Week 5: Closing – Springfield, VA.

Friday, Aug 29th.  What a week…the 5 weeks are finally over, and none were more emotional or dramatic as this one.  After vacating our beautiful home, we awoke this morning in a friend’s house.  Heather was sad and I was happy, the exact opposite of where we were when we agreed to the contract on July 19^th.  The day started off rocky.  We were rushing because we still had some items to get out of the house and into storage before the walk-through at noon.  And it was raining.  Pretty hard.  An ill omen for anybody, especially a pregnant couple who is saying goodbye to their first and honeymoon home.  I will replay some dialogue for you, just so you can feel some of the intensity of the day: B: “I’m really frustrated with you right now…(the rain beats down harder, at the same tone as my voice, and you can hear it wash down the open back door of the Jeep)”. H:…..........(glaring at me through tear-stained eyes).  B: “You hate me.” H: “I don’t hate you.  It just hurts. (accompanied by some expectant sobs).”  There you go- we spanned the entire Psalms concerning our emotions today.  There were happy laughs, sad looks and sobs, laments and praises, mean glares, great hugs, sweet prayers, many 'I love yous' and some holy kisses.  Through it all we remain faithful and hopeful in the providence and sovereignty of our glorious God and King, the Lord Jesus Christ.  He will provide for us, and we will continue to wait upon Him.

Week 4: Birthday celebration and move out week – Falls Church, VA.

This week has been crazy!  After recovering from summer camp, we had some friends come over on Sunday afternoon to enjoy some BBQ chicken, cake and ice cream for my belated birthday celebration!  The rest of the week was filled with getting details arranged for moving out!  We had to rent a truck, get a storage facility, find a place to live while still waiting on the short sale contract, and also get our awesome friends lined up to help us move!  Oh yeah, and Heather took me out for a belated birthday celebration.  Busy for sure!  But now our house is basically empty – thanks to our fabulously amazing friends – and we’ll soon be ready to close this coming Friday!  I’ll post week 5 sometime next weekend following closing.

Week 3: Summer Camp – Bradley, WV

Although it was a busy time (since I was in charge), this was an awesome week, enjoyed by both leaders and students!  The drive was long (5 hours), but the West Virginian mountains were beautiful.  Our theme was from Psalms 121, “Lift up your eyes to the mountains.”  We looked at how God’s desire all along has been to dwell with his people.  We looked at 4 mountains, Eden, where the rivers flowed down from; Mount Sinai, where the law was given; Mount Golgotha, where Christ was crucified and then raised again; and Mount Zion, the new heaven and the new earth.  We also went rappelling, white water rafting, hiking, and did a high ropes course!  What a week!    

Week 2: Vacation - Outer Banks, NC.

This is always a sweet time.  The waves were pretty weak this year compared to years past, but it made for some excellent diving!  I had an enjoyable time wearing my goggles and swimming around looking for "aerobies" that small children decided to launch 300 yards out into the ocean and watch them sink.  It also made for an excellent week for getting swimmer's ear!  I don't know if you've ever had this before, but it hurts like crap.  It's a bacterial infection that grows in your ear, and gives you a splitting headache!  Also keep in mind that we still weren't feeling so hot from Mexico!  I had to go to the doctor before leaving the beach, because I had summer camp to get ready for!  Before I go there, I should also mention that on Monday of vacation week, Heather and I checked the internet, continuing our seemingly endless search for a new place to live.  Well, a house that we both really liked and had seen twice dropped $50K in price.  It was too good to be true, so we contacted our realtor and proceeded to place a contract on the house, while 300 miles away from home on vacation!  Technology is awesome, but it also made our vacation a little busy and short.  I’ll post on short sales later, I've gotta get through the 5 weeks first.

Week 1: Missions Trip - Reynosa, Mexico.

Reynosa is a border town of McAllen, TX.  We were working with a group called "World Servants." We were serving a church plant in one of the "colonias", a poor small village town. We were mainly doing construction/renovation work, a kids club program and reaching out to the moms in the area.  We had a great team, taking 7 excellent students along with Heather and my assistant Ashleigh.  There were also a few other churches there- specifically one from Quebec, Canada.  It was so cool to be in Mexico, hearing lots of Spanish, and then hearing French as well.  It was quite an international experience- the only real issue was that it was so freaking hot! Anytime you went outside you would start sweating almost immediately!  Ah, but the Lord was gracious.  We had a great trip.  We also had a tough time recovering!  The food was really good, but post trip it also was, uh, not exactly coming out quite the same way that it should.  I'll spare you the details, but we thought we might have had some kind of parasite.  It appears that that is not the case, but it also made week 2 a little uncomfortable!

 

Five Weeks!

Starting on July 27th, Heather and I have now completed an incredibly busy time of our almost 5 years of marriage (for me possibly THE busiest time of our marriage).  I'll take this very long post and break it up into pieces, as they will get very long and unwieldy. 

Happy Birthday Elias!

The big man is now two years old.

The celebration began last night with Aunt Amy and Uncle Scott having us over for dinner and some opening of presents. We'll seal the deal this weekend when Granna and Pops roll into town.

Five Years and Counting

[I'm going to continue on with the precedent set by John Christopher and make a post here about my anniversary. No pressure, Brooke.]

First lets have a run-down on some numbers (in no particular order). Five years. Three cities. Two appartments. Two homes. Four vehicles. Three children. Two jobs. Two construction projects. Two churches. Too few vacations (I can think of five "trips" off hand). One dog. One cat. Two goats plus three goat-kids. Two snows. And zero nights apart.

With the exception of the dog, I'd say we've made some pretty decent choices along the way. Every day has been better than the one before, and that makes me all the more hopeful for the years to come.

To Andrea: thank you, and I love you. You truly are a blessing from God.

To everyone else: Just so you'll know how we are celebrating, I have gotten Andrea some flowers and chocolate (Andrea likes chocolate), and Aunt Amy will be coming by this afternoon to play with Timnah and Elias while we treat ourselves and Nahum out for a lunch and afternoon stroll on downtown Franklin.

First Day Jitters

As another school year starts (my 4th year to be exact...that means i'm tenured...wahoo) I am now sitting at home watching the Olympics and replaying in my mind how my first day was with a new group. I knew very little about this group of children except that I was getting one Autistic student. Since I knew very little about my class I was really quite nervous about what to expect. It turned out to be a great day, which will hopefully lead into a great year. As crazy as this may sound the success of an entire year typically has a lot to do with how good or bad the first week was. So here's to another year!

Brothers

A story from this mornings news on NPR (warning: I'll likely preface a lot of posts with a similar phrase) was an interview with one of the brothers of the now-deceased suspect in the anthrax scare from 2001, Bruce Ivens. At first, Ivens's brother, Charles, maintained Bruce's innocence...until he read the FBI's affidavit. It was really kind of heart-wrenching to hear a man's opinion of his brother change in the course of an interview.

This brings up a couple of issues:

• First off, How well do you know your brother?


• I've made up my mind about a man's innocence or guilt in multiple trials that have come across the news. OJ, this guy, Enron execs...How much evidence did I thoughtfully consider? Hmm...whatever was on the news.


• If this man barely knew whether or not his brother was a bio-terrorist or not, how well do we know anybody? How well can we know anybody? How can we know others, people, better?

The link to the NPR story is below:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93483076

Nahum Photo Session #3

Andrea had a bit of a photo-shoot with Nahum Yesterday. Below are the results. Enjoy and have a good weekend.

    

On Going from Two to Three

It can be done, just ask anyone who has done it before...Mom, Dad.

What's funny is that two kids to one parent seems easier than three kids to two. Multiple dynamics going on here.

I think the hard part at this particular juncture, though, is the frailty of the newest addition. I've joked with Andrea about life with Nahum being like living with one arm tied in front of your back. But it is way harder than that, because it is more like living with one arm while juggling a glass ornament with the other. Everything is a potential hazard: stove, door jamb, other kids, counters, sharp objects, other kids...

So one parent tends to take Nahum and sit quietly while the other does the grunt work. The theory here is that this divides the battlefield, leaving one with a slam dunk -- holding a sleeping child -- while the other does what has been done for the past several months -- cook, clean, etc. while simultaneously monitoring the semi-autonomous activities of Timnah and Elias. But the older two, having little regard for our theories, exploit parental weakness where it can be found and their semi-autonomy creeps ever and ever closer to the other front. So the previous slam-dunk is now a dance of 3 to 1 odds. Being mindful to keep Timnah and Elias included in the "new" family arrangement and bonded with little Nahum, while trying desperately to prevent a fumble. The other parent is pretty much left just watching.

This is my perspective. What Andrea contends with while I am at work...I'll remain sympathetic, but I'd prefer not knowing first hand, at least not until the glass ornament has had a little more time to solidify.