You ever have a day in your life when you're just going along minding your own business and then...WHAM...out of the blue you get just knocked off your feet by something? Almost like you're playing baseball, sitting in the dugout waiting for your turn at bat and suddenly the pitcher zings the ball right at you where you're not paying the slightest bit of attention and you just get nailed! Cause it's not your TURN! You're not at the plate! You're not READY!

Well. I had one of those days yesterday. A couple of things happened yesterday, actually. I'll start with the positive stuff: Kyle and I celebrated our 9th anniversary! And folks, it was a great day because of that alone, in spite of the other stuff which I'll tell you about in a minute. I seriously love me some Kyle and would not do a single thing over any other way. As I wrote in his card, (Kyle, hope it's ok that I share this), "If I were standing at the end of the aisle about to walk down it, knowing all that I do today, I would not walk slowly down the aisle to him. I would kick off my high heels and SPRINT down that aisle into his arms." Marriage to Kyle has been far better than I even anticipated, and I had pretty high expectations. He is the most amazing man, husband, father, friend, you name it, that there is. If I'm talking in baseball metaphors, I hit this one out of the park.

Ok, so that was the good part. The not so good part. Ahem. You know how cars have to have periodic maintenance and how it's never cheap on a good day. Well, for awhile now, my Audi has been reminding me that it's due a service visit. And I knew it would be one of those costly visits, cause nothing with cars is EVER cheap. And I also had this little tickling feeling in my gut that I just needed to get the car in...like something hidden might be going on. The car was driving fine, no obvious problems or issues...but I just had this feeling. I didn't even mention it to Kyle. I hoped I was misreading my internal cues. Well, Kyle calls me yesterday with the report from the mechanic.

Fortunately, I was sitting down when he called. My precious little car had been hiding under its hood problems that would result in about $4,500 of repairs. Oh yeah. Something leaking that means my car is a ticking time bomb for an engine head to crack...plus standard timing belt replacement...plus some other stuff. Now, you just don't plop down that much on a car for repairs. And in fact, our mechanic gave Kyle explicit instructions to NOT DRIVE THE CAR A DAY LONGER. Sell it immediately, he said. Not to some unsuspecting person...please, people, we would never do that! He said sell it to a dealer or use it to trade in for another car, because a dealer can fix the stuff for much cheaper.

The thing is, we knew we'd be looking at buying another car soon. Realistically, 2 new cars, just not yet. We had hoped to wait a little bit longer, save a little more money...God just dramatically scooched up the timetable on us. It's looking like NOW!

As unpleasant as the news was about my car, again, I think God really prepared me for it. I had a suspicion founded on nothing other than...God's nudging, I guess. I'm sad, though, because I love my car! It's my zippy little baby! And there are no cars out there that excite me or that I really want to buy. Plus, there's that painful element of just parting with that much money.

And we had not planned to purchase from a dealer. I love shopping online using the vast marketplace of the internet. In fact, we bought the Audi online from a guy in NYC. That sort of shopping experience doesn't look like it's gonna work right now. We need to find something quick. So it's probably some sort of car for Kyle at this point.

I spent a good 45 minutes yesterday just pouring out my heart to God, asking for guidance and direction. And I happen to be studying the life of Abram and am seeing daily how faithful God is in the little and in the big. So I sit here tonite not real thrilled about the thought of having to car shop, but also curious as to how God will reveal Himself to me through this. He already has just by protecting me through the subtle urging to get the car in asap. So I know he has our future car waiting in the wings just awaiting its cue to come on stage.

I'll keep you posted. And I would greatly appreciate your prayers as we pick ourselves up from the dirt and wait for the next pitch.