Mark & Kim Schlosser
A few weeks ago we had the opportunity to get together with some friends from Guam. I'm not sure what it is about Guam and the ministry out there...maybe it is the fact that you basically live, work, worship, celebrate ups, hang together during downs and survive typhoons together that often makes you closer to the people around you than family. Since you are on the other side of the world from your real family, they basically become your family while you are there. I have found that even if you weren't super close to someone while on "the rock" (Guam), when you are Stateside and you have the chance to see them, you jump at it just because it is like seeing family again. You can get together and share your memories and enjoy the fellowship. The Schlossers were good friends to me on Guam. Mr. Schlosser (I still have a hard time calling him Mark) was my deacon for the first few years I was there and was a blessing on several occasions. Kim and I became closer at a point when we were both struggling with some things and the Lord kind of pushed us together. I will always be thankful that the Lord brought her to be an encouragement to me during that time.

I walked away from seeing them a few weeks ago and could only be positively affected. They were an encouragement to me in a huge way and I thank the Lord for bringing friends into our lives who can say the right thing at the right time in just the right way. My life is better for having walked the same path with them for a period of time.

Big Praise

Well, I like to refer to it as "the curse of my bones". It really began right before my freshman year at Northland. I broke my finger just a week before I went up to try out for volleyball...to play the setter position. It continued through the course of all 4 years. Each semester, I either broke or dislocated at least one finger. Try taking your secretarial typing classes and each semester having a different finger sticking straight up in a splint, yet still trying to make your timed typings. It continued in Guam. My first year out there I was having a soccer practice with the faculty and staff ladies who were going to play against my girls in a game. I was demonstrating dribbling back and forth and said "this is how you do it". Just at that moment, my foot came down wrong and I broke my ankle. I also broke at least one other finger while I was in Guam, but have been relatively disaster-free since then.

Yesterday I was sure I broke the same ankle again. No glory story or anything. I stood up. I stepped. My foot came down sideways, my ankle made an ugly noise and I fell. I couldn't get up. Eventually, I hopped to the car and drove home trying not to use my right foot for the entire hour and fifteen minute drive.

We went today to get it checked and thankfully it is just sprained. I praise the Lord for protecting it and not allowing it to break. I am also thankful that God allowed me to get home safely while driving that way through tons of traffic and a thunderstorm. Finally, I'm thankful that God gave me the perfect husband to take care of me right now. He has been wonderful. Pray that the swelling stays down and that I can get back on both feet soon.

More on the saga of how we got where we are...

Last time I left off with us moving out of our condo after only three months due to damage caused by Hurricane Charley. We moved us and our stuff into my sister's house in Kissimmee. After a few weeks, my parents were coming to visit and Mike wanted to give them the guest room, so since our insurance was covering other housing for us up to a certain total, we moved ourselves into a hotel. We actually lived in the hotel for 6 weeks. What an adventure. The best part was the great free breakfast every morning. The air in the hotel room was kind of musty though as the air conditioner would not maintain temperature. We were always either turning it way up or turning it way down to try to balance it out. So, we started to get sick and decided to move.

We then moved ourselves into a vacation home. We couldn't get a normal apartment because they seemed to all be full. However, in Orlando there are tons of vacation homes for rent for families going to Disney. So, we found one and moved into it for a couple of months. During this time, we found a great church (really the first one since we had been married). Unfortunately, it was about 50 minutes away from the vacation home, so we decided to try to find an apartment closer to the church.

We were able to find one. So, we moved again. This time we moved all our stuff out of my sister's house and moved everything into the apartment. We thought we were staying there for at least a year and we were excited to finally slow down. Not long after that, Mike's boss asked him if we would move to Tampa and start another location and Mike would be 1/5 owner in the new company without having to invest anything other than his time. So we started looking for houses by Tampa.

In May, we moved again. We are now in a house in Plant City - about 21 miles from Tampa. The Lord actually blessed us with a brand new home that was going to be the same price as all the "as is" 30 year old homes we were looking at. We have now been here for almost 11 months and it has been wonderful to put down some roots. Now, believe it or not, we are starting the search again for a new place. Because I run the Ebay stores out of our house, I have already taken over 2 bedrooms and the little breakfast nook with Ebay stuff. We just need more space. More space would allow us to spread out the products more so it doesn't take as long to pull the items for orders. So, the saga continues and we are looking again...

A few lessons I have learned through all of this: 1. Don't keep stuff just because you have it. After moving so many times, you learn a lot of things aren't really important. If it doesn't have sentimental value and you haven't used it in awhile, sell it on Ebay! One less item to pack the next time. 2. I'm so thankful that the Lord has given me a husband with an adventurous spirit. As I look back at all those moves, we met each one with an adventurous spirit and looking to see what God would do in our lives rather than being depressed about moving again. 3. I'm so thankful we didn't have children early on in our marriage. I can't imagine all of those moving adventures with a child in tow. The Lord knew that would be more than I could bear.

Okay - I think that completes getting everyone caught up basically on where we are now. I promise that future blogs won't be so wordy.

Happy Birthday to Me!

Yes, it is true. Today is my 29th birthday. The last year that I can have a 2 at the beginning of my age. Some of my older friends have been depressed at the idea of being 30. My husband, on the other hand, actually had a party to celebrate turning 30 (and since he hates all things related to people celebrating his birthday or giving gifts, that is a miracle in and of itself). Thankfully I have another year to figure out how to cope with that 30 number. For now, I will enjoy still being in my twenties.

The phrase "Happy Birthday to Me" brings back such memories. I went through a phase in college where every good thing in life was met with a response of "Happy Birthday to Me" (with unique accents on the syllables). Apparently this phase was so prevalent in my life that last year when I saw the men's college basketball coach, Coach Scott, he remembered me at least 6 years later as the girl who always said "Happy Birthday to Me!"

Having a birthday in April has meant that it often fell on or near Easter. This morning we started out the morning by leaving at 6:20 a.m. to go to a sunrise service at church. It's so easy to get wrapped up in every day life and forget about how much Christ did for us on the cross and what a victory His resurrection was for all of us. Without it, He would have just been another great man. I am so thankful that we know Christ is risen and we will one day meet Him in heaven. I'm humbled by all that He went through for me.

Happy Birthday wishes also go out to my high school friend, Lisa. I've always enjoyed sharing my birthday with Lisa. Also, happy birthday to Bob-man for tomorrow.

Moving On to Florida

Continuing the saga from the last post...we left Pennsylvania and headed down to Florida. Mike's sister and brother-in-law had an extra master bedroom in their house and invited us to come live with them while we looked for jobs. They said Florida had tons of job openings. So, two weeks after our marriage we moved in to their house.

We began earnestly looking for jobs. We sent out what seemed like hundreds of resumes and Mike went to several job fairs. It seemed like all the job openings were low wage jobs like cleaning hotels and things like that. All professional level jobs had tons of competition and the Lord just didn't have it planned for us to have jobs yet. Thankfully both of us were able to come into our marriage debt-free and that allowed us to not have that stress hanging over our heads during the no job period.

Three months later, the Lord gave me a job with Wycliffe Foundation and a few weeks later Mike was able to get a "temp job" through a friend of his brother-in-law. They needed help for a few days at their copy shop and Mike filled in. After a couple weeks of each day being told to come back in, they finally just asked him if he wanted to stay on full time. Just a little after that I decided to leave Wycliffe Foundation and go to work for my sister. We grew up running several different businesses with our family, so it was only natural for us to work together. We get along very well and don't have the normal fights that everyone seems to expect you would have in working with family. Frankly, I love it. My mother instilled in us an entrepreneurial spirit practically from birth so I love working hard and seeing our efforts be blessed by the Lord. It is much different than being a secretary in a Christian school, but after my last position in that role, I was honestly a little burnt out on vocational ministry.

Let me back up though...we moved out of Ken and Kristin's house after almost 10 months. They jokingly commented often that living with their 3 young boys was the best birth control we'd ever have. While we were anxious to be in our own place, I'm grateful for the hospitality and the acceptance Ken and Kristin gave us during our time in their house. I was able to get to know them much better than would have ever been possible had we not had that time together.

In May of 2004, the Lord gave us a little condo in Kissimmee, FL. We enjoyed our first place together. It was about 10 minutes from work for me and I enjoyed that as I had previously been driving an hour to work each day. We were still not even unpacked from Guam when the Lord allowed Hurricane Charley to come through Kissimmee. We had gone through much stronger typhoons in Guam, so this seemed like nothing to us. We even stood in front of our large front windows and held them in against the wind and rain to keep them from breaking. Hindsight might say that was a little foolish, but at the time, we thought it was a good plan. After the hurricane passed, we went outside to check everything out. We saw several windows broken in the condo above us, but didn't know the extent of the damage. By the time we walked in the front of our condo (thinking we had made it through okay), gallons of water were pouring through our ceiling fan in the living room. Through the next few days we found that the roof had severly failed and the condo above us had standing water all over and the ceilings had begun falling up there. We could see water spots starting in our ceilings and knew it was only a matter of time until our condo would be destroyed as well. So, three months to the day after we finally had our own place, we moved all of our things out of our condo and moved in with my sister and her family who also lived in Kissimmee.

More to come soon - sorry for being so wordy. :)

Stages of Life

I've posted below a picture of us in Pennsylvania a few days after our wedding. We thought that would be our home and area of ministry immediately after our marriage, but the Lord had different plans. We moved from Guam to Michigan to get married. The day after our wedding we moved to Pennsylvania. We got there expecting that there was a job waiting for at least one of us and thinking our housing was arranged at least until the winter. We met with the HR director who thanked us for coming and told us he would let us know if there were any openings. Needless to say, we were in shock. We had just moved everything and planned to start our life together there, but it seemed the Lord was closing the door. He confirmed that a week later when our housing situation fell through. Now with no jobs and no place to stay, we felt it was time to move somewhere else. So, on August 6, 2003, we departed Pennsylvania and headed towards Florida. More to come on the stages of life we have been through and the many places we have lived in the past two and a half years.

Mike and I at BBC in Pennsylvania 2003

The Busyness of Life

Do you ever find that life is so busy you can barely keep up? We are kind of at that point. We work all day and then come home and work all night until it is time to go to bed. We go to bed in the 9-10 p.m. range because each morning starts at 5:00 a.m. for my husband. I usually make it up by 5:30 a.m. on M, W, F when I have to drive an hour to work. I just feel like even the weekends are crazy busy. It does make Sunday a much more relaxing day when all we have to do is go to church and relax a little. I live for my Sunday afternoon nap. I keep telling my husband that I'm hoping we'll slow down a little soon as I just need a little break. Does everyone feel this way - or are we just out-of-control, out-of-the-norm busy?