Becoming Chosen

My wife and I are going through some HUGE transitions right now.  The Lord has gifted her with the ability to write beautifully.  Here is her post on our transition, and where God has brought us from.

{from kim}

There is something profound about being able to look back at your life and the decisions that have lead you to where you are. There is something more profound about seeing how God has taken each step and placed you where you need to be. The key is where you need to be.

Our starting point~ 1996-1997

As I reflect back to the beginning of our story together, the words, "in sickness and in health, for rich or for poor, till death do I part", had very little meaning….well, to be honest, they held a lot of meaning but we truly had no idea what that meaning was. It takes Life to show us the depth and breadth of meaning those words inhabit. And it takes a great God who knows us better than we know ourselves, to lead us to where He wants us. Being overly confident in our 20-something selves, we envisioned being in ministry full time…that is until Life showed up. We found ourselves in the same frame of life as most of our peers in College, where what we went to school to do is not what we ended up doing.  We saw that this was just an obstacle or speed bump or stepping stone to where He was taking us. Through the years, I’m not sure we sought Him as much about the direction as we should of, while at other times, we found ourselves firmly face down in prayer.


Which leads us to today. 

The Best of Us, Oct. 2009

Today, we have this thing called Life no less figured out. Several years ago we went through a heart-wrenching transition with our church family. It was one of those events in Life where you question everything- who you are, what you are doing, why you are doing it. A friend, lovingly, seeing our confusion and pain sent us a book based off Romans 8:28 (All things work together for good to those who love the Lord and are called according to His purposes). Nothing, and I mean nothing, seemed to make sense during this season (and yes, it was a season). Out of our deep of sadness and confusion and with some leading by a Godly mentor, we dove into this verse via the book. We decided to pray this passage and to allow this one verse to be our anthem during this season. The outcome was amazing. No, it didn’t take away the pain nor did it heal the mistrust we gained from others, but what it did was even better. It gave us an understanding and insight into our deepest yearning…..

We wanted to be known as God’s Chosen. 

The easiest thing would be to maintain where we were at (I, working full time, growing my practice while Will works his job and helps with the kids). The reality is that there is nothing wrong with that….except God didn’t choose that, we did.

Family Christmas~2013

When we got married I began to pray that Will would discover his purpose in life; that he would have a confidence as the leader of our family and that he would know who he was. My deepest desire was to be in a marriage where I honored God and my husband. Throughout the years, even when we’ve moved in a direction that was positive and good, we both knew that this wasn’t it. I guess that being intentional about where the Lord is leading is becoming aware that we could be in a good place in life without being where He wants us. Our spiritual mentor (yep, same one as before) has often talked with us about knowing the detour signs or upcoming exit signs on our journey. To us, becoming chosen means that we are slowing ourselves down, spending time with Him, so that we are aware of an upcoming detour or exit sign.

While change or transition is never easy, it is important.

It is important to be aware and it is important to be ready. Scripture often talks about being ready and not becoming idle in our lives. This doesn’t necessarily mean something big will happen, but it is
important for us to be prepared, to be attuned with Him.
Roughly 2 years ago, we were asked to apply for a full-time ministry position in Michigan. This seemed so weird to us. When we left youth ministry, we truly didn’t see working in a church again…at least not as paid staff. Apparently, we were right because as we chatted we learned that it wasn’t a good fit for the church or us. But we did learn some valuable lessons throughout that process: (1) If we are willing to move to Michigan, we are willing to move anywhere. (2) We became less confident that we were meant to stay where we are at. (3) It seemed as if there were Exit Signs coming our way.

So we took a weekend and went on a retreat- just us- no kids. 

We do what we like to do best, we hiked and chatted and hiked and prayed and explored. We realized from that weekend that Will was unsettled where he was at, while I was extremely content building a practice. It wasn’t long after we came back from that retreat that I started truly hearing my kids. , so no coincidence that I heard them say things like, “Mom, can you work more from home” or “I wish you were home more” or “I know you need to work, but can you just be around”, etc.
God’s timing is always perfect

This broke me. 

Hiking Turkey Run State Park, Nov. 2014

I could not be content with how I was doing while recognizing that my husband and my kids were struggling. No complaints or criticisms; not even a request to stop working….just not happy. Our prayers changed. They became more broad, more open-ended….”God, where do you want us? What do you want us to do? Lord, what is Your will?” The only request we seemed confident in asking was that if He wanted us to move, we didn’t want to go north….and preferably in a climate with less snow. HA!! The hope of us moving seemed daunting. Neither of us could imagine being away from the Life we created….wait a minute…Romans 8:28, “All things work together for good to those who love the Lord and are called according to HIS purposes”.

Truth hit us square in the face.

If the Lord’s will is for us is to move, then it will work out. His purposes are greater than our own. He wants the best for us, our kids, our family (better than we do) and those who truly know us, and I mean truly, deeply know our hearts, know this about us.

Our purpose in Life is to become chosen by God. 

A new adventure awaits us. We are not sure the reasons why the Lord is uprooting us and moving across country. We are not sure if it is for us or our kids or others that we are moving. What we do know is that God is faithful, His timing is perfect and we are Becoming Chosen.
Many know that Will took a new job and is currently training out of town. Once training is done, he (& once we have everything wrapped up here, the kiddos and I will follow) will be moving to Los Angeles, California. Guess what? No snow!!

Family~Fall 2015

Are we nervous about a big move with the kiddos? Yes! And scared And excited And……….

Of course, I guess this is what it looks like to Become Chosen.

To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heavens: a time to be born, and a time to die . . . a time to break down, and a time to build up . . . a time to mourn, and a time to dance. (Ecclesiastes 3:1-4, KJV)

The basement floor!

Several people have recently asked how I painted the floor in my basement.  First, I cannot take credit for this.  My wife found it on Pintrest from a woman who had done something similar in her home.  Here is her pin on Pintrest if your interested.  My wife is the one who came up with the color scheme.  I just figured out how to make it work together.





Here's a list of items I used for my 500 square feet:

• Muriatic acid; 1 Bottle (I can't recall how much this was.  I think $20)
• 4 paint liners ($5)
• A stiff broom; I had one on hand.
• A good paint roller; 1 ($4 - $10)
• A very good paint brush; ($15 - $20)
• Lowe's wood grain paint tool; 1 ($7.19)
• Sherwin Williams Porch and Floor Enamel paint; 1 Gallon ($56.99 per gallon) 
• Sherwin Williams HGTV Interior Semi-Gloss Black Paint; 1 Gallon ($43.99 per gallon)
• Sherwin Williams HGTV Interior Semi-Gloss Extra-White Paint. (I bought 1 Gallon, but could have used 1 quart or half a gallon instead) ($43.99 per gallon)
• Home Depot Behr Premium Wet-Look Sealer; 1 Gallon ($26.98 per gallon)

Total Cost: $234.14

The first thing I did was prep my floor.  My basement had a sealer on it, so that had to be removed.  This process was fairly straight forward.  After sweeping my floor of any loose items, I purchased some Muriatic acid.   I then followed the instructions on the bottle (if you do this, be careful, this stuff is potent) and applied it to my floor.  The technique I used was dumping some on the floor and then used a stiff broom to spread it around.  After some hissing and spitting, the sealer was no more.  I then filled a bucket with water and baking soda and spread that on the floor to neutralize the acid.

After that was all dried up, I used some soap and water to clean/mop the floor.  Any dried dust, or loose dirt particles can cause the paint to not stick.  That would be bad...

I then waited for the floor to dry completely. Now, it's ready to paint!

 For the base paint I used a floor enamel.  Here is a picture of what I used along with the color combination.  I just put an extension on my paint roller and spread it on. One gallon worked for me on about 500 square feet.  I then let the paint dry before continuing.

While that paint dried, I made a trip over to Lowes for their wood grain painter.  This is what makes the grain effect in the paint (in case you couldn't pick that up by the name).

So, my base paint is now dried and I'm ready to move forward. I used a plank of wood and some painters tape to plot my lines. The plank of wood was 12 inches
wide, so it left me enough room to do some of the grain work.  I
laid the plank down and taped small (1 inch) strips of tape along the edge to give me a rough line to work from. After taping my lines I was ready for the first try.  Now, honestly, it took a few tries to get this right.  So, I'll skip the mistakes and tell you how I did it the way I liked it.

My daughter painting on black lines

The finished black line.

 I used my paint brush to spread the black paint down my taped line.
 I then grabbed my wood grain tool and dipped it in the white paint.  I used the edge to draw the lines that made the staggered plank look.  I didn't measure these, I just eyeballed them.  Which came back to bite me on the last few.  So, if your a perfectionist (which I have been assured I am not) you may want to grab a tape measure and pencil and make some marks on where you want your lines.

Also, I made my staggered lines every other "plank".  Looking back, I would have staggered them every third line.  This would make it look more like an actual wood floor.  So, the line on the first plank would have been 1 foot away from the wall.  The second line would be 2 feet, and the third would be 3 feet.  (you could also do 2,4,6 if you wanted to).

Intermittent white globs.

Small wood grain texture

Once the lines were drawn, I would intermittently dab white paint on different parts of the "plank".  I would then use the small grain (one of the edges) on the grain painter to create a grain texture on one of my planks.  I would mix in any white paint that I had
dabbed on earlier.  I would also make sure to leave a little of the black showing to simulate the long lines where the planks would meet.

Larger wood grain texture

After doing the small grain, I flipped the tool over and would rock while dragging it down the center of the plank.  This is what created the larger (more realistic) looking grain.  This took some playing with, but that was a part of the fun.


As I got the hang of it, it went pretty fast.  I did this over 3 or 4 days at about 2 hour stretches and all 3 of my kids jumped in to help.  I let each of them paint some of the base paint and a few of the black lines.  They were very happy to be helping.



Once I had it all painted and dried, I had to find a top coat.  I talked to everyone imaginable and I finally settled on a sealer from Home Depot.  The guy seemed to know what he was talking about and gave examples of others using this product on outside paint projects.  I know I needed something durable that could handle some high traffic areas.  This had a quick dry time (4 hours for re-coat) and added a nice shine to the floor.  I have tested it with dragging furniture around and it seems to hold up very well.

One bottle worked for 2 coats.  I applied it with a paint roller with an extension.  The great thing is that this goes on a milky color, so you can see spots you may have missed.

This was a fun project that the whole family could help with.  The great thing was that it looks incredible and was not too costly.  Anyone else had any experience doing something like this?