable son

17-18. The Lord is my song & singing with my son

19. How I lost 15 pounds during a pandemic

20. We make soup – how the pandemic brought us closer as a family