And the sun still shines....

I reread the last post, and am so thankful to have moved through that day and others like it, not that they won't come again. But, today is full of sun!

Grief is still there, but there is some peace too. Lots of confusion about where we are to go, but some bits of the road laid out for us. We will complete the homestudy, simply to be open for what God might have planned out. It would seem so silly to not complete it - we are within basically a signature of approval of having it done - all the background checks done, the physicals, the self-studies, and on and on.

The only catch is that since there isn't an imminent child, they want us to have a second bathroom instead of trying to get an exception for that. Not real sure how we will bring that about, but we will work on it. This week I will likely try to find someone who might work with us on this. I don't know how we will pay for it, or how it might work in our old house, where we might put it, but somehow God will show a way. The last estimate we had on it included running the plumbing up an old chimney that is unused. If you took pause at that, so did I. I am not sure that is a good option, but I am far from an expert on plumbing and all that. So, I am planning on several estimates to get several plans. Someone suggested an addition of a sunroom type room with a bathroom in it. We still have the issues of plumbing and how to run it as all our plumbing is on one side of the house! We certainly could use more room in the house! I will have to see who we can talk to about that too. It seems like it will all that needs to be done, that we cannot afford it, but surely we have seen God perform greater miracles!

And about miracles.....

Some acquaintances of ours from church own a car dealership and heard that our van didn't have heat - the blower motor for the heater was dead and though it was on the list, it wasn't at the top! Well, they asked to take the van and fix it for us!!! What a huge, huge, huge blessing!!!!!!! Talk about rejoicing at the house. How do you thank someone for that??? You pray for them every time you turn it on!!! And be very grateful and try to pay it forward whenever you can!

Well, they loaned us a minivan - small for our family, but we could get around - gratefully!

After about a week, we were all set to get it back - these friends had hooked up with friends of theirs from church who have an auto repair shop - and they all put their heads together and were worried about a few other things on our van - "U" joints were mentioned as well as some other things. So they asked to keep it longer to address those things. What can you do but say "Thank you!"?

A few days later, I got a call from the gentleman who owns the dealership. Well, the van is "pretty tough" as he put it, to which I replied that I knew that, but it was doing okay getting us around. It was what we could afford and got us through and we were thankful. Well, he reported that he had been looking around the state and 15 passenger vans were hard to come by - again, another reason we were grateful for what we had!

Going through my head is the knowledge that we have NO car payments and our vehicles get us from A to B.

Well, he said he had located a van coming to auction in a couple days, one that he had checked on and it was in good shape. It is a 2003 (ours is a 1997), and he is going to get to the auction and try to get it for us.

I am then trying to figure out how to gratefully decline as we just cannot do a car payment - we don't want to be dependent upon the future - we try to pay cash and stay out of debt. How do you gracefully decline?

But then he says that if he can get it, they want to trade us straight up for our van.

Silence on my part as my head just empties!

Huh? Our beat up, certainly in need of work over time, farm van that has hauled everything under the sun, van (that we are grateful for), complete with ripped up seats, a falling headliner, headlights that don't go the same direction, and on and on van - for a clean, nice 2003 fifteen passenger van?????? How can that possibly be a straight up trade??? There is no way that their value is the same! No way under the sun.

Except that someone really wanted to do this for us. For our kids, to bless us with every mile we drive.

Talk about being totally emptied, overwhelmed, numb, in shock, and amazingly grateful! I don't know that I can even accurately describe how I felt! Like outside of my own head - this is something that happens to others, in storybooks, not in real life. We work hard for everything we have, for everything we do, and gratefully. How can we be given something like this???

I tried to argue that the value wasn't the same, only to be told that "it isn't mine, I am just the manager, it all belongs to the one who created the heavens and the earth".

Humbled, overwhelmed, thankful, amazed.

In the midst of our pain, God sent a glimmer that He is still in control, and He has His plans and they are not finished. We are not abandoned, even though we walk through such pain and confusion.

So, last Wednesday the kids and I picked up the most beautiful van ever. Beautiful, loaded (CD player, tape player - we listen to lots of books on tape as we travel, cruise control, AC, HEAT that WORKS!!!, complete seats, and on and on). Sitting there numb, just looking at it.

I signed the papers, signed over "The Monster" - as the kids had named our previous van, and was handed the keys to this newer van!!!! Thanking these amazing people, trying not to cry, laughing as the kids clambered all over, checking it out, exclaiming over soft seats, claiming seats, and laughing the entire time. How do you thank someone for this?? Thanks and hugs and gratitude and oh, my!

Then to top it off, we were instructed to bring it back to the repair shop for all its service, it is taken care of by these two families who own these two businesses! For the life of the van! Huh???? More tears, more hugs, more thanks. The wife of one was so sweet, as we were just about to leave and things had quieted down some, she talked with me about our baby and how sorry she was. It was so wonderful. Those words all mean so very much to us. This was all in motion before he died, God certainly knew something.

So, it has been an emotional week.

And the sun is out. We are feeling better. Grief is grief. But, each day we walk with it and work with it. It is like childbirth pains, you have to work with it for the ultimate goal. It is there for a reason and if you don't fight it, but work with it, the job is much easier.

And so, a new week is starting!!!! We are up and at 'em and getting ready to head out to our Monday nursing home church service that we do and some errands. I don't work today and we are enjoying a total of three new baby goats - including a DOE!!!! For a dairy operation, that is the best thing ever!!!! We had the best night last night - the kids got into a squabble about who could look up Bible verses the fastest (huh, why argue about that??), so I challenged them to challenge each other and prove it. My head was pounding and I just couldn't listen to ugly voices - I never do anyway, it isn't allowed here - we don't talk to each other that way!

Well, they asked for more Bibles. Huh, we have lots of them.

Well, they wanted English Bibles for each kid (five of the kids have Amharic Bibles). Okay, we have lots of Bibles - so we collected them.

Well, then they asked if I would be interested in helping them.

Huh, what were they up to?

Turns out they decided to prove their points, but they needed someone to give them verses to look up!

OKAY! I'm no idiot!

So, I gave them verses to look up while all eight scrambled to find them! And then read them!

I was supposed to be helping Steve cook dinner - he looked at me and said "Keep going!" - neither one of us was going to stop THIS for chores! So he made dinner while we did this for over an hour!

Wow, was it great! Of course, the most competitive child won every time (I bet you know who if you know our kids personally), but eventually the ones who found the verse would then help the others find it and everyone took turns reading the verse and talking about what it meant!

Way cool!!!! Couldn't orchestrate that!!!!

We do lots of that with our life - taking advantage of the moment and capitalizing on it, and get way more benefit out of that than if I had tried to plan it out!

Have a great day! We are off to enjoy it.

Hugs and blessings to all!
Christy

Huh?

I am a bit confused this morning. I have a "friend" - someone I once thought a friend obviously - who is also an adoptive mom, who chose to comment on my kids in her blog. It was sad and hurtful, because she chose to say how she grieved for my kids that they left their homeland and the beautiful people there. It went on and on, and was not realistic about the life they lived there. And it was wildly hurtful to our family. Maybe I am being too sensitive, but given the events of this last weekend, our joy at our sons' friends finally being home with their forever family, it was just a very strange dichotomy.

I am trying to process this and to find the correct way to respond. The hurt heart inside me wants to strike out in anger and that is not appropriate. I want to set the record straight, but I am not at all sure that doing so in a comment on her blog would be appropriate.

And perhaps because we adopted older children, our experience is different and not so romanticized.

Don't get me wrong, I love Ethiopia. It is a beautiful place, with beautiful amazing people and an amazing culture. But I cannot look away from the things my sons tell me about things that are not so glorious. A child beaten and robbed of his shoes at 9, a boy locked out from his little hut for days at a time until his father finally arrived home drunk, a child scared and alone, hungry and unsure what was going to come next. Children whose parents died, whose older siblings, no more than children themselves, without any means of support, were trying to keep fed. Children for whom their only hope was the street, no food, no clothing, no nothing. People chewing leaves that were drugs, simply to keep the hunger away, but then addicted and harmed by it. I witnessed it and I do believe my sons when they share. When they open up, when the stories come, the mother in me so wishes I had been there so that didn't happen to them.

The reality of adoption is more balanced - our children's homeland and heritage is beautiful and I respect it, honor it, and welcome it into my home. And I also have to welcome my children's pasts. Their experiences, their hurts and fears.

So to hear that my children were pitied and grieved for because of what they left behind, was simply devastating. They did leave a great deal behind. They did. But it isn't gone. It lives on in them and us, and someday we all do hope to return. On the other hand, they gained a great deal. All I have to do is look at their growth charts in the few months after they came home! They are healthy, talented, valued, cherished, loved, and surrounded by a secure family that is devoted to them and their future as well as their past. They are part of a family, have parents and siblings and security.

When we were considering adopting again - particularly older children from Ethiopia again, I had a very long heart to heart with my oldest adopted son. I was very concerned - I know how hard it has been for him, all the changes, the language, the food, the culture, all of it. He has worked so very hard. I asked him very, very directly about his feelings about it. He agrees that it is hard, or as he puts it very clearly - it WAS hard. I had to fight back tears to ask him very directly if it was worth it. I had to be willing to face his answer whatever it might be. He was very surprised and went on to be very clear that it was very worth it, the best thing ever. I had to ask if he had to do it over if he would - answer was "absolutely". Knowing how hard it was, would he choose it again - yes. Would it be a good thing for another child - knowing all he knows, is it simply too hard? Too much, etc? A very sure response - it is very worth it, to have a family, to belong, to be loved. And that is what it is about.

Yes, they have "lost" some things. But they have gained a great deal.

What I grieve for for my children is that they ever were in the situation where adoption ever needed to be an option. I grieve that they went through what they went through. I grieve for all their hurts, all their past that was painful. I grieve that they ever needed to be placed for adoption. I grieve for that. That is the grief that I have for my children. Not for them coming here, not for them entering my family, not for them leaving their country.

I know that God has a plan for my children. I know that He orchestrated all things so they came to my family, to my home, at this time. I don't know why. I don't know what His plan is. That would be arrogant to even consider. But I do know that HE brought them here, that HE has a plan and a purpose. I know that HE loves them more than I ever could. I know that HE walks this road with them, with us, with the people left behind. If I get hung up in all the grief and obsession, then I am not living what God has asked me to live today. And today, I am the mom to five amazing children. I live in a house that is active, loud, loving and growing. I am so blessed to have my sons, to be stretched beyond what I ever could have imagined. God has changed us all in so many ways, we are simply nearly unrecognizable from who we once were. And I thank God for that every single day.

I don't feel that my children are to be pitied or our family to be viewed as having done something extraordinary. Our children are our children, who God made them to be, where God placed them. We didn't save our children. We didn't rescue them. Yes, their life outlooks are very different from what they might have been. Yes, I am so happy to know that my children are not going to go hungry, that they have love every day, that a mom and dad look after them, that they are healthy and strong. Children who are orphans need help - God has called us to the widow, the orphan and the fatherless, the least of these. But, my children are no longer orphans. God has lovingly placed them in families. God has provided for them.

So, I don't grieve for what they have "lost". I rejoice in who they are, in all that God has done in their lives, in all that He will do in their lives.

We serve an amazing God, one who knows the entire story, who sees it all. Someday I hope to be so honored to see how all of this has been woven into God's tapestry. It is my prayer to be a part of God's amazing work, in our own small way. I will raise my children for the Lord, in the Lord, and in love. In love and security, in faith and family, so they can go forth and carry that on in their lives. I have no idea how many lives they will all touch, how they will move the world, but I have no doubt that they will! And I am so grateful to have been a part of it.

And NO, I don't pity my children! I rejoice for them and with them.

Sad day on the farm

It has been a long couple days since the surprise birth of the baby goat, and at 4AM last night, after a very long night of tending to him, he passed away. Not only was I crushed, but the thought of telling the children and seeing their faces was just heartbreaking. I still don't know how to say it, but I feel like I let everyone down. I didn't do enough, or try hard enough, or did the wrong things. I did everything I knew to do, I don't know what else could have been done. But the feelings are still there. How do we deal with grief, and maybe the major component of the grief is guilt?

Steve just read me a news blog about an artist in Great Britain (forgive me if I get the details wrong) who committed suicide after aborting her eight week old twins. Her note indicated that she died when her babies died, that she didn't want to do it, and that her babies needed her and no one else did. I cannot imagine first of all, why she went through with the abortion, but second of all the extreme guilt when it really comes home to her what she has done. I may have failed the goat, but I didn't actively kill him. I didn't seek to take his life, didn't willingly take life. I may not have done the correct things to save him, but I did not want him gone. And the guilt I feel is over an animal, not children. If I feel like this, then how devastated was this woman?

Once again, there are several victims of abortion - the babies, the mother, and the father. What will it take to make us realize it? Maybe the victims don't always realize it right away, or ever, but they are carrying that weight. That guilt. At this point, I am praying and hoping for another chance at a pregnancy, what a different place to be from that mother. I am constantly watching my body to determine if I may have conceived. Careful about what I am eating, taking all the right vitamins, avoiding whatever I can that might be harmful or questionable for a baby. And I very likely am not pregnant. So right now I have to view it as a gift to myself of better health. And if I do discover that God has blessed us again, then I know that I have done whatever I know how to do.

I look back to the days I considered myself "pro-choice". Though I always said that I would not choose it, I thought that it should be a choice. What a fool I was. Before I even conceived my eldest, my mind had started to change, maybe God once again working on my stubborn heart. And as soon as I saw the double pink lines, my heart was forever changed. That was a baby, my baby and it deserved life more than I did. I had made my choices, the baby had not. It had not made mistakes, willingly done bad things. The baby was the one to be protected in that relationship. How do you go and make that life the villain in the situation? Where in any kind of logic is it the baby's fault? Is it the baby's fault that this pregnancy is an "inconvenience" or "problem"? Or that it will cost more to raise a child or whatever the argument is? Where does that logic fit? If you choose to have sex, protected or unprotected, within or without a relationship, pregnancy is a very likely outcome. Sex creates babies. That is the fact. It might not every time, or most times, but that is the biological purpose of sex. So, if you don't want a baby, don't have sex. Period. Whether or not you use "protection" or not, whether or not you think it is your fertile period or not. That is it. So, if you don't want to be pregnant or for your significant (or not so significant) other to be pregnant, for parenthood, or for choosing to give the baby to another family through adoption, then don't have sex. That is it.

What a strange way to end a blog. Fits with the day. Time to head out to feed chicks and watch for the hay delivery, and to continue to ponder.