Hello Everyone!!! Did you know that even Christians can find themselves overwhelmed at times? Look at Peter, who was walking on water in the middle of a storm, and took his eyes off of Jesus and looked at the storm around him. He began to sink!!! Christians can start sinking too when they look at everything around them instead of looking to Jesus to hold them up.

Since this weekend, our family has a renewed vision of where the Lord is taking us and how we are to get there. It was just a matter of re-focusing and seeing everything through God’s eyes. I am so very thankful to Him for the family He has given me and overwhelmed that He would allow me to have all these beautiful children.

This week we have been spring cleaning the kitchen. I had no idea my kitchen was so big! Thankfully I have many hands that willingly help me. As we cleaned away the cobwebs and got rid of the things we no longer had need of, I was reminded of how much this is like sin. We get comfortable and let things pile up in the corners and pretty soon we don’t even notice the dirt and junk we have in our lives. We need God’s Holy Spirit to help us “spring clean” our hearts and lives just like we spring clean our homes. If we don’t take time to get back on track, we will soon be off the track and in the mire and mud of sin. After that, it is easier and easier to let more and more sin into our lives. If we took the time to look back once in a while we might be able to see how far off course we have drifted into sin. Believe me, others can see it even if we can’t. The things that used to prick our conscience no longer bother us. We over look something so we can “enjoy” ourselves and have a bit of fun. Pretty soon, we are rolling in the mud with the pigs.

Thirteen years ago today, my life changed forever and I am SO grateful to the Lord for allowing me to begin our adoption journey. Our first two babies came home from Haiti and life has never been the same. What a blessing from the Lord these children are! I can’t imagine my life without each and every one of them.

I keep thinking I should write a blog post, then the kids need me or I am just too exhausted to write anything down. Today is a “free” day…nothing to do and no where to go…so I am going to try and give you a glimpse into what has been happening in our house.

My mom has been here since December 19th and I have really enjoyed her company. We have had a lot of fun since she has been here. We have been shopping, bowling, and out for lunch. We have rented movies and been shopping and out for lunch! She will be here for one more week and I wish she could stay longer.

My RAD kids are still RAD…nothing changed just because Grandma was here or because we had some special holidays. In fact, it was worse having special things. Sometimes I don’t think I will make it to the finish line. I get so tired of dealing with the lying and sneaking and stealing and I wonder why on earth I have done this to myself. I mean, I actually chose to take these kids on knowing that other families had given it their best shot and couldn’t go on any longer. What was I thinking? What makes me so special? Did I actually think that I could succeed where others had not? I wonder what is going to become of some of these children. Will I have actually made a difference in their lives? Just this morning I found out about yet another incident with one of the children who continues to be on restriction. I feel like a yo-yo…giving them a chance and then pulling them back when they mess up, giving them another chance, messing up, pulling back…like a continuous, endless cycle. And to make it twice as hard, I do this as a single parent during the week. Only God.

Steve got sick the week before Christmas, yet couldn’t stand the thought of not being here. So, he came home. He promised to wear a mask and not prepare any food. He said he felt better on Friday, so he went to work and then came home. On Saturday, both he and my mom were not feeling well. She hadn’t slept well and was light headed. They each took a couch and pretty much laid on them all day while I made Christmas Eve dinner….lasagna, salad, garlic bread, and two desserts. Christmas Eve I took the children to sing at our neighbor’s Nativity service in her barn. We had decided to open gifts on the morning of Christmas Eve to kind of keep the RAD kids off balance and it worked!! They were not expecting anything and so did not have time to sabotage anything and the other kids got the benefit of not having to wait to open gifts…a win-win situation for everyone.

I was awakened at 4:30 Christmas morning by Steve yelling and moaning. When I got up to investigate, I found him standing in the bathroom unable to move. I guess he coughed and threw his back out. I helped him back into bed, where he promptly fell asleep and there I was wide awake. So,  I made cinnamon rolls and the kids opened their stockings and gifts from Grandma. Since we were also fostering 11 puppies, the children were kept busy with new toys and taking care of puppies out in the barn.  My mom was feeling better, but Steve was worse, so he pretty much laid around while I got the ham and potatoes ready. I asked the boys to bring me in some potatoes from the barn and they discovered that “someone” left the water on and flooded the puppies out of the barn!!! I went to Steve on the couch and told him I was sorry he didn’t feel well, but I was at my breaking point now and he had better get up and do something!!!!!

We got the puppies settled into the “ugly” house out back with a heat lamp…after the girls had given all 11 a nice bath and dried them in a towel. Grandma took over the dinner while I dealt with puppies and Steve supervised the boys getting things ready in the house. He came back and laid down and then we had dinner. Steve decided he was going to be unable to drive the 2 and a half hours back to work and called in sick.

The next morning, he was still not feeling well. So, I popped a new movie in for the kids and my mom and I went after Christmas shopping. Sometime while I was gone, Steve decided he needed a doctor and since no one was open, he left for Boise shortly after we returned from our shopping trip. I was sorry to see him go, but at the same time didn’t want anyone to get sick.

On Wednesday, Grandma took everyone bowling for our 2nd annual bowling fun!! Elizabeth beat everyone with a score of 100 and some of the boys’ egos took a beating with low scores. But, everyone had fun.

Yesterday, Luc came down with a cold…great. I hope everyone else doesn’t come down with this and especially not Grandma or ME! I also got a phone call that a transport was coming to take 5 of the 11 puppies. I met the transport and handed off the puppies. Now we were down to 6 puppies and it seemed so quiet. As I was finishing up making our dinner of ham and scalloped potatoes, the phone rang again. The transport had decided to take another 5 puppies along, which left just one puppy that was already promised to someone from northern Idaho. So, I jumped in the van with the other 5 pups and headed to the shelter.

One puppy is a lot more work than 11…or even 6!!!! We had decided it would be too cold and lonely for the puppy to be out in the “ugly” house, so we tried to put her in a kennel in the house and she was miserable. In the interest of everyone getting a good night’s sleep, we put her back in the house with a couple of stuffed animals. One of our barn cats came up and we threw him in there too. The puppy was happy to have the company and settled right down by her stuffed animals and went to sleep. The cat, however, is probably scarred for life!!

Tonight is the last night of 2011 and tomorrow begins a new year…2012. We will have special food tonight and my children will go to bed at their normal bedtimes because I am not about to try and stay up until midnight with RAD kids and besides…I’m just too tired to stay up.

What will the next year bring? I’m sure there will be blessings as well as hard times.

That’s just the way life is.

More later….

It has been a couple of weeks since my last post and time has just flown by.  The first week or so there really wasn’t anything worth posting because we were just living regular life and with 12 children to care for, it is hard to find the time to have a complete thought. But, then we had some excitement and a birthday party., so I thought I would try and get some things down before I forget.

Last week I had to run to the store for chicken food and while I was there some baby ducks caught my eye. We ended up with 5 of them, one of which had only one eye.

We had been having a great time with them until yesterday when the one eyed duck had a seizure and died.  But we still have four left!

The day we got the ducks, Sean decided to stick his fingers in the gears of the motor that moves the wheel line that we use to irrigate the field. He lost his fingernail, part of his nail bed, broke the tip of this finger and has 9 stitches in the top of his finger. Trust me when I say that it is too gross to post pictures of! He has assured me that he will NEVER do that again! I was alone with the children when the accident happened and at first I was going to take all 12 with me to the emergency room. Steve called me and said that it would be ok for Elizabeth to stay with some of the kids, so I headed off with half of them. Thankfully, the emergency room wasn’t busy at all and we got in and out in just a couple of hours. I was so proud of all the kids who stepped up to the plate and took care of everything that needed to be done. They were awesome!

It was also good for one of the kids who has been having a really bad time of things lately. RAD is rearing its ugly head again and we are back to total supervision and very few privileges. But, after the emergency was over, it was back to the business of being RAD again.

It was Elizabeth’s 13th birthday last week and we had a party for her on Saturday. It was so much fun to gather with friends and family to share in her special day.

The picture collage I made for Elizabeth.

Elizabeth's fan club!

Elizabeth with her Papa and her cake!

Her special gift was a hope chest that is still being hand made by a neighbor. We are hoping he has it finished before too long! We had water balloon games and water balloon fights, great food and an amazing time sharing memories of Elizabeth. She played the piano and even played one of her own compositions!

So, if I don’t post every other day or so, it is because I am here in the trenches of life raising my children and making a difference for a few precious souls.