Curious about our family and the story of this blog? Here’s the long version :)
I’m Jennifer Thorson, the writer and owner of The Purposeful Mom. I am a daughter of Jesus, a wife to a wonderful husband and mom to four sweet kids.
I grew up on a farm in northern North Dakota (literally 10 miles south of Canada). There were difficult moments of course, but I am so thankful for a loving family, a safe childhood and lifelong friends.
I continually strive to embrace the “Northern Prairie Culture” I learned from my family and others in my home state and local community: the pressing on through hard times with a strong faith in God, working hard toward your dreams, bearing one another’s burdens and showing extraordinary kindness to everyone, simply because it’s the right thing to do.
My husband and I met in college in the Twin Cities and once he finished seminary, we moved back to North Dakota (yay!) where we served for 8 years. We now live in South Dakota, where my husband pastors a church in the largest city in our state.
I never anticipated being the wife of a pastor (I grew up Catholic so it didn’t even cross my mind!) but I have been blessed tremendously by our church family and ministry, our home and our four children (ages 13, 10, 7 and 5)!
My main vocation is staying home with our kids but I also enjoy blogging (of course!) and the experience and income I’ve gained through blogging is what has enabled me to be home with them. I also spend 2-3 hours a week managing the website for our kids’ small Christian school, which has given me some good technical knowledge that I can put to use on my blog!
Our family enjoys spending time outdoors (although we don’t do a lot of hiking or camping!) and we’ve been working on creating yearly traditions to bring our family closer. We used to live near our extended family but now that we’ve moved away, we realize how important it is to establish our own traditions!
Life hasn’t been easy (no one’s is!) but it’s good to be reminded of how blessed we really are and how God has sustained us in the hard times.
Why “The Purposeful Mom”?
My blog started in late 2011 as a place for me to share what the Lord was teaching me through time in His Word and cute crafts my kids did at home. That was all I did for quite some time.
After praying over my blog, I felt led to make it a part of my daily life as a way to share how to thrive in motherhood and faith. I mixed in some homemaking, recipes and financial posts as well.
My original tagline was “living with purpose, walking by grace, one day at a time”. The grace of God is the only thing that gets us through life and is what enables us to live intentionally during each day that is put in front of us.
As the years have gone on and time has brought changes, the topics here at The Purposeful Mom have changed a bit too!
Now the tagline is “less chaos, more confidence, learning to choose well”, because I also want this to be a place where you can experience transformation and have confidence in your mothering, powered by the grace of God and know that faithful Christian motherhood is possible, even when life feels crazy!
For years, I struggled as a mom with really knowing who I was and where to find my identity. Although I knew how to keep up with the physical demands of having a family and managing a home, I didn’t really understand how God fit into my everyday life. My devotional life has had its ups and downs and my patience with my children has worn me emotionally thin.
Finding it hard to say no and always wanting to add another “good thing”, I’ve come to the place many times where I’ve been emotionally, physically and spiritually exhausted. Where did this leave me? In desperate need of grace and peace (plus a serious dose of reality and a time management kick in the pants!).
I wanted to know: How does knowing God and being a Christian transform and affect my real life, especially when it comes to motherhood?
Slowly I started to become grounded in who I was created to be, what God’s will for my life really was (it’s not what you’d think) and where I could seek and find the powerful presence of God in the day to day. I began to slow down and just rest, learning to make time for what matters most….and learning to say ‘no’ to the good and ‘yes’ to the best.
Now I want to share those very same lessons learned with you, so you can experience the Lord’s grace and peace in your busy life too.
I truly want you to be transformed by His truth, no matter what’s happening right now, in a way that informs your faith and changes the way you go about motherhood by making small changes, one day at a time.
Wherever you’re at and whatever you’re struggling with, know that I’ve probably experienced those same difficulties, even if it’s in a different context. I’m definitely not perfect and I’m always learning (who isn’t?).
Some days my writing is practical, other times contemplative and occasionally I make at attempt at wit.
But on all these days, I’m here to encourage you and help you experience real change in your faith and family life!
So let’s embrace the days together, knowing that even when life changes, God never changes, and He can keep us grounded and secure.
Thanks for being here!
WANT TO SPEAK WITH GRACE TO YOUR KIDS INSTEAD OF YELLING?
