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So I regret that I have neglected blogging in the last year, so here's a little "catching up." Here are some highlights from the last year.

• Late August 2011, we started looking for a house, which we never thought would happen in a million years. October 4, we closed on our first house! With a 19 month old and a 4 months old, we were dying to have our own space, and a back yard for Ellie to run around in.
• Early 2012, we met with our pastor again about getting our world missions team at church up and running. We kept feeling the call to go somewhere else and do international missions, but our church was not engaged in much of anything when it comes to world missions. So we  began doing research about how our church could partner with a missionary overseas.
• February-ish, we receive an email from World Outreach, the EPC's wing of world missions, asking for more information about us. Apparently, someone we had met along the way, Jim Murphy (pastor to world missionaries with the EPC), had spread the word that we were interested in going overseas.
• March 22, Ellie turned 2! She's such a big girl! It's ridiculous. She continues to amaze us every day. She is currently wearing a "backpack" because she broke her clavicle while falling down a flight of stairs a couple weeks ago at the Grandparents house in Missouri. She is pretty tough though. We didn't even know if was broken until we took her to the doctor 3 days later.
• In June, we spent 2 amazing weeks on vacation in the Carolinas with my Aunt Lois. It was the first vacation we'd had since our honeymoon, which was 5 years ago! Aunt Lois spoiled us with a care-free couple weeks, while she fell in love with the girls, and I think they fell in love with her!
• June 16, we celebrated 5 years of marriage!
• Later in June, we went to General Assembly with our church in Baton Rouge, where we met missionaries and spent some time with World Outreach leaders, trying to figure out where in the world we want to spend the rest of our lives, or at least the next decade or so!
• June 27, Hazel turns 1! Holy cow! We officially have 2 toddlers. Hazel was one year and 2 weeks old when she finally decided to start walking! I think it was 3-4 days ago that she finally built up enough confidence to let go and walk on her own. She's following Ellie around the house now, and Ellie couldn't be more proud of her little sister! It's adorable!!
• July, we finally get all of our paperwork in this weekend, so we can make steps toward going on the mission field. In case you're wondering, here's a probable timeline for us...First interview this fall sometime. Second interview early 2013, then we will start raising support, provided that we have decided on where we are going! :) Another post to come about what we're thinking as far as places to go.
• Later this year, in October, we plan to ride the Katy Trail, all 237 miles of it! We have been talking about doing this for a couple years  now, but since we're possibly leaving the country in a year or so, we figured that we better'd do it now, or it might be a while before it ever happens! So we're riding our bikes more, and hope to ride the Katy Trail (a rails to trails path in Missouri, basically from St Louis to Kansas City) during Fall Break this year.

So that's our life right now! I will try to blog more often, especially about our progress with world missions! Our lives are soon to change drastically...