A Season of Change

Well hello there! I am so happy to be back after a bit of an unexpected blogging hiatus. I am even happier that you are still here with me. Thank you. The last few months have brought so much change that I hardly know where to begin. The biggest development has been our move. We settled in to our new home about four months ago, about a 10 minute drive from our old neighborhood. The transition has been a little tough, in all honesty. The kids miss their old friends and I miss my old comforts, like our well-loved kitchen and my backyard garden. Our new home is in a quiet neighborhood with heavenly peace and that has been like balm for my introverted soul, but like all things in life, there is the sweet with the sour.

I love the morning room:  For some reason, I didn’t have the “feet” on the bottom of the chair yet, so it looks a bit cattywampus. Please just go ahead and disregard that oddity (now that I pointed it out. Ha ha),:)  We painted the room (it had been a mint green) and changed it to “Aged beige” which I would love to paint the entire house in at some point. When we moved in, everything was a rose/pink color. Perhaps that should’ve been a sign of things to come (i.e. lots of work ahead), but we were in house-love and wearing rose colored glasses, so for us, the work ahead seemed more like “fun weekend projects” as opposed to a potential full time (and expensive) hobby. As we’ve settled in, we’ve begun to notice ever more “warts” (just like real- life relationship I suppose). The honeymoon officially came to an end recently when a portion of our ceiling collapsed. The cause was a water overflow on the top floor from the toilet. The good news was that it was clean water. The bad news was, it was a gusher and we didn’t see it until our ceiling was already saturated. We had been praying a family rosary in the morning room and were totally oblivious of the toilet turmoil until we walked out into the kitchen and noticed a mysterious dripping in the living room. We made a collective sprint up the stairs and activated a family flood-drill (translation: total chaos), with all hands on deck getting towels and sealing the gush, but this was the end result:

Warning. This is not pretty.

It was a good thing we had just prayed the rosary or something very different than “Hail Mary” could’ve easily have slipped out of my mouth! The good news….it could’ve been worse. This is just one panel of drywall when you think about it. What we thought at first would be a total loss of carpet in two rooms, a major celling repair, sanitation and painting, ended up being much less than we feared.

“This same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs from His glorious riches, which have been given to us in Christ Jesus.” 

So many things flowed through my heart that day. The gratitude of the community and so many who prayed for our family. The gift of a sturdy home. Visiting Haiti and Guatemala, I remember seeing an entire home collapse from a typical storm. Leaky roofs and crude stick walls are the reality of so many on the planet. We just had one small hole and soaked carpet. All which can be repaired without much inconvenience.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life[a]? -Matthew 6: 25-28

Pray. Trust. Don’t worry. Wise words from St. Padre Pio. In the midst of this trial, there was also something to laugh about…

Another new change to our family is the addition of our foreign exchange student, Vivian. She is from China and attends high school with my oldest son. Her presence in the home as been a wonderful gift and we’ve had many laughs so far, including this! An unforgettable (mis) adventure!  Wherever she goes in her life, she will always remember that crazy day when her American home flooded and the ceiling collapsed!

Welcome to the family, Vivian!:)

Even with that commode calamity, financial strains, busy kids and balancing schedules,  life has been good. So rich with the sweet nectar of God’s grace. Stretching me, pulling me, and pushing me down to my knees at the foot of the cross. I need to be there more. It is there, looking up, that I can see so clearly how He loves me and cares for me when I am unable to do it on my own. He has the answers when I have none. The water that gushes from his side gives rebirth and renewal through the Holy Spirit when I am dry. How can I do anything but rejoice and reach up to embrace his sacred feet? Through times of crisis, he sustains me. This has been the reality and revelation over the last few months that I’ve been going back to. With our lives behind somewhat upended with the move, adjustment, constant flow of  home”projects” and the challenge of plugging Karolina into a new county for care and services, it’s been so difficult to get into any sort of rhythm. Prayer or otherwise. That reality has made an already challenging transition, even more difficult. So, the home crisis was almost like a gift, in an odd way. An opportunity to be in the presence of the Lord. For my soul to be disposed to hear His summons.

And with that, I feel the summons of my droopy eyelids calling me to rest (at 4:15am)!!  I may be a little rusty after so long, but thank you for your grace and patience. If you are interested in a certain theme or topic for my next post, I would be so grateful for your feedback. Do you desire more posts about prayer, meditations and reflections? Do you enjoy the family stories or more of the health/beauty/recipes? Please let me know! And thank you, friend, for journeying with me, even when the sky falls down and the posts aren’t pretty. God bless you.