2017 A year in review

I had planned on taking a month or two off this year, and it's turned into 12.

2017 was a year full of emotion and trials, and yet God was there at every corner guiding me and caring for me.

January began our second year of homeschooling, me running PaperFromHeaven, and John taking more language classes. We were also serving at a local church where John was the senior pastor. We had great vision for the year and saw everything moving forward in the same direction it had been the past few years. Our goal was to serve God faithfully.

By the time February rolled around the trials had begun. Within the blink of an eye God told John that the work was done at the church we were at. We spent a full week in prayer and ready for what was to come, but unaware of what laid ahead. The end story is that John resigned from the church and we moved on. February was a full month of high emotion and long sleepless nights.

March came with a new and fresh look. We also were looking for a church family to attach ourselves to so that we would have a spot to continue to serve our community. At this time we didn't know how long we would be in the local area and wanted to be tied to a local body of believers. We found a temporary home at Exchange Church in Roseville, NC.  Financially, God provided abundantly through PaperFromHeaven as it was our only income.

April + May are a blur. We did what we needed to do to get life done. Everything kept moving forward, but it felt as if so much was missing. John and I longed to serve, even though we were at many different churches serving (pulpit fill + drumming). God was constantly being faithful and giving us the finances we needed to move on with seminary. John was applying for local pastor jobs that would allow him to keep doing school. Sometime near the end of May we realized that John was finished with his language classes and he could finish his degree online. At this point we changed our prayers and began asking God if we could go back to California to serve long term.

June + July were long difficult months. We didn't know anything of the future. The hope of the new year had completely worn off. School for the boys was over and every day was a feeling of not knowing what was coming next. John was gone for 3 weeks during those months playing with Illumination Project at camps from Alabama to New England, and I just kept sewing. God was telling me to get rid of things, to make life more simple. To trust him and walk by faith. We were searching for churches and praying over communities that God might have us serve. Near the beginning of July we began contact with a church in Northern California. We fell in love with the area. The more John talked with the leaders in that area the more clear everything became as they described our exact prayer list of what we had been praying for.

August came quick and with energy. John and I traveled to northern California for John to preach in view of a call at a church. His mom flew in the day before we left. We came home early on a Tuesday morning, my parents arrived Wednesday morning for a pre-planned vacation. Thursday was Ephriam's birthday and we were all awaiting the "phone call" from the church to hear the vote. All of the grandparents left on Friday, and we moved out of our apartment and left North Carolina on the following Monday. We spent the last 2 weeks of the month traveling across the US (again) visiting family and friends.

September brought new life. We arrived in our new home in Fortuna CA and began serving a local church. We spent most of the month getting used to a new life, new schedule and adjusting.

October + November again were a blur as we continued to move forward in life. We began our homeschool year the beginning of October and we were still working through all of the emotions that comes with transitioning. I reopened PaperFromHeaven and worked through multiple schedules and making everything work together.

December has hit strong as a closure to this year. Realizing that I did nothing that I planned in early January, but yet I see God's faithful hand working through it all. It doesn't "feel" like Christmas, everything is new. We are celebrating our family traditions with the boys, and trying to learn new ones. I am trying to find the balance with making new friends and holding onto friends from the past. How to love and encourage people from different seasons of my life. How to homeschool, be a pastor's wife, and how to run a business. I am trying to do it all, and do it well, and do it for God's glory.

I am anxious for a new year and a new beginning and a fresh start. I am eager to begin writing the Bible again, because somewhere amidst the chaos of 2017 I put down that habit and haven't been able to find the energy to do the little things again. I am excited to learn and share that with the women in my church. I am anxious about our 3rd year homeschooling and praying that the schedule and routine will fall into place for the boys. I am looking forward to 2018 and what joys + trials it will bring.

xo,
Katie

Living a life so that

It is my husband’s and my desire to live a life so that others can see our complete trust in Christ.

We were sitting on our porch this morning reading our Bibles and praying and John told me “we’ve done it, we’re doing it, we’re living in a way that others can see our complete trust in Christ.”

Last summer and fall my shop was the only job supporting us. During this time the slow retail season and crazy election year took a toll on our income, so that eventually there wasn’t enough to pay our bills. Then at one point we were given a 2 week notice to pay our rent or to have to be out of our apartment. At the same time our only vehicle was not working well. With each day, we became further and further behind. We didn’t ask for help. We prayed that God would continue to be faithful. We didn’t seek out the generosity of others. We prayed that God would continue to be faithful. We had been there before and God had brought us out of there before, why would he quit this time?

I was growing weary over what to do, should we not enroll in school, but then what? We lived in student housing. We would have to move, but we didn’t have money to move. It was a huge burden on me. One day while I was sinking in my thoughts a neighbor called and asked for advice on basically the same issues we were having. I encouraged her and told her how God had been faithful to us in the years prior. Even how he provided the money for us to move to North Carolina in extraordinary ways. By the time I got off the phone with her I realized that phone call was for me. My own words encouraged myself. My own story. My own experiences of God being faithful.  

 Currently, we are praying over a ministry opportunity in California. We see God moving and see the gifting’s and desires that God has given us as a fit into this community and opportunity. We even see our vision of the Riverside to work well there.

As my shop slows for the summer again, and this still being our only income, I am not fearful of finances.  I have complete trust that God is who he says he is and he will not forsake me. But I am growing weary in the waiting. In the worry that this might not be it. Not that ‘this’ opportunity needs to be it. I guess deep down I still worry that God has forgotten me.

As I have become completely reliant on God I know that if this isn’t it, that something else will come in His time.

“The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him.” Lamentations 3:25

It is my husband and my desire to live a life so that others can see our complete trust in Christ. But more importantly, so that others can see the living God.

Walk by faith

You Need to Let Go of…

This spring God began telling me to let go of certain responsibilities. Focusing on 2 businesses, homeschooling, ministry and my spiritual walk just wasn’t working. So, I began praying asking what to let go of. Because I was excited at seeing some stress released from my life it wasn’t until later that I began asking, why?

Let go of Fabric

I’ve been unable to keep up with both PaperFromHeaven (PFH) and FabricFromHeaven (FFH). I began first with FFH because PFH always gets more of my heart passion. By the end of 2015, I had been approved for wholesale fabric purchases for PFH. This is when FFH was born for at least two reasons. First, because I have a serious addiction to fabric. :) Second, I believed that I could purchase at wholesale and John could manage selling off the extras. This, of course, would have created additional income to support our ministry, the Riverside– more info here. But because of some unanticipated ministry opportunities, John was not able to invest as much time into FFH as we had originally planned. That resulted in me not being able to give the time needed to both businesses and have them both blossom into what I dream of them to be.

To keep FFH growing it would mean purchasing more fabric. That just isn’t going to work with 6 people already living in our 1000 square foot apartment. Also, with the possibility of a move coming soon, transporting 50 bolts of fabric is just a ton of space. But more on that in a bit.

So far I have sold off over 300 yards of fabric and plan to sell off another 300 this week on IG.

Let go of Designs

If you have followed my PFH shop you have seen a lot of changes over the years. Early on those changes were easy to make, but not so easy the longer time moved on. So, with sad optimism, I am retiring many designs from PFH that aren’t selling. But I also need to retire some of these designs so that I can focus on some the new products that I have been dreaming of for some time.

Let go of Stuff

It all probably started when some good friends sold everything they owned and took off on a year-long RV trip. Of course, my heart said I could do that. But John and I both knew, that was not where God was taking us. But I was still prompted to begin uncluttering my shelves, closets and… [gasp!] my mason jars. :(

Until this point, I was content letting go of things and projects. But then I began asking, why?

Why?

The beginning of this year we were serving a church and God told John it was over. Within a week everything blew up, but since we had listened and prayed through it all, nothing was a surprise. This left PFH as our only income, and when I thought we’d run out of funds God provided. March + April sales were higher than Christmas season last year.

As the spring semester was ending for John, we were praying over what we should do for the fall. That’s when we realized we were done. John had come here to study the Biblical Languages (Greek and Hebrew), and now that part was done. John still has many classes left to take, but all of those can be completed online. When I began to destash and even before we knew John was finished with his on-campus classes, God was moving me to start getting rid of stuff that was going to hold me down.

So, for months now God has been working in the background of our lives getting us ready for what is next. He has been revealing himself in the most awesome ways. I can say that I’ve seen God work all things out so clearly the last 6 months. More, clarity has come over the past few weeks. We have been realizing where we sense a call to serve. A call so clear that John turned down a pastoral position because we knew it wasn’t what God was pointing us towards. You can read John’s story about that here.

What’s next?

We still do not know. We are praying for what it would look like for us to move to the west coast to serve the local church there. Wherever we go we long to settle and invest in a community that needs the gospel.