new beginnings

a little more catching up...this one is from dec 7.

Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011?

the first place that comes to mind is my mops group. mops stands for mothers of preschoolers and is a wonderful, wonderful thing. i found a group that meets here in little rock and started going in february. i found it online and went with a friend who i had met at the library that week before. other than that, i didn't know anyone so i was a little nervous. but i was soooooooo desperate to hang out with other moms and get a break from my kids and make friends that i went anyway.

it was a lifesaver. seriously. the other moms were so incredibly welcoming, the leaders were so loving and kind. these women immediately started pouring into my life. they gave me furniture and kids clothes. they brought me meals when we moved. they listened to my stories. they loved on my kids. they made me feel like a part of their lives. they were so welcoming and it really changed my outlook on life.

so, over the year i've continued to connect with them. we meet once a week and my closest mom friends are a part of this group. hiba's close friends are a part of this group and it has been such a huge blessing for me. i'm so thankful that my mom suggested finding a mops group and i'm so thankful that i took the step to try it out.

there are two communities that i would like to connect with more deeply in 2011. the first is my mops group. i want to continue to get to know these women and share life with them. i do see some of them outside of mops, but i'd like to find more opportunities to spend time together. i know i will have to be more intentional about finding time to spend with them and i really want to do that.

the second community is our church. we've started going to this really small, but really awesome church, called r street community church. the people we have met there are awesome. they were (and still are) so welcoming to our family and have already made us feel like we are a part of their community, even though we don't go all the time. a lot of the people we've met there are really interested in social justice issues and have a heart for the disenfranchised of this area. it's very refreshing to find a community of believers who put their energy, not just their money, where their mouth is. i really want to connect more with them in 2011 - go to church more regularly, find ways to hang out outside of church, and serve our community with them. i know this will have to be very intentional and take a fair amount of energy, but it's a community that i think will be great for me and jason to be a part of, as well as hiba and matthias. i can see jesus in their lives and want our family to be a bigger part of that.

there was the time...

i feel like i binge blog. right now, i have a lot to write about, but am having trouble putting it down on paper. or on the computer screen, i guess.

but the main thing tonight is i miss palestine. more specifically, i miss our friends. i miss the community we had there. it really was something else.

sure, there were the times when there were parties on our patio till 3 a.m. the summer after hiba was born and all i wanted to do was sleep instead of listen to people laughing and talking right outside my window. and there were the times when everyone would come over till the wee hours of the morning and make my kitchen dirty and leave their dishes for me to wash and then never take them back to their own house. or the times when andrew would steal my coffee mugs.

but there were also the times when we would play catan for hours on end. or the times we would watch movies with funny subtitles and bad quality. or the times when we'd have sushi parties or saleem would make hotwings. and the times when we would bbq on the deck and sit around and eat and drink for hours, talking about everything and nothing.

there was the time when rachel dropped everything she was doing to distract me from the fact that my husband was detained by the israeli army. she made some phone calls with me and then came over to my house and we taught hiba how to clap.

there was the christmas when we were all so homesick that we had a million different parties and dinners and breakfasts and gift exchanges and acted as fill-in families for each other.

there was hiba's first birthday party, which was filled with some of her best friends in the world - all people who were at least twenty years older than her, but loved her like family.

there was the time when hiba was born and munther snuck food into the hospital for me, tons of people brought us dinner and showered us with gifts.

there was the time when matthias was born and rachel and audra took care of hiba, and again friends brought us food and helped us out.

tonight, jason had to take matthias to the hospital. turns out he has croup. he's fine now - that's not the point of this post. the point is that it was 11 at night and i didn't know who to call. we do have friends here that i would call and take hiba to if i really needed to. but we don't have the sense of community that we had in palestine, where if i called one of our friends, they would drop what they were doing and come to our house, no matter what time. and we all lived so close that it would be a matter of minutes.

i know we have good friends here and i know that friendships take time. i'm thankful for the friends we have.

but tonight, i miss palestine. i miss the culture of closeness that was forced on us, that we had to adapt to, that we were made to live with whether we liked it or not. and by the end, i liked it. and i miss it.