We Started A Newsletter. And Then A Pandemic Happened.

Sorry About That.

Our last newsletter was sent March 21. We were 3 weeks into living in D.C. We were a couple of weeks into a citywide lockdown. The national daily death count was in the dozens. And it seemed like years worth of events had happened in just a few days time. 

How innocent.

It’s hard to summarize what April through today has been like. There’s a lot of ands in our vocabulary these days – we’re grateful to have stayed covid-free; and we grieve a friend who’s passed away from it and the many friends who’ve fallen ill. Staying home all the time sucks; and having a job and lifestyle where we can afford to stay home is a privilege. Being far away from close friends and family is painful; and being part of a church that has been nothing but supportive, protective, and encouraging is a joy. 

I know it’s been a while since our last newsletter. We won’t try to catch you up on all the happenings since March. But we’ll give you some updates now with the intention of keeping you better informed in the weeks to come (But honestly, the world is wild. No guarantees). 

Family

We’re thrilled that Audrey is enrolled in D.C. Bilingual, a public charter school that does 50% of her lessons in English and 50% in Spanish. We had to use a lottery system to get into a school and are incredibly blessed to get into one we’re really excited about. They, like all of the schools in our region, have announced they will be completely virtual for at least the first couple months of the school year. How does virtual education work for a 4-year-old? We don’t know yet! Audrey is disappointed to not be going back to school and making friends. But when we asked about how she felt she said, “I’m just glad that I still get to be with my family.” Audrey is still scarily good at puzzles (rumor is she was a consultant for Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind) and mildly obsessed with books. If it’s purple, is even tangentially related to unicorns or princesses, and sparkly, you can count on her approval.

The pre-pandemic plan for Emily was to find a job sometime this fall, around the time Audrey would head to school. It turns out that the cost of living in Washington, D.C. is much lower when everything is closed. We’re grateful that Emily can stay home in this season and lead our household as we navigate . . . everything. But if you know of anything part time, remote, and very flexible (an easy find, I’m sure) send it her way.

Wesley is thoroughly two. He’s enthusiastically clumsy, eager to explore the world as fast as he can – as long as mom and dad and sister aren’t too far away. He knows how to make a room laugh with his antics and is aggressively cuddly – physical touch is his top three love languages. He follows his sister wherever she goes (whether she likes it not). He can count to 20, adorably says “Matban” when asking for Batman stories, and loves to talk if he can get it in between his sister’s endless chatter.

I (Anthony) remember looking for ministry jobs last year, occasionally seeing “Online Campus Pastor” postings and thinking, “Who would chose that as a career?” And . . . here I am! I have yet to preach in person to my congregation and only in the past two weeks have we had any sort of outdoor gatherings with folks. But we’re immensely grateful to be part of a church that takes covid seriously, is consistently showing up to worship online, serve our city, and protest injustice.

What We’ve Been Up To

Before it got insufferably hot, we got to go on lots of hikes in parks within and near the District. There’s some beautiful stuff to see and are grateful for the outdoors.

There’s a neat park near Reagan Airport where you can watch planes take off from pretty close. Someone had left a kite behind and Audrey was thrilled to learn how to fly it.

At one point, Audrey asked us if the White House was real or make-believe. We decided it was a good time to finally take a walk around the National Mall and take a look-see. It was eerily empty and quite lovely to have the monuments basically to ourselves.

Last week the church hosted a couple picnics throughout the city. We were so grateful to meet and see people in real life.

The National Zoo opened last week! We didn’t get to see the pandas (yet!) but it was well laid out for social distancing and a wonderful distraction.

This is our church’s downtown location turned into production/livestream central. We’re so blessed to have an immensely talented, dedicated, and Spirit-filled worship and production team.

One wild thing - I got to talk about a discipleship book/curriculum idea with Rob Bell as part of a workshop I attended. So that was fun!

Thanks for making it to the bottom of this tome. We pray that you are safe and healthy and loving yourself and others well.