I want that

Some days I am surrounded by so much neediness that I can't believe my children will ever grow up. There is a popular sentiment with many older mommas that they long to return to the days when their kids were little. I, for one, think they are completely senile, but still plan to capitalize on their highly emotional state with a product I'm inventing called "Mommy Memories." For a nominal fee I will send a monthly box filled with various baby/children's items to help mothers relive the glory days of the past. The first box includes a baggie of legos for you to scatter around your living room, bubblegum flavored toothpaste to squirt all over your bathroom sink, three blank reading logs, supplies to make four DIY holloween costumes, 12 mismatched sippy cups and lids, a urine stained car seat cover that needs washing, and a dirty diaper (caution on this one as contents may unsettle during shipping.)  Oh and I almost forgot,  I will obviously include a handmade drawing with cute little child-font scrawl writing "I luv momma" just to jack with my patrons menopausal emotions and trick them into re-ordering for the next month. Get yours today!! :)

This  pic was taken at our 10 year ACU reunion when we had been fostering our youngest three boys for a little over two months. It is one of the few family pictures we have from the beginning. We didn't take many pics because we didn't realize that what we were living and doing everyday was our family, we were "just fostering." ;) There is so much I LOVE about this picture but I DO NOT miss this life at all. I was working full time and surviving newborn sleepless nights while Cory was a stay at home dad to three kids in diapers that included the newborn, an asthmatic one year old, and two 3 year olds that hated each other. I know based on doing the math that Titus was five and Levi had just turned 8.... but I have no real recollection of it :)

Four years after that picture was taken, we are back in that same place. We've been fostering our newbies for a little over two months. And just as I had predicted, we are in survival mode. We have some really great moments and some really low moments and often those are happening at the same time. The perfect example was this past Sunday when Cory got to baptize a couple from church who have both lived some life but are now committing themselves to God's counsel and priorities.  It was the coolest scene. Our church doesn't have a baptistry in house so Cory purchased a huge metal animal trough and with help from a friend filled it with water and set it up in the parking lot. Our whole church gathered out on the hillside to watch and sing. The October weather was gorgeous with the trees that frame our parking lot aching to turn their colors in celebration.  It was such a beautifully simple break from reality having the physical and the spiritual so blatantly co-existing.  

Meanwhile not 20 feet from this scene, I was balancing and shushing two toddlers on my hips, our rambunctious 4 year old was already loaded in the van, our oldest was at home keeping a watchful eye on a puking brother, and I was gearing myself up to prep lunch and naps solo knowing that Cory would be in a meeting all afternoon. Survival mode: where the precious moments of the physical and spiritual blatantly co-existing get quickly dominated by the physical alone. 

I do love this picture that freezes the co-existing moment a little longer for me. And I love that Cory is my preacher. I love getting to life live with him and watch him minister from the pulpit and from our home knowing that he is the same man of character in both places. Sadly that's not true for every minister. It's no secret in our marriage that Cory has the better connection to Jesus. He works for it and I don't. He commits the time to pray and rest in God; while my comfort involves junk food, watching The Voice, and girl time.  He doesn't do it because he's a preacher or because he knows he is supposed to. He does it because it fills him. 

He shared with me, that lately when he prays he uses meditation and imagery. He imagines Jesus with his long hair and tanned skin standing at our front door in jeans and a t-shirt. Cory welcomes Him in and they sit at our table and talk. Yesterday as they talked each of our kids took turns climbing into Jesus' lap. As he picked them up he shared with Cory what he needs to hear about them. 

For Levi: Show him to do things, don't just expect it. He wants to know, but has to be shown. 

For Titus: Steer him towards good and let his selfless nature take over. 

For Seth: More attention. He's trying to please you through obedience. Teach him how to have a relationship with you.

For Judah: He has all the qualities you want your boys to have. Help draw them out.

For Canaan: Give him space and freedom to be himself. Don't be so quick to squash him.

For Silas: There's goodness all over him, he just needs to be reminded that he's good. 

For the little two: It's complicated. 

I mean it is so spot on for each of our kids. I get choked up reading it back even now. I wish I could tell you that the Lord talks to me like this but it's not true.  For what it's worth my peanut M&M's never say this kind of stuff to me either, but I'm starting to wonder if God doesn't even try to get my attention because he knows I'm not listening anyway.

I just finished a great book this week called Reckless Faith by Beth Guckenberger who tells some really amazing stories of the way God tangibly speaks in her life. She is a foster/adopt mom and runs an orphan ministry in Monterrey, Mexico. Theses words of hers really stuck with me: 

"There were lots of days when...I fell into bed with a sense of self-righteousness that God and I were quite the team [but] I'm learning to let my back get pushed against a wall- because that is when I cry out for my Rescuer. Most days when I see the wall coming, I angle myself so I don't get anywhere near it... I realize now that more than three decades into my life,  the only new things I try tend to be those I am already good at or capable of. I'm slowly learning to get in over my head, so God can save the day- or at least pick up the pieces."

I can relate so much to the first half of her sentiments, but the second half is not me.

Here's a little secret: Managing 8 kids is actually not that hard. I'm organized. I'm type A. I can schedule 5 parent-teacher conferences, my work days, doctors appointments, and homeschool assignments like a beast. My masters degree is heavily steeped with child development classes. I can totally rock managing 8 kids with a little starbucks and an awesome husband. Shoot, even all the accolades I rack up for managing this zoo can keep my people pleaser personality going for days. 

But mothering 8 kids is totally different. That backs me up against the wall. Mothering 8 kids I can not do alone. 

We are in the survival years again and I really want to do things different this time around and you know actually mother my kids. I don't want to make it through because the clock kept ticking. I don't want to rely on chocolate and Facebook. I don't want a participation certificate. I want to really live this life we chose and I want to live it with joy and with peace. I want what my husband has. I want what Beth has. Like them I have been a christian my whole life, but I want that.