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| Trusting God!!!!! |
Greetings from the Fletcher's. It's been a while since we did a blog update. A lot has happened since April. We had our busy Summer of teams, it was craziness, but really amazing too. God definitely showed up in the lives of the people that came through SI Nicaragua. It's always a Joy to see lives transformed into the likeness of Christ, ( that's the Vision) watching someone come through those doors, and watching them walk out, changed, it's awesome!!!!! God is so good.
Summer teams came and went, Caleb and I were busy preparing to head back to the States, along with fulfilling our other tasks, and teaching others about how to do the things we did. It was definitely a busy Summer, I was doing Media solo, last Summer I had an amazing intern to help me. So this Summer looked a lot differently, a lot of times I felt overwhelmed, but God always took care of me. Towards the end, I had Miah Mattson help me, which was a big blessing, it was fun hanging out with her and teaching her a few things, she's such a sweet girl and I know that she'll do great at whatever she does. Her family moved to Nicaragua in April of this year, it was so fun to watch their family in their Journey. The first year Caleb and I helped with teams, Spencer and Michelle Mattson came with their church, and the following year, they came with their family, and the following year, they moved to Nicaragua, it's been a crazy journey for them, and we were so blessed to be able to spend time with them and got to know them better before we headed back to the States. We're excited to see what God has in store for them.
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| Miah & I out getting footage. |
After Summer teams were over, we had a week of Vacation, it was good. We got to spend a couple days at the Beach in San Juan del Sur with Austin & Jill Hofsommer. It was very nice just spending time with them, talking about God and all the things that happened in our lives during this journey of life in Nicaragua, it was a good "ending" time and we were glad we got to spend it with them.
The last week that we were in Nicaragua, we packed up our house and we moved into the base. It was kinda neat because when we first moved to Nicaragua, that's where it all started, living at the base, we did that for a little over a year. And than we moved into our own little house about 5 minutes away. So we ended where we started :) The last weekend we were there, all our staff and their families went to the Young Life Camp in Northern Nicaragua for a couple days. Paul Jorgenson from Minnesota talked about the Armor of God, it was a powerful weekend.
We got back Sunday night, and Monday & Tuesday were just filled with getting last minute projects done, spending time with our SI family, packing, meeting the new Fall Semester students, packing, eating at our favorite place, packing, saying goodbyes, did I mention packing? Hahaha, we did a lot of re organizing since we packed up our house and threw stuff into suitcases and than re did a lot of it once we get back from the Staff Retreat. We were able to bring pretty much everything we wanted, in the end I got rid of some clothes, but that's pretty much it. We came back with 5 suitcases, 2 carry-on's, backpack and a large oversized purse :) Everything went well, all our bags made it safe and sound, two pieces of my Pottery broke, I was pretty bummed about that, but my mom came up with a really cool idea on how to use them.
It's been two weeks of being back in the States. The first week was pretty rough, the first couple days were really hard. I dealt with lots of anxiety, feeling like we needed to see all our friends, get things done, get things to take back to Nicaragua, and realizing, we weren't going back, this is home now, it was really hard to switch that mind set, because before, it was always that way, we need to do this or we need to do that before we go back to Nicaragua.
It's a lot better now, I definitely don't feel that way anymore, it's still a work n progress on actually believing that we're here to stay. Getting used to the American way of living, while keeping everything we learned and everything that's changed in us, it's definitely hard and we are fighting to stay the people we've become, to stay connected with God on the levels we've connected with Him, you definitely learn to lean on Him, and not others when your living in another Country, and the only thing you have some days is Him. We don't want the ways of this world to change us, just because we moved back to the States, doesn't mean we're going to be the people we used to be, NO. We are going to be the people that we've become over the past two and a half years, some days it might feel easier to just be the old people, but that's not our desire. We want to be a light for Jesus and serve others.
We've been living with my parents and are so grateful for their willingness to let us stay with them. <3
It's been good to be around family and friends, we've had a lot of fun seeing people and what not. This past weekend we went camping with my family and some church family, that was fun. Here's some pictures from that weekend....
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| Caleb doing what he LOVES when we go camping. So tasty. |
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| Galen, Caleb and dad husking the corn for the big pot boil |
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| Mom did a great job, everything tasted so GOOD. |
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| JOY in my heart <3 |
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| It aint' camping if you ain't playing Phase Ten. |
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| When we left Nicaragua, I left a lot of little pieces of my heart there. It was really hard to leave my kiddos who I connected with over the past two and a half years. So this past weekend, I was able to connect with some special kiddos and just love on them, it did my heart good <3 |
On August 26th when we arrived in Atlanta, I was sitting on the floor charging my phone when Caleb said "hey babe, I think those are Duck Dynasty people". I was like pssshh whatever, so I get up and sure enough, Miss Sadie Robertson, and her mother Korie in the airport getting some coffee, so I jumped up and walked over to them with my heart pounding, and asked if I could get a picture with them. Of course they said yes, so Korie took a picture of me and Sadie, they are sweet people.
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| Miss Sadie and I at the Atlanta airport :) |
So, we landed in South Bend a little before 5pm. My parents, sisters, grandma, aunt and uncle were there to greet us. Grabbed our luggage and headed for home. We had a supper and some more family showed up, it was nice <3
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| WOOHOO!!!! <3 |
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| Some of the Fletcher's stopped in to see us on their way back from northern MI. So that was fun to see them. |
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| Family time |
We just want to say thank you to all our family and friends who have supported us, financially, prayers, love, ect, since this Journey started back in 2010, when we said "yes". We are excited to see what God has for us in this next phase of life. Please continue to pray for us, during these next coming months as we continue to figure out a new normal and start our new lives here in the USA!!!! <3
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| I started a new Journal for this new Journey we're on, excited to see what God has in store of us <3 Trusting Him! |
Our first Sunday back, Lisa Smith asked me if I'd be willing to share about 20 minutes at the Woman to Woman event on Monday night. I was NERVOUS and to be honest, my brain was like "HECK NO", I don't like speaking in front of people, but I said yes. So all day Monday I was preparing and reading my Journals, it was good to just remember all the good times, and hard times and see how God worked. Monday night came, and I wasn't really nervous when I got there, I had a peace, so I was thankful for that. We sang two songs, and than it was my turn, it went really good and I was glad I did it <3 I guess I spoke for 40 minutes, LOL. And here I was worried about the whole 20 minutes, I was thinking, oh maybe 10 minutes, hahaha!!!! Good one!!! :)
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| Photo credit goes to Malyn. Thanks girl. |
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| When I walked in, there was only a couple ladies, so I was like "ok Krista, you can do this". Than when I got up in front of everyone, somehow the crowd got bigger :) |
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| Pray for Caleb, today is his first day working at his new job. He's excited and nervous all at the same time. Pray for protection, strength, guidance, wisdom <3 He'll be farming with a guy from Goshen. |
God Bless you all <3 With mucho Love
The Fletcher's.
