Apple Picking

Look at that growing belly!

Fall Displays

Nick and I have a little joke every year about "fall displays," as I have affectionately named them. I get in decorating mode right about now and find myself wandering through the seasonal aisle in Wal-Mart trying to remember what I have in my little box labled "Fall Decorations" and looking for something cheap to add to the collection...

He thinks its funny that I get so excited about putting these little "Fall Displays" up (he does appreciate them, though). But there's something that is heartwarming about autumn decorations and smells (cinnamon french toast candles!), and perhaps Fall Displays are a way of enjoying our Lord's creativity in the changing of the seasons.

Autumn

This morning when I stepped outside I breathed in a fresh intake of crisp autumn air. How delightful! Beautifully sunny all day, this day truly feels like autumn is here. How thankful I am to the Lord for his creativity in making the different seasons! After getting home from a delightful morning walk, I set to the day's task: homemade bread and trying my hand at making and canning apple butter. The bread is on its second rising as I'm writing this, and the apple butter seems to have turned out splendidly! I didn't have an actual canner or canning rack (or utensils, for that matter), so I jerry-rigged my own system. I put my strainer/colinder sitting inside a big stock pot for the canning rack, and used kitchen tongs to move the jars in and out of the boiling water. I could only do 2 jars at a time this way otherwise they would tip over, but it seems to have worked! I set one jar aside for tonight, so we can enjoy warm bread and apple butter...mmmmm!

It's So Little!

Here's a little sweater I couldn't resist buying at a recent consignment sale... It's so little and cute! The ruler is 8 inches long, to give you an idea of scale. I can't believe there's going to be a little peanut inside of this cute sweater in only 18 weeks!

Great is His Faithfulness

I came to the realization a few days ago that I really do not want to be anywhere else but here right now. Of course I miss home and dear friends in Charlotte, but God has been putting a peace in my heart about our time here in Maryland. What joy to know that he has placed us exactly where He wants us at exactly the right time. He always does! Even in the timing with the baby coming in January, I see that God has led us in his timing to his purpose. I think it would have been much harder coming here next year (one of the original plans) with a one year old, and I'm excited to have our baby here. One of the other PC wives is due to have her 5th baby any time now, and I have been amazed at how much love and support has been poured out on her from the other PC wives. What godly and servant-hearted women these are! Not only does it inspire me to want to grow in areas I am weak by following their example, but I am comforted knowing that I will have lots of arms around me when my time comes to dive into parenthood in a few months. How kind of the Lord!

Speaking of the other wives, last night we had a sleepover at Kristin Seaver's home, which was wonderful! One of the highlights of the evening was when we all received love letters that our husbands had written us earlier...isn't that sweet? And then we were all in a circle, and Kristin had prepared a bowl of chocolates in the middle. For each woman was a chocolate attached to a ribbon, and as we pulled the ribbon out there was a question attached, which we then answered. Some quetions were funny, some were serious. At the end going around, there were some extras, so we read them out loud and whoever wanted to answer could. One of these questions was "I know you won't like this question, but what are some of your strengths God has blessed you with?" Well, we ended up using that as a jumping block to encourage strengths that we saw in others. What a neat time of encouragement, stemming from friendships that have only existed for a month. As I looked around the room, I silently thanked God for his continued faithfulness in each passage of my life. I have a deep peace knowing that God has a plan for my life, and he will continue to be faithful just as he has until now. How good it is to be loved by our Heavely Father!

"Great is Thy Faithfulness, O God my Father,

There is no shadow of turning with Thee;

Thou changest not, Thy compassions they fail not;

As Thou hast been, Thou forever wilt be.

Great is Thy Faithulness! Great is Thy Fiathfulness!

Morning by morning new mercies I see;

All I have needed Thy hand hath provided--

Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me."

Another No Show!

Well, I'm sorry to say that our 2nd ultrasound didn't yield much more than the first one... We still don't know the sex of our baby! The nurse said that it was moving around so much she couldn't see anything (she said it was a little fish!), and then when it finally settled down a little bit, its legs were crossed. Can you believe it?!? But all that aside, our baby has 10 fingers and 10 toes (phew!) Everything else is looking good. So I guess we'll have to wait until January to see if this little booger is a boy or girl. It will make the anticipation all that much greater! I have been feeling "Speck" move all the time, which is amazing. Nick can feel it moving too, which is a lot of fun. Well, I have to sign off now because we're leaving in a few minutes for a meeting. Love to you all!

A Normal Day

Nick and I had a wonderful date last night at Panera (thanks to the Sheas for those gift cards!) to plan our schedules from now until Christmas...at least to get the basic idea of what to expect. I thought I would fill you all in as to what does our schedule look like here in Maryland. I'll start with Nick-

Monday & Saturday

6:00 Wake

6:30-7:30 Devotions

8-4 Read for the coming week at the school

4:30-5:30 Exercise

5:30 DATE NIGHT!!!

Tuesday - Thursday

6:00 Wake

6:30-7:30 Devotions

7:45 leaves for school

8-9 Study Greek

9-4 Class

4:30-5:30 Exercise

6ish Dinner together (Wednesdays are hospitality nights)

7-10 Study (once a month we meet with the Mahaneys as a group)

Friday looks about the same as Tues-Thurs, except he stays at school later to study and take the test for that week.

My schedule is still sort of in the making, but here's a rough estimate:

Mondays-

6:30 Wake

7-8 Run/walk (more walking these days!)

9-10 Devotions

10:30-12:30 Babysit Seavers

Afternoon- chores, nap, Walmart Run

DATE NIGHT

Tuesdays-

6:30 Wake

7:15-8:15 Devotions

8:30-10 Grocery Shop

Lunch, nap, exercise, dinner

7-8:30 Accountability Meeting

Wednesdays-

6:30 Wake

7-8 Run

9-11 Devotions and reading

1-2:30 Teach lessons

Nap, Dinner

7:00 Care group

Thursdays-

6:30 Wake

6:45-7:45 Exercise

8:30-9:15 Devotions

9:30-10:30 Gym Day (meet with other PC wives at the church while the kids run around)

Afternoon- get together with someone, chores, nap, dinner

Friday is my day to relax and rest or fellowship with someone. Or run errands. :)

So, these are our proposed schedules- but as I have had a week of learning, God often sends interruptions to our days to keep us relying on him. My agenda for my day may not be what He has in mind for me. So even as we plan our days, the Lord determines our steps. Two prayer requests here-

1. That God would strengthen Nick for long days of class and study

2. That God would give me wisdom to structure my days but flexibility in welcoming interruptions to my schedule, that I would never trust in a schedule to bring me joy.

Happy Birthday, Nick!

For Nick's birthday, we had a fun evening driving through Seneca Creek State Park, which is only about 10 minutes from our house. We didn't have a trail map or anything, so mostly we just drove around. We stopped at this place to sit and talk, overlooking the lake. The park closed at sunset, so we headed to Ledo Pizza, which is said to be a local favorite. I personally didn't think it was all that amazing, but then again it's pretty hard to go wrong with pizza :)

20 Weeks- Half way there!

New Mercies

This has been a good learning week for me. Yesterday I tried to fill up my day to the brim; here's what my schedule looked like: Run in the morning, meet with a friend for a walk mid-morning, go to Target to get various things, come home and do all the chores that didn't get done from Monday, figure out for 2 hours how to refill ink cartridges (in the process squirting black ink all up my arm and on to one of my best shirts), take a nap (didn't happen), catch up on emails, catch up on phone calls, oops- forgot to eat lunch!, out to dinner with friends. The final result was a crying, heaping, tired mess of a pregnant woman who had a stomach ache from eating a steak dinner on an empty stomach. Thankfully I have a wonderful husband who was able to kindly walk me through my emotions and point me to the Cross. (I love you, buddy!) It's days like this that remind me that I need to rely completely and fully on the Lord for my every breath. I so rarely consult the Lord before mapping out my schedule for the day, and as a result I often try to fit more than He has planned for me. He has given me the perfect amount of time to get done what he has for me to do each day, no more, no less. That brings me much peace in the wake of a tumultous day. I am greatful for his arms of grace, my daily strength. May I not walk on blindly but learn from my errors- O that I would be quick to fall at the feet of my savior, ready and willing to do what HE has for me each day.

An Unexpected Visitor

We passed this cat in the parking lot last night, and when we looked out this afternoon, we saw him nice and cozy on our porch chair. We're such suckers for animals...I went and bought some cat food and fed him. So either we're taking care of a stray or stealing someone's pet. We'll see if he comes back around. :)

Valley of Vision

O FOUNTAIN OF ALL GOOD,
Destroy in me every lofty thought,
Break pride to pieces and scatter it to the winds,
Annihilate each clinging shred of self-righteousness,
Implant in me true lowliness of spirit,
Abase me to self-loathing and self-abhorrence,
Open in me a fount of penitential tears,
Break me, then bind me up;
Thus will my heart be a prepared dwelling for my God;
Then can the Father take up his abode in me
Then can the blessed Jesus come with healing in his touch,
Then can the Holy Spirit descend in sanctifying grace;
O Holy Trinity, three Persons and one God,
inhabit me, a temple consecrated to thy glory.
When thou art present, evil cannot abide;
In thy fellowship is fullness of joy,
Beneath thy smile is peace of conscience,
By thy side no fears disturb,
no apprehensions banish rest of mind,
With thee my heart shall bloom with fragrance;
Make me meet, through repentance for thine indwelling.
Nothing exceeds thy power,
Nothing is too great for thee to do,
Nothing too good for thee to give.
Infinite is thy might, boundless thy love,
limitless thy grace, glorious thy saving name.
Let angels sing for sinners repenting, prodigals restored,
backsliders reclaimed, Satan's captives released,
blind eyes opened, broken hearts bound up,
the despondent cheered, the self-righteious stripped,
the formalist driven from a refuge of lies,
the ignorant enlightened,
the saints built up in their holy faith.

I ask great things of a great God.

(Taken from "The Valley of Vision, ed. Arthur Bennett. Italics mine)

First Trek into D.C.

Inside the Lincoln Memorial


Washington Monument (Capitol Building in the distance)

If you read the post from two days ago, you know that we had a sad weekend saying goodbye to Kathy Bowers. But the up side was that several friends from Charlotte came to Gaithersburg to attend the funeral. Two friends stayed with us (Carolyn Honea and Lizzy Parks), and we also had fun at Denny's with Ray and Jenny Mulligan. It was great to have all these friends around for the weekend. On Saturday, Carolyn, Lizzy, and I took the metro into D.C. to see some main attractions. We went in at about 4pm, so most of the museums were closing by the time we actually got into the city, but we walked from the Smithsonian Metro to the Lincoln Memorial and back, stopping by the World War II memorial and the Washington Monument. Since the last time I was in D.C. was YEARS ago, it was fun to see these famous sites that I only vaguely remember. After we got back to the metro station, we headed to Georgetown, an historic district of D.C. Unfortunately, unlike New York, the metro stops aren't particularly near anything of interest, and are all pretty spread out. It was getting too dark to walk down to the Potomic River, but we did ask a college-age person a suggestion on a cheap local place to eat. So we dined at the "Froggy Bottom Pub," apparently a favorite among young locals. Needless to say, our adventure to D.C. was fun, although we were all pretty tired from walking when we got back home. I think my "city edges" have softened a little after two years of Southern Living :)

Our New Apartment

Nick's Study



Kitchen/Dining Room



Living Room



Extra Bedroom




Our bedroom

We're out of boxes! Hurray! Now that our apartment is all set up, we are feeling more at home in our new apartment. This has been quite a full weekend... The week started out on a rather sad note, since Kathy Bowers, the Mom of my good friend Jeanie Lechner, passed away on Monday. She had been fighting cancer for 7 years, although had only really been sick for the last year. We hosted some friends from Charlotte for the weekend, who came up for the memorial service on Friday. The service was beatiful and Christ-centered. Each member of her family shared, which left no eye dry in the 1000-person audience. At one point during the service, one of the pastors commented that God gets our attention with death and loss. It made me realize that life really is short- I have a very short time on earth in light of eternity. I was provoked in realizing how little I share the Gospel with others and how much time and energy I waste on frivolous things. I don't think it's helpful to rest in condemnation, but rather I look to the cross and to the one who can bring about change in my life. For every one look at my sin, ten looks at the cross... Oh blessed grace poured down on me, an undeserving sinner. How great is our God!

Now You See It....

....Now You Don't

And We're Off!

What A Stud!

Greetings from Gaithersburg, Maryland! We're safe and sound, and almost unpacked. I've been busy putting up curtains and hanging pictures, making our new apartment feel a little more like home. Thank you to all who were praying for safety on the road with our BIG truck (we split it with our friends Mike and Kristin Seaver, who moved up the same day). We would love your continued prayer for quick friendships to form, as well as feeling settled in a new place. We've met a few other Pastors College families, which has been great! We went to Covenant Life Church yesterday, and Joshua Harris preached (he is the senior pastor). I kept thinking about those books of his that Nick and I read and that shaped much of our relationship. We have a new address, but I guess it's not wise to post it on a blog. So I'll send it via a mass email soon. Coming soon- pictures of our new apartment :)

Our Little Peanut

Well, as most of you have heard already, we went in for our ultrasound, but this little one would not show its stuff. So it is still a mystery as to its sex. He/She had its legs crossed, knees locked together, then drew its knees up and put its hand in front of its behind. Hmmm...I sense a little bit of stubborness! A sign of things to come, if he/she is anything like us. It was so fun to see the baby on the ultrasound screen- moving a lot! What an amazing experience.

16 Weeks!

Starting to look a little Pregnant! :)

Outer Banks, NC

Jeep Tours! We saw some wild ponies too.

My neices- Bethany, Alison, Meredith Taylor

Well, it's a cooker today here in Charlotte, like most other places. Heat index is 104. Ugh. It's the kind of humid and hot day that made me think twice before going to get the mail...isn't that sad? Maybe it's just laziness :) We are well on our way of packing. I've got all my pictures off the walls and into boxes, as well as all the curtains down. Teacups are packed up and china is stored up into the attic. No fancy dinners for the next 10 months :( Oh well, better than risking the chance of broken dishes! We will try to get pictures of the moving process soon, along with pics from our wonderful vacation to the Outer Banks with the Taylor family.

If you're following along this blog journey, we'd love for you to leave a quick comment so we know who's tracking with us! Love to you all!