A Fresh Start

(taps microphone) Hello? Hello? Can you hear me?

Welcome back to Warm As Pie. When I posted in July of 2019, I did not anticipate that I wouldn’t come back until 2021. I did not anticipate that in the meantime, our world would experience a pandemic that would change life for every single one of us in some way.

So many days during our lockdown, I thought about writing on this blog. I wanted to record our experience and remember the strange time of quarantine. But…it felt complicated. I realized pretty early on that I was not having the same experience as my friends and the rest of the world. I worried that my cheery posts about board games and pajama parties and learning the cello would only hurt the feelings of folks who experienced job-loss, illness, and fear. I learned a lot through 2020, and perhaps I will share some of those lessons here and there. But I am cognizant of the fact that my joy can exacerbate others’ pain, and that is the last thing I wish to do.

What have we been up to? In the last few years, some things have definitely changed. When I started this blog in 2009, I was a grad student in Education with two very small boys. Now, I am a professional birth doula with five wonderful kids. Those tiny boys are 15 and 12! My baby girl is 4 years old. Ack. I can’t take it!

In these years, our commitment to our faith and our church family have grown many times over, and our family is deeply involved in martial arts now. Almost all of us. (Just haven’t convinced Cory yet!) Tang Soo Do and Haidong Gumdo (Korean sword) are regular parts of every week. We are taking classes over Zoom these days, but it is still a lot of fun and hard work.

Photo by Moments Created Photography, August 2020

Photo by Moments Created Photography, August 2020

In all of our moves and changes, we have learned that some things never change. The moon still hangs in the sky. The sun rises in the morning. God is faithful. Love remains. We can learn together in any and all circumstances.

Homeschooling is still our education of choice. I was never more thankful for that decision than I was in March 2020 when schools closed, and teachers and parents had to scramble to find a way to make learning happen during unexpected and challenging circumstances. We kept on as usual, minus our amazing homeschool co-op. Like many homeschoolers, I reached out to help people trying to find their footing, and I watched as people dug deep and pushed up and over obstacles. New relationships were made and communities formed. New skills were discovered. We kept plugging on, aware of the blessing of norms staying normal!

Now, what? I hope to be back here at Warm as Pie each week, finding my writer-self and getting to know her again. I still have dreams in the realm of writing. I can feel that drive again. I see it peaking over the horizon, sending a few pale rays up into the blue. I hope you will join me as I figure out what that means and where it might take me.