an update after a long hiatus

First of all, apologies are in order:

It has been a long time since I have posted in my blog, other than through twitter. It has been 3 months, and I am very, very sorry. Life has definitely got in the way.

What has happened? It seems like everything.

Perhaps the most exciting thing for me as an individual that has happened recently is that I have continued to take my registration test. On Tuesday, June 30, I will take the last one of this first (and hopefully last) round. Out of 7 tests, I have passed 5, I am waiting on the results on one, and like I said, I’ll take the last one on Tuesday.

Isabelle continues to grow like a weed. She has a vocabulary of about 15-20 words, and is the picture of a normal toddler. I am very proud of her accomplishments, even when they cause me problems, such as her desire to climb on everything right now. However, being a normal toddler also means that we have entered the realm of temper tantrums. I hope that since it appears that she has entered the terrible twos early (she’s 18 months now!), perhaps we can expect an early exit? I can only pray, right?

I am also volunteering at my church. Data entry may not seem glamorous, but it must be done, and it fits my lifestyle—I can do my volunteering from the comfort of my own home! But it keeps me pretty busy. I am the team leader, so I am responsible for the work of five other people, too!

Finally, and the hardest thing of all is what has been going on with my mom. A few weeks ago, she had some concerns and they did a screening mammogram. They asked her to come back for an enhanced mammogram and a biopsy. On Monday, June 15, it was confirmed what we were fearing: my mom was diagnosed with invasive breast cancer. It appears that they have caught it early enough, but it will be a long road for her, with both chemo and surgery. Please pray for entire family as we work through this, but especially for my mom, who is pretty discouraged right now.

I will try to be better in the future to keep up this blog.

new job for Zach

Zach has found a new job! We are so excited! He starts on Monday. I have known the guys that he will be working for a long time. What a huge answer to prayer! Thanks for everyone who has been praying for us!

Yesterday, church was absolutely awesome! I was pretty frazzled when I came in—Zach wasn’t feeling up to coming, and I had already gone to a volunteer orientation for church, then back home to get Isabelle, then back to church. But it was well worth coming through all of that to hear what Pastor Furtick had to say. The title of the sermon series is “The Dip.” It’s about all those valleys in life that we go through, when we are discouraged, disheartened, and in disrepair! Yesterday, he spoke out of 1 Kings 19. Elijah has just come from a huge triumph—at Mount Carmel he showed all of the idol worshipers just who God was and what He is capable of. Then he receives a little death threat from the queen. You would think that he would have said “Bring it on! (snap)” But instead, he ran. The theme: when you are in a dip, don’t dig yourself deeper. One key thought I got through this sermon: The goal of the enemy is to get you to distort the dimensions of your dip. Another key thought: The opposite of prayer is worry. The last one: you need to have perspective. We think that our problem is the biggest problem ever, until we can step outside of it and remember that our God is bigger than that.

Wow. I am a self proclaimed worrier. I come from a long line of worriers. It was awesome to hear this sermon, with so much fear all around me right now. Zach has made little progress in finding another job, and it’s pretty gloomy altogether in the construction industry, where both of us have our careers right now, as well as our entire country. But the opposite of prayer is worry! If you are worried about what is going on in your life, or if you know you are going through a dip—I highly recommend checking out www.elevationchurch.org and watching Pastor Furtick’s sermon series over the last couple of weeks. It truly helped me gain perspective. Hope it helps you.

Conversations with Pooh

This week has begun in quite the crazy manner. After raining over 2 inches yesterday, it proceeded to sleet and then snow starting around dinner time last night. So we woke up to a winter wonderland this morning. The good news: since Zach has not found a job yet, he is home with Isabelle (her last day at the daycare was Friday), so we didn’t have to worry about the delayed opening. The bad news: I had to drive in the snow by myself to work. But I managed to get to work all right, no mishaps. Anyway, I was working away when Zach called me up around mid-morning. “I have to tell on your daughter,” he tells me. “Uh-oh!” I say. Turns out it was cute, not bad. He heard that she was awake from her nap, so he went in to get her up. She was sitting up in her crib facing her stuffed Winnie-the-Pooh bear, just chattering away. When he went to pick her up, she grabbed Pooh, so he brought her and Pooh to the bonus room. She ate snack with Pooh sitting there facing her, like he was a guest to tea. I know this is normal, but it was the first time we had seen her do something like that. We thought it was pretty cute.