Well now. Seven weeks have come and gone since we moved back from Haiti. Feels like yesterday and feels like a year ago. The pace of life here has kind of taken me off guard and I feel like I can't get anything productive done. Plus we've had sick kids pretty much since we stepped off the plane which doesn't help with the productivity levels. Sick kids command the vast majority of my time. Hence this blog post which shall seem forever long as it covers a goodly number of topics. But if I try to break it down into several smaller ones I'm afraid it would never be done.
Haiti: it was the best of times, it was the worst of times. We don't necessarily feel a need or desire to do it all over again but we will never regret it. Ever. It stretched us a little farther than we enjoyed, it changed our perspective on life, it brought some high highs and some low lows. Lots of contradicting emotions. It can be hard not to question what it was all for. Like, why did God send us knowing that our time would be cut a lot shorter than we had planned on? What was the purpose of all of it? I don't know. I mean, I know, but I don't.
We tried to soak it up and appreciate it for what it was those last couple months. There were days when we couldn't wait to be done. Being alone and having all the pressure from the community to fix all their problems was wearing. But we also knew the finality of it all and knew that we would miss some things when we were gone. On Tuesday, January 18, we took one last look around our yard and house, shed a few tears, then booked it to the airport after getting a late start. Only two kids puked and they managed to successfully puke onto easily washable places and almost completely miss their clothes. Almost. But close enough to not have to change!
My dad had come to Haiti to spend some time at
the dairy and met us at the airport then to help us travel. We have travelled with extra adults and with just us. International travel with four small children and a whole lot of suitcases? It's nice to have someone along:) It all went really smooth and the kids did great. Summer, who is desperate for a pet, caught a slow and seemingly injured fly and put it into an empty raisin box. She had every intention of bringing it all the way back to Indiana but was shot down and had to leave it in Haiti. But she took good care of it while we were in the PAP airport.
We finally made it Wednesday night.
We were cold:) It took us a little while to completely figure out the heating situation at the place we are staying, and for awhile the kids played in their winter coats!
However, just a few days later the kids braved the cold and played on the frozen pond. They had such a blast!
We took a trip pretty much right away out to Illinois to visit my family. We wanted to go quick before Summer started school. We celebrated Christmas!
There was a volleyball game thrown in there too.
Summer had been talking about making a snowman for months. She knew we would be moving back during the cold months and was convinced there would be snow on the ground. There was a little. And she made the best of it!
Then it was time to start trying to figure out life up here again. That's still a work in progress. House, job, van... and those are just the big things. There's plenty of little things too. It just takes time. We're not there yet but it's coming. We happened to test drive a van about 45 minutes away on Valentine's Day. We made a little date out of it!
We had left a lot of our stuff for a nearby orphanage we had some connections with. We got this picture one day and enjoyed seeing it all loaded up in true Haitian fashion! We got a good chuckle out of that one.
I had hoped that Sawyer could go to preschool but this far into the year they're booked up. So he does story hour once a week at the library and is loving it!
Probably about 4 months before we moved back I was talking to a friend and she invited me to go on a girls weekend getaway. It. Was. Perfect. Unfortunately the only group picture I got is not showing up on my google photos for some reason and so you get a picture of one of the puzzles that was put together that weekend. I don't do a ton of puzzles, but this one was so fun!! Half of us have some kind of teaching background and there was much oohing and aahing and maybe a little bit of drooling over this particular puzzle:)
The next weekend was our hotel weekend with Danny's family and the night ended with a LOT of people stuffed in one room talking, snacking, and watching Paw Patrol.
During this whole timeframe my sweet cousin, Michael went to be with Jesus. He was stuck in a prison of a body for many years and we love picturing him made whole, running the streets of heaven. I made a quick trip out to Illinois to see his family because we were going to miss the visitation and funeral. I am so glad I made that trip. We watched the funeral live and it was hard to see everyone walk in and to be the one that wasn't there. I've spent quite a few years now living away from my family so it's not the first time I've missed something big like that, but it doesn't make it any easier.
Our reason for missing it was a trip we had planned. We knew when we were in Haiti that we wanted/needed to try and do a little getaway without the kids once we got back to the states. And we wanted to try and do it before Danny started work. So off we went to Charleston! It's somewhere I've wanted to go for awhile now and Danny wasn't completely sold on but he humored me:) And I think he enjoyed it!
It was a great mix of touristy, historical things and outdoorsy nature stuff. And the weather was beautiful!!
Boone Hall Plantation
Shem Creek
Child slave's fingerprints on bricks used to build For Sumter. Pretty sobering.
Jellyfish washed up on the beach.
The only tea farm in the world that's not in Asia or South America.
I do love me some sweet tea!
Angel Oak. This tree is ginormous!
Botany Bay Wildlife Preserve
Managed to hit up Publix three times while we were there. One time just for chocolate cake!
Carriage tour
LOTS of walking around town to see the sights. This is a terrible picture of Rainbow Row:)
Pineapple Fountain
Between my girls weekend, hotel, trip to Roanoke, and Florida coming up over spring break, it felt a little overwhelming to go. But it was definitely worth it!
One day this past week was going terribly for me. And my love showed up with flowers and made me swoon a little.
Spontaneous Tuesday evening trip to Jungle George's. Everybody loved it.
Finished with supper at Steak-n-Shake. Also enjoyed by everyone.
We had fun reminiscing about the last time we did Steak-n-Shake and Jungle George's with the kids. Little did we know that this one was mere hours from making his very swift, grand debut!
So. If you've made it to the end, congratulations. We are really hoping and praying for the whole house and job situation to get worked out. I think we are closer to the job than the house. We did check van off our list which is nice. I don't feel too anxious about the house. Yet. Check back in another month or so and it might be a different story!
And this concludes the story of our life back in the states thus far. The End.
Philippians 4:19 "But my God shall supply all your needs according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus."
