Charm City

Oh, leaving.  

While I'm excited to start fresh somewhere it is so sad to have to say goodbye to Baltimore and our sweet little city spot.  I'll miss the awesome food that's only steps away.  The walks to parks, taking a different route each time.  All the dog walkers who are so kind and stop to let Owen admire their puppies.  Access to the fish and bubbles at the aquarium.  School (yikes...did I already say that!)  Close friends.  Awesome neighbors.  City life.

Owen was so tiny when we moved in.  It was almost exactly a year ago.  He was just 4.5 months when we first moved in.  I was worried about moving here, pretty sure that we'd get mugged.  But it's been wonderful - the perfect city experience and such a great place for Owen to experience all those amazing milestones.  Sitting up, first teeth, first food, walking, falling, first words, first birthday.  It has been a packed year.

We found a beautiful little place, just perfect for our little family, out in the shady suburbs.   It's the exact opposite of where we are now, quiet, semi-secluded, full of nature, suburban.  A great place for this next stage.  We'll be steps away from a swimming pool and a great playground with plenty of baby swings and very little competition for them!   We'll take walks through the forest and by the lake watching squirrels,  instead of down the city sidewalks counting trucks.  

And through it all God remains ever faithful.  This past year has exceeded any and all of our expectations.  I'm sure the next one will too.  So, as always, I expect the unexpected where God is involved and am never disappointed.

Hopefully I can throw together a little tribute week to Baltimore this week.

Check back for some of our favorite spots and memories.

Chesapeake Beach!

Gina, Owen and I found a little beach on the Chesapeake Bay last week.  It was a perfect day to spend in the sun.  

Owen wasn't a big fan of the water at first - but by the end he was having a blast splashing Gina.

But mostly he liked digging up the sand and watering it with his little green can.

And throwing shells in the surf.

Can't wait to visit the 'real' ocean sometime this summer.

Just something cool.

How awesome is this window display.  It's all little  rolls of fabric.  

I'd love to do something like this for Owen's room.   

Effortless Beauty

Emily is an amazing woman.

What you see here is the culmination, the celebration, of all that she has accomplished this year. It is easy to say that I am unbelievably proud of my wife.

But there's a lot that you don't see here...

What you don't see is her incredible focus and energy...

Her battling through morning (heck, all-day) sickness for the past few weeks...

Her cramming in studying, lectures and paper-writing in the briefest of moments when Owen takes a nap...

Her internship at the International Rescue Committee that earned her accolades...

Her excellent papers...

Her constant and consistent growth spiritually...

Her unflagging prayer...

Her patient love for Owen and me...

Her never-complaining, never-flagging, never-quitting attitude...

And beyond a little eye-tick, she's no worse for wear!

Emily, her name means "industrious"

If you ask her, she hasn't always been a big fan of this (the meaning, she likes her name)

But if you look at this past year, it's easy to see how appropriate this really is.

Today, I found a better meaning for Emily:

To strive or excel

Of all the people I know in this life, Emily exemplifies this. And the thing about Emily is that she makes all this excellence look effortless. To this day, I still don't know how she does it.

Even though we've been married for nearly 10 years now, she never ceases to amaze me or show me something new about herself. I am so incredibly thankful that God gave her to me.

The Bible actually wrote about Emily... check it out!

I love you, Emily, and I'm so proud of you!

The Graduate

Do I need more proof of how absolutely ugly these 'gowns' are?  Why do we need to pretend to be wizards with boards on our heads?  I feel like someone, somewhere is laughing at every graduation.  Thankfully the super long sleeves came in handy.  I used them as pockets to hold my cellphone - and plenty of tissues for my cold.  

My parents.

The love of my life.

So excited...again.

This has really been an amazing couple months.  Every time I turn around there is something else to be thankful for, something else plainly displaying God's absolute faithfulness.  It is, without a doubt, the start of a completely new season and I am so grateful.  

Adding to my already overflowing joy, we found out back in the beginning of April that our family will be enlarging by one...a new baby will be here in December.  

Jon and I are THRILLED and almost too excited to wait.  (But we will.)

We already have a sense of this one's spirit - and trust me, having joined me in the final push of my masters program, busy work meetings, and another pending move, I'm confident that this one will be able to find peace in the center of a hurricane.

I can't wait for Owen to have a friend, a sibling, to grow with and I'm so looking forward to experiencing the incredible joy of parenthood with another precious little one.

No worries if you can't figure our first picture of 2.O out...but trust me.  There's a baby waving at you.  And a tiny little foot sticking up. 

Done

And just like that...it's over.

I actually have two more lectures to listen to online...but as far as my grades go I have nothing left to do.  

I count that as finished.

I think I need more time to process it.  I just sent in my last paper 27 minutes ago.  It hasn't sunk in.  

But I do want to mark this moment down.  

Someday, when I look back and remember how awesome this all was, and my brain erases some of the struggle and fight as brains are known to do, I will want to record that, yes, I did actually develop an eye tick that lasted the last two weeks of my grad school career.

Taken at the hight of the twitchiness last week.  

It's in my left eye.  If this picture was animated you would see it. 

I hope that it does become a memory and not a lasting memorial to finals week and capstone presentations.  But even if it did - small price to pay to know that I'm done.

Yay!