Kristin Hill Taylor

Seeking God as the Author of Every Story

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Creating Family Unity

January 4, 2021 by Kristin Leave a Comment

Our homes are supposed to be a place of refuge and comfort from outside forces, but sometimes it can seem like that takes a lot of effort. Helping to create a sense of unity and safety can help the atmosphere of your home be peaceful and loving instead of contentious – even with all the personalities in play at the same moment. Here are some ways you help make your house a home where all family members feel valued and important.

Commitment

It is important family members feel secure in their pace in the family and committed to helping others as well. Many times people will adopt an “everyone for themselves” mentality and that can chip away at the foundation of a family. Family members should be committed and loyal to other members of the family in helping them become their best selves and supporting them in their lives. For us, that has meant conversations about understanding one another’s love languages and personalities.

We strive to be committed to supporting each member’s emotional, spiritual, and physical well-being. If we make this a top priority and goal for ourselves, other people will start to take the cues and adopt the behavior as well. Truthfully, while this prolonged season of social distancing has certain come with adjustments, it’s almost helped deepen our commitments to our family.

Compassion

We also need to act with compassion in our homes. Greg and I believe if compassion starts in our home, it will overflow into our other social circles and even among strangers in our ordinary lives. I’ve certainly been guilty of being the worst version of myself toward the people closest to me, but that ultimately threatens to harm the most important relationships in our lives. Unkind words, angry outbursts, pettiness, and jealousy can all sow deep seeds of distrust and unhappiness in our homes. As a mom, I’ve had to grow in this area along with my kids. I’m thankful for the grace that abounds when we mess up and as well learn together.

Greg and I want to teach our kids to genuinely caring about the struggles, difficulties, and fears each of us face. Allowing space for their sadness, even when we may not understand it, and celebrating victories with them is equally important to create a compassionate environment.

Communication

We need to be able to communicate effectively with our family members to build a sense of unity and deepen our relationships. As parents, we take on the responsibility for this. One way Greg and I have improved our communication is by having a shared Google Calendar. Knowing what’s happening logistically in our day-to-day lives at work and home helps foster even more conversations to keep us on the same page. We need to be informed about the communication they have with others. You can go to this blog article to read more about doing that.

We also need to focus on the communication that is happening in our homes with each other. With different personalities and preferences, we each have our own communication styles too. Good communication requires active listening. Listening to understand instead of to respond, asking for clarification, and offering support are all important to help someone be heard. We need to put down defensiveness and really try to understand someone if there is a disagreement instead of focusing on being understood.

Compromise

There will always be disagreements in any relationship, and family relationships are no exception. Healthy and unified families are always striving toward the best possible outcome for the family unit, and sometimes that will mean that individuals don’t get everything they were hoping to get. And usually that means making adjustments as seasons change, kids grow, and life happens.

Negotiation is healthy and should be encouraged. Considering the hopes and schedules of other family members will help them to feel loved and understood. When we compromise on some issues and take turns, we get what we want sometimes too and the family grows together. There needs to be a balance between striving to get what we want and supporting the other members of the family in their pursuits and desires.

Traditions

A great way to support family unity is through the use of family time and traditions. Embracing yearly traditions or weekly family time will allow family members to get to know each other and to build a relationship that will benefit everyone involved.

We have different traditions for birthdays, holidays, and ordinary days. None of them are elaborate, but they all anchor us to our place in this family and in our larger community of friends. Again, the Google Calendar helps Greg and I communicate about plans we want to make sure happen and don’t get lost in the busyness of life with kids and responsibilities.

Game Nights are some of our family times, and we often rotate who chooses which game we play next. This helps everyone feel included and get a chance to pick their favorite game. While we play games, we learn about each other, compete in good fun, and make memories.

(Here are many of our favorite games, if you need some recommendations.)

Christ

We can do all kinds of things to create a sense of unity and peace in our homes, but ultimately Christ is the center anchor of all this. When all members of the family are focused on drawing closer to Christ and living out our beliefs rooted in faith, we will automatically draw closer to each other as well.

We haven’t been to church since March, but we’ve been having home church in our living room. While it’s been different and involved adjustments on everyone’s part, the time we set aside on Sunday mornings has helped us learn more about Christ and each other. We’ve gotten to share in something Greg and I value in a new way together and God’s been faithful to meet us when we gather on the couches together, often in our pajamas.

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Welcoming a new (school) season together

August 14, 2019 by Kristin 4 Comments

Well, they’re off to seventh and fourth grades! (The youngest, who, of course, jumped into another photo, is headed to Mother’s Day Out tomorrow.)

As my family of five sat on our porch eating our hod podge dinner Sunday night, Greg asked us what we had learned this summer. Sunday nights are always bittersweet for me as I transition from a weekend mentality to preparing for the week ahead, but this was the last one before school started today so extra feelings were surfacing.

I loved that Greg asked the question, though.

Our answers ranged from food discoveries to my more emotional answers about grief and belonging to books we loved to practical solutions around the house. We joked and remembered and listed joy after joy.

Here are some of the things we learned, collectively and individually:

  • Grief is complicated and affects one’s sense of belonging. (Read more about belonging.)
  • Springs of water can come through an asphalt driveway and make quite a mess. (Any solutions to this one welcome …)
  • Trapping wasps is possible but they’re still sneaky enough to make their homes in small places they aren’t wanted.
  • Burgers are delicious cooked in a cast-iron skillet on the stove. So are steak bites.
  • New-to-us book series and authors are always welcomed. One child and I read a lot of fiction books, which is no surprise. And another child learned the joy of reading when we limited TV and other screens. (I have been devouring Colleen Hoover books. Cate found a new-to-her series called “The Unwanteds.” And Ben has been reading like never before.)
  • Hospitality heals. I know this, but I was invited in when I needed a break from initiating plans. (Read more about that.)
  • Home is where I needed to be many of the #88daysofsummer, but now I’m looking forward to some trips this fall.

We learned plenty more about each other – as a family and individually. And I’m in the midst of processing grief and anxiety and motherhood, but, for now, I’m grateful God gave me a fresh perspective and ushered us into a new season of life and school together.

Tell me, what have you learned this summer?

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Reflections on living & dying

May 16, 2019 by Kristin 11 Comments

I knew I wanted to gather some old friends to celebrate my 40th birthday. Four dear friends (and three of their husbands and kids) joined my family at my lake house for the first weekend of May. They brought gifts, memories, and all the food we needed to feed our party of 23 people.

Jaclyn, Sarah, Katie, and Bekah hadn’t all met before, but I have histories with them that span decades, literally. Some of our stories have overlapped, but I knew this was the right group of people to gather together.

Starting in 1990, Katie was my next-door-neighbor-turned-best-friend for all of middle and high school and we remain friends across the state who wish we were neighbors. Bekah and I also were friends in middle and high school. We swam together, she introduced me to country music, and we continue to gather at Christmastime and other times we have extra time when we’re visiting my mom in Louisville. (Fun side note: I encouraged her and her now-husband to date, so they blame me and thank me in the same breath. I’ve actually known her husband Barrett longer than anyone who was at my lake house that weekend!)

Jaclyn and I met in college and had intersecting friends starting in the fall of 1998. We actually got closer after college, got married the same summer, walked through infertility and all the early days of motherhood literally together, and now miss each other if we go too many days without hanging out. Our husbands and kids are tight too. Sarah walked into our church in May 2009, pregnant with Davey who would become my Ben’s first friend, and we’ve basically been friends since. She’s since moved four hours away, but we have an ongoing, never-ending text conversation that brings me so much joy.

Jaclyn and Katie put together a book of blessings and memories from all kinds of people in my life. Jaclyn gave me other goodies and helped organize the whole weekend. Sarah gave me a felt letter board with a sweet message already displayed. (The quote is a reference from a book about friendship by Melanie Shankle that Jaclyn, Sarah, and I like to quote to each other.) Katie made me a T-shaped shelf that’s already hanging on my wall. Bekah bought my dinner when us girls went out for Mexican food one of the night’s together.

Our boys fished and caught enough bluegill and catfish to feed us lunch on Sunday. The older girls made friendship bracelets, had a sleepover in the basement one night, and helped us keep track of the little girls. We went on some boat rides, laughed at memories, told back stories, and ate well.

My soul was so filled with these
new memories with old friends.

The celebrating continued on Monday when some of my friends I know from my kids’ school gathered for breakfast together. It was such a sweet way to begin the new week celebrating some more. Forty certainly had me reflective and craving all the quality time with people I love.

I wanted to celebrate with my people, but God knew I would need to be filled to the brim with love and support as the week continued. God saw beyond my 40th birthday.

My dad went into cardiac arrest the evening of May 7 – four days after I turned 40, one day after Cate turned 12, and five days before Mother’s Day. He passed away about 35 hours later, on Thursday, May 9. (Here’s his obituary.)

He had been without oxygen three different times – for an undetermined amount of time when he went into cardiac arrest, on the way to the hospital in the ambulance, and again in the emergency room. His body never recovered and I watched him stop breathing while hooked to a ventilator and lots of medicines in an Indianapolis hospital.

I haven’t written much about my dad here because our relationship was complicated. For years, I’ve grieved not having the kind of relationship I wish we had. My dad and how I’ve long longed for his approval and attention were the subjects of conversations in counseling. I’d forgiven him and tried to share my life with him, even from a distance.

Regardless of the complications, he was my dad. Right after I was filled from my birthday, I found myself unexpectedly grieving. As Dad was unresponsive in the hospital bed, I learned things about his life in Indianapolis I didn’t know. Even my grief has been complicated and in the days since his death, I’ve found myself beneath a cloud of emotions.

With three kids, the end of the school year, and my everyday life here, I have been able to step out from beneath the cloud, but then when I’m not distracted anymore, it’s still there. Grief is tricky. And I’m so grateful I was filled to the brim with love and support before I had to begin to navigate my dad’s death.

I have questions I wish I could ask him. I want to hold onto hope for a little longer. I remember him as an innovative educator who created an environment at an elementary school for most of my childhood and then a middle school just a little farther down the road that teachers, parents, and students loved. He excelled in his profession.

Three of the friends who gathered at my lake house knew my dad. We had actually talked about some childhood memories involving him just days before he died. Looking back even a couple of weeks, God was preparing me. I didn’t realize it then, obviously, but, for as unexpected as the timing was, I also found comfort in his death being sandwiched between so much life.

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About Me

Telling stories is my therapy and I love sharing them with friends on my porch.

The main characters in my stories are my entrepreneur husband, our eighth-grade girl who never forgets, our have-no-fear fifth-grade boy, and our joy-filled preschool girl. As we live out our stories, we seek God as the author of them all.

Learn more about my story here.

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“The Chicken Sisters” by @kjda was a fun, quic “The Chicken Sisters” by @kjda was a fun, quick read this weekend. I added it to my to-read list recently and then saw it as a @bookofthemonth add-on.

I enjoyed the feuding sisters story unfolding while filming a realty show about their family’s feuding chicken restaurants in a small Kansas town. Of course, not everything is quite as it seems, so the reality show helps uncover some reality both sisters were missing.

#amreading #bookstagram #booklover #recommendedreads #thechickensisters #weekending
We needed to get out of the house today — even t We needed to get out of the house today — even though the sun barely peeked through the clouds into the cold air. #countryliving #weekending #choosingJOY #boymom #thirdchild
A week into Peggy’s recovery at our house, and t A week into Peggy’s recovery at our house, and these two have spent a lot of time together. Rachel encourages her and stays close. Peggy plays games and watches movies with Rachel.

Honestly, this #thirdchild of mine was probably my biggest concern with having Peggy recover from open heart surgery here: I didn’t want Rachel to hug too hard. I didn’t know if she’d understand that her Gran-Gran looks fine on the inside but hurts on the inside. She’s been booted from her room, but she’s been sleeping well on her mattress in the back living room. She’s actually probably not going to know what to do when Peggy moves back home.

For now, we’ll let them make memories together. That’s part of caretaking I hadn’t considered. #bettertogether #weekending #choosingJOY
I’ve been in a reading slump. I returned one lib I’ve been in a reading slump. I returned one library book I couldn’t get into and then couldn’t decide what to read next. So I went with this library book — and I’m glad I did.

“The Unhoneymooners” by @christinalauren is a funny romance novel that helped distract my mind from heavy thoughts. It also made me want to go to Maui. The dialogue is delightful, the story of quirky from the get-go, and I definitely found myself rooting for Ethan and Olive.

I also discovered by reading the acknowledgements (possibly my favorite thing about books!) that @christinalauren is the pen name for a writing duo. What fun to write novels with a friend! 

As always, I’m happy to accept your recommendations on what to read next. I may also be pondering what friend with whom to write my next book. 📚 #amreading #fiction #authorlife #bookstagram #bettertogether #romcombooks
My friend Delana called before she brought us dinn My friend Delana called before she brought us dinner yesterday and asked if we liked chocolate pie. Um, yes. Turns out both Peggy and I love chocolate pie. Delana gave us chocolate chips cookies too, you know, just in case we didn’t like pie.

My friends are loving on us so well this week with dinner & dessert, obviously. Yes, the food is good, but the way they saw a need and met it is even more gracious. (I wrote a book about gathering & nourishing your people!) Having someone provide dinner has freed up some mental space I’m able to use for taking care of Peggy and parenting my kids, some of whom have needed a little extra love and guidance this week. 

Peggy is nine days removed from open heart surgery with quadruple bypass and is doing well. She had a good check up with her primary care provider this morning. We’re thankful for our community of people who continue to pray for us, feed us, and provide help, like today’s impromptu preschool pickup when an appointment ran long. (Thanks, @katie_cunningham85 & @tstanger25!)

#bettertogether #momlife #reallife #morethangroceries #choosingJOY
We are all happy to feel some sunshine today! ☀️#thirdchild #catsofinstagram #winter #choosingJOY
Sweet @ashleelyoung brought us delicious dinner to Sweet @ashleelyoung brought us delicious dinner tonight and the dessert became a craft. I’m so thankful for the way our people love us. 💛 #bettertogether #reallife #choosingJOY
Today is National Milk Day, so Saputo, which has a Today is National Milk Day, so Saputo, which has a dairy plant here in Murray, donated chocolate milk for all the kids at @ncca.lions. This girl has never turned down chocolate milk and basically celebrates milk every day. #momlife #reallife #thirdchild #nationalmilkday #preschool
Honestly, I’ve been in a reading funk. I’ve qu Honestly, I’ve been in a reading funk. I’ve quit one book and started another today, so we’ll see how that goes. 

I did finish this one by @booksbyheather last week and enjoyed it. I loved the Southern setting, charm, and magic. And I loved how the characters untangled assumptions and expectations from their pasts to find where they belong.

What are you reading these days? #amreading #bookstagram #fiction #recommendedreads
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