I'll start off with saying this is not intended to be a glorification of myself or my family. I was just reflecting on numerous things I'd seen my sisters post on facebook recently and I felt I needed to share my thoughts.
All four of us girls are very different from one another. I'm the oldest and have all the classic traits of one. :) I'm also very classic in my tastes and love elegant chic. My sister Kajsa is much more contemporary and can effortlessly fold new fashions into her repertoire. She's always had an excellent style eye and isn't afraid to try new things. (it took her years to make me try wearing purple. :))
Kathryn is the youngest and falls somewhere in between Kajsa and I in her fashion tastes. She's also the most enterprising, starting her own business and being quite successful because she is very good at knowing what other people need.
Naphtali is our sister-in-law, but is as close to us as if she was always part of the family. :) She has what I would call a very French eye for style and can somehow manage to channel Audrey Hepburn while still being modern.
But all four of us are very creative. We share a passion for creativity and it overlaps in a lot of areas and also shows our uniqueness in others. We love to bake and create beautiful and fun things for birthday parties, holidays and events. We all like to dress up for various functions, and we love to create a beautiful room.
We do this because we enjoy it and our personalities are suited to it. Be we do these things for a much deeper reason as well. We do it because we have a Creator. Because He delights in what is true, and what is good and what is beautiful.
Unfortunately, I think Christians have largely lost what that last one means in the past 150 years. We have slowly let the world erode beauty into an ugly soup of subjectivity and we have been told that only 'artists' can really help us define the beautiful.
As Christian women though, Proverbs 31 calls us to find and develop what is beautiful-- in our appearance, in our family's appearance, in our homes and property. We can only determine beauty because our standard is the One who spoke a beautiful world into being.
This doesn't mean a home that is basically a museum or a spread in Pottery Barn. It is a home that is lived in. Messed up and cleaned up over and over. It means making a gorgeous cake that will be eaten. It means making a flower arrangement that will die. It means creating beautiful things that will not last. But that is the joy. We get to create new ones. Sure it takes work but that is the world in which we were made to live.
But I also wanted to mention one more woman in connection to this creative commonality we all have. My mom is very simple. She has simple taste in all things. Satin isn't for her. Loud colors don't appeal. Huge floral centerpieces are not her forte'. But for as long as I can remember, it was my mom who taught me to have beauty in my home. She didn't feel she could teach us which clothes to get or make up, but she did instill in us that we should be looking for beauty. And we did. I can't remember a Christmas she didn't work hard to make lovely in every way. I can't remember a time when she didn't decorate for the seasons and holidays. I can't think of a time when she didn't make our birthday cakes from scratch or sew our matching Easter dresses.
My dad is a hugely creative guy with a massive gift for painting so I'm not downplaying that. But it was my mom who gave all of us the example to follow in finding beauty in everything that we do, my dad included. :) And I know that we girls are all grateful because we all have a pattern that is set for life, founded in our Creator and nourished by our mom.
That's all. Just some thoughts as I look at all the lovely things my sisters do and as I putter around the kitchen myself.
