We’re moving! If you’ve followed my husband’s posts you’ve probably gathered that. We are going to relocate to the Central Coast, where he grew up. I haven’t written a blog post in a while because life has been crazy. Six weeks ago we started a minor remodel on our house so we bounced from a friends’ house to hotel to visiting family to a hotel again. In the midst of the remodel, an unexpected job change for my husband caused us to evaluate where we live and what we want to do with our future. To say it’s been a challenging month would be an understatement.
But this story actually starts this past summer, and it’s interesting how the Lord prepares us for change. We came back from a trip to Durango visiting my family, drove over the Cajon Pass overlooking the Inland Empire, covered with smog. I told Joseph I don’t want to live in this forever. Our lives are crazy busy, we deal with traffic, and we’re hardly away from the insanity. And the conversation started. Where would we go? What do we want? Where could he work that would offer the lifestyle we want? And the decision was made then. The Central Coast. It’s small, quiet, beautiful, and best of all, much of his family is there. Where we live now, we don’t have any family support nearby. So we started dreaming, hoping, praying that one day we could find a way to make a move.
Then life turned crazy. The Lord answers prayers, but to be honest I didn’t like how he answered this one. It wasn’t my timeline, it’s been stressful, and these are big decisions! We’ve been studying the story of Ruth and Boaz (from the Bible) and I told some friends the other day it feels like my life right now—I can see how God works through circumstances but I don’t always like the circumstances. I can see how the big picture is going to be better, but getting there is difficult. But life isn’t promised to be easy. In fact, I’m pretty sure it’s the opposite. Life is hard and challenging sometimes, but in the midst of those challenges, there’s an opportunity to grow, to trust in the Lord. To hope that something ahead is greater than the here and now. And I believe that. I’m going to cling to that. I’m going to cling to the fact, that when all life gets tossed up, I hope in Jesus, because He’s the solid rock. The One who never changes. And along the way, I’m going to enjoy the small things.
We packed up a bunch of the kids’ toys and covered the floor of our house (because heaven forbid they scratch the perfectly-remodeled-floors that we won’t enjoy after the remodel), and you know what? My kids played and ran around more with the few toys than they did the zillions they had before. I’ve had no real “home” for the last six weeks, but I’ve had my family and there’s a beauty to just having each other without all the other distractions. Simplicity. We have had so much help and support from family and friends who have rallied around us. And as I write this, I’m on a much-needed and wonderful trip with just my husband, exploring Boston (a place I’ve always dreamed of visiting).
So we’re on a journey right now. I’m going to miss our friends and community in Orange County; we’ve lived a lot of our lives there. It’s exciting and challenging, fun and scary, sad and hopeful. But we’re trusting the Lord and hopeful for the next chapter of our lives.