An old Friend

This last week I had a wonderful friend come to visit me. It was just what I needed this week. Good ol' roommate Helaine Rozelle came all the way from Dunbar WI to visit me while she was on spring break. I can't even tell you how nice it was to have a friend that I feel so comfortable with. We lived with each other for 1 year at Northland and the level of comfortableness that you develop with your friends from college especially your roommates is unexplainable. The odd thing is, you will never be in a situation that will prompt that kind of friend ship again. It was great to have that christian fellowship too.

We spent a day in New Jersey shopping with another friend. I loved having her in the kitchen while I cooked and cleaned up. Staying up late talking about nothing in particular. I loved have a shopping buddy who happens to have the same sort of habits and ideas about shopping.

Its funny how you can enjoy your time so much with someone and you don't even have to do anything in particular.

On Sat we went to the famous Scranton St. Patrick's Day Parade. It was so much fun. I do like to do stuff like that. I guess it has a reputation of being a pretty roudy parade but it wasn't too bad where we were. And guess who else showed up for the parade. The famous Hillary Clinton. She came so close to us and we got some very funny pictures of her. :-)

On saturday we sadly had to go and take Helaine back to her ride. I'm so glad that she gave up her break to come and cheer me up as Helaine can always do to any room she walks into. :-) I love her to death and I will miss her company in this Scranton PA.

Trusting God

I'm trying to think how I can word what I'm feeling right now. Its like I know all the right things to say, but yet its hard to believe them and act and respond to my belief. I have a tendacy to worry and stress about things, finances, schedules, even stuff like the economy and the voting and what's going to happen to our lives in this country, what if's. Somedays I feel like I just worry about everything under the sun.

At the same time, I don't know how unsaved people can live every day with out the under riding assurance that there is a God in control, that he takes care of us, and that his plan is sovereign for every issue that I worry about. I know that the "world" worries about things and I can't figure out how they just go about everyday without some sort of assurance that someone is controlling this whole world.

Some days I feel like the only reason I should get up and control my thoughts is because I believe that there is a God. But at the same time, if I'm looking for some sort of calming feeling to overcome me when I think or read about God's promises on loving and taking care of us, there isn't much relief. But I'm starting to realize (probably again, I'm always in need of remembering this fact) that Faith isn't about feelings. A good friend Meghan Osborne was the person who first started to make me realize this and through her death it really became a realization. I choose to everday put my Faith in a God who I believe in, I believe that the Bible is true even when I don't understand everything there is to understand about it. I have to choose to believe that events and situations are all part of God's plan.

I think even just writing this out has made things seem a little brighter. I don't know if this will make sense to people or sound like I'm crazy. But its just something that I have to remind my self about. God is in Control, His way is Best, and there is no need to worry about things.

Daniel James

Congratulations Jerelyn and Bryan Kurty on the birth of your new son! His name is Daniel James and he was born on Feb. 19th, weighed 8lbs 13 oz, and was 20 inches long. He is very healthy and doing great. But not without a little difficulty getting him into this world. I went down to visit Jerelyn that Sat right after Valentines Day (which was her due date). All day on Sunday she was having contractions. My mom showed up from Ecuador and we were so excited to be together with her again. So Monday morning Jerelyn called me and Mum and told us the Doctor said to go in for labor. (Jerelyn had called her that morning and explained about the contractions and they were coming often and hard so the doctor said to go in) I thought ( I obviously don't know much about these things) that she was going to have the baby soon, and I was so happy that I was going to be there. I had Monday off of work for President's Day. So we spent all day in the hospital and everything was moving very slowly. I started to think maybe I won't get to be here. About 2pm the doctor decides to go ahead and induce her. So again I figure it's goign to be soon now. But I have to leave to come home. So I was sad that I was going to miss it. But Jerelyn spent all night and the whole next morning still in labor. She had over 30 hours of labor, and the doctor finally decided to go ahead and do a c-section. Daniel's heart rate was slowing down. So after all that she ended up having a c-section anyways. She was pretty tired after all that, but now is doing great and the doctor says one of the best recoveries he has seen. We thank God so much for this healthy baby and relatively few complications throughout the whole pregnancy. Now we are loving visiting them on the weekends and seeing all the family again. My dad and Jeff still are in Ecuador and will get to see him in May. But its fun for all the girls to be together with a baby around.

where are we now?

Another update on our lives. . . We are settling in very nicely and we have enjoyed both of our new jobs. Richard has started classes and is going to enjoy all of them. There is a lot of work though, so he will be pretty busy, which will probably almost be as hard on me because I am so used to a different schedule. So we are trying to get adjusted to this new schedule.

A while ago I wrote about our problem with cockroaches in our apartment in CO. Now we have a new situation. We are getting used to our new apartment. But the heat bill has been outrageous. We thought things were ok, but we got our first bill and it was crazy high. So we turned the heat way down to about 60 degrees thinking that should help and we got an electric heater that we can use sometimes. So we get our next bill and we only saved about $70. We were freezing the entire month. Our butter is so hard sitting on the counter, everything we touch or our clothes we put on or anything was so freezing cold. So after being very frustrated about the entire situation, Richard decided to climb up into the attic and see how the insulations situation was. Come to find out, there is not one piece of insulation in our attic. So right away we called our landlord. He had no idea this was the situation and had never been up there. So thankfully he more than willingly bought us enough insulation to put in, and Richard volunteered to put it in. That was so nice of the landlord. So while Richard is just starting classes and working full time had to find time to put the insulation in. But he did, and I think that it has helped our situation. At least I don't feel as cold as before. But it might be in my head. We will know for sure when we get our next heat bill.

I'm so thankful that we got that worked out. Now we are just waiting for Jerelyn (my twin) to have her baby. My mom is coming back to the states in 2 weeks. And I will try to spend as many weekends as I can while my mom is back with them. Jerelyn is only like 3 hours from me. So I can't wait. Our whole family is so excited.

But classes are going very well for Richard. We are still getting used to a new place, but everything just takes time. We are still looking for a church that we can get involved in and serve and have fellowship. WE are both very anxious to finally just decide on one. It has been harder than we thought it was going to be.

So that is the update on us. I will write a nice note as soon as Jerelyn has the baby!

Jobs

Once again we are so amazed at how God provides for us and is taking care of us. Its mind boggling to think about the fact that we don't deserve and he gives so much.
Well this is how I feel because God once again has worked out all the details for us. And time after time I still get impatient and worried.
We have been here exactly a month and everything is changed over and fully become residents in PA. We both have full time jobs, his seminary schedule is set up. We have all of our Christmas presents and are able to celebrate wonderfully at our new apartment with decorations, a tree, and the holiday baking. And we still have money left in the bank. The only thing that we can do and should do is give God the praise for being so gracious with us.

The details about my job I think are amazing mostly becuase of how impatient and worried I get about things. Of course I had been looking everywhere for jobs. I was trying to get a job that I would use my Spanish. So Richard found this legal office that was looking for a bilingual intake secretary. So of course I jumped at it and contacted them and sent them my resume. Meanwhile I kept calling people to check up on status of applications and trying different things. Then on thursday they called and asked if I could go in the next day for an interview. I was very happy. So Friday I went to the interview. I thought it went well, but the only thing I thought was bad was that they didn't believe that I knew how to read and write spanish. But I tried to convince them that I did. So it was over and they said they would get back with me later. So now back to just waiting. I didn't do too much other looking because I really wanted this job. Meanwhile Richard got a job and started working right away. So I just wait at home all day. Come Weds of the next week and I was really getting anxious. I was waiting for a rejection letter to come in the mail, and I even sent out my resume to 3 other people that afternoon. Then later that day the lady called me back and offered me the position. But it gets better. I was worried about my schedule being worked out with the holidays and the wedding we have to travel to. But turns out I will just train a few days this next week and then start right away full time when I get back from my trip. Its so perfect. Now I can enjoy all the holiday bustle without being busy with work, but I have the assurance and security of a job.
The job is pretty good paying, full benefits, and paid vacations and holidays. Its so amazing.

I just love to look back at how God has taken care of us so much.
I hope that you guys can testify to that too. It makes you realize how much you don't need to worry. Matthew 6.

Here We Are!!

Well we have officially become residents of PA and no longer CO. This is kinda sad since we loved being from the great CO and we loved living there. So the story of our move.

We left Grand Junction on a Tues afternoon and Richard drove the big moving truck pulling my car behind, and then I was driving his ford Ranger behind him. We just went to Denver that day, but that is the hardest part of the trip at least on the cars and gas tank. We made it over the mountains fine. Which was a huge answer to prayer. The next 3 days were filled with the days taking a lot longer that we had originally thought. We were very tired every night. It wasn't too much fun driving separately either. But every night we stayed at friend's or families' houses which was very nice. We finally arrived to our new apartment on Saturday night. Richard's sister Melissa met us here and opened the apartment for us. I was right. I did have my hopes up too much. The place seemed a little less than desired. It smelled a lot like smoke and we have found that the people below us smoke a lot. This smell will never go away that means. I was so sad about that. It was one of the things that I was looking forward to so much. But I guess I'm doomed to smell like smoke my whole life. I do burn candles and have lots of air freshner things, and they help. But every time we walk in the house we get a big wiff if smoke smell. Oh well, its not the end of the world.

Our heaters are old radiator heaters. Initially you say what's the big deal, right? Well I knew that radiators make noise but these make more noise than anything else in the house. They whistle and squeal really bad. Like we have to turn up the tv when they come on to hear over it. :-) But after a few nights of waking up every time they went on we got used to it and they don't seem to bother us any more. Once I had put all my stuff away and up in the house it started growing on me. The kitchen is very big which I love. Every place has things about it that you just have to get used to. And now that we are used to things its ok. :-)

The last few weeks have been filled with running around sitting in offices getting our things switched to PA residency. (this process turns out to be very involved and very costly). But its all done and finished. We were nervous about Richard's truck passing inspection but Praise God yesterday we took it to get inspected and it passed. We were so glad that God answered that prayer. Now we are just looking for jobs. This is a very long and involved process too. Its just hard to know how long to wait on something. Maybe the perfect one will come up. Or maybe we should not be picky and go ahead and just work in retail or Panera. So we are praying for wisdom with that. This is our latest update. It will be nice to get settled and on a schedule and stuff like that. So keep us in prayer if you think of it.

Final Decision

We finally decided!!! God has worked everything out so well. We decided on the Clearview apartment. The guy called us back a couple days after Richard's sister looked at it for us and said that he wanted to know how interested we were in it because he wanted to take it off the listings. He knew some people who attended that seminary and really thought that a Christian couple in the place would be good and he worked with us on the downpayment and everything. He has been very good to work with from long distance too. So we are so thankful that things have worked out and that we have a place to move right into. God has anwered so many of our prayers.

I have ended work this past monday and that has been so nice. Although the idea of packing is so overwhelming. I have started and can see progress so that helps.
We are officially moving this coming Tues the 13th. We are very excited about it. We will take about 4 days to get there and I will be able to see my two sisters on the way. Which I am so happy about.
Mostly I am so happy because we have started to see cockroaches again. Richard has tried to fix some things and we thought the problem had gone away but they are back again. Not quite as bad but still it makes moving even better.

I am so happy to be able to decorate for Christmas in my own house and get our very own Christmas tree. It will be our first time and I can't wait.
I will keep everyone posted on things once we get there. WE still need to find jobs and stuff like that and there is alot we don't know about the area and everything that we need to do so still lots of stuff to pray about but God is always faithful to answer. Next time I write I will probably be in PA. Yeah!!!