Saturday, February 28, 2015

February in our Home

Where to start when you have stepped away from blogging for so long?  And it hasn't been intentional... many (most?) days I think to myself "I need to blog about ___".  I have the notes scribbled on scraps of paper, in my journal and in various binders to prove it.  I've had glorious plans to write down some deeply moving thoughts (they're always deep and moving in my head) I've had on race and racism, the Bible's portrayal of motherhood, on marriage, school choice, sin, loving people who are far from Jesus, and (of course) adoption.  I always have a blog entry on adoption somewhere in my back pocket...

And I don't really know where to start up again.  So I'll just talk about life... where we have been the last few months and where we are going.  And- as usual- life is quite dynamic right now. It seems that life really is never the same for too many months on end for us, as is often the case when you have little ones, but especially for us as we continue to follow Jesus and take uncomfortable steps of faith on a regular basis.

Sometimes its enough to make me want to take a nap just thinking about it.  But what would life be if not for following Jesus?  And why keep life comfortable here when you can store up treasure that will last for eternity?

Where have we been?

The past few months have been full of much toil. Not anything crazy, just the day to day demands of two young children (who are currently sharing a bedroom... with sleep schedules that aren't quite compatible...), and serving at church.

We were supposed to move to a three bedroom apartment in our complex last month but things fell through with that. It was a disappointment, as we were really looking forward to a bigger space, but the main reason we wanted to move was for fostering, which is on hold at the moment.

But not on hold by our choice. Our county child services office is really busy and understaffed at the moment (really, though, what is new?) so we've pretty much been told that we are a low priority to certify since we are limited to a narrow age range (by our choice- we are sensitive to the needs of our biological kiddos in this area).  In California, this was never an issue.  But here in a small county, I guess they can be pickier.  And at the moment, we aren't making the cut.

Plenty of other ministries are keeping my schedule full for the moment, though. I am doing greeting and data entry for BloomingMoms (our church's moms group), childcare scheduling for Sundays, coordinating Wednesday evening childcare, social media marketing for Encores, a consignment sale that raises funds for BloomingMoms, childcare coordinating for our summer conference and working to start a community garden, in addition to things I just attend, like Bible study. While being a part of a church plant was a lot of work, being a part of an established church is even more work, we're coming to find, though we have a lot more administrative tasks and less shepherding than we did before.

Where are we going?

There are so many plans on the horizon that it is actually quite exciting. We are looking into buying a house for the first time ever. We've been married 6.5 years (exactly, tomorrow! :) ) and have always rented. And I've been fine with that... its cheaper, gives us more flexibility,etc.  But for the first time we both really want to "settle down" for a bit. Even if just for the next four or so years while we are here. We are hoping for a bigger place suitable for more hosting and where my mom can live with us again. And even though I am terrible at decorating, something besides white walls would be gladly welcomed at this point. And a piece of land that is ours to do with as we please (chickens? a garden? play area?).

Another area we are dreaming in is the area of adoption.  With our county not caring to certify us, we are thinking about looking into other avenues of orphan care.  Specifically we are considering pursuing an international adoption. No details on that yet, but we're going to continue to look in to it and see where God leads.

The biggest thing on the horizon is the community garden.  At the moment, we are working on a kickstarter campaign to raise the funds that we need.  Weather permitting, we can break ground some time in mid-March to start building.  And also weather-permitting, we hope to open the garden for the season sometime in the spring.  More details on this to come!  But please be in prayer for us in this.  Its a step of faith and we look eagerly to see our Father to provide for it to happen.