What's going on?

It's been a while since I really blogged about what is actually going on in my life. There has been a lot of stuff going on, so that's probably why. I'm just too busy to talk about my busy life. That and there are things that I really couldn't share on the internet until they were done, so I was really stuck.

Anyway, here goes.

Tony and I have left the church where we have been for the last 10 years. God has called us away, and since we have been gone (our last week was the last week of August) He has confirmed for us that this was from Him.

That was a really rough decision. It's hard to leave the normal and go to the unknown. God really didn't give us any direction besides "go" so we have been going. A church search is really not anything that I have ever done, so I sat down at my computer and researched. Honestly, if the church didn't have a website, I didn't know that they existed beyond those that we had already ruled out, so that's where our search began.

This was really frustrating. When we began the search, I felt my hands tied. I couldn't blog about it. I couldn't even talk to my friends about it. It was just Tony and me and God. I felt like if I couldn't talk about it soon, I was going to explode. Tony and I weren't able to get out and talk about it much, and we couldn't discuss it in front of the kids (they were confused enough already).

Now, we have a church where we have been attending for a while, and it looks like we are likely to join. I've been feeling unsettled, though, and it didn't help that I was hanging out with people from our old church on Saturday and people kept hinting that we should come back. It's really hard to just smile and not comment. Yesterday something happened, though. I'd had a conversation via text with one of my friends (who was actually one of the people who had made a comment, but she got the hint and let it drop), and she said some things that made me think. I told her that my family was all exited about this church, but I really wasn't. I just wanted a friend, and I don't make friends really easily, so I wanted my old friends. She basically told me to get over myself. Not like that, this person is unfailingly polite so she wouldn't put it that way, but that was the gist of what she said. I stopped and prayed. I prayed quite a bit that night and through to Sunday morning. I really wanted to be sure that my issues weren't just me being selfish and not wanting to change.

Sunday School hour Tony, my mom, and I have been meeting with the pastor. It's just something that this church does to let people know what they are getting into coming to the church. The question that came up had to do with our past churches. That conversation, that could have taken a few seconds had the pastor phrased his question any differently, took the whole hour. We let him know what we have been through with churches and our emotional roller coaster over the years. It was a good conversation. Afterward, I felt a lot better about staying. It's hard to be where you have a whole lot of history, but I think it was harder to try and stay where they knew nothing about us.

Then the evening came, and it was time for AWANA. Tony and I have never had our kids in AWANA and not been involved before, so has been really odd for us to just drop off our kids and not know what to do. It turned out to be a really good time. Tony and I have gotten to know a some awesome people. Some that I could easily see being really good friends with. I'd never had that before this Sunday there. For the first time, I'm actually at ease with being there. Tony has been happy with it there, and excited to join for a couple of weeks now. The kids are getting along really well, too. I really just needed to get over myself.

What else is going on?

I've started another project. Becca's Girl Scout troop needed a leader and I volunteered. It's been stressful, but it's really starting to work out. I have a lot of really great help, and while paperwork isn't usually my thing, and that's most of my job, I'm thinking I can handle it. The troop is getting smaller. I don't know if it's because of anything that I have done, but it actually needed to be smaller anyway. Last year it went from 9 girls at the beginning of the year to something like 55 at the end. It was huge and disorganized. Now we are getting the structure that we needed, and the girls aren't sticking around. We still have around 30 girls in our multi-level troop, but it's working out well.

What else?

My grandmother has been in and out of the hospital lately. She's currently in a rehab facility. She just got over pneumonia after a major surgery (colostomy) and still isn't walking. This has been stressful for my mom more than anyone else. My mom is going out to be with my grandmother every day. It's taking a lot out of her.

This affects me because my mom hasn't been around for Tony and I to go out at night after the kids go to bed as often. She usually made dinner, too. That's not happening anymore. It's been hard to learn how to cook without overheating myself. The kids miss their grandma, too. Still, my grandmother needs my mom more than I need her right now. We're all doing okay without her. It's not as easy, but that's okay.

Today my mom is off work, but relaxing during the day then going out to see my grandmother at her regular time. I'm trying my best to just let her rest and keeping the twins from disturbing her too much. My mom really needs it.

Even MORE?

Micah has begun a new behavior therapy. He has a behavior tutor that is coming out 5 hours a week to help him. He has begun to run away a lot, and they are going to be working with him on that as well as a bunch of other smaller goals.

I'm really happy about the therapy, but until the tutor is settled with him, that's 5 hours out of my week focusing on Micah as well. That's harder. I was hoping that it means that I'm going to have that time to focus more on my girls, but I guess it will be a while before they get to that point.

I think that's about it. I would talk about my craft projects that I am starting, but they are for family for Christmas. Since some of the family reads my blog, that isn't going to work. Other than that, there's the financial struggles that we are having (like everyone else on the planet), but no one wants to read about that and this blog is long enough already. Besides, God has it all under control anyway.