Thanks to members of our families who love to take pictures, we hardly took out our camera during our SC trip but still  have over 700 pictures from our time with family and friends. I’m using this week’s blog to highlight pictures from our time with both sides of our families. A big thanks to all who took pictures for us that week! Uncle Joey takes great pictures with and of Becca!

Visiting with Uncle Jon and Aunt Ashleigh. Becca loved their house and enjoyed doing a rain dance with Uncle Jon in his fire pit.

Grammy and Granddaddy Sutter

Aunt Emily – who always makes Becca laugh!

Meeting Cousin Colette Elisse Sutter. Becca is very happy to have another cousin! Becca also enjoyed her time with cousin Bella.

Visiting the mountains of GA with Grandma and Grandpa Jensen

Great Grandma Martin, Great Grandma Buecher, and Great Grandpa and Great Grandma Jensen

We enjoyed our trip to SC for my graduation. It was an especially exciting day for my side of the family, as my youngest brother, Joey, graduated with his BS in Accounting, my sister-in-law graduated with her MS in Accountancy, and I graduated with my Ed.D. in Instruction and Curriculum. Four years ago, when Joey started his freshman year, we figured that if I remained on track, we’d graduate the same year. I didn’t think it would happen . . . thanks for the extra motivation, Joey!

Graduation day was a bittersweet, emotional day for me. Sweet, because it was a celebration of the completion of hours of work and a testimony to God’s grace in my life, but also sad because I should have been walking across the platform with a big belly and about a month of pregnancy left. I would gladly trade my doctorate for the little one we lost. But I have confidence that the Lord’s ways are perfect and that all details of our lives are in His hands.

I am very thankful to my committee members for their assistance throughout this project: Dr. Brenda Ball (dissertation committee chair), Dr. Dan Turner, and Dr. Sue Quindag. I am particularly grateful to Dr. Steve Walter (committee member) who introduced me to the data from the Eritrea National Reading Survey and suggested that I investigate the effects of writing script. I am also thankful for many family members and friends who encouraged me throughout my degree.

A very special thanks goes to my sweet wonderful husband, Josh. I would have given up on my degree if not for his love, support, continual encouragement, and watching our daughter so I could have uninterrupted times of research. He also read through my manuscript multiple times and provided help with formatting details.

The completion of my dissertation is a testimony to the faithfulness of the Lord. While working on the initial stages of this research, Becca was born three months before her due date. During the final stages of this research, I went through a miscarriage with complications that lasted three months. During both of these times, working on dissertation research was the last thing I wanted to do. But the Lord faithfully carried me through and gave me the time and strength to complete my dissertation. The greatest thing I will take away from working on this project is the ways the Lord faithfully helped me through the difficult times.

We have lots of pictures from our visits with both sides of our families. If I have time, I’ll do an extra blog post, if not stay tuned for more next week. . . .

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More pictures to come next week!

Our big news this week is that we moved to a new apartment. The Lord opened up the door for us to move into a 2-bedroom apartment right across the street from where we were living. The move keeps us close to campus — where Josh walks to school and Becca and I explore — and it allows Becca to have her own room. Also, it is about the same price that we were paying for our 1-bedroom apartment. As you can see from the picture above,  our family has grown since we moved into our first home. We’ve been through many adventures in Apt. 253. It was a wonderful apartment and we have many good memories there.

We’ve spent the week packing and cleaning our old apartment and moving, cleaning, and unpacking our new apartment. We’ve very thankful for all who helped with our move: Micah and Anna, Pastor John, and Parke — and also for Lynnelle for watching Becca during our move and feeding us dinner that night, for Heather who made us a wonderful meal, and for Vitaly who lent us lots of boxes. All made our move smooth and we’re very grateful for each person’s gift of time and work.

As of today, I’m finished with all the unpacking. I’ll take pictures of the completed rooms once we finish hanging things and get rid of the boxes. The main things I have to get used to are not having a washer or dryer and cooking with a gas stove. So far, we’re pleased with our new apartment and are very thankful for the Lord’s direction.

Josh has been a wonderful husband during the entire moving process. He’s given up lots of research time to move us to our new place. I’m very thankful that I’m married to a man who has such a servant’s heart. Becca has gotten used to the new apartment and is enjoying the extra space.

One quick cute story about Becca. Every morning Josh and I have devotions together. Becca used to sleep through them, but recently she’s been getting up before we’re finished. This week when we were kneeling to pray, Becca expressed the desire to pray with us. She knelt between us at the couch and folded her hands as Josh prayed a short prayer and then said “Amen!” at the end. It is so cute, I wish I could get a picture of it. Since then, we’ve had her pray with us each morning.