Author: Emma Hall

My name is Emma Hall, and I am a young wife and mother of five. Yep, five kids! My husband and I are high school sweethearts, married at 18. He spent five years in the Marine Corps, during which time we followed him back and forth across the country. Nine moves + one deployed husband later we have settled in Ohio (for good?) where we work to balance chaos, joyful children, toxic free living, renovating our farmhouse, and living simple.
Marriage, Military, Uncategorized

No longer a military wife, but not quite a civilian one either: the in-between life of a contractor’s wife

It’s just another husbandless day. The first question I’m typically asked when people find out my missing husband is deployed: What branch? He’s prior Marine Corps, I tell them, but he works privately now. We did five years in the Marines. Five years surrounded by a community of people who spoke my language, understood the acronyms, knew what it was like for spouses to miss Christmases and milestones and births.tell me the rest!

Uncategorized

The dancing leprechaun: an election story that Jesus wins

With election day coming in only 72 hours, chaos is everywhere. Half of America is going to lose. Regardless of who is elected, millions of people will be angry, half of a family celebrating while the other half recovers from a gut punch. We’re expecting riots or protests, major disruption and…more chaos. The media has a golden child, poised to win. We’ve all seen the polls–and as far as newstell me the rest!

Uncategorized

He’s deployed, and I’m determined to save his place

Reminders of him are everywhere. Half an onion in the fridge from when he made us breakfast sandwiches out of eggs fried in onion rings. A faded old t-shirt he forgot in the laundry. His toothpaste, unwittingly abandoned, peeking out from behind a bottle of lavender essential oil and my satin mint facial scrub. Honey sticks he purchased at a quirky gas station in a small mountain town still intell me the rest!

Motherhood, Uncategorized

The importance of two weeks in bed postpartum

My midwives sat across from me during my prenatal appointment, with crossed legs and kind countenances. They knew something I didn’t. I think you need a new plan, was the gentle reply they voiced only with their eyes. What was my postpartum plan to rest after my third baby was born? Well…nothing? We were new to the area, we weren’t plugged into our church, my husband didn’t have paternity leave,tell me the rest!