Life

Thanks for all the love you have shown me these past few days, blog people!! I have never felt more incredibly blessed and supported in my life, and I have definitely felt the love whether it be through facebook posts, emails, texts and calls or personal visits from friends and family. It literally is crazy to wake up in the morning and remind myself... "I am getting married!" I'll admit that I love to immediately glance toward my left hand and stare at the gorgeous ring that is now occupying my ring finger. Of course, in all this, I feel like the greatest gift I've received is Dustin. I still can't believe he pulled all this off, and I can't believe that I can officially tell people now that I get to spend the rest of my life with him. I really can't believe it. I am so incredibly blessed.

I have been thinking a lot lately just about how much God has played into the last few days of my life, and really, it's quite overwhelming. I wanted to share a little story with you to explain just how crazy this all worked out, and how much God really proved to be faithful in making everything possible. Recently, Minnesota changed the process for obtaining a teaching license by adopting a new licensure exam called the MTLE (Minnesota Teacher License Exam). Previously, MN had been using an exam called the Praxis to test for licensure, but for whatever reason, they have switched over to this new test. Quite great for me as I was entering into my senior year of college (can you sense the sarcasm?) Anyway, these new tests have a passing rate of about 15% right now... much bleaker than the Praxis rate of about 60%. I was pretty discouraged when I failed the Social Studies content exam not once, but twice. In fact, I found out I didn't pass for the second time on Thursday evening at about 7 pm when I was driving in a rush to get to choir practice at my church from work. I was so bummed out and really frustrated, naturally, and almost thought about not walking in to practice, but I had driven all the way out and knew that I had to go. I rushed upstairs to our rehearsal room to sit next to my mom (we joined the gospel choir together!) and whispered to her that I hadn't passed. She looked as bummed as I did, rubbed my back, and told me we were on to the next song, called "Anything". I hadn't practiced this song yet and when we went through the lyrics, I was kind of shocked.

"God can do anything, anything and everything, there ain't nothing he can not do. God can do anything, anything and everything. He can do anything but FAIL." 

We sang through the song and I was almost annoyed... Really, God?! I just fail my exam and we're singing praise about how you can't fail anything? Do you ever have those moments where you kind of feel like God is being a little more than obvious about something? I had that moment at choir practice, as we sung the song "Anything."

So after choir, my mom could tell that I was pretty bummed out and she asked me to go sit with her in the car to chat. I basically burst into tears the second I shut her car door. I didn't understand the way things were going. I felt lost and unsure about my future in anything... and all my mom could do was try to comfort me the best she could. I do remember her saying to me, "Case, even though it doesn't seem like it tonight, God has something BIG in store for you-- something beyond your wildest dreams. You just have to trust and have faith that he will work everything out for good!" You know how it goes sometimes when moms give advice, I gave her a little hug, mumbled a "Thanks, mom...." and got into my own car for the drive home. I appreciated what she had to say, but really just felt like being sad for a minute.

I got home and really just wanted to crash and so I headed straight to my bedroom. That's when I noticed this note on my pillow...

Little did I know that the very next day, not only would I be offered the substitute job, but I would also be getting engaged. And God, in his funny way, proved his faithfulness in everything once again.

After the engagement night was over, I went to bed around 3 a.m. after a full night of celebration. I was exhausted, and yet there was another note on my pillow that just about moved me to tears from my mom...

I love my mom :) Mostly I am just grateful that she was encouraging and really speaking the truth into me the night before when I was really struggling to make sense of ANYTHING... If you're wondering, I sang that song with a smile on my face Sunday morning, because I knew that the words were true. God really can do anything, and will do anything for those who love him. I learn that more and more each day that I'm alive! I still feel so blessed, and I am so excited for what's to come in the near future.

*****

For those that are wondering, we have not yet set a date (that's the most common question I've gotten in the last few days). Right now, we are thinking this upcoming summer. Today we had our first official planning day by 1... heading to the jeweler to figure out a few things (my ring needs to get resized) 2... planning out a first round guest list and 3... discussing photography. After about 3 hours, we have our guest list down to a somewhat reasonable number. Also, we realized my side of the family alone, just EXTENDED family, is 59 people. You think that's big... The Wahl clan comes to a whopping 90 people. Put that together and you already get 149 with just our families... so yea. We love our families, and there is a lot of family, so we are probably going to have a decent sized wedding. Unfortunately, it sounds like it is going to take at least a week to resize my ring, and since our dear friends Molly and CJ are tying the knot this weekend, I want to have my engagement ring to be able to show people. Can you blame me? :) So that is where we are at. Planning is a lot of work, I am learning that just four days in. But it's completely fun as I expected it to be. What a crazy ride we're on together!