New beginning

Here we are starting yet another year.  As you well know, last year was one with many blessings for our family.  At the beginning of 2013, the primary things on my mind were the tiny new life that had recently been introduced to our family. 

Highlights of 2013:
Jan~Enjoyed our sweet 1 month old Jayme Renae; family get away to Seaside, OR for Em's birthday
Feb~Watched our two beautiful girls interact together
Mar~Celebrated Jason's birthday; Easter with family
Apr~Beth Moore Live with my mom and sister; Jason got a job offer in NH
May~We accepted the job in NH; began moving process and telling family and friends :(
June~Jason started his new job and moved; Girls and I stayed with family and friends for a few weeks; Em graduated from OSU with her masters in Education; Jayme got her first tooth and said her first word! We found amazing renters for our house in Oregon; Jason found us a nice place to live in NH
July~Girls and I got to join Jason in NH; found a great church to attend; met several new friends; Jayme started crawling, climbing, and pulling up on everything
August~Hannah Joy turned 3; Jason's mom Karen came to visit in NH; Jayme took her first few steps
Sept~Emily's parents came to NH to visit; We visited Storyland in Conway, NH; Jayme walked fast with the push toy walker
Oct~Jason's mom and grandma got to come visit us in NH; We celebrated Grandma Joann's 75th birthday with her in NH; We got to go on a train ride in beautiful North Conway, NH
Nov~We got to go to Oregon to visit family and friends!!! Jayme walked some and has four teeth; Em started a business with a friend
Dec~Jayme Renae turned 1!!! Jayme started walking all over the place.

What a beautiful year we have had!  While we experienced and still experience a lot of heart ache from being so far from family and friends, we are slowly adjusting to life on the east coast.  I have days or spurts of days where I miss my family and friends in Oregon so much, I wish I could just pack up and head back!  What I miss the most is intimate friendships, I miss having long deep conversations with people I have known for great lengths of time.  I am hoping friendships like this will develop over here over time. That's just it, I have to continuously remind myself of how long it takes to develop that level of trust in a relationship. I am thankful for cell phones, Skype, and facetime even though the time change difference is always a tricky thing to work with when scheduling times to visit with people.  The time change is always a reminder to me just how far away we really are. I have found ways to keep myself busy.  My friend Amanda and I have started our own business making natural beauty products.  It has kept us super busy, we actually had no idea how quickly the business would take off!  Her family has been a true blessing to us, including her parents who open their home to us while making our products.

Jason is enjoying his job and loves living in the snow country...even if he has to get up early to shovel the driveway some mornings.  He works hard and loves doing it!  Work is steady and bountiful here, which is a sure blessing for us!

Hannah is full of good ole 3 year old humor.  She has inherited her fathers great sense of humor.  She has us laughing all the time.  She loves playing in the "swow" (snow), reading books, watching movies, doing crafts, and of course playing with our kitty Tinker and her baby sister Jayme!  She has made several friends of her own and gotten to go to a few birthday parties since we've been here.

Jayme is our adventure kid.  She doesn't say much but is sure to climb or get into whatever she thinks she shouldn't.  We have definitely had to baby proof the house more for her than we ever had to with Hannah.  She is so fun to watch!  She loves to dance, eat, high five, make funny faces to get everyone to laugh, and play with her sister. 

We are blessed!  Thank you for sharing your life with us! HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Love the Jason, Emily, Hannah, and Jayme!

"Home" away from HOME

As I sit here trying to figure out how to start this blog I think of all of the things I want to tell you, but I just can't figure out how to begin so I suppose I will begin by telling you how I can't figure out how to begin...ahaha I know this makes some of you just miss me that much more!

Today I realized something, something relatively important...I realized that if I drank as much water a day as I drink Dunkin Donut iced coffees I might be fairly healthy!  Yep, it's official I'm hooked on the DD, as they said I would be!  Decaf iced caramel coconut coffee with cream and sugar or decaf iced caramel mocha with cream and sugar have now become an active part of my New Englander vocabulary!  Hannah has learned a few new vocabs too, "Look a donut shop mom!" or "Hannah eat donut & mommy drink toffee (coffee)?"  Yes, sadly this has become a fairly regular conversation piece for the two of us!

We love the northern East coast beach!  While the water is still fairly cold, it is nothing compared to the west coast ice water.  It's also so wonderful to be able to wear shorts and tank tops (and yes I occasionally bust out the bathing suit like everyone else) while playing at the beach rather than jeans and sweatshirts!  We are so blessed to only be about 30-40 minutes from the beautiful beach of the Atlantic ocean!  We are still exploring the different beach access points.

We are loving being surrounded by history!  We have been enjoying doing as much exploring of historic sights as we can with two little munchkins.  There are so many intriguing history facts all around us, we will never get around to seeing them all!

It's beautiful here, and it's not even fall yet.  We've been told that fall is the time to visit.  I can easily believe it.  There are so many trees and beautiful landscape.  The landscape reminds me a lot of Oregon but as someone over here said they heard, "NH is a lot like Oregon only Oregon is on steroids."  So true, Oregon mountains, trees, etc. are much bigger.

We have been attending a church called Grace Community Church.  It reminds us so much of Monmouth Christian sometimes I forget that I'm thousands of miles away.  I have met several ladies from the church and made good connections with them.  We have had "supper" out once and a few play dates.  I feel extremely blessed to have connected with such amazing women so early into our move!  We are working on getting Jason connected with some of the men from church.  We'd like to do some family things with others soon. 

Jason is loving his job!  He has excellent employees and the workload is continuous!  He has been able to keep similar hours to those he was working in Oregon.  He sometimes works a Saturday morning but not very often.  I am so thankful he isn't far from home and is able to take our phone calls is we have an emergency here at home.

With all of the positive things above come several challenges during this transition time.  We miss so much of our life back in Oregon!  It's so strange to miss some of the little things you thought you couldn't wait to get away from. 

We are thankful we followed our hearts and made the move.  God has definitely opened our eyes already to a few reasons he asked us to take this leap of faith.  We went from a crazy busy life in Oregon, to a very slow low key lifestyle here.  We believe God was redirecting our focus on Him and our family.  We were busy in Oregon, not necessarily with bad things but busy with many things that pulled our time away from our devotion and intimacy with our Heavenly Father and our family! While we long to be a "part" of a church, a community, a group of friends, etc. again; we understand and appreciate the value of the quiet, calmness, stillness of being a family unit so connected to God and each other that we are overwhelmed with joy! 

Although we've been primarily focusing on personal growth and our family, I am continually amazed when I meet someone new and find out "their story" compared to mine. I wont go into details but lets just say God is at work already with us in this community! I pray that this continues to happen as we meet more people!  We have been praying for the people in this place and back in Oregon because we consider both of these places "home" while we wait to go to our eternal HOME! 

We can use your continued prayers for all of us!   Below is a list of a few requests:
*Continued trust and growth spiritual!
*Continued health for all of us!
*Jason's back is still recovering (doing much better now that he's gone to the chiropractor several times)
*Safe travels for visitors
*Open eyes to see how God will choose to use "our story" in this community!

We love you guys and appreciate your love, support and especially PRAYERS!!!  Keep it coming!

WE MADE IT!!!

And so we are here!  The house is fantastic!  It is a three bedroom, 1.5 bathroom duplex townhome in a secluded neighborhood outside of Rochester.  We go to sleep at night hearing the frogs and crickets, while watching the fireflies.  We wake up in the mornings to the birds chirping, it's so peaceful and quiet.

Things I've learned about the New England coast:
*There are a lot of bugs here (my favorite are the fireflies)
*There is a Dunkin Donuts on every other block
*When it rains...it POURS!
*There are a lot of trees here but no mountains
*Motorcyclists are not required to wear helmets
*They have turnpikes...
*They drive cahs not cars (several of them have heavy accents)
*Many of the roads aren't in great condition ("These are bumpy roads mommy", says Hannah)
*Every time there is road work of any kind there is also a police officer
*Every thing is spread out, it is like driving on River Rd. in Salem, OR all the time
*It's been 80%+ humid here since we've been here
*Seatbelts aren't required beyond the age of 12
*You could likely see at least three different state license plates in one day

Although I haven't been impressed with the weather, overall this is a beautiful place to live. We are doing ok, I've been a bit lonely since my mom left and Jason goes to work but I've been staying busy.  This Sunday we went to a nice church called Grace Community Church.  It's not far from our house.  We found out they are hosting a VBS this week so I finally decided (today) to take Hannah as their minimum age is 3yrs and she isn't quite there yet.  She did fantastic and had a blast.  I met several really nice moms who invited me to a play date next week.  I am thrilled to have already met some other moms.  That will make things so much easier for the transition.  We will post on here ever so often so our west coast family and friends can keep track of us!  Please continue to pray for us as we are still transitioning.  Hannah mentions her west coast people everyday, it's hard to be positive and explain it to her.... :(

Fun pictures! (I got my new camera for a graduation gift just as soon as we got over here, so I've been having a lot of fun playing around with it)

 

It's so beautiful here!  This is in downtown Dover, NH!

 

 

Yep, it's our house...mess and all!

 

 

Grace Community Church and our Hannah bug at VBS!  Such a little peanut!

 

 

Miss Personality...see her tooth!!

 

I have to pump my own gas...WHAT!?  Jason at work!

 

 

Hannah's two favorite things!  They have these swings at most of the parks.

 

 

 

Nubble Lighthouse, York Maine

 

 

On our way!

The movers are here...WHAT!?!  Yes the movers came a whole 24+hours earlier than we expected them.  We had planned to have Hannah away for the day that we were going to be moving our stuff out of the house.  When they showed up the day before we expected them, that was not possible so we called in reinforcements (aka our sweet friend Ashley to the rescue)!

Such as it was, we got the important things packed on the truck and on it's way.  The rest of our items fit on our car which shipped a few days later (we did forget to pack our entire linens closet...haha).

After this "exciting" (more like insanely chaotic) day, we got to spend a few nights a our dear friends home while we finished cleaning up the house and waited for graduation day.  This turned out to be such a blessed time, we are so thankful we got this time with them and other friends just before we left.

Although graduation was the furthest thing from my mind, I'm thankful I got to walk with my fellow graduates.  I will never forget looking up into the crowd seeing my proud family (especially my grandma and my girls) waving excitedly at me!

 

Blessed to get my Masters in Education from OSU!

The two weeks before our departing the beautiful state of Oregon, we spent apart.  Jason was here working hard both at work and at home.  The girls and I were doing our best squeezing in as much family and friend fun time that we possibly could. 

A few picture highlights!

Fun at the Wildlife Safari and berry picking with Grandma Karen!

 

Fun taking a bath in the sink and golfing with Grandpa Keith!

 

Bowling with all the family and bedtime stories with Grandpa and Grandma...and Jayme!

The movers made it to Rochester, NH with our stuff on June 29th.  Jason was a sweet heart and had the basic stuff set up for our arrival.  We were excited to have my mom fly out with the girls and I, this way Jason would have a few more days to set up and not have to take as much time off work.  Plus, mom was thrilled of course that she'd be able to see where we live.

The flight...

We slept (or should I say "slept") in Keizer the night before our flight because we had to leave before the sun rose.  Hannah said when we left that morning, "Wow, it's a little bit dark out here."  Then on the way to Portland as it got light she said, "Where'd the dark go?"

We made it through saying goodbyes (although they were a bit rushed, which might have been a good thing), made it through security, and made it onto the plane.  The girls did ok going through security and my mom and I "figured" it out as we went.  Thank heavens for her help!  The five and a half hour flight was surprisingly ok with both girls.  No major meltdowns...PLUS!

When we got to Boston, we were all eager to see daddy and make sure Tinker (our kitty who was flying under the plane with the cargo) was ok.  Jason and I had a misunderstanding about where Tinker would be picked up at, sooo, we went looking for her...and looked, and looked, and looked!  Finally the airport called us and told us they have our cat and we need to come get her...lol!  Took us over an hour to find the darn cat!  Poor thing!  At this point we were all pretty much done with the traveling.  Then we took a few wrong turns in Boston, which then leads to a MUCH longer trip...all in all, Hannah summed it up perfectly when we drove into the driveway "WE MADE IT!"

Update! (short one)

Well Jason started work on Monday.  In general employees have been very nice to him.  There is always a bit of hesitation and anxiety when new management comes in.  He really loves it there and cannot wait for us to join him! 

As far as finding a place for us to live, we are finding out that cost of living is quite extreme there.  We are looking at 2-3 bedroom places ranging in price $1400-$1800, anything less than that is in very poor condition or a one bedroom.  We have a few options we are wrestling with so be praying for wisdom.

Out here, we are thrilled to have found great renters.  Contrary to what we thought, we found some (what we think) will be fantastic responsible college students to rent our house.  We have had so many people look at our house and even had several applications turned in.  After calling multiple peoples references, we were surprised to find out we feel like the college students will be the best.  At least three of them are believers (+), they are all honors students (+), and all had outstanding recommendations (+).

The places in Dover will be available to rent beginning of July and the renters will move into our house beginning of July.  What does this mean?  We will spend next week packing up the last of our things, take one day to spend as a family (getting away from the madness), then have movers come on the 17th.  Then Jason will head back to Dover to work and the girls and I will head to Roseburg and Cottage Grove.

Again, thank you for your continued prayers and support!

Bringing us closer together!

What have we been up to the last few weeks?

*We have been very busy these days. 

*I have been~Cleaning out cabinets, cupboards, and drawers; packing boxes; managing garage sales; selling furniture and goods online; house/apartment hunting online in Dover; prepping, showing, and looking into potential renters; making all kinds of phone calls (to get things worked out here and there); and squeezing in a few minutes here and there to snuggle and play with my babies!!!

*Jason has been~Tying up loose ends at work here; preparing for work at his new job; packing boxes; cleaning out the garage; working on the yard; making phone calls for all kinds of things; scheduling apartment and home viewings in Dover; scheduling with the movers; scheduling flights and hotels; and squeezing in time with his girls!

We have been so blessed during this busy time by so many family members and friends.  Family have been eager to come up to help with the girls and help with things around the house.  Friends have been delivering dinners, helping with the girls, and offering all kinds of help.  We have had so many people praying for us and we can feel it!  God has been working during this time.  We have grown so close as a family and couple already.

Jason flew to Dover today.  He was welcomed at the airport in Boston by an employee from the company he works at (Basix is the name of his company).  He was dropped off at his work, where he went in by himself and prayed over the office and scoped things out.  As he started to leave the office to head to the hotel, he was welcomed by a huge thunder, lightening, and rain storm.  He is looking forward to meeting coworkers and clients throughout the week!

Hannah went home with Grandpa and Grandma for a few nights this week.  Jayme and I have been working hard today, laughing and snuggling, occasionally getting some boxes and cleaning done.

Jason will return to Oregon late on Saturday. He will work out here off and on throughout the week. We will spend the week getting things packed and ready for the big move.  We plan to take one day to make a family trip to the zoo.  I graduate from OSU on Saturday the 15th, then we are hoping to ship our stuff on the 17th.  This is all dependent on what Jason finds for us to live over in Dover and when it is available.  Our stuff will take 2-3 weeks to ship.  Jason will head back to Dover after our things have been shipped.

At this point, we both have days of sheer excitement where we just can't wait to get over there and start our new lives.  Other days, we are so struck with sadness of what we are leaving here in Oregon.  Overall, we are feeling really blessed and are so excited to see "the big picture" of how God is going to use us in the new community!  One day, all this craziness will suddenly all make sense...

Please continue praying for:
*Good renters
*Jason's first week
*Control of dramatic emotions
*REST
*Patience, peace, trust, faith, etc.
*A good home for us over there
*And anything else you can think of for us!!!

THANK YOU SO VERY VERY MUCH!  EVERYTHING IS SO APPRECIATED!

Love,
Jason, Emily, Hannah, and Jayme!

It's only the beginning!

Strange Things are Happening....

Right before our eyes things are changing. Our home is losing furniture that once gave it such character and meaning to our lives. Things that were at one time in our lives "normal" or "stable" are no longer normal for us. Phone numbers are changing. Dinners are being eaten in the living room because we don't have our chairs to sit on anymore. Our time is spent packing boxes and cleaning cupboards. Clothes are being dug out of tubs to wear. Thoughts of apartment living and renting our house are always not far from our mind. Hobbies have taken the back seat. Time with family seems more appreciated. Time with friends is not taken for granted.

While my emotions quickly change from sheer excitement of the unknown future God holds for us to the overwhelming heart ache that is coming with leaving all that we have known and are accustomed to; when I am able to take a few moments (and I mean MOMENTS) out of the crazy busy life we are now living, I realize a few things. Things like, how blessed we have been to have a home like we have and how God has used it for his glory while we have been in it. Things like, how much "stuff" we have had that we obviously really didn't "need". Things like, how much I love how blessed we are to have two beautiful healthy little girls who need us. Things like, how much our families love us. Things like, how many friends have blessed us these past few years. Things like, how blessed we have been by our church family and pastors. Questions like, how will God use us in a new community? Questions like, what will our new church family be like? Questions like, how will we manage without all of the love our family and friends give us while being close to home? Questions like, what will hosting things in our new home look like? Questions like, how is this going to affect my children?

The list of blessings and questions can go on forever but the most important thing we have right now is FAITH! Faith can be strong enough to take this giant step into the unknown. We have faith that God's will must be done and he knows the big picture!

Please continue to offer prayers for us, we need them! Thanks!

Em :)