37 things I learned this year

It's been a crazy day and a very full year. I have exactly 8 hours to capture and summarize that in a blog post...and no idea how to say it. 

So here are 37 things that I learned this year:

1. How to be a good long distance friend.

2. A wonderful technique for picking up dog poop.

3. How to save a choking baby.

4. How to start a blog

5. How to be a 22 year old freshman in college

6. How to legally change my name

7. Weddings never really go according to plan.

8. At any age, it is hard to leave your mom.

9. How quickly grocery money seems to disappear

10. The skill of packing and moving.

11. Snapchatting.

12. The value of a new hair do.

13. How to live with someone who uses your toothbrush.

14. How to make gravy.

15. I discovered dry shampoo.

16. The best way to get from Illinois to Indiana.

17. I do not like to fly.

18. How to make adult friends.

19. Dunkin Donuts is actually better than Starbucks.

20. How to knit.

21. Settlers of Catan. 

22. How to say goodbye.

23. Sometimes you just have to live with missing people.

24. It is illegal for me to carry a taser.

25. No one should live through winter without flannel sheets.

26. Finally rocked walking in high heels.

27. Garrett hates taking pictures with me.

28. Weddings are expensive.

29. The invention of the Grocery Clip changed my life.

30. How to build a tent... in the living room no less.

31. How to dodge jury duty on the week of your wedding.

32. How to passively aggressively retaliate against noisy downstairs neighbors.

33. Halloween will hereafter always be Harry Potter Day.

34. How to get both a husband and a dog through training at Petsmart.

35. Travel via Amtrak.

36. Diplomatically deal with people who don't like your husband.

37. How to leave home, transfer schools, quit a job, get a job,  be married, move everything, lose friends, leave friends, make friends and how much I appreciate my mom. 

My heart is full. We've been so loved and so challenged and so supported. This has been a hard year, I don't want to sugar coat that. There have been a lot of changes and pressures and days I wasn't sure I could live through. A lot has changed, and more will change before this time next year; but we are confident in our God and content to wait for His timing in 2015. Thank you for being a part of my year.

See you next year,

-- Emily LeVault

Surviving Shark Week

Holy cow-- where did November go?

Christmas is creeping up and it's been nearly six months since we married and moved-- what happened?!

A quick update on our life here in The Fort (that's what the cool kids call it): Purple Rain has officially moved out... so there goes the free entertainment, I am love-love-lovingggg my job, Luke graduated from puppy class and Garrett continues to play paintball.

God has blessed us like crazy over the last 6 months, answered so many prayers but I think the most unexpected blessing was the community we found here.

I have had so many people to love and do life with the last 22 years, but when we moved to Fort Wayne, those people weren't here. Our church is awesome, please don't hear me complaining. But sometimes when you are young and brand-new married and hamburger-helper-poor you want to hang out with people who are in the same place, struggling with the same things, using their mom's old couch.

We found our community through what could seem like an accident, Beth had a daughter Charly, Charly had a friend Steph, and Steph was looking for community too. Within a month of moving to Fort Wayne, we met people we could do life with.

I've heard a lot of sermons in my life-- a lot. One really stuck out and challenged the way I do community. At the Passion Conference in 2013 Judah Smith preached on the importance of community-- he said it was essential to surviving Shark Week.

I hear you --weird analogy-- but apparently sharks have a tendency to attack the lone seal over the group of seals. The lone seal. I'm sorry to tell you this, but you are not the shark... you are the seal. If you want to survive Shark Week, you need to get with a group of other seals.

Life for me at the time included really good things like an awesome boyfriend, a fantastic job and leading a small group in Edinburg; it did not include a community of my peers. After hearing Judah speak I decided I needed to change so I went home and I joined a Christian Student Fellowship small group. This is how I met Lyssa, then Hayley and got involved and invested with the entire CSF community-- and there were things (BIG) things in my life that changed because I was no longer swimming alone on Shark Week.

And then we left.

There I was all over again: a lone seal in shark infested waters. What is a shark? Depends. Sharks come in all shapes and sizes: the lies we tell ourselves to make sin okay, the lies we hear from someone who has us isolated in a relationship, depression, addiction, loneliness, arrogance, selfishness, church ladies-- you name it. It all comes down the fact that sharks are not friendly to baby seals.

Here's the thing: people are scary.

Seriously. Meeting new people is so so so so scary. It's like the first day of Kindergarten but you can't just say "hey, I like you hair-- let's be friends" doesn't work that way in the adult world. Maybe it should, but it totally doesn't. There are so many opportunities to look stupid, for your inner nerd to slip out, to say something politically incorrect, or to disagree on major life-defining beliefs-- sometimes it's better to just stay inside. Because people are scary. They have the ability to not like you, to reject you, to laugh at you, to betray you, to disappoint you and ultimately the worst part is: they are all definitely people, and people mess up.

I'm with you. I get it. I'm scared too. But the longer I'm an adult trying to make and keep adult friends the more I learn just how many people are lonely and in desperate need of community. You need community. You were designed to thrive in it, and I know no matter how much you don't like people you still desire to be known and to be loved.

This month has been a month of community for us. We've spent the past week with our family and friends in Iowa and Illinois, and what a sweet moment to be known and to be loved and to be hugged. Long car rides, so much laughter, getting pancakes dropped on me at IHOP and the feeling that I am known by these people and still loved. Crazy.
Then there are the friends in my life who just keep coming back. This month alone I've had coffee with my sweet Mo, a sleepover with my Mrs. Drent, and really really precious time with Hayley and Lyssa. Talk about being known.

Garrett and I have felt a renewed desire to focus in on our community here; to love them and to know them. God does silly things like providing married friends who love board games, people who laugh at our stupid and geek out with us over Mockingjay Part 1 [but omygosh her hair though]. God has provided for us in ways we didn't think to pray for, with a community that's been here to do life with us and I am so thankful for them.

So I want you to know that I miss you, in a way that fills up my whole heart. I want you to know that God provides for his children, even when you forget to ask. Mostly I want you to know that I know people are scary. But you need them. You need a community if you want to survive Shark Week.

With Love,

Emily LeVault

P.S. This is Garrett eating a burrito.
P.P.S. This burrito is not part of the Daniel Plan.

144 Days Later

October has been a really long month in the LeVault household.
But it's also been my favorite month of marriage so far.
While I was definitely not prepared for all of the joys of being married to a man the day I said 'I Do', here are a few things I can tell you about marriage 144 days later:

1. Husbands do not think that Ramen and ice cream qualify as dinner. [Hayley never complained]

2. The cable bill is due EVERY month!

3. If you wait long enough he will do a load of laundry.

4. Your husband is NOT your sister or your roommate. He will not help you curl your hair, he will not care about your new mascara, he will not notice your new shoes and he can't tell if your shirt matches your earrings. He just can't.

5. Nobody wins if Garrett watches paintball videos while Emily is home.

6. Couple friends: Ready. Set. Find some. 

7. You cannot play Settlers of Catan with only two people. This is also true of Shanghai Rummy.

8. Go to college after you get married-- the Financial Aid is fantabulous.

9. You get a lot of advice you never ever asked for. 

10. I love you, but leave me alone. No one told us that it was necessary to have alone time, so then we just felt guilty for wanting alone time. Turns out this is a normal thing. 
So.... have alone time if you want to stay married.

11. Your single friends are afraid to stay the night at your house.

12. Absolutely no one wants to do the dishes.

13. Do not say 'yes' to anyone before checking with your spouse.

14. Everyone should have a hobby and a job. A stay at home wife will drive both husband and wife crazy.

15. No one ever asked me how to spell 'Collins'...ever.

16. If I had a dollar for the number of times I've heard:
 "Wait- you're married?! How old are you?" (I'd have like 40 bucks)

17. "All you need is each other" - False. You still need people. 

18. Garrett doesn't believe in making the bed...this gives me hives sometimes.

19. Grocery shopping counts as "date night".

20. Hide your toothbrush.

21. My family is your family; the good, the bad and the sisters.

22. Going out to dinner means the Chik-fil-a drive thru.

23. Pray together and pray for each other. This puts you on the same page and it's much harder to get frustrated with someone you spend time thanking God for.

24. Maybe don't get a black lab puppy right off the bat. Or maybe ever. Adorable-- but needy.

25. "Marriage is like having a sleepover with your best friend every night" Sure. Except your best friend really just wants you to shut up and go to sleep because he has to work in the morning.

26. It's not that easy, but its' really really awesome.

27.  My favorite thing about marriage is how much we laugh together. 

Maybe I'll be able to offer you some more solid insights in a few decades, but for now this is what I know about marriage: it's scary and it's hard and it's all about putting someone else before yourself every single day, which means it's exhausting. 

Living so far away from everything we knew, figuring out a new city, a new church, new friends, new kids, new jobs and new responsibilities has made us more of a team than we ever could've been had we just stayed home.

 Marriage is like having one huge inside joke with someone who has seen every failure and understands the joy behind each victory. Life doesn't get easier or prettier or more magical when you get married; but oh my gosh... having someone to share it with is incredible. 

Happy October!

-Emily LeVault

Emily's Guiltless PBJ Shake

Emily's PBJ Shake

Ingredients:

1 Tablespoon organic peanut butter

1 scoop of protein powder

1 Tablespoon ground flax

3/4 cup of almond milk

1 cup of berries 

10 ice cubes

Blend until smooth

Enjoy :)

Camo Cowboy Hat

Hi there. 

It's the middle of the night, Starbucks has this nifty BOGO sale going on right now. And it turns out that when your husband is out of town you can just drink both cups of pumpkin spice latte. Which I did. 

A little update on our life in Fort Wayne: I got job {hallelujah, praise the Lord}, we got a dog [super cute, eats everything], I started school (hate it.), and we are starting a diet called the Daniel Plan tomorrow morning <no dairy, sugar, gluten or any other fun yummy things>. 

Also: we survived our very first Jr. High lock-in.

Lock-in: (noun) a.) An event where adults go against nature and attempt to stay up all night without getting sick or grumpy. b.) The only time Jr. Highers can pump themselves full of sugar and still have time to burn it off before their parents pick them up. c.) Think kamikaze mission. It's really close to that. 

So that was an adventure. WOW. Lots of caffeine, some kid kicked my toe in soccer until it was purple and I definitely did NOT make it all night without being grumpy. 

A few good things did come from this experience; we planned for 15 kids and 24 showed up-- that's a huge number of jr. highers for us. We had more volunteers than the bare minimum needed and most of them stayed up most of the night. 

And I was reminded of a few important things regarding our ministry:

1.) I married the most patient human being that I have ever met. 

2.) Effective youth ministry has more to do with love than lock-ins. 

Around two years ago this guy from my Spanish class asked me to be a female chaperone for a jr. high weekend retreat. I said yes -- to this day I don't know why. 

I go on this retreat with lots of jr. highers-- we stay the night in this hotel - -we got there late (I think we had trouble navigating).
By the time we've got all of these jr highers in this one room for devotions, my patience has cashed out. 

It's late, I'm tired, jr highers are loud-- I'm done for the day. 

These boys just kept at it though--obnoxious noises, lots of giggling and I just wanted them to shut up (Will Patton & Isaac Nicol). I remember looking at Garrett and expecting him to tell them just that. 
But his patience kept going-- it stretched so much further than mine ever could.

That is the moment I fell in love with Garrett LeVault. 

Someone who is that patient with jr high boys is someone worth getting to know. 

So, naturally, I married him.

Fast forward a few years to this lock-in around 3 or 4 in the morning: It's late. I'm tired. Jr. Highers are loud. I'm done for the day. 

I know at this point that my husband is tired, I know he's had a long day, I know that he is a little grumpy... and then this jr high boy decides to plop a camo cowboy hat on Garrett's head in the middle of a volleyball game. 

Sidenote: jr high boys don't believe in showering therefore, everything they wear smells like jr high boy.

 My initial reaction was one of impatience. Impatience for this kid. Impatience for his hat. Impatience with his unnatural energy at 3 in the morning. 

But I watched Garrett LeVault smile real big and pull that camo cowboy hat more firmly down on his head like he really wanted nothing more than to wear it for the rest of the night.

 In that moment I fell in love with my husband all over again and I realized that mere patience could not endure jr high boys and camo cowboy hats at 3 in the morning. 

My husband is so full of love for these stinking, wide-awake beasts, that patience is his first response to them. 
Even when it's late. Even when he's tired. Even if he wants to be done. His ability to be patient is born from a deep love. 

When my Boss told me that he and his wife were having a second baby... I wasn't really sure I was going to love her.  Ellis Throckmorton pretty much had my heart. I was so excited about him. I had watched him grow. I couldn't wait to hear what he sounded like when he started talking. Ellis was a pretty big deal and I was really sure that there was no way I was going to love Baby #2 as much as I loved Ellis. And then I met her. The first time I got to hold her my heart did this weird thing and Ellis and Olive both fit just fine. As much as I had been excited about Ellis-- I was excited about Olive now too. 

And I thought that would happen again for me the moment I moved to Fort Wayne. But it's been a little bit harder than that. 

See, I loved those stinking Edinburg kids. I wanted to watch them grow, I was so excited to see them fall in love with Jesus, I was so proud of them. They pretty much had my heart. 

And then we moved here, and it felt like I had left a part of me in Edinburg. I struggled to quickly form relationships with kids I barely knew, and I started to worry that there wouldn't be enough room for them in my heart. 

But my husband, and his patient love for a jr high boy he's only met a few times, reminded me why we do this. 

When I started ministry at Edinburg there was only one girl in jr. high youth group-- and I volunteered because I wanted her to know she was loved. I had never heard of Edinburg, Illinois; I had no reason to care about the people there. But God softened my heart and he gave me compassion for those kids and it became easy to love them and eventually so very hard to leave them. 

As we get our feet under us, as we spend more and more time with these kids, I'm starting to feel my heart grow to fit them too. I'm reminded of why I fell in love with this man I followed to Fort Wayne. And I am reminded that we do what we do so that these kids will know they are loved.

It's been 3 months and 4 days since we moved here. 
Just before bed this evening Garrett confessed to once again using my toothbrush. 

But things are finally settling. I'm again in a town I had never really heard of, full of people I had no reason to care for, with a man more full of patience than the day I fell in love with him. 

Please keep praying for us. Please pray for our relationships with the kids here.

Please pray for my patience. 
Garrett already has plenty.

With Love,
Emily LeVault

In the Bottom of the Boat ... Again

Confession time: I judge people in the Bible.
I know most of them are dead -- I know they didn't have real toilets -- I know it's probably wrong.

But seriously...the Bible is full of really stupid people. People who just never really get it.

The entire first half of the book is all about one nation that just keeps flying at the windshield, the rest of it is a desperate plea for all present and future generations to "get it". But even the disciples (especially the disciples) just didn't get it.

So I totally judge them.

 Sounds fair.

I've been reading the Bible for a while, since I could read actually, and when you read something repetitively you start to skim over the stories you already know- it's easy to do. One of those stories that I have "known" for forever is the one where Jesus calms the storm.

Jesus Calms a Storm

35 On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” 36 And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. 37 And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. 38 But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” 39 And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. 40 He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?”41 And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”

Yep. See. You know it too.
You probably first heard it in Bible School or Sunday School and you're like
"Wow! Jesus owned a boat!"

And then it comes around again in Jr. High at church camp and you're like
"Wow! Jesus is a water bender!" 

By the time you're in high school and you're really a deep spiritual being you're like
"Wow. Jesus totally calms my storms in life." 

So by the time you're a grown woman and you're reading through Mark before bed its something you can skim over, something you've heard a few times before.

Maybe this isn't your experience, for those of you not raised in the church it might not be. I completely respect that, and sometimes I envy you the newness of the scriptures.

But Jesus' followers are cowering in the bottom of a boat after a long hard day of witnessing miracles.  So if you're like me and you grew up learning this story and you know how it ends -- it's easy to judge these guys.

Which is exactly what I've done.

As an adult I've read the entire passage leading up to this; it's mentioned in 3 of the 4 Gospels, and before each mention there are miracles of healing, Jesus declaring himself to be God's son,  and parables that he explains in black and white to these same disciples.

So why am I blogging about all of this?

Well.

 A few months ago I opened a letter from IPFW and inside was a scholarship that cut my tuition in half.

Wow. Amazing. Great news.

But the moment I finished reading the letter I got this horrible sinking feeling and this passage came to mind. Not because Jesus owns everything, not because he has the super ability to provide for his children, not even because Jesus had calmed my financial storm. I opened this letter, the storm was calmed, and I found myself in the bottom of the boat facing my Savior and heard him say "Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?" 

At this point an "oh crap" feeling had settled over me and the Holy Spirit and I watched a little montage of the last 14 years of my walk, all those storms that seemed like they would be the last one -- the storm that would finally drown me-- but I had survived each one. And here I was, in the bottom of the boat all over again, feeling the need to apologize to those disciples.

So why is this on my Fort Wayne blog? Well. This shouldn't come as a surprise but things have been a little stormy here; trying to get settled, be married, find friends and make dinner every single night (how did you do it, Mom?).  There have been plenty of moments where I was pretty sure this Jesus dude was going to let me drown. But the same Savior -- who has been with me through illness, divorce and those awkward jr. high years -- He commanded me to get in this boat and go across this lake.

I have yet to drown.
But I'll keep you posted.

With Love,
Emily LeVault

P.S. This happened too.

A Foreigner in a Foreign Land

Exodus 2:22New International Version (NIV)

22 Zipporah gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, “I have become a foreigner in a foreign land.”

No. This is not a baby announcement. I know some of you have placed bets, but you're going to lose your money. And no, my son will never ever be named Gershom. 

But yes. This story has come to mind a few times in the last month. 

Hey! It's been a month since I married my husband (still feels funny saying that). 

The phrase "foreigner in a foreign land" is one I've known for a long time but I've never really applied it to myself before we got here. 

And then I had to Google it to figure out if it was even really in the Bible, who said it, and why. 

Turns out it was Moses, when he was naming his first kid, while he was living in Midian. Why was he in Midian? He killed an Egyptian in Egypt (bad place to kill an Egyptian) so he ran away and found himself in Midian where he settled down with a new family and started a new life and by the way-- he also got married.

Yes, I got married. Yes, I moved away from my family. No, I didn't kill anyone. 

Seriously though: I have no idea what Moses was thinking. But I understand what he was saying.

Previous to the murder and being run out of town, Moses was a pretty cool dude. He was wealthy, handsome, young and lived in the palace. Not a bad gig. Jump ahead 5 verses and he kills someone, Pharaoh is trying to kill him, he's stuck hiding in the desert, living with his in-laws and watching sheep for a living.

This I do understand. 

Previous to marrying and moving, I had a lot on my plate. I had a job that was challenging and rewarding, I had a community of people that I loved and who loved me, my mom was 10 minutes away, I knew how to get to Target, I knew which streets NOT to drive down, restaurants served horseshoes, and I was firmly rooted in all of those things. 

I found my identity in my ability to lead Children's Church, in knowing the six different ways to get to Edinburg, in being able to go home when I needed laundry done, in having a dog and yard and a favorite Mexican restaurant. 

I had people I could go to if I needed advice on money or school or life or how to jump my car battery for the eighth time. I could ask a sister or a roommate if my outfit looked okay (Garrett constantly pleads the 5th). I had a dentist and a mechanic. I had a favorite coffee shop and a favorite ice cream place. I knew who I was. I was Emily Collins. 

But then I found myself, a foreigner in a foreign land with a man who uses my toothbrush.

 Yesterday they called for Emily LeVault at the BMV -- and they meant me. I get lost on the way to the church, it took me half an hour to find a car wash, my estimated graduation date is 2031, I'm in search of ANY job, I basically sit around and watch a lot of Netflix... I don't even have a library card.

Here's the thing: I am trying to be funny. Hopefully something in there made you laugh because I complain about the most ridiculous things. But in all seriousness, this is the hardest thing that I have ever done. 

Moses' story does actually get better. When he moved away and got married and started over, that's when God started talking. That's where he encountered the burning bush and his calling to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. 

This little phrase "foreigner in a foreign land" is only two chapters into the entire book of Exodus. Moses' story goes so far beyond his first few years as a prince in Egypt and then as a foreigner in Midian. This is just his beginning. 

So, obviously, I should probably start looking at things that way too. It's only been a few weeks since we got here. There is still plenty of time for things to get easier and better. I have to figure out who Emily LeVault is, what my new calling is supposed to be, how to get to the best Target in town (there are 3 of them, Kendahl), how to graduate before I'm 32, and where to find good coffee.

If you're reading this and you are super offended by my whining and my ungratefulness, well... please just be patient. I am usually much more fun. 
Just ask Springfield.

With Love,

- Emily LeVault

Crowd Surfing

I'll be honest... at first I didn't know what to say or blog or write, whatever it is on here. I was stuck on what to call it, trying to find a clever tagline-- all of that. And then where do I start? The last six months? Leaving home? Leaving kids? Leaving our churches and our families? Maybe I should start with the wedding? The honeymoon? The move-in day? Or maybe I should start with telling you all the things I know about Fort Wayne now that we're here?(Which is about three things) Or how many times I've cried lately?

It's hard to start because I don't know where the story even began and it's definitely not over yet.

So instead... I just want to say thank you.

Thank you for getting us here.

We crowd surfed the entire way.

Back in December when we got engaged, I was pretty sure we could do this all on our own. I was certain we could plan out a flawless wedding timeline that would run itself. We could make sure we had every kind of utensil we needed. We would save up enough cash to get us through the first month. We would be fine as long as we had one another no matter how hard the uprooting was.
We could do this.

Not surprising-- I was really wrong.

That's when all of you came into play.

These last few months you walked beside us and got us ready to go. And when it was time we didn't really get ourselves anywhere... we just crowd surfed our way through a wedding weekend, a honeymoon, moving day and the first week here. Our family and friends have been at every corner-- you've passed us from one stop to the other. We've never been alone. Just when things were getting scary-- leaving everyone we know-- a familiar face was there to pick us up at the airport, another to help us unload our moving truck. And when we finally landed in our new home, the people here overwhelmed us with more love than we could have expected with food and hugs and "welcome home".

I could tell you that I'm exhausted, that it's been a long few weeks of difficult goodbyes and transitions, that I am lonely and I miss you. But I didn't do any of this alone.

This morning was our first Sunday in this new church with this new family and new ministry.
 I was so scared.
 But when I walked in the sanctuary there were three more very familiar faces here; not so scary anymore.

There's just too much to say. My heart is too full. I've never felt so supported in my life.

So thank you.

You showered us with toasters, spatulas, and measuring cups.
You listened to us complain about how stressed we were.
You supported us when we had to say goodbye to the jobs we loved and the kids we love even more.
You counseled us and encouraged us, you told us we could really

do this marriage thing.
You paid for oil changes, margaritas and moving trucks.
You decorated an entire reception hall.
You endured a tornado just to see our wedding.
You took care of us, we have wanted for nothing.

I married Garrett because I love him, and I wanted other people to know how big that love is.
I never expected that so much love would be shown to us instead.

So one more time:

Thank you.

We're about to head out for the very first youth group; pray for us.
I'll let you know how it goes from here, so check in on my fancy little blog from time to time.

We have so much to look forward to here in our new home, but we crowd surfed all the way and we are so thankful for all of you.

With love,
- Garrett & Emily