Have you seen the ridiculously adorable mud rooms everyone’s getting? The ones with cubbies for your kids to slide their shoes in a slot ever so perfectly, and hang their jackets and backpacks on their own designated hooks? I have. And at first, I reallllllyyyyy wanted to convert my entryway closet to one of those cute little nooks. I never did it though, because the way our house is set up it’s the first thing you see when you walk in the door. “Too risky,” says the logic third of my brain.

And boy am I glad for that third of my brain every night when I scurry through the house, gather all the random shoes and jackets tossed around and simply toss them in the closet…and shut the door.

Ahhh. The beauty of a functional mess.

A functional mess describes most aspects of my life. My wardrobe. My car. My house. My wife game. It all works, and it’s all a little messy. This mess tucked underneath the lid of the toybin, behind the coat closet doors and oftentimes in the kid’s art cabinet is often a point of anxiety for me, but really it reflects a lot of life lived.

If you live in Missouri, the weather dictates you must wear more than one pair of shoes per day—flip flops and snow boots. There are lots of shoes.

If you have an imaginative 6-year-old who demands you keep every box that could possibly be cut up with scissors and re-glued back together to create houses, oceans and other indecipherable creations, there are lots of craft supplies.

If you cook meals for your family, there are lots of dishes.

If you spend the majority of your quality time together in the car, there are lots of snack wrappers. (Just me? Ok.)

The point is – life is messy. And if you’re like me, you want to clean it up. Sometimes, you feel like you have to clean it up to achieve some standard you set for yourself from following Joanna Gaines on Instagram. It feels like it should be just-right all the time. But the truth is, it’s just not. That’s not how life works.

Find the places in your life where you can close the (literal and figurative) door, and simply be happy that, for now, the mess is tucked away.

Amen.

Originally featured on Megan's blog which offers an honest peek into motherhood.