A grand accomplishment!

Day before ceremony pics

Graduation Day

Morning before Ceremony pics--packing up, truck and all. A last minute final decision to move to Indiana until God reveals his next steps truly became a whole family affair. 

A visit we least expected but so appreciated. Mauri has been closely involved in David's life since David entered the youth group as a 6th grader. He mentored David as a youth intern, then a youth pastor, and now a campus pastor at LakePointe Firewheel Church. And, he also graduated from DBU. 

One last spur of the moment trip to one of his favorite places for lunch, Cane's!

Giving the family a campus tour while David was in rehearsal. 

God blessed us with a beautiful day, beautiful weather, and beautiful skies.

Peggy and I admiring the prayer garden.

The beautiful stained glass right outside the balcony of the sanctuary that I never noticed before.

Juan made it just in time!

Officially a DBU graduate!

David and his roommate/best bud, Sean

Looks like that diploma just says 

Michael Alspaugh! LOL. Nice try, Mike.

Going down the stairs was much easier than going up.

I can't imagine all the memories made in that house 

over the last three years. 

Loading up the last few things before 

heading to the celebration.

Good food and pickle ball to follow for the next three hours. 

Not very often we get grandparents from both sides in a family pic!

So thankful for other people taking pics that night!

And then one more celebration a day later, 

joint for my birthday celebration.

So proud of my college graduate, though it's definitely bittersweet. Closing chapters are never easy, now matter how exciting the next chapter may be. I myself have a lot of mixed emotions, knowing his chapter at DBU is now complete. 

He officially moved to Indiana now to work with his dad and uncle until God makes his next step (and direction) clear. 

 

25 years

 

I can't let this last week slip past me without posting about the most recent milestone in our lives--our 25th anniversary! 

Over the last year, I pondered over what we might do to celebrate such a milestone. We looked into a trip to Israel with our church, but with so many unknowns at the time surrounding our son David's graduation, it made any kind of planning rather difficult and complicated. Plus the last time we made a big plan around a big milestone, it didn't really go as planned or live up to any of our expectations--leaving a sour taste in our mouth rather than the fond memories we hoped to create. 

So we decided to bite the bullet financially and hire Mike and Matt's business, Tipton Home Services, to get the ball rolling on the next stage of our house remodel rather than continuing to drag it out over a long period of time by doing little bits at a time as money, time, resources, energy, and optimum weather just happened to all coincide. That may take a few years, LOL. 

Our actual anniversary came and went this past Wednesday. But with all the focus on the house, we didn't even get each other cards. Mike wrote me a sweet handwritten note from his heart, and I left little pre-made Scriptural love/encouragement notes for him all over the house to find in the morning. Then for dinner, we ate at Texas Roadhouse (of course) and then walked around SAM's Club to find new things for our house project. We then sat and had coffee at home and played cards, since it was pouring down rain. Our "big" gift, a new bathroom vanity, came in that day, but we couldn't haul it home for two more days because of the rain. 

Currently, we're still living in a big mess at home, but it's finally starting to come together, and Mike really seems to be enjoying the messy process because he can see the finished product in his head. He and Matt do bathroom and kitchen remodels all the time and know what kind of transformation they can make happen, but I personally just have to close my eyes and hold my breath until we are out of the mess and can actually settle in. I have to pray for a grateful, patient, heart of contentment every day and to speak encouraging, edifying words to the man whose skillful hands are hard at work in this process. 

To be honest, it's more than just a simple remodel like they're used to doing. This current project meant cutting up floors and digging down to the dirt. We literally had a digging party where my little nephews all came over with their little shovels and had a blast throwing all that dirt out the window. Then, of course, it rained for days and left a ton of mud all over. Once they dug a deep enough crawl space to put the plumbing and heating under the room, they took out the old joists under the house and put in new ones, then laid a new floor, and finally they moved on to leveling out the walls and framing out the room. Mike had to spend time in the attic getting all the electrical side in order, and hopefully soon we'll see some drywall go up on the walls. (I've been told that will be a whole new mess....as you can tell, this is definitely not my thing.)  Even in hiring the company, it's still a lengthy job that won't be done for a few more weeks. 

But it reminds me of the last twenty-five years that we've been married. Marriage is hard work, and quite frankly, it's messy. Really messy. And it's ugly more often than it is pretty. Sometimes you have to tear up the old floor, demolish what's currently standing, and rebuild something new with a new foundation to stand on. Sometimes you have to pull off the old drywall and paneling, get rid of the old, soiled insulation, and re-insulate with what God wants us to surround ourselves and insulate our lives with. It takes patience, perseverance, determination, and grace to get through the mess to the beauty. But like we learned in our ReEngage program a couple of years ago, if you give up too soon, you may have missed the best part that's still to come. I'm looking forward to seeing that soon in our house. 

I do have a picture we took right after dinner on our anniversary, as well, but it's still on Mike's phone, so I will have to post it later. 

The kitchen is also in another stage of remodeling, so life's just all up in the air. Lol. Stay tuned--with patience, please. 

An unplanned addition

 When we talked about moving, I started sending Mike random pictures of cool reading nooks built in to different houses, saying I wanted a house with one. He kept telling me that he could/would build me one wherever we moved.

Then we bought this old house and just couldn't see a good place to put one, so I was kind-of bummed. 

Most of our projects slowed down or came to a halt through the winter as a lot of time and energy went into cutting, splitting, and stacking firewood, then keeping enough inside by the fireplace, and then keeping a good fire going. We were far more prepared this winter than last, but it's still a lot of physical work to try to keep the house heated with mostly firewood. Plus it's cold outside and gets dark so early. 

So as we started to see signs of spring, Mike came home from a job with a few extra supplies left over or taken out of different jobs he was working on to start building a pantry in the kitchen. He started to put up the wall for the pantry, and then we got to thinking about the other side of the wall. Rather than just put up some drywall, we started thinking about shelves, maybe for coffee cups, decorations, or even books. Then we started envisioning a little reading nook, and the rest is history. We put the pantry on hold while the design Mike saw in his head took shape over the next several days. It still needs a few finishing touches, but he ran out of materials and I ran out of patience to fill it up. He'll finish it up when we have enough materials to finish the pantry on the other side of the wall. Could be a few more weeks, maybe more. But I'm super happy with how my new little reading nook turned out, how it changed the look of the house, and how it just seems to be a perfect fit. It's my official prayer corner and will make a great place to sit and watch the sunrise this summer through the window across the room.

As I watched Mike spend his whole weekend and then his evenings after work making this come together, it made me realize how much I appreciate his craftsmanship, his creativity, and his talent. Sure, there are still a lot of things to be done around the house, but I need to take the time to appreciate his time and effort on this one. He knew it was the one unique thing I really wanted in my house, and he found a way to make it work. Plus it added extra storage space, so now we have the perfect place to store toys for when my nephews or my friends' kids come over. 

Another step forward

In one sense it's just a piece of paper, but it speaks a thousand words to me. It takes me back to that simple conversation with a friend at a park several years ago when she asked me if there's anything else I wanted to do with my life if I could. Out of nowhere came the words, "I'd like to be a counselor. Specifically a Biblical counselor."

God was listening. 

Then just shy of two years ago, I stood in the cafeteria with my young teammate at Bullock Elementary and said the same thing. "I'd like to go back to school to study Biblical counseling."

God was listening.

And again, about a year ago, I saw down with the counselor on staff at Terrace Lake Church to talk through what kind of options I could look at to begin my journey to become a certified Biblical counselor. After talking through it all and looking at several options available, I decided to follow the same route that she took, as well as all of the lay counselors at our church. Shortly after that, I hopped on a plane back to Dallas, Texas to attend the annual conference with the Association of Biblical Counselors and began my journey to certification. 

Today, I joined that group of certified lay counselors at my church for our monthly meeting that consisted of more training, behind the scenes planning for the church, and mutual prayer, support, and encouragement. 

So thankful for all that I have learned (especially about myself) and also how I have grown through these studies for the pictured certificate. So thankful to be in a place with continual training and support. So curious to see how God will (continue) to use me in this area. 

 

An extra Christmas blessing

David flew back to Indiana with me on New Year's night and stayed for another 9 days with us. Mike and I were back to work, so David was able to work with his uncle for several days while here, and we spent most of our evenings playing games and watching movies. We also went over to our friends' house for one evening to play games, eat desserts, and drink coffee--friends that are as close in age to David as they are to us, so he fit right in!

But the sweetest blessing came last Sunday when I was able to cross paths with my Grandma, who was staying about and hour or so from us to help with another grandchild. She happened to call my mom on her birthday while I was at my mom's house, and we found out that she was going to be in Indiana the same time as David. So we said we'd try to connect--and that's just what we did! What a priceless time catching up with her. Had it been just me, I probably could have talked for hours on end with her. I just adore her and respect her so much. Her love for Jesus truly makes her glow, and it always has. I hadn't seen her since 2016, and I hope to see her much more often now that I'm living up North and am settled here. 

Then after our lunch with her, we went across the street to Boot Barn to get Mike his Christmas present from me and David. But David surprised me and had me try on boots and jeans so he could be the first one to finally get me in a pair of real cowboy boots. Such a fun, truly memorable day. Another day of this break to cherish in my heart. 

David flew back to Texas early on Wednesday morning to start his last semester at DBU, so I guess my "break" is officially over. Back to reality, but thankful to be back home with my new friends here.