May Madness

The insanity has begun! Our house looks like (insert any cliche about a house in total chaos, it will still be an understatement). There are piles of paper strewn across every flat surface, detailing tasks that must be done over the next 2 weeks. Our to-do lists have spin-off to-do lists. A veritable mountain of Rubbermaid containers filled with "stuff" partially blocks the front entrance to our home - undoubtedly a fire hazard.  Empty cardboard boxes, waiting to be filled, stand resolutely in every room. Phone calls to insurance companies and utility offices and banks are underway - spawning forms and documents arriving daily with the mailman. Drop-off trips to St.Vincent de Paul have become the main family outing. "Ship? store? shed?" has become a mantra while gazing at individual objects in the general disorder. Plus, there is the hacking cough shared by all 3 females in the house.
Moving to New Zealand wrecks havoc with the automated phone trees of any given utility company or small business. Even when the live operator finally comes to your rescue, she has no field in her automated computer system for entering "New Zealand" as your destination.
To add to the chaos: Maria wants to "help" pack boxes, so she shoves anything laying around into any non-sealed box. Can't find the car keys? your sandwich? any toothbrush? yeah....probably jammed into the deepest recesses of any one of the ubiquitous boxes.  Thankfully, Bernadette has not the slightest concept of what the heck we are doing nor does she groove to the "help" concept yet, but it does just so happen that she is in that developmental stage where babies love to empty items out of a container. Boxes are containers. I think you can follow the chain of logic here. I JUST PACKED THIS BOX TEN MINUTES AGO! WHY IS EVERYTHING BACK OUT OF IT????
And then there is Richard. He was told by the missionaries in NZ how much the teens will read about the faith. How few Christian books are available to them down under. How deeply they have been moved and inspired by the scant titles which they have been able to peruse. And so, he made up his mind that we will simply have to bring almost every single Christian book we own to New Zealand. (Mind you, we both studied theology and are avid readers.) Then he realized that this idea made no sense, after all, many of them would be inaccessible to youth. Instead, his new and improved plan: bring almost every Christian book we own PLUS buy $500 worth of new books written specifically for teens! Anyone who has even the foggiest concept of the shipping costs to New Zealand may grasp the enormity of this undertaking.

Dear reader, you may guess that today's frazzled entry was written not by Richard, but by Kelly. Had Richard written it, he might have shared his shock at the amount of the girls' books and clothing that his wife desired to bring. Perhaps he would have referenced his confusion as to why his beloved spouse feels the need to stockpile mascara for this missionary endeavor - do they not sell cosmetics down under? and if not, would that not be so much the better? Furthermore, why does moving to a foreign country suddenly inspire Kelly with the ineffable desire to abandon disposable diapers in favor of cloth?
Yes, it is mad here. There is much to do. And the hardest, biggest task of all is simply trying to wrap our minds around the truth that 3 weeks from today we will be standing on New Zealand soil, all of this behind us, and we will be engaged in our very first efforts with the youth of St. Thomas More. THAT is truly overwhelming.

Check out our video . . . and consider helping us get some books to NZ!

With less than 4 weeks to go until God's great adventure for us begins, we are officially in "get-as-much-done-as-quickly-as-possible" mode!  We just taped and sent a video of our family to St. Thomas More for the parish to use as an introduction for us, and also to help them fundraise for the youth group budget.  I tried getting the video up on our blog but the main page cuts off half of the video window . . . so yeah I'm still working on that.  In the meantime you can just watch it here:  Sealy Family Intro Movie

One bit of help we need in these next weeks.  I recently asked Danielle and Kerstin the question "Is there anything that you wish you had at St. Thomas More that you currently don't have?"  The response: Books.  Apparently the teens are hungry for good spiritual reading!  We hope to bring down a decent library with us, but we can't cover all the basics!  If you're interested in helping out, I'll be putting a list of 20 or so books up here by next week that we want to add to the parish library - let us know if you'd like to maybe send one or two down to the parish ahead of us!

Maria's Reflections on the Big Move

Praise God for approved visas this week and no more major hurdles between the Sealy family and New Zealand! Oh, except for massive amounts of packing and a painfully long journey. Anyway, as we get closer and closer to our departure date, we are stepping up our efforts to prepare Maria for this enormous change in her little life. Her third birthday will be just a few days before we leave, and these are her thoughts, in her own words, about the move. 

Q: Maria, are you excited about going to New Zealand? 

A: Yeah. Yes I am. 

Q: So what about going to New Zealand makes you most excited?

A: I want to bring my dollhouse and pack it up.

(A non-sequitur, and sadly, not an option.)

Q: Is there anything about going to New Zealand that you do not like?

A: No. I like New Zealand. I like it a lot. 

Q: What do you think it will be like there? 

A: I think there will be trains and pools and rivers and dolphins and trains and hippopotamuses. 

Q: What kind of food do you most hope they will have there? 

A: I hope they have Macaroni and Cheese!

(A food she has actually only had a few times and never showed a preference for.....)

Q: What do you think New Zealand will look like?

A: It will look like beautiful. 

Q: What do you think Bernadette will like about New Zealand?

A: I think Bernadette will like that there will be lots and lots of butterflies in New Zealand - she will maybe try to chase them around. Yeah, I think she will. 

Q: And lastly Maria, what do you think is the most important theological truth about Christ's love that the people of New Zealand need to know?

A: (scowls) I don't want to! (very long pause) Tell me. Tell me about the people in New Zealand.