{"id":898,"date":"2010-01-05T22:21:34","date_gmt":"2010-01-06T04:21:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/2010\/01\/05\/looking-back\/"},"modified":"2010-03-09T08:30:31","modified_gmt":"2010-03-09T14:30:31","slug":"looking-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/2010\/01\/05\/looking-back\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking Back"},"content":{"rendered":"

A year ago I was a student at Asbury, working at Kaleidoscope<\/a>, expecting my first child.\u00a0 12 months later I am a stay-at-home dad with my MA working at a distillery<\/a>.\u00a0 Quite a bit has changed in 2009.\u00a0 Here is a look back in pictures. [HT: Dave<\/a>]<\/p>\n

January -Stephenson Chapel<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"bowling2\"<\/a> \"bowling\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[Bowling with the Youth from Stephenson Chapel<\/em>]<\/p>\n

In January I continued my work with Kaleidoscope writing grants, but also began a stint as an interim pastor for Stephenson Chapel.\u00a0 At first it was only supposed to be a few week fill-in gig, but it ended up lasting 6 months.\u00a0 The folks at this rural church in Russellville were an amazing example of community and incarnate love.\u00a0 They put up with my quirks and gave Beth and I amazing support.<\/p>\n

February \u2013 Ice and Stitches<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Christmas<\/a> \"knee\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[Ice damage and damaged knee<\/em>]<\/p>\n

In late January a major snow storm hit the Bluegrass.\u00a0 Along with many other people I spent several days running a chainsaw helping with the cleanup.\u00a0 Most of my time was out at Camp Loucon<\/a>, a Methodist camp and retreat center near Leitchfield KY.\u00a0 On my third day in I was sawing a hanging limb and it kicked back in a weird way sending the chainsaw bar (the chain was not moving) into my leg.\u00a0 I ended up with 24 stitches in my knee, but was sawing again within 3 hours.\u00a0 Some people never learn.<\/p>\n

March \u2013 Corsair<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Christmas<\/a><\/p>\n

[Custom Still at Corsair<\/em>]<\/p>\n

Beginning in October of last year, I completed several distillery tours in the state.\u00a0 They are always a fascinating mix of industry, craft and science.\u00a0 The most interesting was Corsair Artisan<\/a>, a micro-distillery<\/a> that just opened in Bowling Green.\u00a0 After several visits, in March the owners asked if I would be interested in helping them out on a few projects.\u00a0 My role in the company gradually expanded and now I am the Distillery Manager and handle most of the daily operations.\u00a0 It is a great mix of duties that keeps me on my toes and works with my schedule.<\/p>\n

April – Birth of Mikayla<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"baby\"<\/a><\/p>\n

[Mikayla at 1 week<\/em>]<\/p>\n

Some months carry more weight than others.\u00a0 Thus is the case for April 2009.\u00a0 On the the 28th at 10:36am, our baby girl Mikayla Lillian Kickert was born.\u00a0 She weighed in at 7,7 and was 20\u201d long.\u00a0 You can see more blog posts about her here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

May \u2013 Graduation<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"grad<\/a> \"grad<\/a><\/p>\n

[Celebrating with the family in all my regalia<\/em>]<\/p>\n

After 3 years, $33,000 ($21,000 out of pocket), and over 3,000 hours of work I finally graduated with a Master of Arts in Biblical Studies from Asbury Seminary<\/a>.\u00a0 This time was certainly formative, but looking back at it I am not convinced I would do it again if given the choice.\u00a0 It was simply too much of a sacrifice for what it yielded.\u00a0 For me, graduation was more than just an achievement \u2013 it represented a transition to freedom.<\/p>\n

June \u2013 Blogging \/ Time with Family<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"June<\/a><\/p>\n

[G-ma Morgan meets Mikayla for the first time<\/em>]<\/p>\n

After graduating and ending my stint at Stephenson Chapel I discovered a void in my life.\u00a0 I no longer had an obvious outlet for my creativity or an avenue to work through my thoughts.\u00a0 In order to fix this I began blogging (technically I took blogging back up, but my previous attempts had never amounted to anything).\u00a0 Also during this time Beth, Mikayla and I had the opportunity to spend a lot of quality time together and visit with family.\u00a0 We basically had 2.5 months together and took full advantage of it.<\/p>\n

July \u2013 Garden<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2009-07-04<\/a><\/p>\n

[The garden at the height of the growing season<\/em>]<\/p>\n

While not specific to July, one of the highlights of the year was our garden.\u00a0 This was the first year we moved it to our house and it was also one of the best crops we have had.\u00a0 It was a great escape and the food we produced was excellent.\u00a0 Here is an earlier post about our garden<\/a> and one about lessons learned<\/a> throughout the year.<\/p>\n

August \u2013 Stay-at-home Dad<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2009-08-23<\/a><\/p>\n

[Watching Mikayla while Cooking<\/em>]<\/p>\n

When Mikayla was born Beth and I decided it made sense for me to stay at home with her during the week.\u00a0 In August, my \u201cjob\u201d started in earnest.\u00a0 I had never pictured myself as a stay-at-home dad, but I have really enjoyed being able to spend time with her and it means the whole family gets more quality time.\u00a0 To be honest with you, sometimes I wonder what Beth was thinking when she trusted me to not do anything stupid with Mikayla.\u00a0 So far so good\u2026 for the most part.<\/p>\n

September \u2013 Grandfather<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2009-09-02<\/p>\n

[Grandma and Grandpa with Mikayla]<\/em><\/p>\n

Some transitions are harder than others.\u00a0 One of the tough ones for 2009 was the passing of my grandfather.\u00a0 In his life he had overcome many illnesses and obstacles, but his last few months were filled with pain and everyone knew in September it was his time to go.\u00a0 I wrote some of my thought about the transition of life<\/a> here.<\/p>\n

October \u2013 Long Term Relationships<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2009-October<\/a> [Kickerts and Altmaiers at Abrham\u2019s Falls<\/em>]<\/p>\n

It is amazing how fast time goes by.\u00a0 In October, Beth and I celebrated our 5 year anniversary.\u00a0 A few months earlier we had celebrated 10 years together (dating+marriage).\u00a0 Even though it sounds trite to say, I could not imagine my life without her.\u00a0 That same month we spent a great weekend with old friends (Dave and I go back to Ms. Fitzgerald\u2019s first grade class).\u00a0 For Beth and I, Dave<\/a> and Catherine<\/a> are the type of friends that you can jump right back in with even after several months apart and never feel like you missed a beat.<\/p>\n

November \u2013 Camry<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2009-10-06<\/a><\/p>\n

[The Culprit<\/em>]<\/p>\n

November represents one of the most frustrating months of 2009.\u00a0 A few months earlier the engine in Beth\u2019s Camry blew (read about it here<\/a>).\u00a0 After a month of trying to figure out if was worth fixing, we finally bought a used engine to install.\u00a0 Long story short, the engine was bad, we hit a bunch more hurdles, we have spent 3x the amount we planned on spending and as of the first week of January we still don\u2019t have a car.\u00a0 Ughh\u2026<\/p>\n

December \u2013 Christmas<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"2009-12-25<\/a> <\/strong><\/p>\n

[PJs, Hot Cocoa, and Pictures<\/em>]<\/p>\n

Since this was Mikayla\u2019s first Christmas we made sure we spent part of Christmas day at our home together.\u00a0 We were able to initiate some family traditions of our own (Beth has a great post<\/a> about it).\u00a0 One of the things we did was get dressed up in our pajamas (I had to buy some), make hot cocoa and take fun family pictures together.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

Overall 2009 did not turn out the way I would have expected it to, but I wouldn\u2019t want to be anywhere else than where I am right now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A year ago I was a student at Asbury, working at Kaleidoscope, expecting my first child.\u00a0 12 months later I am a stay-at-home dad with my MA working at a distillery.\u00a0 Quite a bit has changed in 2009.\u00a0 Here is a look back in pictures. [HT: Dave] January -Stephenson Chapel [Bowling with the Youth from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,1],"tags":[461,467,462,108,403,34,65,363,406,759,96,463,369,464,466,92,66,78,465],"class_list":["post-898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family","category-random","tag-461","tag-altmaiers","tag-asbury","tag-beth","tag-camry","tag-christmas","tag-corsair","tag-death","tag-engine","tag-family","tag-gardening","tag-graduation","tag-grandpa","tag-ice-storm","tag-loucon","tag-mikayla","tag-stay-at-home-dad","tag-stephenson-chapel","tag-stitches"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=898"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1017,"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898\/revisions\/1017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kickert.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}