safely arrived!

Well, we are officially residents of Winnipeg again! We had an adventure filled day to start off our year of adventure :)

As I type this I am sitting in Nance and Sean's place in Westwood. They offered us their house while they were travelling in AB and SK for a couple of weeks. We had a good visit with them before we left Hepburn, and I was reminded of how special it is to have friends you've known FOREVER... as in since grade seven!! (I'm not exactly sure, but maybe dirt hadn't even been invented then?) We had good visiting while seeing a couple of Saskatoon sights, over peanut-buttery smores and grown up creamsicles, and while sitting in our very sparse living room. They got to meet a few of our friends in Hepburn and we loved every minute. Their little guy Ethan is a charmer .. I hope we can hang out more often with him this year! Their house is so welcoming and homey, we especially like their kingsize bed. I'm looking forward to going up there soon so that I can spread out all my journalling stuff and Brendan won't roll over and smush it :)

Our adventure-filled journey included a camper tire blowing and damaging the whole wheel casing and the floor of the camper. We ended up going to UHaul in Moose Jaw to rent a trailer and emptying our camper into that. This kind of hampers our plans to live at Birds Hill campground for the next two weeks, but we'll see what happens with insurance. Pics to come..

Today, we delivered our belongings to Flatlanders in preparation for our official move in on Aug. 15th. It was awesome to be there, can't wait to meet everyone and get settled.

This is a really fun and exciting time in the life of our family. There are so many questions in my head right now, and I can't wait to see what shape things take over the next weeks and months. It is so good to have experiences that build faith and to actually live out waiting on God's direction and guidance. Sometimes I feel like we don't have authentic experiences like that often enough. Each time our family has had times like this, we emerge a bit weathered, but with experiences that help us to know God better and understand life more deeply. It seems so ironic to feel so complete and secure at this time in spite of the big question marks in every direction.

As I sit here, I am incredibly thankful. Thankful for friends who blessed us so much in our last days in Hepburn, thankful for kids who had amazingly good attitudes as unexpected circumstances made a hard day even harder, thankful for loving and supportive family. Most of all, thankful for a relationship with God that somehow sharpens and clarifies all of these wonderful things.