Jeff reminded me this morning that it was one year ago today that he found out that his employer was laying him off. He had one month's notice (his European employer didn't look at the calendar and find September 11 to be culturally important so that was decided on as his last day). When he called me with the news, I felt more a sense of adventure than anything else. It didn't really occur to me that it was something we should worry about. He started looking for a new job and as it became clear there wasn't a whole lot available in the DFW area, we broadened our search. He asked me if I could live anywhere in the country, where would I live. Hmmmmmm. As a child I'd lived in California, Indiana, New Jersey, Connecticut and Texas. Telecom, not military (the first question everyone asks). I told him I was game for just about anything but would love to live somewhere that had actual seasons instead of Texas' hot and not quite so hot. I told him I refused to live in Houston. Thankfully God didn't call my bluff on that one.
Jeff found the job lead in Denver fairly early in his search through a longtime friend that lived in the area. Other leads dried up but the Denver job kept progressing. After Jeff was out of work, we started doing "date days" on Wednesdays. Jonathan was in pre-K, Clara was in mother's day out on Wednesday so we realized we could skip the sitter and have some precious time together. We were sitting on the patio at Brio at Southlake Town Center having just watched the movie "War Room" when he got the official job offer that moved us to Colorado. The rest as they say is history. The last year has involved lots of stress but we can look back and see God's hand guiding each decision. Our neighborhood/home search criteria was full of the normal "stuff" people want: big kitchen, large pantry, spacious bedrooms, decent backyard, etc. We found all of that in our house but even more, we found friendly neighbors who went out of their way to greet us. They even cleared our driveway for us the first few blizzards, knowing we had a child in the hospital. We have built in playmates for our kids surrounding us. God led us to the right house, on the right street to find people we could meet and start to do life with in a way we never had in our Texas neighborhood. I picked a preschool using the same check-list type approach but picked the preschool that gave me more peace as I walked through it. They were beyond amazing in supporting us even though Jonathan and Clara were students for a mere week before his cancer diagnosis. Jonthan's teacher visited us many times in the hospital. Her daughter's best friend had been fighting cancer himself at the same hospital for over a year. So they knew how to support us, what to say and not say, how to pray, and were comfortable with all the procedures needed to gown up and come in the room when Jonathan was at his sickest. We feel grateful for the journey the last year has taken us on. To God be the glory!
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AuthorOur family has been through non-Hodgkin's lymphoma with our 4 year old and throughout it all we felt God's presence. My life verse is Romans 8:28. "God works all things together for good..." Archives
February 2017
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