Fall in Watersmeet...Complete with Our First Few Snows

Hello from Fort Wayne!

We are wrapping up our second week of vacation (for the year) in Fort Wayne. It was kind of a last-minute plan to come down and try to get together with Chris' brother and stepmom to try to help sort through some of their dad's things. It's been a full but good week trying to get things done and visit with family. We will be leaving early tomorrow morning to return home to Watersmeet.

In my last post, I shared some of our experiences this summer; here I'll share some of our fall highlights.

First, we adopted a new member into our family! Meet Mr. Tumnus, one of the sweetest kitties you'll ever know:

Charis and Mr. Tumnus: Love at first sight!

Another joy we had this summer was watching the sunflowers blossom in front of our house. Josiah had begged and begged to plant sunflowers - they're his favorite! - but after we were done planting our garden, the only place we had left was under the front living room window of our house. I thought they might reach to the bottom of the window, but I obviously hadn't paid close enough attention to the back of the seed packet...as before long, they reached past our window and one or two surpassed the roof of our house! They were a beautiful sight all summer long...but next year, I'll be more conscious not to put them in front of a window. 😄

Our biggest "Monster" sunflower 😯

In September, our church hosted the Revive LIVE True Woman conference simulcast. We had women from five different churches (including ours) attend for part or all of the weekend. It was a wonderful time!

Beautiful sunflowers from our yard!

Chris was thrilled to be able to act as an assistant coach to the Cross Country (XC) team at our school this fall. He was able to help out at practices, attend meets, and even go to the state meet (an overnight trip) with the team.

The last three runners in this picture are Watersmeet guys

We've also enjoyed living nearby other Village Missionaries and getting together every once in awhile for "VM Fellowships". There are five VM fields in or near the U.P.: Watersmeet, Bruce Crossing (30 min North of us), Calumet (about 2 hours North), Rock (about 2 hours 40 min East), and Land O' Lakes, WI (8 miles South of us). In October, we were invited to the house of Adam an Tamara Hamill in Rock. It was such a fun time - both for the missionaries and the kids!

Our family with the Washburns (Bruce Crossing) and Hamills (Rock)

The kiddos had so much fun together!

In October also, we were blessed to have a visit from Chris' Grandma and Grandpa Soliday (his mom's parents) from Nappanee, IN. They spent several days with us using their spare time to help us with organization we hadn't yet gotten to, exploring our beautiful area, and even watched the kids for an evening and gave us a beautiful date night! We truly appreciated their visit and encouragement. 💓

We have so enjoyed fall in the U.P. The trees and leaves were beautiful - while they lasted!

I realized at the end of my last blog post that I hadn't shared any photos of our house, so here are a few:

Front door and half of the living room

Living Room

Kitchen: The table Chris built fits just perfectly!

Kitchen, complete with my own personal professional Dishwasher 😉

Kids' room

Second half of kids' room

Nursery

The photos framed here were gifts from a dear friend in Ohio - so if you're from our VCC Family,
please tell Luana these pictures are used and well-loved!

Several people from the church worked hard to clean and prepare the parsonage before our arrival, and we are so appreciative! It is beautiful and absolutely perfect for our family! We've made a few changes since I took these pictures in the spring (such as adding curtains in the kids' rooms and decluttering those spaces a little bit), and I've also gotten a lot more organized and set up in the basement/homeschool area, which I don't have any photos of here - I'll have to take some when we get back and share those next time! Our backyard also has a beautiful view:

And yes, that photo accurately represents our current state (admittedly we've been gone for a week, but I assume it hasn't changed much 😉). We are loving the snow!!

Yooper in his natural habitat

At the end of October, the U.P.-area Village Missionaries switched churches for Village Missions Sunday, which was a lovely way to practice the fellowship we have together through VM. We traveled up to Grace Christian Fellowship in Calumet, MI, and thoroughly enjoyed our time there! The congregation was so sweet and welcoming to our family, and we appreciated their generosity and hospitality!

Grace Christian Fellowship in Calumet, MI

We will be sending out our Fall Prayer Newsletter in the next couple of days (I'll admit it used to be monthly, but it's turning into more of a seasonal newsletter lately...), so if you would like to receive that but don't currently, just send us your email or snail mail address and we'll add you to our list. 😊

We are to set off early in the morning for home, so I really need to get to bed, but I wanted to get one more update out while I can! Thank you all for your prayers and care for our family! 💗