A Bittersweet Goodbye.

It didn't seem final until we pulled out of our driveway last Tuesday morning. With tears flowing down my cheeks, we honked at our home one last time, and turned the corner to the next chapter of our lives.

The night before, we laid on our air mattress, with a blanket and pillow we borrowed from our neighbors, since the uhaul out front held all of our belongings. We snuggled in the dark and talked about the first time we had visited Charlottesville. We were only dating at the time, and plans to move to the city were still undecided. Four years later, married with an M.D, we laid in our empty home, surrounded only by the suitcases that once represented our arrival. Life has never felt so bittersweet.

Two weeks ago we attended numerous festivities that celebrated graduation. I knew each party was another chance to squeeze in as much time as possible with our friends. My heart is heavy and excited at the same time; a new city and new opportunities on the horizon, while the reality of leaving a life we love lingers in my head. Just a year ago, we'd nonchalantly respond that we would love to be back in the midwest when people asked about our future plans. The plans to move rolled off my tongue so easily.

And now- here we are. The reality of not visiting our favorite restaurants, having BBQ's in our backyard, leaving our small groups and not attending our church have started to sink in. My mind drifts back to  meeting at Millers for our favorite nachos, sitting in our living room until the wee hours of the morning playing "Just Dance," concerts at Fridays After Five, MFL games, Saturday mornings at the Farmer's Market, indulging in Arch's brownie goodness, golfing at Meadowbrook on a Sunday afternoon, or the weekend hikes in the mountains. All these seemingly small details of life that have one central feature - incredible friendships. Friends, who have become more like family. I think about the first time I attended a girl's Bible study just weeks after settling into Charlottesville, not realizing that some of those girls would be my rocks and encouragers in the toughest of times over the next four years. Or some of Kyle's classmates who road-tripped to Michigan to celebrate our wedding, or stood on the sidelines, cheering during races.

In your mid 20's, you encounter so many changes. Dating, engagements, marriages, babies, houses, career changes, and tragedies. You take risks, face failure and celebrate success. We've laughed so hard we've  I've peed my pants, and cried so hard it left mascara stains. I couldn't ask for better friends to go through life with. I've seen more of the Lord's provision, faithfulness and love through each of these friendships. It just so happened that we had a pretty great city to thrive in too :)

As we welcome a pretty incredible beginning in another city, our life in Charlottesville has come to an end. My eyes still swell as our life changes force us leave behind a matchless past.
Until next time, C'ville!

And Four Years Later...There Was an M.D.

My eyes swelled up as "Kyle Keith VanKoevering" echoed through the speakers of the theatre. It was a sunny, Sunday afternoon, full of anticipation and excitement. Kyle officially became a doctor!

My mind went back to those days when our date nights were in the hospital cafeteria because Kyle was studying for boards. I laughed at the thought of our first week as a married couple, when Kyle took part in a 14 hour surgery, and I cried as dinner sat cold on the table; claiming "don't be a surgeon!!". Ha. The playlist for our road trips to see one another when he was on away rotations. How residency interviews took over our lives and we lived out of suitcases for three months. The honors receptions and scholarships that continually showed me how much Kyle loves the practice of medicine. I smirked at the memory of attempting to quiz Kyle for an exam when I couldn't pronounce the 20 letter words of the pharmaceutical drugs. And then you add in all the memories with our friends, who became more like our family ( and because they are so special, they get a post all to themselves this week :)

I couldn't be prouder of my husbands accomplishments. It's no small task to go to school for 20 years...and then some! God has blessed him with a brilliant mind, but I know that isn't what will make him a great doc. It's the man, husband and friend that he is. That will be the bridge that connects him to his patients and allows for him to care for people to the best of his ability. That's what I'm most proud of.


Congratulations Dr.VK!

Belize, Part 2

If you haven't already, start here:

You're back! Now join me for more excursions from our trip: (and fair warning, there are WAY too many pictures...and I like to chat.)

After a day of training in a pool, in which I cracked under pressure during test drills and failed the goggle cleaning test (no joke), I found myself on a boat heading for the barrier reef. I was running on no sleep, as I was so nervous to scuba dive I tossed and turned in bed while having visions of drowning. The ride to the reef wouldn't have been complete without the veteran divers asking if I needed to throw up ("...I swear, you may feel better.")

Thankfully, Mario, my instructor, was as calm as a cucumber. Following a small anxiety attack while already in the water, I prayed, looked down, held Kyle's hand, and began to sink. Then, I fell in love.

There really is nothing like being submerged in water and peacefully floating around reef. So glad I trusted Kyle and let him convince me to do it! The real thing was 100 times better than any National Geographic magazine or any movie could portray.

There are no words for this picture. We just look hard core.

Two thumbs up for scuba diving! Moving on...

We wanted to make sure we saw more of the country than just the 6 miles of the village, so we rented a motorcycle for a day, drove down the highway, took detours and wandered through a few towns.

We drove through the Jaguar Reserve but I'm sad to report we did not spot one.

We took advantage of any side road, revealing breathtaking mountain views, grazing cattle, banana farms, the scent of citrus from the orange trees and the ocean breeze.

Although we LOVED visiting some towns on the way, they didn't compare to the warmth that Hopkins offered.
There is something about this small town that warms your heart, makes you want to put your feet up and relax, go for a stroll, become best friends with your waiter, and talk to every person that passes you by. Its those things that have drawn so many retirees to begin building homes in the area and settling into this slow, peaceful way of life. To give you an idea of just how relaxed, I used a blow dryer, worn a nice dress and used mascara three times in 11 days. I also didn't use my "pro" camera more than a handful of times (more on that later.)

Based on the number of homes under construction up and down the beach, Hopkins will look quite different in just a few years. However, I hope it never loses the heart beat that draws people in and makes it feel like a home.


Let me introduce you to this little village.

The local market, with the best pineapple this mouth has never tasted.

I had read many travel blogs that continually mentioned how kind Belizeans are, but I'd say that would be an understatement. Everyone we met was incredibly gracious. They take great pride in their country and wanted to share it with us - it made the trip that much better! We were so thankful for Marto and Nicholasa, our little Belizean family, who let us into their lives and showed us a side of the country that we otherwise would never have experienced.


If you are ever looking for an inexpensive, relaxing vacation that offers plenty of adventure (if you are so willing)...I'm happy to send a few recommendations your way.


And who knows, maybe you'll get to sit in the cockpit too!

UnBELIZEable, Part 1

Kyle can't stop describing our trip without saying "it was unBELIZEable." To be quite honest, this was a bit annoying at first, but now I find it endearing. It was an incredible vacation and we feel so blessed to have had that time together! Sometimes you don't realize how much you miss each other until you are away from everything else, and just have one another.

We laughed so hard we I cried. We slept in, went on bike rides, kayak trips and tried new foods. We went primitive and ate coconut right from the tree, fish from the ocean and I even learned how to make mouth-watering tortillas. We found ourselves looking like tourists in a golf cart (but only let that nonsense happen once), meeting locals for dinner, riding a motorcycle across the countryside, and searching for crocodiles at nightfall. Since that doesn't even begin to describe our entire trip, I'll revert to the pictures for further explanation.

Grab a glass of wine and get comfortable, I may have you here for a few minutes :)


We stayed in a home right outside of Hopkins, a small fishing village on the eastern coast. In order to get there, we hopped on one of these:

Our first introduction to Belize:

15 minutes later we arrived in another town, then had a 40 minute ride to Hopkins. We had decided early on that we didn't want to be stuck in a resort somewhere - we wanted to explore the country with free reign.

That idea took us here: The house we stayed in was crazy beautiful, built right beside the ocean. (We booked from vrbo.com, which is a great resource if you ever want to find less expensive, non-resort type vacations) Also, don't think just the two of us took up this mansion. It was split into four condos ;)

We ended up becoming great friends with the Belizean family who cared for the home as their full time work. We spent a lot of time with them throughout the two weeks...more on that later.

So how did we spend all of our time, you ask? Well I mentioned here that Kyle is Mr. Busy Pants when it comes to vacation- he wants to go, go, go and do everything possible. I, on the other hand, need a good balance between busy and laying-in-the-sun-bliss. I will say Kyle won this disagreement most of the time, but the one day we did lay out was sensational.



The first few days we went on some adventures.

I learned I can't keep up with my husband in paddling,

or biking on the dirt roads,

BUT, I also learned I can out-fish him. GASP! He will be rolling his eyes reading this, and his friends will surely make fun of him. But I only speak the truth:

My barracudas were bigger than his. What can I say.

To my husbands defense, he was trying to help Marto and Pedro catch their first barracuda,

In return, they took Kyle spear fishing. At night, in a river. That's way more legit than my sea fishing. I definitely didn't have the guts to even go with them. I waited at the condo and prayed he would return safely (but, seriously :)

 Each time we went out on the reef, we ended with buckets like this of our catch:

Which was excellent, since we only were able to eat a sliver of that, and give the rest away. It made for a few nice nights with our Belizean family, learning their fish recipes and having dinner around the table- complete with homemade tortillas, sweet potato fries and fresh fruit from the trees.

We decided that while in Belize, we wanted to see some of the Mayan Ruins. A 3 hour car ride later, we ended up here:
at Xunantunich, at the border of Guatemala and Belize.

Then we climbed to the top,

 and enjoyed a gorgeous view of other ruins, cities and the Guatemala border

As nerve-racking as it was to stand at the top and blow with the wind, it did dry out sweat from the hot weather (did I mention, it was SO, SO hot there!!)

Okay, I'm wrapping this up for the night. One post was way to ambitious for the whole trip, I'll pick it up  tomorrow with our scuba adventures, a tour of Hopkins and our motorcycle adventures.


Goodnight :)