Coming up Roses 🌹

The semester has come to an end and Lex has completed all his coursework, which means we get to hang out for a whole month relatively distraction-free – yay!

It is almost comical how much my head space has shifted toward the positive while just last month I was writing about “embracing the suck.” Our family’s biggest and most exciting news is that we are welcoming a little boy in May of 2023! We have already started calling him by his name, Jack Timothy Clodfelter. Timothy will of course be his saint/baptismal name, and it is also after my dad, Timothy. Jack on the other hand is a crowd favorite in the family. When you grow up in a house of teachers, names get easily blacklisted, but Jack has yet to waiver, so we are snatching it up before it’s too late.

November was a mixed bag of a month because of whatever the “plague” is that’s going around, but it was also wonderful in so many ways because we had a lot of family time. My mom came to visit during Thanksgiving and ended up extending her stay through the 7th of December. We were fortunate to get the week of Thanksgiving off from classes, so we drove to Western PA to visit my brother, his wife, and my mom who was already there with them. We had planned to celebrate an early Thanksgiving with them before they departed for other commitments, but sickness got the best of us, and my brother and his wife graciously converted their house into an infirmary for us. Hah! Even still, we eked out one day of celebration.

*The Superhero on her throne at the St. Nicholas Party for STOTS families

After leaving my brothers, we headed back to NEPA with plenty of leftovers. We laid low during the actual Thanksgiving holiday, and my mom was a LIFE SAVER (!) to us while she was visiting. After our move-in, in August, we had so much work to do, and we had arrived with only 2 days to the start of the semester, so it was a blessing to finally get the house put together. We had made a nice dent in all the work, but being pregnant upon arrival (and not knowing it- could explain a lot of my mood swings), dealing with Otis underfoot, and being sick of packing and unpacking from the other recent moves, I was tapped out of “nesting.” My mom painted, put together dressers, cleaned, cooked, and of course helped out with Otis. I don’t think we could ever fully pay her back, but we are so thankful!! It was a huge gift.

The other big news is regarding the next steps we are taking in the seminary program. This has been a long time coming, and God seems to keep pointing us in this direction. Through lots of prayer, contemplation, and guidance, we have started the process of switching from the Antiochian Archdiocese to the Ukrainian Archdiocese. We attended a Ukrainian prayer service at St. Mary’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Allentown, PA in November, and not only was the service beautiful and brought me to tears, but Alexis had an opportunity to speak with Archbishop Daniel of the Ukrainian Archdiocese.

*St. Mary's in Allentown (left), Visiting St. Sophia's Seminary & St. Andrew Ukrainian Orthodox Memorial Church

The most common question amongst many folks has been, “Why?” Well, the short of it is, Archbishop Daniel of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the USA, who is on the Assembly of Bishops, serves on the committee for military chaplains. He is also a former service member of the Army himself and retired from the Army as a Chaplain. What this means for us, is that he has a perspective we are familiar with and one we are looking for in a mentor as we begin to navigate this process. As anyone in the military knows, everything is always unnecessarily convoluted and time-consuming; having someone who has gone through it will help us on this rocky path. He has already been exceptionally supportive of Alexis, and we feel grateful to have his mentorship and care. The Antiochian Archdiocese has likewise been good to us, and we are blessed that they accepted us with open arms, but moving to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church is the sort of coming home we have been praying for. It is no question that our time in Poland had a profound impact on our lives as well. We also feel that given Alexis’ Ukrainian heritage, it only makes sense to embrace this opportunity. Bringing up our children in the Orthodox church, regardless of jurisdiction, will always be our number one priority, but if we have a chance to give our children greater ownership over their faith by exposing them to their cultural heritage, why wouldn’t we take it?

This move is still in process, but the ball is now rolling, and we are walking around NEPA with a heavy weight lifted off our shoulders. Ever since we walked into St. Mary’s Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Allentown, PA a couple of months ago, we have felt a sense of God calling us through this door. We plan to celebrate Christmas at the monastery this year but look forward to enjoying our first old calendar Christmas on January 7th, 2023. That will probably be the strangest adjustment for me… there might be a few years of “pulling doubles.” 😉

This will mean that in the coming months and for the next 2 years of seminary life, we will primarily attend services at St. Tikhon’s Monastery, which will be a blessing for all of us, but especially our boys. Otis LOVES getting to hang out with all the kids at STOTS, and the commute will certainly be more friendly. However, we will still have the flexibility to visit other churches, so we look forward to taking those opportunities, and perhaps we will even get to visit military bases and meet other chaplains.

We look forward to visiting some of Alexis’ family in Connecticut for about 4 days over the New Year. I had high hopes for a few days in Florida for some sun, but that will have to wait. Lol Several other families are sticking around for the holiday season, so hopefully, we can get together with them and plan some play dates for the kids. Overall, we are thankful for a full-month reprieve from our busy seminary life schedule and plan to take it easy.

As I reflect on 2022 as a whole, it’s been a pretty wild year. We spent this time last year in Poland and traveled quite a bit while we finished our time in Europe. We enjoyed amazing travels to London, Italy, and Greece in 2022. We also spent our final days doing our best to give back to those going through unspeakable tragedy in Ukraine. After leaving Poznan, I got to go back home to Alaska for one of my childhood best friends’ weddings. We sold our condo in Alaska after having that as our home base for the past 7 years. We traveled from Alaska to Pennsylvania with some pit stops in between. We started seminary. We got the wonderful news about baby Jack, and now we end the year with peaceful hearts as we embrace our latest decisions. At the end of the day, we are keeping our “eyes on the prize” of getting to give back to the military community. This effort is near and dear to both our hearts, and we thank God for opening up this door to us.

We are grateful for how the months of November and December seemed to perk up our spirits. Much of that was thanks to my mom who helped us get back on our feet. We are also humbled by the number of people who have supported us during this time. We feel exceptionally well taken care of and blessed by your generosity.

We hope this finds you well and that you all have a blessed Advent, Christmas, and New Year! We look forward to reporting back in January!

Happy Christmas!!

Lots of Love,

The Clods