One Year and Counting

Bethany kept asking me why I needed to know where the birthday candles were. I avoided giving her a straight answer.

Dinner that night wasn't fancy, just take-and-bake pizza and salad. We would be leaving for a 5-day Lancaster-Pittsburgh trip in a couple of days, and we didn't want a lot of leftovers in the fridge.

I found the candles in a bag of party supplies in the top of the pantry, took out 5 candles, and put one each in the 5 slices of pizza waiting on the table to be eaten. Then I lit 4 of them -- Juliet cannot yet be trusted not to respect the destructive power of the simple birthday candle flame.

Today is exactly one year since we moved to New York City, I told them. We made it a year! Then I prayed a commemorative prayer before our simple meal and we all blew out our candles. Bethany then lit Juliet's so she wouldn't feel left out, and -- with her mommy's help -- she kindasorta blew out her candle.

Then Ginny said, "Can we celebrate the anniversary every year by having pizza?" I thought that was a splendid idea. 

We then each said something we'd learned in the past year. Ginny said that we walk a lot more than drive in the van. That's true, we do. Cora said that there are ice cream trucks everywhere, sidewalks, big buildings, and dog poop. Yep, that's true too. Bethany said that it can be hard to make friends at the beginning, but once you get to know some people you see how nice they are. 

As for Juliet, she's learned lots of words, learned how to climb up and take all the diaper wipes out of the package, and gotten much better at taking the stairs.

I can't begin to list all the things I've learned over the past year. You can read some of them here, here, and here. I won't make another list today, though I probably could. Mainly, though, I continue to learn how dependent I am on God for everything, from the floor underneath my feet to the coffee in my cup to the words in my mouth when I meet yet another man who is homeless to the family I share this cramped apartment with.

I also know how much I have to learn. That list would be quite extensive as well.

A year is a milestone, and no small one at that. I can relate personally to each of the items listed in the link below, and can give examples from my own experience for many of them:

Big Appled: 14 Things I Learned During My First Year in New York 

So here's to the next year, and the one after that. And to seeing more every day of what God is doing in this city and in us.

Here's to many more years!