Here we go!
I shut the door on our 1st moving pod today!
I trust… I trust that I will be ok, my family will be alright and we will land in a better place. No I am not talking about a big fancy house, a boat or a little piece of land we can call our own. Those are the tangible things we are looking at with this move but I am desperate to reconnect deeply with God and live my life once again close to him. I am aware that location will not find that for me. It seems individually we are all struggling and I look to open a new chapter. Fresh page, clean ready to begin, allowing us to each to write the next part of the journey and hopeful to use the parts of the past to bind us and strengthen the path we pave as we go!
Our journey in Colorado started over 20years ago as a young couple looking to spread wings and build a life together! We did just that. We called a little apartment home for a few months until we bought our home. The same home we will be leaving for good in August 2021!
This house we made our home for all these years. The outside has changed colors a few times and the inside went from empty rooms to having little space to move without bumping into something. We stuffed every inch of this house with kids and stuff! This house has seen newlywed struggles to the joy of bringing home each of our babies and the open house to relatives during the times of grief. It has seen its share of heartbreak and sadness yet it has been our shelter through it all! It has protected us in the storms of life as well as the natural storms outside. I pray that our next home will be able to stand the test of time as this little Krameria street home has. I have always been thankful!
My heart. When the love of my life moved to Colorado I was uncertain of my future until he proposed and asked me to join him. I hated Colorado at 1st I cried because I missed the trees of the Midwest. I grew to love it for its unique beauty. Our entire married lives have been here in This house. The highest of high moments to the lowest of lows. There were so many of both! Those that know us know we didn’t get the easy button. We had to cry,work, fight and scream to make it this far. I have hope for our family and hope we can all become closer to God! I feel like the last few years have torn our unit a bit and distanced us from our Lord.
Family has roots. When we moved here we did so just the two of us. Selfishly we built our own lives, community and world! I have always struggled being so far from my family and my roots. Not many of them still live in the same city yet they get together as no time has passed. A boat ride, a camping trip a wedding or a funeral. I long to share it all with my kids before they are too old to remember or want to spend time with family. I want them to understand that beneath it all is Love. We are all so different but we can come together in Love. The kind of love that forgives when you wreck their car or haven’t called in a while. The love that bonds you for life with forgiveness not hold onto resentment. We all make choices for our lives but each choice we make affects those that love us. We need to move forward in life understanding the past can be destructive or beautiful it is up to us to force it to build us not tear us down. I look to a new chapter not for a fairytale but to equip my children for their future by linking them to our roots.
Community is God given. I am an extrovert. I have always tried to live out loud though the last few years have me desiring to find that part of me again but I will. Each time I find a new Job, church, craft or well anywhere they become part of my life to stay. I am the kind of person that loves people and the beauty they show me. I enjoy learning about them and their joys and sorrows what makes them who they are. I never take for granted what a gift a community is. As we faced the depths of diagnoses with our children the lengths our community took to help us though were beyond what anyone can imagine. Selfless, generous, thoughtful, embracing and Loving I couldn’t imagine my journey without the people along the way. I only hope I can be part of that for someone else in life. If you ever wanted proof or a living form of God you dont need to look far! I have felt it and will always be thankful for those of you that have stood on my path rejoiced in the triumphs and shed the depths of sadness when it was crippling. You held me so that I could get up when I was ready that is a gift from God! Each of you handpicked! As I leave the local community I hope to stay connected to many of you as you have meant so so much to me.
Work is difficult. I am a hard worker and always put myself into whatever I am doing. From the beginning and through it all weather it was working the grill at McDonald’s, selling clothes at the mall, answering phones or working at the school I try to find the joy in it. Some I was good at and something not so good. My 1st paid gig since the years of being home with my kids has been such a joy! I love working at the school and never imagined the fulfillment I would get through my Job! Yes there have been difficult days but as a whole it has built me a new love for who I am. Healing where I didn’t know I needed. My job has been a gift showing me a little something new each day! I haven’t yet finalized my departure until the paperwork on our house has been completed. I am leaving a little piece of myself there.
My boys are buried here but will always be with me. 2005 on a cold December day we said goodbye to Elijah my 2 1/2 year old son. He had been diagnosed with Leigh’s syndrome at 5months old. I allowed myself to be emerged in his care and that was what I did for his life! Oh the beauty his life was though from the outside it looked different I am sure people found it difficult to relate. As we moved through life I imagined that loss would be the most difficult valley I would ever be in. I was seriously wrong. 2013 brought so much hope but with the diagnosis of cancer in my then 5year old I once again found myself in a place others could not imagine. However a little spout of joy was emerging as I was pregnant. Some of that time is blurry as so much was going on but I can tell you I was joyful to have another child. The day I knew something was wrong put a hole in my heart. He had passed at 34weeks in my womb. Born September 11 Isaiah will always be my part of me even though he never opened his eyes. We buried him a week later near his older brother. It will still be difficult to leave them even though I know they are not truly there.
Packing was interesting. So many things from the past and the present. Some junk, some space filler and some memories that will always be carried! As we unloaded the crawl space it brought tremendous amount of JOY. Funny to see all the crap we collected all these years and fun to watch my daughter read with interest yearbooks, newspaper clips, awards and anything else she could find in our childhood boxes. She laughed at getting to know her parents better. Then came the biggest fun. My husband has been telling my kids about his teenage love of his stereo specifically his speakers. So we dug them out of the crawl space found an old receiver and boom we were in business! Enough sound to be heard half way up the block. We could only find 2 CDs since I had packed the rest! That was all we needed to reach to our neighbors in the back and up a few houses loved it showing thumbs up. So a little bit of fun in all this move. Later that night we enjoyed the 4th of July family style! Just hanging out watching our neighbors shoot off a fortune in fireworks! So much fun!
Today as I wait for the pod to be picked up I am full of crazy emotions! Still so much to do here before we go it was just the 1st load and so much to do in our destination like find a house, so many unknowns but our journey is ahead I trust that God has his hands in this!
