tjandlily.com

She LOVES books

Hi.  This week was a lay low week.  We had one day of class, and then our language helper’s sister passed away.  Like I said before, death is so common here. It is also sort of expected that life stopBs and if you’re close to the family, you will just spend hours upon hours just being there, we may feel like we’re getting nothing done, and yet it’s not nothing.  We love our language helper and also learned that she’s super committed to teaching us Jola.  She showed up at our house when it was time for class, and we did all the salutations and started talking, she then shared with us that her sister died the day before and as we kept talking she said she had come from the village where her sister died to do class with us, and we said “WHY ARE YOU HERE?!” So TJ hopped in the car and took her back to the village so she could be with her family.

We read lots of books!

We took the opportunity to get some things done that we don’t usually have time for, as well as having people over to our house.  There is family that came over for the evening, and we are growing to love them, their kids speak english and are close in age to the girls and so the girls LOVE that they can actually communicate with one another.  I decided to make them pizza and cookies.  There is nothing like someone enjoying your food for the deliciousness that it is, and enjoying the time together.  Two of my very favorite things, cooking for friends and spending time enjoying each other’s company.  I am grateful for the friends God is giving us here, I don’t know them well yet, but I look forward to getting to know them better.  I look forward to the deepening of friendship and that can only go deeper as there is the commonality of relationship with God.

Cinzia and Mae spend the morning together every day

What am I struggling with these days?  I struggle with my mouth {SIGH}… too much comes out too fast.  I’m really a words of affirmation person, and I need that to operate well in life.  The other side of that is that when I’m not happy with something I will be verbal about it.  At the end of every day, I am often frustrated with myself, with my mouth, wishing I could have dealt with the girls in a different way, or held my tongue in this situation or that.  I have so much need for the Lord, I need him not just in my life and in each day, but in every moment.    We think of this life as so physical, but it’s just as much spiritual as it physical.  It is HARD to be humble and realize that we’ve failed.  I am so thankful that God is so patient with me, continuing to walk me through each day and each struggle, continuing to love me even when I don’t look to him.  This week I had a discussion with Penny about the heart issue of not being sorry for our sin, and what that means.  We talked about forgiveness and how hard it is.  I couldn’t hold the tears back as I myself felt convicted with the reality that Jesus forgave us of our sins before we even committed them.  I asked her if she would be able to forgive Ava for all the things she will ever do right now?  And that, that is what Jesus did!  Before we ever sinned against him, he forgave us of every single thing we would do against him.  Are we sorry for those sins?  Do we accept his forgiveness?  These seem like simple truths, and yet they are the things that should penetrate our hearts and help us to understand who Jesus really is!  In explaining to Penny what Jesus has done and how desperately he wants our hearts, MY heart felt pain for how much I grieve the Holy Spirt, I felt convicted about my struggle with my mouth, and my struggle with forgiving others.  So I’m gonna keep walking forward, incredibly grateful for God’s grace and mercy in the midst of my pride.  How wonderful it is to belong to him!

This Psalm encouraged my heart today, and was a reminder of how much he cares for me, his child! My desire is that every person might know him, and his heart for them!

Psalm 91

“Those who live in the shelter of the Most High

    will find rest in the shadow of the Almighty.

This I declare about the Lord:

He alone is my refuge, my place of safety;

    he is my God, and I trust him.

For he will rescue you from every trap

    and protect you from deadly disease.

He will cover you with his feathers.

    He will shelter you with his wings.

    His faithful promises are your armor and protection.

Do not be afraid of the terrors of the night,

    nor the arrow that flies in the day.

Do not dread the disease that stalks in darkness,

    nor the disaster that strikes at midday.

Though a thousand fall at your side,

    though ten thousand are dying around you,

    these evils will not touch you.

Just open your eyes,

    and see how the wicked are punished.

If you make the Lord your refuge,

    if you make the Most High your shelter,

no evil will conquer you;

    no plague will come near your home.

For he will order his angels

    to protect you wherever you go.

They will hold you up with their hands

    so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone.

You will trample upon lions and cobras;

    you will crush fierce lions and serpents under your feet!

The Lord says, “I will rescue those who love me.

    I will protect those who trust in my name.

When they call on me, I will answer;

    I will be with them in trouble.

    I will rescue and honor them.

I will reward them with a long life

    and give them my salvation.””

Homemade Tortillas

Enchilada Sauce

Sauce: Finished product

Shredded Chicken

Cheese

Fill and Roll

Sauce and Bake

Drool over finished product

Eat Finished Product

This week was one of those weeks that reminded us that we can plan a perfect week but there is not a day that goes as planned.  We managed to get one language session in.  Each day has brought it’s challenges and encouragements.    I am encouraged with all the yummy food we are able to make here.  If you know me, you know I LOVE to create delicious food!  This week I made hamburger buns for our hamburgers, I grilled eggplant for our pasta, made hummus, and baked pita bread into chips.  We found a new source for chicken and delicious homemade peanut butter, and in turn our maid cooked mafé poulet  (Chicken with tomato peanut sauce over rice). Our maid always tells us we pay too much for everything!  Hahahaha… I don’t think we are ever going to get the “right price” for our stuff.  She always points to our skin and says, “it’s because of that!” I have come to terms with it.

hamburger buns just as they were going in the oven

TJ and I got to go to the village without the kids which was nice.  We left feeling more confused than confirmed about where we might live in the village, even though things seemed muddier than ever, I think they are going to come into clear view very soon.

Our carpenter has become a good friend and also speaks the language we’re learning, which gives us an excuse to hang out with him.  His wife just came down for Ramadan and we were excited to meet her because she’s been in Dakar.  It happened to by our friend’s birthday and so I decided to make him a cake.  We told him we would pick him up at his shop and he could show us the way to his house.  So I made the cake, we picked him up and showed up at his house.  He lives with his brother who has 3 wives, there was maybe 40 people at the house.  I don’t know that I will ever get used to the multiple wives here, the brother says “this is my first wife” and of course she’s proud of that, she was a humerous character, she then says “yes, I am the FIRST wife, and this is so and so… his SECOND wife” and apparently the 3rd wife was elsewhere.  Our friend and his wife are so cute… they are obviously so in love, and he assures us he doesn’t want to have more than one wife, he fell in love with her when he was about 16.  We got the cake out and sang, and everyone got a little bit of cake.  Our friend said this is the first time he’s ever had a cake for his birthday or any kind of celebration… my head is exploding, I’m thinking what?!  I was trying to decide whether I wanted to go to the effort of making a cake or not, I felt a bit humbled.  Next time if I wonder whether or not to “make a little effort” I’m gonna do it.  All this to say, our relationships are growing and we can only learn more about life and language here.  God is good and gracious, and he walking this journey with us.

Our carpenter friend and his wife

On a difficult note my dear friend’s Father died this week, and so she made the trip down here once again.  About a month ago, another close family member died of which she came down for.  Death seems so regular here… so often!  Because they are some of our closest friends here we offered our services, whatever that meant.   I spent hours sitting with my friend, and even got to drive a bunch of women to the market to get necessary items for the funeral.  I was grateful to be able to do this, because this was only my second time driving by myself in Senegal.  The entire funeral happenings were from 9 a.m. to the evening… we didn’t leave till 6 p.m.  There were spiritual and familial complications that made the day even harder for our friends, all we could do was be there, listen, maybe drive people around.  No matter what we could do to “help” it is SO. Hard. to watch your friend loose her dad.  It was an emotional, heavy day to say the least.

Saturday is our rest day, so we rest.  It’s hard for my heart and mind to truly rest though as my friend is surely still in pain with the sudden loss of her dad.  It’s been awhile since the death of someone I don’t even know effected me so much.  We can be comforted with knowing Christ and that He has a purpose for every life and every death.  Each of our days are numbered and chosen before our life even began.

My life is busy and yet I REALLY miss writing!! I am setting a goal for myself once again to write once a week. I think the main reason I stopped was because it is hard for me to not share ALL the details and our lives lead towards the direction of not being able to share everything… So here goes it.

There are a few things I am really appreciating about life right now. I have my own home again. I know heaven is the best, but while I’m on earth I have to say it’s really nice to be with my stuff again! We were separated for 1 1/2 years!! Although, when I’m looking for something, for example my amazing natural face-mask stuff I bought a couple years ago, I can’t find it! The question often pops up “Is that is California, in Florida or Africa?”… Little sigh of frustration and then I move on with my life. Back to my stuff. Why is it that as a woman, wife, and mother my heart is grateful and settled when the house looks like a house and is not just livable but beautiful? My husband has helped me make our house a home, he’s so amazing! We may still be living out of our suitcases because we don’t have wardrobes yet (SO EXPENSIVE!!!) but my living room is pretty and the kitchen very operable and bigger than I would have planned! Little by little, and month by month we will get the furniture that we need. “petite a petite” as they say here.

Something that was hard to attain while on our break in the States was a schedule. We LOVE all you people and spending lots of time with everyone, but I can’t tell you how nice it is to have Mae go to bed by 8 every night and the girls soon after. We are able to actually start school in-between 8 and 8:30 instead of 10 am… hahaha!!

But by golly I need Jesus every morning! Teaching 3rd and 1st grade at the same time is challenging, especially when there are behavioral issues. But we are working on it and God is gracious. That is a fact. I am being stretched and I know that God is calling me to trust him in this too.

I’m just trying to catch you up to speed. We just finished week 4 of language study, and Friday was our first day speaking! It was brutal, and revealed that we need to spend a lot more time listening. Where do we fit that in exactly in our day? I’m not exactly sure, but TJ and I are discussing how we might do that, as it is one of the main reasons we are here. Thankfully our language helper is so gracious and patient with us!! She is a wonderful older lady, and we are loving getting to know her and her family!!

We have taken a few trips out to the village, which is always an adventure. We are praying for the right land and the right neighborhood for our family. We are trusting God through it all. There are so many cultural hoops to jump through, we are learning to ask a lot of questions and remind those who are helping us that we know nothing and are relying on their wisdom and guidance.

Things that happened this week: I made lots of yummy food, and am feeling more at home every day. A week ago we went to the village for the day. This week, the chief of our village was in our town and called us, he came to our house for the first time, and we were honored.

TJ went to the beach on his motorcycle with friends and swam in the ocean. We keep trying our Jola on people and anyone who speaks it lights up with excitement, and they quickly surpass our language understanding with their questions. Every day we learn more. We have a tailer in or neighborhood by way of our language helper… celebrate yay!! I went and ordered curtains. I’m hoping to order my first chickens today!

That’s it for now. Check in next Monday for an update.

Taking advantage of green bean season

Someone likes getting in her toy basket!

being creative with food.  Hummus! 😍 as of yet i don’t regret bringing my nutribullet with me this time!

It’s been a while since I sat down to write out my thoughts, and apparently it takes me having Iritis for me to actually do this.  I am thankful I took typing in high school, so that I can actually type blindly.

We have been back in the States for seven months now.  We spent five months in Florida and we have been in California for two months.  It has been hard to come back to our home church here in California, where it is truly in a broken and yet beautiful place.  It was never Auberry Community Church that I would have thought would be divided, and yet here we are.  We are all human… there is always room for division, and there is always room for the Lord to work.  Everything works for good for those who are called according to his purpose, so even from pain and difficulty and definitely suffering, new growth happens, and new love for God can grow, a new dependance on the Lord can come to fruition.  God knows the hearts of every member of Auberry Community of those who left and those who stayed.  I pray for all parties that every person seeks the Lord, and his desire.  I pray that every person can pray for the desires of his heart, and that those desires would be lining up with who God is.  The facts stand for me that it was hard to come back here to a hurting congregation, and the fact stands that we miss those that are not there.  Our prayer is that all involved will search their hearts, that each person will reach out, that they will forgive, and fight to not have bitter hearts, and God knows it takes a real fight to not let our hearts grow bitter… easier said than done.

‘Let our hearts not grow bitter’ art by: Robert Griffith

As far as us here in California, it was a little bit harder for me to come back here than it was for me to go to Florida. I came back here with a cautious heart.  Initially it was harder for me to have a heart that wants to continue investing in people, because we are only here a short time.  We keep experiencing over and over being in different places for short times.  I am thankful… so thankful for the deep relationships we get to build because although it can be rare to to have deep friendships I feel that God has blessed us with many… it’s just that it is always hard to leave every place that we go because we have invested deeply into so many relationships.  And yet I feel that God has called us to these investments, I always feel like God is calling me to towards these people.   As Howard Davies from Calvary Chapel Merritt Island always told us in his english accent “grow where you’re planted, be where you are”.  I will never forget that, because no matter what we are doing there is always the thing that we are doing next, and yet I hear God calling me here and now to be doing well what he is calling me to do right now and in this moment.  Right now that is investing in these relationships here, full fledged like I’m gonna be here forever, without holding back.  I am here homeschooling my daughters, taking care of our house, preparing dinner for my family, doing the laundry and taking care of our baby… and these things God is calling me to do well.

In some ways I have felt more spiritual attacks here than I did in Senegal, or maybe they just look different.  For months now we have been praying and seeking the Lord about whether or not we should go to Senegal for a month this summer  There have been many factors not the least of these was money. After much thinking and worrying, I had a hard time seeing how it was going to work for our whole family to just visit Senegal and the validity of the whole thing, plus all the hard things that go along with bringing a new baby that I’m feeding with bottles and pumping and all that that entails.  After seeking the advice of our Florida Church elders TJ has felt 100% sure with peace from the Lord that our whole family needed to take a trip to Senegal this summer, but he has been waiting for the Lord to convince my heart too.  After much turmoil and freaking out on my part and what I think were spiritual attacks on my peace from the Lord, we decided not to talk about the trip, the tickets or anything about it.  We were silent for about a week concerning anything “Senegal”.  At the end of the week my heart calmed down, God’s peace entered my heart and mind and he calmed my fears, he showed me why he wants us to go and that he has given TJ a conviction for a reason and that he has something great for us this summer.  I feel like he took my eyes and cleared my blurred vision and made it clear, that despite all my fears and worries he was in this.  TJ took a couple more days to pray and received confirmation from the Lord, and we bought tickets to Senegal for one month this summer.  We will be visiting Del and Arielle in the village where we will also be working.  We will take part in important team meetings with our little team.  We will attend a conference being held for all the West Africa missionaries in our organization.  We will also spend some times visiting our friends and church family in Dakar.  I am now excited, and believe that God had this money set aside for this trip the whole time.

We see the benefit in going for the goal of keeping the vision alive for our whole family, TJ, me AND our girls.  We want to be there and connected to what’s going on as this is what we are giving our lives for.  As we are in the States for extra unexpected time (Mae’s cleft surgery),  we want our hearts to stay connected and that we would not lose focus.  We want to stay connected to Senegal and the ministry that we are just starting.  And to tell you the truth, we don’t know all the reasons that God is asking us to go, but we know that he is, and our desire is to follow Him.  The last thing we want to do is miss out on what God has for us because we’re afraid of difficulty.  All the details are scary for me, but I have decided that we will do one thing at a time.  If you think of it, pray that God will meet us in every place along the way.

I am currently down for the count with iritis, and TJ’s back is in quite a bit of pain and he’s taking care of our whole family, please pray that these things heal, but also pray that God would be glorified in our weaknesses, and ailments.  Something that I have been doing while not being able to open my eyes for long periods of time is listening to the Bible.  I have been going through “read through scripture in a year” on my phone and I am learning a lot and am reminded about the stories of who God is and how faithful he is despite all the people who rejected him, I am amazed at how he used lowly people to do great things, and it is so clear that it was the Lord, not the people.  People that the Lord used made mistakes.. . big ones!! When David fell to his lustful passions, he fell hard, but he also repented big, he made some big booboos and he experienced the consequences but he never stopped loving the Lord and serving him.  It is a good reminder to keep my heart soft before the Lord and that it is always worth it to serve him. He is such a great God, and I truly am nothing without him.

Easter Fun

I have not found the time to sit down and write about this birth.

Mae Bénédicte Shropshire was born on December 21st at 1:44 in the morning, weighing in at 8 lbs  1oz 21 inches long

Getting ready for this labor and preparing my mind was not the same as my other births.  With Ava, we took husband coached Bradley method classes and became well informed about the whole process as they say information is power, and it was!  For Penny, I just hoped that my labor would be different and easer than Ava’s… and it was!

For Mae, before “labor” day came I feel that there was much spiritual battle in the mix.  After loosing so many babies, I think somehow I thought that something must go wrong!  I felt like if she was going to live then that must have meant that I was going to die in child birth.  After experiencing so much loss, I don’t think I really felt like God was really going to give me the chance to mother another child.  There was a lot of fear there and denial that everything was going to be okay.  I definitely fought against that, and went to the Word quite a bit, asking God to take away this fear from me, and yet I still found myself consumed by it.

The Night of Monday the 18th of December, I began having consistent and strong contractions all through the night, and when I woke up in the morning I told TJ that I was pretty sure I would be having the baby that day, and then everything sort of faded off which was weird to me, because in the past I had never had case labors like that.  That Tuesday I spent they day preparing for after labor, because even though everything faded, I figured I would be having baby soon.  That Tuesday night/Wednesday morning at 2 am I rolled over in bed and my water broke.  I called the midwife (who was actually the backup midwife… mine was in England)  to find out what I should do… she said to sleep, so I slept the rest of the night waking up every 15 min to contractions.  When I got up in the morning, my contractions faded again like the day before, but the clock had already started… my water had already broken, I needed to get this party started.  Staying at home felt like it was going to stall this labor all day, so before lunch we dropped the girls off with some close friends, and headed to Orlando.  We met my sister in law Cherie at a vietnamese restaurant so that I could eat some especially spicy food.  Cherie would be assisting me in my birth, of which she was VERY excited because I generally don’t like other people there.  We eventually made it to the birth Center and were able to see the midwife at about 4:30.  I appreciated how gentile and kind she was with me.  She found that my cervix was caught up behind the baby’s head… I don’t know exactly what that means, but it was preventing labor from really getting going.  She attempted to slowly pull the cervix forward where it needed to be, and even attempted to break my water the rest of the way.  She suggested breast pumping to get my contractions going. So I breast pumped for a couple hours switching sides every 10 minutes, which really got the contractions going.  All were surprised by the amount of milk I had coming out already.  I felt like I was stealing milk from my baby who would hopefully be coming out soon.  As the contractions were much stronger I didn’t need to pump anymore because the contractions were  coming more frequent and strong.  I walked the main hall by our room.  TJ and Cherie walked with me faithfully.  Cherie was the faithful water girl and was the designated stress relieving instructor.  TJ’s job was pretty much to be by my side at every moment that I was having a contraction, if he even went 5 feet away from me I felt that he was a mile away.  The crazy part about all this, is that for several years when I would dream of being pregnant and having babies, and would instead lose them I would actually fantasize about labor and working through difficult contractions.  There is something beautiful about working hard towards something that you love, and yet you have never even laid your eyes on.  In the moment I was thinking, how could I have every fantasized about this?!

When the midwife checked me again, we found that the cervix was not cooperating and the baby’s head was not as far down as it needed to be.  It was time to get serious, I got into different positions for specific amounts of time to move the baby’s head down.  It was very painful, but successful, and as Cherie would say “it hurts so good!”  I went from the bed to the toilet to some weird positions on the floor… sure enough, baby’s head was moving down.  When the time came for me to begin pushing, I was so ready to have the baby and and to see her precious face, but at the same time I did not want to go through pushing a baby out.  Her head was still in a bit of a weird position, and so pushing her head out was not a one and done push, it took much struggle, strength and going within myself to find some sort of strength to get her out… it was unlike Ava or Penny!  When the head came out, I began feeling her move her head which was weird, and at this point there were some scary things that happened that I was completely unaware of.  I was unaware that the cord was around the baby’s neck, so the midwife began acting quickly literally trying to pull the baby out.  She had me go from the birthing stool to the floor, I gave another couple good pushes and her body came out.  Apparently there was some sort of snap when the midwife was trying to get her out, which scared Cherie and TJ… they wondered if she had a broken bone, but after checking her all out, it was probably just the cord. When baby came out, she put her on my chest, but she wasn’t breathing.  She had a strong heart beat, and as the midwife was putting the mouth piece on Mae trying to get her to breath, she just kept repeating “she has a really strong heart beat” “She has a really strong heart beat!”, which made me feel very calm, I was confident that she would begin breathing very soon, and I think God gave me that peace.  TJ and Cherie however were experiencing some pretty fearful moments.  After a bit of help from the midwife, baby began crying, and so did TJ and Cherie.  I couldn’t believe this was my baby, she was here and okay, and so was I.

And there began a journey with our 4th daughter that I can only thank God for.  We found when Mae was born that she couldn’t nurse very well because she was tongue tied.  So, literally hours after after Mae was born we went to an ENT (Ear, Nose, and Throat) Dr. to have her tongue clipped.  The office staff were so excited because Mae was their youngest patient ever, I suppose she should have received an award ;)!   When the dr. was looking in her mouth, he noticed that she was also lip tied and would need to take care of that also.  He then said “did you know your daughter has a cleft palate?”  I said “NO!”  He showed us her mouth and sure enough, her palate in the back of her mouth was missing.  My head instantly began spinning, not knowing what this meant or what we were gonna do about it, and TJ right away began doing a search on his phone trying to find out what this meant. He had told me that directly after clipping her tongue and lip she needed to nurse, so right after he handed her to me I tried to nurse her and she would not latch.  The nurse kept coming back in asking me if she could nurse yet, and I kept telling them no she couldn’t nurse.  I thought, maybe when we get home I would try again.  When we came home, Mae was just so tired she kept sleeping, and I kept trying to nurse her, but she couldn’t do it, and then by 8 or 9 she just wouldn’t wake up to nurse.  I was exhausted and didn’t know why Mae wouldn’t eat, or try harder.  I thought maybe this is difficult because of the cleft palate, but I didn’t know the extent of it.  Cherie and been telling me that I had to get some milk in her and that if I wasn’t abe to nurse her by 9 pm I was gonna need to give her a bottle, and I didn’t really know what that meant because I didn’t want to give her formula, and I was just beyond myself exhausted after literally not sleeping since the night before I had my baby.  Cherie called TJ and explained how very important it was that I get milk into that baby, because if I didn’t she would become listless and wouldn’t eat at all after a certain point, and it would become very dangerous, so TJ got on the same page as me, and I began hand expressing milk into her mouth.  She began waking up and wanting more, which was encouraging.  Even though we were so tired, we set alarms to get up every 2 hours throughout the night to feed Mae some milk. Someone had given us a used hand pump, so TJ washed that, and when I tried to use it, it didn’t work!  So at 3 in the morning TJ went to Walmart to buy a better hand pump, he came back, I pumped and we started feeding Mae with a dropper, trying to get as much milk in her that we could.  We fed her for the entire next day and night like that, and then next Saturday through Cherie we got connected to an amazing lactation consultant.  I was so grateful for this woman’s help!  She saw us for free at Cape Canaveral hospital, and she was able to get her hands on one of the Dr. Brown Specialty bottles for Mae, as she couldn’t suck like a normal baby.  It was there that it was confirmed that I would definitely not be able to nurse Mae.  That night I cried for several hours, because my dream of nursing another baby would not be coming to pass.  Yes she would be able to eat my breast milk, but I would not get those special moments of nursing my baby every few hours.  There are positives to bottle feeding a baby… I know!  But in these moments, I really just needed to grieve what I wasn’t going to be able to experience this, this time around.  But after having a good cry we were determined to help this baby eat well and gain the weight she needed to gain.  In those first few days she had trouble with her own saliva and seemed to have trouble breathing, and also spit up a lot.  We had to watch her like hawks, and it felt as though we would never sleep again… she seemed so fragile, we felt like brand new parents once again.  We were wading in uncharted waters.  All of this has been new for us.  In those first few days she wasn’t pooping like we thought she would either, but because she pretty much started eating a day late, everything else started a day late!  We are so proud of Mae though, she is doing SO well with her new bottles.  Something you don’t think about breast/bottle fed babies, is that the mother has to pump, then we have to feed the baby, clean and sanitize bottles and everything every day… it’s a lot!  It’s twice the work if not more!  But, Mae is eating and gaining weight.  She is pooping and peeing, she’s crying loud and demanding lots of attention.

Every single thing we have done with her it feels like we have to fight to get what we want or need, but it has all been worth it.  So well will continue on the journey.  For now we make sure she eats and gains enough weight, until her surgery which will probably happen in October or November.

Wrote this a couple weeks ago and forgot to post it… so here it is.

I get to eat yummy salads!

enjoying homemade lettuce wraps 🙂

We are at someone’s house for dinner.  They ask us what were the highlights from our time in Senegal?  TJ talks and I sit there, mouth closed asking myself… what were the highlights from our time in Senegal? What do I say?

Speaking objectively, I’m here in the United States of America and I don’t have to think about Senegal, and then someone asks me, what can you tell me about life there?  And my mind goes blank….  My intelligent psychologist mother once told me that often when something hard happens to us, when we look back that’s all we see, it’s hard for our brains to move past that.  We look back to a hard situation and our brains stick there, and that’s often why we have to work through that so that it is a story of God’s grace and provision rather than just a hard thing that had no rhyme or reason.

So, I’m sitting down today to process some of this life that we’ve lived.  I don’t want to look back and just see a hard thing, I want to be reminded of who God is, and how he walked us through each and every situation.

When I think about “our time in Senegal”, it wasn’t just a time or a trip, it was our lives lived, our lives being changed, turned upside down.  It was relearning how to live.  Today I went through a bunch of pictures from our two years in Senegal, and I cried through many of them.  Some of the pictures I could remember exactly what was happening and the struggles in that moment, and now I know the struggles that were ahead of me at the time.  There were phases of life in those two years, struggles that became easier and new types of struggles that we had to work through.

Life there is so different from our American lives, and yet it became our new normal, and I am soooooo grateful for those new normals!  It became normal to not have AC, during hot season to be in a constant state of sweating, even in our beds at night, sweat puddles under our bodies became the norm.  Normal for us was NOT understanding most conversations around us, yes we were learning french, but most people were speaking Wolaf or some other language.  And even when french was being spoken, we were always missing something, because it’s not our mother tongue and we were learning!  I think a new norm was the spiritual oppression.  Children in the orphanage across the street continually yelling/memorizing their Koranic verses all day long became normal, but like a heavy weight on us.  Living in our apartment where the courtyard and open windows (no AC) connected to the 3 other apartments became a HUGE weight.  One of the husbands beat his wife from time to time, and then with neighbors who are generally unthoughtful, there was always extra drama.   There was always a slight worry that someone was gonna steel our clothes off the roof while drying since it happened from time to time.  The neighbors would often stay up till 2 in the morning, kids playing in the courtyard, loudly talking/yelling all the time!   So as you can imagine our own home was no longer our own peaceful sanctuary.  Something I didn’t realize until we finished french was that our entire two years there, there was ALWAYS this burden hanging over my head that I could be doing something else to learn french, like I should be getting out or listening or I was constantly asking myself “what am I gonna do for my session tomorrow?”  I didn’t realize the constant stress that held until we had our evaluations and we were “officially” finished with the french program.  I felt like I could take a breath in a way I hadn’t been able to do in a long time.  Something that was one of the most difficult things for me was relationships.  I think that God gave me the exact relationships he wanted me to have, but I often felt like I was failing, and even with all the efforts I made I couldn’t do any more, and that weighed on me.

As I look back though I am encouraged, I am encouraged that life became normal.  And there was so much that I came to appreciate.  Before we were overwhelmed with the amount of outside noise flowing into our apartment, and even during that appreciated the fact that our windows were open ALL the time that our house was ALWAYS open.  When it rained we would hear the intense sound it created because the windows were open.  When I sat down to look at pictures from our two years, there were so many happy moments.  I am so grateful that my brother Del and his family are in Senegal, that God gave us the time together that we had.  I think about the encouragement that that brought me and I think in every moment that I was down or was having a hard time, God always knew what I needed, and he was ALWAYS there.  He was always protecting us from the evil that was always around us, from falling into despair because of hard circumstances.  God is so faithful!  He provided close friendships along with Godly guidance from our coworkers and leaders.

I enjoyed the challenge of making a certain food that I wanted with the ingredients that were available to me.  I love that there is a boutique on every corner and if I need onions, garlic or potatoes right now, they are available to me.  I love that it’s now easy to get a taxi, that I can greet others with respect.  I am grateful to have a better (but not complete) understanding of clothing.  I am grateful to be okay and used to wearing wraps and skirts.  I am SOOOOO grateful that our kids now feel normal in Senegal, that they know how to shake hands, and that it has actually become normal.  I am so grateful we can understand the sermon at church, that we can be spiritually encouraged in french from other believers in our church… which is huge!

I love how hospitable Senegalese people are.  They have time for you.  Senegalese friends will do ANYTHING for you, relationships are no light weight deal.  We have some strong connections, and that feels like such an honor!  I love a lot of the Senegalese food, it is delicious and so flavorful!  I love that my kids are used to eating around a bowl with others now, they know and somewhat follow the “rules” of eating with others.  It is easy and normal for me to barter for and buy fabric and order clothes from our tailor, and with so many Senegalese things I don’t have American expectations for finishing dates or it looking exactly like I want.  Clothes… the fabrics are beautiful and SUCH a fun part of Senegalese culture and dress.

I was REALLY ready to come “home” and now that I am here in this place that I imagined as my home, I think I am somehow looking for fulfillment in food that I missed, in friendships, being with family, and even in going to our own church .  It is satisfying to be here, and so fun to eat every kind of berry I want, live in the air-conditioning, drink normal milk and actually pour 1/2 and 1/2 in my coffee, its wonderful to see our friends that we missed so much, and it is so wonderful to again be in our church that we so dearly missed.  It is becoming clear to me that these are not the things that fulfill me, and these things will not truly satisfy me.  It may seem so cliche, but it is the Lord Jesus who fulfills me, and only him that I need.  No matter where in the world I am or what difficulty I am going through, He will remain the same.  I have these scared thoughts that I’m not going to want to go back, that I’m gonna kick my feet and say “Why God?! Why did you choose me?”  I have honest feelings of inadequacy like I can’t do this… all of this.  I can’t deal with the un-organization of missionary life and unsettling feelings of moving all the time, and not ever “being” home.  I don’t know if I can learn another language and make another set of new friends in a culture that is so different from my own.  What if these people that I’m supposed to live near and do ministry for the next 20 years don’t like me?  There are so many unknowns hanging over me about the future… I can’t think of any other way to put it other than I feel scared.

So if I go back to what I know, there are some hard facts that I can’t afford to forget.

God is faithful.  He was extremely clear about the journey he has us on.  What I am living for is so much higher and beyond myself that I can’t afford to just look at the situation I’m in.  Living for eternity is worth it.  Trusting God with all of these unanswered questions is worth it.  Living life never feeling like I have a home is worth it, because we are following him, and in the end we pray that because of our work there will be people who get to know Jesus for the first time.  This life will pass in the blink of an eye, and at the end of it, I want to be able to stand before Jesus and give an account of how we followed him, how we trusted him and loved him.  I know that for the reward it will be worth it.

We got the girls ears pierced so that they won’t be the only ones in Senegal without their ears pierced!

We remembered Nola and I bought myself some roses.

Some friends visited Nola’s grave for us, and brought some flowers. This always does my heart good. It has been 4 years since we lost her. She will always be a part of our story, and I so look forward to meeting her!

Baby is growing healthy and strong. 🙂

We celebrated our 9th anniversary on the 11th of October. Was such a fun and delicious date!

We have been here for almost a month… and these are some of my thoughts from our first few days back… more to come soon!

We are in Florida, we have touched US soil… you could say we are “home”.  I have literally been dreaming for months about what these first days might look like.  Even in my dreams, I would say to myself finally it’s not a dream, we are really here… and I would wake up and it would still be a dream.

Our last few weeks in Senegal were a whirlwind.  Our house was broken into, by the grace of God only our computer was stolen along with a couple other small things.  We made the decision to move out right away because of some other circumstances making it unsafe for us to stay in our apartment.  We packed in 2 days and moved on the 3rd.  Again, by God’s grace and provision a room opened up with our mission guest house that wasn’t originally available, and we were able to move right in!

I had been excited for so long to come home, and then Irma… Irma decided to come visit.  I stopped being excited about coming home and was just concerned for friends and family all over Florida, but mainly our home of Brevard County.  I didn’t even sleep well the night the hurricane came through, I kept checking my phone for updates from people.  Finally when Monday rolled around I could finally be excited again about coming home.  We packed the entire day on Tuesday and then left for the airport at 10:30, it was an uneventful flight thankfully.  Even though we didn’t have ANY time for our layover, we made it to the plane.  My baby belly was unhappy to be sitting up for so many consistent hours at a time, but I survived.

Landing in Florida was crazy, fun, weird, exciting and disappointing.  Our expectations had gone down because of hurricane Irma, but it was pretty sad to walk out of security to no one.  I think originally we were excited about the thought of people welcoming us home…. don’t get me wrong we COMPLETELY understand… but it doesn’t change the fact that it was a bummer.  We got our bags, and TJ’s sister Ruth was waiting for us with a truck for us and all our bags… we were so grateful she could come pick us up.  I laid down in the truck on the way home, was the first time laying down in 24 hours… this baby belly was crunched!  We went right to Publix in Cocoa to get Subs.  My body was tired and hurting, I waited in the eating area while TJ and Ruth waited for about 30 minutes in the Sub line… apparently after the hurricane everyone wanted subs.  I felt like an emotional wreck ready to start crying at any moment.  I even prayed that I wouldn’t see anyone I knew in the store because I wasn’t ready yet, God is good and answered my silly prayer… also no offense it was me not you ;).

We are SOOOOOO grateful for the Dewitt family and a certain Dewitt family member who gave up her house so that we could have a place to live just our family.  They had been cleaning and getting it all ready for us to stay in.  When I saw Joyce… my dear dear friend, she hugged me and I just started crying… why?  I don’t know, because it had been two years, too long and I was tired and emotional and didn’t know how to handle myself.  When we got to our new living arrangement, we were overwhelmed with gratefulness, and feel so so so blessed to have a place for our family to live with furniture and linens and everything we need.  Some friends of friends also are letting us use their car, which will also be a blessing.

I didn’t know what to expect as far as how we would process coming back here.  We have been on such a mission, we have been working so hard to learn french, to make effort in relationships in another culture and language and it has all been hard, good but hard.  It all came to a halting stop, and then all of the sudden we are here in this really nice townhouse, living in the air-conditioning eating Publix subs and cherries.  Just in the first couple days it has been, I feel guilty in a way for enjoying all these nice things… it’s hard to put a finger on it.  I also have little fears that come up like, what if I enjoy living back here too much?  What if I don’t want to go back?  I feel guilty for wanting to be here and not in Senegal right now… I feel scared that I won’t want to go back.  My mind and body feels stretched between two worlds, and I don’t know yet how to fit them together.  In the middle of my fears and emotions that I don’t know how to process, I’m so grateful that we serve a faithful God and that he will continue to guide, that he will deal with my heart, discourage me and encourage me in ways that I need.

There were some immediate physical changes that have been obvious to us.  The air-conditioning, we are not sweating at night, my hair is not always frizzy from constant humidity (although it’s humid here, just not in the air-conditioning).  Inside our house it is. SO. QUIET, our ears are just starting to stop ringing.  Our living situation for at least the last year has been really hard, Senegalese incense and cigarette smoke always flowing up into our house from all the open windows (no air-con), constant yelling neighbors often till two in the morning.  ALL Day, every day constant reciting of Koranic verses from the orphanage that was right across from us.  Okay, back to here.  It is sooooooo clean everywhere!  Inside there is barely a speck of dust which makes sense the windows are not open all day every day.  My mind and heart feel so peaceful, I feel like I have time or maybe just the ability to stop and think, reflect.  In our new house here there is a balcony connected to our bedroom and behind there are just palm trees and green grass, I think it might be an old golf course.  It is so peaceful and a gift of a place for me to sit in the mornings and talk with God, reflect on who he is, what he has done for us, and what he is doing, a place to just think, to just be without the absolute business of life.  These things are all gifts I feel.  “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, with whom there is no change or shifting shadow.”  James 1:17

Walking off the plane and into Dakar for the first time

I don’t know exactly have to summarize these past couple years.  We arrived in this country scared and excited and I felt a little out of my mind.  There were such adjustments that had to be made to my thinking, to my life, to my family’s life.  Layers have been peeled off and peeled off, and yet I have the feeling that God is not done yet.

Something that is beyond obvious to me is that I am so human.  I can see clearly that I am weak that I’m not worth anything without Jesus Christ.  When I stop to look at myself away from Jesus, I am rather disgusted.  I have to work daily at not getting too upset with my girls for their childish behavior towards each other, and then I have to watch myself to make sure I’m not acting like the child.  I have to be careful not to get sucked into binge watching netflix during the weekend because I don’t want to face that I might have to go out and talk to people in a culture that I understand better but is still different.  I have found myself in situations where I am just not liked.  I’m not trying to be conceited, but I’ve never really felt like I was super unlikeable.  I have been in relationships here that have taught me how to be humble before God and listen to his guidance, and to remember what I’m worth to Him, not what someone thinks about me.

who could ever get upset with these sweet faces?!

We put certain expectations on people and on situations without realizing it… and we can come out of it feeling like we have failed in a way because it didn’t go like we planned.  These two years didn’t go like I planned or like how I thought they might go.  But, I learned french, a lot of culture, a lot about who God is and more about who I am.  I can tell that I’m at a deeper level of need for the Lord.  At this point, I feel needy… I don’t know what I need from him exactly, maybe his love, to remember what I’m worth to him, for who I am, spiritual encouragement and rejuvenation, maybe a few worship services in my own language, maybe a few hours of singing worship songs would be amazing.  I have an idea of what I need, but again God knows that better too. I sometimes feel bitter that God brought me to this side of the world to live, away from my family away from my friends, and I am constantly asking myself how God is going to be able to use us?  Such messes of people who are gonna continue to make such cultural blunders.  I have known that what we are doing has nothing to do with what we can do for God but for what He wants to do in us and through us… It’s all him.  But I think I have a new level of comprehension (maybe just a little deeper than before) that God is asking us to be faithful and he will do the work.  If we can continue on this road and remember that he is good,  that he is faithful, it is him who changes the hearts of man, and who goes before us in each step, then we have reason to continue pushing forward and be encouraged in who God is not in what I can do for him.  No matter where we are in the world (if you belong to him), we serve a forever faithful and unchanging God, who will never leave us nor forsake us.

Nov 24, 2016

This is my very first trip to Europe.  I am going to be meeting Cherie in Barcelona and I cannot wait to see her!!

After getting all my baggage together, Del and family and our family took me to the airport.  TJ helped me get to the door of the airport and I wheeled my stuff up to the kiosk.  I was nervous because it had been a while since I flew alone internationally.  When I got up to the kiosk, I started handing her my passport and putting my bag on the moving band.   She then asked me for my card that I had payed for the ticket with, then she told me it was the wrong card and that she needed the card that I payed for the ticket with.  I told her that, that specific card expired, I cut it up and threw it away!!  She told me that I needed to at least find the number if I wanted to get on this flight.  THIS IS EXACTLY THE REASON I WAS NERVOUS!!!  I was sure something like this was going to happen, and it did!!!  She motioned for me to scoot over so the next person could come up.  I wanted to cry, because I could not think of how I was going to find this number.  I called TJ and told him to do whatever he could do to find it.  I started looking up amazon purchases, vitacost purchases, anything I could find where I had used the card, the thing is that we don’t use our cards here for purchasing our groceries and such for security purchases, we just get cash out, so I could not find it!!  I decided to pray, so I stopped and prayed, knowing that I could not fix this but God could.  After praying I decided to ask her again if there was any way we could bypass this or if there was someone over her that I could talk to, so she sent me over to the guy who was head of the department.  When I got over to him, I told him that I still couldn’t find my card number, and that it was expired and that I had thrown it away, he acknowledged me, but then brushed by me to go do something else, I was sure he was just blowing me off!!  After a few minutes he came over to me and told me I could go, I was surprised… I went back over to the kiosk and what do you know they over rode the system and got me through without that wicked little number!  Praise God!!  He answered my prayers.  I was still shaky and nervous, still wanting to cry from the almost disaster.

I walked through security, and when I got to the gate I sat down in a position where I could “people” watch because who doesn’t want to do that in an airport.  A couple english men came and sat next to me, we both started sharing what we were doing in Senegal, they were there for work for a couple weeks, and I shared what we’re doing.  He continued to ask questions, because anytime people ask us what we’re doing in Senegal there is no way to get around who God is and what he is doing in our lives, and how he has lead us here.  He was a science believer, but the kind of science believer that doesn’t believe in God.  He  was fine with me believing what I believe and the muslims believing what they believe, he said that was good for “them”.  I followed that up with a bit of testimony about who God is in my life, I shared how God lead us into missions and into Senegal, and how real he is, and how no man can deny that he exists, all you have to do is look around at humans trees and the entire earth to know that there is a God.  I shared that I have a relationship with him where we communicate on a regular basis and he said that boggled his mind how we could have such clear direction and clear believe when it’s just not possible… obviously that’s where he’s mistaken, and how sad!  It was sad for me to see someone completely rejecting God!  And after living in Senegal for a while I’m not used to that, pretty much everyone believes in a god, the African people are a very spiritual people and I love that!  However obviously, I would love for everyone to know the one true God and have a personal saving relationship with him.  Even though it made me sad that he didn’t believe in God or have a desire to, it also made me thankful for my relationship with God, and for the fact that he has chosen to reveal himself to TJ, me and our girls, and I am grateful that I have a chance to know my heavenly Father and that we have hope in him!  What meaning that brings to our lives, and to know the one true God… what an incredible privilege.  In the moments after I prayed for my new acquaintance that God would be able to pierce through his currently hard heart, that he would have the chance to have a relationship with our true and great God.

Dec 11, 2016

I am beyond grateful I had to the chance to spend a week with my dear sister Cherie, and in Barcelona Spain at that!!

When I flew into Madrid after going through customs, climbing several stair, going down and up elevators and going through more check points… finally I found a bench to lay down on and sleep.  I slept for maybe about an hour.  Unfortunately there was no internet so I couldn’t do anything there… I later found a Starbucks… yay!   Even if you don’t like Starbucks, it is a beautiful site after being out of the country for over a year, I’m pretty sure I spent a fortune on my coffee and chocolate muffin, and then they didn’t have cream for my coffee… no cream?  Who uses milk instead of cream in their coffee?!  Apparently the Spaniards!!  So I asked the poor busy looking girl like 3 times for more of that canned whipped cream in my coffee, I decided that if I was going to spend this much on coffee and Starbucks at that, I was going to HAVE my cream!

After having a nice conversation with a couple newly pregnant couple in Starbucks who just finished their vacation in Spain, I found my gate.

Upon Arriving at the Barcelona Airport, and getting my luggange, find the free buss to take me to terminal 2 and then I needed to find the train… eventually found it, but had to take quite a hike… again with my luggage.  Upon finding the train I needed to buy a special transport card and then wait for the train, I got on the train swiped my card, I payed close attention to my destination, I got off at the right place, but climbed up the wrong side of stairs… I began asking those around me where I might be able to find bus 7, after walking back and forth around a few streets dragging my 2 big pieces of luggage (had lots of gifts to give and lots of gifts to bring home) trying to communicate with people who only speak Spanish, I beginning to feel quite lost, finally I FOUND the right bus stop!!  Upon arrival at the right bus stop I SAW BUS NUMBER 7!!  So I squeezed with my bags in-between some motos and knocked on the door for  him to let me in… well because he was just after the bus stop he wasn’t going to open the door. Ugh!  So I went and sat down for what I was sure was going to be an hour, I wanted to cry, but then 10 min later another bus 7 drove up… yaaaaaay!  I got on the bus and watched carefully again for my destination, when I got off, I had to again drag my luggage down the street, across a big intersection and back down the other side, when I walked into our big hotel I took a deep breath and said “FINALLY… IIIIII’m here!”

I checked in and rested for a few hours, then went out and found some yummy food behind our hotel, and then began my trek back to the airport to help Cherie with her luggage!

My first meal in Barcelona… before getting Cherie

I got on the right bus and got off at the wrong stop… so I walked aaaaaaal the way back to what I thought was the train, it was the right name, but it was the metro not the train, I used my transportation card (10 uses per card) and asked someone which direction to the airport, they said metros don’t go to the airport, so I went back out to the main area and waited 15 min for the lady to help me, but when I asked her for help, she didn’t know a lick of English!!  I didn’t know what to do, so I went up and sat outside in the cold and began to cry because I couldn’t call anyone (dif country) couldn’t talk to anyone, and I didn’t know how to get to the airport or how to get ahold of Cherie!!  Here I am sitting on the bench outside the metro crying.  A man came up to me that I had just passed in the metro and asked me if I wanted to go to the train with him, and I said I don’t know I want to go to the airport, he said the train goes to the airport, he heard me talking to the lady and he said he was a little lost too, but he could help me.  I was thanking God, and then trying to hold back all my tears as I walked with him to the train.  He helped me figure out exactly what to do.  When I got to the airport terminal 2 to be exact, Cherie never came out.  TJ called me with internet, I had a little bit, and told me that Cherie needed my help, but I was confused about where she was, the only way for me to talk to TJ was if he called me, I couldn’t call him or Cherie, So I waited for like 45-1 hour for her, and wondered what the problem was, finally I looked at her itinerary again and saw that she was in terminal 2 A and I was in 2B, so I began running outside towards terminal A… And there she was!!  She said “Theeeeerrrreee you aaaaaarrre!”.  We embraced and were sooooo glad to finally be together!!  We decided to attempt this public transport again, I had successfully done it the opposite way, so we were okay.  On the train, we were together, and it was wonderful. We shared with each other the crazy happenings of the day and night before, it was an eventful trip for both of us!  Cherie gave me a world map necklace that matched hers, so we wore them together most of the week.  You say like little girls? Maybe, but I don’t care, I love this girl and it was so fun to be together!

Together with our world map necklaces!

When we got back to the hotel we settled in a bit, but were so hungry so we headed out for a late dinner, which was fine because people eat late anyway… like 10 or 11 late!  We ate Frankfurt’s and talked and laughed and talked and laughed, it was just so nice to be sitting across the table from such a dear friend and sister.

Day 1:  The next morning to our surprise we ended up getting up at 11:30, we drank some amazingly delicious espresso from the machine in our room, and I ate the waxy donuts that Cherie brought me… Oh my goodness, sooo good!!

doonuuuuuts!

We went out and ate some yummy lunch.  The day consisted of a semi rainy day where we walked through the mall and I bought a jacket with money from my mother in law because I was freezing, and I don’t have any jackets in Senegal.  We walked around the beautiful, fun and old city some, they were selling fresh flowers all along the streets which was so amazing for me, because it is hard to find fresh flowers other than in pots maybe

Flowers!

For dinner found a place to eat “tapas” which is a normal dinner for Spaniards, it is basically like a bunch of little plates with all kinds of food, Iberian ham and quail eggs, brie cheese, fried artichokes, olives, potatoes, scallops, and many other yummy things.  And I have to tell you it was during our dinner times that we ate fun food and talked  and laughed at, and talked and laughed some more, it did my heart such good!  And after our dinner usually we went looking for hot chocolate, because there was different types of hot chocolate all over the city.

Hot Chocolate!

And we of course had to find ourselves some fresh cream for our coffee in one of the little local grocery stores.  We asked someone just to verify that what we were looking at was cream, and he said “well that’s for cooking and desserts and stuff”, he was confused why we would want to put heavy cream in our coffee… again people, your missing out!  We enjoyed our cream in our coffee all week.

Day 2:   We got up a little earlier, and got out sooner, and this time I had my warm jacket to wear, I thanked my jacket several times a day for being warm for me!  We walked around the “Gothic Quarter”, we visited big churches with big windows and lots of detail.

And I found vapor decaffeinated coffee… wahoo!!

Cherie LOVED visiting the churches which made me really enjoy it too, I really just enjoyed being with her, talking and living life side by side for an entire week!  I found myself some raspberries which was is a big missed item for me!

rasberries!

For me, I really enjoyed being somewhere different.  I LOVED walking through the streets and seeing the balconies above the skinny allies.  I loved that everything was clean and we rarely saw a piece of trash on the ground, I enjoyed not being looked at as a foreigner, it might sound funny but as long as I didn’t talk, no one knew that I wasn’t a Spanish speaking citizen, kids weren’t yelling out “toubab” every time I walked by!!

I loved that I could actually experience the cold.  I loved that I didn’t have to be afraid to take a deep breath for fear of breathing in a smell unheard of to most Americans.  I enjoyed the lack of dust and pollution, I liked that there were fixed prices, although sometimes I wanted to barter and did!  In the afternoon we stopped for some amazing coffee with some Irish goodness in it!

Unfortunately this is the day I started having butt problems and by that I mean it was difficult to walk because of the pain in my leg and lower back muscles.

stretching out my hurt butt

We had some incredible Asian food for dinner, like I said we had so much fun eating “fun” food!!

This was on our way to the asian restaurant. It was a little Senegalese artisan shop, it wasn’t open sadly but it was fun to see.

SUCH delicious food!!

Day 3:  Day 3 was massage day.  We got to the place a little early so we went to the chocolate museum that was near by… it was okay.

All of this stuff was made out of chocolate!

My amazing mother paid for our massage, for Cherie’s Birthday.  I got to spend Cherie’s Birthday with her! yaaaaaaay, so fun! The massage place was in actual ancient roman baths… wow, and there were several different types of pools we could go into, salted, jacuzzi, hot bath, warm bath and cold bath.  There was candles everywhere… no other big lights! They had hot mint tea in these ancient looking pots and fresh fruit.  I’m sure people had a membership there and I’m sure they pay a lot!!  We spent 25 min in the baths, had our massages together and then spent 25 more minutes in the baths… we opted for the hot bath mostly.  After the massage, I looked around a what seemed to be health food store with lots of stuff that I can’t get in Senegal, I just looked at  a lot of stuff because honestly it was just fun to have the option of buying it even if I didn’t have the room!  After buying a couple fun items, it was time to go to our “Dinner and a Show”.  We were both very excited about this!  We made reservations to see Spanish dancing and it came with dinner, so we bought the tickets… so worth our time and money!  Again our dinner was really fun… fun food, and such sweet conversation!!  They are really big on aged ham, they have ham legs hanging out to sell everywhere and it’s not cheap! So in the restaurant they just had this leg sitting there, and they would slice the ham right off it. For dessert there was churros, but there was only one left, so I asked if they were going to make more, they weren’t but they did for me.  They also had a chocolate fountain… yes!! So I dipped the churros in the chocolate fountain.  Most everyone was done with their dinner and had already entered the room next to us where the show would be, well, I had just got my churros and wanted to eat them!!  So all the servers were just standing at the door they kept looking at us and so we started to get up and go, I just kept taking bites of my churros… too good!!

Trying to finish my churros while they gave us the “stank” eye!

In my opinion we had the best seats in the house.  We were in the middle in the back, but it was a small room, so there was only two rows of people in front of us.  The dancing was so fun and different and very entertaining!!  We laughed a lot and really enjoyed our evening!!

We weren’t allowed to take pictures till the end so we took some pictures before pretending that we were watching the show… lol

The show

We waited awkwardly behind a couple girls for like 5 min to take a picture with this backdrop. lol

Day 4:  We Went to History of Barcelona museum,  It was very interesting, but a lot of information! haha.. lol I’m still like a kid in that if they don’t make it really interesting for me I get a little bored, but again I was with Cherie and that’s what I wanted to do.  I paid for Cherie’s chocolate museum ticket and she paid for my history museum ticket… so it all worked out 🙂  We had a lot of fun walking around the shops looking at different stuff, Cherie noticed that I like to shop… well I do like to look at stuff, that is true! 🙂

me shopping!

We didn’t take pictures of food that night, because well it was rather sad, however we did find some yummy Hot Chocolate again which was like dark chocolate pudding, they happened to have some Irish goodness also 🙂  The guy made us hot chocolate and then he went to whip cream, he kept smelling the bottle and then he smelled the whipped cream after he whipped it and he said no, and through it away… but we were laughing the whole time that he kept smelling it, so it was too funny, so then he left and came back with cream and whipped it and gave it to us.  And then there was another guy that gave us some chocolates and he didn’t speak ANY English, so he pointed to the chocolate and made this expression with his face and gesture with his hands away from his mouth and said “boom boom!… boom boom” We laughed and said “Mucho Gracias”  and he said with his lively voice “Danada Chickas”  Ugh… too much laughter for Cherie and I… so good! 🙂

We went back to our hotel room and watched a show about Queen Elizabeth, and put our tired selves to bed!

Day 5: Our last full day together, we planned a big day.  We had already bought tickets to go see Gaudi park and buildings.  When I woke up in the morning I had a headache, but I REALLY wanted to go, so I ate breakfast, took Excedrin and we were on our way.  It was a really cool and fun park, but my headache persisted.

From the 3 high crosses in Barcelona

We still had tickets for Sagrada Familia, so we found a little cafe, had a late lunch, I took Ibupfrophen, and we headed to the huge ongoing site and church building Sagrada Familia, I felt a little better but it was still there.  The Church adn

the inside

From the top of the tower in the church

the Outside. Wow!

When we were all done it was evening, and we went back to the hotel, and I rested for about an hour and then we went back to the same place that we had had the tapas before, but we were a little bummed because “our” spot wasn’t available outside because the heater wasn’t working, and our waiter was not waiting on us very well like our previous waiter, who also happened to be much better looking than the older balding Indian man.  Finally our previous waiter showed up apparently he was called in, and we expressed to him our regret in coming to the restaurant because he wasn’t there to make our experience better, good looks and good service goes a long way people!!

Day 6: Departure Day.  This day I had planned on going to the airport with Cherie on public transport to save money and spend a tiny bit more time with her, but that night I woke up with another raging headache and took more medicine as well as tried to find something small to eat in the room.  After taking the medicine my stomach hurt and I couldn’t sleep, and before getting up in the morning I had only gotten 1 hour of sleep.  So I decided to rest in the hotel and leave around 12 when I needed to go.  Fortunately I did feel a little better by the time I needed to go.  I took a taxi where you tag them on your phone and they come pick you up and you pay directly on your phone… pretty cool.  When I got to the airport apparently airport cleaning maintenance was on strike, they had come to the airport with newspapers and shredded them all over the inside.  I laughed all the way through the airport.

Airport was on Strike

In Madrid when I got to my next gate, there were Senegalese everywhere speaking Wolof, and even though I don’t understand Wolaf and even though at times it has been the root of my frustration, it sounded like home, I was happy to be in my comfort zone again.  I took the day as easy as I could, but by the time I arrived in Dakar, my head was pounding and I was feeling terrible.  At one point during my flight there were several young men surrounding me asking me all sorts of questions… and finally the question came “Are you married?” and of course I say yes, and they say “Oh to a Senegalese?” and I explain that no he’s American and we have 2 daughters and like always they didn’t believe me, so I showed them a picture.  I explained that even if I was unmarried I wouldn’t marry them because they take more than one wife, and I don’t work that way… so of course we discussed that for a while.  Right before the plane landed I slipped my Senegalese skirt on over my pants to hopefully help my case as I arrived in Dakar.  Sure enough that skirt did more than I could have ever imagined!!  When I stood up to get off the plane all those same men started commenting… “Ooooh she’s Senegalese, look at that skirt” They were even showing the other women what was appropriate to wear.. whoops.. lol  When I got off the plane and arrived at customs, the man was very kind to me and started laughing with me, he told me he loved my skirt and wanted his wife to wear a skirt like that.  The comments continued through the airport, as I got out the gate people didn’t really bother me the way they normally do, because I had my skirt on, and all the way out to the car, people knew I lived here.  When I got to the airport I will wear those clothes. every. time.

Finally I got my man, and my baby Penny… poor Ava was sick in the back seat! 🙁  I was so happy to be home, but also in so much pain from the migraine.

And coming back to Senegal after being in Spain for a week, there was things I realized that I was grateful for.  It was good for me to come back to Senegal and realize how much it really is my home!!  I love that we are surrounded by Africans, I love that it is rude to not acknowledge someone, it is the right thing to do to ask a neighbor, friend or acquaintance about their family and how their are doing.  I love their desire to help one another and that relationships are worth so much here!!  I love that this is my home and this is where my family is.

This is what my family made for my coming home

We’ve been looking forward to this in the sense that we knew that our lives would be lived on the other side of the world serving God, we knew that.  I has been 11 years since God asked me to “GO”!

These days I miss home…  I really miss it!  I don’t know if it’s because we’ve been here for a year and everything is pretty much normal, and we are used to life.  After a year of living here there are things that I am missing that I didn’t really miss before, new things.  I made a meal for a group of friends the other day, which if you don’t know truly is my love language, if I work hard to make food for you it’s because I care and want to show it!  This group of friends… well they didn’t not enjoy it, but after eating my Indian Butter chicken, Naan and Raita they didn’t respond the way that some of my other friends would have responded.  I wasn’t extremely disappointed because I know this is a different land, different culture, different taste buds, but after,  I did miss those people who LOVE to eat my food… you know who you are!

Butter Chicken and Raita

I have been quite emotional… and it’s not even “THAT” time of the month.  I have missed friends and family, and church…. Home, I have missed home.  I think what I forgot is that it’s OKAY to miss home.  I think I forgot that when God asked me to come here he knew I would be leaving a part of my heart elsewhere.  I miss my car, which is weird I haven’t really thought about that for a year, but ya I miss driving and singing at the top of my lungs, having much needed conversations with my Lord.  It’s like after a year these things are becoming a reality.  Even though I know that we moved our lives here, I have still felt like we are just on this trip and we will go back home sometime soon.

Undoing.  I feel like God is undoing me a little bit… a lot-a-bit!  This refining, redefining, this undoing, redoing process is hard.  It’s sort of like a grieving process which we all know just takes time.  I think I am grieving my life, my friends, my family, my church and my culture being ripped away from me.  I am coming to the next level of realization that this has been left behind.  Because my relationships are important to me I still stay connected and my heart will always be all over this planet in the hands of close friends and family.  Today I hold tight my husband and my two daughters who I am so grateful I get to be on this journey with.  At the end of the day when I ask myself if this is worth it?  There is no question in my mind, because God is good and I honestly don’t want to be anywhere but where He wants us.  He said “GO” and here we are.  There are lonely hard moments, but as I learn to lean into him, I find that we have such sweet time together, and that daily life and small daily decisions cannot be made without him.  And what I cannot forget is that this is a privilege that He has chosen us, seriously weak people to do his work.  I am grateful for HIS clarity and knowing without a doubt that it is GOD who brought us here, and the SAME God who is working in the hearts of men drawing them to himself.

A question I realize has been entering people’s minds is, how am I doing in the baby department?  You know it’s funny!  I have been so content with where I am at and have been so grateful to just be our family this past year, to not focus on  babies, or worried about loosing babies.  I have not had a desire for more children right now, other pregnant people have not brought pain to my heart, I have honestly just been content with the break enjoying the lack of pain and suffering.

All that said, I also realized that having lost several babies, has effected my two daughters as well as the fact that they want more siblings.  So if we have more kids, that will effect them, if we loose more babies that will effect them and if we have no more kids, that will also effect them… there is no way out here.  Not too long after we moved here Ava promised that she would be praying for a brother every day, she has not failed.  Ava and now Penny pray for 2 baby boys every. single. night.  Penny now prays for their lives, she prays they will serve God, and be good Godly men, she prays for specific things in their lives.  Last week she prayed that TJ would make them a crib and told God “How can we have 2 boy babies and no crib?”, “Daddy better make a crib”.  To tell you the truth I don’t know what to do with this, and my heart is a little calloused I think.  TJ and I have been challenged to continue reminding God of his promises as we look forward to whoever baby Joseph is, so that is what we have been doing.  And most recently we have been challenged to just lean into God and who he is, to seek his face, not to look for what miracles he has for us, but to seek Him and his character.

Yesterday Ava started talking about lost babies as she often does.  She talked about Nola and told me she remembered looking at the sonogram without a heartbeat and seeing mommy cry all the way home, she remembered looking at Nola’s body before putting her in the ground.  She remembered very specific moments, and this normally doesn’t bother me, I think it’s good for her to work through the emotions and memories.  However yesterday was a little different for me, she started talking about our last baby, she said “mommy, do you remember how me and Penny were looking at those videos every week on the couch about how your baby was growing? And then all of the sudden one day we just stopped watching them?” I had forgotten about that… You know how I was doing fine?  How content I was feeling?  In this moment my heart felt an instant stab of pain like it had just happened… As those last words flowed out of her mouth tears rolled down my face.  Part of the pain is that it effects my children too, not just me or TJ, they feel the pain too!  It was the first time in a long time that I felt that really strong, pit in my stomach pain of loosing so many children.  It’s the pain of burying my daughter, the pain of seeing a pregnancy test, being excited and coming to find I have lost another one.  The pain of believing God had a baby for me and then loosing it.  Soooo… I suppose part of missing home is also from the pain of this journey with our children.  I know it’s not over yet, so here I am I can’t do anything but lean into him.  He knows me and my heart, he knows my daughters and their heart’s, he hears their cries, He hears mine.

Ava and her Nanny

Penny and her Nanny