Trip #2 to Madison

We had a great time in Madison! We decided to camp while we were there - not only because it's cheap but because we all love camping so much. Wisconsin seems to have this weird mosquito problem though and I wasn't too fond of that.
We really got a better feel for the city this time than we did last time and the more I get to know about Madison the more I like it!
We did some house hunting and ruled out everything we saw except for one place. It's half a side of a duplex and we really like it a lot. It's in a great location, but not the best area. Although...from what I've noticed the "bad" areas of Madison seem to be kind of like South County in St. Louis, so we're not really too concerned. We're kind of waiting right now trying to decide if we want to pursue the place or not.
It was listed as half of the duplex for sale wile the other half is being rented out, but we found out yesterday that the owner actually wants to sell the entire duplex, so we're looking at the possibility of purchasing it with Chris & Christina. If this works out it would be just perfect and we'd know we'd have great neighboors. A lot is involved with purchasing a property together though, so I need to talk to a Real Estate lawyer regarding how we would split things up and rezone the duplex as individual townhouses as well as split the property lines in half. So....we'll see what happens there. It would actually be a lot cheaper if we were to buy the property all together rather than just us by one half of it.

If this works out there would be alot of details involved and we'd have to get everything taken care of pretty quick as the owner will be looking for someone new to rent out half of the duplex pretty soon, so right now we're just kind of processing all the pros and cons. We're pretty much open to whatever at this point. Its been so amazing how God has been with us each step of the way with this journey so far, so we're fine with whatever He wants for us now regarding all of this.

My job interview went well! I really hit if off with the the guy that was interviewing me and that's good beings that we would be working closely together. He has a meeting with the owners today and is going to talk finances and pay with them, so I should hear back within the next few days if everything is possible. When I first told hiim that it wouldn't work out after my initial phone interview he said that they would be willing to pay me a little more than what I'm getting at my current job here (which is crazy since I'm basically starting over and this it a totally different field than what I'm doing now), but I didn't realize that he hadn't got 100% clearance to make that call, so after he talks to the owners of the place he's going to get back with me to let me know if it's going to work out financially or not. I'm hopefully optimistic, but like with the housing situation I'm really open to whatever God has for me so I'm fine regardless of how it works out.

All in all it was a great trip and we had a great time with Dale & Jacq!

Today is the day....

We close on our house! YEA! I am so happy and so ready for this stress to be over.

My emotions have kind of been all over the place the last few days. I really am SO sad to be selling our house! This is the first house we bought together and we've put a lot of work into it as we've made it "ours" and exactly how we like it, so now it's hard to think about someone else moving in and us going back to square one with making a new house our home.

We moved everything out on Saturday and are now living in Barnhart with Steve's folks for the next 6 weeks until we make the big move to Madison. We're heading up to Madison this weekend with Dale & Jacqueline and will be doing a little house hunting and will hopefully find something we like enough to put down an offer on.

I also will be going in for a job interview when we're in town, so hopefully something will pan out there.

This all has been an overhwleming process, but it's been neat to see how God has put all of the puzzle pieces together one piece at a time. Realistically looking at our situation and all the unknowns I get overwhelmed, but it's in those times that within hours God seems to bring another piece into the puzzle and show us how everything will work out one step at a time. I'm grateful for his provision during this time!

Almost out...

Just 2 more days and all this crazyness will end and another kind of crazyness will begin. I kind of wish I could just sleep through the next 2 months and wake up in Madison with a home and job and not have to live with being displaced with the in laws until we leave St. Louis and packing up everything again in another 6 weeks and heading off into the unknown.
Between selling the house, moving in with the in-laws, moving out of the in-laws, quitting our jobs, moving to a new place, finding a new home and finding new jobs I feel like we have enough change to last us for a decade.

Lately I've been hit with the reality that we really have no clue what we're getting into. Moving to a new place where we don't know anyone and planting a church? Who does that? We do! We definitely have no clue what we're doing, but it's been good for us to really learn to become more dependant on God through this season. Every day I have to sit back and wonder why God is so good to me. There are so many unknowns in store for us, but I'm so excited to look back on this season of life and see how God has provided and been so faithful in the midst of all our fears and uncertainties.

Right now I'm just trying to take one day at a time and really trying to get everything that I can out of this season. I feel like there are so many things in our life right now which gives us great opportunities to grow and learn, so I'm trying to embrace that as much as possible.

On to another note....did I mention that I'm helping throw a VERY last minute baby shower on Sunday...THE DAY AFTER WE MOVE?? Yes, I have a few very busy days in front of me. We're expecting a good 50 people to show up at the shower, but since we only gave everyone a week's notice we couldn't really do the whole RSVP thing. With such little time for planning we had to throw something together really quick. They've been really blessed as Liliana's foster parents have given them SO many clothes and toys, so it takes a lot of stress away from them. It's crazy that just 2 weeks ago they were going along with life as normal and now in another week and a half they'll have a daughter! It's all so exciting and I just can't wait to meet Liliana. She is going to be one very loved little girl. She's SO beautiful too!

Still Alive

Yes, we are still alive! I haven't had the time nor the desire to blog in awhile.

Life has been really crazy! We're closing on our house in 12 days and in the last 24 hours we've had our A/C go out, a tree fall down in our backyard and a pipe has started leaking underneath our bathroom sink. In the almost 3 years that we've lived here we've never had ANY problems whatsoever with anything! I think the most stress that we've ever had with the house was one time when it was really cold outside the garage door wouldn't close. Seriously though....murphy's law is in effect!

At first I was really stressing out, but now I really just feel a peace that everythings going to work out. We're supposed to be moving next week and we haven't even done hardly any packing! I did reserve the moving truck today though so at least we're headed in the right direction.

Hopefully this weekend we can get everything fixed and cleaned up.

Things have definately been exciting. Chris & Christina were contacted by their adoption agency last week and were informed that they've been chosed by a birth mother to adopt her little 6 month old girl. I've known them both for 10 years now and I have to say that I have NEVER seen Christina this excited before! We are so happy for them! They're working on getting all the paperwork figured out and she be able to go down at get the baby in about 2 weeks. All along they had really wanted to be parents before they moved away to plant a church and it's so exciting to see how God has worked it all out. We are so excited for them and can't wait to meet beautiful Liliana!

The next few weeks should be just as busy as the last few have been. We move next week, close on the following Tuesday and then are off to Madison for a few days to do some more house hunting. After that we're back in St. Louis for a week and a half before we head to Montana for a week and half. We'll come back and hoepfully by then they will have found a replacement for me at work that I can train and I'll be here for one more week before I head up to Madison to start looking for a job. I'll be up there for the few weeks by myself as Steve has some obligations here and can't leave until after the 14th. It actually works out better because that way he can keep on working and I can hopefully find a job really quick before he quits his job so at least one of us is working at all times. I'm definately not looking forward to beginning the job search again.

So....that's our life in a nutshell right now.