Last Couple of Weeks!

We have been settling in nicely to our town house. The kids are loving it! Chris and I have been working so hard on getting to know people and remembering names. That seems to be the greatest challenge. We are really enjoying the church, and our new youth group. Keep praying for us as we are trying to figure out if we should buy a house or stay put for a little while.

Here are a few pictures of the last couple of weeks .

JJ is making good use of his new smelly stickers from his favorite girl Kenna!
Here is Tyler Cinderella cleaning...cleaning...and....

...taking care of the baby.
JJ thought that he would help himself to some milk and pancakes while mom was resting!
Emilee sporting her first hair clip....isn't she so cute!

Moments With Emilee Renee

Getting Settled

We made it! On Saturday we packed up all our things. We had tones of help, which was so greatly appreciated. A special thanks to the people who directly helped me (Sharon, for doing an amazing job cleaning; Kerri, Amy, and Bethany, for taking good care of my kiddlings). The day went pretty smoothly. The only ripple was having to get an additional trailer to pull the things that wouldn't fit in the truck. But that ended up being no big deal.

It was an emotional ending for me. Chris urged me to go into the house with him and have one final look after all was cleared. As we surveyed the empty, beautiful, little town house thoughts and emotions of memories of the past four years made tears come pouring out. (Tears that I had been fighting all day). It was our first house and all three of our children were born there. There were many great things that happened there. After our long hug, we came out of the house awaited by our close friends and family and said good bye. We jumped in our van and paused for a few last moments with the kids and reflected with them what a blessing from God our house has been. The kids were so cute, confused but so cute. JJ kept tell me that "it's okay", and Tyler was searching for sadness in saying goodbye. Chris and I prayed with them, and thanked God for what He has given us, and prayed for our new adventure in Victoria. Chris reminded us that it was the people in the van that made the house so special, and the people in the van were coming with him.

God has been teaching Chris and I a lot lately about generosity, hospitality, and giving. In our new house we want even more, to make it a place where God is glorified. It it His house! When we tell people to come and visit, we meant it. You are welcome to come, and stay. We are excited to see what awaits us this new year, and to see what God has planned for us in our new house and our new church. Here is a video our our new house that I put together real quick just to get an idea of what it looks like.

beginning of the end

So we are in our last week here in Surrey. It is bitter sweet to say the least. We are very excited about what lies ahead for us in our move to Victoria and the ministry at Saanich Baptist Church, but at the same time we have to move out of house that our 3 children were born in, that we have started our family in, and a great bunch of friends and to us as close as family...

Tonight we had a 'farewell party' with our great friends, the Frews, the Oldhams, the Vanderkuips, and the Unruhs. They are all great people and over the past 5 years we have really grown close together (well the ladies have, guys don't really grow close together, we save it for the women). It is weird to say goodbye because we really aren't going that far, with the ferry we are about 2 hours from our old house, but we know that it is enough to certainly make it different, and of course it eliminates any spur of the moment visits. We had a great time saying good bye at 'Go-Banana's' doing what we love to do, letting our kids run wild, while we eat food and talk, it is a great combination. Thanks guys.

As for our future, many likely haven't heard all of the details. We have found a place to rent. It is a 3 bedroom town house, about 1300 square feet, very similar to what we are currently living in. It is very expensive, we will be spending about 50 percent of our income on housing alone. But on Saturday morning the moving truck and our army of helpers will be showing up and we will be loading the truck and then jumping on the ferry. It should all be done by 5pm if things go as planned.

As for phone numbers and stuff, not completely sure yet. We have one, but Kellee wants to change it to something that is easy to remember, like our old number 9665. But I had to remind her that that number wasn't easy to remember until we dialed it a bunch of times...

So if we don't post for a week or so forgive us, we are up to our ears in boxes and goodbyes this weeks. But please email us. chris_synesael@hotmail.com or kellee_lin@hotmail.com