Random Thoughts on this Monday

Another blogger posted the following quote "If our poor die of hunger, it is not because God does not care for them. Rather, it is because neither you nor I are generous enough. It is because we are not instruments of love in the hands of God. We do not recognize Christ when, once again, He appears to us in the hungry man, in the lonely woman, in the child who is looking for a place to get warm." Mother Teresa. I think I have expressed in the past, and my friend at work makes it a point to me quite often how in the best of times, I rejoice in the Lord, but as stumbling blocks cross my path, I am the first to get angry and frustrated and forget that God has a plan for me and my family in all of this. In all my distress when K came home, this time around, I never lost sight of the fact that I could see this child was meant to be my daughter and that it would all work out, given time. This is pretty rare for me, that is, to see through the chaos and rationalize with myself that God has a plan for this little girl in our life. I never doubted for on second and I know today, that it was true all along. We began this journey to K in December of last year looking at the photos of 3 siblings from the DRC, while God lead us to the DRC, it wasn't those 3 siblings he was leading us to, it was K, he pointed, we followed, blindly (for the most part), and here we are with a beautiful daughter. At this point, one (and the one being me) would rationalize that blindly following God has been pretty good to us. That is we have 3 of the most amazing kids in the world! (I say world, because they are from all over the world, so of course that is a valid statement LOL!), I have a job that allows me to help people and we are blessed with family, friends and neighbors. What I find interesting in all this is that the more I relate my journey to God's will in my life, family and work, the more people come out of the woodwork and try and talk me out of it, by either rationalizing things away or developing their own theories on why something is the way it is. Where is this coming from I wonder? Does it make them uncomfortable that I profess the will of God in my life? Does it make them even more uncomfortable that I trust the will of God in my life? Is it a control issue? Or are they questioning their own faith and by doing so, question mine? To which I say, Lord, give me the blindfold, I am ready to follow you where ever you lead me.

The Return of Sanity

What a difference a few weeks makes! I was at adoration last night and journaling about my present state of mind and realized that the word that came to mind was "quiet". That is pretty extraordinary in all the chaos and high blood pressure over the past few weeks. We had dinner at a restaurant last night with all three kiddos and apart from one "get back in your chair" episode, it turned out to be a very nice meal and we were all able to relax and enjoy eachother's company. Amazingly, there wasn't even alcohol involved. K and I have been having more and more fun and bonding on our days together. I have to admit it, I was skeptical when our social worker told me to "just push through it". To which I asked her what that meant after I had just admitting to her that our time together infuriated me and was not helping the bonding process. She said I needed to keep at it, setting aside time just for the two of us. Instead of dreading a full day with just K, I found myself looking forward to it this week. We didn't do anything amazingly exciting like the past weeks when we went to the Children's Museum, we just hung out, did some errands together and took a long walk chatting and kicking leaves up as we went. It felt normal for the first time in about 6 weeks. Normal, there world I said it, we have returned to NORMAL! (for now at least!)
The craziest thing I have noticed that with the 3 kiddos, we seem to be somehow finding quality time alone with each of them, more so than with just the 2. Maybe we are doing with more intent now or I am just noticing it more, but it is really nice to have the one on one time. Last weekend E2 woke up at 6:15 and it was clear he was ready to start the day, not spend any more cuddling time. So we snuck out of the bedroom to the basement where we had a fun breakfast together while the rest of the crew slept in. Certainly could have used an extra half an hour of sleep, but afterwards, realized how great it was to just spend some time with E2. Now if we could just squeeze some couple time in (don't tell T about the dance lessons I am working on for us! )

Reconsider Columbus Day - Pause music before playing