The Life Changing Email!

Wow, where do I begin? There I was minding my own business on my way to the local waterpark to enjoy a Monday with my daughters and mom on her last day visiting us. When my dear husbands calls! I answer as normal and the next few minutes are a blur. I can hear the words he is reading me from an email he recieved but it all sounds like a bunch of military terms and abbreviations until one word stops me in my tracks. TURKEY. Suddenly my mind flashes back to a conversation we had 6 months prior involving a job he was considering applying for in Turkey. I had agreed it was an amazing opportunity and he should apply but after waiting two months and hearing nothing we assumed we had not been selected, that they would have made their selection by this time and so we put it out of our minds and moved on in other directions we felt God was opening doors for. Well there I stood a little in shock and a lot of things fluiding my mind, like could this really be possible who moves to Turkey? Cody then explained it seemed like he was just the most qualified applicant and there would still be a selction process to go through. Well the next few hours I try to enjoy a 'relaxing' day at the waterpark with my kids and mom. (It's hard to relax when you think your entire world has just changed, oh and by the way, at this point we were told if selected we had to be in DC for a year of training in just 30 days.) I would find myslef floating around the lazy river thinking how can we sell/rent a house and relocate our family of 5 in 30 days. My kids were two weeks from starting school. To say I spent most of that day in shock is an understandment. I recieved multiple calls from Cody over the next few hours with questions of this or that for paperwork he had to turn in to complete 'the selection process' or so we thought. During a conversation with his point of contact he realized this wasn't a selection process but a screening process. He had already been selcted and this process was just gathering more indepth information to make sure we all (including the girls and myself) qualified to accept this position and there was nothing in our records that would prevent the government from shipping us to an overseas location where limited services for care are available. Upon realizing this isn't a possibility it is really happening I found my brain wondering, random questions popping into my head. I repeatedly text Cody are you sure this is real and for certain is happening not just a chance we could get this position. He repeatedly told me yes we are moving to Turkey as long as I pass the screening process. Over the next day or two we recieve bits and pieces of information on the details of the move and what is required of Cody. Numerous documents were to be filled out and returned as well as pictures of Cody and our family. This is where I realized how serious this was. We have been in the Air Force 12 years and never have they asked for photos of our children or myself.

It was Wednesday when we learn that Cody would need to take a DLAB test on Friday to determine his ability to be able to learn a new language. As if that wasn't worrisome enough he also learned there are 4 categories of difficulty ranking a languages ability to be picked up from English. 4 being the hardest to learn, of course Turkish would be a category 3. He needed a score of 95 to pass or our opportunity would end before it ever got started. He researched the test and found there was really no way to study. So we did the only thing we knew to do, PRAYED! We needed a clear sign from God if this is what he had for our family's future for the next 4 years. We spent Thursday night praying as a family. If God wanted us to go in this direction the test was the key. We asked God to either close the door completely or we would take it as his sign of yes. That night the only one that got a good nights sleep was Cody. That man could sleep through a tornado I'm sure. Even our girls were having a hard time sleeping. Alizabeth came to our room twice saying she couldn't sleep because she was too excited to know if daddy passed his test and that she was too hyper. Friday morning we all tried to go about our usual routine as if normal, but the only thing going through our minds was the test. I sat through a meeting that I'm pretty sure if you asked me what was said or decided or happened I couldn't tell you. Hours passed and I finally get a text from Cody saying he was done but wouldn't have a score until others who were testing for other things in the same room had finished, so it could be another hour or more. I finished my meeting and met him in his office, where we both watched the email closely. Then the email came. As he opens it he realizes the requirement of a 95 for category 3 now read 105. How could that change we thought, and then we read his score a 99. Our hearts sank as we thought our adventure was over. Cody submitted his results to the point of contact and all we got back was 'Thanks". So what did this mean, were we done, were we in? Apparently the website were Cody got the requirements for the test hadn't been updated in a while and the new requirements were 105. Cody called his point of contact to see what we do now. We were very surprised to learn we were still in. He informed us the test is an important part of the screening process but Cody's score was amazing for a category 3 and he had already put our recommendation through. We would have orders cut by Monday and we now had 60 days to report to DC for training. So there you have it, our crazy week in a nut shell. Cody has been selected for a position as the Defense Attache' at the US Embassy in Turkey. We will spend the next year in DC as Cody goes through job training and learns Turkish, then we will continue our journey to Turkey where we will serve our country at the Embassy for 3 years. We are all very excited for this amazing opportunity. We look forward to taking advantage of the location and seeing all there is to see and do while living international. We have already begun a bucket list of places to see some of those are Italy, Greece, and the Holy Land. Lots of adventures ahead, but for the moment we ask for prayer to rent out our house.