Wanting What I Have

We're about to move into a new apartment next week and I'm kinda dreading it. On the one hand, I'm very excited to start decorating a new place. It's like a clean slate. There is so much more storage and more room in general, and I'm really looking forward to finally living in a relatively clutter-free home.
On the other hand, moving means buying supplies, and supplies often take you to parts of the store that are full of home-improvement supplies, which for me might as well be rows and rows of designer handbags. I'm walking down the paint aisle looking at all the really great brands, and I know I can't afford paint that's $40 a gallon. It's so beautiful. I go to the craft aisle, and I want to buy everything and fill my home with homemade, personal projects. But I don't have that much money. And on and on, aisle after aisle, I find disappointment after disappointment.
We got a couple of things for the new place - a handmade piece of artwork from etsy.com for $35, a couple of dollar-store craft pieces, and we will soon be buying a thrift store sofa and sideboard. But other than that, I have to use good old-fashioned creativity to redecorate our new home. This makes me sad and here's why:
I want more money. There, I said it. I don't want to have to find ways to use the same things over and over again hoping for a different result each time (isn't that what someone said is the definition of insanity?!?!). I mean, I LOVE thrift stores and I will always shop secondhand as long as people are selling secondhand. But I walked into Michael's today and saw so many beautiful home decorations. They weren't even expensive! I think the thing I wanted most was this white porcelain lantern and it was only $15. But it was $15 I couldn't spare. $15 I didn't have. $15 I needed to use for buying diapers for my baby.
I came home from shopping for the things I did have to get and I looked at our home. Toys shoved into bins, overflowing pantry, more books than my shelves have room for - not to mention the fact that we haven't had a sofa in over a year. I thought about all the things we don't have. We don't have enough storage. We don't have the right furniture. Our son and daughter have to share a bedroom. We don't have area rugs. We don't have enough bookshelves. We don't have this. We don't have that. We don't have ANYTHING!!!!
And then I looked at the kids. My daughter doesn't know she doesn't have a sofa. She sits on my lap in the recliner and plays with my hair. She calls me "Mama." She kisses me before bedtime and tells me she loves me. My son is barely 5 months old. He smiles all the time! I've never seen a baby so happy. Everything is fun to him. He doesn't know what we don't have - he doesn't even know what we DO have. He's a baby. They're both babies. Their lives aren't polluted with knowing what they're supposed to have or are expected to own. They just love eachother and they love us and they love everything.
And when my daughter hugs me around the leg and kisses my hip and says thank you after I give her a glass of water, I know it doesn't matter what I don't have. I have her, and I have her brother, and I have their father. And I have a roof over my head and I have food in my fridge and I have love in my home and I have friends and I have church and I have EVERYTHING!!!
Life is not easy. Pain, sickness, poverty, and need happens. And it seems to be happening a lot more often to a lot more people lately. There really is no secret to being happy in an unhappy world. It's as simple as counting your blessings. And I know that sounds cliché... and it kind of is... but it really does work.
I can't wait to spruce up the new place and assemble it over time. I look forward to my kids entering the years of their lives when they will actually be able to cultivate memories they will keep for a long time. I want to have a happy home, and I know that has nothing to do with what we have, but everything to do with who we're with. I have what I want because I want what I have, and I wouldn't change it for all the fancy porcelain lanterns in the world.