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| Layla licking some melted (dairy-free) chocolate chips. God bless Costco. |
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| She has taken to dressing in only one color each day. So...this was "white day." ;) The hat arrived from Sue in the mail and she decided that it was HER hat, and it needed to be worn all the time . |
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| Finn loves to ride around on this Little Tykes school bus. |
Last but certainly not least, this is a picture of our last ever "Communications Meeting." Our pastor, Pat Kahnke, is on the left, and the associate pastor, Mike Goslar, is on the right--with his son Elijah. We met every Thursday for an hour or so for church related communications purposes (in case you don't know I'm our church secretary...), but really it just became fun chatting and snack time, with a bit of business thrown in for good measure. Mike is moving out to New York to plant a church in Brooklyn. We are SO sad to lose him, but very confident that he's going to the exact right place. This was our final meeting together. Sigh. :(
In OTHER news, I'm going to be doing some part-time
paid work (I have been volunteer for the past 5 years) for our church starting very soon...Renee actually will too! The two of us, and a lot of other people, are hoping to all combine to do at least 1/2 of what Mike was doing for our church. A tough mission for sure, but we figure we can at least handle 1/2 his stuff, right?? ;) In all seriousness, though, I'm thrilled about this for two reasons:
1. It's wonderful to be seen and valued for things other than just mommy related stuff. Don't get me wrong--that is VALUABLE. But it's hard going from teaching full time to mommy full time with no bridge in between. I couldn't have handled it before, but now is a good time for this. The kids are older, I'm slowly getting my act together again after the "young kids" chaos... ;) It's all coming together, and I LOVE to use those old skills I have shelved for the past few years! :)
2. Money. Jonas makes a great salary for sure, but buying a house has stretched our budget. We currently don't have any way of buying tickets to go out East! If Jonas were to have to buy a new car we'd be in a tight spot, etc. Layla is going to pre-school next year. All of these things don't require a ton of money, but they do require some, and so I'm delighted to actually be able to contribute to family finances again!! :) If my small amount of money can cover just those three things, I'll be thrilled. Thrilled! :)
