What to expect when you are expecting:

Things I expected before I fell in love with Seth vs. Reality

     1. Get married vs. marry a Russian man who lives in Uganda (yes I had all Russian men stereotyped as being too plastic and conceited, Seth is neither one).

     2. Live in a house that makes all my pinterest dreams come true vs. live in a house where all the beds are covered with mosquito nets and where you can hear the sounds of cheers coming from the un-decorated bathroom after a good poop.

     3. Always be highly involved in church vs. be the youth pastors (aka. live at church) and love it

     4. Have a cute pet that makes us look awesome vs. being the proud parents of a dog that poops out the plastic bags he eats when we forget to feed him dinner (no ones perfect right??)

     5. Marriage isn’t so hard vs. marriage is the hardest yet very best thing that God ever created.

Things I expected from Uganda vs. Reality

     1. Move to Africa and get skinny eating tons of vegetables and walking a lot vs. get fat eating too much rice, mashed plantains, french fries and being so tired at the end of a hot and humid day that exercize only has a 10% chance of happening if it didn’t happen in the morning.

     2. Dress down everyday vs. feeling the need to dress “nice” all the time because it’s a big deal culturally to present yourself in the best way possible, but still dressing down.

     3. Slow paced life vs. life is slower than it is in the U.S. yet we still find it difficult to find much free time other than Mondays (our coveted day off)

     4. Grass huts and no electricity vs. nice brick/cement houses and everyone having Facebook and being up on all the current shows on t.v. including “Keeping up the the Kardashians” and even “Shark Week”

Life (God) certainly has a way of blowing all expectations out of the water. This life I (we, Seth and I) live isn’t even comparable to the picture of life that I had in my head. I can’t exactly explain what that picture looked like, because even I’m not sure, all I know is that this isn’t it. This life is actually perfect. Not perfect like without flaws, but perfect in that I was designed for this. You should know that this life is full of flaws, mostly because I am very human (Seth is a little human but mostly angelic) and because we live on Earth where sin runs rampant, and in Uganda where corruption runs in the government and beyond (though, it is currently in the process of improving). Even in my wildest dreams I couldn’t have pictured life to be as it is: married to whom I’m convinced is the BEST man in the world, living in Uganda, pastoring the BEST youth in the world, having the BEST loving and supportive family and people around us (near and far) who believe in us, and serving God, who loves without conditions. We’re winning at this life thing. I’m convinced that life will always have very tall mountains to climb and very low valleys that have to also be walked though, but I’m also convinced that my God will never stop making a way and that I’ll always have my husband’s hand to hold along the way.

– Diana