What we’ve been doing

For those who have not heard, we moved to Georgia! How did that happen? Well let me tell you a quick story on that, then I will update you all on what we have been doing. I think for fun, I will do this in a “bullet point” format. (That and it will help me to organize my thoughts.)

*Let’s start with saying that youth ministry is hard. It is also darned near impossible when one does not have much support in the parish. Joshua worked so very hard to bring the faith to the kids in the parish and was pretty much rejected at each point. He bore it very well but knew it was time to start looking elsewhere. I was looking at this website one day and came across a job that would be perfect. I mean downright, absolutely, positively, the best job that Joshua could ever in a million years dream up and get paid for it! I sent him the link and he replied “Heck no, it is in Georgia”. Ten minutes later, I got another message from him, stating that he would apply for it. Of course, my response at that point was “Really?!?!” then I started dreaming about what living in Georgia might be like (ha ha).

So here we are, living 15 minutes from the Georgia/Florida line, in the deep south. In the summer…and I am pregnant. It is hot. I am reminded of Father Vath’s statement during mass at St. Boniface in the summer time “If you think this is hot, imagine what hell is like”.

*When we moved, our house was under contract, but the buyers backed out, so please pray that someone else comes along!

*We have been preparing for the arrival of our newest little one. I am not due for another month, but I am hoping to have a nice birthday present for myself. Come one baby, what child wouldn’t want to share a birthday with his/her mother? We have been blessed with another awesome midwife for a homebirth, God is good. We have our home visit with her this week and are working on getting things set up for the new little one.

*This weekend we went to St. Augustine, Florida for an overnight. While it was a nice trip, I do not recommend anyone heading there in the summer. It was so very hot. We went to the beach, my first time seeing the Atlantic and actually swimming in an ocean. After the beach, we went to the Alligator Farm in St. Augustine. It is a zoo and they do not actually farm anything. It is a small zoo, it only took about an hour and a half to walk through and see everything (including stopping for a feeding show and a lesson about reptiles and amphibians) but it made it nice for the kids. We spent the night at a hotel and splashed in the pool for a while. Karol was very proud because he used his arm floaties to help tread water for a minute. Margaret was content holding on to the side of the pool while Caecilia was ready to swim.

The next morning, we headed off to Mass at the Cathedral Basilica in St. Augustine, the oldest parish in the United States. The church itself is not that old, about 100 years, I thing. It was very beautiful though, with a nice choir and Father’s Homily was very timely.  We chanted the Salve Regina (in Latin!) for the recessional hymn, ah, yes! It was wonderful.

We drove back up the A1A toward Jacksonville and hit the beach one more time. The waves were pretty big this time, so the kids just wanted to play in the sand. I went in the water and had a blast in the waves. I didn’t realize though that salt water would burn the eyes, it does. It started raining, so we packed up our gear and headed home.

I will come back to post pictures of the trip in a bit, but for now, I need to feed my crew!