Book Review--Empty Nest

Barbara & Susan’s Guide to the Empty Nest 

Discovering New Purpose, Passion, and Your Next Great Adventure 

by Barbara Rainey & Susan Yates

Reviewed by Lori Hatcher

In an empty nest:

• You dust more than you clean.
• You throw away leftovers instead of never having enough.
• You turn the radio on for noise instead of turning it down for quiet.
• You still buy a gallon of milk at a time, but find yourself giving half to the neighbors before it spoils.
• You frequent Facebook to see glimpses of your college student instead of telling her that she shouldn't spend so much times posting pictures.
• You pray more than you work, although prayer is the hardest work of all.

It is a different season of life. Not all good, not all bad, just different.



I recently read Barbara and Susan's Guide to the Empty Nest -- Discovering New Purpose, Passion, and Your Next Great Adventure. Co-authors Barbara Rainey (Family Life Today), and Susan Yates, mother of five, come alongside readers in empathy and identification with the realities of the empty nest.



What I appreciated about this book is that although they spoke candidly from their own lives about the sad emotions that often come with launching their children out of their homes and into adult lives, they also shared the other side of the coin. Empty nest time can be a time of great personal growth, opportunity, and adventure.



While I miss my young adult daughters' presence in my home greatly, I am also enjoying some freedoms of the pre-parenting years:

• spending uninterrupted time with my husband
• buying a tub of ice cream one day and knowing it will still be there the next day
• receiving the phone calls from my girls sharing the big things and the small
• more time to write, and think, and pray

I have absolutely loved being a mother of young children and of young adults. Each season of life holds great potential, joy, and adventure if we seek God's face every day.


Guide to the Empty Nest will comfort, encourage, and challenge you to give your empty nest years to the Lord and watch what He will do.

Other Book Reviews:
Promises to Keep by Ann Tatlock
Finding the Groove by Robert Gelinas
Untamed by Lisa Harper
Same Kind of Different As Me by Denver Moore and Ron Hall

Movie Review:
The Grace Card