Life Outside the Box{es}

Have I really been here a week?

And am I really here?!

It was just about a year ago that I started realizing God was nudging me back to the States.  At that point I hadn't much inkling of what exactly lay ahead for me (a roller coaster ride?).  Even when I got back in July, I really didn't know what I'd be doing, but I started looking at different possibilities with NTM USA.

After six months in no-man's land (well, technically it was my home assignment after two years on the field...), I am so happy to be moving onto the next thing.  I prayed for guidance so many times and sometimes it felt like there'd never be an answer, but at last...here I am.

And I'm honestly so thrilled to be here.  The journey that brought me to this point has showed me over and over that God is big.  Amazing.  Faithful.  Crazy good.  So I'm sitting at the edge of my seat right now, hardly able to wait for how He's going to write this next chapter.

I'm not always going to remember, I know.

Sometimes I'll listen to fear.

Sometimes I'm going to fight Him.

Sometimes it's all going to seem foggy and gray instead of sunny clear.

But.

That's okay.

Because He's still big and amazing and good and totally faithful whether or not I remember.

There's a hand still holding me
Even when I don't believe it

That much I've learned already.

- - -

And now, let's get to the pictures from the last 3+ weeks.

Christmas.  The only picture I took that day.  Lame, I know.

It's weird, it didn't feel like Christmas.  It was a good family time (although we missed Beck and my cousin Ben), but it just didn't seem like Christmas.  I don't know why.

Anyway, I'm glad for the time we had to eat and talk and watch a movie and just be together.

- - -

Packing.  I dare not say much more, lest I traumatize myself with the memories.

I'm pretty sure every box I brought with me had at least one green and one brown thing.  You'd think I liked those colors or something.

- - -

California has had an unusually cold winter - in our area, it got below freezing repeatedly (which is very rare for us).

Cool frost, huh?  Also, our backyard has started sprouting mushrooms.  Not good.  (It's usually a sign that lawn is too damp and/or not properly aerated.)  But at least the make for a couple interesting shots.

- - -

So I rolled in here last Sunday night, after a six-day trip.  The weather was beautiful nearly the whole time (HUGE answer to prayer), I got to see friends along the way, and I checked Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio off my list (which brings me to a grand total of 23 states).  The whole trip just went very smoothly, which I was super thankful for.

However, I was more than happy to be out of the car and to sleep in "my own bed".  Even if that bed was new to me. :)

I started unpacking a bit when I got in, and the apartment looked like tornado country.  (Trust me, this wasn't the worst of it.  There's a reason why there's no picture of the bedroom.)

But things took shape, and happily by the next afternoon all was unpacked and home-y feeling.

Mom gave me a coffee sampler for Christmas - a brilliant gift, I must say - and so Monday morning I was able have a cup before tackling the rest of the unpacking.

You know three things that make a place feel like home to me (after moving)?  Lighting a candle, brewing that first cup of coffee, and putting up my favorite-ever picture frame.  It's like my heart sighs a happy sigh after all that.

Hello, Monday.

Hello, powdered sugar snow!

And hello, little home. :)

It's small and simple, but it's cozy, and it has amazing storage!  After my apartment in Senegal, I was a bit surprised to find that a place this size could have so much storage space: all those kitchen cabinets (and I don't even have them all filled - the luxury!), a pantry, a built-in glass-doored cabinet, and a closet in the bedroom.  Will wonders never cease?!

Take a look around.

That little pitcher is possibly one of my favorite thrift store finds of all times.  So. cute.  And green.  (Of course, green!)

There's the built in cabinet, with all my dishes and pots and such.

Baskets.  They're my one weakness.

A door!  Perhaps it leads to Narnia!

Or perhaps not.

You want to know how many times I've been to Walmart in since being here?  Four.   Yes, four.  In one week.  It was hard to know what all I'd need to buy right off the bat, and also...bringing a trunk load of groceries up three flights of stairs is a bit of work, so it was easier just to make a couple smaller runs than try to get everything at once.



This may not seem like that exciting of a find, but I discovered this stuff in Missouri and loved throwing it in beans.  I don't recall seeing it back home (maybe I didn't look hard enough?), though, so I was quite pleased that the Walmart here carried it.

Here's the bedroom.

Top of the action packer = temporary bookshelf.

There's my favorite picture frame, on top of the dresser.  I love everything about it.  The rustic wood-and-iron frame, the sepia-toned picture, the place it was taken, the girls standing on either side of me.  It's gone everywhere with me.

I quite like my new little place.

- - -

Life being life, there's been new-but-less-happy stuff too.

My grandpa passed away the night before I left on the drive out here - the first grandparent I've lost.  We don't know for sure if he was trusting fully in Jesus' work or in his own when he died.  That makes it so much harder.

People I loved - and still love - walked away from Jesus.  Left the church, threw out the Bible, said Jesus is all a hoax.  And now the last little shred of a relationship with them I was trying to hold onto is over.  What in the world do you even do?

In the midst of the move and the transition, it's been difficult to process much, but I realize I don't entirely know how to deal with these griefs.

I know grace is the answer somehow.  I don't know what it's supposed to look like, or exactly what it means for these situations, but I do know it's there.  He's there.

Somehow knowing that I don't need to do more than come, snuggle up in His love, and let Him be God is a comfort.  Even in all of this.