When yes becomes not yet

I can't tell you the number of times I've opened up this document to start typing and end up just staring at a blank page for 20+ minutes because I simply cannot put everything into words.  All that to say, bear with me as I attempt to give you an update from my last post to now.

If you've been following to this point then you know that Jared and I, almost a year ago now, went on an exploratory trip to New Zealand. Exploratory meaning we were scoping it out as a potential place to land for church planting. To briefly overview the trip for you: New Zealand (NZ) is an incredible place with an incredible need that is not typical to most fields of work with church planting. We left feeling excited and optimistic about our calling to working among the people there. Once we were back home and really processing through everything that involved NZ we initially planned on doing the assessment and training with the organization we would be going with.

Not long after our initial decision to go forward with the NZ process life got busy: holidays, Jared off to Israel, a very busy birth season for doula stuff, and some pregnancy complications for myself. (Remember those darn kidney stones?!! GAH!) Towards the end of January and after a long prayer process, Jared and I realized a big halt sign in our overseas plans. Initially we were hoping to do the assessment/training for NZ by March (2017) and go into full time support raising with hopes of leaving to go to NZ by the end of this year. But it seemed as though God had different plans...and man, was I angry! Angry because NZ seemed like such an incredibly good fit for us, and us for it. It was the "fit" we had been looking for for so long! Angry because I thought that it was finally my time to shine. I would finally get to be the one to go onto school and study midwifery! Angry because, selfishly, I felt as though God owed it to us to finally be able to live out our dreams of living in a different culture and having our children experience life in a different capacity. But God did not see it that way. I cannot tell you just how many nights I fell asleep crying when we were hit with this glaring halt. As God had it, we ended up telling our NZ folks that we would be putting this journey on the shelf for the time being. Which proved to be quite the difficult, disappointing and even slightly embarrassing conversation to have because of our prior exciting commitment.

All I can say is this: the decision to "shelf", so to speak, New Zealand has been extremely disheartening for us, but even more so for me. Over the last 3-4 years we've pursued different avenues of opportunities...all of which have not panned out like I had hoped and progressively left me feeling as though I couldn't really trust any kind of opportunities presented to us. I've found myself having a tough time even trusting God with any kind of pursuits...even in my own faith journey. To put it bluntly: God and I are kind of on the rocks. And that realization alone was confirmation enough that we were not in a good position to be uprooting our family to a completely different part of the world just yet.

But it has also posed some good realizations for us as a family. The biggest realizations being our financial stability, our living situation and also the way in which we now parent 3 children. Now that both Jared and myself are both working full time, we are finally getting the chance to start gaining a bit in the financial aspect of our life. But at the same time, we've also had to take a serious look into our living situation. We have 3 children, two of whom are at ages where they want to be outside, enjoying all the seasons and just simply run around without their parents coming down on them to be quiet for the downstairs neighbors. Jared and I had started looking at getting out of the apartment living lifestyle and looking into renting a house. Little did we know just how much renting a 3/4 bedroom house would be in Omaha! That then lead us into poking around a bit into the whole idea of buying a house. YIKES!! If you were to ask Jared how his wife took that subject...he'd laugh and cry at the same time, I'm convinced! I was in COMPLETE emotional turmoil over the idea of buying a house! Why? Because it meant commitment. It meant we wouldn't be leaving Omaha anytime soon. It meant we wouldn't be renters anymore. I cried and then cried some more about all these realizations and poor Jared was the one who took the brunt of all my emotions. But he handled it like a trooper as we walked through the details and pros/cons of this house-buying thing.

Thus began the process of looking into houses to buy. TO BUY! What?! I'm quite certain we drove our realtor absolutely insane during our process since I had so many emotions about it all. On our first meeting with the realtor she asked us what kind of things we were looking for in a house. My answer was something like: "...I don't really know...Um, a roof? Maybe some grass for the kids to play on?" But thankfully Jared had us covered in the absolute necessities for what we'd be looking for.

To make a long story short: after looking at many houses we found one. We debated, talked at length about it and eventually put in an offer. And were accepted on that offer! So...we bought a house in Benson! And we are pretty excited about having a place of our own. A place we don't have to share walls with a neighbor. A place we can let our kids go outside and play and enjoy themselves freely. This is definitely a big step for Jared and I, and we're pretty pumped about it. We never realized how much we had been struggling mentally and emotionally from being cooped up in an apartment and never being able to host get togethers with friends. But we will finally be able to do that! We have always loved to host parties and hangouts in our home, but living in a tiny apartment has made that difficult for the last 3 years.

SO! Are you still with me? I know. It's a lot and some of it depressing...but what is life without some valley's between the mountain tops to really grow you as a person! Anyway, I do hope that God opens the door back up with a resounding "YES!" for New Zealand one day. And I'm pretty confident He will, I'm just unsure of when it will be. In the meantime, we're going to need all the help we can get in getting settled into our new home. When? Well, we close on September 29th and hope to start moving that day and on the 30th. If you're free, come on over and help out! Even if it's to play with the kiddos and keep them busy!  Either way, we'd love to see you and hope to plan a fun house warming party very soon!

Love to you all,
  Anna

Kia Ora!

Hello there!
Finally, right?! Well, kind of finally...because this is only Part 1! There was so much to our trip in New Zealand (Which I will often refer to as 'NZ'), that I couldn't really figure the best way to put it all into one blog post. So we're going to do a two part series here, bare with me! When we got back to Omaha I didn't realize we'd be as busy as we were with work, births, school, kiddos...etc. I also did not expect my over all processing of the trip to be as extensive as it was. Let's dig in, shall we?

First off, I want to answer some of the most common first questions I've had since returning: 1. No, we did not noticed their toilets flushing the water the other way, haha! 2. Yep, there are accents. And they are truly the coolest! 3. Yes, New Zealanders often refer to themselves as Kiwis! Also, the coolest! And lastly, 4. Yes, it really is as green and lush as what is portrayed in Lord of the Rings. Talk about beauty in every which direction!

Anyway, when we landed in New Zealand it was about 8 in the morning. It was a bit of a rough few hours of transition as we had left in the early morning from Omaha and arrived in the early morning to NZ...and sleeping on planes is next to impossible. At least when you're pregnant and nauseous it is! So we had arrived, got our rental car (which Jared did great driving around in!) and arrived to our host home. A HUGE thank you to the Cherry family for opening their home so graciously and allowing us to live with them for a few days!

We got settled and were then told to try our hardest to stay awake in order to help make the jet lag less abrasive, so to speak. So we walked to a local cafe for breakfast! With an 18 hour time difference, I think the hardest part was not the jet lag...it was definitely getting our digestive systems to adjust! But we did eat and walked around some more until I just couldn't do it any more and decided to pull the pregnancy card and catch a two hour nap. Which I'm convinced is what made jet lag non-existent for the rest of the trip!! So we woke up from our naps and headed over to meet our next round of people: The Hutchisons.

Jared, Anna, Whitney and Nate

Let me stop there quick. We knew going into this trip we'd have some great experiences...but we did not realize that those experiences would be happening right off the bat. Meeting the Hutchison family was like the breath of fresh air that Jared and I never knew we needed until that night. Nate and Whitney have been in NZ for about 10 years now and to say they are like wise ol' souls is a severe understatement. Their family was so open, honest, raw and full of encouragement in, again, ways we didn't even fully realize we needed. We had dinner together, talked, drank coffee/tea until Jared and I were almost falling asleep mid sentences. It was such a great start to the trip in having some insight into NZ and the culture in which they have been living. We did meet with Nate and Whitney a few more times throughout the trip and talked more in depth about what to expect in NZ, how to handle the transition in culture, and understanding the field in which they work.

Muriwai beach, day 2

We woke up the next day and decided to go to one of the black volcanic sand beaches we had been told was neat to see. After Siri decided to take us down "bob's road", we finally were able to walk to Muriwai beach and see the black sand ourselves. We then eventually met up with our friends Randy and John, who work for South Pacific Christian Fellowship, for lunch and got to catch a view of what the other side of the beach looked like. (Which is where we took the pictures of announcing baby Landt #3!) After much walking and "tramping" around (what kiwi's refer to as hiking), Jared and I headed back to our host home and hang out and eventually watch our first rugby match: the All Blacks.

Day 3 we woke up and head to church at Shore Community, the church our friend Randy and his family were a part of starting many years ago and is now flourishing well! It was great to meet so many others who have been a part of the church and also were native to NZ. This was also the point in which I met Eleanor, a midwife there in NZ. Obviously, if you know me, then you know I was completely on cloud nine! After church, we went to lunch with Eleanor and I was able to ask all the questions I wanted to my hearts desire. She informed me of what the birthing culture was like and how different it was in comparison to the United States. Especially the further outside of Auckland you got, where more midwives were prominent. Particularly in the areas of homebirth. It was wonderful to speak more with her and hear her experiences as well as wisdom on being a midwife in New Zealand!

After lunch, we headed to the beach to meet up with Nate and Whitney and watched the kids play as well and learned more about NZ culture in regards to families and friends. It was so neat to talk and then also observe how other people interacted. Parents tend to be much more lax in just letting their children play freely and learn about what they can and can't do on their own accord. Something that was interesting to hear communicated to me was how there isn't fear, or at least nearly as much, instilled into parenting in this culture. Media and social outlets don't feed parents about all the potential risks of just about anything and everything like our culture here in America tends to do. Hence why, of many reasons I presumed, many kiwi families are more laid back. Either way, it was intriguing to people watch as someone who comes from quite a different background.

That evening Jared and I had dinner with Jeff and Indra Palmer, and their three sweet kiddos! The Palmer family has been in New Zealand for 6 or so months now, so their fresh mindsets of integrating into culture was great for us to hear. Jeff and Indra are such a wonderful couple who opened up to us about living in the area they do & what they felt they were being called to while serving there.

John. W and the Palmer family

 Both are wonderfully passionate about their faith, family and just life in general, I could tell that many people around them were already quite drawn into knowing more! Indra had invited me to see what the school setting was like for one of her kids, and it was amazing to see (after only 6-7 months of living there) people light up when they saw her walking by and saying hello. Have you ever met someone briefly and left thinking, "I've got to know more!"? Well, Indra is very much that person! (I hope you aren't blushing reading this, but you've just got to know how amazing you are! Lol!)  Anyway, our time with them was hugely informative as they were able to give more intricate details of the necessities of moving with young kids, what to expect and what to tangibly plan for. We were so thankful to get a few more times to hang out with them all over Auckland and hear more of their story throughout our time there.

Monday, day 4, morning came early as we got up and ready to head over to a networking brunch and meet with all the people who were working in New Zealand and associated with SPCF (South Pacific Christian Fellowship). It is truly amazing to meet so many people who have different backgrounds

Brunch meetup

come together and speak about what was going on in their ministries, how to pray for them, and also encouraging others about what their seeing in shifts with culture. Each individual or team were in different areas and doing various things in culture, but all for one purpose: loving the people and living out their faith. There was no bible-thumping or preaching fire and brimstone...each and every one of the people there are genuinely there to serve people and love them in any capacity possible!

Ferry to downtown Auckland

We were thrilled to be a part of a meeting that was uplifting as well as filled with many who offered some advice and direction for others, too. After the meeting we headed out with our friend John and the Palmers to see more of Auckland. We took a ferry into downtown and walked aronnd the docks to see all the different boats and various other things as well!





I will continue to write out the rest, but wanted to give a Part 1 of our trip to give you just a bit of a taste! Stay tuned, Part 2 should be done soon!

Muriwai Beach

A little kiwi and a whole lotta Jesus

I think this might be my 20th time at taking a stab at this particular post. Most of that comes when I'm in a decompressing mood and just need to type for a bit. If you've been following me to this point, then you know my best processing is often times through blogging. Shall we start?

The last time I had blogged was when I was going through another miscarriage in February this year. And the amount of love and support we received from people/family was just astounding; so THANK YOU to all who supported us through such a tough time! We are doing much better and feel much at ease knowing we have so many loving people who are supporting us.

Just after February, Jared and I decided to put our focus on what the next step was for our family. We had so many people flooding in, and all with one question..."So...what's next??" They all knew that Jared's last year of school was this year with him graduating in May of 2017. (Not that I'm counting...but y'all, it's SO CLOSE!!)  This was the question that has almost haunted us for years because we have ALWAYS wanted to live life and raise our family serving people in different cultures, and most everyone knew it...but yet we just seemed stuck with no answer to that question. We had pursued various opportunities, and many of those pursuits never really came to fruition. To put it mildly, the attempts at some of those opportunities were quite devastating to say the least. Anyone who knows Jared and I well, know that we've always had a heart for serving people overseas. To be more specific to that passion, we have been particularly drawn to being in community with people who have been exposed to sub par representations of the gospel, who Jesus really is and what He means to this world. For as long as we can remember, we've always been in close proximity to those who have endured some pretty severe heart break from the Church.  For Jared in particular, his schooling has very much prepared him for encounters like this. The amount of depth and exposure to the context and history surrounding every aspect of biblical times has opened not only his eyes to truth, but mine as well. (Shameless plug: Thanks, Pillar Seminary) So, we've prayed and we've prayed hard with what to do and what the next step was in our walk. Where did God want to take us? WHO did he want us to live our life among??  Pursuit after pursuit and door opening after a door slam, we finally feel we've gained at least a little bit of traction.

Not but a couple weeks after the miscarriage, and Jared and I having a heart to heart about Omaha, did something just kind of plop into our laps. We had literally just told God, "listen, we're going to plant ourselves right here. We're not going to do anything besides focus on right now.". You'd think I would have learned my lesson in the realm of telling God I'm going to do this or that...haha! Because He ALWAYS has a different thing in mind. Not long after, Jared was out to coffee with a friend he had met a few years ago. Little did he know that this friend, and missionary, was going to tap into some of our deepest heart strings and in what seemed to be the most unlikely scenario.

In a place filled with beauty and history was a place also in rapid decline for any affiliation with religion, especially Christianity. In the last two most recent census' taken, religious affiliation has dropped by 10% each time in this particular place...and continues to do so. Just in 2013, 4 out of 10 people claimed no affiliation to religion in any way. That, in turn, means an entire younger generation bringing up their own children with little to no understanding of who Jesus even is. Which begs the question...what happened?? How did a country who is considered a "reached nation" come to where it is now? Who and what were they exposed to? Having said all that, let me say this...what snags me the most is not what you might think. We are not ones to go out and bible thump people, preach in their faces and turn blue trying to convince them to follow or go to hell...no. No, that's not how Jared and I roll. What is so concerning to us in this scenario is that there is an entire nation who is quickly turning away from Jesus...and it has been incredibly thought provoking to try and understand the "why". Why if the Gospel is so compelling, and we believe that it is, are people so eager to walk away from it? So Jared and I found ourselves becoming increasingly more interested in finding out more about the "why", and even more so, we found ourselves beginning to feel like we needed to experience this firsthand.

So, where would a place like this be? New Zealand. Yep, you read that right! We were quite baffled ourselves, but at the same time not entirely surprised considering our own exposure to many other countries who have found themselves in this current state. However, we've not ever been to this particular country ourselves, but we felt led to start praying about an open door to experience it. Not long after we began praying, we actually got invited to join in on a 10 day exploratory trip with that very missionary..for October. Of THIS YEAR! We were invited about late August and thought, "there is absolutely no way we can raise funds and put together an itinerary in that small amount of time!" But, we figured we'd keep it in prayer and give it a valiant try. So try we did...and did we succeed?  Holy. buckets. Yes!!  Some of our closest friends and relatives caught wind of what we were doing and attempting to plan and wanted on board to support us in every way possible. So we set a goal: $2,500 by Sept. 20th (just one month from the day we were invited to go) or we would shelve the idea for a later time. Little by little, and with a generous contribution from the organization we would be working with long-term, we made our goal...a week early! So we bought our plane tickets! And now we only have a small chunk to raise before we actually take off for New Zealand. How crazy is that?! Our consistent prayer in all of this has been, "God, if you want us on this trip, provide the way and the people who want to support us. If we are not to go on this trip, give us peace about not going and close the door, giving us clarity."

We're very excited for this trip and what it could possibly mean for next steps for our family. While we are in country, we will be meeting with various families and individuals who are church planting and working in different areas of the northern island. For me, one of the most exciting parts is that I will be doing a campus visit to a university to inquire about the midwifery programs!!  I will also get the chance to sit and be with a midwife who has been in practice for quite some time now!! EEEKKK!!!  Needless to say, we will be busy but it will be absolutely worth it.

Before I leave you, I want to ask one thing: will you pray with us? Send good, uplifting vibes? We are asking for strong discernment and guidance while on this trip especially. And on a related note, will you pray for our kiddos as this is the first time they will be away from us for this long? Both Sonja and Harper will be staying with my parents up in Iowa, so maybe pray for my sweet parents as well as they take care of two cute but crazy kids!

And lastly, thank you. Thank you to all who have followed us on our journey, loved us no matter where we've been and also continue to support us in all the ways you have. We are SO appreciative and eternally grateful for each and every person who has contributed in the many ways you have. I will continue my blogging as much as I can while we are in New Zealand. And once we return I will be sure to give you all an update! Much love to you all!

- Anna & Jared

A simple hair tie

Do you ever have that fleeting thought in a given situation, though you'd not tell a soul, "something just isn't right." I've not had too many of those times, but when I have they are always right. A mother's instinct, woman's intuition, gut feeling...whatever it may be, it's almost as if, I believe, God set that there to help ease the load of what is to happen.

Last night, Saturday the 20th, Jared and I went to bed and I had this odd thought as I was pulling my hair out of its ponytail for bed, "I should keep my hair tie on my wrist in case I need it if we go anywhere in the middle of the night."  It was such a random thought it surprised me and almost left me a little lost on why I thought that. I went to bed knowing that the next day would be putting me at 11 weeks pregnant, almost out of the "danger zone" as many call that first trimester. But yet I just couldn't shake the feeling that something wasn't right and to keep that darn hair tie on my wrist.

Fast forward a few hours later, 4am to be exact, when I wake up and have another thought to just go to the bathroom. I looked at my hair tie, put my hair up and off to the bathroom I go only to find I'd begun the difficult process of enduring yet another miscarriage. Waking up Jared I felt panicked yet calm enough to tell him what was happening and begin deciding what to do.  We quickly called my sister-in-law, Leah, to see if she might be able to come over and be with the girls when they woke up. She was to our house and ready to go as if she had been waiting all along, but she's also just awesome like that and always quick on her toes. :) 

Now, let me pause there and give you some back story:  Our first miscarriage, which was 5 years ago this August, was quite literally awful. Our ER experience was awful, the doctors and nurses were very calloused and not exactly the friendliest of people...so that being said, I was not too terribly fond on having to go to the ER.  I even work for a doctor's office and frequently find myself getting upset at even the thought of potentially having to see my own doctor. I've always believed in just leaving sickness/ailments alone and let them run their course, no doctor needed. But this was obviously very different.  

We arrived at the ER and were greeted by some of the sweetest receptionists and triage nurses I've honestly ever encountered. Upon being put into our room, the nurse said many times she was so sorry for our loss and also reassured us that this was not our fault. So at this point we had multiple people in and out, every one of them taking the time to talk with us and genuinely care about what was happening. I was so very blown away by the meaningful dialogue and listening ears we encountered during this stay, I will forever be grateful to that staff for bringing so much peace to us during that time.

Anyway, as you can imagine, tests were run and all the usual stuff that needed to be done to ensure my body was doing what it needed to do in order to heal itself. After those tests came back normal and the doctors felt good enough, I was discharged. Obviously, at this point I was just about starving. So that good ol' husband of mine and I decided to head over to Panera for a bite to eat.  About 10mins into our time at Panera I was sitting at the table across from Jared and felt my sight and hearing begin to go out, my arms became tingly and a severe bout of nausea set in. I'm sure I completely freaked Jared out as he was attempting to wave his arms in front of me and almost have to catch me. So! Back to ER we went!  I was monitored for another couple hours just to ensure my blood pressure didn't plummet like it had at Panera causing the episode. The nurse we had (a guy named Tori) might literally rival even the sweetest midwives I've met during my time of doula-ing. He was absolutely incredible! He was informative, caring, and also so good at lightening a mood.  If you ever meet a male nurse named Tori (not sure of spelling) from Nebraska Medicine, I highly encourage you to thank him for choosing the profession he is in. Because he rocked it!

We left, came straight home and opened the door to a completely cleaned apartment. My sister-in-law is absolutely AMAZING!  And I cannot even begin to express just how thankful I am for her existence in my life, and not just because she cleaned and watched our kids! 

So, why do I type all of this out?  Why give you the details of such an awful experience? Because I am one of those people who has to process everything out in this kind of way. There are times as people we live through experiences and it all seems as if it was just a dream. I often blog and write because it brings experiences in every form back down to earth and allows for the grieving and healing process to take place. I have way too many people in and out of my life who have not taken any time to really process a said experience, and I see what it does to them and how it has affect their life. We are emotional creatures, and that's ok! Learn to embrace that. And emotions can be such a difficult thing to navigate, and that is why I choose to blog/write. My heart learns to accept the grieving instead of stuffing it away and as time allows I begin to heal as I understand what has happened. I also write these blogs to help be an encouragement to others whom have experienced loss. May you take the time to grieve and heal; know there is no time limit on that process. Take comfort in knowing there are many of us out there who have experienced this kind of loss, we can come together and be a village who extends an understanding hand as comfort. Please do not be afraid to let your friends and/or family in, allow them to take some of the burden and just hold you during such a time. Let them take the hair tie, pull your hair back and say, "I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. Let your tears flow, I've got you." 

And as for my own hair tie, it held my hair all day but is currently making my head hurt. Thank you all for taking the time to read and allowing me to grieve and heal. Much love!

The long pursuit

Hello again!
It's been a while since I last wrote on this blog, so I thought I'd take yet another stab at getting back into the routine of blogging.  Especially since I've found that doing so helps me to process all things life! Am I right??

As many of you know by now, already a year in, we've moved back to Omaha for Jared to attend The Pillar Seminary after living in Topeka for about 2 years.  Those two years there were wonderful and definitely full of love and support. We could not have asked for a more peaceful season of life during those two years than we did.  So to those of you from our Topeka family reading this, thank you for the print you have left on mine and my family's life.  You mean more to us than I can even put into words!

Omaha, seminary, work, money, kids....and on the list goes...

I wish so badly I could tell you that this transition has been smooth, peaceful and completely blissful...but I'd be lying if I said that.  It has been quite the journey thus far as we've hit some low points emotionally, spiritually and especially financially. And I can't tell you, honestly, the number of times I've found myself thinking, "is this pursuit of ministry really worth it?  Is this frustration and sometimes pain worth it??"  It is difficult to see those questions even typed out because we've been on this pursuit of ministry for so long that it almost feels like we've nothing to show for it. But yet both Jared and I find ourselves back at the same spot when hashing through those questions realizing that if we were not on this journey, then we would be dead on the inside. I believe God built Jared, myself and our kids for something specific and we cannot stop this pursuit now because it's almost as if we would be giving up a large part of our life. That is how I feel, no matter the pit I'm in or the amount of tension I feel, I know deep down that we can't stop now.  What God is doing in us now could very well be a stepping stone that another person later on might need to hear or spoken into their life.

So we keep rolling. Time and time again we have had friends and family that often come through to help pull us through the tough times and rejoice with us during the joyful times. I have to remind myself that not every bit of the journey in life is going to be this amazing, flying over clouds experience...it takes the valley's and trenches to learn how to gather your footing and develop the skills or gifts for navigating. And right now we're into Jared's second year of three in seminary. I'm so proud of the man he has become already in being back in school. He's focused, determined and quite literally one of the most hardworking people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. Jared takes on a lot each day and on top of it all makes his faith and family his first priority. While I'm still nervous and anxious about what our future holds after seminary is done, I'm now beginning to get more excited about who we are being shaped to be.

As for me, I'm back at work full time and also doing doula stuff on the side again as well. In the midst of doulaing, I've found a deep curiosity and interest in serving pregnant women in countries where they are less fortunate to have the resources and technology our country has when it comes to pregnancy and birth. Midwifery is essentially where I would absolutely love to end up with all this pregnancy and birth stuff, but I'm still waiting on God to open the door for that.  Until then, I'm continually studying up on everything I can get my hands and serving women and their families as a doula!

The girls are hilariously amazing! Sonja and Harper are almost complete opposites without being different genders, haha!  Sonja is a sponge and learning new things every day, she's recently begin to write letters and loves to do somersaults everywhere. Harper is turning out to be quite the inquisitive little thing.  She enjoys climbing and getting into just about everything. It has been fun to watch the past few months as they've grown more self sufficient and begin to play together more.  That always makes for a happy heart for a mom and dad!

I can't really think of any more to say at this point, but I suppose that's what blogs are for. You know, to bug you a little more with other thoughts or processes.  Before I'm done, let me leave you with this:
If you are someone reading this that's at a point in life where you feel like you've pursued all you can and cannot push any more...ask for help. You've got more in you than you might realize. It's not easy to ask for help, especially living in the culture we do.  But let me reassure you in saying you never know the amount of blessing and/or endurance you receive when just simply asking for help. There are people out there who are rooting for you; rooting for you to continue, battle on and help you past this check point.  You are not alone in the journey, while we're all at different stages, there are always people there to help, but you just have to ask.  That being said, I ask you to help me in praying for each other's lives. Pray, good thoughts..whatever it is you choose to do, please join me in doing so for all those around us.  You just never know the difficult pursuit someone might be on.

Until next time,
  Anna

Seasons of life

Let me first start this blog post out by stating this: I am officially world's worst blogger. If that's even a thing. My last post was over 2 years ago! Oops. Oh well, I'm here now and that's all that matters in the blogging world, right?

Anyway, to catch everyone up to speed in one summary: we again reside in Omaha and have added two to our family! There. All done, see you guys next time! Just kidding, let me get into the guts of this all...let's do this:

Not long after I returned from China (my last post) and Korea, Jared and I moved to Topeka, KS to serve at a wonderful church, Countryside Christian Church. The pastor, Nate, was a long time friend of my family and our initial connection to that particular place. So it was nice to start out that journey having some sort of personal connection. Topeka was really good for Jared and myself, not only because we had two amazing children while there, but I believe it was a season of rest and rejuvenation for us. For those of you meeting this blog for the first time: just before Topeka we had a pretty rough year and a half previous that I had written about a few posts before this one. We made quite the crippling and ripple effect of a decision to quit our jobs without much prayer and in *hopes* that finances would somehow come out of the sky and send us to Chicago then to Salt Lake City. To put it simply: that didn't happen. In fact, we were left crushed in many ways. Then to top it off, I had a miscarriage that same year with my first pregnancy. Needless to say, there was a lot of hurt we experienced. To be honest, some of those wounds are still healing to this day.

But all in all, God placed Topeka and Countryside Christian Church in our lives at the most perfect time. We were surrounded by a loving church family and I was able to begin the journey of doula-ing. If you'd like to know more about that, visit this link: http://ohbabybirthservices.webs.com/apps/blog/

Moving on! So, after almost 2 years in Topeka, God kind of came full-ish circle by placing an opportunity that had once almost been almost 3 years earlier: seminary for Jared! I mentioned Chicago a few paragraphs up; Chicago was almost the location for this seminary to take place, but that actually came crumbling down like the tower of Babel. Chicago was our reason for quitting our jobs in the first place. It was tough, but we found out years later that God was truly protecting us from that because of some other things that had gone down with that, which I won't go into here.

Seminary. Graduate school. In Omaha. Jared. Once this opportunity was presented I knew it'd be one that Jared couldn't refuse, but yet he was extremely prayerful about the whole idea. He knew with our track history of just jumping on the train and trying to move the boxcar ourselves never worked out. So being prayerful about every single angle of this was what we did. We committed to 40 days of prayer solely for this opportunity. One would think, knowing how much Jared and I absolutely love Omaha, that we'd be very excited about moving back and just up and do it. But having two very small children and loving the church we were at, we were hesitant. Myself more so. A lot of my hesitancy was rooted in my doula buisness as I had just become pretty well established and had gotten myself into many connections with great people in the birth world. My name was out there, I was getting quite a few emails and requests...all of which I ended up referring on to other doulas because after our 40 days of prayer, we felt God was telling us to move back to Omaha, NE. And so here we are! Back in Omaha.

We are so very glad to be back. However, it's not been world's easiest transition for us. Doula business has not quite panned out the way I had hoped, but it also doesn't help I was coming from a city where I was one of very few doulas practicing and very spoiled with having a great relationship with two of the more prominent midwives there. Whereas in Omaha, I'm one of MANY doulas. I've also been battling the process of what it would look like for me to go back to school one day to eventually become a midwife myself, and that decision has still not yet been decided. Jared has been so incredible in every way possible. He's worked his butt off to help provide for our family by working 2/3 jobs and now going to school with studies full-time. Seriously, this guy is incredible in every way possible. But now as we've been back for a little while we have realized that God may be changing things up yet again...

 It has been laid on my heart to go back to work after 3+ years of not working, 2 of those being a stay-at-home mom with kids. This was no easy decision...in fact, there were quite a few tears shed the night I told Jared I was being called and wanted to go back to work. Yes, you read that right...I want to go back to work. I like being in the workplace. I thrive being among people in all facets. I enjoy just being in the simple presence of people. That's just how God has wired me and I don't know how else to explain it other in that way. This is not all to say I haven't enjoyed being home with our girls the past couple of years, because I have loved being able to help raise them each day! But as of now, I'm back on the job market. Well, hunting through the job market, that is. If you'd like to know more about this decision, shoot me an email or message and we can talk more extensively.

Well, folks. I think I've pretty much covered the life of us Landt's thus far. To sum up everything, we're still trucking through this valley of life, but I do believe that an uphill is coming soon for the Landt family. I'm not entirely sure what that looks like yet, but I trust God will be revealing that soon. So as we continue on this journey, I would like to ask you, dear reader, to pray for us as we are in the midst of some great and tough change. We would appreciate the prayers, and please know how much we love each and every one of you and the impact you have made on our lives thus far. Until the next post...

Grace and peace,
       Anna

We are Chi-a-nese if you please!

Oh, why hello there folks! It's Anna here.  I'm all showered up, dressed for the day, and have a cute Chinese scarf on for writing out a long blog today....and I've been ready for the day since about 3:30 am.  Can we say jet lagged much?

Today's blog will be all about my trip to China (and a little about our short stop in South Korea as well).  Ready?  Here we go:

Well, let me just first state that traveling that far across the world on plane makes for a quick mess up of your sleep schedule.  Lol!  But hey, we're humans and we learn to adjust.  We took three planes in order to get there: from Omaha to Chicago, Chicago to South Korea, and then South Korea to Beijing.  I've never seen such fatty feet and ankles in my life than I did after our 13 hour flight from Chicago to Korea...it was quite hilarious to be honest!  Anyway, we left on early morning April 19th...and we were already starting out on the tired side.  After many, many hours of traveling we finally got there on Friday the 20th!

We got there at about midnight and all went to bed, hoping to wake up feeling well rested and rejuvenated.  And I would say most of us did that Saturday morning.  So we woke up, ate breakfast and were ready to take on our first project: help with teaching basic English conversational skills, and putting on a talent show.  Hehe!!  The english school was getting ready to start taking applications and new students for their next semester of teaching, so this day (Saturday the 21st) we were basically helping to promote the English school in order to help them maintain the amount of students they needed.  It was really fun actually!  We each got to have our own little group of younger, college aged, Chinese students. Most of them knew little tid bits of english, so conversing with them was only going to help them in their knowledge of keeping up in a conversation in english.  SO!  After we had our group time with students, we went and had lunch together and then started talent show.  We came up with quite a few "talents", and so did many of the Chinese students.  We had a couple of groups put together some stuff to show off, like a group who did a Tai Chi routine, a girl who did belly dancing, and a few others.  My talent, you may ask?  Well, for the special birthday that was there I did something EXTRA talented...I hand-tooted the Happy Birthday song.  I know, I know...I'm quite talented.  :)  Anyway, after the talent show some of us took a walk around the area where the orphanage was located.  We were not quite in Beijing, but I was told they still considered themselves Beijing because city limits were quite spread out.  And actually, Beijing took a good hour to even get to or longer with traffic!  So...this pretty much wraps up our first day in China.  After our walk, we all ate, and then crashed for the night...well, crashed for what hours our body would allow us, lol.

Sunday the 22nd - this was our first sightseeing day: Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden Palace were our two places of sightseeing, and then a little shopping on the side in a market.  It was a pretty fun day, lots of walking, but it kept us awake and going...so it all worked out great.  Two of the girls on our trip, Regan and Candace, both had very blonde hair...which, as most of you know, is a very rare thing in the Chinese culture.  So on our day of sightseeing, many of the Chinese people wanted pictures with them. And some of the people would even just walk up to them and snap pictures, it was pretty funny!  Anywho, the two places we went, the Square and Palace, were both really cool to see.  I've never gone through so many layers of a palace in my life...rough life for the people that use to live there. ;)  After that stuff was done, we headed out to a market to do some bartering and get our souvenirs.  When we first stepped foot into the market they were selling scorpions and sea horses and whatever other bug you could think of on a stick...to eat.  BLEH!  But we have a few in our group brave enough to try.  Surprisingly, they said it tasted pretty good.  lol!  So we did our barter shopping, and then left to go back to where we were staying for fellowship with the staff of the organization of the of the English school and orphanage (also called a foster care).  It was cool to have church with the staff and get to know them a little better as they were welcoming us to China.  That night was an awesome blessing, and also a great opening for us to be a big encouragement for the staff.

Monday the 23rd - The Great Wall of China day!  We were all REALLY looking forward to this day...but what we didn't really know was how much work it was going to be climbing around on that wall.  :S  But regardless, it was fun!  We didn't even climb the whole thing, obviously because it's so huge!  But we did climb an entire side of it...which I would like to say is a pretty big accomplishment considering I was 23 weeks (now 24) along in my pregnancy.  I need to pick up myself an award somewhere.  Just kidding.  Anyway, after a few hours of climbing and taking a bazillion pictures, we left to go eat at a traditional Chinese restaurant.  *Before I get into the food part of this...let me just put here that this was the day that about ruined my stomach for the entire trip.  If you were to ask any Chinese person what their favorite thing was about China, their answer every single time would be: "oh! The food!"  Or, "To eat!".  Because that was LITERALLY their favorite thing...and yet, they're so tiny and in fantastic shape!  I suppose it's probably because their food doesn't have all the junk in it like America does.*
Anyway, we got to this restaurant and there were about 13 of us, and we were definitely hungry...but not for what the rest of the day held for us in food, lol!  We sit at this table, and food is just being ordered and ordered and ordered...next thing I know there are about 18 or 19 plates FULL of food.  If I heard this correctly, it was explained to us that when Chinese are present at a dinner like this (one was) then they order more than needed, just to cover the bases of knowing everyone got to eat.  Lol!  Needless to say...I have NEVER in my LIFE been so stuffed full of food.  And it was fantastic food as well!  We were so spoiled with all this authentic stuff...that I think I'll be too snobby for the stuff that's served here in the states now.  ;)  Maybe not...?  So after this gigantic beast of a meal, we took our stuffed bellies to another market where they sold real pearls for great prices (even lower if you knew how to barter).  So we all did our shopping, then headed back to our little village...where we had some young Chinese students waiting to take us out to eat.  Lol.  So we get back, walk to town and have our try of Donkey.  It was very good!  And I figured since we had told them that's all we wanted to try since we were so full that they understood...but nope!  They started ordering food and ordering MORE food.  I thought I was going to cry trying to stay happy and keep eating...but thank you Lord you've made me a strong conversationalist, because none of them noticed how painful it was to try and stuff ourselves again.  Haha!  It was really a good night to reach out to these students and know them a little better.  For most of those students, it was their last week at the english school, and also the last chance the staff had a chance to really speak into their lives and ask Jesus to shed his light on them.  So it was truly an honor to be asked to be part of this process of reaching out to them in this way.  So despite all the food that was eaten that day, I felt so blessed to be a part of this beautiful piece of the puzzle!
After dinner, we walked back and we all managed to roll ourselves into bed and pray we didn't puke in the middle of the night (for me...I wasn't so fortunate, oh well).

Tuesday 24th - Thursday 26th: These three days were totally and completely filled with serving the staff and their work in any way possible: through service projects, helping with babies/toddlers/preschoolers and helping in the English classes/students.  Each day was started out with a half hour prayer meeting with all of the staff at this orphanage/English school.  In my opinion, starting out a day with your staff like that is one of the best things you could ever do in your walk with the Lord!  I know it helped me in just the few days we were there to listen to everyone pray and feel the blessings they have received already.  And God has definitely blessed that place in many, MANY different ways!  Anyway, after prayer time, we had one of the staff, Brian (in charge of coordinating visiting groups) would assign us to a particular area for whatever hours of the day they needed us.  We all got the chance to be with the foster kids at some point in those three days, some more than others.  I loved being with the kids...but I especially LOVED being around the students from the English school part of this organization.  We usually did English classes with them, or activities.  One of the days we had a Sports Day where we were all broken up into different groups and competed against each other in multiple events.  It was fun!  And not to toot my horn or anything...or maybe a little bit...my team won, the entire thing. :)  First places!  But everyone did fantastic and it was cool to help them use English in this way.
So many of the students would tell us how much they enjoyed being around us and the staff, and a couple of girls had told me one day that they felt a blessing from "the one above" (they couldn't remember the name in English.."God") to be here with all of us.  And it was so wonderful to hear them say such a beautiful thing, I was so touched! So truly, it was amazing to be around these students and see their eagerness to learn a new language, and learn it well.
 This is pretty much what those three last days looked like while being in China.  On our last day there, Thursday, half of us had the chance to go on a field trip with the English students into Beijing.  That was SO much fun!!  Each person from my group split up and went into different groups of the students (they were broken up by class numbers according to their level of English: 1, 2, 3, and 4).  I went with class 1 and quickly found out that we'd have a little different experience with where we were going to eat.  One of the women in the group was a Muslim, so we all decided to eat where she would like to eat.  It was really excited to get to know her a little bit and share stories of life and travel.  She's quite the traveler as well!!  So I was super pumped to learn of her experiences (in what little way she could tell me, lol).  So after our field trip, we got back to the village and had our sad goodbyes.  Even for just a short 8 day trip, we grew close to the people and it made it hard to want to leave.

Thursday (late) night we set off and flew into South Korea - Friday, 27th - We arrived in South Korea, got a shuttle to our hotel from the airport, got our room assignments...freshened up, then all of our group (but one) got into taxi's and headed for downtown Seoul!  It was about an hour drive to downtown, putting us there at roughly 2am-ish.  We walked around and saw the city a bit, went to some vendors, ate some local food, and did some shopping.  It was fun...but also tiring!  At one point we stopped at a place that was just like Burger King or something, and I about had my head hit the table because I fell asleep just sitting there.  Lol!  Anyway, after that we headed for the train station, which would get us back to the airport, then from the airport we'd be shuttled back to our hotel.  Just in time to shower up (or sleep from some), eat a complimentary breakfast (YES!) and then head back to the airport for our 13 hour flight back home!  I got back to the hotel and sat in the huge bathtub for about half an hour...and it was GLORIOUS!  I even prayed while chillin. :)  So, that's about how South Korea went down.  Bam bam bam!  We left South Korea on Friday morning....and then arrived in Chicago on Friday morning.  Weirdest and longest Friday I have ever lived, lol.

So, here I am now.  Back in Omaha and jet lagged worse than I've ever been in my life...but it was totally worth it!  Many of you who know me, know how much I love traveling overseas and seeing/experiencing different cultures.  You also know that I tend to grow very attached to the particular place/and work I've been/done, and begin praying very seriously about whether or not God wants me/us there.  But this trip was different.  I did love being in China and doing the work we did, but God made it very clear to me from the start that this is not where He wanted myself and Jared.  He did use me, I know that for sure, but I was also given peace in knowing that this could be a great long term experience for someone else.  And that is how I've been praying since I've been back: That God would open up the heart for this person(s) who needs to be there to hear Him and His calling.  They are in need of some staff help, and please know...that I am praying for you, whoever you are.  I know I haven't mentioned the name of this place, mostly due not being able to recall if I could mention their name because of safety issues and them being in China, and having this blog publicly posted to the internet.  But if you would like more information about this particular organization, feel free to shoot me an email or message on facebook and I'd gladly tell you more in depth.  Hopefully I can have an answer by then about the name!  If you feel called in any sort of way to helping this organization in their English school, or foster care/adoption, I hope that you will begin praying about that opportunity!

Again, thank you for taking time to read and allowing me to just debrief my trip.  It's nice to see it all in writing and think about it as a whole instead of just day by day.  I appreciate you readers, thank you for all your love and prayers you have offered to Jared and myself.  May God shower you with blessings and open your eyes to His great works!  Grace and peace!

- Anna