In case you were wondering....

...my life if CRAZY right now!  I haven't given an update for a while, so here goes...

We are mostly living in PA at this point.  My parents have been so generous and hospitable as 5 of us and all our stuff descended on their home.  Patrick started his new job three weeks ago, and it is going really well.  He splits his time between Baron Family Practice and a clinic in inner city Lancaster for now.  He has off on Wednesdays (LOVE THAT!) but works late on Thursdays (so they can have some evening hours at the clinic).

We've been working on renting our home in MD, as we would lose too much by selling it.  The market has tanked everywhere, but it seems to be especially bad in the DC area.  It stinks if you want to sell your home, but it does create a rather nice rental market.  Anyway, we just agreed to a lease this week, and the new tenants are moving Dec 1!!!  That means we need to get out....SOON!!!  The packers/movers are coming the Monday after Thanksgiving, and we will spend a few days bonding over the work of packing most of our worldly goods, which will then go into storage until we close on a house in PA.  To close on a house in PA, we first need to have a contract.  To have a contract, we need to have a loan.  Having a loan largely depended on having a tenant.  Ah, now you see how this is all coming together.  We are hoping to hear news about our loan tomorrow (happy news, please!!!), and put in an offer this week.  The owners of the house we want don't want to move until January, so if all these little details work in our favor, that is when we will finally settle here.  God is so good.  Thank you for your prayers.  Please keep praying!

Having a house here will probably help reality to set in that we now LIVE in Pennsylvania.  I've been working on and off in MD, and we've been down to visit on a few weekends, so we still pop in at church and Bible studies on occasion which really makes it seem like we're not really gone yet.  I guess not having a house there anymore will help the feeling of permanence.

We've also begun to plug into life in our new town.  It helps that this is "home" for me, and we already have friends and family here.  We are really excited about church and the people we are meeting there.  I joined the flute choir.  Patrick is planning to sing with the men's choir in a few weeks, and he will probably join one of the noteveryweek choir options.  The church offers dinner every Wed evening for $12 for your whole family.  LOVE THIS!  After dinner, there are various rehearsals, Bible studies, classes for the kids, and nursery for the babies.  How nice to not have to cook dinner or find childcare to be involved in church activities.  I've also been going to a mom's group (at another church) that several of my friends attend on Wednesday mornings.  I've run into old friends that I haven't seen in years.  It feels good to be home.

So, that's us.  That's why I haven't been blogging.  I can't find my shoes some days, let alone compose coherent sentences.  Most of the pictures that go with posts in my head are on the computer we still have in MD.  I keep reminding myself that this is not a normal season for us.  My kids may watch more TV than I ever thought I would allow.  I might not read to them as much as I like, they might have candy before breakfast some days, and we may have to skip many of our holiday traditions.  It's okay.  This isn't our home.  Our stuff is in a million places, and I don't have to do it all.  Can you hear me preaching to myself?  I'm tough to convince....