Are we crazy? I’ve been asking myself that for the past few months! My husband and I felt called to leave our hectic, busy schedules behind and slow down. After 30 years of teaching, we made the decision to retire, sell our house, buy a camper, and travel. We decided to take a leap of faith. Follow us on our journey of faith, fitness, and fun!

Our journey began four months ago when we made the decision to retire. We felt called to give up our busy schedules. We had TOO many commitments. I taught full time plus more (I taught every other day during my planning hour), and I coached both sideline and competitive cheer (which was more like a second full-time job). My husband taught full time, was the Union Vice President and the Social Studies Department chair (PLC leader), and he announced the football and basketball games. We shared the Senior Class Advisor position in addition to being parents of three and grandparents of six. Add to that, stenosis and arthritis in my neck causing my whole left arm to go numb and hurt, and it became clear that we needed to take better care of ourselves. Still, the decision was not an easy one, and we prayed about it A LOT. Our prayer was, “God, this is what we are thinking about doing, and what we think You are leading us to do, but if it’s not Your will, PLEASE stop us!”. As we started things in motion, we felt our decision was confirmed at every turn, as things seemed to just easily fall into place –including selling our house in one weekend for $20,000 over the asking price. Our life became a whirlwind of things to do such as getting the house ready to sell, filling out paperwork, showing the house, packing, giving things away, moving items into storage, and buying a camper (it took us three tries to get the right camper, but that’s for another entry!)

We turned over the keys on Thursday, June 20th after days of packing, sorting, and cleaning and official began living in our camper. It was bittersweet, to say the least, with a lot of emotions bubbling up. The house we sold was our “dream home” with an inground pool, a hot tub, a finished basement – the whole nine yards. We traded a total of 4,400 square feet of living space for only 390! Well, about 410 – if you include the back of our truck. We gave more away to Goodwill and our grown children than I ever imagined possible. I had to keep a clear focus that things are JUST THINGS! We are trading them for time and experiences.

So, here we are taking a Leap of Faith. Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as, “…confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see”. I have confidence that God is calling us to a deeper relationship with Him by slowing down our lives and taking better care of ourselves. I have faith that He will lead us and take care of us on this journey. So… I guess it’s not such a “leap” after all. 🙂

A big RV trip, but the little things are most important