Bowling + New York friends

 A couple weeks ago we had a sweet family drive all. night. long. to come visit us from New York with their three kids.  Seriously, they are such troopers!  And it was so so nice to have them stay with us and visit!  These sweet friends were some of the closest we had in New York.  Kristen and her family moved an hour away about half way through our time in New York, so when I went to do play dates with them Jake and I usually just stayed the whole day since it was easiest after the hour drive. We essentially did life together and it was so wonderful to have such great friends and fellowship!  We miss their friendship and LOVED having them here!  The only day I took photos was when we went bowling.  Their kiddos had never been so we thought it would be perfect to take them to Pinstripes- even though it's kind of like "high class" bowling- we set the expectations high! I loved capturing their sweet looks after they rolled the ball - they all had a blast.  And, their youngest loved the air - it was so funny to watch it blow on his face and hair!  We miss them so much and hopefully can visit them in New York soon!

Last get together with some friends in New York :)

These last few weeks have been a little busy- so I have to apologize for the delay in blogging.  Between some unexpected naps (eek!) and looking for homes and working on (hopefully) selling our previous home, things have been busy around here!  I've actually had these pictures uploaded for some time, it has just taken me a couple weeks to actually write this post :)

It doesn't seem like it's been almost month since we have been in New York!  Thankfully because of social media and technology, I still feel *somewhat* connected to our old friends.  We have had some FaceTime conversations (even though FaceTiming with three year olds hasn't been going as well as expected lol), emailing, texting back and forth, and seeing updates on social media with our old friends which is so nice :)  These pictures are from a couple of our friends who threw us a little "goodbye Party."  It was so sweet of them to cook out, get some gifts, and also get a pinata- even if it did end up falling off the rope. The kids ended up wacking it on the ground and didn't know the difference lol  

It will be so nice to see everyone one more time when we go to pack up our things in a couple weeks :)

We have arrived... in our temporary home.

There's a lot of things about transition that can be hard. Saying goodbye is never easy.  Packing and cleaning can be downright exhausting.  Trying to help a toddler adjust to the idea of a temporary home can be confusing.  And there is an endless list of doctors to call, internet to change, insurance to update, etc.  Thankfully, we are moving to a place where there are plenty of familiar faces.  There have been groceries dropped off at our home, old restaurants we have been excited to try, and friends to catch up with.  And for all of those things, we are so so grateful.

The hardest challenge thus far has been waiting.  Until our home sells in New York we are kind of at a stand still as to how to move forward with our lives here.  The type A list person in me wants to move into a home here asap.  Especially since we need to update our home study for our adoption, we can't do that until we have an actual home to update!  And, it can be hard when you see homes that you like quickly slip off the market.

But as always, God has shown me that waiting is going to be apart of my life.  Whether it's waiting for a baby, waiting for an adoption, waiting for a new job, waiting for a home.  Waiting is always the same.  It involves trusting that God has already gone before me and is making a way.  That he sees our future home.  He sees our future neighbors.  He sees the future family that is going to live in our home in NY.  And the challenge for me is always sitting in that unwritten story and finding comfort in this space that I'm in.  And not just being ok in the waiting, but trusting that God even has a plan for us while we're in this temporary housing.  That He may want to use us and grow us in ways that He couldn't if we were in our future home.

And so we wait.  In the next couple months we will settle into this temporary place and see what God has in store for us here.  And I will need to fight back the "what if's" and my typical controlling tendencies.

So we will get back into the new normal here soon.  I'm excited to dive back into my daily photos (I know lame, but for real, I am lol), we will find the parks and libraries and find a new normal.  And I'm excited to keep you updated as I do :)

Here are some pictures from our last couple weeks in New York :)

We're packing our bags again.

Yes, once again the Cinadr's are on the move!  Does it feel like we just got to New York, because at times it can definitely feel like that on our end!  However, we were very excited when a couple weeks ago Dan received and accepted a job offer from Valspar, and in the next week we are going to be heading back to our old stomping grounds: the suburbs of Chicago :)

As with every move we have done, there are so many emotions.  While we are so thankful for this opportunity that has been presented to Dan and looking forward to connecting again with the wonderful friends we had in Chicago, we definitely are going to miss the community we have formed here in New York.  We have had so many great people come around us and support us here over the last two years and the way that God provided friends almost instantly when we moved to New York was such a blessing.  We have grown in so many ways and it definitely is going to be hard saying goodbye to our friends, church community, co workers, and neighbors. 

So this week we will head out with a heavy heart saying goodbye to some great friends, but with anticipation to what God has in store for us in the future as we head back to Chicago :)  

Here's some of our favorite memories from New York!

Starting our adoption

The many trips to pick apples

The Spiedie Festival

Visiting some New York parks 

Trips along the East Coast: Boston

Oh the Binghamton Carousels

The Story Garden

Trips to Cooperstown

Our porch

Trips to the East Coast: DC 

Wegmans Halloween

 Trips to Ithaca

The Fall

The great friends we made

That time we made the Binghamton newspaper

Indoor Water Parks

Raspberry picking

Sugar Lips (aka ice cream places)

Where Jake first started mowing the lawn :)

More trips to Ithaca

Some of the great friends we met at church!

How little Jake was when we moved in!

Our trip to the PGA tour in Rochester

Trip to the Finger Lake wineries

 And more apple picking :)

 More Wegman Halloween

More trips along the East Coast: New Hampshire

Jake's first haircut (this was the before lol)

Our first trip to NYC where we met famous people :)

Surviving the New York Winters (mainly Dan surviving his long commute to Walton :)