Day 15 - Patience is a virtue . . .

Today is yet another day here in Eindhoven that we are still not in our new house. Basically, our 40-foot container has been here since the first week of June, and they are just now getting around to looking at our paperwork -- goes to show that governments around the world are more similar than we think. So apparently they had issues with Keith's car that we were bringing with us, and have been going back and forth about that and who knows what else. As of today, that is looking to be resolved, but still no word on when actual movers are bringing our stuff to our house.

I'm not going to lie, last week was rough for me . . . after living in a hotel (and switching hotels mid-week, mind you), Keith being at work all day, and feeling some days like there wasn't any reason to get out of bed, I was feeling pretty down. By Friday, I had had enough. Add to that the fact that I'm 8 months pregnant, and Keith pretty much came home ("home"?) to a walking, crying hormone that afternoon. That's when we decided we needed to get out of town (and switch back to our other hotel when we returned).

So now that we're both back to feeling 100% after our bout with food poisoning, I actually got out on this beautiful day -- albeit hot for the Netherlands (about 90 degrees). Murphy and I went for a walk and then settled in under this shade tree . . .

 

The book I'm reading is called Praying Through Your Pregnancy, and was given to me by my dear friend, Stacy, as soon as she found out we were pregnant. It has been a very inspiring, thoughtful book and unlike any other pregnancy book I've read. What I love about this book/journal is that it not only takes you week by week on how your child is developing, but it gives you specific things to pray for that relate to what is happening with your baby. For example, during week 24, the basic structure of the inner ear is present and babies can then hear and detect direction of motion and know when they are upside down, forward, backward, etc. That week, there were specific prayers for not only giving my child a good sense of direction, but also a good sense of balance in life.

This week, Week 33, was all about how much Liam is growing . . . about half a pound a week at this point, not to mention how much his brain is growing and maturing as well. Therefore the prayer was about Liam growing in his faith and finding a passion and purpose in life. At the end of the chapter, it talked about having patience as these last few weeks are upon me . . . about not wishing away this time, how I can show my child patience when he arrives, and teach him to be patient as well . . .

. . . which brings me back full circle to the beginning of my post. As tough as it is right now, this too shall pass. These pains we are suffering (#firstworldpains for those of you on Twitter) are fleeting. In a month's time I will be teasing Keith about how he probably wishes we were still in a hotel with a maid and gourmet food on hand whenever we wanted it (because I am neither an excellent maid nor chef!). The same goes for missing all our dear friends and family -- we will be home often and have visitors here as well, and years from now it will just be "that time we lived in the Netherlands."

So tonight we went to dinner with about a dozen of Keith's co-workers from in and out of town -- let's see, there was a Filipino woman who lived in France and now has lived in the Netherlands for 6 months; a German who has lived in the NL since he was 8 years old; a Belgian (born in the Congo -- not kidding) who has lived in Atlanta for 15 years; 2 Atlantans who just moved to the NL (oh wait, that was us); and of course there were many "Dutchies" who were so kind and interested in how our transition was going, how I've been feeling, and what we think of Eindhoven so far. It was really great to get out and meet more people (well, I was just meeting them, but Keith has worked with most of them for a while). I find it pretty incredible that everyone here comes from such different walks of life. In the states it would be the equivalent of someone born in Illinois, lived in Florida for a while, and now living in Georgia -- but here it just sounds so cultured! The countries here are just so much smaller and close together, so people move countries here like we do states (did I mention that The Netherlands is the size of Rhode Island??).

All in all, it was a good day -- especially because we finally have more clean clothes! I was able to do 3 loads of laundry today using the facilities here at the hotel, so that was awesome. And more to look forward to tomorrow: breakfast and shopping with Deena, hopefully *fingers crossed* hearing from customs that they're releasing our stuff, and some skyping in the afternoon. : )

Learning to be patient . . .

~Jessi