Saturday, October 13, 2012

More stuff...

More stuff! That's what we're getting at our house! Our small shipment from Arizona arrived in Fargo on Tuesday morning, and we picked it up that afternoon. As well as getting our things, we also had a great evening with new friends. Bret & Sheri took us to a great Mexican place for dinner and we LOVED connecting with them, hearing their hearts for what God is doing and the things He has taught them along the way. We arrived home around 1 am, tired but blessed and encouraged.

Thursday our shipment from the Philippines arrived in Winnipeg, and Friday afternoon we went into the city to present our paperwork to customs for clearance. It all went very well, and we are expecting our crates to be delivered to our home in Kleefeld on Monday morning!

This is the first time that all our belongings have been in one country since we got married 20 years ago! It's pretty cool... and somewhat scary. We've never really "settled down", we've always been between places, on our way somewhere at some point-- whether that was anticipating a home assignment in a few years or headed back to the field after home assignment.

So, getting all our "stuff" in one place feels significant in some interesting ways. But it is, after all, just stuff. Neither our identity nor our value is wrapped up in the things that are arriving at our house, though hopefully some of them will help us be more efficient at what we feel called to do.

Garry is looking forward to having a few more tools here. I am looking forward to having a fully-functional kitchen and the boys are looking forward to having some of their favourite things to use and enjoy.

2 comments:

Benno said...

Interesting photo: Garry drinking from a small cup with a wierd-looking straw, Cynthia drinking from the largest sippy cup I've ever seen, and Kevin falling asleep eating a whole bag of cookies!

Garry and Cynthia Barkman said...

Ha ha! It's Paraguayan yerba mate... reminders of a past in Paraguay. But the photo made me laugh, so I'm glad you laughed also!