Our Next Family Adventure!
We have had quite an interesting, fun, sad, challenging, and joyful 2018. We thought we knew what God had planned for our lives and that we were following that path, but He had something else in mind. :) Colt was applying for jobs in administration, assistant prinicipal or principal, but nothing was panning out. Doors we thought were wide open and ready for him to walk through were closed and closed hard. We really enjoy working in Pasco School District and I love my job as an Education Specialist, so we wanted to stay in Pasco. Colt decided to take a position at a Pasco Elementary school that serves only Kinder to 2nd graders, as a Behavior Intervention Specialist. That's right! The High School Science teacher is now doing behavior intervention for 5 to 8 year olds! :)
So much happened in May and June. Colt and I celebrated our 13 year anniversary. Zamin spent his last day at St. Pat's, where he went to daycare/school the past 2 years. We sold our home of 10 years in 2 days, above asking price. :) We found a rental house that accepted dogs and cats. There was a month between when our house closed and our rental was available, so we lived in an RV that our neighbors Barb and Leon let us borrow and parked it at our friends' house, the Massie Family. We are so thankful for the amazing people in our lives who treat us like family.
We thought we were going to build our dream house. We had saved and saved and did "everything right." We spent two years designing what we thought was going to be where we would live for the rest of our lives (aside from the assisted living center Colt would probably end up in). Thankfully, before we broke ground, that door closed too. We were so confused. Why did we sell our house? Why didn't we just stay and settle for what we had? We started looking for another house to buy in the Tri Cities, but that didn't work either. We just couldn't find anything that met our expectations, especially for the price, as the market was crazy! We weren't sure what to do next.
August brought the start of a new school year for all the Nickels, but also brought sadness, as we had to make a difficult decision and put our dog, Ender down. He definitely had his issues, but he gave us some wonderful dog years. This is the first time since I was a freshman at OU in the dorms (too many years ago) that I didn't live with a dog. We miss him dearly, and didn't know what it was at the time, but God had a plan, as always.
After a few months, we started to look at working with a different builder. Maybe that was the problem. As we prayed and tried to figure out our next steps, we were hit with a sudden tragedy. One of our friends from work lost her life, too early and in an unimagineable way. It shook us in a way we did not fully understand when it happened. We were confused, hurt, and still in an unsure space. We continued to pray and heal, but weren't quite sure how to move forward. We did know we wanted to continue to spread our friend's message:
Then, we started talking about the possibility of teaching internationally. Could we do it? Would Zamin be able to go to our school? Could we find jobs together? Could we afford to move? What would be the benefits? Many of you know Colt and I were accepted into the Peace Corps before we moved to Washington State. The timing and location were not right then. We toyed with the idea again before Zamin was born, but at that time we owned a house and had several pets. Again, the timing didn't feel right. When we started talking about it this time, we felt a weight lift off our shoulders. Things started falling into place. I know all of that sounds cliche, but then we started doing more research; ok, lots of research. :) Turns out, the Principal I worked with at Taft Middle School in Oklahoma City is the head of a school in Bangkok. We sent her our information and found out she had two openings that fit our skill set. Door opened! We have always wanted to travel to Southeast Asia, so Thailand was in our top 5, but we were also interested in the Middle East (Level 1 Travel Advisory Countries, of course). We submitted applications to multiple schools and ended up with 3 offers! After much deliberation and many more prayers, we decided to take the offers in Bangkok at Berkeley International School. I know. Colt Nickel will be living in a city of almost 6 million people, with over 14 million in the metro area. It didn't take much for him, knowing we'd get to eat authentic Thai food for two years. :) Colt will be teaching Middle School Science and I will be doing Elementary Learning Support. The school is fairly new, opening in 2010. All levels are on the same campus, but are in different buildings. The school pays for Zamin's tuition (he'll get to start in Kindergarten 1), our housing and settling in, medical insurance, the cost to fly there, and the cost to fly home once a year. We have signed a two year contract, and aren't sure what we will do after that! :) We will be leaving the Tri Cities in June and leave for Bangkok in July from Oklahoma City.
It is bittersweet, as we have established our family in the Tri Cities over the past 10 years with amazing friends we now call family, wonderful careers, and we truly love this part of the country (the Pacific Northwest). However, we feel confident God is calling us to take this next step in the adventure we call life. It's remarkable how God works through what we think is the bad. There were many things the past year that we thought of as negative, but it turns out, had those things not happened, we wouldn't be able to say yes to this opportunity.
We are so excited to take this journey as a family, and would love to have visitors! You might want to message first to make sure we're not at one of these spots for a quick trip! :)
We hope you will follow us on our adventure through this blog and on our Instagram page. We will post here and there as we are preparing for the move, then more frequently once we are in Bangkok. Feel free to comment below if you have any questions or send us an email at adventurerules@gmail.com. Sending our love to you and yours this New Year.
So much happened in May and June. Colt and I celebrated our 13 year anniversary. Zamin spent his last day at St. Pat's, where he went to daycare/school the past 2 years. We sold our home of 10 years in 2 days, above asking price. :) We found a rental house that accepted dogs and cats. There was a month between when our house closed and our rental was available, so we lived in an RV that our neighbors Barb and Leon let us borrow and parked it at our friends' house, the Massie Family. We are so thankful for the amazing people in our lives who treat us like family.
August brought the start of a new school year for all the Nickels, but also brought sadness, as we had to make a difficult decision and put our dog, Ender down. He definitely had his issues, but he gave us some wonderful dog years. This is the first time since I was a freshman at OU in the dorms (too many years ago) that I didn't live with a dog. We miss him dearly, and didn't know what it was at the time, but God had a plan, as always.
After a few months, we started to look at working with a different builder. Maybe that was the problem. As we prayed and tried to figure out our next steps, we were hit with a sudden tragedy. One of our friends from work lost her life, too early and in an unimagineable way. It shook us in a way we did not fully understand when it happened. We were confused, hurt, and still in an unsure space. We continued to pray and heal, but weren't quite sure how to move forward. We did know we wanted to continue to spread our friend's message:
 |
| -Laura R. Cole |
Then, we started talking about the possibility of teaching internationally. Could we do it? Would Zamin be able to go to our school? Could we find jobs together? Could we afford to move? What would be the benefits? Many of you know Colt and I were accepted into the Peace Corps before we moved to Washington State. The timing and location were not right then. We toyed with the idea again before Zamin was born, but at that time we owned a house and had several pets. Again, the timing didn't feel right. When we started talking about it this time, we felt a weight lift off our shoulders. Things started falling into place. I know all of that sounds cliche, but then we started doing more research; ok, lots of research. :) Turns out, the Principal I worked with at Taft Middle School in Oklahoma City is the head of a school in Bangkok. We sent her our information and found out she had two openings that fit our skill set. Door opened! We have always wanted to travel to Southeast Asia, so Thailand was in our top 5, but we were also interested in the Middle East (Level 1 Travel Advisory Countries, of course). We submitted applications to multiple schools and ended up with 3 offers! After much deliberation and many more prayers, we decided to take the offers in Bangkok at Berkeley International School. I know. Colt Nickel will be living in a city of almost 6 million people, with over 14 million in the metro area. It didn't take much for him, knowing we'd get to eat authentic Thai food for two years. :) Colt will be teaching Middle School Science and I will be doing Elementary Learning Support. The school is fairly new, opening in 2010. All levels are on the same campus, but are in different buildings. The school pays for Zamin's tuition (he'll get to start in Kindergarten 1), our housing and settling in, medical insurance, the cost to fly there, and the cost to fly home once a year. We have signed a two year contract, and aren't sure what we will do after that! :) We will be leaving the Tri Cities in June and leave for Bangkok in July from Oklahoma City.
It is bittersweet, as we have established our family in the Tri Cities over the past 10 years with amazing friends we now call family, wonderful careers, and we truly love this part of the country (the Pacific Northwest). However, we feel confident God is calling us to take this next step in the adventure we call life. It's remarkable how God works through what we think is the bad. There were many things the past year that we thought of as negative, but it turns out, had those things not happened, we wouldn't be able to say yes to this opportunity.
We are so excited to take this journey as a family, and would love to have visitors! You might want to message first to make sure we're not at one of these spots for a quick trip! :)
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