New year, new baby, new zip code

By Mary

I guess I can't really say that the baby is new since she was born the beginning of September...but I'm not sure I even ever mentioned my fourth pregnancy, much less her birth or the daily ways she lights up our life. Sofia Nicole (wise, victorious) She's the sweetest thing. Part of me thinks the fourth kid just sort of has to be easy-going, but mostly I think God was just super kind and gracious and thoughtful and decided to cut me a little slack.

2018. Just crazy. I had to write the date for the first time the other day (signing in to urgent care unfortunately-shingles isn't the best thing to get when you're nursing a baby and you're everybody else's jungle gym) We had a whirlwind end to 2017, starting with Sofia's birth really. I checked out of the hospital the day after she was born and started helping my husband put up storm shutters over our windows for the hurricane coming our way. After that I tried to pack as best as possible for our newly grown family of six and evacuated to North Carolina where my husband had to work from the hotel for about a week, keeping accountability for everyone on Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort. On day two I was about to lose my mind so thankfully my parents changed up the timeline of their visit just a tad and came to save the day by meeting us at the hotel for the first half of their two week visit.

Once things began to settle from that whole adventure and we started getting in the swing of life with a newborn, homeschooling and AWANA starting up again, we had some surprise orders come our way, to about as far away as we could get-Washington state. And it's really amazing, because in that one week between being told about the move being a possibility and when the movers were actually packing up our house, God really worked a lot of things out. A family from our church mentioned needing temporary housing for their family while their new house was being built. And their timeline for moving in allowed for the perfect amount of time for us to move out and get the house cleaned up before they moved in. So we have a house on the market right now, filled with a sweet family till the spring time.

Just the fact that the military actually assigned us a moving company in the short window of time we had before leaving South Carolina was an act of God. And somehow this was by far our best move, all things considered. After some time in Colorado that went much too fast (and missing out on seeing Alanna by less than a month 😭) we hit the road again. This time we brought my mom with us which was the best idea ever. Honestly her presence made the road-trip a hundred times better, smoothed and speeded the unpacking process, and made the whole last month of 2017 a thousand times sweeter. We're all so grateful.

So here we are, at the beginning of a brand new year. I'm not sure what to think of it yet, or what to expect from it. It hasn't been the easiest start in just this one short week we've had. But I know that God is with us and there's no reason to fear. And there's more than enough reason to hope.