A New Renaissance

People are moved to wonder by mountain peaks, by vast waves of the sea, by broad waterfalls on rivers, by the all-embracing extent of the ocean, by the revolutions of the stars. But in themselves they are uninterested.

Augustine, AD 399

I see you there awkwardly turning your wrist, trying to conceal the fact that you're uploading another artfully edited picture of your children to Instagram. Does your husband laugh, and do you blush? Have you convinced yourself that what you're doing is silly? Or are you halfway holding on to hope that each picture is an offering of something beautiful and worthy and encouraging? Because it is. And so are you.

You are an offering altogether beautiful, worthy, and wonderful. You, dear Mom, are the poster child of a brand new Renaissance! This movement is not coursing across Europe as it did in the 1500s, or blaring from the jazz clubs of Harlem, pumping out into the humid New York skyline of the 1920s. It is, instead, flowing out of homes, nurseries, kitchens, and living rooms around the world through cyberspace, uploaded and shared with friends and public circles, allowing this generation of Renaissance women to move faster than Michelangelo or Langston Hughes ever dreamed.

Here's the most amazing part: you're just being you — altogether beautiful you, amidst the chaotic rhythms of motherhood. Capturing great glimpses of glory with your camera at the sandlot over brown bag lunches. And when you lay your little ones down for naps, out it flows — the inspired offering of a creative woman. I'm here to tell you this is a worthy use of your life: both the grand offering of motherhood, and the smaller gifting of artistic self-expression. I hear you and see you, and am experiencing you as you pin your way through new recipes and craft ideas. As you redesign your child's room and paint her walls with murals, I stand in awe of your outpouring. This is the flow of a Renaissance mom.

Of course, it's not easy, is it? This glorious Renaissance most often happens in the quiet moments, many of them hidden in the dark of night after children are asleep, or early mornings before tiny feet pitter-patter to your side. You're sneaking it in, because life dictates that you do so. But I see you as you work.

I see the artistry eeking out of those slivers of silent moments ... stolen, sequestered, and sanctified. I've taken the time to consider the way you work dough, the way you fly that needle through fabric, plan a birthday party with handcrafted banners, and type out the poetry of your days into short blog posts. And I invite you to join me in this observation, to consider the way you were created creative. I offer this invitation with a warning, though. It's not uncommon for women to experience shame and embarrassment when they pause to focus on themselves, particularly when they are in the thick of this others-centered season. This book is a safe place where we seek out together what God might have intended when, just days after He hung the heavens and fixed the Earth in place, He fashioned us in His image — creative.

Some of you are stay-at-home moms, each day carving out those rare moments that you get to call your own. This book is for you, a love letter to your creative heart. Others of you are on-the-job moms, fitting your creativity into the packed places of work-life balance. Either way, consider me your cheerleader, shaking my pom-poms and shouting 2-4-6-8, because I appreciate you! And so do your children as you decorate their lives and keepsake their memories. Your husband, coworkers, and friends are grateful for the gift of your creativity and the marvelous meals served on the tablecloth of your hospitality.

You are the face of a brand-new Renaissance. Look in the mirror and take a deep breath, knowing you have been affirmed.

But let us also acknowledge that it's a dance, this creative life in the midst of mothering — a dance that threatens our balance. You understand balance as you hang your canvas upon the wall. You choose balance as you create a website to market your treasures, and balance again as you purposefully shut down your computer when it's time to join your family around the table. And in all the understanding and the choosing, you may just find that there is no such thing as balance after all. Some days it's all mothering, and other days you're lopsided the other way. Like dancing on a tightrope as it sways in the wind, one foot in front of the other, each creative step and mothering step, back and forth.

So read on, dear Renaissance Moms, not just to receive affirmation, but also to find encouragement and help in this dance between family, faith, and flourishing creativity.

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Renaissance man (noun). A cultured man who is knowledgeable, educated, interested, and/or proficient in a wide range of subjects.

A Renaissance man or woman, or mom as the case may be, is a term reserved for one who is generally known to be talented in many different areas. "She bakes, she sews, she sings ... what a Renaissance woman!" Though most Renaissance men of the late Middle Ages were artistically gifted, the term was not relegated to the arts alone, but rather included a wide skill set. Leonardo DaVinci, for example, was a master painter and sculptor, but also studied the stars and charted the anatomy of man. DaVinci was both artist and scientist, a man who could seemingly do it all. And so can we, perhaps, but not all at once. And not all today.

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During our college days, Jules smelled of citrus and cinnamon when everyone else smelled of Dr. Pepper and granola. She was altogether different and intriguing because she dared live off campus and make her own meals rather than join us in the cafeteria.

Jules was a poet, an actress, a dancer, and, I thought at the time, quite possibly a fairy.

She no longer performs onstage, but this doesn't mean her creative life has been lost. It's morphed out of the theater and into the home instead. Yet through the passage of time, one thing remains consistent — she still smells of exotic spices. These days, however, instead of keeping to herself in a small off-campus bungalow, Jules has swung open the doors of her family home in Los Angeles, feeding women from her kitchen with healthy meals and rich conversation. Her passion to blend art and life within her own four walls over a wooden cutting board has overflowed into lives the world over.

Knee deep in mothering, Jules creatively inspires women not only to feed their families healthy, beautiful meals but to nourish their own souls as well. Encouraging weary...