Happy Birthday, TIm!!

I just wanted to say a quick happy birthday to the most special person in my life...my wonderful husband...Tim!! This is his second birthday we have been able to celebrate as a married couple, and I must say I love him more and more each day. He is so special to me, and I feel so blessed to be married to him. I thank the Lord for giving him to me. Tim loves me no matter what (and that is a lot to say now that I have been pregnant 35 weeks...all my crazy emotions and he is still there beside me and loving me!), spends time with me, encourages me, prays with me, leads me, etc. He is truly my best friend!

Happy Birthday Tim! I love you!

His birthday ended up to be a very busy day because this is a Sunday. He had Sunday School to teach and then Teen Bible study tonight after church to lead and teach until 9:00pm. He also had to go into work tonight for his first day of work, so he left the house here around 10:15 pm to get to work. The afternoon was spent taking a nap so he would be awake for his 3rd shift tonight. We did get to celebrate his birthday with the teens tonight. We got some ice cream cake from Dairy cream and enjoyed that. Last night, we also went out to eat and got to have a little date together so that was also very nice! Next big thing in our lives will be the birth of Megan Hope...5 more weeks...or so...

Job update

Well, the Lord has provided a job for Tim, and we are so thankful for it!! Tim is going to be working for the Juvenile Detention Center in Wichita. He is going to be working 3rd shift from 11pm-7am. There are some positive things about this job and time.
1. It does not interfere with church times...of course he will be pretty tired on Sundays if he is working the night before and has to go pretty much straight to church, but at least it does not conflict with the times in any way.
2. It should be a pretty easy job as when he gets to work, the boys will already be sleeping. (The hardest part may be to stay awake!!) His job is to do rounds 3 times an hour to check up on the boys. He will have 11 rooms he has to check just to make sure they boys are asleep. They are all locked up in there own individual rooms so hopefully there will be no problems there. Then he has a little paper work to fill out and some laundry to do. Other than that though, he thinks he may have a couple hours free during this shift to study and read and such so that is good. He does have to wake the boys up at 6:30 am and get them on their way to breakfast but other than that, they should always be asleep.
3. There is a little pay increase as he is working third shift so that is helpful as well.


Of course the hardest thing (for me at least) is that I will not have him home at night. I do not like being alone at night, but I will have to get used to it. But....we are so thankful for the Lord's provision in this area of a job. He officially starts on 9-28 (which is ironically his birthday), but he does not have a schedule yet so who knows. He is doing the paper work tomorrow. Then, next week, he will do on the job training. The first week of Oct. or so, he has day classes he has to go to. After that, it will be all 3rd shift. Thanks for those who have been praying for us!!!

The next step now is to find housing. We were really thinking of buying a house, but at this point, we both feel the best step is to just rent. So, Tim and I were out a few hours today looking at apartments. (That is very tiring...) We have a couple we are interested in, but we are waiting to make a decision right now. I will update more on housing later when we have made a decision.

Kansas Life

We have been in Kansas for about 3 weeks now. The first week was kind of a relaxing week as James and Laura were here on their vacation so we enjoyed being together with them as a family. My Grandpa and Grandma Riffel came and visited that first week, and we were able to visit the other side of the grandparents on their farm that same week. It was nice to see them as well as some of our uncles, aunts, and cousins. We were also able to enjoy a state fair here as well. (Enjoy the pictures below...Tim found out what Kansas was all about at the fair!!) A guy from our church gave us some tickets so we went with my parents and sister and her friend. We did enjoy our time there as we just walked around and took everything in...animals, rides, food, etc. We splurged and ate some fair junk food!!

These last two weeks have consisted of Tim applying for jobs daily online whatever is available, getting settled in at the church, studying his S.S. lessons, teen Bible study lessons, and AWANA lessons, a couple of interviews, and keeping me company...Some of you have asked about what we are doing here. We actually moved to Kansas to work here in the youth group at my parents church. It is a smaller youth group, but we have really enjoyed getting involved with them. It is a part time job so Tim has been looking for a full time job. He has two job possibilities right now as he has been able to set up a second interview with one of them and then is going back tomorrow for another interview at this second possible job. (Hopefully next week, we will have an answer on either job possibility, and he can begin working...when he does have a definite job, I will definitely post on that!)

Right now he is teaching teen S.S. (we are going through Romans.) We also have teen Bible study on Sunday nights after evening church so Sundays are very full for us. Then on Wednesday, he has been teaching in AWANA the 3rd-5th graders as well as the 6th -8th. He will only be doing this 1 month out of every three months though as he is on a rotation. He has stayed busy with church responsibilities. ( He has been reminding me frequently that when he gets a full time job, he is going to be super busy. I think he is getting me mentally prepared for this transition time for me not seeing him as much as I am used to.)

I on the other hand have had a lot of time on my hands. I am not used to not working and being home all day so that has been an adjustment. Of course this is what I am looking forward to...being home with the baby when she is born!!! I have enjoyed working with the teens along side of Tim though. I am also teaching Sparks this year and have enjoyed that as well. I am feeling well...praise the Lord!!! I have about 6 more weeks left until the due date so it is coming quickly. I had my first dr. appt. here a couple of days ago and really like my new doctor. I am so thankful for that. The dr. said the baby's head is down now so that was exciting news to hear!! Tim and I are going to some classes this week at the hospital to get prepared (if you can even be prepared for birth!). I just can't believe how fast this pregnancy has gone.

We are still staying at my parents house until Tim gets a job. That has been going fine, but I can't wait until we get a house so I can get the baby room set up!! All of our boxes are in my parent's garage just waiting to be unpacked. We are so thankful though to be able to stay here as this has been such a help to us financially!! Dad and Mom have been so gracious to us to let us just barge in here and stay here indefinitely.


That is basically it for now...hopefully I will be posting soon on a job for Tim!!!

Kansas Pictures!!

A Much Needed Update!

Well, I thought about just giving an update about what is going on right now in our lives, but I could not leave out the past month or so. So much has happened!! So I will write briefly (well maybe not briefly !) about the last month or so and include pictures of course!!

At the end of July, my church in VA held a baby shower for me. It was so wonderful. My mom was able to make it as well as most of my sisters/sisters in law-Karis, Bethany, and Laura. That was so special for me. My mom ended up coming out to VA for a few days so we enjoyed that so much. My nieces Kayla and Krista stayed with us a couple of nights so Dan and Karis could get stuff packed up to go to Cameroon. We had so much fun. The shower was great as well. The church people were so generous, and I received so much. I am so thankful for Colonial!

Tim and I ended up quitting our jobs on Aug. 9. We wanted to have time to go see his family in Florida before we moved. We headed out Aug. 10 to Florida where we stayed at his family's house for a little over a week. We had so much fun with them. Both of Tim's sisters live there so we got to see them as well. We spent a lot of time playing with the kiddos!! (1 nephew and 3 nieces...including a niece that was just 5 weeks old..so so cute!) We had a lot of fun activities we did while we were there. Tim helped his Dad build a shed in their backyard. We also enjoyed a meal at the Melting Pot...it was my first experience. My favorite was the dessert!! It was so good. We also went to a great Japanese restaurant and even to Chuckie Cheeses with our nieces. Of course, we both loved Chuckie Cheese! We did a lot of swimming in his parents pool as well. We were both so thankful for the time we got to spend with his family. We had not been there since we had been married.

The next week was the week that Karis and Dan were going to leave to go to Cameroon. So we had that week to hang out with them as well as pack up our house for the big move to Kansas!!! Both my parents and Dan's parents were in town this week, so we enjoyed having a lot of family time this last week. Bethany had us over for a wonderful supper on Tuesday night. Then on Wednesday everyone hung out at my house during the afternoon, and that night we went to Jason's Deli as a family. We threw a surprise Dora birthday party for Kayla which was so much fun for all of us. (John and Bethany actually put the party together!) Then on Thursday we were able to enjoy one last breakfast together at Cracker Barrel before they headed to Africa. It was such an enjoyable week, but very emotional as it was hard to say goodbye. (Poor Tim, I had been crying to him for a couple of weeks I think...being pregnant probably did not help my emotional state) We had prayed so much for them to raise their support and for them to get to Africa. The Lord provided and we were so excited to see the Lord work out all the details for them to go to Africa. With being so excited though, it was so hard to see them go knowing that we may not see them for 4 years. The girls will be 7 & 4 years old then. Tim and I have both enjoyed so much time with our nieces and they are so special to us. And Dan has been a great brother in law...who also put up with me for a whole year when I lived with them. But at the time came closer, I hurt more seeing Karis leave me for 4 years. She has been my closest friend since my high school years. She has been such a wonderful sister to me and helped me through so much with her encouragement as well has hard talks she has had to have with me. She helped me in my single days, dating years, my engagement time, my first year of marriage as well as my first pregnancy. She has been such a godly influence in my life, and I really struggled saying goodbye to her....But we made it through the day. What peace we can have knowing they are in the center of God's will which is the safest place to be for them.


The next week was the week we would be moving to Kansas. So we were very busy getting everything boxed up. My family was a huge help in getting everything boxed up. We loaded up the truck the Saturday following the Seelys departure. God provided so many guys to help load up the truck as well as some of the ladies from the church to help clean the house. It was such a blessing to have so much help!! We were able to hang out with family and friends the last couple of nights there. We were so excited to move on to our next place of ministry. Again, sad to leave friends and family, but so thankful for the Lord to work out this opportunity. Tim and James drove out the big moving van on Tuesday the 26th (Thanks James...what a huge help he was!), and then Laura and I flew out the a couple of days later.

We are now in Kansas and getting settled here. That is for another post and I promise it will not be a month from now to get the update in. I am determined to stay caught up better on this blog. I do not blame you if you did not read down to the bottom of this as it is so long, but I really wanted to share with you our last month as so much has happened.