As we pass the two month mark of arriving here in Saipan, I thought I’d post a little update on how we’re acclimating to our new home. I know many of you who are interested in ‘real life’ updates follow us on instagram (currently our Saipan-update channel), so some of this will already sound familiar.

This move has been both fabulous and really difficult! Luckily, we seem to have rounded a corner a couple weeks ago and are living mostly on the better half of that equation.

Since it is pretty labor intensive to just make normal life happen (gathering groceries, or paying bills, or making dinner, or doing errands just take so many extra steps here!), there is a steep Saipan learning curve.

However, within the last couple of weeks, the extra steps started feeling normal to me. Five markets or grocery stores to get food for dinner? Sure, no problem. Farmer’s market every single Saturday, and often on Tuesday night as well? Totally normal. Paying all of our bills in person? That’s just how it goes here. Seventeen trips, five forms of ID and three notarized documents to figure out our account with the energy company? Well, that still makes me kind of nuts, actually.

Plus- and this is huge- I just keep realizing, over and over again how lucky we are to be here.

We get to pay off Adam’s dental school loan… and spend tons of time with each other… and live on a tropical beach… and spend so much time outside (snorkeling! hiking! beaching!)… and travel around Asia (can’t wait to finalize our fall travel plans, and then share them with y’all!)…

God has been extravagantly generous to us (and, I should note, is also extravagant in His generosity even when the end result is not living on a beach and traveling around Asia). I have just been so very thankful for this season.

Not to say this place is not quirky and frustrating and just so different than Denver- it IS! In fact, I should make a good-bad-funny Saipan list for y’all sometime. But the beaches are helping us muddle through. More to come…