New Beginnings

Let's start from the beginning.

I was born in the fall to a family that had a mom, dad and big sister all ready to welcome me. We lived in the same town for six years, and during that time every 2-2.5 years another bundle of joy would be added to our little brood. After those six years had passed we moved to an island and farmed a 13 acre vegetable and hobby farm. There we added our last sweetie, a sister which made us a family of seven. By the time she was three we were ready to move back to that small town where I was born and it was fall again.

That's where we all stayed until we grew up and started to spread our wings.

Currently my parents, oldest sister, brother and youngest sister can all be found there while myself and third sister live a bit further away.

In the Fall of 2009 my husband and I began writing to each other and this began our whirlwind romance as the books would say and in the fall of 2010 we got married.

New beginnings in 2010...

A new marriage, a fresh start, a new city, church, job, friends - new everything it seemed. Truthfully I hadn't really thought about after the wedding too much and all of the new things I would encounter and so I was painfully unprepared for my first year of marriage. To put it delicately it was HARD. Even though is wasn't ideal and there are hurts and anger built into our first year memories there are also some of the sweetest, most romantic memories too. God is gracious, always, and even in the midst of brokenness and hurt we have found healing and sunshine. I'm so grateful for that first year of learning and growing with my husband and all of the wonderful memories and experiences we shared along the way.

Fast forward to 2014...

We were excited, surprised and a little nervous. We were pregnant with our first and the feelings and thoughts and excitement that comes with your first baby are so precious. Sometimes however there isn't a happy ending and in June of 2014 we said goodbye to our baby that was lost through a miscarriage. To try and explain the loss and sadness felt and experienced and the heartbreak is something you have to walk through to truly know. Again God walked us through this desert place and we came out brimming with hope, joy, healing and trust. I am ever so grateful.

2016 - buckle your seat belts we're having a baby!

 It was the fall of 2015 (you may have noticed already that a lot of important events for me start and end in the fall) and my husband and I started talking about trying for another baby. We never really came to an agreement or conclusion but (haha) God has His own perfect plans and so there I was on the phone with my husband saying "I think I'm pregnant" and him replying "there's no way!" Two pregnancy tests later and we were confirmed parents to be. Natural family planning is our method of contraception and while it worked great for the first five years, once you start hemming and hawing about having babies things can get a little lazy which in our case always equals a baby.

It's been a crazy start to a pregnancy. My husband is 31 years old and in his 2/3 year of changing his career at UBC. So while he works on becoming a mechanical engineer he doesn't work a paying job, which means I work a full time job to pay our bills. So here we are, pregnant and in a few months about to lose our main source of income and live off of... What EI?

I do need to add that when God gives you unexpected things (such as a sweet baby) He always provides at the same time. So far, thanks to unexpected set backs and changes that we couldn't figure out their reason or good at the time, my husband is getting a bunch of extra time off of school to work at his previous job. Did I mention that his old job hires him every chance he's available because they love him so much - Thank you God and thank you husband! Through this provision of time and work we are able to save and make preparations for this time of little income that is coming. God is so amazing. It just blows my mind and gets me excited. I can't stop thanking and praising Him and all of His goodness to us. I am overwhelmed by his love and generosity in every moment in our lives, no matter what they look like to us, I hold on to the fact that God is up to something and it is good!

So the facts as of now are that in a few months (we are due the first week of July) I will be quitting my amazing 4.5 year nanny job and becoming a mother to my own sweet baby. My husband will be working at the time and able to help out and establish a normality we wouldn't get if he was taking full-time classes (engineering is like working a full-time and part-time job all at once or more). And we will be living on a very tight budget and walking through one of the biggest tests of our faith financially we have ever been through. I am so excited. My God is beyond anything I can comprehend or imagine and although there will be struggles it's going to be a wild ride and I'm so excited to be able to share with you the blessings that God is going to send us and how He is going to walk us through the paths he has us on.

I hope you feel encouraged in your season whatever it may be.

Look for the healing and sunshine!

Laura xo