For years Zeus and I have prayed and dreamed about taking our family to live in Switzerland for awhile, for our children to know their other culture and language, and to live near his family and be involved in their lives. After all, when we moved back to the Northwest it wasn’t necessarily for keeps. We’d lived in Europe since soon after we were married, but in 1997 we were at a crossroads, with one baby girl, an homesick mama and an uncertain career path. We investigated the possibilities of living back in the States, but when God moved us back here there were things about that move that made us absolutely certain that He was doing the leading. This is where we’ve been supposed to be, and we’ve seen how much we’ve grown in Him in the intervening years. But slowly a desire has grown in us to go back, at least for awhile.

So the Big Plan is this: at the end of June, we’ll pack up our essentials in our suitcases, store some stuff and sell the rest, rent out the house, find loving homes for the chickens, teach Bella the Wonder Dog to come, sit, and stay in French (viens! asseyes-toi! restes-la!) and leave on a jet plane for foreign parts.

Crazy, isn’t it? It seems like life as homeschoolers has just finally started settling into a nice routine. We are finding ways to connect and serve in our church. We have wonderful friends with whom we know we can live life with for the long haul. It is hard to think of leaving and disrupting that, even if just for a year. But we can’t escape the sense that Yes, this is what God is leading us to do. And we know that He will put the brakes on if this is not the right way to go.

Of course there are tons of questions – lots that we ask ourselves. Where will we live? Rent a house somewhere in the region Zeus’ family lives, hopefully with lots of room for friends to visit. Do you have jobs lined up? No, not yet, this is a big faith thing. In the meantime we’re tucking away funds to tide us over for a little while. Will we homeschool over there? No, the kids will attend the local schools in order to immerse them in French language. Are they freaked out about that? No, not quite. They are mostly excited with a little freaking out around the edges. How much chocolate will you eat? Way too much, I can say with almost no doubt. Everything that is said about Swiss chocolate is TRUE!

There are more questions that we’re finding out as we go along, and I’m sure that this will be a place to answer some of them. Whatever happens, even if we come back home after a month, it will be a Grand Adventure, in both a physical and a spiritual sense, one we are excited to share with each other, with our children and with you.