Welcome home
The joy of a warm place to land
Every year, I take a few hours to go through my camera roll and save my favorite photos of the year in an album — titled this year “Providence 2025.”
There’s no real rhyme or reason to the photos I save on this album — I add whatever I want to remember from the year! Some photos are beautiful, some are blurry. There are screenshots and sky pictures galore. But each photo in that album takes me to a moment, a memory, that holds an important part of this year.
As I built the album this year, I was floored by how few of the things that happened this year were on my bingo card. Two months in Australia? Surprise trips, a weekend in Paris, new friends, celebrity run-ins, unexpected deepening of relationships, a zillion flights, fancy hotel nights, and so many laughs? If God has taught me anything this year (and He’s taught me a whole lot), it’s that He is a present, responsive God.
It has been a long and wild year. I spent 47% of my nights this year in a Marriott (this does include 2 straight months in Australia, but that’s still a lot of nights), and that doesn’t take into account the many weeks/weekends I spent staying in friends’ houses, with my family, or out of town and not at a Marriott, bringing the number of nights I’ve spent in my apartment this year to less than 50%. It’s been a lot. Traveling, even for very fun, engaging reasons, is exhausting. (I’ll probably write more about what I’ve learned about surviving all this travel early next year). But no matter how long I was gone or how far I traveled, I always came home to people and a place that loves me so well.
I’m especially grateful for friends this year who texted me on Friday evenings and reminded me that I was necessary for the evening’s plans, that they had ordered gluten-free pizza just for me, and that I would be missed if I melted into my couch like I was tempted to do. I’m grateful for friends who FaceTime me while I’m eating Thai food in a hotel room, or send me videos and pictures from things I’m missing while I’m away. I’m grateful for friends who pop in and fill my apartment with flowers so I can return to a beautiful home.
I don’t take any of it for granted. I know how hard it can be to make and keep friends, especially in the transient young adult years. But I have not doubted God’s love for a moment this year, and a big reason for that is because He has loved me through my community. Going through my Providence album this year, my heart feels like it might explode because I have felt so loved, so seen, so known, and so held by the people who surround me. Even when I’m far away, I know that they are always ready to welcome me home.
This year stretched me a lot. But at every step, in every Holy Hour, I felt the Lord close. It’s beautiful to believe that God is using my experiences to shape me, and I pray that I’m responding well. I pray that I am flexible enough to say yes when He asks me to do something new or unexpected. I pray for the courage to say no when I know something isn’t right. But most of all, I pray for the freedom, peace, and joy that come from trusting in a God Who takes me on the wildest adventures and holds nothing back.
I pray that as Jesus enters into the world this Christmas, I might receive Him with a fraction of the love, generosity, and excitement with which I have been welcomed home all year by the people I love. There’s nothing more beautiful than someone who is excited to see you. And I am so, so excited to see Him.
Merry Christmas, my dear friends!
In Christ,
Jane
What I’m loving lately
New (to me) Christmas movies
This year, I watched White Christmas and Charlie Brown Christmas for the first time (at the insistence of friends who couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen them). They will both be in the annual rotation for years to come. Speaking of which, it’s time for my favorite Christmas movie think piece, “There’s no Mary Problem in It’s a Wonderful Life.” Enjoy!
Deep clean of my dreams
As a Christmas gift to myself (from myself), I had my apartment deep-cleaned. When I say that this is in the top 5 things I have done for myself all year. My kitchen! My bathroom! My baseboards!! Sparkling like the top of the Chrysler Building! I love it here.
Books to hit your Goodreads goal
My favorite guilty pleasure is a “book in a day” which usually happens on my long-haul flights between California and DC. If you’re just shy of your 2025 book goal (or looking for an easy, fun, page turner by the fire during these no-mans-land days between Christmas and New Year’s), here are my recs:
The Housemaid – This just became a movie, and it’s a perfect page-turner. A young woman takes a job as a maid in a big house in Long Island, and something is very off in the marriage of her employers. What could possibly go wrong?
Maybe in Another Life – Probably my favorite on this list. A woman returns home after living in other cities and faces a decision on her first night back: stay and dance with a guy she loved in high school, or go home with her friends. The book follows both choices (Sliding Doors style), and it’s joyful, fun, and impossible to put down. As someone who thinks a lot about the weight of small decisions, I found this one so, so sweet.
Courage Is Calling – This will make you go, “Heck yes, I can be brave!!!” Full of stories about the cost and responsibility of courage. Do the hard thing!
The Mostly True Story of Tanner and Louise – Cute as heck. An elderly woman is taken on an adventure (read: they go on the run) by her twenty-something caretaker. Very Thelma & Louise, lots of giggling, and yes, another page-turner.
Atmosphere – We love Taylor Jenkins Reid. It was so fun to read about going to space! Couldn’t put it down.
As much as I loveeee a page turner (see above) I’m also trying to make my way through the “great books.” Reading “great books” is challenging — it requires a conscious decision, a commitment, and a deliberate choice to pick them up day after day. But they have changed me in profound ways. The Brothers Karamazov and Anna Karenina and every Jane Austen and John Steinbeck book — they touch a place in the human spirit and help me to understand myself and others better. There’s a reason that they are “great!!” I’m hoping to finish The Grapes of Wrath this holiday, and embark on The Count of Monte Cristo in the New Year. I loved this article, which spoke to the challenge and goodness of great books. Also, for this reason:
Merry merry Christmas!
I hope you and yours have a wonderful and blessed Christmas this week. I pray it’s a day of great joy, rest, and celebration. Please know of my prayers!
Prayer intentions
For a very merry Christmas!
For those who are grieving loss this holiday season
For a special intention