About
Hi, We’re the Huffmans!
Oh, hello there! If you’ve found your way here, you probably know a little about who we are and what we’re about. But if, for some reason, you’re checking this page out to do some mild internet stalking (hey, no judgment, I get it), I’ll make it easy for you and give a little background info.
We’re the Huffmans! Our family is composed of Jarrod (”Dad”), Emily (”Mom”), Ambrose (6), Theodora (4), and Elisabeth (2). Right now we’re wrapping up a period of living in Kansas City with Jarrod’s parents; in August our family will load up a U-Haul and head to Yonkers, New York, where Jarrod will begin his studies at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary. God willing, he will be ordained a priest at the end of his time there, and we will move yet again, this time to the parish he will be serving at!
Some Backstory
How did we get here? The journey has been winding. Growing up, Jarrod was raised Baptist, and I was raised Mennonite. We met in high school — yes, we’re high school sweethearts — and after graduating, Jarrod went to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, while I stayed in Indiana and attended Goshen College. It was at USAFA that the first seed of Orthodoxy was unknowingly planted in Jarrod’s mind — one of his professors was an Eastern Orthodox Christian.
But the seed wouldn’t be harvested for another four or five years. In the meantime, Jarrod and I finished school (Jarrod a year later than me, because he spent a year teaching in a small village in Assam, India), got married, and spent our first year of marriage living in Kolkata, India, where Jarrod was a Fulbright scholar. On returning to the US, Jarrod, who had been commissioned as an officer in the Air Force on graduating from USAFA, began pilot training. That journey took us from Mississippi to Alabama to Albuquerque and finally to Las Vegas, where we finally got to settle down a bit!
Throughout all this moving, Jarrod and I both experienced what Jarrod likes to call a “crisis of church” — neither of us were losing our faith, but we were having trouble finding a church that really felt like home. It certainly didn’t help that we were moving so much, and could never really set down roots.
Finally, the seed planted in Jarrod all those years ago began poking out of the ground. (Ok, too many plant metaphors, sorry!) Something prompted him to visit St. Paul the Apostle Orthodox Church in Las Vegas for a Saturday evening Vespers service, and although he was certain he would be the first non-Orthodox inquirer they’d ever encountered, he quickly realized that his assumption was incorrect. He was greeted by several parishioners, from all manner of religious upbringing — including a former Baptist who sang in the choir and later became his godfather!
Jarrod was immediately attracted to the church and asked me to attend the next Vespers service. I did, and I found myself both overwhelmed and smitten. The heavy scent of incense was so familiar to our time in India, and I had always secretly loved a liturgy. I also adored the music — growing up Mennonite, I’d sang a cappella with the rest of the congregation as soon as I’d learned to read music. So many years of drifting from church to church with music led by praise and worship bands had left me starving to join a choir again.
From there, our full immersion into the church was swift. We began attending regularly in July of 2014, became catechumens a few weeks later, and by November we were chrismated and brought into the church officially.
And Now…
Now we are heading to St. Vlad’s! Our family has been anticipating this change for years — we visited the campus all the way back in 2019, when Liesl was still just a hope in our hearts. As such, we have been able to prepare a bit for this big life change (read: the loss of Jarrod’s salary and Tricare, yikes!), and I have successfully made the transition to a career in software engineering to help support our family and maintain health insurance while Jarrod is a full-time student.
Still, we have a long journey ahead of us, and that’s why A Hodgepodge of Huffmans exists — to keep you all updated on where we are and how we are doing. We know we won’t do it without continual prayer and support from our community.
At the least, you can expect a monthly update from me on the happenings of the Huffmans, although be warned — I tend to get wordy (I do have my MFA in writing, after all!) so I apologize in advance. Depending on how busy things are, I may sprinkle in a random post or two about apartment living or a favorite recipe, but we’ll see. I have a feeling life will be a little wild starting in August.
In the meantime, we welcome any and all prayers. If you’d like to support our family financially, you can find more details here.
