A Nutshell

SO MUCH has happened in the past few weeks. Some of it I need to process (and writing is a great way for me to do that) and some of it I just need to tell people about. So here I am. Oh, and this has been written gradually over the past week, so some of the references are a little off as far as when things have happened.

LUKE GRADUATED! 

It seems like an eternity ago, but I'm pretty sure it was just last week. After 2 years of studying and studying at Wheaton, he is finally DONE. Oh, I mean, well, he has one little paper left. And by "little" I mean, only 30-40 pages (that's writing, I don't even want to think about how much reading that involves!).

So we went through the ceremony, which was pretty exciting, but he still has a little more work to do. We're hoping that he'll be able to finish by the end of June, but who really knows? It's for an independent study, so there isn't a real deadline. And it is for credits that he doesn't need, so he'll graduate even if he fails, it'll just screw up his GPA (not that I expect him to fail, that is all just to say that there's really not a lot of pressure on this paper). But even with all of that, the end is near.

THE BOYS ARE GROWING UP. 

Judah is crawling, Ayden is tantruming, and they are finally playing together. Judah can finally shove some food into his own mouth (not much, but some anyway), which means that there is hope that he will someday be an independent child instead of a needy infant. Ayden has finally learned the concept of whispering, which has led to some success in having them share a bedroom again (Judah has been camped in the living room for months now). They chase each other and wrestle with each other and yell at each other and share food with each other and all kinds of brotherly interactions. 

MY SANITY IS RETURNING. 

I mean that quite literally. I was really losing it for awhile. The first 2 areas listed here are major contributors to this third one. There is routine and balance in my life, and for the first time in 3 years I find myself NOT pregnant, breastfeeding, postpartum, or some combination of those things. Yes, it was this time 3 years ago that we got pregnant with Ayden and my body has been some alien object ever since. I find myself asking Luke to do something around the house, then realizing "oh, I can actually do that myself for once." That is a great feeling. We can also credit an awesome counselor and the arrival of summer as major contributors to my mental health status. I simply love sunshine.

RWANDA PLANS ARE MUDDLED. 

This deserves an entire post of its own, but a blurb will have to do for the moment. We have been asked by the mission board that we are applying with to slow down the application process. Because we have been in SUCH a crazy period of life, they think it would be best for us to wait to go to Denver to complete the application process (probably until the fall, but the specifics haven't been decided yet). For one, they think it would be good for us to have a period of calm in our lives before we jump into fundraising and preparing to move. In addition, there were some things that they wanted to evaluate more carefully (like my mental health) that they didn't have adequate time to explore with the deadlines that we were initially aiming for. 

Despite my impatience, we feel really good about this. Their decision was obviously made with our best interests in mind, and that is very reassuring to see in the mission board that you are hoping to join! In addition, they handled it all very appropriately; they flew us to Denver for one day so we could talk about everything face-to-face.

There was a second reason that they wanted to fly us to Denver and talk. We're a little less certain about what to make of it. They are very excited to have us join their organization, but they want us to reconsider Rwanda. Yep, you read that right, and yep, we were pretty surprised about it, too. To clarify, they didn't say we couldn't go to Rwanda, just that they weren't certain if that was the best field for us to join and they want us to think and pray about that decision some more. 

Their reasons are based purely in concern for us and our ability to fit in well there and thrive. I'm not going to get into all of it here, but again, we found that their motives are genuine concern and care for us. Although I can see how they came to have these concerns, I'm not sure if the reasons are completely valid. So, right now we are opening up to the possibility that God may be calling us somewhere else, while hoping that He is still calling us to Rwanda. If Rwanda isn't where He wants us, then He has something else that is even better than Rwanda. 

VACATION!! 

Luke's parent's have offered to take the boys for a week so we can have a little bit of a break, so I am taking them down there today! Meanwhile, we will spend the first part of the week ignoring all demands from work, church, school, or anything else. Then the later part of the week, we will take advantage of some time to get things done without constant interruption. THEN, as if that isn't great enough, we are going down to join the boys and their grandparents for a few days over the weekend. So the next few weeks look to be a nice break from the normal routine. I am REALLY looking forward to it!!

I think that will have to do for now. God is good. God is leading. We feel really good about life right now, despite the recent uncertainty about our longer-term future.