So if you didn’t catch this post in my weekly roundup last weekend I am sure you caught in on Facebook or Twitter. It. was. everywhere! There is a reason that post went viral. It is because Girl Was Speaking The TRUTH! I know many of you are already done with your school years. But here in Michigan we are limping to the finish line.

Last Friday we piled in the car to head to school after a slightly frazzled morning. But we were out the door quite early and I was so very proud of myself. Take that end of the year school mom!!

We were seconds from school (so close!!) when Hannah BURST into tears from the back seat. Hysterical tears. I assumed her sister had done something wicked to her (this is not remotely unusual sadly) until I heard Hannah wail, “I forgot my shoes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Like PE shoes? Like special shoes for weird shoe day? Like clogs for some sort of Holland dance days????

Um no. Like she is sitting in the back seat of the car on her way to school completely barefoot. Insert inappropriate language in front of children. Although thankfully that only occurred inside my brain.

So I quickly dropped Lily off at school and turned around to head home and get Hannah some shoes. We were halfway back home when she piped up again from the back seat. “You know I have P.E. first thing in the morning. Maybe I could just wear my P.E. shoes.” FOR THE LOVE OF PETE why didn’t you mention this 5 minutes ago?

Second turn around in a parking lot and headed back to school. As I am halfway back to school my phone rings and it is Lily calling from school. “I need my recorder today for a concert. And I forgot it at home.”

Then I blacked out from pounding my head on the steering wheel.

I replied some version of “You’re out of luck missy” and kept on towards school. Where I dropped off my dear middle child to shuffle BAREFOOT into the building. The building where my oldest child sat waiting to play her imaginary recorder during her concert. Mom of the year.

Three and a half more days and we can stick a fork in this year. Cause I am done.

title blatantly ripped off from one of our favorite books

Tonight as I tucked our foster baby it hit me like a ton of bricks. I love this baby. I mean I really love this baby.

It might shock you that I haven’t experienced this before tonight. I mean we have had her for a little over six months now. And she has been easy to love from the beginning. But it was love with a “little l”.

Part of the problem is honestly she wasn’t able to bond for many months. It is a sad reality of a child in the foster care system. She had been shuffled so much, handed off to worker after worker and spent a lot of her first six months in daycare (not a dig against daycare, just trying to make a statement about how many people were in her life).

The other half of the problem if you want me to be really honest with you…. I have held back. I have kept part of my heart safe. I had to. We all have except for Silas who went all in from day one. That boy loves her fearlessly. He has taught us all.

As time has gone on I have been worn down and this little girl has wormed her way deep into my heart. She has come out of her shell and this amazing little personality has emerged. She has always been easy going and happy but it was a generic happy. Now she has highs and lows and makes her feelings known (oh does she!!).

This weekend we were at a birthday party with a large crowd of strangers. Normally she will not seem to differentiate between strangers and family. In fact she did spend a lot of time getting passed around my complete strangers and it didn’t phase her.  But she got scared by a loud noise and immediately crawled over and up onto my lap. This. is. a. big. deal.

It is a bit heartbreaking that as she starts moving more and more towards reunification she is finally bonding with us (especially because I have observed her with her mom and this isn’t the case with her).

But this is the way of foster care. And it would be wrong to pull back and prevent her bonding. Her bonding to us is a very good thing as far as her development goes. I often worried she wasn’t able to bond. She has come such a long way in six months.

But it will make our goodbye much harder…….

(to be continued)

On this Mother’s Day I leaned over a child that I didn’t give birth to and kissed her good night. And it occurred to me that being a mother isn’t about giving birth. It certainly is in some respects. I was birthed by an amazing mom and have given birth to three amazing children. But being a mother is about loving fiercely, sacrificially, loving long past when it makes sense, loving when you barely like.

So it is only fitting this week that I could be found writing two other places than this blog about how you can be a mother to a child who grew outside your belly. I am over at Grand Rapids Kids talking about my experience as a foster mom. And I am over at the World Vision blog talking about how to be a mother to a child halfway around the world.

A few years ago I started to feel like our family might be a good fit for foster care.

There are a hundred of complex reasons why, but the main one was that honestly, our family has been very blessed and we felt we could be a blessing to someone else.

We spent a long time talking about it as a family before we committed to this decision. It was not something we took lightly. It is hard to  People often ask me if it will be hard to love her and then give her back.try and explain to your children why a child might need to come live in your home because their mommy and daddy can’t take care of them. Your heart breaks before you even start the conversation, but we needed to make sure that every member of our family understood what was going to happen.

Read more over at Grand Rapids Kids…….

___________________________________________________________________________________________’

This Mother’s Day, I am acutely aware of what it means to be motherless. Not because I don’t have a mother. I actually am blessed with an amazing mom, mother-in-law, and step mother-in-law. Three amazing women, three of my own children. My heart is full.

But this Mother’s Day, I am also a mother to a child who will spend the day separated from her mother. Her mother is not yet capable of caring for her. So this is my first Mother’s Day as a foster mother.

I can fathom what it must feel like to not be able to parent your child. This past week when our foster baby’s mom was asked to fill out a form about her biggest concerns for her child’s development, she wrote, “I am worried she will be adopted by another family.”

My mother’s heart broke for both mother and child.

World Vision steps in much like a foster parent and cares for children around the world who are parentless, or whose parents simply can’t care for them properly. One such family they are helping is Pyae Sone Kyaw and his mother, Daw Mee Nge.

Read more at World Vision…….  (and consider Sponsoring an orphaned child today)

not my kid. not that he is above this. just wanted to be clear

Becoming a boy mom after being a mom to two girls is an exercise in constantly being surprised. First of all because after years of all things pink and princess, we are all things swords and trucks. And second of all because I have spent my life being a girl, being a boy is just so…… “other”.

He is my buddy every day. Yes, we have the baby now, but she is gone a lot at various appointments with her mom so Silas and I get a lot of time together. And we spend most of it snuggling and laughing. This boy cracks. me. up.

Silas has a reputation for hating pants. He prefers to run around in his underwear and I am pretty sure if he had his way he would prefer to live at a nudist colony. It has gotten to the point where our social worker will pretend to be surprised if she comes over and Silas has pants on. Thankfully that doesn’t seem to be a reason to call CPS.

Today we were outside enjoying an 80 degree day (apparently we have skipped spring and moved straight to summer) and Silas announced he had to go potty. He is super independent so I continued to sit in the driveway soaking up some much needed Vitamin D and he ran inside.

He came back out a few minutes later completely naked from the waist down with his pants in his hands and a devilish grin on his face. Before I can say anything he smiles and says “Wait mom, I know what you’re thinking.”

If this is 3 1/2, I can’t wait to see what 4 brings.

When Lily was really little we were SUPER AMAZING PARENTS and didn’t let her little eyes ever see a TV. Because it would destroy her developing brain forever.

After she turned two we gradually gave into a little TV. Mostly because I was pregnant and tired and she was, well two, and did I mention I was tired and pregnant. But then it was ONLY educational TV where she would learn to count to ten in Spanish or learn about famous composers. (we also quickly learned Calliou is from the devil).

Pretty much the same routine followed with Hannah but we probably got a little more lax. Not necessarily in what she could watch, but the frequency. Her viewing habits still leaned heavily towards PBS kids and educational Nick Jr. shows. We have a lot of Dora toys still milling about the house.

As you can imagine with Silas all bets are off. The kids watches TV every morning upon awaking (mostly so we can get a few more precious minutes of sleep). And his favorite shows, Peppa Pig and Bubble Guppies, have very little value.

For the longest time our rule has been “no kids shows with real people in them”. Not because they are necessarily corrupt, but just because the glimpses I have seen have a lot of sassy and disrespectful kids in them. And I am pretty sure my kids don’t need lessons in THAT. Bring back the Dora por favor.

But there comes a point when it just doesn’t seem fair to force your almost ten year old (WHAT??) to watch cartoon characters asking what shape has three sides. At the same time, usually they all watch TV together so I have to make sure Silas isn’t exposed to things I don’t want him seeing.

So back during Pukefest 2013, when Lily and I were stuck in bed all day she convinced me to watch an episode of Good Luck Charlie with her. She had seen an episode at a friend’s house (which she really isn’t supposed to do, but in between puking seemed like a non-ideal time to lecture her on this fact) and assured me it was appropriate. I was actually super impressed that she said the only thing I might take issue with was that the mom didn’t always speak to the dad respectfully. Dang, they are apparently listening after all.

Anywho, we downloaded and episode and interweb peeps? I enjoyed it. It reminded me a bit of the family shows I grew up with, laugh tracks and all. The family all loved each other and treated each other well. There were mini life lessons to be learned. Although instead of relating to the kids I found myself relating to the mom (who by the way has a small muffin top so kudos to Disney for casting a mom who LOOKS like a mom).

So now Good Luck Charlie resides on our DVR with Peppa Pig and Phineas and Ferb (who I also secretly enjoy). I have also found that America’s Funniest Home Videos and Family Game Night are awesome no matter how old you are. When we really want to blow the kids mind we let them eat at TV trays and watch those as a family. Fun mom wins!!

How about you? What shows do you let your kids (or not let your kids) watch?

When Lily was little we didn’t let her watch TV lest it hurt her newly growing brain. We caved to Dora eventually (oddly enough right about the time I entered my first trimester with Hannah), but only educational shows would do.

Two kids later and Silas is fed a steady diet of Phineas and Ferb. No educational value whatsoever. And by steady diet I don’t really mean steady diet. Because no good parent would let their kids watch too much TV…..

Anyway, Lily never really watched movies. Hannah a few more, but only after we heavily screened them. But oh Silas. That third child of mine just finished the Star Wars trilogy this weekend in a flu induced haze with his daddy.

An event 30 some years in the waiting. Doesn’t every child of the 70s long for the day when they can introduce their boys to light sabers, storm troopers and Princess Leia in a bikini? And Silas ate every single second up.

Now everything is a light saber. Or a gun. I am usually a storm trooper. On a lucky day, I get to be Chewbacca. Silas is always Han Solo. Hannah usually Princess Leia. Lily plays a totally uninterested older sister. Ryan plays a proud father.

We checked out every Star Wars book from the library. He can recite you all the lineages, even from the movies he hasn’t seen yet. We have Star Wars fever on our hands and I am not sure what the cure is.

Then again, there has never been a cuter Jedi. Star Wars mom am I.

First day of spring break and my son wakes up looking like this:

The little devil horns should have been a sign. My day was punctuated by lines like:

“I’ve got punching and hitting and kicking power!!”

“You are making this the worst day ever!!!!!!!”

“You don’t get to be the boss, I’m the boss!!!!!!!!”

“I WANT CANDY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

The fundamental problem with all of this is two seconds after being the most frustrating child on the planet he is doing things like snuggling with me and telling me that I am his favorite snuggler.

This boy owns me. Somebody send help.

Something happened today that made a whole lot of stuff worth while. I was so shocked when it happened my stomach did flip flops. And honestly I am still kind of processing that it happened.

If you have followed our foster care story (check out Love Wins and Grace Begets Grace for the back story), you know that the biggest challenge so far has been my relationship with our baby’s mom. To sum it up in a few words: I have a hard time showing her love instead of judgment (that might be the most succinct I have ever been).

But today. TODAY. Today I got this note.

I cannot tell you what this meant to me. Even looking at it now, I well up with tears. To go from a place of picking apart every move I make to this statement is monumental to me. Monumental to our whole family.

There is a whole lot of stuff about the foster care system that is not in the best interest of the child (despite the fact it promises to be). There is very very little about the foster care system that looks out for the best interest of the foster families.

But working together to parent this beautiful little girl is absolutely in the best interest of us all.

Thank you so much for listening and supporting us through this journey. I love that I feel like we have a community of cheerleaders have our backs. Seriously. It means the world.

Foster care has a major learning curve.

I got the mom thing. Fourth kid? I can diaper, feed, rescue a pacifier seconds before it hits the ground in my sleep. She has lifted into our family pretty seamlessly. I hardly blinked tonight as she dropped a lovely gift into the bathtub before bedtime (is that too much info? Keeping it real up in here).

But dealing with a birth mom? You can take your licensing classes. But just like a parenting class isn’t really going to teach you how to parent until you have that kid in your arms, they didn’t prepare me for the emotions I feel towards her. 

I started out so well. We got our baby right before Christmas and her second visit I made a beautiful canvas with the baby’s footprints on it with her name. I wrapped it lovingly and addressed it to mom from her baby. I wanted her to know we were in this together. I might have smugly even patted myself on the back at how awesome I was being (again, keeping it real? Humility isn’t always a strong suit).

Those feelings didn’t take long to change.

They say you can catch more flies with honey and I knew the constant anger I was feeling wasn’t really helping anyone. My pastor always says bitterness is the poison you drink hoping it will kill the other person. I was the only one suffering from my bitterness here.

So I tried to change my attitude towards her.  Which isn’t near as hard when you don’t have to deal with someone in person. But God has a lovely sense of humor. I met up with birth mom at a doctor’s appointment and had a 40 minute wait. Not in the giant waiting room. But in the teeny tiny exam room. Good times.

I posted about how awkward it was on Facebook and someone said something to the affect of “Why should it be awkward? Don’t you have a lot to talk about?”

In a perfect world, yes. But foster care is as far from a perfect world as it gets. It is difficult to show grace to a person whose broken history you know and has resulted in a sweet child being taken away. And it is difficult for a woman to have a strong sense of appreciation for the person who is getting to see every milestone her daughter achieves while she reads about them in a notebook.

I used to get so defensive when I would get the notebook back after a visit and birth mom would criticize something I had done in parenting. Irrational things too like her carseat being too tight. I would write back defensively proving I was the better mom in paragraphs. I would stew about her words for days thinking dark thoughts in my head.

Then one day I realized that I have nothing to prove. I am not a bad mom. I am, in fact, a pretty darn good mom. But this mom? She has everything to prove. And everything to lose. And she needs to somewhere somehow have some control. The notebook is all the control she has.

So (slightly begrudgingly) I started responding in grace. I started telling lighthearted stories. More smiley faces. More “have a great visit”. Less this is what our schedule is and how you should follow it.

And amazing thing happened. Her tone changed too. More smiley faces back. More “have a great weekend.” And today? Today we had a break through. Today she asked me my advice on something. I sat and stared and smiled.

We aren’t done with this journey. And I still have a lot to learn. But I do know this. Grace feels a lot better to give and to get. Yet again. Love wins.