Hello all,
Chris and I are back in the States safe and sound. We have
been back 2 weeks now, and are slowly adjusting back to the time change, the
culture, and the weather!
This mountain girl is happy to be home but is missing her
Ugandan family. It is a difficult thing to go from eating every meal with
people, seeing them all day long, sleeping in huts and homes very near one
another, to being half way across the world or country in a matter of a day
where everything and everyone is different.
So those of you who are reading this half way around the world, know
that we love you and miss you and recall memories of our time together fondly
and often. Although it is hard to be separated, we have the hope and joy and
gratefulness to know that God has stretched our hearts and given us family in
another part of the world.
For those of you here in Colorado, or even in the States
with us, we have been so excited to see your faces again and begin to do life
with you again. Although we are slowly re-engaging back into the social scene,
we are excited to see everyone. Thank you for all the hugs and the grace to
just get a hug in return as we at times have had the deer in the headlights look
as we process all that God has done and don’t quite know what to say yet. Your
love and friendship is appreciated and, as we can, we want to meet to have more
than passing conversations at church.
You are important to us!
Many of you have asked us what is next, and although God
gave us a vision for our life together while in Uganda, the first step for us
is to get re-established here before we begin anything else. We are currently
staying with my parents while looking for jobs and would appreciate your
prayers in regards to us finding employment.
While in Uganda, as you can imagine, our bills continued and
we have gotten behind on a few. We know God will continue to provide for us,
and if any of you know of jobs that may fit us please let us know. We are open
to ideas! We also are willing to do small jobs for people to earn some money if
anyone needs help! Cleaning, hanging Christmas lights, running to the grocery
store, cooking/baking! Whatever you
might need! Chris has some meetings scheduled this week in regards to helping
out in some areas of construction, so that is exciting and we will see what
happens!
God confirmed my call to writing while we were in Uganda, so
I am pursuing that more intentionally, but for the sake of immediate income, I have
signed up to work as a temporary server at banquets and other holiday events. I
will hopefully begin that as soon as this cold leaves me and my nose stops
running! My Mom and I also may bake banana breads and possibly cookie trays for
the holidays for people to purchase for their businesses, so if you’d be interested
let me know!
As we get our finances in order, we are also are beginning
to pray for the place we will live. We are praying for a home that has some
land and will allow us to have things like a garden and the ability to host
people. We know God is leading us to a place where hospitality and hominess
will occur! Thank you for your prayers
in this area as well!
Anyway, we are very excited to see what God has in store for
us as we intentionally settle back into life here and get our proverbially
house in order.
On a fun note, we are enjoying being home and wearing winter
clothes. My feet missed warm socks and cozy shoes! And my husband joyfully has
donned his fleece vest and hat again! And
my sweaters and gloves, don’t even get me started! They are glorious! As is the cool mountain air here.
Chris and I just celebrated our 2nd wedding
anniversary on the 4th. Thanks to a gift card from my parents we went out for a
romantic meal at Chik-fil-A where we feasted on chicken, waffle fries, and
milkshakes. Our first ice cream since returning to the states and it did not
disappoint! Thank you Chik-fil-a and
thank you Mom and Dad for the gift card so that we could “go out” on our
anniversary. We can’t believe it’s been 2 years already, but at the same time,
it has flown by as we have already experienced so much together. I can honestly say I am more in love with “my
mister” than I was the day we got married and I am grateful to God that He
doesn’t just stop at love but continues to deepen it, strengthen it, and
cultivate it into something we could never have forseen or imagined. Chris is
more in love with me too just for the record, I am quite the catch. J
So, as we head into this holiday season we are grateful to
be home in Colorado pondering all the things that we learned during our time in
Uganda. We look forward to seeing those of you that we haven’t yet. I am going
to continue to write a blog to keep people updated on where we are in the
journey here and just to have a place to set my thoughts as we experience life.
Please let me know if you want to be taken off the email update list, I won’t
be offended. And thank you so much for reading the blog and laughing and crying
along with us throughout this journey. J
Until next time,
Aimee and Chris
