Threads of Grace

Grief...and Grace

2019-05-15T14:22:00.000-05:00

Easter. Mother’s Day. Birthdays. Father’s Day. Spring. Summer. Fall. Holiday season. Anniversaries. School. Home. Public places. Too much noise. Too much quiet.

We talk about traumaversaries. We talk about triggers. We talk about grief.

What happens when all of life becomes a trigger and every month includes a traumaversary and every day is filled with grief? We have two children who have not been able to live here at home for awhile now, with much uncertainty surrounding when they may be able to return home. Those of us here grieve their absence. Those who are gone grieve ours. We all grieve the loss of others who are not present. My health is also gone for the time, leaving me bedridden for months, and I grieve as I see an entire season of life passing me by – yet again. And my family grieves the wife and mother who is often barely here.

This. This is where we live. Where we have been living for some time now, without reprieve. The entirety of my life right now consists of being sick in bed and managing grief – my kids’ and my own. There is some ebbing and flowing over the course of days, but each day contains the traces. I am beginning to understand certain common trauma behaviors; I am understanding more because I am experiencing more of it myself. Call it stress, call it grief, call it trauma. Call it a rock or a tree or a stick. Whatever it is called, it is like living life with a filter on the brain that muddles everything.

I am currently reading through a book, “It’s Ok That You’re Not Ok: Meeting grief and loss in a culture that doesn’t understand”. While I will add a caveat that this is book is written from a secular perspective, so it misses large pieces of the puzzle and I cannot wholeheartedly recommend everything in it, the author does a good job of putting into words what it is like to be living in a state of grief:

“Let’s say you have 100 units of brain power for each day. Right now, the enormity of grief, trauma, sadness, missing, loneliness, takes up 99 of those energy units. That remaining one unit is what you have for the mundane and ordinary skills of life. That one remaining circuit is responsible for organizing carpools and funeral details. It’s got to keep you breathing, keep your heart beating, and access your cognitive, social and relational skills. Remembering that cooking utensils belong in the drawer, not the freezer, that the keys are under the bathroom sink where you left them when you ran out of toilet paper – these things are just not high on the brain’s priority list. Of course you’re exhausted.”

“The world itself can become a bizarre and confounded place.”

When you have an entire family living in this state for an extended period of time, it gets quite wearisome.

What is grief? What is this thing which feels like it has invaded our home and lay claim to every surface? Grief is not a being who has walked into our life and settled within our home. It is merely the name of what is. The layers of pain enfolded around each heart within this family. The name we can call the emotions swirling – around and over and under and within. The voices we do not hear. The hugs we do not feel. The safety we do not know. Grief is the empty seats around our table and the empty beds upstairs. Grief is the faded pictures of people who are no longer near, in albums worn with use. It is the van that feels too big. The clothes still hanging unused in the closet…and the clothes no longer there. The ache of longing when things are okay for just a little while and so much of you wants to believe it can really be that way, even while you know it is not. Not now anyway. It is the awareness that something is always missing; or the crushing realization if for a moment it was forgotten. It is the things we cannot do; the memories we cannot make.

Grief is the screaming, the endless tears, the broken doors, the holes in the wall. It is the scars on bodies and scars on hearts. It is the sense that you can never be enough.

Grief is rage and grief is weary and grief is lonely.

Grief is all these things. And none of them.

What is grief?

Grief is love. Grief is sorrow. Grief is fear.

Love in a broken world. Sorrow over what cannot be. Fear of both.

Yet there remains grace.

While my heart beats to the steady rhythm of brokenness, my lungs yet breathe in grace with each and every breath. Within this brokenness, the threads of His grace continue on.

And therefore I have hope.

“Yet this I call to mind

and therefore I have hope:

Because of the Lord’s great love we are

not consumed,

for his compassions never fail.

They are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness..

I say to myself, ‘The Lord is my portion;

therefore I will wait for him.’”

Lamentations 3:21-24

Two Years

2018-12-12T22:44:00.001-06:00

Two years ago I posted this song amidst emotional turmoil and anxiety. The day we met three of our children. A year ago I included it in a blog post, acknowledging the anniversary at the end of a long day of a many hours long escalation. Tonight I do not have the energy to even sort through the emotions of this two year anniversary, and still this song applies. Maybe even more today than it did before. We are not where I imagined we could be. We are not where I hoped we should be. We are not where we prayed we would be. Yet...here we are. There have been mountains moved, though not the ones I would have chosen. The waters have not parted, yet we have not drowned. We still wait on the answers, though they are continuously revealed. So here in that place of waiting, that trust which first pushed us out to walk into the impossible those two long years ago...here is where that trust still stands. I have a guess at what tomorrow holds and it makes me anxious. He already knows our tomorrow and that gives me peace. So we trust for another day.

“When you don’t move the mountains

I needed you to move

When you don’t part the water

I wish I could walk through

When you don’t give the answers

As I cry out to you

I will trust, I will trust

I will trust in you.

Truth is you know what tomorrow brings

There’s not a day ahead you have not seen

So in all things be my life and breath

I want what you want, Lord,

And nothing less

…I will trust, I will trust,

I will trust in you.”

https://youtu.be/n_aVFVveJNs

Sharing a Shoe (Life With RAD)

2018-07-21T23:49:00.001-05:00

Imagine you are running a race. Let's say a marathon. Only it had rained the night before and the trail is now a muddy mess. You are running along still managing a steady pace when you see someone has fallen in the mud. As you slow to check if she is okay, you see her shoes were lost in the process (don't think about how realistic this is, just go with it okay?). She accepts your hand to help her up, but glares at you when she realizes your hand had some mud on it which added to her own. She is visibly upset and starts going on about how important this race was to her. It had always been a dream of hers to run a marathon and finishing this race is what she wants more than anything else in the world. Since you are already miles into the race yet still far from the finish line, you decide to offer her one of your shoes. You figure you can both make it a little better with one shoe each. Again, she accepts, but seems angry that you are only offering one shoe. "How much good is one shoe going to do me anyway?"

The two of you get back moving, a bit slower with one foot bare, noticing for the first time how many rocks are lying hidden in the mud along the trail. Apparently this stranger also managed to lose her water bottle. You see her eyeing yours as you reach for a drink, so you offer to share. She takes it, and with another several miles left to the race, she finishes off the water and hands you back an empty bottle, asking if you have anymore. That was all the water you were carrying and she rolls her eyes and huffs when you say as much.

Over the last few miles, the other girl moves further ahead and you lose sight of her for a little while. It is almost like the running with one shoe doesn't even phase her; if you didn't know better you'd think maybe she always runs barefoot. As you near the finish line, foot sore and bleeding from the rocks, you catch sight of her again. Your heart leaps as you realize she is SO close to meeting the goal she so desperately wanted to reach! The shoe and the water and coming in last place is all worth it in that moment. Then, suddenly, about 10 feet from the finish line she sprawls onto the ground. Only, she didn't trip on anything. She tripped herself. At that moment, she sees you coming up from behind and starts screaming that you tripped her! Everyone surrounding the finish line begins to look over, trying to figure out what the commotion is about. It now looks like you were so desperate to not be in total last place that you knocked another runner to the ground. Surely no one really thinks that, do they? You look around, aghast, and just when you think things could not get any more ridiculous, she starts shouting some more. This time she is shouting about how you have repeatedly knocked her down and even stole her shoe!

You try to shrug off the accusations, hoping she will calm down so the race can just be done already. After all, there is only another 10 feet between her and her greatest dream. She begins to cry. Sobbing that she can't finish and it is all your fault. No amount of coaxing gets her to move toward the finish line and she throws the shoe back at you wishing she had never met you because you have ruined everything for her. Eventually, as everyone else begins to scatter since the race is pretty much over, she finally pulls herself up and starts walking. In the wrong direction! She is walking BACK to the starting line! Over 26 miles away. Without shoes or water. When you try to get her turned around, she tells you to just go away and leave her alone already. Finally you decide you can't do anything further and leave to go find someone who might be able to better help her. As soon as you start walking in the opposite direction toward the crowds to find help, she shouts over her shoulder, "See?? I knew you never cared anyway! You wanted me to fail!"
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Now. Imagine repeating that scene. Not once. Not twice. Not a few times per year. But every single hour of every single day of every single week of every single month. If you can get that picture in your head and fit that analogy over every area of life, then you might be able to grasp just a small piece of what it is like to live as a parent of a child with RAD (Reactive Attachment Disorder). Sometimes (today, for instance) it is like this except repeated approximately 7,236 times in one day.
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If you know a family with a child who struggles with RAD, please be aware that this is the life they live (more or less). Not every now and then, but continuously. Even if there are good moments. Even if things look okay from the outside looking in. Your prayers and practical support are so vital. We are among the few who have been seriously blessed with both prayers and support on an ongoing basis. No one parent or set of parents can do this alone.

If you are a part of a family living with the reality of RAD, please know that your efforts are not in vain. Those baby steps count. Even if they are tiny, tiny, itty, bitty, and it is one step forward and three steps back. They count. Because love always counts. Whether you feel loving or not doesn't matter (let's face it, how many of us really *feel* loving towards someone who is consistently hurting us?), the fact that you are still there - still giving your shoe and sharing your water and seeking out help for the very person who is driven to harm you - this is you loving your child in the middle of all their hard stuff. You are doing God's work and it is not in your own power or by your own strength that you will keep running this race; only by his grace and in his strength can you go on. Day after day after day after weary, long, maddening, exhausting day. Hold on and know that you are not alone in this race. There are many of us who have been there, are there, and we get it. Hang on with all you've got; hang on with all the strength God gives you; because for a child with RAD, hanging on is what love looks like.

[It was actually my husband who came up with a similar marathon analogy recently, however I could not remember the exact details so I elaborated with my own version here.]

Yet This I Call to Mind

2018-07-07T21:48:00.000-05:00

Words cannot even begin to convey the depth of the weariness which comes from managing mountains of emotions and constant behaviors day in and day out. I think about posting a Facebook status about how things are going, but I don't even know what to say. I consider calling a friend, longing for connection, but I do not have the emotional energy to explain all that has been going on. So I go another day, each day more weary than the last. Blogging has always has been my way of coping as a verbal processor when my energy is spent, so here it is.

June was the 17 month mark since bringing our girls home. This is a major milestone for them based on history and, as of late June, they have now lived with us longer than any other family since coming into care four and a half years ago. In fact, I suspect this has likely been the longest they have *ever* lived in a single house/location. I expected one child to react to this milestone. I was kind of taken off guard when they all did. You don't have to remember a date or track a period of time or consciously bring to mind an incident. The brain knows. The body remembers. I believed this to be true before, based on research. I know this to be true now, based on the lives within the four walls of my home.

One might expect this milestone to be cause for celebration and security. Except not. Instead, we have had some major regressions in behavior from all sides. This happens to some degree every time there is a significant anniversary...or birthday...or holiday...or...you get the idea. We make progress and then, BAM, overnight it is like we are almost back to square one. June contained this milestone, plus Father's Day, plus two birthdays. Needless to say, June was not fun.

July 1st rolled around in the exact same way that April 1st showed up after a similar month surrounding a major traumaversary in March. After a solid month of being lied to, manipulated, pushed away, and yelled at, I hit my limit. Thankfully, one of my three tends to settle down immediately after the trigger passes. The other two, however, they're still going strong. And I am weary.

I cannot even count how many times I have been lied to in the past month - or in the past 12 hours for that matter. Lying is one of my parenting triggers. I have multiple children who lie to me almost daily. I have one child who lies literally almost every single time she speaks to me. Not even exaggerating. The constant need to read past the words, interpret expressions, identify manipulations, stay one step ahead of elaborate attempts to control the home...exhausting does not begin to cover it.

I also have one child who is going through a process of difficult growth as she faces the triggers head on and works to regain control of her own mind and body, by way of actively giving over control to her Lord. In between struggling with her poor choices and her premature battles for independence, I get to see her amazing heart as she seeks to grow and heal and mature. "The old has gone, the new has come." Even in the midst of her battles, I have never seen the truth of this verse more clearly than in this child. She is beginning to truly know the vastness of God's love for her. That love is visibly changing her and it is so beautiful to watch. It is incredibly hard to be parenting her through these difficult, overwhelming phases, and yet I am often brought to tears when I glimpse the beauty within her heart. Plain and simple, she is not the same person she was before she welcomed Christ into her life. I pray for this same thing to someday be able to be said for another child.

There is yet beauty in this life. The days can be heavy. So very heavy. There are tears and struggles on a daily basis. There is also growth. Sometimes it is harder to see than others. At times it may even be impossible. In between the screaming and the throwing things and the careless running over of others...in between the hours and hours (and hours and hours) of talking and coaching and doling out consequences, the fighting my own inclinations in order to connect with those who would push me away, the watching children self-destruct, the protecting them from each other and from themselves...in between all of that there are the moments. There are always the moments. The moments in which I catch a glimpse of God working. Sometimes in a child's heart; often in my own.

My body is struggling. I am in physical pain due to needing to physically restrain a child nearly my own size today. My store of emotional energy is completely run dry. Mentally, I have been living in survival mode for so long, only taking on bite sized pieces of the must do priorities. Rarely can I so much as wrap my mind around cooking a real meal. Grocery shopping is done in a haze. I am depleted in every way. As I have been every day for some time. Hope is running thin. I would think I should completely dread each day - and sometimes I do. Sometimes it is too much to look into another day of all this.
"Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his mercies never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, 'The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.'"

The moments of grace. The moments where I get to see his mercy at work within our home and in our family. On our worst days they are there. These are the moments, often mere glimmers of hope, which allow me to lie down with nothing left tonight and get up tomorrow to do it all over again. And again and again and again as we all learn together what love really means. Because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for his mercies never fail.

What We Need

2018-06-28T17:09:00.001-05:00

This morning started out rough, immediately dealing with lies and behaviors. While grumpy and frustrated, God started nudging me to consider changing a consequence I had given this same child for significant behavior choices a different day; in my heart I knew the consequence, though not remotely overboard, would not be beneficial to her moving forward. Reading a heartfelt post from another adoptive parent this morning nudged me further.

So when she got home this afternoon, our conversation started with that. Me acknowledging my choice had not been the best thing this time and removing the consequence. I reserve the right to be wrong sometimes and to tell my child when I am! We had some not so good stuff to address from earlier today as well. Because of how the conversation began, in the process of dealing with things it came out that something going on at school all week had been very (understandably) upsetting to her. Knowing this made all the difference in the world, as we were able to come up with solutions to help her. I was able to let her know it’s okay to not be okay with it. It’s okay to let us know. Tomorrow I will be picking her up early from the last day of summer school in order to protect her heart and mind, and today she knows that I am on her team. For real.

None of this would have likely ever come out if I had not been willing to give her what she needs instead of what she deserves. We would have spent the rest of the week (maybe much longer) battling what looked like oppositional behaviors without having a clue what was driving it. God knew though. And, in his grace, he let us know as well by steering us to open a door we didn’t even know needed opening. Because that is what he does.

There generally are consequences for choices. Sometimes, however, bad behavior is the only voice a child knows to use when they need help. Sometimes letting a consequence go is worth it to give them a chance for another kind of voice. I am not good at this, but I am learning. After all, isn’t this what God does? He gives me what I need instead of what I deserve, in order to draw me to himself and to work for my good. That is the kind of parent I want to be.

First Christmas

2017-12-25T00:15:00.001-06:00

A year ago yesterday I was up late getting ready for Christmas, to be celebrated on Christmas Eve. We were to have one hour with the kids who might become ours. Baking and wrapping and setting things out, a million emotions running through my heart and mind. Would this be our last quiet Christmas with two young children? Would we have several more children next year? What if we don’t? Was I hoping and wishing for what life might hold...or grieving for what might no longer be? Or both and all and everything in between.

One hour, sandwiched between our traditional Christmas morning at home and celebrating with my family. An hour which ended with this sweet little girl who I knew in my heart to be mine having to be literally pried off of me, begging to stay with me. Walking away listening to the shrieks, leaving my children in a facility instead of being in our home, a part of our family - or any family - for Christmas. Everything out of my hands at that point, unable to even promise a next visit. It was easily one of the hardest days of my life. Filled with uncertainty and emotions and tears.

That was last year. Tonight I kissed my little girls goodnight. All of them. Tonight we set out seven place settings for breakfast and filled seven stockings. There are still plenty of emotions to go around, but the uncertainty is no more. Tomorrow we celebrate Christmas as a family of seven. And it feels just right. ❤️

What it takes

2017-12-16T11:59:00.001-06:00

Right now I have a pulled muscle (again), a bruised hand, aching knee, I’m sore all over, and I am on day five of a headache. I am weary of being kicked at and screamed at and yelled at and hit at. Of things being thrown constantly, kicked, torn apart and damaged. Of being told how I care only about myself - by the one for whom I chose to spend my past 12 months wrecked. Having hatred and rage and anger spewed directly at me. Only at me. Only because I am mom.

My days are spent in a fog. Either I am spending hours managing an irrational and escalating child...or recovering from the adrenaline surges of it all. I can’t just walk away from it and continue my day where I left off either. My brain simply can’t think straight and my energy is sapped. Possibly sustaining an injury or two. Always scrambling to think through how to respond next. Or how to avoid the need for me to respond because my calm responses are all used up.

I love everything about Christmas. This year I am wondering if we will make it to Christmas Day with our family intact. Nine days left. Nine days of a child trying to cut her losses and get her Christmas taken away already so she can quit dreading losing it, in spite of anything we say. Indefinite more days of a child trying desperately to break me. To prove that we were going to give up on her at some point anyway.

It feels impossible to see her as she is through what she does. We haven’t settled down in four months. I am weary, my other children need me, and I cannot continue functioning like this. Yet there is no other solution. In the end, no matter what we do, it will always come down to me and this child. Either she breaks me or she does not. I do not have it in me to love her through this. I do not have it in me to hold on through the hurricanes. I do not have the patience or the fortitude or even the love to get us through. Only God can do in me what needs to be done to get her through. If I can stick it out just long enough, she will stop trying so hard to push me away; I’ve seen it in her and I know this to be true. If I can be the safe mother she’s never had, she might one day believe that a mother can be safe. If I can love her right through the storm of hate, she may finally, eventually recognize love for what it is instead of all the things it has masqueraded as in her life. I do not have that kind of love. It isn’t there. It does not exist in me. Yet it does exist in Christ. It is the love that gave us Christmas. The love that drove him to the cross - while we were yet sinners. The love that whispers grace to our hearts in the very moments of our darkest sins. That which ignites hope in the midst of hopelessness. The love that gave himself for the very ones who rejected, abandoned, mocked and killed. This is the kind of love he calls each of us to walk in. Not just me with my child, but you in your own life. And he does not ask of us what he does not promise to supply. It is not in me. It is not in you. It is all from him.

I can stand on that truth, even while everything else falls away. His love IS strong enough to hold us together. I know this because it is his strong love that has held me to himself right through the rages of my own life. If his love can keep my wayward heart in his, then it can certainly teach my heart to love like his.

This is the very essence of both Christmas and adoption, is it not? To take the love given to us by a Savior who took us at our very worst and loved us to himself - to take that love and offer it to another in the very same way. He offered his very life for us, to the point of death. No exceptions, no limits, his love and unending grace stands open to any who will accept it. May we, by his great power, learn to love as he does in order that those who we love will see the love greater than ourselves.

A Year Ago

2017-12-12T23:01:00.001-06:00

A year ago I posted the song below on Facebook. I posted it in between nerve-wracking emails that were leaving me an absolute emotional wreck all day.

Those emails led to an outing that evening. The evening one year ago today when we met three of our children for the first time. We drove away from that first visit utterly overwhelmed. The VOLUME and ENERGY level was overwhelming. The obviously high level of needs were overwhelming. The thought of the drastic changes we were contemplating for our family. The weight of the decision that had the potential to change everything. Forever. The sheer insanity of the idea.

We met four strangers that night. Within a matter of weeks, three of those strangers were living in my home and calling me Mom. We could have walked away and said it was too much for us. Because it was. But we both knew. We couldn’t actually walk away. It was too late. We had seen their beautiful faces, heard their anxiously chattering voices, looked into their eyes as they studied us wondering if we might be kind - sure we couldn’t be trusted. That night God was asking of us the impossible. They were not the first children we had met. We had said no before when we were not the right home. That night, however, we knew that walking away would not be an option this time. No matter how crazy it seemed. Because these children were our children.

Last week we went on a wedding anniversary trip for a few days without the kids. Since getting home I have done little beyond managing the self-sabotaging behavior of one of our children who struggled with us being gone and is trying her hardest to prove that she doesn’t really need me by pushing me away. It is exhausting. These past months, particularly since finalization, have been even harder than I dreamed. To be honest, I wondered what to even write about today’s anniversary. What does one say after literally hours of managing a grieving, conflicted child who masks fear as rage, spewing hatred at you, and trying desperately to break you? “One year today! To celebrate, I spent nearly the entire day battling a child. I’m so glad we are here!” Not exactly the feeling that comes to mind.

Yet here we are. A year ago we had two beautiful children. Today we have five. Five little people (one not so little!) who, without hesitation, call me Mama...Mommy, Meemee, Ma, Madre, Moooooom. Who make me get well cards when I am sick and hug me every day and trust me enough to cry their tears. There is a light in their eyes that wasn’t there a year ago. We have watched confidence grow in beautiful ways. I have grown myself in leaps and bounds. They are making me become a better person - albeit slowly and as a result of shining bright spotlights on my weaknesses. We share a name; we share our home; we share our struggles. It might take 20 years for our one daughter to believe we won’t leave and we won’t abandon and we won’t throw her out...but like I told her today, at the end of those 20 years we will still be there. Possibly haggard and worn. Definitely stronger and more patient and with a far greater understanding of our Father’s grace.

A year ago I awkwardly, nervously met anxious strangers. Tonight I kissed my daughters goodnight.

“Letting go of every single dream

I lay each one down at your feet

Every moment of my wondering

Never changes what you see

I’ve tried to win this war, I confess

My hands are weary, I need your rest

Mighty warrior, King of the fight

No matter what I face

You’re by my side

When you don’t move the mountains

I needed you to move

When you don’t part the waters

I wish I could walk through

When you don’t give the answers

As I cry out to you

I will trust, I will trust

I will trust in you.

Truth is you know what tomorrow brings

There’s not a day ahead you have not seen

So in all things be my life and breath

I want what you want, Lord,

And nothing less

…I will trust, I will trust,

I will trust in you.”

https://youtu.be/n_aVFVveJNs

Are you sure?

2017-06-12T12:50:00.001-05:00

When asked by an acquaintance how things were going, I honestly answered that life is busy and overwhelming. Later in the conversation, I mentioned that the adoption should finalize sometime this Summer.

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

I laughed. “Well, it’s a little late for that now.”

“Not really. You could change your mind. I mean, foster kids are used to being moved anyway, right? At least that’s what I have read.”

“They don’t get used to it. Every time they are told they will live with someone forever and then are moved, it damages their brain’s ability to form relationships.”

“Yeah, but you know what I mean. They kind of get used to that.”

“No, there is not really any getting used to that. Yes, they expect it, but that’s the problem. Every time changes their brain more. The only thing that will correct how their brain responds and allows them to have relationships in the future is for someone to not pass them on. For someone to stay.”

“But are you sure you want to do that?” She prodded.

“We already made that decision when we brought them home. When we chose to bring them home as our children, that was us making a commitment to them. The same kind of commitment as saying “I do” at the altar for marriage. There is no decision now except to stick it out no matter what.”

“I just don’t understand it. I really don’t.”

No, I suppose she really doesn’t. Foster children are not theory or philosophy. They are not a news article or a book. They are children. Little people. People with hearts and minds and memories and hopes and fears and dreams. They have friends and family and loved ones – even if they can never see them again. They have names and faces. We have spent six months creating memories with our girls, spending our every day together. There is no such thing as saying, “Never mind. I want to go back to how things were.” There is no going back as if you did not just build relationships, such as they are, with three individuals.

The first time we met our children, we were overwhelmed, overstimulated and terrified of the idea of bringing these strangers into our home as our own. We knew it would change everything and our life would never be the same. And we knew in our hearts that it would be impossible for us to walk away. These were our children. They are our children.

Technically, yes, we still have a choice. The papers have not been signed; they do not yet bear our name. This life we have chosen is hard. It really is hard. There are many days when a large part of me wishes I could run away from the heartache and overwhelming exhaustion of it all. But there is no running away from your own children, your own heart. They walked into our lives and into our hearts and we were right: we are not the same. Everything has changed and I am honestly overwhelmed by it. And I would never go back.

All These Things

2017-05-28T19:10:00.000-05:00

“But rather seek ye the kingdom of God; and all these things shall be added unto you.”

I feel responsible for so much these days. I feel the weight of responsibility to teach and train and clothe and feed and de-escalate and diagnose and connect and grieve with and piece together histories and hold and love and attach…and carry in every way the children who have been entrusted to me. And it is heavy. So heavy. The weight of it all is crushing when held on shoulders not created to bear it.

When I finally asked God what in the world I am supposed to do with all of it, this was his answer. Seek first his kingdom and all these things shall be added. All these things?

The dirty floors and the paperwork and the diagnoses waiting to happen? The piles of dishes and laundry and the vanishing food that I can’t keep up with? The research and therapy and handwriting that needs to be corrected? The tantrums and tears and the weeks when everyone is coming apart at the seams for days on end? The balancing sensory loads and energy outlets and reading practice? The heaviness of the diagnoses and evaluations as they come in? The weight of the case files and disclosures and decisions that will effect your child for years to come? The process of attachment and exhaustion and being desperately needed when you have absolutely nothing left to give? The grieving and anxiety and long nights and hard memories? The navigating minefields you don’t even know exist? All these things?

But rather seek the kingdom of God.

Adoption has broken me as I have tried to carry the weight of a load he never asked me to bear. He asked me to seek His kingdom and to love his children with the love that he gives through me. He asked me to trust him with their every need, as he loves them more than I ever will. He offers mercies, new every day. He promises all sufficient grace. All these things will be added.

Attaching to near strangers who take everything you have plus some (and then some more after that) is hard. Making big decisions on a regular basis is hard. Normally small daily decisions becoming big ones as you maneuver fragile emotions is hard. People around you not understanding that is hard. Handling meltdowns out of nowhere and disruptive tantrums and frequent tears (and more tears, and a few more tears) every. single. day is hard. Feeling pressure to respond perfectly to it all is hard. Undoing years of trauma, literally rewiring brain connections, and catching up on missed developmental areas is hard. Nothing about life being normal (neither your own normal or the standard normal) is hard. Going to great lengths to create felt safety, and scrutinizing the smallest changes and every event or outing through that filter is hard. This life is hard.

But seek his kingdom, and these things will be added to you as well. All these things.

I don't want to continue to strive for the impossible. I do, however, want to live an impossible life within his hand, by his strength and filled with his grace. Not my own. This is what I desire more than anything else.

“And you will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart.”

Jeremiah 29:13

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

Matthew 11:28-30

“Then Jesus said to his disciples: ‘Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?

‘Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith! And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.’”

Luke 12:22-31

If not us, then who?

2017-05-21T00:59:00.000-05:00

I had a conversation today standing beside the vinegar in a Walmart aisle, while trying to prevent my three year old from blocking every passing cart as he sorted the macaroni on the shelf. An acquaintance who does not know the Lord and who is aware of our adoption was simply baffled by our family makeup. The conversation went something like this...

Lady: "I just don't know how you do it."

Me: "By the grace of God and taking one day at a time. When it's your life you just do it I guess."

[Sometimes one minute at a time, to be perfectly honest.]

Lady: "I mean, you did choose it though."

Me: "Sort of. When God tells you to do something, you kind of just say okay and go with it. He was pretty clear about this one."

[Ignoring God seems ill advised. Ask Jonah.]

Lady: "But adding THREE children at once? Why would you do it?"

Me: "Well. If not us, then who? Who else is going to offer these children stability and a home? After all, why not us?"

This. This is the honest why behind what we do. If not us, then who? If not you and I, the church of God, then who else? Who else will welcome his beautiful children with open arms and an open door? Why not us? Because we are exhausted and don't have great health and already have kids and don't have experience and aren't wealthy and we have dreams (good dreams!) which include a normally functioning family and...and...and...yeah. We tried those reasons. We did. His response was always the same. If not you, then who? Who else is going to love them no matter what? Who else is going to let them fight and scream and cry and rage and still be there when they're done? Who else is going to laugh with them every day and notice that sparkle in their eyes? Who else is going to stick around long enough to find out who these precious people really are inside? If not you, you for whom the Father has looked beyond your fighting and raging and defiance and has sacrificed his own Son in order to welcome you into His own family by adoption...if not you, then who?

The how is Him. The how is always Him. The who, though...that is us.

A Glimpse Into Our Journey

2017-01-13T23:40:00.000-06:00

I really wish that I had the time, emotional energy and mental capacity to better chronicle our adoption journey. Here or in my personal journal – anywhere! I saw a mother’s journal that piqued the idea of maybe just grabbing a notebook and jotting down a sentence or two every day. Perhaps that might grab some of the biggest highlights and lowlights. I feel like I’m going to eventually look back and wish I had tracked SOMETHING beyond the legalities and paperwork. So here is an attempt at summarizing just a little bit of our journey thus far.

Some portions from my blog on January 2^nd, 2011

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"It is a safe thing to trust Him to fulfill the desires which he creates." ~Amy Carmichael

Amy Carmichael said well the thoughts which have been going through my heart and head in recent weeks. If God has placed a desire in our hearts, will he not fulfill the desires he creates? Will he not satisfy the longings he builds within us? I must believe so. Does ever he call and then fail to equip? Has ever he failed in faithfulness to those who take a step of obedient faith? I think not.

…All that to say, we are praying and working towards adoption - hopefully in the near future, though we do not know what God's timing will be. Whatever the timing, we do believe this is the direction we are to go. So we are doing what we can to prepare and to walk in that direction now, believing that he will open the doors when the time is right.

…Some may think us crazy (or naive) for jumping into this so quickly after getting married. Perhaps they are right. But I am okay with being crazy if it means allowing God to do as he pleases in and through our lives. I honestly don't know how soon things will start moving. It may be awhile yet anyway; but for now we are praying and preparing.

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Ah, yes. All that.

When I wrote that post we had been married just shy of a month. We would find out within approximately two weeks of this announcement that I was already pregnant (!). At that time I had no idea it would be six years and two children later before the door to adoption would finally be flung wide open.

We put off pursuing adoption when we found out I was pregnant. I remember when Addy was just a few months old it occurred to me that our children might already be out there somewhere (three of them were!) and that I could start praying for them then, even if it might be a long time yet before we met them. I wish I could say that I was consistent about this being on my heart and a part of my prayers. It wasn’t always in the forefront of my mind or prayers, but it was often.

When Addy was 10 months old we heard about three little girls who were waiting on a forever home. We made about a gazillion calls and then spent a good chunk of money to push through a private home study within two weeks’ time in order to be considered for placement, even though we were not technically licensed yet through the state. For whatever reasons their case was politically charged and we suspect Nathan’s job had a lot to do with us not being selected. Most of the next year was spent submitting our home study over and over and over. To multiple state, open to all ages and most needs. Nothing.

Finally we chose to try to have another bio child, as adoption was not looking imminent and we felt that Addy needed a sibling before she got used to being an only child for too long. We let our home study expire and started out on what would turn into an INTENSE two years of struggling through the complications of that pregnancy and Elijah’s infancy. He has been such a delightful baby and little boy. He’s had such a pleasant disposition even in spite of his chronic pain and difficulties. He introduced us to the life of digging for medical answers for our children. I’ve lived that for a decade myself; it is very different being on the parent side of it. He taught me that God can give very specific direction to get the help needed. That I could be stretched beyond anything I thought I could. And that we could make it through some intense seasons. Getting us out the door for therapies multiple times per week and driving hours to see the right specialist who could help us became a normal part of our lives. Those were foreign, intimidating things before…and then they just were.

Eventually he began to stabilize and we began to stabilize as a family. Early in 2015 we found out that a STARS class (required foster parent training) was scheduled for Saturdays, which could be a rare schedule find at times. So even though we were only barely coming up for air we decided to go ahead and take advantage of the more convenient class times so we could have it taken care of when we were ready down the road. After all, maintaining a license until we are ready is no big deal, right? We took the class with the intention of waiting about a year. Maybe the following Spring we might start seriously pursuing adoption. Turns out we are not all that good at waiting. As soon as the classes and home study were finished we started looking at the waiting child galleries online…and couldn’t help but start submitting our home study.

By Summer of 2015 we started visits with a teenage girl with whom we all quickly fell in love. Initially I really wrestled with the idea, but after spending some serious time praying about it I agreed to the visits. I’m so glad we did! Our time with her was so precious and we would have brought her into our home and family in a heartbeat. It broke our hearts when politics and Nathan’s job position once again wiggled their way in and completely slammed the door shut on our ability to have any relationship with her. The situation was taken entirely out of our hands and we were left with only the ability to pray for her from a distance and grieve the loss of what should have been our child. We were remodeling our newly purchased house at the time of doing visits. I still look at the walls she worked with me to paint and think of her exclamations, “This color makes me just want to hug the walls!” She never got to see it after it was all finished. I am so thankful for the memories we made over the few short weeks we had with her and I don’t think my heart will ever not miss the opportunity to have her a part of our family.

After that, we were pretty discouraged about the possibility of being able to ever adopt while Nathan worked for the state children’s division. He began seriously looking around for other job options as we wrapped up our remodel and settled in. After the high stress and physical labor of pushing through the remodel on a tight deadline, while Elijah was still not sleeping, my health totally gave out for the Winter. Thankfully, God again gave direction and guidance and 2016 was spent figuring out what I need to be healthy and then inching my way back. I’ve learned a lot in this past year about my many years of chronic illness. Throughout that season, the Lord was also working in my heart. Teaching me what faith is and that it comes from him not from within myself. I learned to begin to ask him for the faith to believe that he is who he says he is and that he will do what he says he will do. I still struggle to trust well, yet I am learning to bring that struggle TO him and ask him for the faith that HE can build in my heart. Eventually we started half-heartedly submitting our home study again. We wanted to be ready, but knew we were not quite there yet. Nothing came of anything until after my health had significantly stabilized.

Also during this time, we began to realize that what we had always suspected was almost certainly true: Adalynn struggles with sensory processing disorder (SPD) and for whatever reasons her struggles with that really peaked for awhile. This thrust us into studying and learning and seeking out those who are further along in the journey than us, with both adoption and special needs (since those so often go hand in hand anyway). In the process, it has totally reoriented how we approach parenting in general and her needs in particular. We have grown immensely because of it, as parents and as individuals. The difference in how I view people in general now compared to what I did even six months ago is amazing to me. I am thankful for the people God has placed in our paths to help us to grow in our understanding of a variety of needs and in how to respond to them.

In August, for the first time after an accumulative 2+ years of submitting our home study for literally dozens upon dozens of profiles we were actually selected as one of a few families to go for an interview to be considered for the placement of two little girls. We were uncertain about going for it with my health having been so poor so recently, however, after much prayer we felt like God was asking us if we were willing to say yes to him. So we said yes and asked God to either open or close that door as would be best. He closed that door and, surprisingly, I was mostly okay with that. Again, Nathan’s job had played somewhat of a role in make it a complicated situation and we wondered anew if he needed to find another job in order to pursue this thing we knew that we knew that we knew that God has put in our hearts. Again, God closed doors as Nathan applied and nearly got a new job.

In October of 2016, I took note of an email from our licensing worker with a profile. We had begun looking seriously again and had submitted our home study probably a dozen more times. Typically, if an emailed profile is not within certain boundaries I immediately delete or archive it and go on. What we will consider has been WIDE open, however, if it was more than 2-3 siblings it usually got immediately archived. For some reason I actually opened that one. Not only did I open it, but I really read it. In my memory, I thought there had been a picture enclosed in that first email – Nathan is certain that the picture did not come until after we had asked for more info. Which makes it even more odd that I paid attention (because, seriously, who can ignore a picture??). I have no idea what possessed me to even be open to considering it, but I responded and asked for the long profile with more info.

Long story short, we ended up one of two families who were considered for this sibling group. They needed to find a home ASAP so we didn’t have to wait long for the decision. Nathan, who had previously been open to larger sibling groups really dragged his feet about it this time initially, however, God really impressed these particular kids onto my heart so he prayed about it rather than write it off. I knew that whoever received these kiddos into their family, the kids will be such a blessing to them. That’s not *normally* my early thoughts when thinking about adopting a larger sibling group. No, my thoughts normally are along the lines of, “That would be crazy!” Still, I couldn’t help feeling like these kids are a gift and some family is going to be so lucky to get them. The Designed for Life conference was right about that time and the entire conference my heart was centered around adoption and, in particular, these children. Every prayer time, the cry that God placed in my heart and gave me the faith to pray was, “God, bring our children home.” Even though the case worker liked our home study and what little she knew about us, the team selected the other family purely because of the ages of our kids versus the other family’s. We were mostly okay with the decision, figuring that it must have been more than we could really handle – after all, FOUR kids!! Still, what God gave me the faith to pray at DFL became my reoccurring prayer for the following months: “Please, Lord, bring our children home. It is time. Bring our children home.”

Fast forward to December. Another emailed profile in our inboxes…only they were the same children that we had been considered for in October. We were devastated to learn the attempted placement had not worked out and that they were again seeking a home for them. It was so frustrating to know that someone had committed to the kids and then did not follow through. Again, we prayed, uncertain if we should even initiate contact with the case worker again and open that can of worms. God had closed that door already, hadn’t he? We cried and prayed and maybe panicked a little. Then after a few days, I called. One thing led to another and before we knew it, the team was asking if we would meet the kids. Yes. We met them and were overwhelmed by the number and the energy and the needs…and we left that visit knowing there was absolutely no way on earth we could just walk away now. More visits. More panicking and sheer terror at the enormity of it.

How do you even commit to something so big and so permanent when you cannot even fathom what forever means? Yet the Lord keeps whispering, “Will you love my children? Do you believe that I am big enough?” And you know your heart is already gone.

Prayer became like breathing. Day and night and night and day.

“Are you sure God? Is this a terrible idea? Can we do this?”

“You cannot do this. But I can. Trust me.”

“You will really, really be with us? Will your strength and wisdom really carry us every moment of every day?”

“Trust me.”

“Is it really you I am hearing? Or is this all in my head?”

“Trust me.”

“Okay, Lord. I trust you. Bring our children home.”

And he is. After six years, he really is bringing our children home. Oh, how thankful we are for the journey it has been. We are not the same people we were six years ago. We still have a long ways to grow (so long), but we are vastly more prepared than we were then. Elijah’s medical needs, Adalynn’s behavioral and emotional needs, Nathan’s job, my illnesses. They have all made us who we are today. We are still terrified and overwhelmed. The confidence in our spirit still wrestles with the fear in our flesh. However, as we get to know our children and begin with these baby steps of learning to become a family, we are also excited.

I have no idea what our future holds, except that we will certainly grow and that God will follow through on his promise to be with us. This is all new territory and all we have studied and learned and practiced over the years suddenly feels so insufficient. We have no idea how to be parents to our children or how to manage this transition for all eight of us (eight?!). There have already been hard things. Really hard things. Constantly I find myself thinking in my head as we face yet another scenario that should not even be: Adoption is not normal. It is common, but it is not normal. There is nothing beautiful about adoption. It is the piecing together of brokenness and trying to make sense of it all. It is messy and ugly and heart wrenching. Often there are no good answers and you are left to just pick the best there is and work with it. But our children are beautiful and our God is faithful and his redemptive story is working. I know there will be dark days ahead. Probably more than I can imagine. I also know there will be blessings of which I never even thought to dream. This IS crazy, this doubling our family and venturing into such a vast unknown. And these children are blessings. These children who have a hold on the heart of the God of the universe. And we get the awesome privilege to have these beautiful, beloved children in our lives. We get to be the ones to fumble our way through the dark days with them and, by God’s grace, learn to dance with them on the bright days. Adoption is brokenness. God’s redemptive plans are beautiful. And we are incredibly privileged as the ones he has called to be family.

Strong Enough

2016-10-22T23:18:00.002-05:00

I don't really know what to write. I rarely do when I begin. Rather like life in my experience. God rarely lets me in on more than the next step. The road ahead is usually obscured, with only the first step made clear. Sometimes that first step looks like applying for a job or getting an adoption license or submitting a home study. Or sometimes it is as simple as opening a blog and beginning to type. It is knowing the next right step, taking it and then trusting God with where it will lead.

In the past few months we have been led to take first steps in various areas at an unusual frequency and, as of yet, most (all?) of the reasons for those first steps are fuzzy and the paths where they may lead are yet unclear. Some of them we may never get to see in this life. It has been interesting to seek God and listen for his direction, step out with confidence and then...nothing. Repeatedly. Well, nothing visible anyway. I would be fascinated to know what has been going on in the invisible realm. Then again, maybe I don't really want to know! It is enough to know that God is working and he is moving in us. Whether our circumstances change or our external paths lead anywhere is not exactly the point anyway. Our hearts are changing and that is what matters. Our faith is being stretched and molded and shaped and I am glad for it. More than anything else I desire for my heart to be made steadfast in him. Life is hard. Some times it is harder than others. My greatest desire is to be firmly planted in him no matter the season.

I don't say this from a position of sitting in a bed of roses. It can be easier to share that God is doing work without sharing the struggles in the midst of it. Honestly, I have been really overwhelmed with life of late. For going on a month now, I come to the end of each day and my reoccurring thought is: "I feel like I've been run over by a steamroller." Pastor John posted on his Facebook today something about it being difficult to be spiritually strong when you are physically weary, so choose to rest. I wanted to cry when I read his post. Because it is SO INCREDIBLY TRUE...and I rarely have the option to not be physically weary. And he is right. It is so very difficult to be spiritually strong when physically weary. So very. I am glad that it is not all on me to be spiritually strong.

This week in particular has been rough. Physically, emotionally, spiritually, this week I felt like I was spiraling out of control, feeling the curtain of fog settle heavily on my brain and spirit once again. The smothering darkness that I have battled time and again amidst the unending fatigue and physical pain that are a part of my life. But grace. Unmerited favor. His grace has been strong enough. Again. There are no depths to which I can fall where he cannot reach me with his grace. Even if I have fallen there one hundred thousand times before. The whispers in my ear are not greater than his voice yet alive within my weary heart. It is not without battle, but as the song says: grace wins every time. Because I am his and he is strong and it is not by my own strength that I live. It is not by my own righteousness that I belong to him. In my weakness he is strong. Not in spite of my weakness. IN it. In the midst of my weakness his grace is present and strong. There is so much room for him to work when I am relying on him for each hesitant, tenuous, weary step. And he does. Because grace.

If you hear his voice calling, don't turn away because you are weak or because you are weary or because you are not enough. Take him at his word, step out past the edge of your own strength, and trust that his grace is strong enough. Because it is.

In our weakness, He is strong.

Clearing the Cobwebs

2016-10-02T18:00:00.003-05:00

It is difficult to make my brain focus on much these days. Often it feels like a scattered blur inside my head able only to focus on whatever task is at hand - if even that. I am not sure how much of it is a result of my body struggling to sleep so much this past month (I am finally sleeping restfully more often, which is a wonderful thing!), or still adjusting to the restricted diet we are on, or some combination of hormones and supplements, or the fact that life itself has been genuinely scattered of late. Regardless, I do not like the feeling of sludge in my head and I am working on ways to clear it up.

Reading and writing are things that force me to think beyond the moment. They require enough focus that the cobwebs begin to scatter and my thoughts gain just a little bit more clarity. This is why I have done so little of it most of the last several years. I began this year resolved to read more - anything remotely edifying, as long as it was words on a page and was longer than a blog post. Simply because my brain needed to be exercised. I quit reading again through the Summer and now I am back to forcing myself to choose a book over another activity if I have some time on my hands. Technically, I have always loved reading, but reading really is work! Especially if it is anything of substance. The other day I listened to a podcast by Sally Clarkson where she talked about feeding our own minds and being in a state of continual growth ourselves in order to be able to teach our children well. Also, she referred to worshiping the Lord with our "mind, heart and soul" and that putting effort into keeping our minds active and fed is a part of doing that. It was the motivation I needed to continue following through on tasks and ideas which feed my mind and direct me toward the fullness of a life lived for Christ. Not just in my heart and soul, but in my mind also. They really do go hand in hand and if one of those areas are neglected it holds the other areas back as well.

So here I am typing away at whatever comes to mind in an effort to exercise my mental focus and communication. I think that is one of the areas where I have struggled most both with my chronic illnesses and being a parent. My brain just...stops. And I let it because it is easier that way. Easier, at least, until I get lost in the fog of life and I can hardly think straight enough to keep my days and weeks sorted out and moving in a moderately stable fashion. The daily rhythm of keeping children fed and alive, the perpetual choices of how much do I push myself before I crash and where, trying to tame the chaos of life...it keeps me spinning until I no longer know which way is up. I am choosing to learn (albeit slowly) to press the pause button and ask God which way really is up instead of guessing and increasing the speed of the spin cycle.

If you can at all relate to this struggle, here are some things I am doing lately to help clear the cobwebs:

- Listening to podcasts, as mentioned. Listening regularly to a series of podcasts is one of the best things because I don't necessarily stumble on trying to find a topic of interest. I simply listen to the next one in the series and usually find it holds my attention anyway. The fact that it makes doing housework more interesting is an added bonus.

My current favorites: At Home With Sally (this is seriously like having tea with a wise friend and a breath of fresh air all rolled into one), Focus on the Family and Family Life Today.

- Reading.
Picking up a paper and ink bible; there is something about reading the familiar, well-marked pages of my real bibles instead of a bible app on a screen.
Downloading free books as I see them on my Kindle app and choosing that over facebook in down time.
Purposefully opening the few books on our shelves that I have not yet read.
Frequently getting new children's books from the library so that I can enjoy and engage in reading aloud to the kids.

- Listening to worship music. Before I had kids, I listened to music AAAALLLL the time. Then once I began the life of perpetual multi-tasking that is parenting, I stopped almost entirely. It was too much to handle at the same time. Thankfully, my kids are now getting old enough that I now have frequent periods of time where I can handle the added stimulation of music and it is so refreshing to my heart and soul. My most frequented Pandora station is Lauren Daigle. The songs speak so much life!

- Refreshing old skills. For me that comes in the form of working a bit on the side again. Office work and some content writing. Sometimes it is hard to get my head in the game when I need to, but overall it has been refreshing to dust those parts of my brain and refresh my skills in these areas. I really do not want to let my skills stagnate to the point of one day being useless.

- Learning new skills. Confession: I watch a lot of cooking competition shows. I really do glean so much from them and I try to implement new things that I learn as I go. I would love to take a real cooking class one of these days to learn better techniques and improve my knowledge of flavors and seasonings.

- Organizing my life and getting some of the scattered areas out on paper. Making some simple goals for the week and planning a reasonable schedule instead of stumbling through it because everything is up in the air. Often lately it really is all up in the air and there is nothing I can do about that, but written lists can help sort and prioritize the chaos anyway.

- Last, but not least, writing. Facebook statuses killed my blogging years ago. Why write a whole blog when you can throw out your paragraph-sized thoughts at any time of the day or night? I am going to try to get better about saving some of those thoughts to develop into something worth writing. In the meantime, if I pull out the laptop and tell myself "Just start typing. ANYTHING." then I'll continue to manage to get some things out there. :)

Not On Our Own

2016-09-17T14:44:00.001-05:00

I have been reading a Kindle book called, “Trees Tall As Mountains”. The book is a compilation of excerpts from the author’s blog. Initially I downloaded it because it was free and I was fairly skeptical about it holding my interest. However, the author? I get her. Her writing style is familiar and she seems to process life similarly to the way I tend to process. I do not write very much anymore, yet every time I read her book I end up with my life floating around my head in blog style. That has hardly happened for many years! Reading her simple writing makes me want to write. So here I am, writing. This is mostly for my own purpose of processing and practicing putting things into words again, but perhaps some of it will speak to someone else as we go.

This has been a week.

Sunday, I woke up fried from the birthday tea party we hosted for Addy and all the preceding birthday activity. It was fun and went well, but I was tired. I debated going to both church and life group. Then I went anyway. I met new attendees at life group, had a delicious breakfast-for-dinner and was encouraged through our discussion and prayer time.

Monday, I crashed. I yelled at my (whiny and also crashing) kids, struggled to keep everyone fed and we generally dragged through our day. Then a nap happened and we woke up ready to face our day – even if it was 3:00 in the afternoon. I read aloud while the kids played outside, we cleaned up from the birthday party and then ended the day with a relaxed date with Nathan. Naps are amazing things.

Tuesday, I woke up in pain after only four hours of sleep. At 6:30 I was certain I could hardly get out of bed for the day, never mind get the kids and me all out of the house so I could go work at the office with a probable migraine heading my way on top of it. Then I did. And my headache never made it to migraine status. After all, sitting at an office desk requires less energy than caring for children anyway, right?

Wednesday, I had my first good night’s sleep in a week and a half. My plan was to rest and be with the kids and catch up on some laundry. I began thinking about when would be a good time to invite my Russian neighbor over for tea and God asked, “Why not today?” Well. Why not today, indeed? So I did. The day was spent putting dinner in the crockpot so I could not worry about it later (total flop, no one liked it), baking zucchini bread and catching up the house from being gone Tuesday. Knowing that I would never get everything done to have a perfect company setting, I simply prayed that God would make her feel welcomed and comfortable here in our home in spite of all that I lacked. You know, the little things like a perfectly cleaned house and the ability to speak Russian. And he did. It turned out to be a lovely afternoon. I don’t know for sure if God made her feel welcomed and comfortable, but I think he did…and, as God tends to do, he went beyond my prayer for her and put me at ease myself. We managed the language barrier just fine and now I have a new friend. Funny how sometimes we think that we hear God calling us to bless others when really he is as much calling us to step into a blessing for ourselves.

Thursday, began on the heels of a sleepless night. We had various appointments scheduled at 9:00, 2:30 and 7:00 and somewhere in there I needed to get groceries. As my morning began, I was sure that was an impossible schedule with next to no sleep and there was no way I could do it. Then I did. The kids were amazing at each of our stops, even when we stayed at one appointment for three hours! Well, unless you count Elijah’s whining, “Mommy, I still tired. Mommy, up me?” on repeat through. the. entire. grocery. store. All things considered, that seemed a reasonable allowance for a child who had been awake from 1:30-5:15am and then was repeatedly dragged out of bed to leave the house that day. We made all our appointments, got a brief nap slipped in the middle, met some sweet people, and were able to pick up the groceries needed as we began a restricted diet for the whole family; a diet that we are unexpectedly doing all the way through mid-December instead of the 4-6 weeks we had anticipated. As an added bonus, God recalled to my memory that a certain supplement had previously kept Elijah awake for hours during the night when I took too much of it while breastfeeding…right before I gave it to him at bed time. I HAD given it to him at bed time the night before. No wonder he was awake half the night! He slept much better that night.

Friday, started with Elijah getting up at 5am and I wondered why in the world I do crazy things like decide to have company three times within one week, on little sleep, when I am overwhelmed with adjusting to working a bit each week and struggling to keep up with the basics. I started to let myself get stressed by all the things on my plate and the house not being ready for company yet again. Until I reminded myself that this is a friend I have not seen in nine years, coming to visit me and meet my family – not coming to see my house or the clothes my kids were wearing. So I let the dishes go, dressed the kids in whatever was clean already and focused on the paperwork I needed to finish before they arrived. Then we proceeded to have a wonderful visit with wonderful people. It is a pity they happen to live on the other side of the world.

Sometimes you have weeks where grace is seen more tangibly than others and this was one of those weeks. Timely conversations, resolutions for problems brought to mind at vital moments, circumstances lined up just so, a specific sense of purpose for each day…and most of all the grace and strength needed to keep doing the next right thing. It is encouraging to see the blessings and favor that comes from walking in step with the Spirit. We are not on our own.

It was an exhausting week. It was a blessed week. And I probably ought to finally go get that laundry clean.

This Life of Ours

2014-08-01T22:58:00.003-05:00

We spent today at a day use area at the lake. The only other time we had been to that particular location, was the weekend of Nathan's first visit. Unless you count driving to the entrance, only to find it was flooded one Spring. Four years and two kids later, my, how things have changed! This week also happens to be the anniversary of our engagement. We spent the drive home tonight remembering. Remembering what was and pondering the changes that brought us to what is.

Four years ago, we were strangers finding our way into each other's lives. Today our marriage is built on the friendship that developed during that time. One time, marriage and children and becoming a family were things we talked about, dreamed about - a future we anticipated. Today, this is that future. We are living it. It is now.

Is this the future we imagined as we floated in the lake that day? Is it all we dreamed of through the twenty something years before we met? I don't think so. Not really. It is much more. Harder in some ways. Much less exciting. Much more daily. But mostly...we were not capable of imagining the reality of this life. This love with roots and history. The sleepless nights and seeing the world through the eyes of a vivacious little girl. The assurance of waking beside our best friend. Having our favorite person always at our side. A built in companion and partner and travel buddy. Seeing the world together. Seeing pure delight in our baby boy's smile. Sharing our hearts. Sharing ice cream. Listening to the ocean waves sitting beside each other. Listening to the shrieks and giggles of our little ones. Growing. Learning. Giving and receiving. And sometimes giving more. Holding our broken hearts. Holding our dreams. Beholding the gift of new life. In our children. In ourselves. In each other. In others. Miscommunicating and reconnecting. Weariness and rest. Sorrow and joy. Sickness. Pain. Wandering through dark nights, grasping a hand that is always there. Stumbling. Falling. Carrying. Always continuing. The anchor of a promise in the midst of storms. Becoming who God made us to be. Individually. Together. Becoming one.

No, I did not imagine the realities of this life of ours. I took a leap when I said yes and when we said I do. We knew we could not really know what forever means. But God did. God does. And we are learning.

Not for one second have I been sorry for this life we chose. This life God has gifted to us. Sometimes - often - I wonder how we are so blessed. I am not deserving, but I am thankful.

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails."

(1 Corinthians 13:4-8)

I'm Back!

2014-07-20T10:44:00.001-05:00

Okay, I have said this before and I will say it again. I'm back! It has been too long and I need to try to write again. On my list of blogs to come are a general life update and Elijah's birth story. If we are really lucky, maybe I will finally write Adalynn's too. Maybe. We shall see what else tumbles out from this chaos we currently call our lives.

Thankful

2012-08-03T09:59:00.002-05:00

It's funny how "normal" can become really wonderful when it's taken away for awhile. I have been realizing a lot lately how "normal" my life feels. There was a time when I wasn't sure I would ever be able to say that and I am so, so, so incredibly thankful for it now.

There was a time not too long ago when I spent more time in bed than out. Though I slept 10-12 hours most nights, my sleep was not restful and I was always utterly tired. I would work around 5 hours in an office chair, then go home exhausted. There were days when my fingers ached too much to type and taking a shower required more energy than I had. The physical exertion of bowling with friends would send me home throwing up. If I attended a dance, I could pretty well figure on spending the entire next day sick in bed. If the flu was going around, then I got it - and I got it harder and longer than most anyone else.

I remember those days well. But the great thing? I'm not living them anymore! You know what I can't get over? The fact that I have not had a really restful night's sleep since the end of my pregnancy, a year ago...if I can get 3 hours of sleep without Addy interrupting it's like a miracle...and I carry a 22lb baby around all day every day...and I *still* get more done in a day than I ever could before.

In the past few weeks I have: played tennis, rode bikes, gone swimming and kayaking, gone for walks, and done some P90X workouts. Do I get tired? I'm always tired! Do I get sore? Are you kidding me, I am so out of shape. But I can do it. And I can get up the next day and do it again. And I don't throw up because of it.

I am still randomly nauseated; I still have down days or weeks; I still get headaches regularly; my blood sugars are wonky; I often have stomach aches and other digestive issues; I can hardly eat enough to keep up with a nursing baby, which just makes everything worse; I am tired all the time and some days I would do anything to have just one night of restful sleep. But I am functional. Which is something I will never, ever take for granted! It makes me almost giddy when I realize that I can function on a daily basis like any other normal adult!

For the first time in my adult life I am in a position to choose where to spend a fair amount of my energy...it is not entirely spent by simply surviving. In some ways I feel lost and it has actually been a struggle for me lately, trying to figure out what in the world I want to or like to do beyond survival. It sounds weird, but it's true.

So anyway, I've been thinking about this a lot lately and have been feeling very blessed. I still don't know what was/is wrong with my health, and I probably never will. But between prayer and taking steps to keep up with my general health, God has brought me further than I hoped possible. Thank you again to everyone who prayed and encouraged me during those really hard months and years!

While I hope I never have to go back there, I can't say I wish I never went through it. As I have said before, I was able to know a side of God that I likely would have never known otherwise. Some of the most precious moments in my life were during those times of being completely alone and sick, when God's presence was real and his love sweet. I was so utterly dependent on him during those months. There is a part of the intimacy of dependence that I really miss now that it is so easy to get swept up in the busyness of life. But I am thankful that he is the same God, regardless of my circumstances. He is still God. He is still good. He is still able. In all things and through all seasons.

5-Week Rotating Menu

2012-07-06T18:35:00.003-05:00

I finally made myself sit down and write out a rough draft 5-week menu rotation. I say rough draft because I will probably tweak it as I find new recipes we like. Partially because I'm bored with our normal and partially because I would prefer to reserve some of these easy meals as "fall back" for days that don't necessarily go as planned.

But I needed someplace to start - needed something to immediately curb the needless stress and annoyance that happens every time we're running low on food and I'm once again forced through the endless torture of meal planning...or worse, shopping without a plan :p

So here is my basic plan to get me started. Note I did not specify which day of the week each meal is for because I prefer to plan around the busier days in individual weeks. Nor did I add a lot of detail or specify sides, which leaves it open for variety (i.e. chicken enchiladas vs. beef). I also left one day open per week to try a new recipe in order to keep things interesting. If we particularly like something then we can add it to the rotation. Frankly, we won't likely have a leftovers night, since we usually eat leftovers for lunch...so if we happen to be home for dinner all seven days, then that would more realistically be titled "scrounge" night. But "leftovers" looked better in writing ;)

Let me know if you have any great meals that are not on here...maybe it will become our new favorite!

	Mexican	Pasta	Crockpot	Veggies	Other	Something New	Leftovers
WEEK ONE:	Fajitas	Lasagna	BBQ Meatballs	Salad	BLT
WEEK TWO:	Burritos	Chicken Alfredo	Chili	Stir Fry	Chicken & Rice Casserole
WEEK THREE:	Enchiladas	Spaghetti	Italian Chicken (Pinterest)	Salad	Grilled Cheese w/soup
WEEK FOUR:	Tacos	Tuna/pasta salad	Cheesy Chicken & Rice (Pinterest)	Stir Fry	Hamburgers
WEEK FIVE:	Taco Cornbread Muffins	Random Pasta	BBQ Chicken	Salad	Pizza

Freezer Cooking: Pizza Pockets & Breakfast Burritos

2012-06-13T09:08:00.004-05:00

I am trying to get into the habit of spending one day each week doing freezer cooking. At least on the weeks when we are not terribly busy. For me, with a baby, it is so much easier to spend an afternoon preparing one or two things in bulk, than trying to do an all-out 30 meals freezer cooking day. My goal is to keep our freezers stocked with individually portioned meals so we can have food in a hurry, but stop spending extra money on the expensive and unhealthy processed freezer meals from the store.

Over the past few months, I have made meatballs, various muffins and individual chili portions for the freezer. Yesterday it was homemade pizza pockets and sausage breakfast burritos. It took me a few hours to finish with a baby in tow, stopping every so often to change a diaper or lay down for a nap. Without her "help" they were fairly simple recipes and shouldn't take too long:

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Pizza Pockets

I used this recipe from MoneySavingMom.com for the pizza pockets. The only thing I did differently was to use white wheat flour instead of unbleached and I made the pockets larger - more meal size than snack size. I also find it much easier to pour a little oil on a cutting board or some wax paper than to deal with a flour mess when kneading and rolling dough. The pizza dough was super easy to make, but we have not tasted them yet so I can't tell you much about the flavor ;)

For the filling I used:

Sausage

Ground beef

Onions & green bell peppers (I keep bags of chopped onions and peppers in the freezer, so I just added a few handfuls while the sausage was browning)

Olives

Canned mushrooms

Pasta sauce

Mozzarella cheese


A quick photo of the pizza pockets that I snapped with my phone camera while they were cooling. They baked very evenly, but a little bit faster than the recipe time in our gas oven.

After they had cooled completely I wrapped them individually in plastic wrap, then stored them in a large tupperware container in the freezer. The result was eight large pizza pockets, with just enough toppings leftover for me to throw together a small pizza for me to eat this week :)

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Breakfast Burritos

I happened to have a few tortillas on hand, so I borrowed some of the meat mixture from the pizza recipe to make some breakfast burritos (this is why I used sausage and ground beef - to make it spread a little further than the one package of sausage would have gone). The only extra prep was to scramble eggs.

Filling:

Sausage

Ground beef

Onions & green bell peppers

Eggs, scrambled and seasoned with Mrs. Dash & black pepper

Cheddar cheese

I filled and folded the burritos, then let cool. It didn't seem to be a problem, but if I were to do it again I would let the filling cool before making the burritos, just to be sure the tortillas don't get soggy while cooling. I also took the advice of a lot of people online and did *not* add salsa, in order to avoid sogginess when they are defrosted. These are seasoned enough to be eaten on the go, but if they are eaten at home they would be great with salsa and sour cream on top...and maybe a glass of orange juice on the side!

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What freezer cooking have you done? Do you have any recipes to share? I am always looking for more ideas!

Play The Pause

2012-05-31T09:45:00.001-05:00

I have recently started teaching piano to a few of my younger siblings and several of my nieces and nephews. I am well aware that one of the hardest things to teach children on the piano is to follow the timing of a piece. To most children, including myself, the idea was to learn it well so you could play it fast. NOT to learn it well so you can play it slow. And rests? Those little symbols are not really serious about pausing mid-song, are they? Yet music composers do not flippantly slap rest symbols into the music, merely to annoy all those aspiring young pianists who play their music. No, they are used intentionally and with purpose.

A quiet, well-placed pause amidst a flurry of notes can heighten the impact of the notes around it and make a piece come to life. The timing and pauses are where the distinction lies between an amateur and a great pianist. Anyone can play the notes. Few will choose to play the pause.

I feel like our life right now is at a “rest” moment. The measures preceding have been rapid bursts of staccato notes – played fast, with little predictability. Then suddenly a pause.

We want to adopt, but due to circumstances beyond our control we must wait. We intend to homeschool, but Addy is still just a baby. Nathan would rather be in a different position, but it is not time to switch. We would like to live in a single-family house, but for now we hear the neighbors downstairs and share the yard. We know we are called to ministry, but for now Nathan is working on the schooling he needs to get there.

The question is, will we play the pause? We have been given an opportunity to rest from the last season and prepare for the next. Our daily lives have stabilized. Nathan has a job where he is gaining some experience in his field while finishing his degree. We have a steady salary. We are living near some family, in a decent house that fits us well. Though Addy is always changing, I am finally feeling like I am adjusting to being a mother. I am learning how to balance the different areas of my life and learning ways to be more efficient and effective in what I do in this season of life. We have time to enjoy our little family. We have people in our lives that we can minister to because of where we are right now.

We can strain ahead, trying to rush into to the next measure. Or we can enjoy the full count of this rest that God has given us. Right now, while there are no emergencies, no great trials, and little pressure – this is the time to tune our hearts to the still, quiet voice of the Spirit. We have nothing urgent pressing us against God. Nothing forcing us to our knees. Now is our time to gain a desire for who God is, rather than what he can do for us. To know he is near, even when all is quiet. To choose him, even in the stillness.

The thing about a pause is that it is not the end. The music is not over. There may yet be pages of music left to play. Any moment the next notes will come crashing in, breaking this silence; perhaps much sooner than we expect. But this pause, if played well, can usher the melody in with a deep expectancy. A readiness for whatever may come. Because we were given a rest and spent it within the abiding presence of Christ.

We can play this pause. Or we can miss it.

Fail-Proof Baby Sleep Solution

2012-05-30T15:32:00.003-05:00

After months of waking up feeling very unrested due to a baby waking up a lot, I have finally discovered how to get a long, restful night with this baby. It is really quite simple and so effective it completely surpasses any effects of teething. Here is the formula:

Day 1: Spend all afternoon playing at Grandma's while mama teaches piano lessons. Then stay home with daddy while mama is gone too late into the evening, so baby gets hungry and fussy for awhile.

Day 2: Play with cousins for a few hours at Aunt Stacey's house while mama and daddy have a date.

Day 3: Go to church, then spend the rest of the day at Grandma's house with lots of attention from cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents.

Day 4: Go to the park for several hours with a lot of family and strangers. Then go to the store. Then go to Grandma's house with more of the same family and strangers. Take some naps, but don't get home and to bed for real until 1:00AM.

Day 5: Sleep pretty well, but get woken up too soon to get ready to leave in the morning. Then spend all day at an amusement park with lots of people and noise and only a short nap or two.

Do all these things and baby will then sleep for most of 12 hours through the night, only waking about three times to nurse and immediately fall back asleep. Followed by a two hour nap soon after. This is a tested and proven theory. The result is a reasonably well-rested mother and child who are both more than happy to spend a couple of uninterrupted days at home.

Don't Paint Pink

2012-05-17T11:30:00.002-05:00

It has been a little over three months since we moved and the majority of the unpacking is done. The extra bedroom/office still acts as a storage unit for the yet packed boxes, but there are only a few other boxes lingering in the rest of the house. So my current “settling in” project has been curtains.

Curtains make me happy. I cannot explain it, they just do. Nathan doesn’t get it either, but he is happy that such a small thing can make my day (week!). I am too lazy to paint right now (besides the fact that we’re in a rental, so I’m not even sure if we can) and I don’t have a ton of décor, so curtains can do amazing things to bring color and a finished look to a room!

The down side is that the nameless person who picked the “neutral” wall color for this rental house…well…failed at picking a neutral color. It definitely has a pink tone that kills certain colors or shades. I am using our lovely deep purple curtains anyway for our room and it looks reasonable, but I am still at a loss for what to do with the living room. I tried a dark brown, but it darkened the room more than I like and the style didn’t work like I thought it would. Those curtains are going back to the store next week! However, I am hesitant to use a lighter tan/khaki color because of the wall color. I would so love to remove any pink hues from these walls! Lesson? Make sure your neutral colors really are!

As of now, I have collected enough curtains and rods for all the windows I am going to worry about for now. Except the living room, as I mentioned already. The trick now is to get them all up on the windows. Have I ever mentioned how much I dislike hanging things on walls?? Nathan was kind enough to hang several for me as a Valentine’s Day gift, but I didn’t have most of them yet. He really is a lot better at getting things straight and in the right place, but he doesn’t particularly enjoy it either. So this week I am trying to get over my dislike and get those rods on the walls. Two down. Six to go. Hey, it’s progress.

In the meantime, I need some input. For Addy’s room I am sticking with a clean, contrasting white/black theme, with an accent color. Partially because I really like that look and partially because it is easy to change out accent items if we end up being here for some time and have another child…like a boy. However, I don’t know what accent color to use. Pink would be easy, but *every* little girl has a pink room. Our room is deep purple with silver/gold. The main living area is all shades of red.

So here is my question to those of you have more decorating experience than I have:

Would it be too difficult to find matching items if I use a blueish-green color? Does it work to have slightly varying shades together? I know there are a million shades of teal, so that could be trouble. It is such a pretty color though! Plus, it is still girly while being a little bit more unique than pink.

And with that, I had better go get some things done with my day...like maybe hanging curtains.

Making Time

2012-05-01T11:26:00.000-05:00

Nathan says I should start blogging again. I say I don’t have time. He says make time. So this is me trying to make time ;)

Have you ever tried to “make time” with a baby-almost-toddler around? It looks something like this:

I think to myself, Ah, Baby is still sleeping. I am too awake to get anymore sleep, so maybe I’ll try blogging now. After all, if I get up now she’ll just wake up anyway.

Start up the laptop and get everything ready…just in time for baby to wake up.

Type a few words. Move baby hand away.

Type a few more letters. Delete all the 0’s she just added to the page.

Type a sentence. Realize she is hungry.

Type one-handed while feeding her.

Change positions so her foot can’t pound the keyboard while she nurses.

You get the idea. I guess I won’t get bored while I try to write anyway, right? Now that she is finally preoccupied by Mr. Teddy, I guess I’d better type fast!

I don’t have a plan for what I want to blog about. It is really just an attempt to get myself writing again. That, and perhaps have an outlet for the things going on in my heart and head. The last couple of years have been good, but also very full and often stressful. Unfortunately, I quit writing during all the upheaval and writing used to be one of my primary methods for dealing with emotional stress. Addy doesn’t like having an irritable mommy though, so we will see if this helps. That is, if I actually succeed in making time for it on a semi-regular basis.

I spend a lot of time reading other people's blogs while I feed a baby or wait for her to fall asleep. So I may be doing a lot of commenting on and sharing the interesting tidbits I find on other blogs or Pinterest. Even though I generally feel overwhelmed and behind, I have been finding more time lately to try new ideas and work on some projects around the house. Which has been great! Especially with Nathan on the South Beach diet right now, I am doing all kinds of healthy food experimentation! Sometimes it's scary...

Well, I need to get going with my day. We are leaving Thursday for a long weekend in Nashville, so I'd like to get as much non-packing stuff done around the house today as possible! It is always soo much nicer to come home from a trip to a reasonably clean house without loads of work waiting for me. I finally understand why my dad always made such a big deal about cleaning up the house before we left anywhere for an extended period of time. As a kid, who CARES about the dishes when we are leaving to go have fun?? ;)

Baby, kittens, fleas, car accidents, ministry...life.

2011-10-17T16:04:00.000-05:00

*sigh* If it's not one thing, then it's another. Trying to have a good attitude and just take things as they come...but, goodness, life can be tiring.

For the skim readers:

Our life of late has involved: Kittens (8 of them, actually). Open House. Bed rest. Baby Adalynn Grace. Emotional rollercoasters. Life adjustments. Major ministry/life decisions. Fleas. Car accident. Insurance hassles. Spiritual stretching and growing. An awesome husband, adorable baby, and a good God.

And for the long-winded readers who actually want some detail:

Early August, we rescued 6 young kittens and bottle fed them around the clock for a few weeks before they were old enough for wet/dry cat food. Oh, and that was after bottle feeding a couple of my parents' kittens for a day or two. Unfortunately, for various reasons, in the end only one survived. Trouble is a tiny, curious little thing, who fully lives up to his name. Thinking he's been lonely, we adopted a recently weaned kitten from my parents' cat to keep him company. So far their interaction consists of Trouble curiously trying to play and Lucy (twice his size) hissing threateningly and batting him away. Best friends in the making, I'm sure.

Mid-August we held an open house. About 75 people showed up for chili, children's games, visiting, and Contra Dancing. It was a fun day and we were thankful for their encouragement and support for the ministry.

But I guess transforming a monstrous house from a construction zone to being company ready - between work days - making nine crockpots of chili, preparing prizes & paperwork and hosting 75 people in our home must have been a little much. Two days later, at 35 weeks pregnant, I was having a lot of contractions and beginning to dilate, so I ended up on partial bed rest for the last few weeks of the pregnancy...

The following week, after two days of regular, time-able contractions, no progress had been made and we decided the baby *probably* wasn't coming quite yet. So I spent a weekend at my parents' house while Nathan flew up to Canada to attend his sister's wedding. I stayed down as much as possible that weekend, just to make sure baby waited until daddy came home! Thankfully, she did wait...

Until the day after daddy returned home - sick. Nathan got home late Sunday and promptly went to bed with either a flu or food poisoning of some sort. I was then 37 weeks and 2 days and Nathan was home, so the idea of bed rest flew out the window and I was able to take care of him that day. By the end of that first day of being up and around, my waters started leaking, which meant that we needed to get labor going for real (contractions had never really stopped for about two weeks by that point)...

So that is how we spent the next day. And the day after that. The amniotic sac seemed to have resealed itself by that point so we no longer felt that we HAD to make labor happen. So the midwife stayed one more night and we went to bed figuring whatever was happening might settle down while I slept. The sleep idea lasted about an hour and a half. Labor was finally progressing...

And about 12 hours of intense-no-break-contractions later, a 7lb, 12oz Adalynn Grace was born. When she was born, the midwives told her to cry (to clear out her lungs) and, being the obedient child she is, she proceeded to cry for about the next 24 hours. Perhaps next time they should be more specific.

Then followed the usual weeks of recovery and getting to know this baby. I'm happy to say, I have been enjoying this time with Addy and bonding more easily than I expected. I'm less happy to say that recovery wasn't so great, especially with weeks of daily headaches and stomachaches thrown into the mix. But, we were/are both generally healthy so I can hardly complain.

Since she's been born...
Life has been about as routine as Missouri weather and has felt about as solid as a water bed. Like I said, I *have* been enjoying getting to know my little girl. However, otherwise, it's been tough. Between not feeling well physically, exhaustion, post-pregnancy hormones, and struggling to get on some sort of schedule...it's been a little tougher than usual to take life in stride.

Yes, I have been around babies my entire life. Yes, I know how to change and bathe a newborn, how to calm a fussy baby, and how to use a car seat (they seriously have instruction manuals for those things). I've even done dishes, cooked dinner, paid bills and folded laundry one-handed while holding a baby. Yet, somehow, it feels like I am having to relearn everything I know in life right now.

I've always had the option of giving a crying baby back to its mother. I've always had the option of waiting to do something until someone else could hold the baby. I've never had my (very) limited hours of energy/productivity interrupted to feed a baby.

And I am only just now realizing that the functionality of virtually ALL of my relationships has changed to some extent. Add to the relationship adjustments the fact that I just quit working regularly after working the same job for nearly 7 1/2 years, and I was on bedrest for several weeks (before/after birth), and we recently moved just far enough away that it's no longer convenient for people to drop by anymore...I admit that feeling lonely/isolated has probably been the hardest thing for me by far. I'm definitely not used to being at home all the time. I love my baby girl, but sometimes it feels like she is about the only person I have much of a connection with anymore. And she's not much of a conversationalist so far ;)

Right around when Addy was born, the kitten had picked up a serious amount of fleas. Oddly enough, they didn't spread anywhere else, so I quit being paranoid about them. I figured it was probably because we let him in the house less frequently and he was only ever allowed on the hard floors. Until we made the mistake of getting a flea collar. The kitty feels better I'm sure, but the fleas suddenly spread like crazy. Even after banishing him to the outdoors (the poor thing felt so neglected), thorough vacuuming, being careful about clothing that's been in contact with him, washing bedding repeatedly...we still haven't managed to completely get rid of them. But apparently fleas are picky about who they pester. They have hardly touched Nathan, Bria or Addy. I am the lone, unfortunate person who has been perpetually attacked. Let me tell you, being COVERED in bug bites while recovering from pregnancy/birth = NOT fun. But at least I didn't have to worry about the baby; she has not had a single bite.

Oh yes, speaking of Bria. She moved in with us in early September. It has worked out very nicely for both her and us. She needed a good place to live where she could get away from life stresses, and we have appreciated her helpfulness. It's nice having someone else to hang out with occasionally too!

This last week I was just beginning to think that life could start finding some semblance of normalcy. Until a dump truck side swiped us on the highway this weekend. We had planned on picking up my eldest niece and nephew and taking them with us to see a show, then having a dinner date later. What actually happened was we spent most of the afternoon dealing with insurance claims and police reports. Which, as Nathan pointed out, was better than spending it at the hospital. Other than being a bit shaken up, we were all fine. Both Nathan and I saw it coming, but there was nothing we could do as we were caught between a big, old dump truck that was changing lanes without looking and a concrete barrier wall. It messed up the whole left side of our car, but it could have easily been worse. Not even any broken glass. Thankful for God's protection.

Unfortunately, cleaning up the mess isn't going to be as easy as we'd hoped. Turns out that the other driver's insurance policy was inactive. Which means we have to come up with a fairly large deductible amount and hope that our insurance company can get it reimbursed someday in the future. This morning was spent trying to figure out what to do about his lack of insurance, how to get our car fixed, and what to do about our lack of a vehicle until it is fixed. Fun, fun.

But on the bright side, we are all generally healthy, I have an awesome husband (who is also a pretty awesome daddy), an absolutely adorable (albeit stubborn and feisty) little girl, and a good God. The rest are pretty much all just details anyway!

And now I'm going to try for a shower, if I can, then get on to other Monday stuff.

Farewell until next time. (Hopefully sooner than two months from now!)