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what if your life has three doors? how will you choose?

By on April 21, 2012 in God and stuff, Lifestyle, Musings, Transitions, us

if you’ve been around much at all you already know that we are a family who loves adventure and tries to think outside the box and order our lives in a way that enables us to take opportunities when they come (as well as seek adventure out, and look at our everydays as one).

we believe that people are at their best when they know and understand why they were created, and when they cut out the other crap in their life that hinders them from being and doing whatever that is.

our life purpose/picture has become less and less fuzzy over time, and we’ve definitely been trying our best to order our life and make the cuts where we need to (a pretty big ordering is coming next month – for which Mr. D is preparing an introductory post – get ready to think we’re crazy-er? :) ). we’ve been living for a long while with a lot of unknowns, walking the tightrope of faith, and just moving forward a step at a time in the way we feel God is leading us.

yesterday Mr. D was talking with his mom, who said they’ve been praying for us, and she got the picture of 3 doors, our family all going through one together. is this tightrope leading to 3 doors?

Source: enpundit.com via tico♥tina on Pinterest

obviously we’d like to pick the right one…
(from the picture, I’d pick the middle :)
which is funny because the middle is what I’ve been picturing in my mind also)

but sometimes I don’t feel like there necessarily is a “right” one.

Source: ticoandtina.com via tico♥tina on Pinterest

remember these? I kinda rigged this particular book :)
(and we don’t really think we’re the hero of our own stories – we know that Jesus is.)

but we still play a big part in our own story, obviously,
and that story affects a lot of other stories…

I like to imagine that God has written trillions of different story lines based on all of the choices that we make and how we interact with each others adventures – no matter what, he knows, but that knowledge does not render our choices impotent.

while choices can be incredibly scary, and sometimes debilitating with the potential for regret (which can cause the best of us to avoid making those risky decisions at all – obviously a choice in itself…) I do find it comforting to know that “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” Romans 8:28

Source: ticoandtina.com via the Beauty on Pinterest

the problem is, we don’t even know what our 3 doors are…!

sometimes we really feel like this:

Source: ticoandtina.com via the Beauty on Pinterest

Comments { 6 }

that time we tried to leave the country… again!

By on April 11, 2012 in Costa Rica, help!, IRLOMashup, Transitions, traveling

here we go, folks… it’s our “the third time’s the charm or we’re just staying here in Costa Rica forever” day.

more than being embarrassed about it all, I mean I think I kind of got over that, is the whole scrounging around for clothes and then dirty clothes piling up again when we had had everything clean the first go-round; the finding the right clothes for the kids to wear while traveling for the third time – you know, decent, but not too good, not easy to stain, that sort of thing; the packing and cleaning for the third time in a week. we were only leaving Mr. D’s hair clippers here last time, as we discovered, but now, WHO KNOWS. we might be leaving a shoe under a couch somewhere…

actually we found the other one of Maverick’s sandals that had ruined his pair previously, so that’s something. though they were only $1 at Walmart, so… it feels like a bit of a bust compared to the hundreds we’ve had to dish out in “stupid tax” over this whole situation. (Dave Ramsey anyone?)

humbling.

humble pie has got to be like the worst breakfast food.

I hope they’re not serving it at the airport again today. or force-feeding more like it.

see you in Florida tonight, if we make it and can get online, lol. pray?
(Eddy might be praying we get stuck again)

meanwhile, start training your clicking finger so you can be one of the lucky first 10 team members (and in other words, the ones who get to choose who else is going to be on their team) when the races open on Friday! We’ve already got our first giveaway sponsor signed up and we’ll be posting about them as we go! #IRLOMashup baby!!!

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white leg teaser… an outfit post?!

By on April 10, 2012 in Costa Rica, HA! ☺, it's an "outfit", the cuteness, Transitions

just wanted to remind you that
something awesome
is coming later today…!

and I also wanted to stun you with the vivid shade of white that is my legs, and well, all of me. I’ve always been brilliantly white, but somehow I just stand OUT so much more now that I’m constantly surrounded by brown people. sigh. my lucky kids.

this is not a proper outfit post by any stretch of the imagination because, well, I won’t EVER do that unless someone someday sends me some clothes that they want to get rid of. (that could actually be rather funny)

what this IS, is what we were able to scrounge around through 3 huge adult-size duffle bags of our stuff on Easter morning. (by adult-size, I mean a small adult could fit in them. I think I could fit in them.) have you had the immense pleasure of scrounging around through bags looking for stuff? I’m guessing you just may have. perhaps, then, you can identify with my extreme distaste for such activity? and that, my friends, is why I’ve been trying to wear the same clothes as much as possible in the last few days… (why?)

again, I have no faint clue what I’m doing
(see, I even lost my balance, literally, on the right, lol)

he might look mad to you, but he looks smoulderingly hott to me :)

they just do this, no coaching necessary. funny little people.

and the whole motley crew!

bring on the magazine covers.

Comments { 9 }

do you ever feel like you don’t have a faint clue what you’re doing?

By on April 9, 2012 in Costa Rica, God and stuff, HA! ☺, help!, Lifestyle, Transitions

we’re all adults now, right?  we’ve been put through life’s loops enough years to be considered so, anyway…

but I discovered long ago that nothing really ever seems to feel the way you had always expected it would feel.

getting engaged? sure, it was cool, but the most vivid part of my memory of it is the feeling of “what?! this feels weird! this is a big deal, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!!!!” Mr. D wished I would have said yes just a BIT faster… but my life was flashing before my eyes, and it was all I could do to force out a reply, because I knew that he was the one I wanted, but the feeling in the moment totally threw me for a loop.

having a baby? yeah, it was totally awesome. but at the moment that she first came out I was like “this is my child?!?!” people always say you just automatically feel overwhelming love for them, but quite frankly my brain had to catch up with the concept. it just didn’t. seem. real. and again, I kinda had to go through the motions of doing what I was supposed to do for the first hours because I knew that I loved her, even though it felt so strange to me.

I was talking to a friend recently about feeling like you’re playing dress-up in your parent’s clothes. when your child is sick for the first (and possibly subsequent 35 times, especially if it’s all different stuff) it’s like, what the crap, when are the adults going to show up to figure out what we need to do here?! because we sure as hell don’t have a clue (I just realized I don’t know why I shouldn’t say that, even though I’m pretty sure my upbringing would frown on it – hell is sure, as well as crappy, isn’t a bad word, and nothing else fits? soooooo)

all vocabulary policies aside, we don’t even have a boss telling us what to do, so we’re really out there, lol. it’s like, well God, here we are, uh, HELP?! as I think I’ve mentioned on twitter before, “aaah, please help us, God!” is a pretty common, probably daily and sometimes multiple times a day, phrase with us. it’s generally accompanied by feelings of excitement, but also a fairly numerous amount of stomach butterflies.

“well maybe if you didn’t say words like crap and hell and ass, God would be more favorable towards helping you”

if you think that, I grin in your general direction.

right now we are praying that we don’t get stuck in the country again on Wednesday. although, honestly, if we do, I think we might just have to stay, because if the third time is not the charm as we have found to be customary with us, well then perhaps a 2×4 to the head is what we needed to figure out our next step.

we’re also praying about all the things we will potentially do with the remainder of this year – which is a scary concept, we’re already a fourth of the way in, folks. there is a lot of fun, adventurous, and most assuredly CRAZY stuff in the works (which will be forthcoming before long!), but one never knows how things will really go.  and that’s why I’ve mentioned the tightrope of faith…

and when it comes right down to it, there is a very fine line between giddy and completely freaked out, and that’s what it feels like to walk that tightrope.

we’re doing our best to embrace it!

on another note, in honor of our anniversary tomorrow, which we’ll now be spending here in Costa Rica apparently!, we’re going to be doing a really fun little get-to-know-you-and-share-your-blog activity, which will be limited to the first 10 people to sign up! (and the limited number of people they choose to share with… hmm, sounds intriguing!) be sure you’re following our blog in some way so that you don’t miss the signup, though the fastest way it goes out is via twitter. there will be prizes!!! hehehe, it’s so fun, seriously, I can’t wait :) (now I need to go finish working out the details!)

Comments { 7 }

adventure is not all fun and games – sometimes there are tears and yelling.

By on April 7, 2012 in Costa Rica, HA! ☺, help!, Lifestyle, Transitions, us

if anyone can tell you that we’re just us, all the time, it’s our intern Krista, who’s had the great pleasure interesting experience of living with us for the past 3 months. I’ve often considered how bad we might look to the general public – “wow, if they’re like this in public, how in the world haven’t they all killed each other yet”

ok, I don’t know if we’re really that bad, but I can’t say that we do a whole lot of editing. I would probably prefer to edit to some extent, but I’m not sure if Mr. D has an edit switch when he is truly pissed. (I don’t mean cussing, I mean more just being generally jerkish)

like any properly passionate couple, we push each others buttons sometimes.

often it is outside circumstances that put pressure on situations and we lose a bit of the joy of the Lord, so to speak.

we are firm believers that satan likes to wedge his way in and take advantage of any little possibility for a rift that he can… he is a destroyer, after all. and boy does he wreak havoc with times of transition. (if you’re a Christian and you don’t believe satan has any effect on your life, I’d be very interested to hear about it)

we’ve been effectively in transition for a couple of weeks already (regular routine, to visitors, to preparing to leave), and now with this latest development, our transition is getting extended by another week PLUS the week after we get home that we will still be reorganizing our lives.

suffice it to say that while we love traveling and being adventurous, it definitely comes with it’s large share of difficulties, and staying grounded is very important!

so not long after skyping Mr. D to “[12:47:35 PM] STOP BEING AN ASSSSSSSSSSSS” I spent some time praying and refocusing. (and no, he has not dignified that with an answer as of yet, and I’m not sure that it doesn’t still apply, lol)

BUT I’m sorry, honey, I’m not helping the situation any. we just need to remember we are on the same team… and not being selfish would help, too, no doubt. maybe a few attitude adjustments here and there…?

blah. anyone else love transitions as much as we do??????????????????????

Comments { 1 }