On December 15, 2025 I attended Desree Mendoza’s service.

She was beautiful and she was deeply and unmistakably loved.

The sanctuary was standing room only, family, friends, children, neighbors, and co-workers, all there because her life made a difference. Because she mattered. Because love leaves marks that grief can never erase.

After paying my respects to her, I made a promise to her family: I will fight for change. This is how I fight my battles, with honesty, compassion, prayer, and a commitment to healing and prevention. I am only one person. Helen Keller is quoted saying  “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do something that I can do.” My hope is you will join me.

The pain in that room was heavy, but it was also a call to action. We cannot sit in silence about what brought us here.

To anyone who struggle with anger that feels too big or too familiar:

If you are afraid of what you might do, there are places you can reach out right now, and I am begging you to use them. Listen, you are not beyond help, and accountability is not weakness. Compassion and change are possible.

There are crisis resources available 24/7 for anyone in emotional distress:

📌 Call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, trained professionals are available to support you through intense feelings or hard moments.  

📌 The National Domestic Violence Hotline (1-800-799-SAFE) offers confidential support and resources for people impacted by relationship violence.  

Right now, we do not have a widely known, dedicated hotline specifically for people who fear they might lose control and harm someone, like 988 is for emotional crises or 911 is for emergencies. I want to open up this conversation:

Would a resource like that help our community?

A place where someone who feels cornered by grief, rage, fear, or shame could call before disaster happens, where they could talk to someone trained in anger, trauma, and accountability? I believe the answer is yes.

I truly believe we also need: 

💜Open, honest conversations about anger and violence

💜Community spaces where we can talk about harmful behaviors without shame or avoidance

💜Clear paths to help for people who want to change their patterns

💜Support for families and friends to know what to do when they see warning signs

Domestic violence doesn’t happen in a vacuum, it’s rooted in emotional pain, learned behaviors, and unaddressed hurt. Abuse is a choice and I believe prevention is possible when people are willing to seek help.  I also know it’s so difficult to be vulnerable enough to admit there is a problem.

Hear me loud and clear!  I don’t want to shame people with abusive behaviors, I want to challenge them to speak up, seek help, and take responsibility. Accountability isn’t weak. It’s heroic.  Self-awareness, self-control, and support systems can exist together. They must exist together if we want to stop losing people we love.

Desree’s death was not in vain!  We must be willing to face these issues openly, honestly, and with real resources. If we don’t, we risk more community destruction.

Let’s talk about solutions.

Let’s talk about prevention.

Let’s talk about compassion and accountability.

Let’s build the support our community deserves, before it’s too late.  To share anonymously click the google form below to give feedback.  I want to hear from those who have been abusive and from victims of abuse.  I also want to hear from those who have been both, abused and abusive.  I know it’s hard to be that vulnerable but it’s worth it!

Click HERE to complete the Anonymous Survey in memory of Desree Mendoza.

💜

Motherhood is a full-contact sport. I don’t care what anybody says.

Some moms are out here making laminated snack schedules and matching monogrammed devotionals. Meanwhile, I’m over here whispering, “Lord, multiply my minutes,” while frantically digging through my purse like a raccoon trying to find a permission slip.

Let’s just say I love Jesus wholeheartedly…but I’ve never really felt like I fit into the traditional “Christian mom” mold. Maybe it’s because I didn’t grow up with the kind of belonging other people take for granted. Maybe it’s because the first half of my life was survival, not soccer practice.

Whatever the reason, motherhood has been a constant mix of trying, failing, getting back up, and laughing at myself so I don’t cry too hard in public.

And THIS week? This week was a Hall of Fame moment.

My girls had a school event where they had to build a whole business from scratch:
• Product
• Business plan
• Branding
• Materials
• Pricing

Honestly, they put together more detailed presentations than some adults running actual companies.

Personally I’m proud of my girls, THEY did amazing and somehow pulled off a great pop up shop.
Focused.
Creative.
Leaders.

Me?
I was multitasking like a well-meaning working woman who is doing her absolute best while also trying to answer emails, cook dinner, and remember if anyone has clean socks for tomorrow.

Then… two things happened.

FIRST: I Forgot to Sign My 10 year old Daughter Up for her big day… the 13 year old was good because she had a plan when sign ups began weeks ago.

Look. In my defense… my 10 year daughter didn’t finalize her business details until the biblical equivalent of Mary’s water breaking.

In a very 10 year old fashion she waited. waited.
WAAAAAITED… to figure out the name, theme, or anything remotely classified as a “business plan.”

The forms required all of that.

We didn’t have it and I didn’t think to write TBD like some of the other genius moms!

My husband mentioned to the teacher that she’d be doing it…
which somehow translated to everyone thinking it was handled… except nothing was actually handled.

We showed up ready.

Except she had no table.
No assigned space.
No setup.

Cue the internal collapse.

But thank God for grace-filled teachers who felt the frustration of my lack of having it all together but showed us grace anyway. Because a “natural consequence” that day? That would’ve crushed my girl after all her hard work.

SECOND: (cue the gasp of the proper women) The Sticker Situation (AKA: The SmuTHING Scandal)

Now this is where motherhood reminded me that humility is my spiritual gift.

My daughter needed stickers for her business. So I (loving, supportive, distracted mother) ordered some.

They were neutral colors.
Book-themed.
Aesthetic.
Very “Pinterest Christian mom.” (So i thought)

I read three of them when they arrived. They were wholesome. Encouraging. (Reading and relaxing, finding my kindle, reading keeps me sane) I was proud of myself and my girls for picking (inspiring) book stickers.

Fast forward to the event.

Halfway through, our 21-year-old daughter shows up to support her sister. She spins the prize wheel. She wins a sticker.

She looks at it.
Pauses.
The she bursts into uncontrollable laughter.

I assume she’s just excited. Nope.

She whispers, “Mom… why is she selling smut stickers at a kids’ business fair?” I blinked so hard my eyelashes almost filed for a restraining order.

Denial echoed through…“WHAT? No. They’re inspirational reading stickers.”

She shows me the sticker, sure enough. I, a woman who reads devotionals and self-help books… a woman who has never once wandered into the spice aisle of fiction… had purchased a whole pack of reading stickers with smut stickers sprinked in for my child’s reading themed business project. WARNING (Not all amazon inspirational reading stickers are created equally)!

I didn’t even know “smut stickers” existed until I accidentally hosted an outreach program.

Honestly?
My laughter in that moment was pure denial. The kind where you laugh because your brain simply cannot compute what your eyes are seeing.

I stood there thinking, “This is how I go down. This is how my spiritual reputation ends. Not with a bang… but with a sticker.”

The Part Where I Cried in the Car! After the red faced chaos… after the laughter… after the realization that I had scanned Sam’s style by reading 3 instead of proof reading through 1000 stickers…

I went to the car and cried.
Not the “call a friend” cry.
Not the “thunderstorm movie scene” cry. Just a quiet, overwhelmed, “I really am doing my best and sometimes my best is a whole circus”
kind of cry.

It wasn’t about the stickers, or the sign-up, or even the confusion. It was the weight of showing up for my kids in ways I never had growing up.
It was the pressure. It was the tenderness. It was wanting so badly to do right by them.
It was trying to break cycles while also breaking down a little myself.

After I let those tears fall, I took a breath, wiped my face, and whispered:

“Okay, Jesus… I need You to parent WITH me today”, and He did.

Because this is motherhood:
Trying. Missing the mark. Laughing through disbelief. Crying from the weight of love.
Standing back up because your kids are watching. Finding grace big enough to hold the messy and the holy in the same story.

Even the chapters covered in smut stickers.

P.S. Thank you Abby Ellison for digging through the sticker packs and saving the last half of the children from learning about smut!

When asked later about it, Willow thought smut was another name for a dog (like, it’s a mutt!)🫢😬 does that count as vocabulary lessons? 

Thank you to my therapist for squeezing me in! 😂

Welfare.

I don’t talk about this part of my life very often, but like many Americans, I grew up on welfare. My birth family depended on it, food stamps, government housing, Medicaid, all of it. As a young adult, I remember telling myself that one of my life goals was to never have to live on welfare again if at all possible.

It wasn’t because I thought I was better than anyone. It was because I was tired of being afraid. When you grow up depending on the system, fear becomes part of your daily life. You start to fear being promoted at work and possibly making too much money. You fear losing benefits that help you survive. You fear the rug being pulled out from under you if your income goes up by even a few dollars. You fear government taking it away before you are on your feet again.

After having my children, I didn’t make enough to afford insurance so I had to be on government insurance because I knew if something catastrophic happened I would not be able to take care of it. I appreciated CHIP and wanted to stay on CHIP, because with it, I could actually pay a small co-pay. I guess the small payment I made, felt like a restoration of dignity. It made me feel like I was contributing to my child’s health, like I was moving forward and not expecting everything free. When it came time for me to renew in  Texas, that choice was taken away. I’ll never forget the day I called to ask about being forced to be on Medicaid instead of having the option of Medicaid or CHIP. The woman on the phone, talked down to me. She told me I should just accept Medicaid, food stamps, and go apply for housing based on my income. The crazy part is, I was very proud of my income. I was happy to be able to provide something for my family.

I remember sitting there thinking, You don’t understand. I don’t want to stay stuck. I just need a little help while I’m building my life. I had a garden in my backyard. I was paying for my very own house. I just needed medical coverage for peace of mind.

😬🤯😂 I was so frustrated, I actually wrote a letter to the President of the United States. I never heard back, of course, but I’ll never forget how it felt to write that letter, to say, “I’m trying. Please see me. Please hear my story.”

It’s really hard when you grow up on government assistance to try to get off of it. The system isn’t built to make it easy. Sometimes you make just a little bit more, and suddenly you’re cut off, but it’s not enough to cover a high monthly insurance premium.

So when our family finally reached the point, not too many years ago, where we could buy our own insurance policy, I cried. Not because it was perfect, but because it represented freedom. It represented years of clawing our way out of fear and learning to stand on our own.

See, I’ve been homeless. I’ve lived in cars, tents, hotels, and government housing. I’ve witnessed both sides, the fear of losing help, and the irresponsibility of taking it for granted. I’ve learned this: we absolutely need systems of support but we also need systems that empower.

I’ve met so many families who are terrified of losing their benefits, and I get it. It’s scary when you’ve got kids depending on you. That’s why I decided to speak out, not to shame anyone, but to remind us all that freedom is possible. We can use these programs as stepping stones, not final destinations.

If you’re still reading right now and you’re working hard, showing up, doing the best you can, I see you. From me, there’s no shame in needing help. There’s power in believing that you don’t have to need it forever. Eventually maybe you will pay it forward to help those moving forward and needing help still.

We can build something better together, one small step, one brave choice, one honest day’s work at a time.

Freedom isn’t about pride. It’s about peace. Peace comes when you’re no longer afraid.

❤️

When I talk about finding freedom, I don’t just mean emotionally, I mean financially, too.

There are so many creative, honest ways to start building stability again, even if you’re starting small.

I started my first job at 13 years old as a bagger and shopping cart pusher at a local Winn-Dixie. That job didn’t just teach me how to work, it taught me how to show up, budget, and take pride in earning something for myself. I’m not saying kids should break child labor laws, but I do believe it’s important for our youth to learn responsibility early, even if it’s a weekend job, mowing lawns, or helping around the neighborhood. As a teenager, I also worked at Churches Chicken, Eckards, in the photo department, the Burleson Chamber of Commerce, a local dry cleaners, IHOP, and Kmart.  I learned so many skills at these different jobs. I am so grateful they were willing to hire young people. 

I truly believe work builds confidence. Contribution builds character. Those small beginnings can turn into big blessings.

2025 is amazing because there are many ideas for families who want to start building independence together:

For Adults & Parents

Delivery & Gig Work: DoorDash, Uber Eats, Amazon Flex, or Instacart for flexible side income.

Home Services: Cleaning or organizing for Airbnbs, house-sitting, or pet-sitting.

Online Reselling: Use Facebook Marketplace, Poshmark, or eBay to sell gently used items or handmade goods.

Small Business Ventures: Create candles, crafts, jewelry, or baked goods to sell locally at craft fairs or online.

Freelance Skills: Offer virtual assistance, writing, photography, or social media help.

Affiliate Marketing or Product Sales: Partner with brands or small businesses you truly believe in.

Elderly Support: Provide errands, cleaning, or companionship to neighbors who need an extra hand.

Seasonal & Event Jobs: Local fairs, catering, lawn work, or Christmas light installations.

For Teens & Kids

Weekend Yard Work: Mow lawns, rake leaves, or plant flowers for neighbors.

Pet Care: Walk dogs, feed pets, or offer vacation care for families.

Babysitting or Mother’s Helper: Great for older teens learning responsibility.

Tutoring or Homework Help: Especially for kids strong in certain subjects.

Creative Work: Start a small jewelry, bracelet, or art business; sell at local events or online with adult help.

Tech Help: Teens can help older adults with phone setups or digital organization.

Family Garden Projects: Grow and sell produce or flowers at a local market.

Every step counts, even the small ones. When families work together, something shifts. Kids learn ownership. Parents model perseverance. Everyone begins to understand that hard work and faith can rebuild what once felt impossible.

The goal is progress and progress starts with doing something today that your future self will thank you for! 💕
Love, Steph

“Forty wasn’t punishment, it was preparation.” This is what is churning in my mind today! I am just beginning to recognize the importance of my forty years. 😭

If you had told me years ago that I’d be sitting at a Directors’ Retreat for a church I now get to serve, I don’t think I would’ve believed you. Honestly, I still can’t believe I’m here. Home. 🤯

There are moments when I pause, look around, and whisper under my breath, “God, I can’t believe You LET me be here. Transplanted, deeply rooted, reedeemed and ready.”

This morning, while reflecting on yesterday, I felt the Lord tug at my heart and remind me of something both simple and deeply meaningful. I turned 41 this year, and it’s only now that I’m beginning to understand the wait, the weight and the wonder, of forty. We talked about our paths yesterday and it dawned on me, every step where I could not see ahead was preparation for now, such a time as this. Every moment purposeful.

In Scripture, forty represents testing, transformation, and preparation. It rained 40 days and nights before Noah saw the rainbow of new beginnings.

Moses fasted 40 days on Mount Sinai before receiving the Ten Commandments.

The Israelites wandered 40 years in the wilderness, learning to depend on God before entering the Promised Land.

Jesus Himself spent 40 days in the wilderness, facing temptation and teaching us not only how to live, but how to suffer with purpose.

Every time “forty” appears, it marks a season of waiting and refining before a new beginning.

The Waiting Was Hard… but Holy. My “forty” didn’t look like a desert, but it felt like one.
It has been years of heartbreak, rebuilding, surviving, failing, growing, and trusting that somehow the pain isn’t pointless.

I have suffered in very human ways, through loss, disappointment, betrayal, and exhaustion. Jesus taught me that suffering isn’t wasted when it’s surrendered. He didn’t just show us how to live well; He showed us how to suffer well, with grace, with faith, and with hope anchored in something eternal.

Just as Deuteronomy 8:2 says:
“Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart.”

God wasn’t punishing me. He was preparing me. He was building endurance, compassion, and faith that could stand the storms of life and still say, “It is well with my soul.”

The Promise after forty is here! As I sit here surrounded by leaders who love Jesus and serve with such passion, I’m overwhelmed by gratitude.
It’s not lost on me that EVERY hardship, EVERY delay, EVERY tear, it all prepared me for this moment.

The number forty means transition, and I can feel that in my spirit. God transitioned me from striving to surrender, from surviving to serving, from wondering “Why me?” to whispering “Thank You.”

The suffering I once thought would destroy me has become the soil where gratitude grows.

To Anyone Still in Their “Forty”, Maybe you’re waiting, for breakthrough, direction, healing, or hope. Maybe it’s been a long wilderness, and you’re wondering if you missed your moment.

Friend, don’t rush the waiting. Don’t despise the desert.
Because even there, Jesus is teaching you how to live and how to endure. The same God who led His people through the wilderness will lead you into your promise.

Forty isn’t the end, it’s the beginning of something new.

When I think about this new chapter, working for the church, sitting in rooms where vision is cast and lives are changed, I’m reminded that God’s timing is perfect, even when it feels painfully slow.

What felt like delay was divine development. Now, standing on the other side of forty, I can finally say, The waiting was worth it. The suffering had purpose. The forty prepared me for the promise. Thank you to everyone who met me in the last fourty years and whispered, keep going. I am grateful.

Jeannette thank you for the random Wednesday call in May, an invitation to read a job description. Thank you Beltway Park Church for an invitation home, to serve with you. I am truly humbled and ready to take one step at a time.

Lord, thank you for all of the moments you waited for me to call on you. Psalm 40:1-3. Trust refined.

🩷Steph

Yesterday I think I understood what Mary must’ve felt when she realized she lost 10-year-old Jesus… because yesterday I lost 10-year-old Willow Grace at The Well (Church).

We were at an event, and I was working my table for Foster325, thinking Willow was just hanging out near the start and finish line, cheering people on. After I hadn’t seen her in a while. I started asking friends, “Hey, has anyone seen Willow?” One of the kids said, “Mrs. Ellison, she’s RUNNING!”

I laughed, “No, she went to WATCH. We didn’t sign up to run! She already rode her bike three miles today on the bike trail! She wouldn’t have?!” They were adamant. “No, she’s in the race, I passed her and she was booking it!” 😳

Sure enough… after searching and searching, I look up and see my daughter, chip timer on, running a 5K like she’d been training for it her whole life. (In loose purple crocks AND she wasn’t last🫣)😅 Oblivious to my worries and so proud, and thirsty!

Apparently she decided cheering wasn’t enough, so she marched over to the table and assertively said her name and signed herself up while hastily making her last name a little extra 😉, grabbed a bib, and ran an entire 5K while I was busy thinking she was sitting with friends somewhere near the finish-line eating her snacks.

I went from panic ➡️ disbelief ➡️ hysterical laughter ➡️ mom guilt ➡️ pure pride.

What ten-year-old does that?!
Mine, apparently. 🩷

Independent. Tenacious. Fearless. Mary had Jesus in the temple… I had Willow at the Well 5K. Glow Run for Jesus or like Jesus? 😂🫣💕🤪😳😭🎉!

Anyone interested in more info about foster care?😬

I couldn’t sleep last night until I finished this. I hope someone needs it, I’m sleepy.

When I Felt Alone

On September 11, 2001, I was less than one month from my 17th Birthday. I was living alone in a small trailer in a trailer park. I had been on my own since I was 15. My life already felt like a war zone inside my own mind filled with fear, anxiety, and questions I didn’t know how to answer. That morning was different than every other morning because every radio station in my old 80’s model Buick LeSabre (the boat) had someone talking about planes and the World Trade Center, they seemed sad and in shock but I didn’t understand why. When I walked into my English class that morning and saw the towers falling on the TV screen, I remember feeling a heaviness I couldn’t name. I knew the world as I knew it was changing. The world looked as broken as I felt inside. One of my friends said their uncle worked in those buildings and they were crying so of course we all began to cry.

In the days that followed, I watched people grieve, pray, and cling to one another. I listened as our president tried to steady the nation with words of comfort like “Today, our nation saw evil, the very worst of human nature, and we responded with the best of America with the daring of our rescue workers, with the caring for strangers and neighbors who came to give blood and help in any way they could. All of America was touched on the evening of the tragedy to see Republicans and Democrats joined together on the steps of this Capitol, singing ‘God Bless America.’” The most unexpected gift for me came from a precious church down the road and its people.

It wasn’t a perfect church. It was messy, full of people with their own flaws and struggles (this was actually refreshing for me because I feared not being “good enough”. Over the next year and a half this place became my refuge. They opened their arms to me. They welcomed me when I was just a scared teenager trying to figure out how to survive on my own. They didn’t have all the answers, but they had love and sometimes love shows up as a meal, a hug, or simply sitting beside you when words fall short.

That church became a place where I could breathe. A place where my loneliness was met with kindness. A place where God reminded me that I wasn’t forgotten.

What I Carry With Me

All these years later, I still believe what I learned in those days: Jesus doesn’t need politics to prove who He is. He doesn’t call everyone to power; He calls us to love. His love is simple but radical, love your neighbor, this includes your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

That’s what that little church taught me. They showed me that the gospel isn’t about winning arguments, although I do love conversations and even debates that cause reflective thought that leads to actions. The gospel is about being present with the hurting. It’s about kindness in the face of chaos. It’s about love that doesn’t need to be earned.

Why Am I Sharing This?

I share this because our nation is grieving again. In moments like these, we don’t need louder politics, we need louder compassion. We need our churches who will step in, not with conditions, but with comfort, compassion and truth as people wrestle with their own convictions, doubts, and stories that do not make sense. We need neighbors who will open their doors, even if their lives are messy too.

Because when the world shakes, what steadies us is not power, but love and forgiveness. I’ll never forget the way God used the kindness of a messy little church to steady a broken, lonely girl from the trailer park when the world seemed to be ending.

Go love.

Happy Sunday! My random story today is about saying goodbye to mashed potatoes!

For a long time, I thought love meant affirmation. I thought it was confirmation. I thought love was someone saying “You’re right” when I was wrong or “You’re valid” when I was hurting. But through nearly two decades of marriage, I’ve learned that love is something much deeper.

My husband, Danny, has loved me and walked with me for 18 years. Let me be honest, there have been times when I desperately wanted affirmation or confirmation. I wanted him to agree with me, to side with me, to make me feel immediately justified. But that’s not what he gave me. Instead, he gave me love, sometimes tough love, sometimes grace. He’s also had to learn the balance between the two.

Early on, I often became offended when his love didn’t look like what I wanted in the moment. But Danny has this way of circling back. Even when I didn’t understand right away, he would patiently return to the conversation, help me see it differently, and remind me that his love wasn’t about winning or losing it was about choosing me, choosing us, and choosing growth.

One of our funniest (but also hardest) examples of this came in the form of steak and potatoes.

I didn’t grow up grilling steaks. Steak was a rare luxury in my childhood. I remembered one of my uncles making steak with mashed potatoes, and it was my favorite meal. So, in the early years of our marriage, I decided I wanted to recreate it for Danny.

He came home from work one evening, fired up the grill, and went to sit on the back porch. Meanwhile, after taking the steak out to be cooked, I happily began peeling potatoes in the kitchen. He walked back through the sliding door, saw me at the counter, and asked, “What are you doing?”

“Making mashed potatoes,” I said proudly.

That’s when he gently (but firmly) informed me that the potatoes needed to be prepared and cooked before putting the steak on the grill. I hadn’t known. I was just excited to make the meal I had loved as a child. But when he told me there was no way they would be ready in time if I cook them, my feelings were crushed.

I insisted I still wanted to make them. He insisted cold steak is never as good as hot steak. Suddenly, what started as a meal of my dreams turned into a battle 😂🫣. To be completely honest, in that moment, I felt so misunderstood, so unheard, that it almost felt like a deal-breaker. We laugh about it now, but that night I remember thinking: Are we really going to end our marriage over mashed potatoes?

We didn’t have mashed potatoes that night. But I learned something far more important: preparation matters. Timing matters and so does grace.

Love is not affirmation or confirmation because those things, while comforting, don’t change us. They make us feel good in the moment, but they don’t shape us. Love does.

Love is pursuit, not agreement. It chases us down even when we want to run, and it refuses to abandon us when we get it wrong. Love is presence, not permission. It sits with us in the ashes, but it also whispers, “There’s more ahead.” Love is formation, not flattery. It doesn’t just tell us what we want to hear, it helps us become who we’re meant to be.

Here’s what I’ve come to believe: Love is the choice to seek another’s good with truth and sacrifice, not simply their comfort.

Sometimes that looks like tough love, spoken with honesty that stings but saves. Other times it looks like grace, spoken with gentleness that heals and restores. Danny has had to learn the grace part, and I’ve had to learn that love doesn’t always feel good in the moment but it bears fruit in the long run.

Eighteen years later, I can say this: love is not always what I wanted, but it has always been what I needed and sometimes, it’s even better than steak and potatoes.

Danny Ellison I love you!

She was a weed.

Not chosen,

not planned,

not purchased from a nursery

with careful hands and pride-filled soil.

She was scattered,

tossed by wilderness winds

into ground that was cracked,

unwanted,

unprepared.

Still, she grew.

Still, she bloomed.

Not to boast of herself,

but to whisper:

“I am here. I matter. Even weeds bring color to the field.”

She prayed someone would notice,

not her name,

not her label,

but her courage,

her beauty.

She did not last forever.

Her petals browned,

her stem bowed low.

But her hope remained:

That before her final breath

someone might see

she was never “just” a weed,

she was a life that reached for the sun to shine truth into her life.

There’s something about weeds that I have always resonated with.

They aren’t planted with intention. No one drives to the nursery, picks them out, and tucks them into rich soil with care and plans to enjoy their blooms. They’re tossed into the earth by chance, the wind carrying their seeds into cracks where no one meant for life to take root.

Yet, they grow. Against the odds, they push through gravel and clay. They bloom where no one expected beauty to appear.

I’ve often felt like that weed, unplanned, overlooked, even unwanted. I wasn’t rooted in the kind of soil people take pride in. I wasn’t carefully tended. But still, I grew. Still, I reached for the sun. Still I was here.

In my growing, I’ve prayed that someone would see me, not as something disposable, not as a burden, but as a life that carries its own beauty and worth.

Because here’s the truth: weeds may not come with a price tag from the greenhouse, but they have a tenacity, a resilience, that no manicured garden flower can match. They remind us that beauty can be found in the most unexpected places.

I was a weed.

But weeds still bloom.

Maybe that is enough.

Maybe just before her final moments she will realize she is not a weed but a wildflower.

A Family Confession:
Sometimes I’m just over here winging it with these humans I love. I never want to make parenthood sound easy, because it’s not. It’s more like stumbling through a land of cactus in shorts and flip flops, trying not to let the splinters stop me from moving forward. Then I realize I get so many cactus splinters, I’m basically a cactus! Some of those splinters come from my own words or choices, and that’s hard because I absolutely desire to do better.

Then there are the blooms, those beautiful seasons where it feels like I’ve “arrived” as a mom or wife. But just like a cactus flower, that bloom fades, only to return again in its season. It’s my reminder that I will always be growing in this role, always learning, always stretching. Parenthood (and marriage, too) isn’t about arriving, it’s about continuing through the desert and letting each bloom remind me that growth is possible again and again.

I didn’t expect a simple comb to make me cry today.

While cleaning out a box, I found it, the comb of a student I served a few years ago. He never meant to leave it. One day, he stopped coming to school. I was so devestated when I learned he had been removed because of domestic violence and physical abuse at home.

When I met him, he was consistently in trouble and not wanting to stay in his classroom. One of the discoveries we made during a vulnerable conversation he disclosed that he was embarrassed about his hair being too dry and not knowing how to style it. As a white teacher, I knew his hair needed different care than mine, just like my curly-haired daughter’s hair needs different care than my straight-haired daughter’s. I asked for help, found the right product, labeled it with his name, and placed it with a mirror in my classroom.

The first morning he saw it, his face lit up. “Is this mine? That’s my name! It’s new Mrs. Ellison!” I just smiled at him and told him we better get to work because I was definitely a rookie with his hair type.  I realized pretty quickly. I needed to ask another teacher to help him style it so he could feel confident. Before long, it became his morning ritual after breakfast, a small moment of dignity before the day began.

When he left, the comb stayed in my cabinet. Every time I opened it, I thought of and prayed for him.

That comb has never just been plastic and teeth to me. It is a reminder that sometimes our students carry insecurities that weigh more than their backpacks. It only takes a few minutes, a few dollars, and a little intentional love to lift some of that weight.

As you begin this school year, look for the little ways to see your students, really see them, and meet them where they are. You never know how much a simple act of care might mean.

I taught the students with Big Behaviors that they are loved. 🥹😭.

To my student, if you see this someday. I kept looking for you. I asked that my name be written in your file. I never gave up on you. I pray you remember the words you read when you walked out of my class each day. I love you kiddo! Always & Forever!