At Home In Maryland

We're here & pretty much settled! The Lord has been so merciful to us during this transition and we are truly overwhelmed by His kindness. Let me recount to you some of the details from our traveling...

We left Thursday morning at 4AM and arrived at my Pappy & Nana's (my mom's parents)home in South Carolina at about 4PM. We haven't seen them since they moved from Sarasota over a year ago and so this was a special treat for us to be able to spend this time with them and for them to be able to see all 3 of their great-grandsons. My Uncle Sam, Aunt Tricia & cousins, Julie & Russell also joined us for dinner. One highlight for Joshua was the beautiful stony brook in their back yard. He loved having "tub time" in it. :) They also gave him a cool car to ride on as an early birthday gift. It plays music when you push the buttons and so we were entertained by our little music lover as he pushed the button over and over again to dance.

We left at about 1:30PM on Friday and stopped sometime after 6PM to stay the night in Durham, NC. (You should get a laugh out of the picture of us all eating our Boston Market Dinner in the middle of our hotel room.) Yes, it was quite a sight with all 4 of us adults plus 3 little ones and 2 playpens all in one hotel room. We had a blast though and were all in silly moods from being in the car so long. :)

We then left at about 7:30AM and arrived in Maryland on Saturday at about 1:30PM. Two homegroups from Covenant Life Church have adopted us for our time here and there were about 30 people here to help us move into our new home. They had the truck unloaded in about 1 hour. Beds were up and made, boxes were being unpacked. Our kitchen was all set up and stocked with food...including Aaron's favorite blueberry muffins (made by one of our new friends, Pam Kelly & her daughters) and tons of goldfish for Joshua. :)

We met so many new friends! I cried after everyone left out of gratefulness the Lord for His kindness towards us. We don't deserve his mercy but it overflows to us on account of Jesus Christ, our glorious Savior!

A side note: I started feeling really "car sick" on Thursday & experienced the side effects of it on Thursday night. At least I thought it was car sickness until it carried on for a few days and kept hitting me in waves. We then began to wonder if there might be a possibility that it was morning sickness! Let's just say, I've never been so glad, as I was on Saturday afternoon after all the moving people left, to find out that I really had some type of flu virus/stomach bug. :) Amber stayed home with me on Sunday to help me care for Caleb & Tyler while my mom, Aaron & Joshua went to church. I would have expected that I would have struggled with having to miss our first Sunday here meeting people but the Lord gave me much grace to receive this sickness with joy. And I am so grateful that no one else caught it and that it did not hit me fully while we were on the road! As of this afternoon, I am feeling much better and the Lord is renewing my strength.

I hope to post a slide show for you soon of pictures from our road trip.

Until then...love from us all!