Rituals

Every night we have our sweet little bedtime rituals.  I lather everyone in coconut oil and we put on Jammies, then either a dance party, story, or show (depending on Mommy's energy level).  Then we brush teeth and set out for each kid's individual routine.  

First I set Mollie up with books in her bed and tell her I will be back.  Then I head into the boys' room to hand out books & set their iPod to a book on tape and promise to come back to give Charlie hugs, kisses, and high fives. 

Then I head to Grace's room to snuggle, sing 3 songs (typically Twinkle, Twinkle, La La Lu, and Jesus Loves Me), tuck in her 4 million stuffed animals, and say the Lord's Prayer.  

Then I head back in to kiss Henry and then Charlie tells how many hugs, kisses, and high fives he wants.  Typically it's 10, 10, and 5, with the occasional fist bump for good measure.  

Lastly, I head into Mollie-Moll's room.  We snuggle and sing Jesus Loves Me, and pray she sleeps all night long in her own bed (very.important.prayer).  Then I let her pick which song on the IPod she wants to start off with (always Lisa Loeb's Twinkle Twinkle but she still scrolls through the entire lullaby playlist I made). Then I give her a kids in her palm and say "Where's Mommy's kiss?"  Then she waves her sweet hand and I cradle her face with it.  Then she kisses my hand and cradles my face with it.  It is very dear.  

And just as we have gotten this routine running smoothly, I think we may have to change it up.  Because now we have a boy willing to read everyone a bedtime story.  

Snow Day Parenting 101

We woke up this morning to about 2 inches of snow.  Not enough to really enjoy or even to cancel/delay school.  But enough to mean wet, dirty laundry and three littles chanting, "Mommy, can we go in the snow?"  And since they're too young to just send out in the snow alone, that means Momma must also go in the snow.  Yuck.  

So when they began playing in the snow after bus stop, despite being ill prepared in the clothing department, I thought, "Whatevs.  I don't care.  I'll be doing laundry and mopping soppy floors all day anyhow."

So here's my parenting lesson:

APPEAR TO BE THE BEST/MOST FUN MOM IN THE WORLD FOR TEN MINUTES AND YOU MAY JUST GET A MOVIE DAY WITH COCOA AFTER ALL.

I know you're telling us to get our gloves and hats and boots, but the snow is here now!

What, Mommy?  You mean leggings aren't waterproof?

 "It's not cold!" said the little Congolese boy.

Guys! Guys! Dere's snow everywhere! Follow me to da snow!

"Hey Mollie and Charlie! I have the best idea ever!!!!!!"

No, Charlie.  We should definitely take our shoes off to jump in the snow.  This is the MOST FUN!

Come on, everybody!!!

Wahoo!  YIPEE!  Dis is da best!  We not do this in da Congo!!!  

Mollie: Wee!  I love da snow!!

Grace:  I think there's snow in my panties.  

Charlie: Mom, my feets is wet.  

Charlie:  Oooh, Momma,  I is cold.  I'm freezing.  I hate da snow! I AM FREEZING CARRY ME INSIDE!!!

Mollie:  wee!  wee!

Insert massive meltdown of all 3 and me carrying all three back inside.  

Mommy, dis da best way to play in da snow.  With the hot chocolate and da snuggles on da couch.  

Yes, Charlie.  I agree.  Snuggles on the couch rock my world too.

How to love the crazy adoption people...

My dear friend Lisa, along with her family, is in Lithuania.  They have adopted the adorable Asher and Annalise, 4 year old twins.  Asher and Annalise join sibling Adeline and Alden.  These friends are precious to us.  We met them only a year ago through a mutual friend but it was an instant love connection.  Our husbands get along; our kids want to marry one another.  And we all love Jesus and adoption and pizza from Costco.  (You, know, the trinity of important things…)

Anywhoozie, Lisa is about to come home and I’m just reupping my blog and I thought I’d reflect on our first few weeks home in order to help her.  Most friends, though well meaning, have zero idea what it is like to bring an older child into your family through adoption.  It is foreign and so those well meaning friends often do harm when they mean to help, or worse yet, do nothing at all.  So here is my version of how to love an adoptive family.

First of all, read Jen Hatmaker’s How to Be the Village.  Jen does an excellent job of setting the stage of what adoptive family’s go through after the big hoopla of the airport moment. 

Many people will say “Oh, you went from 2 to 4!  It’s like you brought home twins from the hospital!”  Um, yes, but a bajillion times harder.  It’s similar because your expenses doubled and you are sleeping approximately 2 hours a night, but that is really where the similarity ends.  Babies are pretty easy.  You have a baby and people expect you to be tired and bring you stuffed animals and meals and the world’s cutest socks but really all you are doing is wiping poop, producing milk, and watching Netflix whilst the smooshy balls of flesh sit still where you put them.  I mean, a baby doesn’t crawl under the bed in defiance right before your in-laws show up to meet their grandchild for the first time.  A baby can’t lob the remote at your head or stand on the kitchen table or forget that you said to not eat the soap.  You bring home two preschool children and despite the fact that you are getting no sleep and these kids don’t know what you are saying nor what it means to be in a family, everyone asks you to meet them at a park and to touch them like they’re the newest addition to the petting zoo… “Ooooh, their hair is so soft, I never expected that!” 

Ouch, Elizabeth, now it sounds like I will just screw it all up, when I want to love my friends.  What can I do????

Make meals.  We were blessed with meals three times a week for close to two months.  There were so very many days that I’d been up for so long and spent so much time in “come to Jesus” meetings on the time in couch that I couldn’t form sentences, much less a meal. (And did I mention that while I was in those time-ins with one child, the other children were unfolding the five loads of laundry I’d just folded while we watched Cars two times in a row.) A couple of weeks ago, I was so proud because I’d planned this yummy crock pot meal.  I’d set the table!  We were using real (not paper) plates!  I’d even managed to sweep up the cereal from breakfast, so our kitchen was neat.  And then it was around 5pm that my darling husband noticed I’d forgotten to actually turn on the crock pot.  Y’all, I would’ve cried, but by this point, I was so used to dropping all the ball all the time that I realized from now on my role as Mom was to just roll the ball.  I could no longer juggle. So we went out for pizza. 

So cook.  And make something normal, please.  No lentil salad or tofu lasagna.  It does the family no good if you bring over some wackadoo meal and they still have to order pizza to feed the family.  Because chances are they’ve already had pizza three times already this week.

Do the grocery shopping.  If you live near the family, whenever you go to the grocery store, text your friend.  Sometimes you picking up a gallon of milk or another 8 pack of yogurt will save the day, and really, how hard is that?  Things that would be a blessing to a just home from the airport family:

-milk
-cereal
-frozen pizzas (are you recognizing a theme here?)
-eggs
-kid friendly yogurt
-oreos
-goldfish (and other “pack in lunch” items especially if they have school aged kids too)
-bread
-rice
-deli meat
-spaghetti sauce
­­­-bag of salad
-paper plates
-small plastic cups (not giant 16 oz solos, but ones for kids)
-paper towels (seriously!!!!)
-kids’ band-aids
-fruit: bananas, apples, grapes, clementines, strawberries (things that are healthy that can be offered to a child that has known starvation at anytime without a parent having to feel guilty)
-ice cream
-beer
-wine (lots!)

Fold laundry.  Come over one night after the kids’ bedtime and offer to watch TV and fold laundry. Most likely, your friend will first refuse this offer.  Offer again.  Say, “How about I just fold the kids’ laundry and linens?  You won’t even have to say words or think or even help, you can just tell me how you like your shirts folded and stare off into the mid-distance.”  A friend did this for me and I still cry when I think about it.  In fact, I hired a friend to come for a couple of hours every week just to fold my laundry and vacuum.  Adopted kids often regress in the potty department so it is not abnormal for the addition of adopted kids to multiply the laundry exponentially. Maybe your friend thought they were potty trained but they aren’t.  Or maybe they don’t know how to wipe and so even though the kid is going in the potty, they still have to change clothes 47 times a day.  Or perhaps the kid is so ecstatic about having their own clothes that they don’t have to share with anyone and drawers to call his own that the child changes clothes every 5 minutes.  Your friend knows she should probably say something but a)how can you blame a kid who has had so little for so long, and b) that would probably require moving and/or dodging a shoe.  Or *cough, cough* maybe a child who has been in the home since birth with the addition of two new siblings has suddenly lost the ability to go pee and poo in the potty but also refuses to wear pull ups because she’s been in panties for over a year. 

Check in.  Send texts.  Most likely your friend is lonely and starved for adult conversation.  And possibly homicidal because of all the pee and poo everywhere.  That said, don’t assume that because things are hard they regret their decision.  Or maybe they momentarily regret it.  With a lower case “r”.  Which then makes them feel guilty and horrible.  So don’t say things like, “What?  Is it harder than you thought it would be?”  Because more than likely your friend has spent hours researching and training, but when the time comes, no one really knows what to do when your child screams and thrashes and throws whatever loose object they can find at your head for 45 minutes because you dared to strap them into the car seat. And don’t say things like, “Well at least you are now together!”  Because that completely negates your friend’s feelings.  It’s like telling a woman with severe morning sickness she should be thankful for the puke on her shirt. 

Your friend has done things she never thought she’d do in these trying times—let the TV stay on 24 hours (hey—it’s teaching them English!), gone to the pharmacy in pajamas, yelled at the kids so loudly her throat was raw, seriously pondered nudism as a means to reduce the laundry, driven around aimlessly for two hours because all of the kids fell asleep in their carseats, cussed out her spouse, given the kids bubble wands then locked them outside, and locked herself in the bathroom with her phone (that candy isn’t going to crush itself). 

Whatever you do, DO NOT GIVE PARENTING ADVICE unless you yourself have parented an adopted child.  It’s so very different.  And it’ll make your friend want to punch you in the face.  You know how it’ll take ten minutes to get out the door with your kids, so you just say, “Fine then! We are leaving without you.  Goodbye.”  You can’t say that to a kid who has actually been abandoned.  To a kid who has been abandoned or orphaned through death, you can’t send them to their room when they misbehave.  They’ve already been sent an ocean away from everything they know.  Every parenting decision, every consequence given,  must be done through the lens of trust-building, relationship affirming.  So when you see your friend offer a do- over to a kid who just hit her because he’s mad, don’t say, “Oh, in my house that would get a whoopin’.”  Because more than likely, your friend’s adopted kid has already had more than his fair share of whoopins’ and your friend is trying to both earn her kids’ trust and also teach him the appropriate way to deal with his anger and disappointment.  Kids who come from hard places have this intense internal struggle.  How do I grab on to this new family while grieving the loss of my first family?  How do I suddenly accept help from a parent when I’ve done it all on my own for so long?  How do I accept that these people are telling me I’m precious and adored when the circumstances of my life tell me differently?  These are very difficult and adult and complex emotions being sorted out by teensy tiny immature people.  It's no wonder there is crap everywhere.  (Gosh, why won't she stop talking about poop?)

Send your friend money, gift cards, jewelry.  No really.  Money because adoption is expensive and more than likely, your friend has at least 10k in debt.  And the need to pay it off isn’t helping your friend relax in the 2 hours a day she gets alone.  Gift cards because your friend needs a million things from Target and WalMart.  She needs pants because their newly home child has gained 7 pounds in two months.  Baby wipes because one of the children put two bins of wipes down the toilet.  A plunger (see previous sentence).  More Doritos, because, well, just because.    And getting to go shopping without having to price out every little thing is such a joy and Target has baskets that three kids can be strapped in so it’s the closest to normal your friend has seen in awhile.  And jewelry, because, y’all, she needs it.  A dear new friend gave me the cutest Stella and Dot studs yesterday at church.  Just because she loved me and wanted me to feel special and loved.  Oh my goodness.  I may not have bathed today but on my ears are the loveliest pair of sparkling earrings reminding me that Jesus sees me and is for me and so is my buddy Nicole.  Even if I can smell myself, especially when I can smell myself.  

We’ve been home almost 4 months.  And this crap is still happening.  (Though, honestly, a lot less.  Or at least the kids have gotten used to the car seats and now all sleep in their own beds.  Most of the time…)

Ok, so now you are thinking, holy heck!  What did my friend sign on for?  Why on earth would anyone adopt?  Go into debt and get shoes thrown at me? No, thank you.  Because while it is the most difficult thing I’ve ever done/am doing in my life, it is also the most joyful.  There are days it feels like death.  But even those days bring me closer to my Jesus than ever.  I know what my adoption cost him.  It was bloody and precious.  And well, this holy calling of adoption puts our family in this raw place of genuine living that it’s almost a high.  A joyful intensity that can only be accurately described as bordering lunacy.  Unbeknownst to him, I think adoptive families are the ones Keroac wrote about:

“the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones that never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes "Awww!"

We aren't Dead

So, it's been three and half months since we brought Mollie and Charlie home.  I haven't written much because a) I am so very tired, b) um, I have four kids 6 and under so there is no time, c) I feel like so much of our life right  now is sacred and private and not my story to tell, and d) I spent a good bit of that time in a cave of post adoption depression afraid of myself of other people. 

So, you know, the usual.

I can say that it has been HARD.  Hard for all of the reasons listed above and also because my dear kids have experienced trauma and that's just difficult to wade through.  Heartbreaking really.  But redemption is always bloody, right?

All that said, I am blessed.  Beyond measure.  All 4 of my kids are hilarious.  And our life is bursting with so much life.  And life is always loud and messy and sticky and joyful.  I don't do anything half-assed.  So this integration of family has been approached with my whole ass.  And sometimes I fallen flat upon it. 

Never the less, if you wanted to buy me this shirt in a pink XXL, I'd love you forever...

So the looks of this blog are going to change.  I'm not quite sure how that is going to look just yet.  I've considered just disbanding it entirely, but I want to document some of our lives.  I'm thinking now it might just be pics and random conversations.  I can't do weighty blogs about transracial adoption or ethics  or attachment parenting or any of that other serious stuff that I spend a lot of time praying and chatting about because I just don't have the stomach to wade through that as well.  Plus, there are already people doing that well.  And I'd just be noise.  (If you don't read Kristen Howerton's blog Rage Against the Minivan, you should.  Like Jen Hatmaker, I like to pretend Kristen and I are besties because I follow her on facebook and we are in some transracial adoption groups together.  I'd love a complete new blog design, but that's not in the "let's get rid of the adoption debt and also have money to readopt the kids and get their citizenship" budget.  So we will just have to work with my playing with the layout button for a few minutes change.  Unless YOU want to make me a new pretty template.  :)

The Lord is not Slow...

Wow.  It’s been almost two months since I last posted.  And these months have been insane.  Pretty sure we’ve experienced every human emotion, sometimes simultaneously.  Why?

Well remember in June how I told you that there was a teens tiny chance that we might not have to wait until the end of the summer for investigations to be completed?   That if they were completed sooner that maybe we’d get to travel this summer?  To be honest, I only half-heartedly prayed this would be the case.  But, 48 hours after our living relative interview at the embassy, we received an email that our investigation was complete!  We had visa appointments in July, which meant we would be traveling in July to pick up our children!  Wahoo!

We booked a hotel room.  We booked plane flights.  We furiously packed.  And packed.  And weighed bags and repacked.  We scurried around finding perfect money newer than 2006 with no creases, marks, or tears.  (Because few places accept credit cards and apparently, they only like perfect US money.)  We hosted missionaries to the Congo who helped us pack and prepare for life in Kinshasa.  We gathered groupons and gift cards for Henry and Grace to take with them to our friends who were keeping them.  

And then about 48 hours from the time we were supposed to leave we heard devastating news:  Charlie’s passport application had been lost by the passport issuing office and so, obviously, the kids had missed their visa appointment.  We were suddenly forced to decide to push back our tickets and pay change fees and the difference in fares or cancel them all together, pay fines and get partial refunds. We tried to push back our hotel reservations, but always knowing there was no real way to know when exactly his passport would be issued.  Or if the embassy would be able to reschedule our appointment in a timely manner.  We were one of the first appointments scheduled for our agency under the new immigration policies, so to some degree, all of us were swimming in unchartered waters.  And the water was deep, dark, and churning.  

To say we were sad and angry would be an understatement.  There was a sense of us reliving every miscarriage and the loss of Emma Sloan all over again.  Because you should just know that waiting adoptive Mommas are so very much like pregnant women in their emotional (in)stability. But not only are we wrecks,  we are loony while also under intense financial strain.  So much fun for everyone!  (Bonus points are that you can drink while waiting during adoption.  And you should.)  

Henry and Grace even buckled under the weight of our grief.  I oscillated between snapping at everyone and crying out of sadness and shame.  We tried to find someone to blame: each other, our agency, the system, the embassy, the Congo, God.  At one point, Sloan awoke to the sound of me crying and cussing while in the shower.  He asked, “Ummm…is there someone in there with you?”  I replied, “I’m yelling at God.  Sure, there are bureaucratic delays, but ultimately He is in charge.”  Sloan said, “Okay, well maybe lay off the f-bombs when praying.  You’re a grocery cart and a pint of booze away from being a hobo.”  

But in the end, we knew the truth:  there was no one culprit behind our delay—this was just life in a fallen world, bureaucracy was slow and orphans got the short end of the stick.  

But this was God’s plan for our family, and He would derive glory in our delay.  I delved into the Psalms.  Ever grateful for David’s words which were f-bomb free but still spoke my heart.  Psalm 22 was ever on the tip of my tongue:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest…Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to help… I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint.  My heart has turned to wax; it has melted within me. My mouth is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you lay me in the dust of death.

And in the midst of David’s distress, David ends the psalm in the future tense, knowing that one day God’s people will proclaim He has done it!  So while I was upset with God’s tarrying, I knew He would bring my kids home.  

But when?

After much delay, we FINALLY got Charlie’s passport.  So then it was time to re-appproach the embassy and ask for another appointment.  During this time, we continued to beg God for patience.  If there was a verse on patience in the Bible, I was clinging to it, thinking if I just prayed the right prayer, God would make me okay with these delays.  That if I just trusted Him enough I’d be all zen and peaceful and could return to business as usual, complaining about my first world problems like too much rain and forgetting my grocery bags as opposed to yearning for my children languishing in an orphanage.    That if I could just learn the lesson that God was trying to teach me, all would be well and we could proceed.

But then God gave me 2 Peter 3:9.  At first glance, I kinda dismissed it.  Perhaps God was not trying to teach me about myself.  (Wait?  You mean it isn’t about me?)  Perhaps it was not my own impatience God was trying to reveal, but rather, His own patience with me.  That I can and should continue to pray Come quickly, Lord Jesus!  Hasten the day when my faith becomes sight and there is no more death or mourning or tears or orphans!  However, I should also realize that He tarries not because He is forgetful or distracted or angry with me or stuck on Candy Crush level 208 (for the love, people!), but because He is patient and He is not done.  He is waiting so that more of us can experience forever in His fullness.  His love is so great, it empowers Him to wait for us.  

Y’all I can’t even comprehend that.  Love so big it is pleased to wait? 

So we wait.  Not because we are pleased to do so, but because we really have no other choice.  We have new visa appointments for next week.  We hope to travel mid-September.  About 2 months after we first thought.  But I do get to be here for Henry’s first day of Kindergarten

.

How can you be praying?

-For no more hiccups in our process.  For the embassy appointments to go well and for our visas to be issued quickly.

-For the next steps in country to happen quickly. 

-For our new travel plans to be able to happen:  I am planning on travelling solo and then Sloan will follow up about 12 days later and then we will all fly home together, thereby maximizing Sloan’s PTO stateside.

-For me to figure out how to divvy up our supplies.  Before I had everything split evenly between 5 bags.  Now I have to basically put every necessity in 3 or pay loads in extra baggage fees.  So that’s 100 lbs less!

-For Charlie and Mollie’s health.  Charlie has lost some weight and has begun to ask for us.  Our boy misses us and is ready to come home to us! 

-For us to continue to trust God to provide for us.  Each delay has had both emotional and financial cost.  The changing of the plane tickets cost $1600.  So basically the entire amount raised during our CFA fundraiser. 

Settled (lessons learned in 2012)

I’ve written this post a thousand times in my head.  So much that now it seems I really feel like I’ve already said it all even though I haven’t written a word.  But here’s the shorthand version of what I’ve learned in the past year or so.  The little tidbits God taught me about Himself, myself, adoption, and life in general.

Don’t Feed the Crazy.

I’ve said it before.  Crazy is like a gator on a golf course—feed it and it will hang around and eventually will bite you in the bum.  Ignore it and it’ll leave you alone and, perhaps, go away.  This advice holds true whether it’s your in-laws, some yahoo commenting on Facebook, or even that little voice in your head.  Just let other folks be crazy.  It’s not your job to make them sane or correct them.  Leave the room.  Block the feed.  Tell that voice to sell crazy somewhere else.  Life is short and you’ve got real stuff to deal with.

There’s Dr. Pepper in the Dr. Pepper Can

I have been known to lose my temper.  Because the kids don’t listen, because the seat was left up, because all I asked was for him to take out the recycling and it’s still on the back porch.  But guess what?  I’m angry because I have anger inside me.  I can’t be made angry.  It’s already there, bubbling under the surface.  And I have to own that and repent.  Then, and only then, am I able to quietly return to my daughter and ask her to try again to come when called, to remind Henry about bathroom etiquette, and calmly say, “Hey, I went ahead and took out the recycling but please try and get to it next time, thanks.”

And the same goes for other people.  It helps to ignore the crazy if you remember that it has nothing to do with you.  Or even the topic at hand.  Scripture describes it this way “Out of the overabundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.” (Matthew 12:34)  So when someone is angry with you, remember, it’s about them.  They’re just angry.  You don’t have to soothe them or fix it or convince them to calm down.  Generally, if you just listen and try to figure out exactly what it is that let the anger out, you can love them accordingly.  

And when dealing with a toddler’s anger, remember this sage parenting advice:  Don’t negotiate with terrorists. 

Less is less and that’s More

When we moved, we purged a lot.  A lot.  And after the move, we purged some more.  I seriously have no idea how we had so much stuff crammed into the old house when the new house is literally twice as big and still it was too much.  

And I’ve purged elsewhere.  I was just doing too much to be the kind of parent, wife, daughter, friend, and follower of Jesus I want to be.  Every time I say “no” I’m saying “yes” to that.  Though I feel as though I’m introverting a bit, it feels right.  It feels like home.  I have room to breathe.  My main ministry is to my growing family.  That is who I’m serving.  

I’m a Stay at home Mom, and that’s enough

Since I’m a missionary to my kids, I need to treat that with the same level of professionalism and respect that my working friends treat their jobs.  It has value and meaning, even if it only has benefits and no paycheck.  If I’m too busy doing other stuff, then I’m slacking on my job.  Yes, yes, I still facebook and Instagram like a madwoman, but that’s generally in the carpool line or while sitting in time out with one of my little terrorists.  

Patience doesn’t mean liking to wait and Impatience is a sign of mistrust

After the loss of the referrals of K & N, I felt at peace.  It was like I had been splashing about just trying to keep my head above water until then and then we just sunk.  We drowned into Jesus.  And we were fine.  More than fine.

So it has been easier to wait on our adoption journey.  Because of our agency’s unwillingness to participate in unethical practices in a country full of corruption, they won my trust.  I trust our case worker completely.  I know she will keep me in the loop.  I can rest knowing she is advocating for us and our family.  And I’m happy to report that not only is all of our paperwork is in the DRC and we have a court date at the end of January.  We are on track for hopefully traveling this summer to pick up our kids.  

But don’t confuse this with liking the wait.  I’m just trusting that it will happen when God deems it appropriate.  Because when Henry complains that I’m not bringing him a snack fast enough, all high pitched and whiny, it tells me he doesn’t believe it’s going to happen.  And in his case, I do sometimes forget.  But God does not forget me.  He is for me.  He is for my family.  Our names are written on his heart. 

I will say that I owe a lot of these lessons to our new house.  The flow of it just calms me. And the knowledge that we will never move again until it is time to pay someone to bathe us makes me happy. We’ve got a huge basement and a great yard, so to be clear, the kids are elsewhere a lot.  That makes my mothering a tad easier.  But they’re playing and jumping and running around like banchies til they fall asleep in their new Ikea beds.  We are beyond blessed.  Beyond.  Our cups runneth over.  More than enough for our two newest little loves. 

8 years and change…

A lot to update you on.  I hope to post more details about most of these things in the future, but for now, I’ll simply say:  we are in the process of accepting a referral of a sibling group, Henry is super sick, we are ending our adoption fundraising efforts, we are putting our house on the market and moving.

I promise I’ll say more about all of these in later posts.  But the short story is that the referral we are accepting is EXACTLY perfect for our family and yet different than we first envisioned.  I mean, we started this journey thinking we were bringing home a Chinese toddler with mild cerebral palsy.  Now we are adopting 2 children from the Congo, a boy who just turned 5 and a girl who is 18 months old.  This has made us realize that it would serve our kids best to move now and not a couple years from now.  We need to provide as much stability as possible for our Congolese son as this has been a pretty rough year for him thus far.  And because we want to make sure that people know their donations are going towards the adoption and not to our “buy a bigger house fund”, we are stopping the fundraising efforts. 

Do I still have supplies to make frames and some wreaths to sell?  Yes, and you can buy them and know that it will all go to the adoption.  Will I solicit donations of toys and formula and mosquito nets before we travel to donate to the orphanage?  Yes, but that is more for the kids than us. 

Part of the reason we have done fundraising is because we wanted to invite others to love orphans alongside us.  And I still want to send out that invitation.  Adoption and orphan care is such a clear picture of the Gospel that I truly believe you can’t really “get” how much you are loved by God until you take a peek inside the world of orphan care.  It is a peek inside the very heart of Jesus.  I will always cry from the rooftops “Do you want to see Jesus at work?  Here.  Pray for this orphan.  Make a meal for this foster family.  Send this kid a mosquito net.”  I can guarantee that both your life and the life of a child will be forever improved with these simple actions.

It is also true that we still have 4 plane tickets to buy and other traveling costs, all of which will total over 10k.  And that’s a conservative estimate.  If folks want to consider donating airline miles, I will make that information available when I have a clearer picture of what our actual travel needs will be.

That said, I don’t want to post pics of our new house or write about how I’m pretty sure I’m high right now from all the noxious fumes in our current home and receive harsh judgment.   (We resealed the driveway yesterday and had the mustard yellow shower in our master bath refinished this morning.  It’s like a giant bottle of nail polish made out with a gallon of tar.  It’s awesome.  Thank God for our whole house fan.  Too bad it is 90 degrees outside.)

 I don’t want to have people go all “Why were they asking for donations to adopt when they clearly have enough money to mulch their natural areas?”  (Because in my mind, that’s what rich people do.  Mulch over their natural areas.  And by natural, I mean the places they haven’t been able to grow grass.)  (Also, I can answer that question--bank loans.)

So it’s a whirlwind here: packing up, meeting with handymen, gathering adoption documents, trips to Lowe’s, middle of the night sick sessions, and talking to realtors and oh yeah, IT IS MY 8^TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY TODAY!

We are celebrating by cancelling our babysitter and our reservations and packing up the living room so we can paint it.  And spraying the aforementioned natural areas with Round Up.  And letting the kids watch hours of movies because Henry is so sick that this morning he puked on me.  As I was cuddling him in the doctor’s office after his strep test.  Oh, and did I mention that the vomit was bloody?  And all down my back?  And then he stood up and puked on my feet?  

But the honest to God truth is, I wouldn’t have it any other way.  (Well, I’m sad Henry feels so yucky.  But thankful to be his Mommy.)  

It is easy to have romance over Fried Green Tomatoes with a Pimento Cheese and Peppadew Aioli or tableside Bananas Foster.  But a marriage isn’t about how well you love one another at candlelit dinners on your honeymoon.  It’s about being forgiven for the thousand times you snap at your spouse because you are certain he is snoring just to spite you.  (He is.  He confessed.)  It’s about the fact every time my dear husband leaves to go out of town early in the morning, he kisses me goodbye, affixes a love note to my alarm clock and makes sure there are plenty of Diet Dr. Peppers in the fridge.  It’s about learning when to feed and when to starve your spouse’s brand of crazy.  When to encourage dreams and when to rein them in.  When to just forgive the lost temper  without having to talk about it and when to step back and rehash each and every word so that real reconciliation can occur.  You never count your money while you’re sitting at the table.  Wait, no, that’s not marital advice.  That’s the gambler.

Well, my darling Sloan, eight years and counting, I’m still all in.  You are my ace I plan to keep.