This week marks 3 years since I starting writing here and to celebrate I am re-sharing one old post each day this week. Thank you for coming into my stories and for letting me into yours. ❤

Originally posted on 3/18/15

My 3 year old daughter is obsessed with this little game she recently made up called “kitty in a cage.” She pretends to be a cat (the basis for most things these days) and wants you to buy her for 5 cents. Sometimes it’s 5 dollars and the other day it was 7 dollars, but usually it’s just 5 cents.
Her ideal set up is that she sits in our dog’s bed and her dad (my husband Brian) is the one shopping for a cat. He pretends to be looking for a kitty to take home while she meows. He asks her questions like, “Do you scratch?” “Are you soft?” He draws the whole thing out just the way she wants him to. He’ll always ask what her name is and she’ll say “Sparkle Kitty” in her high pitched cat voice while closing her eyes and nuzzling his hand. He asks if she likes dogs because he has one at home and wants them to be friends. She always says, “No, I’m not nice to dogs.”

She doesn’t always sell herself well, but nonetheless the game always ends with Brian giving his money, picking her up and carrying her home.

Silly little game, but after the hundredth time I saw them playing it, it dawned on me what she was doing. Besides living out her dream of being a cat, my 3 year old little girl created a scenario where over and over again she gets to be chosen by her dad. She doesn’t realize that he chooses her in a hundred ways every day. She has no idea what foundational work is being laid. She just knows that she likes it.

Being picked feels good. It speaks louder than anything else; telling us that we are valuable. Worth the time, worth the energy, worth the love. And we need it. Even if we’ve done everything we can not to need it, it’s there. God created us to be in relationship and we need to be chosen- by our parents, our friends, our mate and ultimately by God himself. Even if our need is all jacked up because the ones that were “supposed to pick us” chose not to, we still have hope. Since God is the one that put the need in us, He has the power to meet it. And He will. 

“I am the Lord; those who hope in the me will not be disappointed.” Isaiah 49:23