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Monday, March 26, 2012

Great Quote and Stress



It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man
stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit
belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust
and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, and comes short again and
again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does
actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great
devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the
end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least
fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and
timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.President
Theodore Roosevelt
Ok, I saw this quote on someone else's blog tonight and thought it was great. Whew! What a year it has been. This is how overwhelmed I have been. A year ago today we met Ethan for the first time. A year ago yesterday, we met Seth. And it just now hit me.
What a whirlwind year.
March 2011 Took our entire family to Ethiopia. That in and of itself was a feat. Met our boys for the first time. Did not pass court because paperwork on the Ethiopian side was not there yet.
April 2011 Missing boys. Finally passed court on April 20. Officially became a mother of 5.
May 2011 I don't know the exact date, but by this time the well at our house had become so low that all we had enough to do was wash hands, drink it, and wash 1 load of dishes a day by hand.
June 2011 Went with sister in law and neice to pick up boys. Spent two nights in Dubai. Flew out to go to embassy to bring boys home. Spent 3 nights in Ethiopia then spent 36 miserable hours traveling to get home.
July 2011 Finally admitted to ourselves that we were not really welcome or embraced where we were attending church. I think we had lived in denial for a long time. No bulletin announcement that the boys were home. Nothing mentioned that we were proud parents again. So much more went on, but that is not for now. Just saying that it was a sad time and still is. Also finally made the very hard decision (for me) to put our house up for sale.
August 2011 Well finally went dry. BOOOO!!!! Now that we had 7 people living in the house, there was not one drop of water flowing through the pipes. Which means taking the kids 15 min. to Mom's for a bath whenever they need it. Filling a huge pot with rain water to heat up on stove to bathe when going to Mom's was too inconvenient. Hauling in and buying tons of gallons of water and paper products since the dishes either had to be taken to Mom's to wash or washed with boiled rain water. Filling up gallons and gallons of rain water into milk jugs to carry into the house and store in tubs for flushing toilets. Not to mention taking ALL of our laundry to Mom's every day. Never being able to just leave the house with 5 kids. Always making sure the laundry went with us. In and out with tons of clothes baskets, water jugs, etc.
September 2011 Other than 3 birthdays this month, I am not sure what all went on. It is a blurr, but I am sure the lugging of kids, water jugs and laundry kept me busy. No to mention homeschooling and soccer.
October 2011 Aaron goes out of town for 24 days. Makes extra money. We thought it would be worth it. I suppose it was. During this time, Soccer season was in full swing. Which meant me, alone driving all 5 kids to soccer fields 3 nights a week for either practice or games. Kids were on 3 separate teams this year. Yippee! Then the worst of the worst. Stomach virus, husband out of town, 5 kids, no water. Oh yes, that happened. Thankfully the boys were picked up and taken by mom until it went through us 4 girls and they never got it.
November 2011 Ethan turns 1! Thanksgiving and travelling to TN. Basketball starts.
December 2011 Seth turns 2. Christmas and all that entails. We finally move into a house that our friend is letting us rent for dirt cheap. However, even though I can now crawl out of bed and take a shower without dressing and driving to Mom's, it is costing us more money. I guess I didn't mention that on our adoption loans alone, our minimum payments add up to over $1000 a month. Basketball 3 nights a week and often on Saturdays.
January 2012 Utterly stressing out about bills. Trying to work as much as possible, while trying to get our homeschool in each day. We have now run out of savings and things are looking bleak. Miracle of miracles. We get an offer on our house. And we take it! What an awesome burden taken off our shoulders.
February 2012 Trying to potty train Seth. Why did I start this? Can't go back though and undo all that we have done. Looking around for a house
I look back at this past year and see that without God, I believe I might have imploded. I talk to Mom a lot about this. How stressed I am...
How I feel like I haven't been able to truly enjoy the boys since all this other stuff has been thrown at us.
How I feel like I haven't been able to truly enjoy much of anything when it really should have been a very joyful year.
Mom says it is a miracle I haven't completely lost it. I believe she is right because there are many days when I think I might.
But God ALWAYS reminds me of my blessings!
Thank you God for loving me so much every day!

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