Our Address Is About to Change

Last November, I attended an IEP meeting with Sam’s teachers to evaluate how far he’d progressed the previous year and to set new goals for the coming school year. Sam had been in public school for one year since our move back from Kenya. I had seen a lot of progress in his learning and skills at home, but I wasn’t sure what his teachers would say. In the meeting, I learned that he was doing really well in every area! He met nearly all the goals we set for his kindergarten year and was excited about learning. I left that meeting feeling so proud of Sam and incredibly thankful that we were able to be in a place to give him what he needed to grow and learn.

There have been lots of mixed feelings this year as we’ve been praying about what’s best for the next few years. I still long to be teaching in Kenya. I miss the life we started to build there. But the last three months of distance learning and teaching Sam on my own at home have shown us that he’s not ready for me to be his solo teacher quite yet. He thrives working with multiple teachers, a very clear schedule, and being with other kids in a general education classroom and special education classroom. We’re just not ready to take him from a system of learning where we’ve seen him make tremendous growth these last two years. On Friday, he finished first grade, and we know we’re still in the critical early stages of his education.

Because of this, and following lots of prayer, we’ve decided as a family that we will be staying the U.S. for at least a few more years. While it does hurt a little to know we won’t be moving back to Kenya soon, we know this is what continues to be best for Sam. We’ll stay open to what God has next for us, while we also allow ourselves to settle into a regular, daily life in the States.

Since living in East Africa, where the weather is warm year-round, we’ve all had a harder time with the long, cold, Minnesota winters. We want to be in a place where we can be outside most of the year and close to the water. Thus, we’ve decided to move to the Atlantic coast of Florida, a little south of Jacksonville. We’ll make our move around the first of August, and the kids will start at their new school on August 10. We hope to spend summers back here in Minnesota near family when it’s crazy hot in the south.

Our decision for another big move didn’t happen quickly. We’ve passively talked about a move to The Sunshine State for years, but when we thought we’d be in Kenya a majority of the time, we decided we’d rather be close to family in the Midwest while in the States. But when we realized we’ll be here at least a few more years and winter was feeling really hard for all of us, we started to talk more seriously about a move. We’ve taken multiple trips to various parts of the state since 2014, which helped narrow down where we might actually like to live.

In early March, Pete and I took a trip to St. Augustine to celebrate Pete’s 40th birthday, right before everything closed for COVID. We did a lot of exploring that weekend and found an area between Jacksonville and St. Augustine with a highly rated school district and met with a realtor to pin-point a couple good neighborhoods. We had planned to take another trip down in April to look at houses, but of course that couldn’t happen, so we looked at houses online while our realtor did video walk-throughs to help us see them ourselves. We picked a house a few weeks ago and our Duluth home went on the market last week!

Pete will continue to work at his current hospital in Minnesota after the move, flying up to work for one stretch each month. The rest of his administration work can be done virtually from home. The way we’re setting up his schedule will give us the most time we’ve ever had together as a family! Pete’s schedule has been intense, to say the least, for the last ten years. We pray this will be a change that will give us all more time together while the kids are still little.

We love Duluth, and we had thought our next big move would be back to Africa. But right now, taking Kenya off the table for the next few years feels like the right choice to make sure Sam gets everything he needs. We’ll keep doing what we’ve always tried our best to do – follow the next step God has for us. Will you please pray with us as we make this transition over the next several months? We’re excited for all that God has waiting for each of us in Florida!