Luxury Bathrooms and Life Lessons

We recently finished re-doing our master bathroom. Last summer Cameron found some water damage and gutted the whole room. I should have taken some pictures, but if you can just imagine a room without a floor and with only some of the walls left intact, you'll pretty much have it. The last several months we talked to plumbers and shopped for fixtures and parts. And boy is it nice to have a bathroom again.

We got a luxury two-person tub on clearance.

And we finally have the dual shower heads we've always wanted.

Of course, pregnancies spent working on home renovation projects remind me of June 4, 2009, when Cameron spent the evening hammering baseboards into the playroom we were building. We were so excited for our second baby, who was due the next month, and we couldn't wait to watch our kids play together. The next day I walked into a doctor's office and was diagnosed with cancer. Quite suddenly finishing the playroom didn't matter. Purchasing the last couple baby items didn't matter. Eating didn't matter--I had no appetite. All that mattered was our marriage--our covenants with God and each other. All that I cared about was whether I would live to raise my children.

Months later as we started trying to regroup and crawl away from the trauma that encompassed that summer, we talked about what we had learned from my cancer, and we formulated what we now refer to as the cancer test. In the midst of my cancer all that mattered was our faith and our family. Life is so easily filled with things of no worth. Now when we make decisions, we hold our options up to the cancer test. If choices don't bring us closer to each other or to Jesus Christ, there's an excellent chance they aren't worth our time and money.

I think of the cancer test as I look at our bathroom now. If a fancy tub and shower gives me and Cameron a few extra minutes together, that time is precious to us. And if our three little monkeys all want to splash together in Mom and Dad's huge new tub or use it for their "cave" the answer is always yes.

Bathrooms come and bathrooms go, but families are forever. Thank goodness.