The Day I Killed Santa

My friend Jen Hatmaker has the BEST blog posts. (And by friend, I kinda mean, like, I know her. Like, she's an adoption mommy friend. Or really, like, she kinda posts on our yahoo group board occasionally and I follow her on facebook. So kinda like she has no clue who I may be. But hey, I'm still callin friend rights.)

SO, my friend Jen posted the following post a couple weeks back that immediately went viral and was reposted, retweeted, and read outloud on media outlets across the country.

The Christmas Conundrum

And it made me think, really think - what have we done right, or wrong in bringing our brood up to celebrate the season correctly? or incorrectly?

So the afternoon of me reading the above post about the cons of creating the god-image of Santa Claus --- who often trumps our kid's own God-image of the Christ child and his reason for coming on that night 2000 years ago --- my littlest angel says to me:

"Mommy, is there, or is there not a real Santa Claus??? Tell me the troof. Cause JoJo says there is a Santa Claus and Nicky says there is not!"

And at that moment I had a decision to make -
1) lie to my child, or bend the 'troof' again or
2) take this newfound wisdom and run with it. So I ran.

"Well honey, many, many years ago there was a man named Nickolas. And he loved Jesus SOOOO much that he would make and give presents to children on Jesus' birthday because he loved him so much."

Angel - "So the Santa at the mall is not real?"

"No, the Santa at the mall is just a man who is dressed up and is pretending to be that man who lived so long ago, because he was such a good man....... and loved Jesus so much"

Angel - "So that man lived a long, long, long time ago??"

"Yes Baby. He lived a long, long time ago."

Angel (in an octave and volume slightly higher than a 757 engine -
"SO SANTA IS DEAD!!!!!???!!!!!!!!!!!!!???!!!!!!!!!!!!"

aye-ya-ya. So that my friends, is how to gently kill Santa. Feel free to take notes if needed. The cost of later therapy is entirely your responsibility. Merry Christmas!

Demon Chickens

(I bet you clicked on the link just to see where I was going with this didn't you ???)

My eldest son is extremely artistic.
Like, better-than-his-mom, artistic. Which I am completely ok with.
About a year ago, he gave his dad this egg he had made at school that
never fails to make me giggle. I leave it in our car, just so on bad
days, I can put the visor down and smile at the silly. Here ya go, I
present to you - the Demon Chicken:

So it seems we have made the chicken mad. We've kinda known the chicken was mad. Maybe it was the way we
started loosing friends in really random, weird ways. Like the WEEK we
decided to adopt. Maybe it was the way weird things started making us
have to leave churches we loved. (loose a church? loose your prayer
support, your spiritual support, your emotional support) Maybe it was
the way Tony kept loosing jobs. Maybe it was the way things started
breaking and money owed started piling up. Or health scares. Or the
lies whispered that made us doubt. But yes, I think we have definitely
made the chicken mad. And yes, I think he has bit us, kicked us, and
thrown us to the ground. More in the last two weeks than ever. And I'm
getting sick of it.

1 Peter 5:8
Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around
like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

And as I read somewhere recently - lions don't look for the big
kill. They look for the straggler, the weak, the small. They are
chickens. They don't go head to head usually with the big bull
elephant. They go after the little, the innocent, the weak, the
helpless. They usually go after the young.
It's the same with the enemy. He goes after the children. The helpless.
All over the world, there are little ones who are being picked on:
Stolen. Sold into slavery. Suffering from poverty. Dying. Prostituted.
Abandoned.

But adoption is God's plan to thwart that. Those children who otherwise
would fall prey to the enemy are led by God to a safe place. A place
where they are loved. A place where they are taught to love HIM. A
place where their story is used to show others God's miracles and God's
power.

And the chicken hates that. So he tries to stop it. Again, and again,
and again.

It would boggle your mind if I had every adoptive parent list every
weird or strange thing that has happen to them since they decided to
adopt. It's not in our heads. It is an attack. And it is on us, so that
we will back out, and leave the little ones prey to his cowardly
attacks.

But being pecked at isn't fun. It isn't pleasant or funny. It is real.

BUT - my God is bigger. And HE is stronger. And HIS angels are around
my daughter, and around us. BUT the battle, while raging above and
around us, we know who wins ultimately. And that makes me so much
stronger, and more angry, and a little more ticked off at the attacks,
and will help to sustain me until we have her home in our arms.

Silly demon chicken.

Psalm 138: 7-8
"Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life; you
stretch out your hand against the anger of my foes, with your right
hand you save me. The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me; your love, O Lord, endures forever - do not abandon the works of your hands."

Beans, beans, good for the heart....

For those of you who haven't been following me for as long, I will always lovingly refer to Amy of "Building the Blocks" as my 'pickle jar lady'.

You see, Amy had just started her own adoption (her 4th!) a week or so before us and had set aside a pickle jar for her family to contribute their loose change to. Just a symbol - "God, we've got it started, we're going to work towards the goal, but we know you can fill it.." A couple days later, their pickle jar was running over as their entire adoption was generously donated by a spirit-led donor. So what did our family do? We put out a pickle jar of course!!!

Now our jar (which is actually a juice jug, but let's not split hairs) - hasn't been filled in one day, but I can say, over the last 2 years, God has put more change in that money jar than we ever could have been able to do on our own. Every penny has come from him. And so far, every penny we have needed, he has provided, on time and in the amount needed.

But back to my pickle jar lady.... Last year, I read this post. Amy and her family had sworn to eat beans and rice for dinner every day for a MONTH and then donate the money saved toward their 'pay it forward' adoption fund for another family. I was floored by not only the simplicity of their idea but the lesson that was being taught to their children. The majority of the children in this world will have one meal a day, if that, of the same ingredients. And our children throw away food on a daily basis... or snub their noses or whine and say 'I don't liiiiike this...'.

And while I LOVED the idea, I could only go for one night of a lesson, cause I'm all chicken and didn't want to deal with the recourse of a houseful of 3 men and a month of beans.. (although now that Addison has gotten older - I think I am seriously more afraid of her 'reaction' than the boys. Sister can put up a stank).

BUT, another year of live and learn and I'm all in on the wild side of educating my children now. (says the lady set on taking 3 under 12's on a total of 36 hours plane ride to a 3rd world country..)

SO, our church's children's program is trying to raise money to build a well in Africa and instantly, I fell in love with our new church. How cool is that!! So as the end of the year grows near and their goal is still $3000 away - we were challenged to think of new and creative ways to raise money. So my mind goes back to the beans and rice challenge - and I think I'm ready to put the clothespin on and take it for a spin.

So instead of going on my Sunday afternoon shopping trip for groceries, this week I'm going to just rest my amateur couponing skills and go get a couple more bags of beans and rice.. ( and possibly a cheap rice cooker since Tony claims rice is the only food I am inept at cooking correctly). Usually we spend around $120 for groceries in addition to money a couple times a week or so eating out. So we'll donate that amount of money to help bring children clean water.

I'll let you know how it goes. While I have high expectations -- my family may think the idea stinks quite a bit (and they might be right) - but in the process, I'm hoping their little hearts can be broken just a little bit more through the experience. Beans, beans, good for the heart......

And we are.....

After almost 15 months of watching our phone with longing.... and begging it to play the stupid little song set aside only for our adoption agency....

we are now going to be obsessively watching our phone everyday..... and begging, no pleading, no - crying, praying, for it to play the stupid little song set aside for our adoption agency....

it's enough to make one go crazy...

(too late, right??) I think I gladly put on the crazy crown and became the queen of crazy when:

#1 I married Tony
#2 I gave birth to three little Tonys
#3 I said yes to our fourth little wild one, who will finally NOT look like Tony.

So what does #1 mean??

besides me taking my phone into the bathroom and having it turned on full volume for the unforeseeable future?

It means that the next little girl that our agency has, which is under 12 months of age, who is completely well, and has every last piece of her paperwork tucked snuggly in her fat file -- will then be matched with our family as we are #1 in line. But we do covet your prayers as it has just been the rainy season in Ethiopia which often brings with it illness and infections for the little ones. And Olivia has to be completely well for us to receive her referral. And with so many new paperwork requirements, it is taking so much more time to get a child's paperwork ready to go as our agency often has to drive many hours to try to track down an abscure person or office to sign off on or provide needed information.

It also means that when that baby is all ready to go, we will get a phone call from our family coordinator. It could be a Monday, but most often is towards the end of the week on Thurs or Friday... often near the end of day (so as not to cause too much stress and anticipation, right?) She will call, I will cry, we will get Tony on three-way call (hopefully) and she will then describe our new daughter. We will then rush to get the 3 littles and run home, screaming all the way, to open our email with the photos that will be enlarged and pasted all over the house. And in the car. And in our wallets. And possibly enlarged as an 8 X 10 around my neck. Possibly.

It also means that she is 'matched' with us. But NOT ours yet. So we cannot show her photo on the blog or internet as legally, she is not ours at that time. We will then wait for 1-3 months until we can get a court date and then travel to Ethiopia to meet her and appear before a judge affirming our desire to adopt her. Only 50% of families pass on their court date. So we may find out that day that she is our daughter, or we may have to come home and wait the excruciating time necessary to complete more paperwork and finally pass court. And then, and only then, will Olivia be OUR daughter and we will be able to post photos and more information.

And then we wait some more time - possibly 2-3 more months, for the US Embassy in Ethiopia to review our case and either pass us on and issue us (me) an appointment for her visa interview and passport; or then request more information, and once again - have us wait....

So the wait's not over... not by a long shot... but at least we are finally seeing the beginning of the tunnel.

It's funny - a friend just told me that we are "blazing the trail for those who would dare doubt the soverignty and might of God..." However, I told him I think we are more, "blindly and clumsily hacking our way at the bush with a machete." We'll get there one day but it ain't gonna be pretty.

Someday soon friends, someday soon. We pray. But in the meantime, we can bask in the joy of being #1. And hope it is a very, very short stay at the top..

Precious Photos

May I just point out the precious children captured in this perfect photograph??

And may I also point out the status of how valuable a digital camera is with 3 children?? And the sheer beauty of capturing the perfect picture? When you have faces like these ------

With these gorgeous eyes ---------


Or these loving looks ---------




And these award-winning smiles -----------


Or with expert (but unplanned) prop placements ----------------


It's only with the most precious photos that we capture the preciousness of these children ----

6 snaps to get 1 good shot...
can you imagine how much footage I'll go through when we increase the child number to 4??? Although if you evaluate the above, I think it may be one child in particular that I am having the most difficulty with??

Mustard Seed Faith

So it's taken me a good week to write this blog... cause I knew I needed to. But I didn't want to. Cause it's embarassing. And I knew to tell you the good thing I learned, I would have to confess to you the bad things I said. And that's not easy. But God said 'write' so now I write. "I just want to stop. I don't want to do this anymore!" Not the words that any child, anywhere, should have their parents say about them. But words that poured out of my soul 2 weeks ago. Out of a soul that was hurting, that was grieving, that was giving up in a snotty, exhausted fit of tears. So don't judge me too fast. Don't tell me I'm not fit to be her parent. That I haven't fought hard enough - cause let me tell you friends, 2 years is a long time to have your boxing gloves on. How could I give up on my daughter when we are so close??? (All these comments by the way, went through MY mind). But you see, our baby Olivia, at that moment - didn't exist to me any more. She was a dream. A beautiful dream that God had given me two years ago that was not destined to come to fruition. So to me, it felt like she had blown away like a vapor. An image I had created in my own mind. I should have ran, without stopping, to my Heavenly Father. Clinging to my current life verse as if it were a small island in the midst of a storm. But I didn't. So much for this strong Christian example. Isaiah 41:13 "For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you 'Do not fear; I will help you." Or how 'bout my other current verse of the day - written down in my car and read almost daily?? Did I go there? Nope. Jeremiah 17:7-8 "Blessed is the (wo)man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. (S)he will be like a tree that is planted by the water who sends out its roots into the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought; but never fails to bear fruit." But finally, after a day of pouting, and crying, with fear AND worrying (good to know those verses sunk in my thick brain, huh?)... I prayed the next morning on the way to church for God to just talk to me that morning. Let me hear His voice. Let me know if I had heard him wrong 2 years ago. Let me know if we were making a big mistake. If it was time to turn the ship around. First a great sermon - but nope, no 'ah-ha' moments. And then after, during the invitation, the pastor goes off to a different tune sung just for me, something to the tune of: "The enemy does not want you to be happy. He is a liar. He wants you to be unhappy. He does not want you to fulfill the purpose God has for you..... stand strong... run from the darkness and into the light." And then, the next song - again, just for me: 

 The verses saying "YOU wont relent until you have it all.... my heart is yours...... come be the fire inside of me" So it hits me.... IF God isn't going to give up until His purpose is fulfilled.... and IF I claim to be His child, with Him taking residence in my heart..... and IF He is the fire inside of me..... than who am I to say 'I give up'? who am I to relent and throw my hands up because I am tired? am I not acting in the face of all I say is true? where is my fruit in the face of this drought? and since when did this become all about ME? So I come home, with the puzzled, slapped in the face kind of heart. And then my neighbor sends over a big bag of yellow banana peppers. (I AM going somewhere with this, I promise..) And I like to can them for a salad I make. So I get out my recipe box and start pulling out ingredients. 

And then laugh. Cause my Daddy knows I need to be thumped in the head every once in a while just to get His point across. It was just like He was saying to me, "Tracy, you see this???? This is ALL I'm asking from you. This much Faith. That's all I need from you. I've got the rest covered." Matthew 17: 14-21 "....Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

And then tonight, as I looked for images for this post, I came across this blog and quote: •A mustard-seed may in fact be small in size, but the miracle is in the relationship between the seed and the reality of the mustard tree. The seed produced phenomenal growth, point blank. Does your faith produce phenomenal spiritual growth in your own life? Does it produce phenomenal results for God’s Kingdom in the spread of the Gospel? That’s faith “as” a mustard seed. So yes - my tree did kind of run away from the water... and my fruit kind of stunk... but I needed that moment of desperation to figure out where I was planted was all wrong. As another song says, you have to be at the bottom before you start looking up. So that's why I wrote it all down. So you can laugh at me or shake your head in disgust. But at the end of the day, so you can see what mustard seed you may be holding that needs to be planted and watered - cause God only needs that much from us, a tiny seed of faith - but the fruit He will bear because we allow Him to work in us... that's where the real fire and beauty comes from.

We're just a small seed that has to be plucked in the head once in a while to figure out where our roots need to be firmly planted...

Passing by

"I forgot my book bag"

"How can you forget your book bag!?! This one time - this is your one time. I'll go back and get it but you need to take responsibility and remember or you'll have to face the consequences next time. Consequences are real life. What if Mommy forgot to pay my car payment...... blah. blah. blah. blah. blah. blah"

So we go home. And return towards the school in a direction opposite of usual. Just a couple minutes to spare.

And there he was. Running. Fast walking. Jogging. Fast walking. Obviously late to school. Obviously upset. Book bag and gym bag over his shoulders. Walking.

I feel that Holy Spirit nudge - 'don't pass by'.

But I keep driving, and take the littles on to school. And then come out to go back home a different way, this way he should have walked. And there he is. Maybe 9th grade. Hurriedly walking to school with only about 5 minutes left to make it and a 12 minute walk ahead. So I pull over and offer him a ride. And he was a sweet kid. Good manners. Appreciative. Ran out to his bus only to watch it pulling away.

Not saying all this to toot my own horn. I'm saying all this just because it has eaten and eaten at me since yesterday.

How many passed him by? And why? Were they late? Were they in their pajamas (which I would have been on ANY other morning except this one)? Or were they scared? Of his age, or of his color, or of both?

Others told me, 'you just have to be careful now'.... 'you just never know anymore'....'it's just too risky'.

But how many others have we passed by because we are scared? How many have I passed by????

The foster child; cause they might have too much baggage for us to handle.

The orphan with a now-treatable HIV; cause just imagine how hard that would be for our friends and family.

The sibling set, cause that's just too many kids for us to feed.

The homeless man outside Burger King, begging for money; cause what if he uses the money for booze?

The neighbor with cancer that may just need someone to talk to; cause I don't have time to invest in someone else's problems.

Sponsoring a child in another country; cause what if the organization doesn't use the money like they say they will?

How many? And why?

Although such a small, small deal - getting a kid to school on time. I don't know if he was a child of God.... but God orchestrated every minute for that moment, so I have to think He had his reasons. Those reasons I may never know. The only day I felt like pulling on my clothes early. The only day we would have been coming up the road in that direction because of a forgotten book bag. I don't know why. But I'm glad I didn't pass a good thing by even if it was risky.

Cause dying on a cross was risky. But thank God, HE didn't pass me by.