It's been a long time since I last updated. Way too long.
Last time I updated was in June. We were still living in Oakdale - not even thinking about selling our house and moving. Boy has a lot changed.
Justin was a teency bit frustrated by his job search. With church positions, generally you start in youth ministry. This is all fine and good, except that Justin's passion isn't necessarily for youth, and he's not really one to fake a passion. It's just not in him. So in his frustration he ended up meeting up with Scott Woller - lead pastor and founder of Corner Church in Minneapolis. Corner Church is super awesome. Scott and Amber started Corner Church in Corner Coffee 10 years ago. They now have two church locations and both meet in coffee shops - Corner Coffee and The Beat. The vision is to continue to plant churches in businesses in Minneapolis. They are super community-driven. Justin and I decided that we would drive the 35 minutes to check out this church in Minneapolis, and we really enjoyed the discussion-oriented service as well as the extremely personable vibe. This was maybe in early August.
Okay. So we had also been kind of talking about selling our house for the purpose of me being located a little more central job-wise. After visiting Corner Church a few times we decided we wanted to plug in and go all in with this community and their vision. So, now we have two reasons to move west.
We ended up putting our house on the market on a Wednesday, and by Sunday evening we had three offers all over asking price. Holy cow. This just got real.
We looked at 15 houses in Minneapolis/Brooklyn Park/Brooklyn Center. Even with a decent profit from the sale of our home we still didn't want to spend an arm and a leg on our next house. The houses in Minneapolis were not in the greatest of neighborhoods - high crime rates - a wee bit scary. The houses in the burbs seemed too far away from the city. Weird. I know. Coming from a family who lived in the burbs. On a Friday afternoon I got a text from our realtor - "A house came on the market in a nice North Minneapolis neighborhood. Pictures aren't up yet, but if they match the description we should HURRY." Our realtor is awesome, but we hadn't seen her get excited about much. In fact she was even-headed to the point of a little bit negative. Actually a really great quality in somebody who is helping you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars.
We were the first people to walk into the house that we now own. We loved it. Serious business. Love at first sight. We made an offer on Saturday morning and they accepted it on Sunday night. Good to go!
We moved in on October 30 and got to meet our neighbors while trick-or-treating. Turns out we didn't just land in a nice neighborhood, we found a place on a really great street. On December 17th we opened our house to our block for a holiday open house and it was fun to continue to build our new network. I can't wait to find out what it's like in the summer when we can all be outside more. We are two blocks away from a beautiful parkway with nice walking trails and lots of greenery. So far - I'm loving it. To be clear - we aren't in Kansas anymore. If you come visit us you will want to lock your car doors. :)
So. Since moving to NoMi and plugging in with Corner Church we have also made the decision to lead Corner Church's third Minneapolis location. Corner Church North Minneapolis (actual name still to be determined) will launch in January 2017, and Justin will be the community pastor. Yikes. It seems like that's just around the corner and we have a lot to do to prepare in a short 12 months. I can't wait to see how God leads the way.
What else is new? No wine for me these days. Baby #3 is on the way. For real. We will meet him/her in August 2016. Since we already have a girl and a boy we are going to let the gender of this one be a surprise. I'm really excited about being surprised in the delivery room. It gives pregnancy a whole new sense of anticipation. Soren's pregancy flew by since we were already chasing Via around. I have a feeling August is going to be here in no time and I'm going to have absolutely no idea what hit me. Sleep deprivation? Here we go again. Good thing babies are so darn cute.
Finally. Justin bought me a really great book for Christmas. It's called "The Fringe Hours," by Jessica N. Turner. After reading a few chapters I was prompted to blog again. Because it's something I love to do. Ladies - I highly recommend this book. Buy it. Read it. Make time for you.
Also - being NYE - I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my sweet brother. November 1 and December 31 will never be the same for me. I love you a bunch, Ryan, and I talk about Uncle Ryan often with Via and Soren. Missing you.....I could totes go for one of your hugs right now.
Last time I updated was in June. We were still living in Oakdale - not even thinking about selling our house and moving. Boy has a lot changed.
Justin was a teency bit frustrated by his job search. With church positions, generally you start in youth ministry. This is all fine and good, except that Justin's passion isn't necessarily for youth, and he's not really one to fake a passion. It's just not in him. So in his frustration he ended up meeting up with Scott Woller - lead pastor and founder of Corner Church in Minneapolis. Corner Church is super awesome. Scott and Amber started Corner Church in Corner Coffee 10 years ago. They now have two church locations and both meet in coffee shops - Corner Coffee and The Beat. The vision is to continue to plant churches in businesses in Minneapolis. They are super community-driven. Justin and I decided that we would drive the 35 minutes to check out this church in Minneapolis, and we really enjoyed the discussion-oriented service as well as the extremely personable vibe. This was maybe in early August.
Okay. So we had also been kind of talking about selling our house for the purpose of me being located a little more central job-wise. After visiting Corner Church a few times we decided we wanted to plug in and go all in with this community and their vision. So, now we have two reasons to move west.
We ended up putting our house on the market on a Wednesday, and by Sunday evening we had three offers all over asking price. Holy cow. This just got real.
We looked at 15 houses in Minneapolis/Brooklyn Park/Brooklyn Center. Even with a decent profit from the sale of our home we still didn't want to spend an arm and a leg on our next house. The houses in Minneapolis were not in the greatest of neighborhoods - high crime rates - a wee bit scary. The houses in the burbs seemed too far away from the city. Weird. I know. Coming from a family who lived in the burbs. On a Friday afternoon I got a text from our realtor - "A house came on the market in a nice North Minneapolis neighborhood. Pictures aren't up yet, but if they match the description we should HURRY." Our realtor is awesome, but we hadn't seen her get excited about much. In fact she was even-headed to the point of a little bit negative. Actually a really great quality in somebody who is helping you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars.
We were the first people to walk into the house that we now own. We loved it. Serious business. Love at first sight. We made an offer on Saturday morning and they accepted it on Sunday night. Good to go!
We moved in on October 30 and got to meet our neighbors while trick-or-treating. Turns out we didn't just land in a nice neighborhood, we found a place on a really great street. On December 17th we opened our house to our block for a holiday open house and it was fun to continue to build our new network. I can't wait to find out what it's like in the summer when we can all be outside more. We are two blocks away from a beautiful parkway with nice walking trails and lots of greenery. So far - I'm loving it. To be clear - we aren't in Kansas anymore. If you come visit us you will want to lock your car doors. :)
So. Since moving to NoMi and plugging in with Corner Church we have also made the decision to lead Corner Church's third Minneapolis location. Corner Church North Minneapolis (actual name still to be determined) will launch in January 2017, and Justin will be the community pastor. Yikes. It seems like that's just around the corner and we have a lot to do to prepare in a short 12 months. I can't wait to see how God leads the way.
What else is new? No wine for me these days. Baby #3 is on the way. For real. We will meet him/her in August 2016. Since we already have a girl and a boy we are going to let the gender of this one be a surprise. I'm really excited about being surprised in the delivery room. It gives pregnancy a whole new sense of anticipation. Soren's pregancy flew by since we were already chasing Via around. I have a feeling August is going to be here in no time and I'm going to have absolutely no idea what hit me. Sleep deprivation? Here we go again. Good thing babies are so darn cute.
Finally. Justin bought me a really great book for Christmas. It's called "The Fringe Hours," by Jessica N. Turner. After reading a few chapters I was prompted to blog again. Because it's something I love to do. Ladies - I highly recommend this book. Buy it. Read it. Make time for you.
Also - being NYE - I'd be remiss if I didn't mention my sweet brother. November 1 and December 31 will never be the same for me. I love you a bunch, Ryan, and I talk about Uncle Ryan often with Via and Soren. Missing you.....I could totes go for one of your hugs right now.
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