Hopefully this sticks…

Gosh dang if I haven’t started and stopped one million things in my life. It’s kind of the running joke in my family. “How many different jobs have you had, Jessica?” “What are you starting now?” “Why did you quit making bracelets? …doing balloon arches?…”. You name it, I have tried it and I have succeeded at it. With every passing job I’ve had, I’ve always had this feeling of knowing that something more, better existed out there for me.

What I thought was just being “unsatisfiable” was in fact ADHD. Apparently girls growing up in the 90’s were among the top undiagnosed groupings of people in history …or at least that’s what the very factual reel on IG said. Regardless, it seems true.

I am 39 and finally realizing why on earth I am the way I am. I’m not to blame — it’s simply the way our loving God made me. Don’t get me wrong, the “skills” of ADHD have served me well. I can carry 20 conversations at once, I have this insufferable need to accomplish things, and the list goes on. The only problem is, I also have this very bad habit of not finishing the things. We get close to the finish line and BAM — over it.

This isn’t meant to be about ADHD but yet, here we are. So I digress. What brings me here, to this “House Note #1” is actually the opposite of everything I thought I was searching for.

Since I can remember, I’ve always been running at hyper speed. Ready to go to high school, ready to drive, ready to graduate, ready to work, ready to advance, ready to master a new “thing”, and ready to move on. So when I tell you the irony in this Note hits pretty hard, I’m not making it up.

Over the past few years, my husband, Jacob, and I have experienced several hardships. We’re both employed full time with very successful companies. Each of us in management positions after climbing the “corporate” ladder. The funny thing is, once we reached where we thought we wanted to go, the party wasn’t near as fun as we thought. Don’t get me wrong, we are absolutely happy in our careers and with our lives; but our lives are not slowing down. They are speeding up. And we knew we had to make a change.

Earlier this year as spring was beginning to give way to summer, we were on a walk and Jacob asked me, “what do you want our summer to look like this year?” I almost violently said, “slower!” To my surprise, he agreed. So we began planning. “I want flowers!”, I said. “Yes, and a garden”, he replied. From there, we realized that everything we had been chasing was not as fulfilling as we thought it would be and that we were in a place where it was time to dial it back and slow it down.

The question became: How can we steward the blessings God has given us to serve others and ourselves while leaving a legacy when we are gone?

The answer was obvious; less is more. Slower mornings. Slower evenings. Garden walks. Home projects. Not rushing. Just living… slowly.

We started hosting brunch at our house every Sunday as a way of letting our kids and immediate family know that they always have a place where they will be welcomed with smiles, breakfast, and open arms. A place at a table where they are called by name, chosen, wanted, and loved. A reminder to slow down and enjoy life. What started with brunch has grown and become much more in our hearts. Brunch was the birth of Sunday House but it means so much more than that now.

If you’ve made it this far, first and foremost – thank you!! Secondly, congratulations for making it out of the wild goose chase I took you on.

Jacob and I plan to share our adventures in gardening (we are not experts), home renovations, small DIY projects, recipes, and so much more! We’d love you to come along with us. If you’re lucky I’ll even show you my ONE, single flower I got to bloom this year.