My in-laws, husband and I were still sitting at the kitchen table. Our day had begun more than an hour ago with some delicious breakfast tacos made with our scrambled farm fresh eggs. I was sipping the last of my second cup of coffee as our children chatted with us from their stools at the kitchen bar. The kids and I were still in our pajamas. It was a lazy morning on the franch. But, little did we know, that was about to change. My father-in-law was in mid-sentence when my husband suddenly got up and went down the hallway toward the laundry room. Before my father-in-law finished that same sentence, my husband was back with his overalls pulled over his jeans and his Franchlife long-sleeved t-shirt. He didn’t have to say anything to our children. Up they dutifully stood and carried their plates over to the sink. Our children know what daddy in his overalls means. It turns out our lazy morning didn’t last very long, abruptly ending at 8:52 a.m. It’s moments like these that I know why my husband’s father nicknamed him “light-switch” as a boy. It’s something he never grew out of it. You really don’t know what’s going to happen from one moment to the next with that man. “What are we going to do, daddy?” inquires our youngest as my husband helps her into her pink and white striped John Deere overalls. “We need to butcher the last of those chickens before your piano lesson this afternoon and I have to go to work.” When they all head out to the barn, my mother-in-law and I start to clean up the kitchen. The back door opens, “Kel—,” he doesn’t even finish my name before I yell back, “I’m coming, sweetheart!” even though I’m still in my pajamas. I grab a sponge to wipe the counter. My mother-in-law says, “He’s like a force, isn’t he? It’s amazing how you don’t resist the force. You just go with it.” (You know by the choice of her words that grandma gave into her grandkids last week and went with them to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens!). I reassure her that I don’t mind it most of the time because it makes every day of my life with her son an adventure. Her comments remind me of an email she wrote over a year ago after she read the first four blog posts on franchlife.com. It reads, “Your renderings are precious. You’ve reminded me of the basis of a recent Bible conference at our church. The speaker stressed for us to look at nuisances to life-challenging circumstances in our lives as, ‘What are you trying to teach me, Lord?’ Thanks, dear, for loving my son. If you didn’t know Jesus, I’m sure it would be a lot harder. You have to have extended much grace and forgiveness.” Of course, I had forwarded that immediately to my husband for a good laugh. I keep that email in my archives for those times my husband forgets what I put up with. His own mother knows what it takes.
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