The Schneiders in April

Yup, we are still alive...barely! Nathan is coming to a close on his 6th semester at The Master's Seminary. It has been a long and challenging one, and we are looking forward to a break!

Since our last update we have had many changes, including our home! Mid-March we made the move from Granada Hills to Canyon Country (20 minutes north)  because the Lord provided a wonderful place for us to live. As many of you know, we had been struggling with what to do after we made the challenging decision for Natasha to leave her job. After a few months, it was looking like she needed to find some source of income, but then the Lord provided an amazing opportunity for us.

In exchange for nanny help, we would receive free rent, utilities, internet and a plethora of other blessings we soon would realize! Unfortunately this blessing came with a sad reality, the family had recently lost their mom to cervical cancer after battling it for nearly 3 years. My heart aches for this family, yet rejoices at the reality of where their mother is! She is with the Lord with no more sin, pain or suffering!

We are so thankful that we can be a part of this sweet family's life and we strive to be a blessing as we are so well taken care of. The dad leaves early for work, so I walk the ten feet over to their house around 5:15am and normally go back to sleep until 7am when I wake the children for school and help them get ready. They do have a full-time nanny that comes in during the week to help with housework, meals, ect, but they needed someone for the early mornings and the occasional weekends that the dad is called in for work.

All in all, we are still amazed at the perfection of this situation. We are so thankful that the Lord heard our prayers and gave us an answer better than we could have imagined! Not only are we thankful that the Lord fulfilled our needs, but we really are thankful to have been put in the position that we needed Him to move so desperately! We would not trade these trials for anything because seeing the Lord work like this has been so rewarding.

Thank you for your prayers and your support! We will soon be updating you on some interesting traveling adventures we have on the horizon!

This Week...

Nathan's been working super hard to keep up with homework, work and me. He's done an amazing job and I am so blessed to have him. I've been sick this past week and I couldn't have asked for a better care-taker. I am on the mend and able to do more housework and activities, but still have a lingering cough...I get excited at the thought of one day, being all better. :-) I praise God that this is only a small, insignificant cold that won't go on for the rest of my life. I have been reminded that there are people that are chronically ill and suffer daily. I know they don't have a choice, but I don't know how they do it. I know many that suffer day in and day out, yet they are some of the most joyful people I know. The Lord is so gracious...

Bye Christiana!

A very dear, sweet friend that I was blessed to meet and spend time with for a short period is leaving for Cambodia tonight along with her husband and 3 month old baby. They will be missed! But, they go for the sake of the gospel and there is no better reason than that!!! My prayers and thoughts are with them this evening as they say good-bye to all things familiar and begin the long flight across the world.

Classes Have Begun!

Nathan began his sixth semester in seminary today. It will be a challenge, but a joy to learn and discover what the Lord has in store!

Highlights of 2009

2009~We enjoyed our first Christmas-New Years-Traveling-Home break, Nathan survived a second semester of seminary married (makes some things easier, and some things harder...), we explored some hot spots of California, managed to go from a one bedroom apartment to a studio apartment (and like it), Natasha went from Starbucks to a full-time nanny/housekeeping job, we went camping in Virginia Lakes (a place of which Nathan has fond childhood memories), bought our first car together, enjoyed Nathan's mom, sister and niece on a mini-vacation, celebrated Thanksgiving with my sister and some of our L.A. friends, and were blessed yet again with the chance to return to Alaska for Christmas break.

Nathan and I celebrated our one year wedding anniversary! We are so thankful the Lord blessed us
with one another. We really love being married and are thankful for a great first year.

In order to save some money, we moved into a studio apartment in our same complex. It challenged us to go through our worldly possessions and decide what was really necessary in order to make everything fit. Ironically, we love this apartment and it is a home we will think fondly of in years to come. 

In March Nathan had his spring break and we decided it was time to get our of this crazy city! On a shoe-string budget we went to Monterey to see the sea aquarium and down to discover Santa Barbara. We know consider it a special place that we try go to as often as we can. We had a great time wandering around new cities, trying some new food and seeing some more of God's creation.

Beautiful coastline of Monterey.

Two dorks enjoying Honey! I Shrunk the Audience! at Disneyland.

Disneyland was offering free tickets on your birthday, so in May we were able to celebrate Nate's b-day at Disney! We may be getting older, but that place is still magical! Nathan was a good sport and went in the tea cups with me. :-)

Nathan's mom, sister and niece (well, two of them, but Miriam wasn't born until December) came to visit us for a wonderful week in August. I can't begin to explain how great it was to see them! It had been 8 months and I was quite homesick! We showed them around L.A., had a lot of great food and were given another excuse to go up to Santa Barbara. It was like a slumber party every night with all of us sleeping in our studio apartment. I am so bless to have a second family that I really, really like!

And, potentially more photos to come...

Home for Christmas

Hello Again! I thought I would post some photos of our past year and our holiday break. We had a wonderful 3 weeks in Alaska and it was very hard to leave! We are now back in L.A. and Nathan started 6th semester of seminary! It's going to be a toughy, but I know the Lord will see us through it!

Christmas Eve with my family...

Got a little weird...

But, that's a little normal.

Nathan's wonderful parents...we forgot to get a real Christmas photo!!! Probably because it was Christmas morning and who wants a photo taken then? This one was from our very first night back in our beloved state, we went to a hockey game of course!

We got to meet our sweet little niece, born on December 4th.

We will miss our Alaska!

Welcome!

We hope this blog will keep you more informed of where we're at in life and how we're doing. More to come soon! We also hope this will encourage to record more of our life in LA with some photos. If you haven't received our newsletter yet, please drop us a line if you are interested and we will be sure to get that to you.

Goodnight!