Life Update

Hi everyone,

It's been a while since I posted and I wanted to give an update on our life right now.  The past few months have had an incredible amount of ups and downs, and if I'm being honest, there have been more downs than ups.  We are living life in a pandemic, moved to a new state, and have had some major changes in our family.

Like everyone else with kids, we finished out the school year at home doing distance learning.  As much as we missed school it was a wonderful time for our family to be together for our last couple months living in Kentucky.  Our relationship with each other was strengthened because we had so much time together.  The kids loved having daddy around more, I loved having him and Isaac around more, and I learned that we could do school at home, even if it wasn't easy.

We also got to spend more time with our neighbors in Kentucky living in seminary housing.  We spent so much time outside and it was great to be able to chat with friends who lived there while the kids played.  We stayed as socially distanced as possible with toddlers!  I miss our friends from Asbury so much and am eternally grateful for the time, especially at the end, that we had with them.

About two weeks before we were set to move from Kentucky to Alabama our family experienced a huge tragedy.  I'm not going to go into details here but my family will never be the same, my life will never be the same, it was devastating news.  All I will say is that my parents are no longer together.  

We had been planning this move to Alabama and were excited about the opportunity for Brian to be a pastor.  It is a great church and we are very happy to be a part of it now.  We were also looking forward to living closer to our families.  My parents even had plans to retire in the next year and move even closer to us.  We couldn't wait for the kids to have their grandparents around more.  All of that has changed now because of the circumstances but we are grateful to be closer even still.  

As much as we were excited about our move we were wondering why God asked us to move two years earlier than we had planned. We loved living in Kentucky, loved being a part of the Asbury Seminary community, and loved our jobs and church family.  But we felt that God was saying it was time to move.  

After we found out about my parents splitting I questioned God about the timing of our move.  Why did this happen now and ruin my grand plans?  Often clarity comes in moments of distress and I knew that the timing of this move was God ordained.  

After many tearful goodbyes we loaded up the moving truck and car and headed for Alabama. We have been warmly welcomed by our new church family.  We had several people bring us food for the first couple weeks.  Our church is still not meeting in person but we have met a few people and have been doing socially distanced neighborhood tours where we meet on a church members lawn and enjoy snow cones with the neighborhood.  We like our house we are renting and have got to meet a few of our neighbors.  We are slowly getting settled in.  

We found out last week that our school district won't start until September 1st and at least the first nine weeks will be online remote learning.  Earlier this week our friend and the wife of the lead pastor at our church took the kids and I on a tour of the school Isaac will be going too.  I'm glad Isaac got to see his new school even though it will be a while before he actually gets to have class there.  I also got a job teaching at the church preschool where Adelyn will attend, I'm just not sure exactly when that will happen.

Yesterday in my devotional I read this scripture: 

“Dear friends, don’t be surprised at the fiery trials you are going through, as if something strange were happening to you. Instead, be very glad—for these trials make you partners with Christ in his suffering, so that you will have the wonderful joy of seeing his glory when it is revealed to all the world.”

‭‭1 Peter‬ ‭4:12-13‬ ‭NLT‬‬

The last few months have been filled with trials, but I will choose joy.  These have been some of the hardest times I have experienced but I see glimpses of God's glory and know that one day it will all be revealed.  

Thank you friends for your prayers, I'm so thankful for everyone who has reached out and loved us.  

Grace and Peace,

Cassidy

Front door of the new house

Front of the house

Backyard, thanks for the swing set Papa!