Hello Second Grade!

A week from today, I shall become, among the other things which define me,

Mrs. Wood, 2nd grade teacher.

I am VERY excited and super grateful for God's provision of opportunities in our family.  We can look back and see how he has used the ups and downs of our lives to bring us to this point.  Always in my mind, though, is the fact that an opportunity for me means some loss in others' lives.  Mrs. Meehan, who was my fifth grade teacher and Isaac's 2nd grade teacher, is retiring earlier than she planned, and I'm certain that when she imagined her retirement, this is never the way she saw it happening in her mind.  So, it is a bittersweet thing for me...the sweet in the looks on those kiddos faces today when I got to break the news to them that we would be spending every day together, the bitter as I think that Mrs. Meehan thought she would be spending every day with them during this school year.  Life is made up of the bitter and the sweet and they go together to make something beautiful.

I am thankful...for a new adventure, for a job I LOVE, for Mrs. Meehan and others who have left a legacy before me...

I just now stopped to listen...

...and this is what I'm hearing:

• rain on the tin roof of our porch
• Simon singing Ezra to sleep
• Tim talking on the phone to a sweet college student, talking him through how to love his room mate to Jesus
• thunder rolling
• a quilt and coffee calling out my name

Loving the sounds in this old house tonight.

Thankful...

What a super-fun night.  So many of the people we love the most all in one room together eating yummy food and talking about great memories.  We felt so loved and honored to be appreciated and celebrated by the FCC Church family tonight.  Thank you for speaking into our lives.  Thank you for your presence.  Thank you for your cards.  Thank you for the pictures...oh, the pictures!!!  Thank you for being on the journey with us.  We are grateful that our paths still cross on a regular basis.  We are grateful, too, for the years  God chose to place us in youth ministry at First Christian Church.  We came as young kids with a brand new baby.  Now we're old[er] with 3 sweet boys in the house and such a great group of "big kids" we get to watch become adults.  We remain...thankful. 

I love this man.  I can't believe I get to do life with
him every.single.day.  I am a blessed woman.