New Years Resolution: March & Saying Goodbye

I really dropped the ball on my New Year's Resolution this month. I didn't force myself to experience anything new. But I did force myself to say goodbye to some of my favorite people in the world.

Jenise & Fran have worked so hard for the last decade or so training to be missionaries. When I first met them, they were living in Spokane while Fran was attending Aviation school. Since then, he has graduated, they have started a family, moved across the country (back home to us), moved across the state (twice), said goodbye to Jordan & Hannah & Soly & Grace, took a few support raising road trips, raised the support they needed to go on the mission field, attended workshops on aviation missions and living in a different culture, got assigned to work in Cameroon Africa, and moved to France for language school. They ha

ve been an inspiration to me (& I'm sure to J as well). Through every single experience they have demonstrated amazing faith. I am so proud to be able to call them family. They will be missed while they are in France, but I know everything they do is for the glory of God. And that is definitely consolation for losing some of my friends for a few years.

I wish you the best. Y'all are in my thoughts and prayers. And I cannot

wait to see what amazing things you guys do.

Waiting for their flight. Ready to start the next step of their adventure.

New Years Resolution: February

I know February is only halfway over, but I wanted to go ahead & write about this months "new experience" & let me tell you it has been great. Completely freeing. In February, I choose not to worry. Simple as that. I will not worry about anything. I still prepare & make lists for things (groceries, bills, dinners, chores, etc), but I simply choose not to worry about anything. The funny thing is that this is super easy. Much easier than I thought it would be. For as long as I can remember I've been a worrier. In every situation my mind automatically jumps to the worst case scenario & I begin to fret about it. So much so that I have actually made myself physically ill from worry. And that's just not healthy, y'all. Besides, it's not Biblical to be such a worry wart. The Bible says:

Matthew 6:34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

Phillipians 4:6-7 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

I'm not sure what made me decide to focus on this, but I am thankful for it. Normally, in the circumstances I am in, I would be paralyzed with worry/fear. But not this time. I know that God will take care of me.

New Years Resolution: January

Remember my resolution to do something new every month? Well, January is almost over so I'm kind of phoning it in on this one.

For the month of January, I (well, both J & I) had the baby talk and have started taking steps toward beginning that process.

Right after we got married the baby fever hit me, and I managed to tell myself the timing wasn't right... And it definitely wasn't. For as long as we've been together the timing has been wrong due to our circumstances (living arrangement/finances/school/insurance/etc). I've told myself and J that I want certain conditions to be in place before TTC. First, I had to graduate college. There was really no debating about that. Second we had to be living in a house or apartment by ourselves (due to timing of apartment leases we had a roommate for the first 9 months of our marriage, then my job called for us to live in a hotel for about 1 year). Third, I demanded that we have our debt under $10,000 (and we are so close to that). And finally, we needed insurance. Somehow the planets have aligned this month and pretty much all of those things have been achieved. Crazy. So now that the basic requirements have been met, we've discussed it and made a few more requirements (mostly about losing weight and gaining money) and started making plans. Part of the plans include educating myself about this whole process because for as long as I remember I've only educated myself in NOT getting knocked up. Another part includes educating ourselves about raising a tiny human. So we signed up for a small group at church for parents/new parents/not parents yet. We really hope this will be stimulating and encouraging, because honestly the thought of raising a human kind of scares the crap out of me. Don't get me wrong it makes me feel great and excited too, but there is a lot of fear there. Just trying to be honest.

So, run down of January: met all the basic requirements (set at the beginning of our marriage) for TTC, had a baby talk with J, made a few new requirements (lose weight for a healthy pregnancy, plump up our savings, pay down some more debt), and will begin educating ourselves. See? Told you I was phoning it in... But this is kind of a big deal for us.

We know ultimately it will be in the hands of God, but there's nothing wrong with a little preparation, right?