Read part one here.
Read part two here.
Read part three here.
Read part four here.
Read part five here.
Read part six here.
Read part seven here.
Read part eight here.
Read part nine here.
So Ruby was born via c-section for breech presentation one September 3, 2008. Blaine and I now had four children, ages 5, 3, 15 months, and newborn. Dear Sterling, laid back child that he is, didn’t walk for four more months. It was the days of the double sling, running one ring sling across each side of me, crisscrossing Sterling and Ruby across the front of me. As for my reproductive years, I was 24 years old, had four children, and I was done. Very done. No. More. Children.
Sterling loved Ruby though. He acted as if I’d given him the greatest gift. I was rather inclined to agree, but most of my children didn’t appreciate being “replaced” as the baby. Sterling was never happier as they day he became a big brother. Now often referred to as Oil and Water in our home, Sterling and Ruby are polar opposites as far as personality. She keeps him on his toes and he mellows her out a bit. They are a fun combination to have as middles in our family.
Blaine was working second shift at the newspaper at this point. It was great all around – he was home for much of the day and I had the opportunity to go out by myself if I needed to run errands in the mornings. Life was easier than it’s ever been as far as that goes. The neighbors continued to be an interesting part of our lives, we hated the area we were living in, and we were struggling with a church choice, but I had help.
Ruby was seven months old when we switched churches. Four months later, we made the decision to move out of Pennsylvania. Unsure as to where, just knowing we didn’t want to be in PA and the only thing we liked there was our new church and Blaine’s job, we went on vacation the summer of 2009 and visited friends in Missouri. We loved it. In August, we moved to Missouri. The house we rented off Craigslist (Another story for another day.) and we had a savings to live on until Blaine found a job. The only for sure we knew was there was a church, the denomination we were coming from New Jersey from, and we moved. Warmer and midwestern was what we were after.
The day after we unloaded the truck into our new rental, we went online to find out what time “our” church met. They had a big notice.
“Church CLOSING and Church FOLDING in two weeks, on September 6, 2009.”
What on earth had we just done?!
Lanita says
I love it!! Your story just gets better and better. You are a great story teller. And of course, I know how the story ends, sort of, not all the details. I am SO glad you all moved to Missouri and that we “found” the church and a new church family as well. God is SO good!!