it's one of those days...

I sent a text last night that read:

Pray for us. It's getting rough.

Can you imagine only knowing tolerance? People endure you, but never encourage. People notice you, but never listen. People permit your presence, but never empower your voice. The romantic notion of adoption is quickly wiped away by day in and day out life of living with a child who has never known the true love of a family.

Love can overwhelm. Emotions suffocate. Trust is built moment by moment, coming close and then running away. Hugs turn from timid to hesitant to real. Love must be tested, pounding hard to determine if it is trustworthy. And then, with your hair frazzled and your resolve withered and your kindness thin, you are rewarded with one of those hugs that only a momma knows, those hugs that melt into your entire body, and you think you might break under the heartache of it all, but you know by grace you can manage the strength to handle the weight of a haunting history.

Sleep is supposed to restore. Sometimes, though, the love must be tested the following morning. Perhaps it was just a dream. And so it begins the next morning and you just might wonder if you will have enough gentleness and joy to sustain a love that must be tried again and again.

Yet, I feel peace. It is a peace much bigger than I am, and I know this is from Him who cares more for his children than I can imagine. My hope isn't to get this parenting-thing right, my hope is I won't do more damage.

I steel myself for another long afternoon and evening of constant push-backs and redirecting and reminders to choose kind. I remind myself it takes time to heal. I cling to the truth that we are exactly the family we were created to be. I know these growing pains will yield more joy than is fathomable.

And then a miracle happens. His spirit yields and the boy we have only glimpsed shines brightly. He pays his consequences. He learns when he makes positive choices good things come his way. He licks the beater from the cookie dough. He makes us laugh at dinner. He graciously hands over his video game controller when he loses the match. He hugs his siblings at bedtime.

And they hug him back. "I'm glad you're my brother."

I blink back tears, knowing this is one of those days when miracles happen. Just when I wondered if I am capable of being the mother they need, I'm granted the vision God has for our family...eventually.

There is still much work to be done by the healing hand of God. I'm sustained because tonight I lived a bit of the family life that will come after the trust is established and the love is built and the hearts are healed.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers for Slice of Life Challenge on Tuesdays.

mother's day

It would be easy to write a sweet little Mother's Day post tonight. After all, I spent it with my mom and grandma, Andy's mom, and our dads. I spent the entire day with my four children. Andy made prime rib lunch and then cooked dinner for the kids too. We started the day with church and a child dedication service, dedicating ourselves to parenting with Jesus' help and guidance.

Yes, it could be a sweet little post about the dedication service and how I'm reminded that children are a gift.

Yes, it could be a sweet little post about how my mom has always been there for me and continues to go above and beyond, even now that I'm all grown up (as if we ever grow up).

Yes, it could be a sweet little post about how my mother-in-law and step-mother-in-law are always kind and supportive.

Or it could be a sweet little post about my over-eighty year old grandmother and how I keep seeing more of her in me as the years go on.

It could be all of these things.

But it wouldn't be real.

I spent many Mother's Days waiting for children. Even now, I still remember the ache of waiting. And so I remember all of the aches Mother's Day can bring.

I remember those who are waiting for children. Adoptions that are halted. Adoptions that have fallen through. Families who long for a child.

I remember those who are missing children. Mothers who ache because their children were taken or kidnapped or ran away. Mothers who ache from outliving their children because of accidents or cancer  or war.

I remember those who are motherless, orphans in our state and country and world. Those who are waiting for someone to love them just as they are.

I remember those who have lost their moms. They can't pick up the phone and hear her voice or stop by for a visit.

I remember those who selflessly gave their children to adoptive parents. Birthmothers who love their children and decided on the gift of adoption. We honored three birthmothers today in our house.

The reality of Mother's Day is the reality of being a mother. It isn't all sweet little moments. There are aches involved. So when you see this sweet little photo taken today, don't be deceived.

It is not a plethora of sweet little moments that make us a happy family. We are a happy family because of grace. The aches of a history without a forever family prick even on a day designed to celebrate family. Love can overwhelm. And it takes time to accept a momma who looks and acts completely different than you've always imagined.

But at the end of the day, I see the trail of grace. Their little arms wrap around my neck and their "I love yous" warm my ears. I am sustained by peace from a God who loves much more than I do and is much bigger than I can even imagine.

Blessings to you this Mother's Day, no matter your emotions, may you too know grace.

what healing looks like

Growing up, I always imagined protecting my children from the world. I never even consider the possibility that my children could be hurt and scarred and battered. Parents are supposed to shield their children.

Some days I feel like I'm a day late and a dollar short.

There are those moments when I wish I had a magic wand and I could wave it and *poof* all would be easy. But then I look a little closer. There's a lot of healing going on around here. To someone who isn't living it day in and day out, it might be possible to miss the healing. For that matter, it might be possible for someone who is living it day in and day out to miss the healing because she just might be deep-bone tired.

Like most things in life, there is an ebb and flow to healing. At first, you just catch glimpses. I'm holding on to these moments. They sustain me. It is only fitting to make a list of healing slices.

1. It's handing over the last bit of monkey bread dessert when you know you've had more than another.
2. It's taking a shower the first time you're asked without stomping or yelling.
3. It's drying the dishes and saying, "I love you."
4. It's not taking the extra shot at the hoop when you're called in for dinner.
5. It's getting all mad, facing a consequence, and accepting responsibility.
6. It's sharing the monster truck.
7. It's laughing over the whoopee cushion on your sister's chair.
8. It's filling water glasses without being asked.
9. It's saying, "I'm glad you don't yell at me, Mom."
10. It's boxing with you're dad.

Love makes healing possible. And healing builds a family.

This makes me happy (sols)

It's not so much because he greeted me when I pulled into the garage after school today.

It's not so much because he had on his helmet and big plans to skateboard.

It's not even that his plans were altered and a book became more pressing than a skateboard.

No. None of that is why my heart overflows from joy well after they are in bed.

This makes me happy because his brother brought home the book for him. "I've been dying to read this one," he said.

"I know," Jordan replied pulling out his homework. "You can read it while I do my homework then we can skate together."

"Awesome," he said sliding into his spot at the table. Jordan sat across from him.

I went through the pile of papers on the counter that is always waiting, no matter that I just dispersed one in the same location the day before. Hannah practiced her clarinet. Steph clomped through in her cleates. I defrosted the chicken; turned on the oven.

Sam read a passage aloud to Jordan. Jordan asked about a math problem. He put away his homework and then squeezed into the same chair as Sam, reading along until the end of the book.

"Thanks, bro," Sam said closing the book.

"I thought you'd like it," Jordan said. "Since we're forever brothers I see things and think of you." They closed the door on their way out to skate.

And this momma's heart was happy. If that isn't a sign of healthy, whole-hearted adjustment, I don't know what is.

- Posted from my iPhone

writing life restarted

In November I knew I was going to put my fiction work aside until the new year.  In December I knew I was going to put my professional writing to the side also. In January we got our new son and the writing stayed to the side. It's kind of a big deal adopting a fourth child. Even if the child is older, it is still quite an adjustment for the entire family.

It's an adjustment for the writer in the family too.

My writing life didn't cease. I continued to blog. I continued to write in my notebook. Things shifted, though. I was writing mostly about my faith and it was for me, not an audience. The notebook work wasn't leading to anything more.

I made a promise not to let life overwhelm me this time around. In order for this to happen, there were things that took priority over writing. Life is about choices. In the past three months I've not chosen writing.

I'm ready to write again. I keep emailing my editor. I'm opening my computer after the kids go to bed in order to work on articles. I'm planning blog posts. I've organized my photos and have been documenting stories of family life. I began playing with an unexpected draft inspired by my notebook entries about faith and adoption and motherhood. To top it all off, I even wrote a haiku!

And my characters started talking again.

I feel like I'm on the brink of my writing life beginning again. It's easy to feel like there is too much to write and not enough time to write it all. This isn't true, though. Like so many other things in life, I think I'll accomplish more by slowing down. I write because it's fun. I write to make sense of the world. I write to collect story and inspire others to do the same.

I don't write for my livelihood. (Thank goodness.)

So bit by bit I'm putting words together and making stuff.

Easter Sunday

Scars. This was the angle of today. The scars of Jesus. The scars of injuries. The scars of life. You know, the only remaining scars on Jesus after he rose were the scars on his hands. Why do these scars remain?

Andy and I sandwiched our kids in the pew today during service. There they sat, all clean and shiny. And they listened to the sermon about scars. They know all too well about scars. All but the youngest, have too much of an understanding about scars.

"What's Kurt mean about internal scars?" Sam whispers to me.

"He means when someone hurts your heart it sometimes leaves a mark on you."

He nods. Is quiet. Then: "It stops hurting if you forgive them."

I'm quiet. Nod. Then: "Sometimes it's hard to forgive when people hurt us."

He leans close, his forehead bumping my temple. "That's why Jesus died on the cross. When He lives in your heart it's easier to forgive."

I nod. Stay quiet. He may not understand about having scars, but he knows how to help heal scars. Sometimes scars make it difficult for people to be pleasant. Sometimes when people are scarred they don't treat others kindly -- especially those they live with.

He is the glue that binds our family together. It happened when we adopted the girls and it's happening again. He shows unconditional love and forgives again and again. I've often wondered how he keeps loving. Now I know his secret.

savoring story

Yesterday morning, during our first minutes of spring break, the kids opened our albums and were remembering. I love when they pull the albums off the shelf, open them up, and point and giggle and smile and remember. It reminds me how important it is to help young children build a story.

The pages I create for scrapbooks have about the same systematic approach as my blog topics, which is to say there really isn't much reason to the choices I make. I simply sit down and am moved. I let the moment decide what I should write, what I should collect, what photo I should anchor in our memories. I often wonder if I should be more responsible about the moments I document. They act as a frame for their childhoods, a place for them to begin making sense of the world and their places in it.

I'm coming to realize perhaps it isn't the moment that is so important, but rather that there are moments collected. Daily moments. Ordinary moments. Small moments. A life is built around moments, and it is these moments --- the daily, ordinary, small moments -- that I believe reveals the most about a life.

You might notice that I don't document chronologically. Our albums are organized around topics, not years. This allows me to tell stories as I am moved. My kids inspired me to get my photos in order. I've let them slip. Today I filed them in folders, backed them up, and got the masses ordered. Now I'm ready to organize the prints (when they come) and be ready to be moved by the stories. Until then, I have my photos organized on my computer in order to inspire my storytelling digitally. I love that I can tell stories through paper and through computer clicks.

(I learned my system through the book Photo Freedom by Stacy Julian. Woah! It's a good thing I got the book when I did, because the price has skyrocketed! Here is a link to a blog post she just wrote along the same lines about an order other than chronological.)

Story wraps around my life and I'm constantly looking for more ways to document it and savor it. There isn't a single right way...the only wrong way is to not document this perfectly imperfect ordinary life.

Click on the image to join us
at Two Writing Teachers
for the March Slice of Life
Challenge.

spring break anticipation

It begins.

Home.
Board games.
Bike rides.
Imagination.
Lego creation.
Homemade lunch.
Cookies.
Train tracks.
Art.
Letters.
Books.
Bonding.

This is the anticipation for a break that builds a family.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers for
the March Slice of Life challenge.

eucharist

“I could not help but think that somewhere along the way we had missed what was radical about our faith and replaced it with what is comfortable.”

--- David Platt

sweet fun

{spring}

sun and melting snow

bright green buds on bony limbs

blue sky holds the chill

I've noticed quite a few haiku around the slice community this month. I've been wanting to write my own. All month long I've been stumbling over syllables, attempting to shove images into the required rhythm. Not to mention trying to be inspired by nature to give a traditional lean to the haiku I pretended I could write. Many slices this month have started with the promise of a haiku that soon fizzled and was replaced with my comfortable prose.

But not tonight.

Tonight I finally wrote a haiku I'm proud to have written. I told myself when I finally did write one, I wouldn't post anything else...only the 17 syllables. However, I couldn't do it...I wanted to capture my process, to remember how I tried and tried, and then with only a handful of days left in the month, this little haiku just spilled out.

I think it was even more fun because of all the failed attempts at haiku this month. Failure make success just a little sweeter.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers
for the March Slice of Life Challenge.

take the time

Today I found a poem in my inbox. As I read the words, tears pricked my eyes (and I'm not really someone who cries much).  It's the timing of the thing and the unexpected sender who cared enough to take the time to pass it on to me that means something big to me. "Don't Quit," an old poem with an unknown author resonated with me. The last stanza beats:

Success is failure turned inside out-- 

The silver tint of the clouds of doubt, 

And you never can tell how close you are, 

It may be near when it seems so far, 

So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit-- 

It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.

{To read the entire poem, click here. For an inspirational video click here.}

It reminded me of a quote I wrote in the front of my very first reflective practice journal. I hunted it down and found it in the belly of an old filing cabinet.

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt, "Citizenship in a Republic,"

Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910

Yes, I needed these tonight. I'm so thankful someone took the time to send me an email. I hope I pass the goodness along the next time I'm nudged to send along a quote or poem or video to someone else. It's a simple matter of taking the time to pass things along when we think of another person. These little acts of kindness make the world a better place.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers
for the March Slice of Life
Challenge.

writing by the ocean

As I write, this is my view.

I sit here, by the ocean. The sun sparkles off the water. Canadian geese fly past. It is quiet. The world moves outside and I sit still inside. The words pile this morning. The thinking is full, boxing ideas, embracing change, searching for meaning.

I walk the breakwater one more time. The salty waves crash and splash. I taste salt on my lips. The world moves and I keep still on the inside. Heather and I talk writing, one writer to another. It's not about teaching writers, it's about being writers. There's comfort in feeling another soul understands your own.

Many find peace at the ocean, they find comfort with the salt air and the sound of the waves. I understand the draw, but it does not capture me. I slip through the net.

My comfort is in train tracks built around my chair and Lego cities constructed on the dining room table. It is snuggled under a quilt with a child and a book. It is movies and popcorn and all six of us somehow squished on the couch. It is bike rides and playing catch in the yard and racing up the hill. It is a homemade play directed by my daughters and banana bread baking in the oven. It is noise and hugs and one more interruption that starts with, "Mom..." It is laundry buzzers and dishes stacked in the cupboard. The words pile in the crevices of a full life.

I sit here, writing by the ocean, ready to be home.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers for
the March Slice of Life Challenge.

purple sandpiper

Purple Sandpiper
Source: Wikipedia
(Click on the image.)

As Deb and I were walking out to the Rockland Breakwater Lighthouse today we noticed two men with binoculars. Curious about their conversation, I asked, "Do you mind if I ask what you are watching?"

"Birds," they responded.

"I have some friends who are birdwatchers too. It's a great hobby."

They both smiled and nodded in agreement. They walked a few paces with us and then began telling more of their story They shared how they began bird watching. Then one said, "Three weeks ago we were here and saw some purple sandpipers, right here along the breakwater. We were so close to them. It's a rare treat. They usually don't come this far south."

Their wives, who were farther down the breakwater, joined the conversation as we neared. "Those sandpipers are here again."

"Really?" both men perched their binoculars and focused their attention in the direction of the purple sandpipers.

Deb and I searched for them too. One of the wives pointed them out to me. "See the three? Down there in the rocks?"

I stretched and angled and saw them hopping along the black rocks. "They are rare?"

"Oh, yes," the woman said. "This is special to get to see them." The enthusiasm of the bird watchers was contagious. We were compelled to watch for a little longer.

I was struck by how we could have completely walked by this rare treat. Without having someone, an expert, point it out to me, I wouldn't have even known I was near something special. If they weren't looking the purple sandpipers could have been almost invisible.

I think this happens too often with the readers and writers in our classrooms. We miss the rare treats of deep thinking or compelling writing because we aren't looking. We see the misspellings. We see the conventional errors. We get hung up on text complexity. And we miss the remarkable work that is happening each day in our classrooms. This wee let's be on the look out for rare treats. Let's look past the annoyances and instead find solid reading and writing work.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers
for the March Slice of Life Challenge.

lighthearted.

light·heart·ed

 adjective \-ˌhär-təd\

Definition of LIGHTHEARTED

1

: free from care, anxiety, or seriousness : happy-go-lucky

2

: cheerfully optimistic and hopeful : easygoing

from Merriam-Webster Online

I'm coming to believe lighthearted is a choice, a choice I want to make for my life. Here I am, a mother of four children, a full time instructional coach, a writer, a friend, a wife, to list the roles will fill the night, and I make mistakes.

It's impossible to get things right every single minute of every single day of every single week. I'm bound to mess up. Even if I don't mess up, there's a good chance I'll be misunderstood. Even if I'm not misunderstood, there's a good chance I'll drop the ball. 

As my life gets fuller, I've noticed the potential for mistakes increases. I don't like mistakes. Actually, that's not true, because I'm quite forgiving of other people's mistakes. It's my own I don't like. I don't like making mistakes.

Who does?

The problem is sometimes when I make a mistake, I feel guilty. I wrack my brain trying to figure out what I could have done differently, how I could have avoided the mistake. I want to fix it. I'm embarrassed and wonder how I could have made such a mistake.

All of this and it doesn't even have to be big.

This takes a lot of energy out of a person. It can make a person serious and prone to trying to corral the day in order to avoid mistakes.

I'm not that person anymore. I'm pretty sure this part of being a recovering perfectionist.

Mistakes are part of life. I'm learning to live in the midst of them and still shine. I can do this by choosing cheer. I can do this by smiling, laughing, and remembering it is up to me to bring joy. I can't do this if I'm handcuffed to my mistakes. Rather, I'll let them go and step into a light heart.

Join us at Two Writing Teachers
for the March Slice of Life challenge.