October: A race, a birthday, and student loans

Hello friends and family!

Mikaela here to tell you about our October! I know it’s only been a few weeks since our September post (we’ve been getting behind on our blog posts), but I’m going to try and get this one posted on time! October has been a wonderful month, filled with wonderful time with friends, wonderful weather, and some awesome accomplishments in our lives!

October is a wonderful month in St. Louis – the humidity goes away, the air is crisp, and the sunshine is pleasant rather than oppressive. October is also the season for Oktoberfests, sausage suppers, and races! One of the benefits of a semi-local vicarage is that we are able to attend some seminary events, so early in the month, we drove into St. Louis on a Friday evening and spent the evening at Oktoberfest eating brats, listening to polka music, and catching up with lots of friends who have returned from vicarage.  That same weekend, I got to spend time doing just about the same thing at Our Savior’s Fall Festival/Sausage Supper. We had the opportunity to spend time with some new friends from Immanuel, which is fun because we are getting to know the people of the congregation and making new friendships! This weekend, we drove into St. Louis again to go to a Halloween party at the house of some friends who are here on a local vicarage as well, and it was so wonderful and refreshing to spend time with them!

Halloween Party

Early morning trail run

We have loved taking advantage of the beautiful weather and the beneficial impact it has on our running! We spent one of our Saturday morning runs on the Katy Trail, running through farmland and enjoying the crisp air and sunshine. We also had fun running in a 5K that Immanuel’s 8^th graders put on as a fundraiser for their class trip. Being a small race, I placed first for overall women and Nick placed first in his age group for men (but that was by default since he was the only 20-29 year-old male to run the race). One of our big accomplishments this month was running our second half marathon! One of the fun parts about this race was that as a Halloween race, we of course had to dress up in costumes! This was also one of the challenging parts of the race, as finding a costume that is comfortable to run 13.1 miles in is not easy. We finally decided on costumes….three days before the race…and Nick spent all day Friday shopping for all the pieces of our costumes. In the end, it worked out great, and we were a comfortable Han Solo and Princess Leia for our second half marathon! The other important part of the race was our goal time – after running our last race in about 2 hours and 5 minutes, our goal was to complete this race in under 2 hours. As the weather got cooler, our times got faster, and we knew we were on track to meet our goal. On race day at the starting line, we made sure to move up closer to our pace group (the people running to meet close to our same goal time), since at our last race, we started so far back that we spent several miles weaving through and passing people. It was a beautiful day, not too cold and nice and sunny, and it ended up being a beautiful 13 miles to run. We got to run past the newly-renovated area around the Gateway Arch and other beautiful St. Louis landmarks. In the end, even after Nick battled an awful side cramp in mile 8, we crossed the finish line at 1 hour and 52 minutes! We were very happy and celebrated by eating a big breakfast and taking naps on the couch.

Immanuel's Dash to DC 5K

After our half marathon

Halloween half marathon costumes - Han Solo and Princess Leia

Another major accomplishment in our lives this month is that WE PAID OFF MY STUDENT LOANS!!!!! Yes, this deserves all caps! We made the first payment on my loans back in November 2014. These federal loans are on a 10 year repayment plan, and through budgeting, extra payments, and extreme generosity from churches and individual donors, we were able to make the final payment on my loans two weeks ago. This means that we paid off about $30,000 in loans in less than 2 years! We are so incredibly amazed at God’s blessings and provision in our lives and thankful for all the people who have given to us so generously. We are so excited to be free from this debt and we are excited for what it means in our lives. Now, we move on to paying off the loan we have on our car, and after that, to Nick’s student loans from his undergraduate degree. However, we did take a little bit of money to celebrate with a nice dinner out that night.

Our "We paid off my student loans" celebration dinner

On the work front, I am enjoying my time with my students. I got a new student in my class a few weeks ago, bringing my count up to 15 students, and we are constantly busy! Although it brings about the stress involved with teaching, working with Kindergarteners is a constant lesson in grace, and their love and willingness to forgive is such an amazing blessing to me. This month brought parent-teacher conferences, which, while they take extra time and writing report cards consumed me for a week, are also an amazing blessing. I love hearing what the students convey to parents and how the parents are seeing their learning and growth at home, and sometimes we just have lots of laughs at what their children say and do.

Nick has been enjoying life as Vicar. He got another chance to preach this month, and continues to assist in Sunday services, teach confirmation and Bible study, and go on visits to homebound members. He had to spend a week walking to work this month after a little trouble getting his car started, but thankfully after a few trips to the mechanic, it was a quick and inexpensive fix and he is back to driving to work again.

We have finished off October by celebrating my birthday today. We got to participate in a beautiful church service for Reformation Sunday this morning, with Nick leading liturgy and me singing in the choir. After church, we ate a delicious lunch on a rooftop patio right next to the river and picked up some local wine and homemade pie from local shops. The afternoon consisted of long naps with the fire going and lots of birthday wishes from friends and family! It was a perfect day and I am blessed and excited for what this next year of life will bring! 

Thank you again for all your love, support, and prayers. We are so blessed to be in this place with so much support and we constantly feel God’s blessings being showered upon us.

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Nick and Mikaela Duerr

Busy Schedules and Cool Weather

Hello!

Stirring apple butter

Our last update left off with Karina's wedding, but honestly, that was only the start of a long few weeks. After returning from the wedding, I had one day in the office to take care of business before I left with Immanuel's 7th grade class for their annual retreat. It was a fun but exhausting couple of days playing games, being very active, and most importantly understanding what it means to be claimed by Christ. Before we returned Pastor Bangert had left on a much needed week-and-a-half long vacation with his family, leaving me in charge of many more things than I am used to, including a hospital visit, as well as running Sunday services solo... two weeks in a row. During that time adult bible classes started, which meant I had to begin planning my 9-10 week study of the book of Revelation. And add to that doing devotions at several special events, confirmation, and calls throughout the week, it was rather tiring. But as exhausting as it was, it was also very rewarding to spend time doing what I enjoy, and having many opportunities to lead people in worship. After that things began to quiet down a bit, until Apple Butter, a school fundraiser, began. Apple Butter is a four-day endeavor in which 110 bushels of apples were turned into 204 gallons of apple butter that were then sold. The church was bustling with activity during those four days, and smelled delicious for quite a while after.

Throughout this time, Mikaela patiently put up with me, and continued teaching her large class of kindergartners. She really began to feel comfortable with the two big adjustments of the year, first having fourteen students rather than six was extremely challenging just because it was quite the growth in class size for her. The second change was having an aide who could help out with the students. Mikaela figured out how to divide the labor between the two of them so that they were being most efficient with their time and therefore best able to help their students. Not to mention that having an aide has afforded her more breaks, and has allowed one-on-one time with students, for things like assessments, to be handled in a better way. Now with a couple months under her belt, Mikaela has seen a lot of improvement in her class, not just with her own adjustments, but also with the student's adjustments to being in class full time. Overall, September has been a much better month than August.

One other exciting event in September was my mom flying out to visit us. She arrived shortly before the second weekend of preaching I had, and so was able to hear me preach and attend my Bible study. While she was here we were also able to go wine tasting at one of the local wineries, she was able to go with Mikaela to school one day, and she came in to work with me on another and helped core apples for Apple Butter. And on the Friday before she left Mikaela had a professional development event in Saint Louis, so we went in with her and spent the day around the city, going to chapel at the seminary with Mark, visiting the zoo, and, after picking up Mikaela, visiting a little specialty shop called Hot Box Cookies. It was an extremely fun week, and great to spend time with family.

Sunday afternoon date at a local winery

Mikaela and I have really been having a great time in Washington, living in a house, and enjoying the small town atmosphere. All of the little shops and restaurants give it a fun feel, and the people are always very friendly. We have been fortunate to have time to socialize with new friends at the church as well as old friends from the seminary. We have also been spending our time running and preparing for a second half marathon. We are enjoying the coming of cooler weather which allows us to enjoy our time outside.
But mostly we are enjoying having each other, and getting to continue our adventure together. 

One practical note to conclude, if you are interested in listening to any of my sermons, they are all posted online on Immanuel's web site. If you go to imlutheran.org, on the left side of the page it says, "Sermons Online." That link will pull up a good number of sermons, and mine are all the ones labeled "Vicar Nick."

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Nicholas and Mikaela Duerr

New Year, New Adventures

Hello friends and family!

Another month is over and we finally seem to be settling into routines here in our new life in Washington. Of course, I am currently writing this post from South Carolina, where we have spent the weekend for my sister Karina’s wedding! It has been a wonderful weekend getting to spend some amazing time with family, all together for the first time since our wedding two years ago. We’ve enjoyed making new friends and making sure that Karina and Hunter had an amazing and happy wedding! We sent the newlyweds off last night and now we are relaxing with the rest of my family until our flight back to St. Louis this evening. We love seeing how our niece Teagann is growing and we are having so much fun with her! It’s been a busy weekend, constantly on the move between bachelor and bachelorette parties, rehearsal, and the wedding, all in various locations in South Carolina. We were fortunate that the hurricane didn’t cause any damage here aside from a few delayed flights, and that the rain was all on Friday and we had a beautiful wedding day yesterday! We are tired but so, so happy.

August has been a pretty intense month for the both of us. The start of school and start of vicarage, along with moving and wedding preparations, have kept us both busy.

August 1^st brought the start of faculty meetings and home visits for me. I spent mornings in meetings, afternoons working in my classroom, and evenings driving around to the homes of my 14 students to visit them. It made for some very long days, but we were able to get some packing done in the midst of all that.

The next weekend was a frenzy of packing and moving preparations in our apartment. We carefully planned meals (as we were still on our Whole 30 diet) for moving days and worked to cook our food ahead so we could finish packing up the kitchen and everything else. Sunday and Monday, we packed and cleaned and prepped from morning til night. On Monday afternoon, we picked up the truck and began loading up our things with some help from some wonderful friends. Our biggest stress was the lack of space in the truck – we should have gotten a bigger truck – but knowing we would have to come back anyway to pick up the second car, we knew we could leave some things in the apartment. As a sort of Type A person, it was frustrating to me to not have everything done and neatly wrapped up when we left on Tuesday morning, but it all worked out just fine.

Moving day - in front of our new house!

 Tuesday morning, I was up at about 4:00 (there may have been some paranoia about our moving truck being stolen tied into that). Thankfully our moving truck was still there and so we hurried to eat, pack up my car, and clean, and then we were off to Washington! Some wonderful members of the church showed up to help us unload when we arrived in Washington, and with the help of 5 or 6 men, our moving truck was unloaded in a matter of 30 minutes. They even stayed around to help us get furniture assembled and placed correctly in the house, which was an enormous blessing. They also brought an entire pick up truck full of food for our pantry! So we spent a lot of time that day getting our basics unpacked – sheets on the bed, some dishes in the kitchen, and the tv hooked up, as well as unloading bags and bags of food into our pantry.

It was back to work for me the next day, and Nick began to go into the office as well to get acquainted with the space, unpack some books, and start some basic work. We slowly unpacked throughout the next few weeks, making our home more and more functional each day – getting the kitchen fully unpacked, getting clothes hung in the closet, and thanks to Nick, getting decorations on the walls. We are finally feeling mostly settled into our new house and we are loving it! Pictures will come soon. We are thoroughly enjoying the amount of space we have – there is so much space to spread out and it is so much less cramped than our apartment. (It also means that even if we make a mess, it’s not as big of a deal as it was in our apartment!) We are loving having the dishwasher to help with the work of washing dishes rather than doing them all by hand, and washing clothes in our washer and dryer without having to put quarters in (and we can also just put a load in in the morning and take it out in the afternoon when we come back from work which is a huge blessing!). We are absolutely enjoying the fact that we have a back patio to set up our grill and sit out and enjoy the occasional cool evening (we are hoping that we get more of those soon!). We also love the fact that everything is just 5 minutes away in Washington. There are some fantastic restaurants we are excited to try and we have been enjoying running around the city in the mornings.

We're enjoying using our grill on our back patio!

I have been adjusting to the long commute to and from Fenton each day, which has been just about a 40 minute drive each way. I found some podcasts to listen to in order to help pass the time. The long commutes make for some late evenings for me, especially with the extra work that the beginning of the school year brings. Nick has been an amazing life saver because once he gets home from work, he gets dinner started, so that it’s ready when I get home. That saves me a lot of time in the evenings when I get home. My school year has started out like most school years start – with a lot of work and a lot of exhaustion. I am finally adjusting to my class and I feel like my class is beginning to settle in and learn routines, which really makes the days easier. This year I have 14 students, which is over double my class size of 6 last year. It has been quite the adjustment to remember how long it takes to get things done with a large class, and I’ve been slowly remembering to pare down the amount of things I have planned and increase the amount of time to transition between activities throughout the day. That, along with the students’ increased abilities to listen and learn, has made things start to slowly get better and a bit less exhausting. I’m excited to get even more settled into routines so I can be a little less overwhelmed and get home a bit earlier.

Vicar Nick on his installation day

Nick has been thoroughly enjoying and thriving as Vicar Nick. He started out slowly, getting settled into his office and writing a sermon that he preached on August 20-21. Once school started, he began working with the 7^th grade religion class, getting to know them, because he is teaching them confirmation each week. He began teaching confirmation – to the 7^th graders during the day and to a group of public school church members during the evening. He has begun his nursing home calls and home visits to shut in members of the congregation, visiting with them. He assists with church services when he is not preaching, and he will be beginning to lead a weekly Sunday Bible study as well. He is gearing up for a busy month, with 2 preaching weekends in a row, the 7^th grade confirmation retreat this week, and the beginning of the Sunday morning Bible studies. He is enjoying the supervision of the pastor and the company of the other staff there at the church. He is so good at developing relationships with the church members and has already learned more names than I could even hope to do. We have made some friends in the church through staff socials and Sunday lunches and we are excited to spend more time getting to know the wonderful people at this church.

We are looking forward to this year because we see so many opportunities for growth and relationships. We are excited for what vicarage year will bring, but we also know that it may be difficult to find a good balance of work time and resting time with each other as we work with commitments at two churches, new schedules (Nick has a lot of evening commitments now), and my long commute. We ask that you pray that we can find joy in our work so we don’t feel overwhelmed by the commitments, and also can be intentional in preserving time we need to rest and be together to grow our relationship. We ask that you pray for safety for Mikaela as she makes a long drive each day, especially in storms and into the winter. We ask that you pray for health so that we can continue to serve as needed. We also ask that you pray for strong bodies as we begin training for another half marathon coming up in October, and that we can avoid injury.

Thank you again for all your love, support, and prayers. We appreciate knowing that we have so many wonderful people walking alongside us in this journey.

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Nick and Mikaela Duerr

A Month of Preparation

July has really flown by! Of course, since we published out last blog post in the middle of the month, it would seem like there's not a lot to talk about. But it has been a busy couple of weeks. First of all, we started a diet program called Whole 30. The first disclaimer is that while it is a diet program, it is not a weight loss program. The objective is not to keep the calorie count low, but to keep the inflammatory substances low. That means we are not allowed to eat any grains, dairy, added sugar, legumes, or alcohol. Essentially all that is left for us to eat is fruit, vegetables, and meat. This means we have had to become a lot more creative with our meal planning, but it has been an interesting adventure for us. Some of our better meals have been things like pork carnitas with a side of sautéed vegetables and home made hamburgers with sweet potato buns.

The time we aren't spending cooking the significantly more elaborate meals has been dedicated to preparing for August. Mikaela has spent weeks in her classroom getting it prepared for the upcoming school year. This means a lot of cutting, pasting, laminating, more cutting, and taping everything down. She got everything finished up just in time for the kindergarten play date, an opportunity for the students and parents to come in and see the classroom and meet each other. While it has been a lot of work, it is rewarding knowing that the classroom is ready for the first day of school. 

On top of that, we have been packing in preparation for our move out to Washington. This has been a laborious process of going through all of our stuff and seeing what we need, and what we haven't used in the two years we've been married. Our first order of business was rearranging the basement so that all of the empty boxes we saved for just this occasion are readily accessible while the things packed and ready to go are stored away until moving day. Our second order of business was the office, where we are staging things upstairs for our move. With both of those rooms packed up, it is a lot easier for us to pack up other things since now once things are packed up, we have somewhere to store them. And while packing things like our winter clothes was relatively easy (everything gets packed, since I obviously don't need my heavy coat for the next two weeks), packing up the kitchen is proving more difficult due to being on Whole 30 (who knew that on a diet where you can't eat bread, you would need your muffin tin?).

In any case, as we begin August, we have a lot to look forward to. Mikaela will be beginning her third year of teaching, which is really cool for many different reasons. First, she gets to be in the same classroom as the last two years, which we didn't think would happen because of vicarage. Second it is cool because she has now had two years of experience teaching kindergarten, and has a much firmer grasp on what she is doing. This means she has been able to expand her curriculum and begin to really engage teaching kindergarten on a whole new level. For me, August begins an entirely new adventure in my life, vicarage. While technically I am still a student (which is kinda cool cause I don't have to start paying student loans yet), for the first time since I started attending preschool, I will not be in classes. There are so many new things that I will begin to experience, that sometimes when I try to comprehend how much things will be different, I get a little overwhelmed. But at the same time, I am really excited to begin this adventure and see what God has in store for me. 

Finally, we want to thank you for all of your prayers and support. The last two years have been an amazing time, and we thank God for all that He has done for us. We are excited for this upcoming change in our life, and you can expect to see quite a difference in the stories we will be sharing over the next year. 

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Nicholas and Mikaela Duerr

Summer time!

Hello friends and family!

I have to apologize for the lack of blog posts recently – between the craziness of the end of the school year and vacations I just haven’t been able to sit down and write when I’ve needed to.

May consisted of the normal end of the year wrap ups. We started off May very relaxed and enjoying life without the stress of Call Day and other events. Things, as usual, got busier as we approached the end of school – for Nick, it was papers and finals, for me, it was testing my new students and planning field trips and graduation and all the fun that comes with the last month of school. After school let out we took a little mini vacation, just the two of us, for the first time over Memorial Day weekend. It was so wonderful and relaxing to go away and enjoy life without to do lists. We went to Washington, MO for the weekend to attend our vicarage church and spend some time in the town. We had a wonderful time picnicking and walking by the river and enjoying some of the wonderful restaurants and wineries in the area! We enjoyed the free time to sit and read and nap and just relax without worries.  

Picnic by the Missouri River

In the beginning of June, we went back to a semi-normal routine, with Nick working a few days a week at his job at the seminary, and I spent some time in faculty meetings and getting my classroom packed up for the summer cleaning. We also began prepping for our upcoming move and planning our vacation. Before we knew it, our vacation was upon us!

We flew out to California on the morning of June 17^th, greeted at LAX by my parents. They took us to breakfast and drove us up to Visalia, where we stayed until the following Thursday. My brother TJ was there, enjoying some well-deserved time off work, and it was so fun to spend some time with him while we were there! My sister, Adrionna, came over with our niece, Teagann, who is now walking and talking and just so grown up! We had a wonderful evening with some of my friends from high school, talking and catching up on what everyone is doing. Nick especially loved holding Asher, the 6 month old son of one of my friends. The next day, we had all kinds of family over to see them, since we always end up missing holidays. It was so much fun to see my grandparents and aunts and uncles and my cousins who are all grown up, and of course, to spend the day with Teagann. We spent Sunday, Father’s Day, hiking in Kings Canyon, a place we both spent a lot of time at growing up. It was a beautiful day and we enjoyed being up in those mountains we love so much! Our last big adventure in our time with my family was to purchase a car. Nick will need a car as a vicar, especially since I will be working full-time quite a distance away from Washington, so we were in the market to purchase a second vehicle. Purchasing one in California ended up being beneficial to us, so that we had mobility as we went around California to visit family and friends! We spent a long, hot day shopping but came out with a little used Kia Spectra. The fun part of it was that it is a manual transmission – an overall benefit, because it was a little cheaper than an automatic would be, and overall will be more reliable with fewer moving parts to break. However, I never learned how to drive stick shift, so we spent some time driving verrry slowly around to help me learn how to drive this car! I’m still not 100% confident on it, but I can drive it in an emergency, and it’s going to be Nick’s car anyway! I’m glad that my husband is a very patient teacher, and willing to do so much driving.

Nick playing catch with Teagann

Hiking in Kings Canyon on Father's Day!

Our favorite treat is always In N Out!

After saying goodbyes to my family, we took off to Orange County. We spent a little time at the beach and walking around Concordia’s campus, which always brings about a lot of nostalgia. We had a blast at the San Diego County Fair with our friends Danny and Stephanie. We got to play some games, eat some greasy food, and watch pigs race (which was obviously the highlight of the day!). The following day, we got to attend the wedding of my good friend Lauren in the beautiful sanctuary at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Orange (also where my friend Whitney got married back in December!) and with the reception at a gorgeous restaurant up on a hill with a view of Orange County. We had such a wonderful time celebrating and being able to spend time with my Credential class buddies, Lauren and Nadine. Long-distance friendships are hard to keep up, but when we get together it feels like no time has passed and we just enjoy the time we do have.

We felt so fancy at Lauren's wedding!

The three of us together again!

Watching the pig races with Danny and Stephanie!

We left Orange County early Sunday morning in order to make it out to the desert to attend church with Nick’s grandparents, who we had not seen since our wedding two years earlier. Nick’s grandpa, a former pastor who, like most pastors, never really retired, was filling in for their pastor who was on vacation, so we got to hear him preach and lead worship. It was a small storefront church, which was a new experience for me, and it was such a unique experience and community, and we had a wonderful time! We spent the next several days being spoiled by Nick’s grandparents, enjoying talking with them, eating out, cuddling their dog Littlebit, and seeing the movie Finding Dory. It was such an enjoyable, relaxing visit, and we were sad to go!

Our next stop was to drive allll the way up to the Sacramento area. (Side note: When planning this trip, I hadn’t really realized how long of a drive that was going to be. Growing up in Visalia, everything in California was 4 hours away, so I didn’t really account for the fact that we were starting out many hours south of my childhood home before heading up to Sacramento. The drive took us about 8 hours, which is the length of a typical day when we drive across the country to get to St. Louis, where we may cross several states. I forget how HUGE California is!) After a long day of driving with – thankfully – no traffic, and a quick stop off at a McDonald’s to see my dad near where he was working that day, we made it to Linda’s house, who is Nick’s godmother. We LOVE spending time with Linda because she always gives such a warm welcome and has such an infectious, exciting personality! Linda lives right next to Folsom Lake and she owns a jet ski, so we spent part of a day out enjoying the lake. There were very few people out on the lake that day, so Nick and I had a wonderful time getting out and speeding around the lake on the jet ski. That is legitimately one of my favorite things in the world to do and I hope to live near a lake someday so we can do that more often. We also enjoy just floating out in the lake and soaking up the sun and the cool water. Linda also cooks the most delicious food, and we had an evening with a delicious dinner and games and a last minute visit from my brother, who lives in the area. Having TJ over was a fun addition to our visit with Linda, especially because I get to see him so rarely.

While in the Sacramento area, we stopped by to meet some of our sponsors through the Adopt-a-Student program at the seminary. The seminary matches up donors to send financial support to students, and we have been able to keep in contact with these donors, Chuck and Joan, over the last two years. We stopped by when we were in the area and had a chance to visit with them and eat lunch with them. We were so delighted to meet them, and we soon discovered that there was more to them than meets the eye! They have immense travel experience and have traveled to and lived in dozens of countries. Their house is a treasure trove of artifacts from these different places and conversation with them was a treasure trove of stories! We are continuously blessed by their financial support but now we are even more blessed by knowing them and having met them.

Our last stop in California was, of course, to see Nick’s family in Bakersfield! It felt strange to spend such a long time driving around California without stopping by, but Nick’s mom and sister, Cathy and Angela, arrived in Bakersfield the same day we did after a month of traveling in Europe, so we waited until they were home. Our visit with them was wonderful and relaxing and filled with just the right amount of adventure. We spent time swimming and playing board games and video games and eating delicious food. We went to an Escape Room – a new experience for all of us – and had such a blast. We celebrated the 4^th of July by setting off fireworks. We were treated to Starbucks and pedicures (well, I was, not Nick). We also had the opportunity to stand up in front of Nick’s church, St. John’s, and thank them for their financial support and prayers. They have been so wonderful about publishing a letter from us in their newsletter and sending financial support to help cover the costs of seminary, and we were so glad to be able to thank them for that. We hope to be able to stop by there again in order to spend more time with the people there and thank them again for what they have done for us.

Unfortunately, our time in California had to eventually come to an end. We set off early Wednesday morning with Las Vegas programmed into our GPS! Our original plan was to stop by the Grand Canyon, but after discovering that the campgrounds were all completely full, we opted to find a hotel in Las Vegas instead, since they are really inexpensive. Upon arriving in Las Vegas, we walked the Strip, and I showed Nick the important sights since this was his first time there. We walked through the big casinos and saw all the iconic places. However, it was a really hot day, and we were pretty miserable by the time we got back to our hotel. After showering and resting, we were refreshed enough to venture out and see a few more places. It was a fun day, but we both agreed that Vegas really isn’t our style. The following day, we set out for Utah, heading to Arches National Park. If you haven’t been there, make it a priority. It was such a beautiful place, and even though it was hot, we hiked that evening and the next morning, and it was significantly cooler. We enjoyed setting up and using our tent for the first time, and camping together for the first time! And the views of the Arches were just magnificent. I took so many pictures. We were just in awe of God’s beautiful creation. After Utah, we set off for Colorado. Colorado was absolutely beautiful. Just driving through it was worth the stop, even though our hiking plans were ended when we saw a thunderstorm moving in, and relaxing by the fire was out of the question after a rainstorm soaked everything in the campsite. But we went to the camp store and bought a deck of cards and enjoyed the evening warm in our tent playing cards. The next day was our long drive, all the way out of Colorado and through Kansas to Kansas City. It was a long day, and we were very happy to get to our hotel in Kansas City and crash. We did, of course, stop for some barbecue on the way, because you can’t go to KC and not eat barbecue. It was somewhat relaxing to be back in Missouri, although we did not appreciate the humidity when we stepped out of the car! Our last day, last Sunday, we got up nice and early to make the four hour drive back to St. Louis in time for church in order to see our friend’s baby baptized. It was such a special day and we were glad we made it back in time! We all went out to lunch afterwards and it was fun to celebrate all together.

Las Vegas

Arches National Park in Utah

Waiting out the rainstorm in our tent in Colorado

Made it back just in time for this little guy's baptism!

Since returning home, we have settled in and divided our time between relaxing and working. Over this past week, Nick was not scheduled to work, and I could not get into my classroom, but we have lots to do at home as we prepare for our move in about three weeks! Our apartment has been a consistent disaster zone/obstacle course as we unpacked our things from our trip and have attempted to start packing up things we know we won’t use in the next month. My goal is to get it live-able/walkable tonight before I head back into my classroom and get into work mode tomorrow.

We celebrated our second wedding anniversary last week! It’s hard to believe we’ve already been married two years. I know that to many of you we are still newlyweds, but we have learned and grown so much in these two years, and we thank God for the time we’ve had together and the blessings that have been showered upon us in our marriage. We celebrated by going out to a super-fancy (for our standards) restaurant, where they served us complimentary champagne and decorated a pretty plate for our anniversary. It was fun to dress up and go out, since we don’t get to do that often.

We spent time this week helping our friends Tyson and Heidi and their sons move out for vicarage. I had the best job on moving day – child patrol! While the others hauled boxes, I followed their three-year-old around, keeping him out of the way of moving furniture, helping him chase the dog back in the house, chatting with him about their move and the moving truck (a huge point of fascination for a three-year-old boy!), while also holding their newborn so Heidi could rest and get things done. We were so sad to say good-bye, but there is consolation in knowing that we will all be together again for our fourth year of seminary. We have several more good-byes coming up soon and have enjoyed the time that we do have with our friends before they leave.

It’s hard to believe that July is halfway over already. As I said, I’m going back into work mode tomorrow, because my classroom has to be ready at the end of next week, and I’m helping with VBS next week as well. Nick will be working a few days over the next few weeks and also helping to get things done around the apartment and run errands while I’m at school – the newfound benefit to having a second car! We’ve got several busy weeks ahead, but if we can get through moving and the start of the school year and vicarage, I think we will be set up for a good year. We look forward to what this new year brings, especially for Nick as he gets to take on new responsibilities and experience pastoral duties. We are excited to live in a house, although the reality of living so far out of the city, and not right down the street from our friends, hasn’t quite set in yet. We have already fallen in love with Washington, though, and we know that anytime we want, the city is only an hour away.

We appreciate your prayers in this time of transitions. We ask that you pray for all who are moving, that they can transition and settle into their new homes and congregations and find friends to spend time with. We ask that you pray for Nick as he takes on the role of vicar, that he would constantly seek God’s will and serve others in a Christ-like way. We ask that you pray for my new school year and my new group of students coming into my classroom, that I would continually show Christ to those children through all my actions and work. We ask that you pray for peace and patience for us as we work our way through this stressful time, and that we continuously will grow closer to Christ and closer to each other, no matter what the circumstance.

God’s blessings to you all, thank you again for all your prayers and support.

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Nick and Mikaela Duerr

A Letter to the Mothers in my Life

I never, ever tell people how much they mean to me as often as I think it, or as often they deserve. It’s too much for a photo caption, and too much for a card. So this is a letter of thanks to all the mothers in my life.

First and foremost, to my mom. Mommy, thank you for giving me life. Not just for giving birth to me, but for giving me life. You worked so incredibly hard as a teacher in order to help provide for us and taught us what it’s like to have a passion and be in service to others. You provided me with siblings to love and play with. You provided a home out in the country, a child’s dream, with pets and chores and lots of room to play. You provided a loving, caring family and a stable marriage that allowed me to grow up never fearing if my family would fall apart, and taught me what a strong, Christian marriage looks like, so that I can now live that out in my own marriage. You took us to church, every Sunday, without fail, even when the drive was long and we were little and squirmy. You taught me what it means to serve God with my entire life and to live out the forgiven life I received when you had me baptized at just days old. You shared with us the financial struggles of sending us to Christian schools, yet rather than letting us worry about our future, you helped show us the ways in which God was blessing us and taking care of us. That is a skill I carry through to this day. You taught me how to enjoy life, how to laugh and have fun. You taught me the meaning of responsibility and rules, never giving in to my whining or my ability to “forget” to do my chores. You didn’t seek to be my friend, rather guiding me as a mother should. You understood my need for independence you let me be myself and move out and grow up. I was blessed to grow up with you as my mom.

And the blessings still keep coming. You forgive me when I am busy and don’t call. You understand when our short visits are filled with other responsibilities. You pray for us and brag about us and update us with what’s going on at home. You show you care by saving those fun magazines and cool stickers for my Kindergarteners, who you love as much as I do, even without meeting them. You have become a friend, someone who I can talk to more and more on a peer level, as we discuss classroom woes and parenting philosophies and faith questions. You inspire me with your new-found passion in serving in Guatemala, going out of your comfort zones in ways I don’t know that I could. You show constant love without discrimination, welcoming Nick into the family with open arms.

People always say you grow up to be like your mom. Every day I realize how much that is becoming true, and I am proud to say it. If I can raise kids like you raised the four of us, I will be a proud mom someday. If I can be a teacher as loving, dedicated, and creative as you were, I will count myself as blessed. If I can be a wife as committed and loving as you are, then Nick and I have a bright future ahead. Thank you for everything you do, you have done, and you will do, Mommy.

Secondly, to my mother-in-law, Cathy. Thank you for welcoming me into your family. You show me love in your thoughtful gifts and in your eagerness to help with anything we ask. You have endured the changes that come with a marriage in the family, being willing to be flexible as I invaded your home or took Nick to mine on holidays. You’ve welcomed me into your home, providing food to eat and a place to stay and someone to talk to, even the times when Nick wasn’t there. You’ve helped take care of me, letting me crash in your house on visits even when I ended up sick with the stomach flu or shingles. You’ve shown your love in so many ways, whether by making my favorite Red Velvet cake balls or hosting a bridal shower and rehearsal dinner in your home or taking me out for pedicures and girl time. In the short years I’ve known you, you have shown me how deeply you love those around you. You have become “mom” to so many more than just the children you gave birth to, simply because you are willing to love and care for others without restriction, providing a place to stay or food to eat to those who need it. You are a role model to me as you hold to your faith through rough times, and your constant prayers are a continued blessing to Nick and me. I thank you for raising Nick to be the wonderful, caring, Christian man he is, so that we can now build our own family based on the example that you have provided. Thank you, Cathy, for all that you do.

Also, to the grandmothers God gave me. I was blessed to live nearby both my grandmas, so I was raised by them and got to know them well. My Grandma Betty is now in heaven, and I miss her and the special times we all had as a family. My Grandma Mary continues to amaze me in her strength and joy as she continues to take care of the farm even after my grandpa passed away. I am thankful to both of them for their faith that kept them going through all the rough times. I am thankful to them for raising my parents in the church, loving Jesus, and serving others. I am thankful that they were around for the dance recitals, the birthdays, the graduations…I was so, so loved. I am thankful for the grandmothers I received in my marriage to Nick - two more Godly women who love us and spoil us beyond what we deserve.

I am thankful to my friends who have children, who show me just what a blessing being a mom can be. They show me that you can do it without looking like THAT cliché mom or talking about mom stuff all the time or being a Pinterest Super Mom. They show me that you can genuinely enjoy motherhood and that you don’t have to look like a mess or complain about food stains or sleeplessness all the time. They show me the wonderful impacts that a mother’s love can have not only on the child, but also on the mother and father. Thank you, especially to Adrionna and Heidi, because you have, probably unknowingly, helped me move from being completely terrified of the prospect motherhood to being excited about that day (someday in the distant future…don’t read too much into this) that I get to be a mother too.

I am thankful to all the wonderful women in my life who have or do provide motherly guidance and care. To my Aunt Tami, who gave us a key to her house so we could just crash any time after school in high school, knowing the drive home was too long. To my Aunt Nina, who I knew was always just a phone call away during college, and still lets us stay there on our trips home. To my dance teacher, Teresa, who taught me not just how to dance, but how to be kind and loving while being confident and graceful. To Mrs. Neipp, who taught me to play the piano, and also allowed my little 12-year-old self to babysit her children. To all my teachers growing up and to my fellow teachers now, who help provide that guidance because my mom is 2,000 miles away.

I am thankful for the parents of my students, who entrust their children to me for a short time each day. My kids know that they are just that, my “kids.” They know that I don’t have any children of my own at home, but I don’t need any, because I have 6 of them at work. And they know that I will do anything to protect them, just like their mom and dad would, because I have been given that gift of caring for them and loving them for a year, and boy, do I love those kids. I am thankful for all the lessons I have learned in my past two years of teaching that may someday help a little in my vocation as a mother to my own kids.

Thank you, God, for the rich blessings You have bestowed. You have given me much, much more than I deserve.

Mikaela

We Survived: April

Greetings!

April tulips at the Seminary

May is here! We are both very excited to finally be in the final stretch of this school year. Nick will finish up his last classes on May 19^th and my last day of school and Kindergarten graduation are on May 26^th. This is probably my favorite time of year – time to wrap things up, celebrate the fun we’ve had, and clean out and pack up. Now that we know our vicarage placement, I’m itching to clean out not only my classroom but our home as well. But I’m getting ahead of myself….here’s a little (or a lot, we’ll see) about how April went.

Honestly, we’re surprised we both survived April without either a nervous breakdown or illness of some sort. But here we are, on the other side of the madness, survivors who are now enjoying a very well-deserved weekend of rest, relaxation, and lots of catching up on sleep.

April contained two very big milestones that we have been anticipating since the beginning of the school year. The first was the half-marathon, the second was Call Day.

Celebrating with our post-race ice cream sandwiches

Let’s start out with the half-marathon – April 10^th. We approached it with a lot of nervousness, because it is such a huge event. But we knew that we were physically prepared – we ran 12 miles a few weeks before and survived. We did all the right things – we tapered (slowly cut down the miles we were running in the weeks leading up to the race), we ate healthy (cutting out all the junk food…that wasn’t easy), and mentally prepared. The day before, we had to go to a big expo to pick up our race packets that included our race bibs, shirts, and all the free goodies they give out. It was fun, and we bought ourselves some cool Go! St. Louis hats to wear for the race since we were anticipating rain. After getting home, we laid out all our race gear, carefully selecting clothing choices based on the weather, along with socks, shoes, energy gels, race bibs…all the essentials. I sort of obsess over the right choice of jacket, and I did until the morning of when we were getting out of the car, but it paid off! The race was at 7:00 a.m. on Sunday morning, so we woke up early and drove downtown with plenty of time to spare. This race has thousands of participants, and roads were blocked off, so we didn’t want to risk anything. When we got there, we got to our starting spot, and waited and waited. Because they start runners off in waves, we didn’t get to start until about 10 minutes after the actual race start time. It was a fun race, with lots of supporters with silly signs standing on the side of the course. The starting line had a scenic view of the Arch and we got to run across the bridge to Illinois and back, and then down and around Anheuser Busch. There were water stations every few miles and even a chocolate station at one point. The only disappointing thing about the race was that when we signed up back in September, we had no idea what our pace would be, so we just signed up with a 10 minute per mile pace. However, this put us pretty far back in the corrals and as a result, we had to spend a lot of time and energy weaving and passing people, because we are really at closer to a 9 minute per mile pace. But now we know for future races! We both felt great the whole race (well, good enough to keep running. All my joints were in pretty bad pain for the last few miles), the weather cooperated, and we finished at the time of 2:04:59. We were hoping to finish in under 2 hours, but we knew it would be close, so now we have a goal for our next half-marathon. Our sweet friends Trevor and Hannah came out to cheer us on and took us out for lunch after the race. We were thankful that the rain held off until we were sitting inside at lunch! We really enjoyed the experience and we hope to run the Go! again next year! (The next day, we were also in pretty severe pain. 13.1 miles is a lot of pavement to pound! Next year, I’m taking the day after the half marathon off of work if I can!)

Anyway, that was one of our big goals for the year, and we are pretty proud of ourselves. However, it has been nice being able to relax a bit and not worry about getting in every workout over the last few weeks! We’ve filled up our weeks since the race with faculty meetings, voters meetings, vicarage workshops, seminars at the seminary, time with friends, seminary events, school events, and more.

One of my personal big events of the month was our school musical. I’ve sort of spearheaded this project the last two years, and it’s a very time-consuming, but very rewarding experience. The last few weeks leading up to it always bring about the extra time at school putting things together, the extra shopping trips for costumes and props, and the extra hours out of the classroom for rehearsals. But man is it totally worth it, on musical night, after the show, when all the parents and grandparents are coming up to you, telling you how amazing their children were, how much they enjoyed the show, and how excited they are for next year. Totally, totally worth it. It’s hands-down one of my favorite nights of the school year.

One of Nick’s big accomplishments of April was starting his practicum for his Pastor as Educator class. This involves spending three weeks in a classroom, teaching religion. He was assigned to a 5^th grade classroom at a nearby elementary school, and it’s been a lot of work for him. He’s been writing lesson plans every night and putting on his slacks and dress shirt and tie every morning. He’s come home with some fun stories (although let’s be honest, it’s hard for 5^th graders to compete with Kindergarteners in the story category), and has been really enjoying being able to teach and learn in this time in the classroom.

With our friends at the Mouse Races

This month also held some fun social events for us. Aside from the fact that every time we got to see our friends, we were all bonding over our Call Day predictions and nervousness, we got to make some fun memories. First was an event that is put on each year at the seminary called We Love the Sem, in which all the pastors of the biggest Lutheran churches in the country come and shower students and faculty and staff with gifts and food. It was a huge dinner complete with Ted Drewes and carriage rides this year and we really enjoyed it! Two days later was another big seminary event called Spring Fest, which was again lots of good food and music. The next night was the Mouse Races at my school, the biggest fundraiser of the year. We bought a table for ourselves and our friends and my parents and it is such a fun time getting to bet on mice as they race! It’s amazing how people get into it, and it’s fun to see that other side of school and church members.

On top of all that, my school had its accreditation site visit at the end of this month. So the day after Mouse Races (seriously, I can’t make this schedule up), Nick and I went to a dinner for the visiting team as they started their accreditation visit. They were in and around my classroom on Monday, watching for things we had written in the report as well as looking for safety procedures. They worked through the day on Tuesday, and Tuesday afternoon they gave their report recommending accreditation (yay!). However, I wasn’t there, because that day was Call Day!

With my parents after the vicarage service

My principal was kind to give me the entire day off on Call Day, as my parents were in town, and it gave me a chance to spend time with them and with Nick on this nerve-wracking day. We got all dressed up, me in a new dress and Nick in his suit and clerical shirt. Right as we got to the seminary campus, about an hour before the service, a major thunderstorm decided to hit. Thankfully we made it inside before the downpour – some people were coming in completely soaked! We endured the long waiting before the service and through the service until the moment came to hear the vicarage assignments. We were so excited to hear that we are assigned to Immanuel Lutheran in Washington, MO. Washington is a cute little tourist town just about an hour outside St. Louis, and close enough to Fenton that I can keep my job at Our Savior. God answered so many of our prayers, both spoken and unspoken, and we are feeling blessed! For more details on that, see our previous blog post. After the service, we were fortunate to meet Nick’s supervising pastor and his wife for the upcoming year, the deaconess for Immanuel, and one of the congregation members. They took us out for a delicious dinner as we got to talk to them about their church and what our life might look like next year. So this summer, we are going to move out to Washington, as they provide a house for us to live in for the year. We are so incredibly excited to be placed there  - we have heard nothing but good things about it, even from two previous vicars of that church! Call Day was a long day – we had just enough time after dinner to sit and watch the later Call Service via livestream before heading back to the seminary to meet the District President and take official photos. We finally got home close to 10:00 that night, and were very thankful for a few days following with no evening commitments to allow us to recover a little bit.

At the Bubble Run with the bubble cannons in the background

We wrapped up the month with some fun events! We went to a trivia night at our friends’ church on Friday night, ate way too much sugar, and discovered that our talents are in the categories of Musical Lyrics and Candy…and not much else. But hey, it was a fun night, some great memories were made, and it benefitted the church. Yesterday morning, we got up early and went out to do a Bubble Run – much like the famous Color Run, but with bubbles instead of powder. It was just a 5K, but we thought doing it would be fun and a way to keep us from completely stopping running after the half marathon. It was only one of those things. It sort of kept us running. It wasn’t really fun. Not to be a downer, but unfortunately, yesterday was a wet and windy morning, and well, bubbles don’t really cooperate in the rain and wind. So we arrived an hour early to stand in the rain and had to wait half an hour past the start time in the wind. Once we got started, it was a pretty nice 5K. Nick and I were some of the fastest out there since it’s just a family fun run, and so we got to the front of the pack pretty early and got the bubbles to ourselves as we ran through. But the “party” at the end wasn’t much of a party, and it took us a good 30 minutes to find our way out and walk back to the car. Needless to say, we won’t be doing a bubble run again…but it was an experience J

So I said it would be a little, but it was really a lot, and not my best writing, I have to say. Thumbs up to you if you’re still reading, I’m pretty impressed. But that was April. We are thankful for May and the bit of relief it brings. We are looking forward with anticipation to the summer, the plans we have and are starting to make, the new beginnings we will have with a new school year, a new (temporary) home, and a new church family to get to know and love. Prayers are appreciated as we work out all the details of our summer and the move to Washington, and especially as Nick begins his work as a vicar in August, that he will learn and serve and share Christ with those around him.

In the name of Christ our Savior,

Nick and Mikaela Duerr

Overwhelmed

Yesterday afternoon, Nick and I sat in the Chapel of Saint Timothy and Saint Titus at Concordia Seminary along with hundreds of others: students, family, and friends, awaiting our fate for the upcoming year.

We were overwhelmingly blessed to hear the words….”Nicholas Duerr…Missouri District….Immanuel Lutheran Church in Washington, Missouri.”

For those of you who don’t know, Washington is just about an hour outside of St. Louis, in the same direction and on the same highway as Fenton, where I currently teach. This means that, although I will have a longer commute than I currently do, I get to keep my current job at Our Savior.

Needless to say, we are overwhelmed at God’s loving faithfulness and grace toward us.

We are overwhelmed at my opportunity to continue in ministry at Our Savior, teaching Kindergarten, loving those kids, working with a team I have grown to know and love to grow and develop the school.

We are overwhelmed at the fact that not only do I get to keep my current job, but that God chose to provide a wonderful church for Nick to serve as a vicar…a church that fits many of the things we were hoping for, a church that has been praised by many people around us, even including a former vicar of that church.

We are overwhelmed at the financial blessings of this local vicarage…vicarage means an income for Nick to match mine, as well as housing provided by the church (a 2-bedroom house WITH a washer and dryer!). We cannot wait for the opportunity to decimate our student loans.

We are overwhelmed at the perfect match of this community to our tastes…a beautiful riverfront town, a medium-sized town with small-town community and feel (plus an ALDI!), with tourist fun, running and biking trails along the river, and right in the heart of wine country (yeah, you’re all ready to come visit us now, aren’t you?).

We are overwhelmed at the love and support that we received from friends and family yesterday. The prayers, the text messages, the time spent watching the service, whether in St. Louis or away…all that love has been felt so deeply.

We are overwhelmed at the excitement of the teachers and staff, parents and students that I work with at the fact that I will be staying at Our Savior. I am so blessed to work with such loving people who care so much about me. They cheered when they heard I will be staying next year and greeted me this morning with hugs and excitement.

We are overwhelmed that we get to stay around next year, allowing us to spend precious time with friends and family who will be back in St. Louis after vicarage, moving to St. Louis to begin seminary, or staying around for a local vicarage like we are. In the seminary life, you often only get one year with any other class, and so the opportunity to stay local extends that time before everyone moves off to different parts of the country again.

We are overwhelmed at the gift of each other…even with the potential of moving anywhere in the country, we knew that no matter what, we would be together, our constant support and favorite person always by our side.

We are overwhelmed at God’s amazing faithfulness, and how He has been planning and setting this up from the days before seminary life, before we were St. Louis residents, before we even knew what vicarage really entailed. With generous gifts, we bought a new car before getting married, one that will be able to handle the long commute that I will be making with good gas mileage. Through God’s amazing planning, I got a job two years ago in a location perfectly placed to allow us to be placed at this vicarage, at a school and in a grade level that really benefits from my staying there.  

God’s love and faithfulness is evident throughout our lives, and we give Him thanks, especially in times like this. We put our vicarage placement into His hands back in December when we prayerfully submitted our application and attended our interview. He saw fit to place us at Immanuel Lutheran in Washington, and we are, again, overwhelmed at His love and blessings. We look forward to this upcoming year with anticipation and excitement. Your prayers are appreciated as we begin vicarage in August, and we work to join the congregation, get involved, build relationships, and most importantly, to serve others in Christ.

--Mikaela