We're Home

The grass withers

and the flowers fall

but the word of our God endures forever. Isaiah 40:8

Friday afternoon as we approached the farmhouse, we were greeted by a bright patch of poppies at the end of the lawn.  This is my first springtime in Illinois since the summer of our wedding (1999). I vaguely remembered this patch of poppies, which apparently was planted in the 1960s. 

When we left on April 2 it was 31 degrees and the trees were barren.  We came home on Friday to temps in the 80s, and full, green trees.  And poppies. 

The RV has been emptied and cleaned (no small feat).
I shared with Mom at a Sunday school class in Pekin on Sunday about the village women's retreat in March.
Last night we rode out some nasty thunderstorms, with the kids having a slumber party on the living room floor (closer to the basement).  We're all a little bleary from the late night.
Nathan's taking the kids grocery shopping this morning so I can get in a few hours of uninterrupted desk work. And he's buying a weather radio.

Yesterday we had a Skype conference with Pastor Lind from Calvary Bible in Rutland.  He and his wife, Dawn, minister to couples in ministry and they gifted us with a strengths evaluation which we completed a couple of weeks ago (I referred to this a bit in my last post).  Yesterday we discussed the results and he interpreted some of it for us.  The biggest (yet at the same time, least) surprising piece?  In managing change, on a scale of 1-10, I naturally scored a 7 in "structured" (the way God made me, I don't break the rules, I like predictability and systems). This was the area I scored the "strongest" of the four strengths analyzed.  So how has my natural penchant for structure had to adapt to our current lifestyle?  Well, an area of significant stress is indicated by a change of 5 points or more in adaptation.  My score?  An eleven point swing in the opposite direction (towards "dynamic") to compensate. To summarize Pastor Lind -- that "indicates an area of major stress." Uh- huh. He explained that to deal with the lack of structure in my life, I've probably become even more structured.  Nathan said, "That explains her weird, overly-excited obsession with color-coded packing cubes (more on that later, I'm still excited about them).

All that to say, it feels good to be home.  To be able to catch up. To look at poppies.
Posts forthcoming from the last two weeks of our time on the road.  Enough about me. :-)