Goodbye or See You Again?

The life we have lived for most our of lives has meant many goodbyes. As a family we don't know what it means to have lived in the same house or the same town, or even the same country our whole lives. 
I think we are up to 18 houses in our 20 years of life together!Our adventure has allowed us to live in 4 countries and experience the joy and pain of meeting people from over 65+ countries of the world.
Joy because it has been an amazing journey of meeting people and learning about their culture and life story.
Pain because with every part of our journey there have been too many goodbyes to count.
So today we come to another goodbye.
For two years our younger Kiddos have had the priviledge of attending an international school after homeschooling for most of their lives. Within our own resources there was no way for us to afford all that comes with international schooling. However, God in his sweet way brought people across our path allow this to happen. Today is the end of this journey for our Kiddos. As we leave Oman they have to say goodbye to friends and teachers that they won't see again. It is so hard. I feel their pain as if it were my own.

Waiting for my Kiddos

For us as parents, there are goodbyes too. There have been people here that we have met that will forever impact us. We will always be glad we came back to Oman for we have treasured deeply the people who have loved and cared for us and our Kiddos. 
This has not been an easy place to live the past three of the six years here. We will be grateful for those sweet friends who and showed kindness and generosity to us when we needed it most. We will miss the people who took time to share our hurts and discouragement and who cheered us on when we thought we couldn't get through this year. 
We grieve, rightly so, for those we will miss and be thankful that our paths crossed in this desert place. As my Mum taught me, there is always something to be glad about. That is not to minimise the pain of the goodbyes but as journeyers of faith, we know that goodbye is not forever. In each road we travel we are blessed with more friends to journey with us. So we look back with grateful hearts and look forward to meeting those friends that God is preparing for us in the next place.