I feel like my time in Uganda has been divided into three distinct chunks. Number one trying to work with the Phase Project, number two moving across town and moving in with a family that I had just met, and the most recent development being a pretend “co-mom” to six children while their parents are out of country trying to figure out emergency medical care for the mother Michaela. God works in crazy ways. Seriously I came here with the expectation to be doing something extremely different then what I am now and the random connections that lead me to my current predicament are mind-blowing.
I met a random girl names Laura at church somehow ended up mentioning that I had a lot of free time and I once had a job teaching swim lessons. I am not even sure how swimming was even brought up. The next day Laura messaged me and said that they were starting a swimming program and desperately needed some help. She asked if I could come teach the next day. Just like that my life changed. Sunday; talked about how I taught swimming in the past. Monday; told they needed help. Tuesday; started a new chapter of Uganda. Not long after I started teaching the job I initially thought that I would do fell through. I was given three days to re-figure out my life. It seemed like almost an impossible task. But anything is possible for God.
The next bit was a whirlwind. I talked about my situation with Cody the guy I taught swimming with. He said he had a girl who lived at the house with him and his family that he thought I should talk to. On the day I was supposed to give my final answer to the girl I was living with whether I would stay and tough it out or go Elise messaged me and said she was at a coffee shop and asked if I wanted to meet up. I thought about making an excuse and not meeting up with her but I didn't. I grabbed my bag and headed out the door.
She ended up bringing me back to the house for dinner… and promptly left me to have a “short” three hour Skype call… (I still give her a hard time about that) but it worked out fine. I talked some more to Cody about my situation and he gave me some really good insight on why I should probably just quit. I used to pride myself with not being a quitter. I almost would torture myself by continuing doing things I hated just so I could say that I didn’t quit. But the more that I have “quit” the more I have realized how awesome it is and sometimes God lets us go through hard things to break us out of what we are doing and move us towards something better. If I hadn’t had a hard time with the Phase Project I wouldn’t be where I am now..phase three in my project..I mean the third part of my time here.
I feel like I am exactly where God wants me to be. I knew God wanted me in Uganda but when O first got here I couldn't for the life of me figure out why. But now I get to be a blessing to a great family who so generously opened up their house to me when I was on the bring of being displaced. Because they are so open with their house the three random girls living with them were able to take on parenting so that they were able to leave for the U.S as soon as possible knowing that the six children they left would be fine in Uganda.
I am not going to lie suddenly becoming a “mom” to six children has been kind of exhausting at times and it makes me really appreciate my mother... apparently it is true what people always say about the correlation between having kids and being grateful to your mother. But I am super happy to be here for them and I am so glad there are three of us “moms” at the house to make sure everything happens smoothly… well at least semi-smoothly.
Today has been kind of rough though nothing particularly bad has happened besides the three year old spraying Deet directly in his eyes at 7:00 in the morning. (Cody and Michaela if you read this he is fine and can still see) it just meant I had to peel his eyes open and dump water in them for a long time. I would say I feel bad for him but his siblings told him not to and he still did it… so natural consequence… I feel heartless… but not. So that is where I am at right now.
I know God is teaching me a thousand things but I haven’t had time to process them. How do parents do it!?! I now understand parent bed time. I can say in earnest "8:30 no wonder I am yawing" before I would say that as a joke to people who aren't night owls but now I can relate.
 If you feel like God is calling you to pray for the situation here please pray for Michaela as she is getting medical tests done to figure things out. Pray for peace for the whole family during this stressful time and that God would use this time to draw everyone involved closer to him and that we would find our strength only in him.