I planned out this elaborate sentence to welcome you back to my blog after such a long absence because I have been with out a computer and laptop for as long as I can remember. My memory really isn't what it used to be that is for sure! Here I thought it was super long and low and behold it has not even been a month since I last blogged. ( insert the clearly addicted face of someone who blogs too much)
Regardless, I wanted to write because as you saw earlier, I am clearly addicted.
I thought that I would take a moment to update you all on some happenings in my life, since several of you read in my previous blog that I was applying for a job and I didn't exactly tell you how that went.
I got the job!
I am the new Assistant Director for the Redmond and Bend Pregnancy Resource Center's. Its more than I ever thought it could be, granted its only been two weeks but any organization that is built on clear communication and Jesus can't ever really go bad.
I feel incredibly honored and blessed to have gotten the position and I am already in awe of what God is doing through it.
Also some new things, we are renovating..sort of..we decided to do a random entry way project and when I say we, I of course mean my amazing husband who works ten hours a day and then comes home and busts out these projects. He is simply wonderful and I feel insanely spoiled to be married to him. So right now the project is nearly done...
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We have some dry wall put up and just a few more things to go. This project is super exciting but it has left my house looking like a major work zone, so everything feels out of sorts. We also sold our couches so we look like squatters sitting in camping chairs with dry wall dust all over the place. ..sigh.... its a lovely look.
We had our cable guy come over and I nearly died of embarrassment, I mean things have really fallen apart.Anyway moving on, that is something I need to clearly let go.
We also had our nephew move out, which is bittersweet, we loved having him with us for five months but God is good and we prayed that he would have the opportunity to live with his mom again in all the right circumstances and that happened so we can't really be upset but we do miss him.
So Kailey moved into her own room which has been another project of moving and adjusting everyone to new beds and new dressers and moving beds out and dressers out. But we are happy with the way things are now, she feels all grown up and has put these prayer papers all over her walls specifically reminding her to pray for my Dad. That girl just blesses my heart.
Stuff with my Dad has changed as well...he has now moved from the hospital in Denver to a nursing home outside of Montrose. This is a good change but still hard, he wont be getting the same care as he did in the hospital, but he is much closer to family so my step mom and brothers can see him more often now. We are getting the same news about him, still moving a little bit, will open his eyes and move his body but isn't doing it enough to show there is actual meaning behind his movements. They say he is not in a coma which is good but I guess to me he isn't awake so it seems like the same thing. Here is a picture of him that was sent to me just a few days ago.
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With all this new stuff that is happening it feels like ten chapters closed at once and we started on a whole new book, so I feel a bit spiritually and emotionally drained which has been a struggle to not get religious about fixing it or pushing for something artificial or band aid like.
I feel like so many doors are closing at once and that I am standing there with my fingers pried around some of these doors just trying to keep them open.
It's hard to explain, but things I had time for before, I feel like now I don't and not by choice but rather submission( which is another blog all in it self).
But because I now work two full days away from home, that is two days my husband has to do dinner and two days he has to get the girls which some of you may be thinking ( big deal he needs to man up) please understand my husband is MORE than willing to do these things but he is our bread winner, he works very hard at his job and if I was working full time it would be different but we are caught in this awkward in between, mostly what affects our family is just my time away from home, so if I have a meeting with the church or a friend or any ministry related thing its just more time out of the house.
So I am feeling this pressure to be a submissive wife and honor that time that I do need to be here but the selfish side of me is screaming that I can balance it all, I can do the work, do the meetings, handle the pick ups and the drop offs and balance the friendships and the ministries and the events and I can still be a mother and a wife and cook dinner....I can do it....but then there is this small teeny tiny voice that I keep hearing that is telling me that a new door has opened in my life and its one that will lead to things I only ever dreamed of and that its what I have been praying for but its time to close some other doors. My heart is aching because I don't want to close any doors, I am not ready to. I always thought that if one door opened then you would automatically be equipped and ready for the other door to shut or the window or what ever it is.
I never knew that there would be this cross roads of wide open doors and that it would be left up to me to decide which ones to close. I have found that this closing of doors is something that is staring me in the face every day, every quiet moment, the Lord is just waiting to discuss it with me but I don't want to talk about it, I don't want to face it, I just want to keep everything open.
Then I hear that voice again that says " Ashley, something has to close"
I know that his timing is perfect and that he gave me this amazing man of God to be my husband, my care taker, my spiritual leader and that I will be blessed if I can heed what he is trying to tell me and just come under that authority in a loving and tender way. And his words echo that ones I know the Lord keeps whispering over me, "something has to close."
So that is me right now in this place that I never thought I would be, I thought my dreams with the Pregnancy Resource Center and speaking would take like five years to get to, never under estimate your goals or your dreams or the timing that God will move in. I think the hardest part of all this NEW stuff in my life is not being able to share any of it with my Dad, so I feel like before any other door can shut he should hear about it or know what is going on in my life, but life just keeps going at a rate that I don't entirely approve of, and I feel like there is all this stuff he needs to know and I want to talk to him about it and hear his opinion, I want to hear what he thinks about my new job and this new project and Jose selling his motor cycle, I want to hear what he thinks about all of it....but he can't and I hate that...so I am stuck grasping at these tail ends of life before they leave me.
I know God knows this and has it in his hands, its just hard...I miss my Dad, more than I could ever efficiently put into words.
So friends, if you think of me and see posts of my life and think I might be over sharing ...I honestly might be but I feel like I have to get this stuff some where...some how I have to keep a marker of it so that when my dad wakes up I can tell him how much life has changed in the time he has been asleep. How much my world has moved around and shifted and how all of it happened with out him and how much that hurt.
I keep trying to end this...but as you have read I am not good at closing doors or ending this LOL
But it feels good to be transparent and real about what is going on in my heart, all I can do is hope you will gain some understanding on the things that look like strength but can be tethered to weakness and the weakness that is slowly making us strong.
Have a blessed day friends
Ashley
