This time last year, I wrote about how much I Love undecorating the house after the holidays. The old post appears in my Facebook feed. 

I read it again as I’m sitting in my minivan beside the sledding hill. I’m grading the responses of students to the writing prompt: What is your dream career? 

It’s cold in this van, and my fingers stiffen against the cold. I watch girls sledding and listen to the icy snow falling on the windshield. A million tiny, jingling arrivals of snowflakes sound whispery and musical. 

I could build a career in observation. I could make a life of listening to nature. 

And once again, I love this simple, raw, undecorated moment alone to watch and listen. 

Enjoy the Undecorating post below: 

I notice today that nobody ever posts photos of undecorating.

Nobody wants to see a house dismantled of its glorious holiday adornment. I find it curious because I love taking down the decorations as much as I love putting them up.

Stripping down the house back to that pure, simple home creates a sense of a fresh start and a refocusing on day-to-day simple community living and work.

I think about God’s work of dismantling the excess and the show from my own heart. I imagine the clean surfaces, the fresh walls and windows, and the wide open living spaces of my own heart now cleared. I’m pared down to Basics. 

I love the basics of family, friendship, hard work, and creativity.

I love the basics of living from my soul and not my circumstances.

I love the basics of having a grateful heart.

I love the basics of walking to school.

I love the basics of a cat at my feet, the Bible in my hand, and a mug beside me. I love the basics of a teaching life where I print out the fresh names of all those new students. I paperclip stacks of lesson plans freshly copied and organize my bag for a new day of school tomorrow.

Soon, I’ll cook dinner, and I think we’ll watch Downton Abbey tonight when the girls go to bed.

I love undecorating.