People from the past...

impacting the future.

Whenever I listen to Carolyn Arends, I am brought back in time.  To the summers of '94 through '96, to be exact.  I was 14 in 1994, and I can oh so vividly remember sitting in my friend Deb's living room late at night.  We'd sing for probably hours, Deb playing her guitar along with our friend Laura (whose last name I cannot remember for the life of me!).

Deb wasn't just any friend.  She was an adult.  A real live adult, with kids of her own.  The reason I was there was to babysit for her girls, who were not all that much younger than me, at least in hindsight.  I would stay at their house for a week or more at a time.  Those years between 14 and 16 were rough ones for me, and I'm not sure if Deb ever really knew how rough.  Oh, they're probably hard years for most kids, those years in between childhood and adulthood.  So maybe she did know.

What Deb did for me in those years was amazing.  She loved me.  She trusted me...with her babies, with her home, with her dogs, with her heart.  Deb never treated me like a kid, but always as a friend.  She listened, she respected me for who I was, and had a profound impact on who I am now.

Deb was a single mom.  She had a lot on her plate.  Too much, actually.  I know they were hard years for her.  Yet, not only did she keep going forward, one foot in front of the other, she took the time to love a kid during the transition to young adult.  When I hear "Seize the Day", I can only think of Deb and how she lived that song we would sing together.

And now...we are both students at the same college.  Her babies are grown and on their own, and I have 5 babies of my own, and probably too much on my plate.  We're both seizing the day...

We have another reader in the house!!!

My girl can read!!!!  Really read!  She can sound out and figure out words she hasn't seen before!  She is now whizzing through her phonics book.

Go, Hannah Girl!!!!

I cannot begin to express the delight in my heart.  I have a feeling this one is going to be a little bookworm, like I was as a child. 

And I taught her.  Me.  An untrained teacher.  That just flat out amazes me.  IMO, the hardest thing to teach a child is how to read.  Everything else builds on that, so there is a lot of pressure to do it well and do it right.

We did it, Hannah Girl!  Go, us!!!

Just another day

Hard plastic toys hurtling through the air, connecting with a sibling or a wall.

Spreading little papers all over the living room and refusing to pick them up.

When made to pick up, shredding the papers and shoving them into his mouth.

Screaming.  Crying.  No, wailing.

Hiding and pooping in his pants.

Pinching, hitting, pushing, throwing.

Refusing to eat anything but carbs.  Throwing his food on the floor.

Attacking baby sister as if he hates her, when I know he doesn't!

Just another day for Levi.  We have had three in a row like that, actually.  I am exhausted and don't know how to help him.  There must be a way...

Forgiveness and bologna sandwiches

I think I have been overthinking the concept of forgiveness, thinking it had to be some spiritual event and certainly had to result in an epiphany of kindhearted feelings on my part.  Lately, I'm thinking it's much simpler.

Forgiveness is...doing something nice for my husband when he's just shown me his oh-so-human side.

Forgiveness is...allowing every day to be a new day for my children.

Forgiveness is...giving friends the same grace I hope they will give me when I need it.

Forgiveness is...making bologna sandwiches for Tractor Man.*

Forgiveness is...meaning it when I tell him to have a great day.

Forgiveness is...knowing God has my future under control, and I don't need to hold onto the anger.

Forgiveness is...knowing that God can handle the justice part, and I don't need to.

Forgiveness is...remembering that I am one of those Jesus was referring to when he said, "Father, forgive them.  They know not what they do."

I don't have it all figured out, but I think being open to learning is all that is required here...


*Tractor Man...used interchangeably for the man who drove the tractor that hit Brian, and also for the farmer that owns the tractor.

Missing my boy

I haven't cried too much lately, but it seems to be coming due.

Part of my heart is missing, though it lives just over a couple of hills, in another town, with another family.  I keep hoping maybe his mother will relent and if we keep trying, maybe she'll just let him be with us again.  Maybe this weekend.  Maybe this Wednesday...maybe...or maybe not.

And then he doesn't come, isn't even in school on Wednesdays.  He's been stolen from us, and it is so unfair.  To him, to us, to the other kids.  They deserve to know their brother as a real brother, here in their life regularly, to play with, to fight with, as all siblings should.  I hate that he's already become "the brother we never see" to Levi and Esther.  I don't think they even realize he's as much of a brother as Noah is.  It's just not fair.

People ask me how many kids I have, and if I think I won't have to explain anything, I still say 5.  But if it's someone who sees me with my kids, sooner or later, they're going to wonder where this 5th imaginary child is.  A couple times lately, I have said I have 4 kids.  Even as I type that, the guilt is overwhelming.  How can I disown my boy?  Oh, Nick, please don't ever think I've disowned you, that I still don't think of you as mine.  It just hurts so much to explain to someone who doesn't really need to know and probably won't understand why an "evil stepmother" would be anything but relieved over not having to deal with another woman's child. 

Please forgive me, Nick.  If I don't cry, it's not because my heart isn't breaking into a million pieces.  I just can't cry because if I start, I might never stop.  I have to be able to live life, to love and care for what is left of our family, even if it means I must lock the sadness into a room no one lives in any more.  Your room.

I love you, Nicolas.  More than you will ever know.  I pray you are missing me.  I hold onto a thin thread of hope that you'll come back to us.  It's been over 1/3 of a year.  I miss you so much...

Hannah Day!

Yesterday was also another very special day!  I always thought it was very neat that God had Hannah be born on the very same day Nick came into our lives (at least on paper).

Hannah-girl day.  Of course, she's the kind of kid that thinks every day is or should be Hannah day.

Somehow, I ended up with a little girl who is into all things girly...frilly dresses, makeup, I think she would even enjoy the dreaded Barbie if she were allowed in my house.  She is my beauty, inside and out.

My favorite times with Hannah are when we talk about God and Heaven.  And people who don't know God.  Hannah definitely has a heart for people to know Him.  She puts me to shame in this way.  I can't wait to see what God will do with this heart in her!  Amazing things, I'm sure!

She's fun.  She's incredible.  She's the girl I never knew I always wanted.

Caragen and Hannah!

She's my baby!  I can't believe she is 6 already!

Things she's looking forward to this year, in her own words...
1. Learning to ice skate better.  (She's already pretty good!)
2. Going to McDonald's.
3. Going back to the train museum in Penner's.  I mean, Pencils-bania.
4. Going to Lilly's house.
5. Learning to crochet better.
6. Playing with Caragen. :)

See, told you she's awesome!  I love that girl!  Mostly, I just love that she's mine. <3

A very special day

Today is a very special day.  Probably not for the reason you are thinking, as you read this.  Yes, it is Hannah's 6th birthday today, and that post will come later.  But since this other special day came first, it deserves to come first.

It was 9 years ago, February 21st, 2002.  It was a warmish day in Pine Grove, PA, with spring in the air.  While Noah napped in his room, I walked up to the mailbox, hoping for something other than a handful of bills.

What I found that day changed the rest of my life in ways I never could have comprehended that afternoon.

But first, a little of the back story that brought us to live in Pine Grove, PA at that time...

It is no secret that Brian and I had a rough few years at the beginning of our marriage.  We were both so young (18) and really had no business getting married with the baggage we were both carrying.  But we did get married, and while I tried to set up a happy little home (snort), Brian was out...pretending he wasn't married.  Sorry, there is no delicate way to say that.  He was staying out late, partying, and sleeping with other women.  I don't say that to make you all think horrible things about my husband, for he is not that person at ALL anymore, but to understand how we got to this day walking to the mailbox, you have to know what came before.  And it was ugly.

So.  We ended up separated in the spring of 2001, and back together at the end of the summer, when Noah was 18 months old.  At that point, everything was out on the table, Brian admitted he had been a complete _______________ (fill in the blank with whatever nasty word you'd like...but remember, this is not the Brian of today).  I had some requirements to us getting back together: 1) We had to move away.  The influences here in NY were out of control and I wanted to remove them from his life.  2) We had to attend church as a family.  And 3) He had to work.  Full-time.  No excuses.  He agreed, went to school for a few months to learn to drive a tractor trailer, got a job driving out of Carlisle, PA, and we moved to Pine Grove on our 3rd anniversary...January 1, 2002.

Life had been rocky, but it was going to be good now.  We began to heal, to learn to work together, learned to be parents as a team, and having only each other to rely on was a big part in that.  Then something incredible happened.  I found a church for us to attend (remember, requirement 2), and on Brian's second time there, February 3rd, he was moved by the Spirit of the Living God, and accepted Christ as his Savior!

WOOHOO!!!  Now life would be really good!  The past was behind us, and the future was bright.

Back to the mailbox...

There was an envelope from County Family Court.  Weird.  Not even the county we had lived in.  And it was thick.  As I opened it, my heart beat faster until I felt nauseous.  Blah, blah, blah, appear on this date, to answer these charges...you are the putative father of Nicolas S. C------, date of birth 2-7-01, whose mother is J----- C-------.  Putative?  I didn't even know what that word meant, but the rest of it was pretty clear.  Brian had another son.  Maybe.  Noah had a brother.  Maybe.  I had a stepson.  Maybe.

I walked in the house, shaking, glad Noah was still sleeping.  Quickly, I called Brian's sister.  Yes, she was the first one to know.  I asked her if she knew this woman, and she didn't.  I asked her to please not say anything to anyone, and she agreed.

Ironically, it was the day Brian was coming in from the road for a few days, and Noah and I went to pick him up at the truck terminal an hour away.  I probably wasn't fit to drive, alternating between crying and shaking.  My nice, neat world was falling apart before my eyes.

I meant to wait to say anything until we were all in the car.  But I couldn't, and my tear-stained face gave me away anyway.  The first words out of my mouth were, "Do you know J---- C-----?"  He didn't deny it.  But it's not like I hadn't known.  I knew there were other women.  The past was behind, forgiven, gone.  Until all of a sudden, it wasn't gone, and turns out, never really would be.

What followed was a lot of pain, a lot of tears, a lot of what ifs, and five months later, when we got to meet Nick, a lot of love.  And a lot of healing.  And learning what real forgiveness is.  It was not easy, and sometimes still is not easy. 

Truth be known, had I known then the agony of today, of being kept from MY son, Nicolas, of seeing my other kids miss him desperately, I might have demanded we not have anything to do with him.  But there is a reason we don't know what lies ahead for us in life...probably many reasons, most of which we may never know.  But I know that the decisions we made then to be in his life as fully as we could be, which led us to move back to NY only 8 months after we had left "for good", were and are the right decisions. 

I can't imagine my life without that little boy.  My little boy.  I never went through labor with him, but the anguish of the heart was more than enough to count him as my own.