Wife, Then Mama

Today my brother left for his first deployment. When he enlisted in the Army, I was less than supportive.  I love my little brother, and don't want him in harm's way.  I did what I could to discourage him, to keep him safe.  However since he doesn't tend to take my advice, he joined up anyway. Me and my baby brother a million years ago! Last night I talked to him a couple hours before he had to leave to Kuwait before going on to Iraq.  While talking to him, I realized that although I think his excitement to deploy is a bit misplaced, I am proud of him. I don't know why most people join the Army, but I believe that my brother joined because he truly wants to do his duty to protect the people he loves (and other people of course).  His choice to deploy (it was a choice because he has moderate asthma and could have chosen to be medically discharged or "non-deployable") is a reflection of his dedication to the commitment he made. For our country to b...

Welcome. Many people have a mat outside their door telling visitors that they are welcome.  How many of them really mean it? If I am quite honest, although I do LOVE having people over, I wouldn't necessarily welcome them with open arms should they happen to show up unannounced.  I would act like I did, and I might even enjoy my time with them, but I would be wishing they hadn't shown up. Why? Because I am a mess.  My house is a mess, even though I do the dishes and laundry everyday, everything else kind of gets ignored much of the time.  I tend to have a number of children in my house at any given time, so my dining room floor could feed a small country on the days (weeks?) that I let sweeping go. My TV room is a disaster.  We have a large house, but somehow have ran out of space, so all of our camping stuff, extra toys, and donation stuff is piled in our TV room.  It is hugely embarassing, but I am to easily overwhelmed by giant messes to do any...

My mom was talking to someone about my quest to conceive, and they told her that when I finally have a baby, it will be "able to do no wrong".  Luckily my mom knows me better than that, and after living with us off and on this year has seen my parenting in action and knows that won't happen. My husband and I REFUSE to raise a spoiled child.  Even if it takes many more years and thousands of dollars to conceive, we will not, I repeat NOT allow our child to believe that they are more special than anyone else.  Because they won't be.  Yes, they might mean more to US than a random person, but in the big picture, and in God's eyes, they are no more important than anyone else.  And I want to make sure that my kids know that. I want to have children that other people enjoy being around.  I want them to be respectful, generous and polite, and I don't think that I can achieve that by spoiling them. There is obviously no guarantee that my children will not be b...

It has been about a year and a half since I have last blogged about infertility , unless I forgot to tag a post.  This timing is not coincidental.  That was about the time that I became the mother of a sweet baby girl.   I did not become a mother the conventional way, I became a foster mother. I will still be a foster mother after Miss Baby leaves, and hopefully be an adoptive mother to Little Guy, who has been with us almost as long (although life sucking the way it does sometimes, that could end quite soon as well, since he has family members that *might* want him, and I should hear more on by the end of the week) sometime in the near future. But the reality of Miss Baby leaving soon has left me questioning if I am ready for the ride of adopting from the foster care system.  I am perfectly, wonderfully happy with being a mother to kids that need one.  I am less happy with having those kids taken from me.  No matter what happens, we will continue d...

While I am still holding out a thread of hope for a miracle, the very likely outcome of the hearing on Friday is that Miss Baby will be moving out of state to live with some family. In case you don't know know who Miss Baby is, she is our foster daughter.  We got her on July 18th 2013, and she will be leaving sometime this month.  I very quickly fell in love with her. I still have the first two kids that I got.  This will be the first time that one of them leaving will leave a hole.  With the others, it has felt like a relief to get back to just "our family".  When Miss Baby leaves I don't think it will feel natural.  I think it will feel empty. I am coping with it better than I expected, although I am giving her A LOT of affection, trying to get 15 years of love into a week or two.  I've only cried once, right after getting off the phone and hearing the bad news.  I am trying really hard to be content, and remember that God has a plan and ...

I recently read a post on a blog.  It was about how coloring books stifle creativity.  You should just hand your kids plain paper. However, I realized that I don't care one iota about cultivating creativity.   I have seen a chart that was ripped to shreds on a Facebook post explaining good coloring vs. bad coloring.  I really want to make one myself.  Abstract art is NOT my thing.  In fact I think that most abstract art is either atrocious or looks like a small child did it. I have a wonderful picture that Miss Baby colored.  She did it SO well.  I told her what colors to color everything, and she did such a good job not scribbling (keep in mind she is 2!).  I was so pleased with her good work!!! After seeing the chart and reading about the perils of coloring books, I got to thinking about what I care about in regards to my kids.  That post will be done later.  This post is about what I don't care about. C...

Lately I am a wreck.  Not on the outside, just on the inside.  And vocally.  If you talk to me for more than 5 minutes you will realize that I have one thing, and one thing only on my mind.  "My" babies. Obviously the details of the babies cases are not allowed to be public information.  Heck, I don't even know that much about the cases if I did want to break the rules and blab about them. But we have had both the kids for around a year now.  A year is the "magic" number for foster care.  At that point the plan is supposed to change from reunification to some other sort of permanency, either adoption or guardianship.  It doesn't always, sometimes they get extensions to get more time, and even when it does change, it can take months to do anything about it. Right now I feel like everything is so far up in the air I can barely see it.  I love both of "my" babies so much, and although its unlikely to happen, I have a terrible feeling that ...