Enthroned

Two years ago we were at the hospital while I miscarried our 10 week old baby, Baby Cali.
The pregnancy had been a surprise.
I love surprises.
I remember sitting in the hospital the next day, sad and alone.
The longing to have and know my child was almost more than I could bear.
God led me to Psalm 113.

v5Who is like the Lord our God,
the One who sits enthroned on high,
v6who stoops down to look on the heavens and the earth?
v9He settles the barren woman in her home as a happy mother of children.
Praise the LORD.

With 3 children at home, I didn't know the pain of being truly barren.
But my empty womb was barren that day when before it
had been full. Full of the promise of new life.

The promise God gave me that day is that He sits enthroned on high.
He was enthroned when we conceived. He was enthroned when the
ultrasound revealed that the baby had died. He was enthroned as I sat in
a hospital bed alone with my longing.

And He is enthroned now as I sit with another longing.
A longing to adopt that has been 5 years in the making.
Our miscarriage was a part of this process as,
after a time of grieving our loss,
we really sought the Lord about the best way to grow our family.

Adopting a child does not "replace" the one we lost.
You replace batteries, not people.
But as we walk this journey, with longing and hope,
I want to remember that there is One who sits enthroned on high.
I'm glad I know Him.

Actually, it IS easy being green

Though green is my favorite color, I ashamed to admit I haven't been very environmentally conscious in my life. We didn't recycle regularly, used disposable diapers, and I don't have the first clue when earth day is. But something has come along to change all that and that is accessories. As soon as cute bags became a "necessity" in being green, I was all over it. That I can justify my purchase of tote bags by saying I'm saving the earth is a beautiful concept. So, though I may have gotten to this place of environmental consciousness through the back door of fashion, at least I got there, right?

Some of my inspiration

We even recycle now, too!

As for disposable diapers, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Although, I have been inspired by a fellow blogger to consider cloth diapers and, well, they are really cute. I wish I wasn't this shallow, but I just am. Remember...green is the new black!

I will survive

I survived the first day of school. Thankfully I had a morning meeting that kept me from lying on the floor in the fetal position drowning my sorrows in Barry Manilow songs. The second day I used Target as a coping mechanism. I must say it was nice to be a little lonely while wondering the aisles. But, I miss my kids!

My big fifth grader...his last year in Elementary school (sniffle). He was the most nervous of all of them, my responsible first born. On the second day when we were done with breakfast and ready to go with 15 minutes to spare he said, "Wow, Mom, we're doing really good this year!"
Of course, it was only day two.
I'm counting on his responsibility to help me get out the door
on time this year.

The Divine Miss Em is off to second grade. It's hard to imagine a child
loving school more than she does. This year she and her best friend
get to be in the same class...yippie!

My big Kindergartner. I sobbed as he headed off into the school.
He didn't even look back. On the second day a Para said, "He sure has a lot of
energy!" Guess everyone is getting to know him around there already.

I will survive without my kids here with me.
I want to embrace each stage of life we are in.
When they are all home and fighting, I think what I want is a quiet house.
It sure is quiet now. But all I can think about is that it's only
an hour and 23 minutes until the noise returns. I can't wait!
And hopefully, in a year or so, I'll have another pal with me all day again.

So long summer!

We spent our last day of summer out at my parents lake cabin. I love that my kids are getting to make memories at the same place that so many of my childhood memories are from. As the years have gone by, I have gone in the water less and less due to the fact that I came to this adult realization: I am swimming where ducks and fish poop.

Have fun kids...but keep your mouths closed!

Check out his "I own this lake" stance. Let's hope he doesn't pull this out on the playground!

Look out world!

Gone are the training wheels.
Gone is the joy of wearing that Power Rangers costume day after day.
Gone are the days of preschool.
And gone are the days of being my constant companion all day long ("NO, Mom, not Target again!")
Look out world, this guy is going to Kindergarten!
And this Mom is going to bawl her eyes out.

One thing that helps me in my emotional instability is that
he is so excited. He wears his new backpack around the house with the tags still on it.When discussing how
we were going to handle lunch his response was "Oh yeah baby...hot lunch!"

And when I asked him what he was going to miss when he goes off to Kindergarten, his answer was "Ruby!"

The dog. Of course.
Because she housed and nourished you in her body for 9 long months. And she suffered through childbirth (okay, okay I had an
epidural...it wasn't that bad) to bring you into this world. And she makes your meals while only
complaining 3 days a week about it.

What does the dog do? She lounges around shedding her hair all over and nudges houseguests in the crotch.
But she's the one he's going to miss.
I get no respect.

But, the point in being a Mom isn't how much my child misses or loves me. The point is how I get
the amazing privilege of loving and knowing and raising these kids.
I'm gonna miss you, Jack.

P.S. Try not to end up in the Principal's office too often, okay?

out of the mouths of babes

This is my sweet girl.
We had a bit of a challenging day.
I was recognzing that I can't make her want to honor her brothers.
I was realizing that I can't make her respect our authority.
I was reminded that I can't make her feel bad for something she has done.
What I can do is pray.
So I did. And a desperate kind of prayer at that.

My 12 year old niece is staying with me and she showers every night then spends time with Jesus.
So now my little Em (who adores her) is doing the same. I got her a journal and tonight this is what she wrote to God,
"honer. honer. honer. (honor)
help. hlep. help. i need hlep with honering other pepol.
if you cod help me with that I wold be honred by you."

To be honest, that's a better quiet time than I had today.
I'm glad that God answers prayer.
And I'm glad that I can learn from the heart of a 7 year old
that I need "hlep" too.

A new kind of labor

I'm learning something about adoption as we move along in this process. I will not go into labor with our fourth child. But, there is a certain kind of labor involved. So far the paperwork has been a real labor of love. Neither one of us are really "details" kind of people. I can barely remember to enter things in the checkbook. Paperwork and I don't get along very well. But that is the first step in this process, the "paperchase". I don't mean to complain because 1)I'm sure those who have adopted would say that the waiting stage is much harder. At least there is something we can do right now to bring our child home. And 2) we will do whatever it takes to see our family completed as we add another member to our team.

But what I'm learning about my adoption experience is that this is "labor" for me. Not labor as in pain (I guess that comes later on), but labor as in work. Being a youngest child, I never have been a fan of the word labor in any sense. But I guess I am going to be in this kind of labor for the next couple of months, so I better get used to it. I want to call and ask for an epidural, but there is none available. I need to trust the Lord to wade through all these papers in a somewhat orderly fashion. It may not be my strength, but it is my calling. And, Lord willing, when I'm looking into two little brown eyes it's not going to matter how much of a stretch it was for me to get the paperwork done. Oh, how I look forward to that day!

Here we are with our box that had our big ol' binder of adoption paperwork. We look excited, but we're also petrified. In case you were wondering, I put lip gloss on before we took the picture. So, I may be freaking out, but I've got shiny lips!