Well, Christmas was okay, I don't think I cried about him being gone Christmas Day, but it wasn't easy. I'm glad that for him, Christmas Eve is the height of the holiday; that's when his family celebrates. He was home Christmas Eve (well, except for that SO party).

This morning was a bit of a challenge, though. Sometimes I feel trapped in this position we're in. The night shift challenges of no social life and no husband home at night is hard. It's also not fun on his days off, since he's really still on the night shift (he can't just switch to our schedule at the drop of a hat). He tries to sleep when we sleep but his body thinks it's time to be awake, and at 7pm when we're ready for some family time, his body says its time for him to be in deep sleep.

We went outside this morning and realized the girls hammocks were stolen from the side yard. They weren't expensive or anything, it's just the fact that someone was outside messing around with our stuff probably on a night Shane was gone. A couple of nights ago I heard male voices and our dogs were barking like mad. We live in town, so I'm not too alarmed. I chalked it up to our noisy neighbors and just got Shane's gun and put next to my side of the bed, then went back to sleep.

So it's not all about fear, although those nights come. It's just about being backwards from everyone else, even on days off. It's staying up late to hang out with him when I have to get up early the next day. About feeling like I'm the family's protector at night.

What does the Lord want me to learn from this? I'm not there yet, but I want to seek those answers. I desire to be less negative about it, but at the same time not gloss it over and pretend its fine. Is God moving us to change jobs or shifts or our lifesyle in anyway? Is God just wanting to teach me contentment in this situation?

Oh how I want to be content! I promise I would be if God would just change Shane to days with Sundays off, give him enough of a raise so he only has to work one job (uhh, that'd be a miracle!). Really, that's all it'd take to make me content. Well, for at least a few weeks, then I'm sure I'd come up with something else...I guess God might want to go about the contentment stuff from another angle!