One Year

One year ago today, my three oldest children stood at the airport, surrounded by a crowd of their friends (this is the only picture I could find, but all the girls were there, too).  They said good-bye that day.  Good-bye to the only home they have ever known, good-bye to the friends they have grown up with, good-bye to the beachfront community we had grown to love.  They have been very brave this year.  None of us quite realized what we had until it was gone.  We took these people for granted, these friends God placed in our lives - for such a time.  The relatively small city where we raised our oldest children was a place that to be quite frank, I detested when I moved there 18 years ago - a 22 year old young mom, newly married, and 1,000 miles away from the town of 6,000 where I had grown up.  At first glance, the people didn't seem very friendly, it was HOT (that is an understatement), and my husband traveled four days a week.  Then, God started to move in our lives and in ways that only He can, He provided us with a group of families to do life with.  I just assumed they would always be there.  Now, there is a void in our hearts and lives that God has not yet chosen to fill with other people.  Apparently, He wants us to lean on Him during this time.

One year later I can say that this has been the longest and shortest year of my life.  I'm not sure how that works, but that is how it feels.  We have had lots of family time - good family time.  We have had some strife, some moments where we all just wanted to pile in the car and head east.  We have met some beautiful people, some like minded families who love each other and are passionate for the orphan, as we are.  We have laughed, we have cried.  We are finally beginning to stabilize.

Our friends from Naples made our transition a bit easier by visiting us this summer.  We could not have been more thrilled that for a period of about 6 weeks, we had company the entire time.  It was truly humbling to me that these people, who we love so much, would take their time and spend their money to travel across the country to visit us.  They decided on this year to take long anticipated Grand Canyon vacations - as if God knew that this is what we needed most.  A drop of familiarity, a kitchen full of people laughing like old times.  It was balm to my soul and it pushed us through the hot days of summer, before school started back, when we otherwise would have spent our days longing for our Friday mornings at the beach and the rainy Naples afternoons, playing board games and the kids all laughing and filling up the kitchen cooking crazy concoctions that turn out healthy and delicious.

So, now that a year has passed and we are settled in our new, permanent home after months of temporary living, we are ready to jump into life in our new area.  It really is a beautiful place, the people are super friendly, and we do love it.  As I said, we have met several families that have become special to us and I am eagerly anticipating the days that my house is once again full of kids, making themselves at home, cooking in my kitchen, and shaking the rafters with laughter.  We will never forget the friends that are like family in Naples that we shared life with for so long and never again will we take friendships like that for granted.

We are eagerly anticipating a trip to Naples in two weeks, where I will get to hug each one of these precious people.  I can not wait to fill up the house where we will be staying and watch these kids interact with each other.  I can not wait to hear my kids laugh.