Longing For Paris – Book Review

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I was honored to be chosen to receive a preview copy of Longing for Paris: One Woman’s Search for Joy, Beauty, and AdventureRight Where She Is by Sarah Mae.  I love the title because it expresses how I feel so often!  I love my life – husband, three kids, four cats – but I frequently find myself waiting for the next big thing to happen.  Not Paris – I’ve never dreamed of going there, it’s not on my bucket list, it’s not even someplace I’ve ever considered going. I tend to get bored with everyday life.  I’m always looking for the next thing – moving to Florida, fostering kittens, moving again (that’s another post), camping.  Just day-to-day life?  Bor-ing.  I don’t want to feel that way, but I know that my middle child feels that way too.  He’s always asking when we’re going on our next adventure and every adventure gets compared to this time we went hiking in the PA State Game Lands near our house looking for Robinson Falls, a waterfall that I had read about in a magazine.

I had read an article about several waterfalls in western PA and thought it would be neat to check them out.  Robinson Falls happened to be the closest so that’s why I picked it.  Well, I missed the part of the article that said it’s for the truly intrepid.  Oops!!  The kids were 6, 4, and 20 months at the time.  It was a somewhat spontaneous decision to go that day.  Looking back, I’m sure my middle child doesn’t remember that he barely made it – by the time we got back to the car he was almost asleep on his feet.  He doesn’t remember that his feet were soaked from wading through two streams.  He remembers the fun parts.

I dream of owning the empty lots behind us so my kids can have more room to explore.

I dream of having chickens (even though my husband tells me they’re horrible creatures to take care of).

I dream of selling everything and living in a camper (not our current pop-up) for a year (as a side note – I’m living vicariously through Take That Exit).

I dream of an etsy shop that provides a livable income.

I dream of a blog that provides a livable income.

I have lots of dreams (obviously), but they don’t all fit together.  I can’t sell everything to live in a camper if I want chickens or extra lots.  My etsy shop requires a sewing room which doesn’t work with living in a camper, but traveling the US in a camper sounds very adventurous!  What am I to do with all these dreams?  God cares about my dreams, but I need to give them over to him.  Sarah says, “where we go wrong is when we hold so tightly to our dreams that we neglect to fully trust God with them” and then,  “The other trouble we run into with our dreams is when we take our very good dreams and try to walk them out before their time, which can bring frustration and/or neglect to our families or where God has us.”

So, dream, dream BIG, but make sure you hand them over to God and let Him guide you.

Buy the book – it’s currently only $8.37!!

 This post contains affiliate links.  See my disclosure policy.