For the prison days

 Paul and Joseph were two men that taught me about feeling God’s peace in the hardest of times. 

 Before I can tell you about them, let me give you a little backstory. In January 2013, my husband and I both told each other that we thought we should make a decision whether or not to adopt.  We had thought and talked about it off and on for ten years - every time we had another biological child - and it seemed the time to decide once and for all if we should. We decided to take our question to the temple the first weekend in February. 

In the celestial room, I experienced one of the strongest and clearest answers in my life.  Both my husband and I came out of the temple feeling very strongly that, YES, we should adopt and that it should be soon. We both felt an intense urgency. After scrambling and stressing over paperwork for the next month and a half, we were matched with two little sisters from the DR Congo on March 27, 2013. We saw their faces through pictures, and again prayed and felt that they should be our daughters.

 At that point, our agency let us know that the rest of the process would take 9-12 months, which seemed so unbearable. How could I watch these little girls grow up through pictures for up to a whole year? I told myself that we knew God wanted us to do this, so He would definitely help us zoom through the process.  Maybe, I thought...maybe they would be home by the end of 2013.  Maybe by Christmas!  

By October 2014, they still weren’t with our family even though they were legally our daughters. The entity of their government that handled immigration would not let them, or any of the other hundreds of adopted children, leave the country. They had said they were suspending the process for a year, but that year had come and gone and there was no end in sight.  We hired a foster family to care for our girls and, having no idea when they would join us, I decided to visit them. 

That month I got to travel to Kinshasa, the capital city of the DR Congo, where my daughters lived.  I spent a week with them.  It was one of the hardest weeks of my life  - the exhaustion of traveling met with sickness, the difficulty of visiting a third-world country where I didn’t speak the language, the overwhelming task of getting to know and caring for a 3 and 5 yr old who didn’t know me or trust me.

It was also one of the best weeks of my life - seeing those pictures that I had watched for months actually living and breathing, hearing their laughs and adorable voices jabbering away in French, taking them swimming for the first time in their lives, feeling their little arms around my neck as they giggled in the cool water, snuggling close to them all night and just enjoying having them with me. 

When the week was over, I took them back to their foster home and somehow said goodbye. My younger daughter was hysterical and had to be pried off of me. I felt a peace that could only come from my Heavenly Father as we drove away, back to my hotel, but my heart ached for her.  I wasn’t leaving until the next morning, and that night, all alone, I had a lot of questions for my Heavenly Father as I knelt in prayer. What it all boiled down to for me was this thought: 

What if we had been wrong to start this whole crazy process? 

I could trust that it was all going to be okay if I truly knew that God wanted us to adopt. But what if He hadn’t? What if we had been wrong that day in the temple? What if we were just messing up our daughters’ lives even more by making them live in this limbo?  How could I know this was what Heavenly Father wanted when it was going so badly? I couldn’t see His hand in this mess. 

I felt comforted that night, but received my real answer the next morning, as I was leaving my daughters’ city.  

The airport experience in Kinshasa is intense and chaotic, and several other adoptive parents recommended that since I was traveling alone I should hire someone to help get me and my bags checked in . His name was Paul.  He was Congolese and spoke at least four languages.  I had met him during the week as we had hired him to go a few places to translate. So that morning, Paul and his driver loaded my suitcases. Before we even left the courtyard, Paul turned to me and softly started talking about what a hard day it was for me.  I will never forget what he said. 

“Your children may feel like you have abandoned them right now.  They don’t understand why you can’t be with them.  They don’t understand what you are doing to bring them home.  But you know.

You may feel like God has abandoned you right now. You can’t see what He sees.  You don’t know what is going to happen.  But He knows.”

As I nodded my head and agreed wholeheartedly with him, he let that settle, and then we talked a little more about God, and he continued.

 “Look at Joseph in the Bible. He had a dream when he was a teenager. That dream did not come true for many many years. Even as he tried to do what God asked him to do, it was not easy for him. He was sold as a slave. He was accused by Potiphar's wife. He was thrown in jail.  And we know that it all worked out because we have read the ending. But while it was happening to Him, he didn’t know how it would end. He might have wondered if he had really dreamed that dream or if it was from God.”

I can still see the busy Kinshasa street we were on when Paul said this to me.  Time stood still as he taught me, from the Bible, and the Holy Ghost manifested to me that what Paul was saying was a direct answer to my prayers the previous night.  

I knew, in that moment, that my Heavenly Father had answered my prayers, not just from the previous night, but in the temple back in February 2013. He knew me so well that He had sent an almost-stranger to speak the very words I needed to hear, halfway across the world, in a language that wasn’t even native to him.

I thought about Joseph many times in the long months that followed. Every time we got bad news and it felt like our daughters would never join us, I tried to remember that God knew the ending, and He had not abandoned us. He had asked us to do this work, and His promises were always sure.  

We continued on in faith, even as many of our adoptive friends either gave up or illegally paid smugglers to sneak their children out with false documents. We visited Washington DC three times to meet with congressmen, representatives from the Department of State, and the DR Congo ambassador to the US. 

We kept serving in callings, praying, going to the temple, and paying our daughter’s foster family. 

Elysee and Simone finally flew to join our family on June 8, 2016, more than three years after we had first been matched with them. They were sealed to our family six months later. 

Now, after five years, I’m sure that people look at our family and only see the victory, the happy ending. They don’t know the agony and uncertainty that clouded our lives during those years. 

If you’re in that agony right now, please know that God has not forgotten you or abandoned you. Even when Joseph was in prison, Genesis 39:21 tells us: But the Lord was with Joseph.

God is with you.  

You haven’t reached the end of the story yet.

It’s not over. 

God knows you. 

He is working on your behalf in ways that you may not realize for years. 

We can always trust in His promises. 

That’s what Joseph and Paul helped me understand.

Winter by Carina

The trees' leaves are falling

And dying

I've never seen the flower 

Glower more

The moose and the goose

Have not been as loose

I doubt the peony 

Sprouts

The bird chirps weary tunes

The grass is a scarlet brown 

I better put a jacket on

It is winter now

War, by Carina

Everybody trying to make

A living out of fighting 

Everyday they train

In pain

Hoping to come back 

To the light

The might 

The right

But instead have to return

To the core war

Everybody stay put like a willow

Ain't going down like a pillow

Everybody follow me

This isn't a comedy

I want to go down strong 

Not wrong

This war could last on

Long

Our kids are growing!

 

Carina - 56in

Simone- 60 in

Oliver - 62 in

Elysée- 67 in

Gabe - 68 in

Colin - 68.5 in

My word for 2020

Work. 

Work out to get healthier.

Ruminate less, work more.

Do temple work.

Work on my relationships. 

Works of faith.

Work hard, every day.

Do the hard work for repenting and forgiving.

It'll all work out.

My color of the year is white.

To remind me of the temple.

A fresh start.

Hope.

Purity.

Keeping myself clean.

My Nature Story, by Carina Coleman

In the car, wearing a mask, was Carina Coleman and her friends.  They were on the way to Forest School. When they got there, they went to park the car, and they all got out. They played over by the lake for awhile. Then Carina's mom told them to come make their foil dinners.  While the dinners were cooking, they sang.  After the foil dinners were made, two were burnt. They played in nature for awhile and then it was time to go back home. 

 

This weekend

Chad and I went to Lowe's to look for a cabinet to install in our downstairs nook.  Right now there is just the fridge and microwave, and we want to have in a built-in cupboard and counter top. We didn't find what we wanted, but we did buy grass seed and soil to cover up the pool area. Chad spent a lot of time doing that while Carina and I worked on outdoor Halloween decorations.  Then I transplanted some impatiens that were running out of room, tied up some dahlias, and pulled some weeds. We have mums in pots and green grass. I love fall. 

Elysée has struggled the last couple of days. Her food anxiety seems to have roared back to life, bringing with it mumbling and clipped arguments about everything. This evening during dinner Gabe said that grass is green, and she shot back, "Not always." Everyone laughed because they knew he had said it just to see if she would argue. Before bed, I hugged her and told her I would do anything I could to help her - that I love her and I know tomorrow will be better. I know she's dealing with old trauma. We ALL have our moments- even those of us who haven't been through so much. 

Here's to better a good day tomorrow- Oliver is the only one with school!

Also, the boys went to church before us to prepare the sacrament (for our once-a-month-socially-distanced meeting). When we got there, Colin was sitting with the Jeppsons. I kept glancing over at him to make sure he wasn't on his phone. I did this a half dozen times, impressed every time that he wasn't. Then I remembered he doesn't have his phone! Wah. Poor Colin. He had to sent it to Apple and they charged him $570 to fix a problem they caused and I think it craziness but at least Colin has been working almost 40 hours a week and could pay for it. He is such a hard worker! He also took the SAT yesterday and felt like he did well. I'm excited to see what his future holds! I have faith that he'll learn the things he needs to learn. 

A Little Child

I was up until 1 am last night, thinking about summer.  We have our above-ground (not yet set-up) pool, we have some running goals, and that's about it.  It's a summer without Carowinds and no travel on the horizon.  It's probably a summer when we say goodbye to our beach house.

There's a schedule mapped out in Google Docs now, just like the summers before.  But the kids are older and wiser (than me) now. I'm still struggling between giving them choices while also giving them responsibilities - giving them freedoom while also encouraging them to do something more than sit with a controller in their hands all day.

This is the constant struggle of being a parent - especially the parent of teenagers.  I want to guide them, not push them. But I have to create boundaries. I do. 

Sometimes I look back at the baby pictures and long for the simple parenting acts of those days: nursing, changing diapers, reading books, singing songs.  None of those acts were exciting or cool, but I felt confident in them.  I long for the simplicity of knowing that I am doing exactly what I should as a parent.

With the complexity of parenting young adults comes a new kind of delight: sharing jokes, making plans and talking smack about the latest conspiracy theories.  All of these moments reveal brains that have developed far past the basic infantile thoughts of food and comfort - brains that have experienced and learned things completely separate from my motherly influence.

When I feel the tug tug tug of rebellion, the straining to abolish my boundaries, the wild anxiety that manifests as anger every time I hold fast to the sureness of my decrees, can I picture those brains?  The brains that are still developing. The brains that will build connections based on my reaction, for better or worse.

I can try. I can pray. That's about all I can do. 

— Jesus once was a little child,

A little child like me;

And he was pure and meek and mild,

As a little child should be.

So, little children,

Let’s you and I

Try to be like him,

Try, try, try.

Carina's Favorite Things

Food: Orange Chicken and Chow Mein 

Toy: Mr. Fluffer

Primary song: Close As a Quiet Prayer

Dessert: Popsicles

Book: Princess in Black

Activity: Swimming

Store: Target

Color: Blue

Flowers

Mom told me go and find as many different  color flowers as I could find. Elysée 

Well I have to write something so here we go. Im gonna write about my summer. I'm really hoping I can get my job sorted out soon so I can get out of the house. The Y has had a few days to respond but I haven't heard anything back yet. Ill give them a bit more before I send another email back. I'm actually kinda excited to be working there because I have a few friends that also work there that I'd hopefully be able to see. I haven't hung out with them in so long so it'll hopefully be nice to be able to talk to them in person after this long.
-Colin

Hosanna

I cut a sheet up, right along one sewn edge.  After hemming one square, I left the other seven with unfinished edges, knowing that they would probably be forgotten by the evening.  I wanted them to be precious momentos, but I have been a mom for seventeen years now, so I have had some hard lessons. One (that I still sometimes deny) is that when I push for a sentimental response from my children, they are more likely to remember a disappointed mom than a present one. Because they just don't care about the same things as I do. While I was making hankerchiefs, they were thinking about what they wanted to eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, rummaging through the fridge and pantry.

After laying the hankerchiefs aside, unfinished but ready, I moved onto a project that was just for me. I spent an inordinate amount of time looking for the newly purchased painters' tape, giving up on said painters', then using other painters' tape to block out a chalk-painting on my driveway that shouted, "Hosanna!". Because I am sentimental and I care about picture-picture moments, and I was going to do something to mark this holy day (even if it took all day).

When the Hosanna Shout came that afternoon, I had just finished a piece of Oliver's plotted and kneaded pizza. Simone sat next to me, yanking on her dolly's hair. Colin's hand itched to grab his phone and Chad's eyes squinted to stay open. I called Elysée and Carina in from wandering through the living room and into my bathroom and back again. They had my high heels on, smelled like they had been bathing in perfume, and looked like they had been rolling in makeup. 

I shushed and fussed and told everyone to grab their hankerchiefs. Gabe accused Elysée of grabbing his. Elysée has never met an accusation she isn't willing to fight to the grave, so I knew this conflict was not going to be solved in the brief moment we had before we needed to raise our voices together. I tossed my own hankerchief to Gabe and ran to my bathroom to grab a tissue that wasn't there. I heard the shout begin and ran back to awkwardly wave my hand in the air and pretend that it was a meaningful moment for me.

After the session was over, I went back to painting my chalk masterpiece with a Pinterest recipe that was too lumpy. I added water, then more cornstarch and more food dye and altered my plan in my head because the original simply wasn't going to happen. I looked for more cornstarch, found none, and grabbed some old potato starch. 

I thought about my kids and worried and felt no peace at all.  I prayed and asked for peace and felt the cool breeze and heard the birds.  

Nothing really changed but I kept painting and my kids left me alone. 

I thought about this old blog for some reason, and decided to revive it.

When I finally pulled the tape off my completed painting, after the second session, Colin was there. He said it was a mess, but I defended it. It wasn't what I had planned, but it was what I was capable of, with what I had on hand. I hadn't given up. It was mine and it was meaningful. 

I would take a picture in the morning and write about it. 

I laid in bed tonight after forcing the oldest two into theirs. I downloaded the Blogger app onto my phone. While typing the first few sentences of this post with faint little deet deet deets in the dark, Chad laying next to me with his earbuds in, I thought I heard a noise. 

Rain? 

Alexa and been consulted repeatedly and had insisted it wasn't possible.

I grabbed my phone to take a horrible flashy picture of my artistic offering before it streaked under the car and into the mulch.

 

Hosanna! 

Save me, sweet Savior!

Take my imperfect offerings and sanctify them.

Save me and my family from ourselves. 

Lemon Sunshine

            I picked up a pen to write what I was thankful for on a paper leaf.  It was the first Thanksgiving that my adopted daughters were there with me, instead of sitting in a foster home in Congo.  I no longer felt that old ache of absence as I quickly wrote down “My family”, but there was a new hurt.  My mom had left us earlier that year, just six weeks shy of meeting her granddaughters.  My youngest brother, the red-headed caboose of eight children, had also knelt across the altar from his strawberry-blonde bride two days ago, with his seven siblings and teary-eyed dad watching. 2016 had worn itself out with milestones.  None of us desired to make any more, so this was a happy but subdued day.

            After the turkey was eaten, we sat in the back yard on hammocks and lawn chairs enjoying the crisp North Carolina air.  We had brought our white husky-lab puppy, Lemon, because she was the great unifier in our still somewhat shaky family circle.   She chased Ava, her doggy cousin, and both children and adults stopped to watch how their first meeting would develop.  Lemon’s puppy enthusiasm was always two degrees too much. She lunged at Ava’s face, her head tucked slightly, her mouth open and then shut, her paws bouncing.  When Ava tired of running back and forth, Lemon plopped on her belly, her legs splayed to each side like a roasting turkey.  With her head tilted back and her eyes squinting, we all recognized her smiling and smiled in return.  She was adored and knew it.

            Lemon started to throw up the next day.  Then came the diarrhea and with it that smell. It had filled my nose as a ten-year-old and had taken my dog.  A trip to the vet confirmed what my nose knew.  Lemon had Parvo.  She might die. 

            My mom-guilt was overwhelming.  I had forced my four biological children to wait to get a dog until their adopted sisters came home, never knowing that a one-year pause would turn into three torturous years.  Now, just a few months in, the baby we had attached our aching hearts to might not make it because I had procrastinated getting her booster shot.  I had taken her on a walk that had exposed her to this treacherous disease.  I had let danger back into our lives when we thought we had finally escaped it.  Wrapped up in the knot in my chest was a fear that this was just one more thing in my life that wasn’t going to go how I hoped it would go.  This was one more thing that was supposed to serve as some sort of lesson to make us stronger.

            I didn’t want to be stronger.  I just wanted a break.

            We clung to each other and whispered about the very real possibility that the pet hospital might call each evening with an update that would throw our family back into turmoil.  My son walked into my room four days in, shaking and crying, saying, “What if she dies? What if Lemon DIES?” 

            I took him in my arms and guided him back to bed.  As I laid my face down next to his wet freckled cheek, I uttered the strongest prayer I could.  I knew though, from the past few years, that sometimes prayers weren’t answered the way you wanted.  Sometimes the answer was simply an admonition to stay strong.  Sometimes you asked the same question over and over again until you wondered if you would recognize an answer even if you got one. With all of these thoughts loaded onto my prayer, I squeezed him tight and told him to try to sleep.

            Back in my dark bedroom, my husband’s phone rang.  The vet gently told him that Lemon’s fever was dangerously high and there was a good chance she wouldn’t make it through the night.  I fell to my knees once more, bawling and begging.  This time, an answer came clearly.

            “Lemon will live.  Tell your kids.”

            My body relaxed. My mind became clear.  I walked back to my son, took his quaking body in my arms, and spoke confidently,

            “I prayed.  The Spirit told me that she is going to live. She is going to be okay.  She is going to be okay.”

            “Are you sure?” he asked, looking straight into my eyes.
            “Completely.” I was able to answer back. I visited each child, relaying the same message and where it came from.

            I felt relief, but not surprise, when the vet called in the morning and said in a shocked voice that Lemon had turned around.  Two days later when we went to bring Lemon home, her whimpering cries of relief and delight sounded through the hospital.

            Now Lemon crawls up onto the bed next to me every night, stretching her long legs, eyes locked onto mine as she asks for some goodnight snuggles.  As I fold my body next to hers, her satisfied sighs match my feelings of comfort. She is Noah’s rainbow – a reminder that sunshine does come after the rain. 

Who I Want to Be

In my Gospel Library app (the app I use for reading and marking my scriptures, seminary lessons, and other church-related materials), I have created a tag entitled "Who I Want to Be".  Whenever I find a scripture or quote that inspires me to be more than I am and to aspire to be the woman I picture my Heavenly Mother being, I mark it with this tag.  

2 Nephi 4:33
O Lord, wilt thou encircle me around in the robe of thy righteousness

When I read this phrase, I picture myself peaceful and happy, wearing a swirling silky white robe.  It is white and bright because it is free from the stresses of the world. I am able to move freely in this robe, and wearing it is a constant reminder of that flowing freeness - of the neverending possibilities of my life.  It is in unconcerned with what is on trend and beautiful because it reflects the love of the giver.  My Father gave me this robe to protect me and it does.  I am careful not let the grimy dirt from the roads I walk on stain the hems.  When I spill on it, I ask my brother to wash it clean again and He does.  It can always be as bright as the day I received it.

This is who I want to be:

A woman whose concern is not on looking good for the world, but being good.
A women who embraces the commandments her Father in heaven gave her because she knows that they will make her stronger and happier.
A woman who is comfortable in her skin, every moment of every day, because she knows who she is and whose she is.
A woman who sees the eternal potential she possesses if she doesn't give her freedom up.
A woman who knows that there is power in purity.
A woman who remembers that there is someone who loved her enough to suffer all her sorrows for her. She doesn't trample on that remembrance but holds it in her heart every day.

Keepin' It Real Wednesday

Last Wednesday I went to ballet class.   I held my chest and chin up with my ballerina gaze, waltzing and pirouetting until my calves ached and my back was drenched with sweat.  For an hour and a half I was grace and determination

I went home, put the harness on Lemon, and walked her down our trail.  I left my phone at home and basked in the dark shadows and bright sunshine of the leaveless trees.  For half an hour I was strength and serenity

When we got home, Lemon napped at my feet as I cooked and did laundry.  My Mindy Gledhill station sang out from Pandora as I cooked Masaman for school lunches the next day and chow mein and spring rolls for dinner.   The clock counted the minutes until my kids would step off the bus. Everything would be ready - clothes in drawers, food on the table, mom happy to see them. For three hours I was energy and confidence

Fifteen minutes before their bus was set to arrive, a realization jolted through me.

The four youngest were not taking the bus today.  I had reminded them and sent two of their teachers notes telling them they would be car riders......

So that we could get to a music class, which started in fifteen minutes and was half an hour away......

.....AND I should have been at the school half an hour ago to pick them up - the school that was twenty minutes away.

For the rest of the night I was panic and shame.

And there is a possibility that I might be writing this Keepin' It Real Wednesday as a reminder to myself that they are car riders today

In addition to the three reminders on my phone

and the alarm that Colin set up on Alexa.