So I know I have not been consistent with blogging and updating much at all. Probably because by 3PM every afternoon I’m ready to throw in the towel and call it a day and there are still 4-5 hours till the littles go to bed and then the mound of things yet to be done after they are asleep….
All in all the days are going well. Paxton is a pretty laid back little guy and he goes with the flow of things. He loves to giggle and laugh and we play a lot of “chase me” and “tickle me” every day. Trucks are still his favorite thing and he adores his big brothers. He naps like a dream for 2 hours every afternoon. Grieving ebbs and flows, some days we only see traces of it and other days its much more apparent. Night times are definitely the worst. We’ve had a couple calm nights but most nights usually have at least one if not more long night terror stretches. I’m amazed that Caedmon sleeps through it (they share a room), as Paxton screams and moans and cries and kicks for often 30 minutes or more at a time. But this isn’t anything different than we expected.
The other three boys are doing really well. There’s the usual melt downs at 6PM every night because someone is exhausted (but usually disguised as “so and so looked at me or touched me or breathed the same air I did or something”). Sometimes one wants more one on one time or gets jealous but we’ve been making it a point in the midst of everything to spend some focused one on one time with each boy.
But running a house with 4 kiddos under the age of 8 is exhausting. Clint and I are constantly talking and planning ways of streamlining things. The boys all pitch in but just making life work day to day sometimes is a feat in itself. And in a week it’ll be 5 kids under the age of 8….
I leave this Sunday (Easter) with my mom to head to Korea to take custody of Coppelia. We take custody on Tuesday the 18th, do her visa interview on Thursday the 20th and fly home the 21st, landing in Denver at 7:15PM. Anyone local is invited to meet us at the airport. I don’t know how often I will be able to update while we are there, but I promise I will introduce everyone to our daughter Coppelia as soon as I can.
Please be praying for a number of things over this next week.
-Pray for continued peace and comfort for Paxton’s little heart and attachment and bonding continue and he grieves the loss of everything he has ever known.
-Pray for Clint’s strength and stamina as he single parents all four boys for 6 full days.
-Pray for my mom and I’s travels. There is a lot of tension between North Korea/South Korea/and the US right now….pray that nothing serious happens and we are safe and aware throughout our trip.
-Pray for Coppelia as she leaves everything she has ever known and begins the journey of learning and accepting us as her forever family.
-Pray for Coppelia’s foster family as they say goodbye to her, after loving and caring for her for so many months
-Pray for all 7 of us as we all learn and grow and work towards being a family together.
While I strongly believe that God never intended families to be broken apart, this world we live in is broken, and while adoption brings a family together, it is only so because first families were broken and our children will carry that as part of their stories and lives forever. Pray that we are always aware of that and honor that part of their lives and stories. As we celebrate Easter this weekend and the miracle that happened Easter morning, as we read in the kids’ Bible to them tonight, Jesus came to make all that was broken new again. May He do that in each one of our lives and in the life of our family.
Hiking Mommy 