A Franciscan Benediction

May God bless you with discomfort
at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships
so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression,

and exploitation of people,
so that you may work for justice, freedom, and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who

suffer pain, rejection, hunger and war,
so that you may reach out your hand

to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness
to believe that you can make a difference in the world,
so that you can do

what others claim cannot be done
to bring justice and kindness

to all our children and the poor.

Amen and amen. Yeah, I am foolish enough to believe our family can impact those less fortunate than us. I am currently working on a great opportunity to do just this for someone very important to our family. I'll share more in the next post.

Summertime baking

The littles wanted to cook. They wanted to make some brownies and cupcakes. Observing the egg cracking alone would have been worth the price of admission to this show! Ana Lucia claimed the mixer made her arm shake like crazy.

As we were preparing to get everything in the oven Marco asked for a clipboard. Huh? He went around to several neighbors and took their order. He came back with a page for each family and their request for cupcakes, brownies, or some of both. Too funny.

The boys just finished their deliveries much to the delight of the kids in the cul-de-sac..and a few parents as well.

There is nothing like chilling out and participating in a baking project with little kids to remind one of what is important in life.

Home is where the heart is...not always completely true

I saw what I saw and I can't forget it
I heard what I heard and I can't go back
I know what I know and I can't deny it

Something on the road, cut me to the soul

Your pain has changed me
your dream inspires
your face a memory
your hope a fire
your courage asks me what I'm afraid of
and what I know of love

...a few words from one of my favorite Sara Groves songs

The song sums up my thoughts after every trip to Guatemala. Each time I return from Guatemala I leave a bit of my heart behind.

Traveling to Guatemala with children who are 17, 15, 7, 6, and 3 years old is an adventure. Spending time with the 7, 6, and 3 year old children's birth and foster families was a leap of faith.

How would everyone handle the time spent together?

How would the children feel when reunited with the women who had either given birth to them or cared for them in their first months of life?

It was a gamble for sure.

The truth is each child handled the visits beautifully.

While I believed before we left that these meetings would be beneficial, I now know they were absolutely the right thing to do for all parties involved.

For the birth and foster mothers the visits granted much desired peace. To see the children they had given life (or cared for like a mother) healthy, happy and loved was a dream come true for all of them. For our children their birth/foster mothers are no longer a stranger we talk about and look at in photos. They are real women who love them and hugged, cuddled, and kissed them. For me, the adoptive mother, it was joy come full circle.

Yes, there was sadness present. In a perfect world there would be no need for adoption. Our world is not perfect. The birth mothers in our family have difficult lives. Their decisions were not made in haste or arrived at easily. They made difficult decisions in an effort to provide a life for their child that they knew they could not.

Right now I hang in the balance - between two worlds. My life of luxury here in the United States and my extended families' lives in a developing nation seem at opposite ends of the spectrum. While I suspected that one of our birth mothers lived in extreme poverty, this fact was confirmed during our trip.

I saw photos of her home and I am haunted.

My soul is disturbed.

My heart is hurting.

I am unsettled.

I have returned home a different person with the knowledge of some of what I learned last week. Now that we have met her face-to-face I hope a relationship develops. I am unsure what this will entail. I must rely on God to reveal how our family fits into her existence.

In the midst of working through this reality I must be careful not to be flippant toward the everyday. Please forgive me (or at least be patient with me) if I appear to be frustrated at the ridiculous "drama" of life in the United States.

It is one thing to be aware of the fact that people in today's world have no running water or no indoor plumbing or not enough food to eat or no access to clean water or no warm/comfortable place to sleep but when it is the very person who gave your child life it is an entirely new reality.

Some of my posts in the near future are going to be an attempt at working through emotions and thoughts. It is cheap therapy. I welcome your prayers and feedback/thoughts dear friends.

I read the following this morning and intend to pray it daily:

"God, would you do a miracle for our family? Would you cause us to remember what we have seen and heard and then go and do something about it? Would you prick our hearts to be sensitive to the poor, the suffering and those around us? With time, it always seems like our pain is dulled and the sting loses its hurt. Would you keep the emotional wounds that were carved during the past week from healing?”

So incredibly grateful for our week in Guatemala.

Winding down...

Today is our final full day in Guatemala. We fly home very early in the morning. Oh dear, my heart is already sad just thinking about leaving.

I just walked Zack and Katie to Pollo Campero to meet up with friends. They hopped on a school bus (not a chicken bus - don't freak out) and are headed to the Pacific Coast for the day with a mission team. It is great to have friends in a foreign country!

I have so much to share but will post some random pictures of our week here until I get home, process my thoughts, and write about the week.

God has blessed our time here for sure!

Gustavo working on his lion craft at the VBS in Magdelena

Ana Lucia checking out a parrot at a hotel we visited

Katie playing with her favorite little boy from VBS

Katie with new friends in Magdelena

Gustavo and Marco playing hoops at our house in Antigua

Hanging out in the hammock

Zack & Katie enjoying some facebook time in the evening

The men (Mark, Marco, Zack) shopping

At the world famous arch in Antigua

Walking to the market

Ana Lucia pooped out at the market

Livin' life

"We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us."
~Joseph Campbell

As I sit here and write my husband and teenagers are working at a project site with a mission team from the states, my 6 and 7 year old sons are lost in a pretend world of adventure in the courtyard, and my 3 year old daughter is napping after a morning of being in Magdelena.

We were picked up this morning by friends and taken to a community served by mission teams from the states. I have served with the Greene family before and was excited for the rest of my family to see Magdelena, the school where a feeding program takes place, and the church where we tiled the floor last summer.

Our teens have joined me on mission trips before. This morning was the first chance for my husband and young children to get a glimpse of what Mommy does when she goes to Guatemala.

The littles ones loved peering out the car windows and taking in the sights. The sights and smells were intriguing. Ana Lucia quickly became Guatemalan (as in no car seat) as she sat on my lap while driving and then stood in the backseat of a Suburban and enjoyed the bumpy ride. The kids especially loved when the car had to stop and wait for a herd of cows to get out of the street in front of us. The cows walked right by the side of our car much to the delight of Marco, Gustavo & Ana Lucia.

We spent part of the time at a Vacation Bible School and the little ones joined the other children in the craft. Zack joined some local boys in some futbol (soccer) before heading off to work. Katie enjoyed being with the children from the community and took many photos before heading off to work. I imagine Mark will head to the site where they are building a house. I can't wait for them to be back and hear about the rest of their day.

Zack and Katie are headed to the Pacific coast (black sand beaches) on Thursday with our missionary friends. Very cool.

It is happening. We are experiencing Guatemala. We still have so much to learn and experience. But for now, for this one week out of our lives, it is absolutely amazing.

Had you told us twenty years ago that we would have 5 children, 3 adopted internationally, fall in love with another culture and country, develop a passion for serving those in need in Guatemala, and develop friendships with the many amazing people we have I am sure we would have laughed. We had plans...a couple of kids, careers, the American dream. Somewhere along the way God got ahold of our hearts and revealed his plan for us. I am so thankful that we were willing to get rid of the life we had planned in order to have the life that was waiting for us.

Dinner delivered via a motorcycle driver


The kids love riding the tuk-tuks!



We have put the kids to work...

True joy

While I would love to post many of the photos we have taken this week, I will share some here which respect the privacy of the foster and birth families of our children.

I believe the phrase "a picture is worth a thousand words" is so true. I feel I could write a book to correspond with each of these pictures. I have been given the blessing of observing true joy this week each time our kids were reunited with a foster or birth mother. Ana Lucia and Marco were able to be with their birth mothers. The women who gave them life and then gave them a life with us. Both of these courageous women feared they would never see their children again and took a bold leap of faith that their decision would indeed result in what they hoped for. Marco's birth mother made a statement that I will cherish forever. She simply stated, "He looks good. I will never worry about him again."

Gustavo was reunited with his entire foster family. They cared for him from the time he was a week old until we brought him home at six months. We have stayed in contact with them and developed a friendship over the last 5 1/2 years. Every time I have returned to Guatemala I have spent time with them. Mami Ruth has fostered over 50 children and Gustavo is the very first one to return to Guatemala. Mami Ruth's daughter told us that she has told everyone (family, friends, and even strangers) about Gustavo returning for a visit. At one point during the visit I looked over to see Gustavo sitting on her lap, surrounded by her three daughters and husband, enjoying one another. Priceless.

Ana Lucia began her visit quite shy. She drew some pictures for her birth mother and slowly warmed up. By the end of the visit the two were playing together in the yard with daughter Ana Lucia babbling away and pretending and mother Ana Lucia enjoying every second. We all held back and gave them their time together.

Marco shows his birth mother pictures of his life in the United States


Gustavo reunited with Mami Ruth


Ana Lucia with her birth mother also named Ana Lucia


Ana Lucia marches off to the yard to show her birth mother around


Giggling and playing with birth mom


I'll never be the same having experienced what I have this week.

The adventure has begun...

I'll sit down later today and share some of our trip thus far.

In a word...incredible.

As we drove through Antigua yesterday Gustavo remarked "Mom, everyone here looks like us. You don't look like the people here but I do." It didn't take long for him to verbalize his observations.

I'll leave you with the opportunity to share in the view from our upstairs patio this morning.


Gustavo just ran downstairs yelling for me to come up to the patio because the little ones noticed black smoke coming out of the volcano. He turns around and exclaims to me "Is that the fastest you can run? Come on!" Ouch.

Yes, indeed the volcano is smoking and the 3, 6, and 7 year old nature buffs discovered it all on their own. They are in paradise!

Stories to follow later today...

Our luggage is supposed to be delivered today. Cross your fingers. We are on day 3 of the same clothing. In a word - gross.