I'll admit that I often times get myself into some strange, albeit awkward, situations. The following story, however, happened just shortly after we moved to Singapore, so I just want to say that it was not completely my fault....it just took me a little off guard.

(ring...ring...)

Adam: This is Adam.

Me: Uh...hey babe, it's me. I, uh...well,I'm just wondering what time you will be coming home?

Adam: Uh, the normal time. Why?

Me: Well, you see...how do I explain this...

Adam: What's going on?

Me: Okay, I'm just going to say it. There is a chicken in the kitchen and I'm afraid to touch it.

Adam: Hold on just a second...are you saying there's a live chicken in the kitchen!?

Me: No, I didn't say it was alive. I just said it was in the kitchen.

(silence)

Me: Are you there?

Adam: I don't see what the problem is.

Me: The problem is, when I took the whole chicken out of the package, something poked my hand. At first, I thought it was a stray piece of plastic, but when I flipped the chicken over in search of the plastic, the neck and head of the chicken swung around and its beak poked me in the arm. That's when I realized that I was actually grabbing the chicken feet that had been tucked under the skin to keep them in place.

Adam: (Laughing) What did you do with the chicken?

Me: I threw the chicken and after sliding across the counter, it hit the wall and hasn't moved since. And it's really creeping me out because I half expect it to get up and walk away, considering all the necessary body parts have been left in tact. I mean, who, in their right mind actually sells them with those body parts attached?!

Adam: Can't you just put it in the fridge until I get home?

Me: Are you kidding me? I'm not touching that thing with a 10 foot pole! Besides...it keeps looking at me.

Adam: It's dead.

Me: I'm not convinced of that.

Adam: Ask Isaiah to help you.

Me: He's weirded out too.

Adam: Figure out how to get it in the fridge and I will deal with it when I get home.

Me: Fine. Bye.

Adam: Bye.

Me: Isaiah, Dad says you need to put the chicken in the fridge....

When I was a kid, we got our skateboarding kicks by careening down the hill in front of our house and crossing our fingers, as we blew through three stop signs in the short 1/4 mile run, in hopes that there wasn't actually a car crossing the road at the same time.

Mom? Dad? If you are reading this, I just want you to know that Steve made me do it.

In hindsight, that was a really stupid idea. I mean, who in their right mind thinks that they can pull such a stunt and live to tell the tale?

On second thought, don't answer that. It turns out that my own son just happens to be one of those people.


"Isaiah, do you see that ramp there? It is sure to break bones and is therefore off limits.

"Isaiah, are you listening to me?"

No, it's not because I doubt your abilities to skate down it. The problem is that our medical insurance says we can't afford it."




Nowadays, the quarter mile stretch of road that I skated on when I was a kid has been contained to a big cement park full of steep slopes, ramps, jumps, rails and stairs.

Why don't I feel any better about this alternative?

I would now like to introduce you to what has been the bane of my existence for the past 18 months...



Do you see that one stack of paper being held together by the large black clip? Most people would call this a dossier. I call it Lucifer.

I don't mean to be derogatory, it's just that we don't get along.

My problem is not the documents themselves, but rather, that every piece of information on these documents must be absolutely perfect and fit the ever changing requirements of the Russian courts.

It's times like these when I am so frustrated with the process and can't see straight, that I believe perspective is in order. And God, in His abundant grace, delivers me a plateful of it. Through these experiences I have learned that God is not above using humor to get His point across.

A few weeks ago, one pastor in our church started a blog called Project 1189, and invited the church to take part. His aim is to read through the bible - all 1,189 chapters of it - in two years, offering his daily input into the passages and allowing others to comment and add any insights they receive as well.

This week, we are reading through Genesis chapters 12 - 24 which focus on the life of a seemingly ordinary man. A man who, against all reasoning, left the familiarity and safety of his home, culture and everything that he knew, because God said "go".

At the age of 75 (he was no spring chick!), Abraham left his homeland and lived the life of a nomad, wandering through the wilderness, tending his flocks, breaking up fights, making mistakes, but all the while, remembering God's promise to him that his descendants will inherit the very land that Abraham walked as a foreigner.

25 years after receiving that first promise, Abraham was given another shocking piece of news: His wife Sarah would give birth to a son. Abraham, of course, laughed saying "how can this be? She is 90 years old and barren!" But again, against all reasoning, Abraham believed God and continued to walk out his faith.

I can't think of a better way to describe Abraham's faith than what was written by our pastor in today's post:

"Real faith does not consist in the refining and affirming of propositions, but in the courageous act of the imagination that is able to “suspend incredulity and believe the impossible” – even though to all outward appearances it seems pure folly."

Talk about perspective!

Genesis 12-24 shows that when an ordinary man dances with Almighty God, extraordinary happens.

I have to wonder though...Would things have turned out differently if Abraham was forced to carry with him a file cabinet full of pesky paperwork?

I'm just saying!

Seven years ago I was a young 'soon-to-be' mother, just seven months pregnant with my first child, when I heard news about a bible study starting up for moms in our church. I was so excited about the opportunity to glean wisdom from other moms who had traveled this road before me - and lived to tell the tale - that I pushed aside my inadequate feelings of 'not quite mother enough', and walked into that room full of women.

I was very intimidated, considering the fact that I was not blessed with the pregnancy glow, but rather, pregnancy acne. That, coupled with the stark realization that my butt had ballooned overnight, caused the following question to play over and over in my mind...

Did I seriously just waddle like a duck?

If anyone noticed my inadequacies, they didn't make mention of it. Instead, I was greeted by an eclectic mix of women from all different walks of life and different shapes and sizes. Some newly married, others divorced or widowed. There were new mothers, mothers of teenagers and grandmothers, who, in winding through many different paths in life, and perhaps in spite of them, all came together in one room to find fellowship and relationship because of this one commonality...motherhood.

There is a lot of pressure put on mothers to be perfect. We don't want people to know that we raise our voices a little too often, or that our kids watch a little too much TV. We would be horrified if people knew that the bathroom hasn't been cleaned in two weeks or that we have had chicken nuggets and applesauce two nights in a row because we keep forgetting to take meat out of the freezer.

It is so easy to internalize our inadequacies and doubt our ability to be a good mother. And because we don't want the world to know that we often fail in the most sacred area of our lives, we become superficial and put on a face that we can do it all and be all. Even while we're falling apart on the inside.

A comedian once said, "we're all in this together, alone." While that mental image gives me a good laugh, the truth is, we don't have to be. We were created for relationship, and would do well to actually relate to people. But we have to be honest with ourselves first.

I am so thankful that seven years later, I am still apart of that womens bible study. Through being honest in our own struggles as wives, mothers and Christians, we are able to encourage and uplift each other.

It's strange how admitting your failures makes you feel a little more, well...normal.

Mirror, Mirror on the wall, which is more concerning to us all?

Waking up to Isaiah and Caleb chanting,

We will. We will.
Rock you.
Sock you.
Pick you up and drop you.
Flush you down the toilet.
Hope you enjoy it.

Or hearing them sing a song about killing Barney the purple dinosaur to the tune of Jingle Bells while being evaluated by their doctor for physical and mental health?

On second thought, Mirror, don't answer that, just give me the phone number to the doctors office so I can apologize.

I'm sorry I have been ignoring you lately, Mirror. You see, we have had a crazy week of completing our adoption paperwork, and just when we thought we were done, we were told that two medical forms were not filled out correctly, and our state police clearances had inconsistent dates that would not be accepted in the Russian courts.

It's uncanny, Mirror, that Adam accidentally drilled a hole in his thumb while building some shelves, and therefore, can't be re-fingerprinted for those police clearances. What are the odds? Oh well, they agreed to use his fingerprints from two weeks ago after some good, old fashioned arm-twisting.

As of today, Mirror, we are done with paperwork. All of our fingerprinting for the state police clearances and the USCIS clearances have been completed and sent to WACAP. Adam and I have also completed our medicals and the paperwork has been corrected and sent in for a second time. And as of today, the boys medicals have been completed and notarized. Assuming the doctor wasn't too thrown off by the Barney song, my guess is that we should be heading back to Russia by the end of February or beginning of March.

Is that my reflection, Mirror? I almost didn't recognize myself without the stress of adoption paperwork on my face.

The other day, Adam replaced the soft yellow incandescent light bulbs in our bedroom with the compact fluorescent (hideously ugly) light bulbs. I, of course, did not expect these light bulbs to burn my retinas and change the color on the walls, but alas, they did.

Sensing that something about the lights was off kilter, I said to Adam, "something must be wrong with these lights because after I turned them off, they glowed green."

Adam looked at me and said, "there's nothing wrong with the glowing lights, that's just a feature."

As we walked out of our room, Isaiah was coming in the front door when I noticed a huge hole in the knee of his jeans. Isaiah didn't seem to care, but after a few minutes of nearly exploding from keeping my mouth shut, I finally said, "Isaiah, you need to change your pants. That hole is too big."

"But I like this hole there."

"I'm sure you do, but I will not allow you to wear clothes like that when it's 20 degrees outside."

"But Mom, this hole is a feature. It cools me down when the rest of my body gets too hot."

Thinking to myself that those pants would disappear in the night, I told Isaiah to go wash up for dinner.

A few minutes later, while wearing his swimming goggles and eating his dinner, Isaiah looked at me and said, "Mom, these goggles have a cool feature. They make your pimples look really dark."

At this point I start thinking how nice it would be to take my slice of cheesecake and sit in a dark corner where my acne scars can't be seen by strange boys with funny looking goggles, but the only place I can find has a green glow to it and makes me wonder if my house has, in fact, been invaded by aliens.

Instead, I find myself checking e-mail where I see a message from our case-manager stating that the notary date does not match the letterhead date on our state police clearances, and therefore, need to be redone. (At this point, my eye's have started twitching) If that's not enough, we were also told that the title of one of our doctors was not printed underneath his signature, and that this might not be accepted by the judge in Russia, and as a precaution, we should have that corrected.

I'm not exactly sure what happened after that. All I remember is Adam coming into the room saying "What's that noise?"

I said, "What are you talking about? I don't hear a noise."

He looked at me cautiously and said, "Honey, something's wrong with your ears, they are whistling and it looks like steam is coming out of them."

Then I looked at him and said, "Nothing's wrong dear. That's just a feature."