Surviving the Laundry of a Family of Six

Recently I was at a playground with a friend while we watched our kids run around, I commented that I really needed to go home and put away laundry.  She said, "Oh, I feel like I am doing laundry all the time and I just have two kids, I can only imagine what it is like for you with four kids!"

Yes, the laundry is something!  And it threatens to eat me alive most days.  Thankfully my 8 year old has gotten to be nearly as capable as me at folding and putting away wash!

Find more Wordful Wednesday here.

October 20th

What God Can Do:

October 20, 2010
This little girl entered a government-run orphanage in Ethiopia, malnourished, infested with ringworm, and covered with sores.  Without knowing the real date, October 20th forevermore becomes her birthday for legal purposes.  She is estimated to be 2 years old.  She is a female orphan in a 3rd world country, over the age of infancy, a low state of being by the world's standards.

 
October 20, 2011

That little girl legally becomes our daughter!  God redeems that day, October 20th, in her life, by placing her in a family on that exact day of all the other calendar days it could have happened. Her name is changed, she is an orphan no more.  He made her a daughter!  But she spends that birthday in an orphanage, waiting on remaining red tape to be cleared so that she can go home with her new family.

 
October 20, 2012

She has been home for nearly 10 months.  Her family and friends got to celebrate her 4th birthday with her!

 
October 20, 2013

That Little Girl has been home for nearly 2 years.  Surrounded by tons of friends and loving family, her 5th birthday is celebrated.

 

Our God never leaves us nor forsakes us.  Even when it seems we are all alone, starving, and forlorn, He has great plans for us, plans for a future and a hope (Jeremiah 29:11)!  He is a God of redemption!

"See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is."1 John 3:1-2

Snapshots from Life This Week

 That dog did not actually shower while she was in there, she just likes licking the shower water (gross, I know!).  I usually keep her out, but she got past me while I was getting out of the shower and then I didn't want to deal with drying off her paws, while I was still drying myself, so I shut her in there for a few minutes.  Too bad she can't shower herself, she really does need it!

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Pedicures with my daughters.  They picked five different colors, a different color for each toe on a foot!  Colorful and high-maintenance my girls are!   

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Practicing his spelling words with my 6 year old.  "Said" does not at all sound like it is spelled, so it's a tricky one!

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Happy Friday, Friends!  Find more Friday Fragments here.

 

When Life Feels Hard

There have been some especially hard things in my life lately, big, ugly situations that are not my fault, yet I must deal with them.  Those situations combined with tons of busyness has made it super important for me to focus on that which is good.  

There is a whole lot of good, some days I just have to remind myself more to look for it.  You know, "Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens. . ."

So, let's focus on the positive, 

Like the one square foot of my house that IS clean.

Sisters in matching pajamas:

(That is the one clean spot in my house!  Okay so maybe, it's 3 square feet!)

God's mercies, new every morning.  And several perfectly timed reminders this week that through Jesus we are more than conquerors even though we may face trials here on this earth!

"No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us."  Romans 8:37

What Can We Do About The Orphan Crisis? Part 1

I posted last week about my visit to an orphanage in The Dominican Republic during a mission trip and how I was not okay with the reality that nearly all the kids I met would never be adopted, they'd grow up in that orphanage.  Being an adoptive mother and having the privilege of knowing many adoptive families, I've seen the amazing, astounding, dramatic ways God heals children just by putting them in a family and I want that for all children!

Megan left a comment on that post saying, "It is def not ok! Breaks my heart...I want to help, anyone know where to start??"

I so appreciate Megan's heart and her desire to help.  It is such a good question, but not an easy one to answer.  I have been a part of a few different adoption/orphan care ministries and can tell you we all spend a lot of time talking about and thinking about this very question!

So, I thought I'd begin sharing some of what I've learned about how to help.

International adoptions are sadly declining.  The reasons for this are many, but countries have closed due to suspected corruption, like Guatemala, and some countries have stopped adoptions to the U.S. for political reasons, like Russia.  Then there are countries where there is so much red tape that international adoptions take a very long time (think years and years), like Haiti and now often-times, Ethiopia.  So, adopting all the orphans to the United States is not the main answer to get kids out of orphanages an into families.  I still believe it is AN answer but it is not THE answer.

So, what is?

Some countries have tried to promote adoption within their own country, but unfortunately, many countries, like Ethiopia, have a strong culture against adoption.  Orphans are viewed as very low members of society and bringing one into their family is not something most native people would consider.

There is an organization that has a unique solution.  It is called "Bring Love In".  They couple orphans who are given to them by local authorities (often school-aged children living in orphanages), and widows from within local Christian church communities, to create new forever families in Ethiopia.  You can to find out how you can get involved in what they are doing on their website.  But, also, it is a model I'd like to see take off in many different countries.  Orphans + Widows = Family  It's a beautiful idea!

This is just Part 1, the topic is huge, stay tuned for Part 2 (not sure WHEN that will be, but stay tuned).

For The Love of Books and Oven Space

My 6 year old guy has finally turned an important corner in his reading.  He likes to read!  And actually chooses to read now some in his free time, as opposed to being forced/prodded to read like it's been for the past year.  What brought the turning point?

His reading got good enough for these books: 
 

The Magic Tree House Books are great books about the adventures of a sister and brother, Annie and Jack, as they travel through time in their tree house to different places in history.  In the series there is a book about dinosaurs, one about pirates, one about travels to the moon, one about ninjas, and on and on for 50 books!

We invested in the set when my oldest was starting out on chapter books and I'm glad we did.  The books are great for boys and girls alike!  As much as I love the library, there is something to having an entire series right there on the bookshelf in your bedroom, too.

My 6 year old first grader is so excited about these books that he's read about 12 of them in just 2 weeks!  Before that he never really wanted to read in his free time and I worried he was not going to love reading like my older 2 children, my husband and I do.  I actually told his first grade teacher at the beginning of the year that really my only goal for him this school year was for him to grow to like reading.  Goal accomplished in October -- not bad!

But honestly who could blame him for not liking books when the books went like this:

"Mat sat."

"Sam sat."

"Mat sat on Sam."

"Sam sat on Mat."

"The end"

That is a paraphrase, but really we were so OVER the easy readers!

The little guy reading in bed with his book light:

I love that sight!

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We got a new oven this week.  The old one was an oven with a microwave attached to it on top, a model from the 1980s.  The microwave stopped working a few years ago, but the repairman said it was too old to repair.  Since it was attached to the oven, which was working fine, we just never prioritized replacing it.  And life without a microwave was really easy.  Seriously, I can count on one hand the times I missed it.  We learned to pop popcorn on the stove and heat left-overs in the oven or in a pot on the stove.

But, then recently the oven stopped heating properly, only the top heating element would work.  The bottom heater coil would not heat at all.  So, it was time to replace the whole thing.  We debated over an oven/microwave combo again, but ultimately decided we'd more use a double oven in the space.  Of course, the new double oven was bigger than the old unit, so we had to get our handyman to cut into the cabinets below to make more room.

Hence my kitchen looked like this from Monday when the new oven was delivered until today when it could be installed:

Feel free to soak in the mess in the background.  That's real life, folks!

Fun does happen amidst the chaos, though, and that is the important thing!

Happy Friday!  I have no idea how I'll handle my new-found capabilities to cook 2 ovens-worth of food!  Oh the power and possibilities!!

Find more Friday fragments here.

How long does it take to fix her hair?

I get that question a lot about Little Girl's hair.  The answer depends on the style.

This one?

Took 3 Brady Bunch episodes (our whole family loves old Brady Bunch episodes we get from Netflix).

So about 1 hour and 30 minutes.

And that is just the braiding and beading, it doesn't include the washing and detangling that I did for about 30 minutes prior to the braiding.

If you'd told me 4 years ago there would come a day that I'd spend 2 hours fixing 1 child's hair, I'd have said, "No way!  That's crazy!"

But, this is our life now and it's not so crazy, it just is the way it is.

Is it worth it?  I mean it's just hair!

In your native culture a little girl's hairstyle may not be a very big deal, but in some cultures, including much of the black culture, hair is very important and how a little girl's hair is fixed represents how well she is cared for.  Fixing my daughter's hair in some of the more ethnically-traditional styles is one way to embrace her birth culture.  There are a lot of things in life that are going to be different for her growing up in a white family versus growing up in a black family, hair does not have to be one of those things.

And, it's practical!  The braids and twists keep my Little Girl's hair much healthier.  Her hair dries out very quickly when it is in a "free hair" style and it is much more prone to getting sand, grass, dirt, and debris in it that are hard to get out.  Also, while the initial investment of time is a lot, this style will easily last a week with very little maintenance, maybe longer.

My 8 year old white daughter with long, fine, straight hair gets it brushed and fixed a bit each day, sometimes twice a day, and her hair has to be washed nearly every day. So, while she does not get 2 hours put into her hair in one day, she gets 10-15 minutes each day.

And my 4 year old black daughter with her coarse, curly hair, gets 2 hours of maintenance once a week (and some styles do not take that long) and then she only requires about 1 minute each day to add some oil to her part lines!

Another reason it's worth it:  She likes it!  This style is only the 3rd time I've done beads and I only attempted them after Little Girl and I were reading a book and the girl in the book had braids with beads in the ends and my Little Girl said she wanted her hair to be like that so she could swing it and hear the beads click, click, click together.

And the best reason of all:  Little Girl often gets compliments on her hair and people ask her, "Who did your hair?"  And she proudly says, "Mommy!"  As someone who only got to start being her Mommy when she was 3 years old, hearing her get to boast about something her Mommy did for her makes every minute spent on her hair totally worth it to me!