Year-In-Review: 2024

Here we are at the beginning of 2025! So much has happened in the last year. Let’s see if we can get some highlights down! You may know some of the events already, but here we get to reflect on what was meaningful and memorable over the course of the year.

1. Of course, the most momentous event was the birth of Naomi Elizabeth on January 12. She has brought so much joy and wonder to our lives. Becoming parents has truly felt like a totally new life stage and has already taught us a lot about ourselves and our world. A whole blog post could be written about this. (In fact, Christian’s Mom wrote one for the occasion of Naomi’s birth — check it out!)
   
   Although we had a bit of apprehension going into the process — the Chinese medical system is big and largely unknown to us — we were very pleased with how everything played out. Our doctor was always supportive and helpful; our doula prepared us well for many of the challenges of birth; and the midwife team that actually delivered the baby was entirely friendly and encouraging. Leigha was able to give birth in a way that felt comfortable and manageable for her, and she and Naomi both remained healthy throughout. (And Leigha was a champ! What an incredible feat, to grow and sustain and then birth another human!)
2. Leigha stayed home with Naomi for all of 2nd semester, from January to June. Meanwhile, Christian took over some of Leigha’s classes (AP Calculus and AP Physics). There was a lot of content that he had to learn or re-learn (never took Physics in the first place), so there was some stress involved in that, but at the same time it was really edifying to do some intentional, college-level learning and to learn alongside the students. Leigha had great rapport with her students and Christian was able to capitalize on some of that (having a baby around helped too), and it was great to experience students coming to just hang out and talk about math/science problems. A bit more involvement/stress for Leigha than if a stranger had taken her classes, but she was also able to provide insight and context that made Christian’s job a lot easier.
   
   In the meantime, Leigha stayed home with Naomi, which was a big shift in a number of ways. Switching from more-than-full-time-teaching the week before Christmas to months at home with a baby and many fewer “tasks” is no small change! Thankfully, Leigha felt well supported, both our moms were able to visit, and Leigha’s mom stayed with us for the last two months of our time in China. Leigha was grateful for chances to spend extra time with our Chinese houseworker and friend, as well as new interactions with neighbors and strangers on public transportation and outside. Having a baby as a foreigner opens up lots of chances for conversation, connection, and relationship, and she feels grateful for those opportunities. She was fortunate not to experience any severe postpartum challenges, even as she did have to adapt to a new pace of life and a new role as a stay-at-home caregiver.
3. We moved back to the US from China in June. There were lots of highlights here, from getting to hang out in Bammental, Germany with Christian’s cousins, to attending the first wedding of one of our siblings (Christian’s brother Andrew and his wife Laurel) in Virginia, to various other family reunions and gatherings, to orientation for our new work! Lots of moving pieces, which is a common experience for expats returning to their country of origin — ‘vacation’ can feel like a blur of catching up and renewing relationships, and doubly so for introverts like us. Still, there is so much joy to be had in cherished relationships that have been relegated to Zoom for quite a long time.
4. Then we moved to Colorado Springs, where we are serving as unit leaders for the Service Adventure program. This has been a big shift in a number of ways — China to the US, full-time to part-time work, living in an apartment to living in a house, living by ourselves to sharing a house with others, and of course as the months go on Naomi continues to grow and change and we get to adapt to her!
   
   We continue to believe that Service Adventure is an important and needed program. Intentional communal living, voluntary service, and church engagement tend to all be underrated (to varying degrees) in American culture, and exposing young people to these concepts as they move into and embrace adulthood is one way to slowly (sometimes imperceptibly) move the needle. Learning to live simply (and to discuss what that even looks like), learning to live without access to a personal vehicle, and keeping rhythms and routines with other members of your community are meaningful skills that our participants — and we! — get to learn and practice.
   
   Of course, there are challenges that come with communal living and with voluntary service. We find that we are in a strange balancing act, especially around our job status: do we have “jobs”? Our work with Service Adventure is not full-time or standard-hours work, but it does consume a not insignificant amount of time and energy, both during the day (coordinating meetings, writing emails, discussing situations, making plans, updating budgets, etc) and in the evenings (cooking, cleaning, learning components, worship nights, business meetings, board games, movies, church events, etc). Of course, the participants are doing the evening activities on top of their full-time volunteer placements, and many of those activities are just having fun! But there are also layers of responsibility overlaying those times that differentiate our respective roles.
   
   Not having full-time “day-jobs” (besides the aforementioned logistical activities) does mean that we have more time than we’ve probably ever had for other important things: catching up with family, taking walks, going to the library, reading books, playing with Naomi, taking seminary classes, volunteering, and generally learning to take life more slowly. We remain very task-oriented people, and it has been a challenge to not have task-heavy work in front of us. (Parenting is pretty much as far as you can get from task-oriented work!). Learning how to relish different forms of work is pretty new, and some weeks we do better than others.
   
   (Recently it struck me that I had called my mom 4 or 5 times — just short calls, often for unimportant reasons like getting a code for her Amazon account — in the span of a couple days. Being able to just call family and have someone pick up was literally impossible most of the time in China and is a small blessing I won’t take for granted!)
5. Christian has officially applied, been accepted, and enrolled in an online MDiv (seminary) program next fall. He is excited to move forward with what has been a desire and hope for years now. There’s a long road ahead, with many books to read, papers to write, and perspectives to deepen or shift; but with goals in mind like God’s glory, personal growth, and service to the church, it’s an exciting prospect. He is particularly excited to study Hebrew and Greek; to be part of a discipling community (to grow personally); to set aside an entire stage of life to Biblical studies; to sharpen his writing and critical thinking; and to learn with and from students from all over the world.

We welcome you to join us in prayer in some of the following ways —

Thanksgiving:

• Support: we are grateful for the many expressions of support we have received from our various communities! Thank you to all of you who pray for us, encourage us, hear from us, or contribute to our unit’s financial support. (If you want to contribute in any of these ways, please contact us and/or see this page)!
• Community: this could fit equally well under “support,” but we have been astonished at the support and encouragement we have received from our host congregation. It has been seriously unreal how welcoming, supportive, and friendly people have been. We particularly appreciate the support committee responsible for this program, who are incredible people and who have been exceptional resources, supports, and friends to us in these months.
• Climate: people rave about Colorado, but geographically speaking, it truly is an amazing place. After years living in Minnesota, Indiana, and China, it is wonderful to consistently have sunshine outside and to experience clean, crisp air. After years of seeing nothing but skyscrapers (cool as they are), having the mountains on our doorstep is just incredible. May we not take these things for granted, and may we relish them while we are here!
• Naomi: she continues to amaze us every day. We could never fully express how grateful we are that she is part of our lives.

Prayer Requests:

• Meaning: for meaningful service and church experiences and relationships for our participants, and that we would continue to see the value and importance of our own work.
• Community: we want to establish ourselves well in our church and in our community. Finding good ways to build relationships without shared work is new to us, and we hope to get better at it!
• Formation: this comes in multiple parts. As focused and task-oriented people, it is easy for both of us to get more caught up in “what we have to do” than in “who we are called to be” and “with Whom we are in deep relationship;” we mentioned above some of the ways that we are learning to focus on relationship rather than, or alongside, tasks. Pray that this would (continue to) be a time of growth and renewal in our own walks with our Creator and Sustainer.
  • At the same time, we have the opportunity to minister closely in the lives of our participants. May God use us in small and large ways, from a gentle word to an intentional conversation, to edify and encourage and challenge them in their walks.