The White Rabbit

"What are you chasing lately?"

It's so fluffy and sweet!

I was chewing on this question above when Alice in Wonderland popped into my mind. Specifically, I pictured when she first meets the White Rabbit. This little White Rabbit who was obsessed with time and who fears being late and not being able to complete his tasks. This hare is always rush, rush, rush. This rabbit is burdened.

As I've been talking to my family lately, one thing has become obvious: I'm chasing tasks so hard that I've over extended myself. As you know, for introverts this can be harmful because we can't keep that fast pace for very long without becoming drained. I've been having tension headaches, bad dreams, tight muscles and bones that crackle. Ha! If I were to be honest, lately I've physically felt terrible even though I'm eating well and exercising. So what gives? 

Well, my "cup of energy" has only drops left in it and I've got to take some time to get a refill! I need to move from being the white rabbit in Alice's story to being a little bunny resting in God's mighty hand!

Ahhhhh....you know that's super cute!

So I've made two small decisions to apply for the next two weeks. To help me remember in a fun way, I'll use two recent movie titles. :) 

Frozen - From now until May 5th, my calendar needs to be frozen. No new tasks, commitments, or duties get added. I need the rest because without rest, I'm no good to anyone.
 
The Lego Movie - The word lego always reminds me of how people in the south say, "let go." LOL. So I've decided to journal daily and pray more specifically about things I need to 'lego' of and surrender to God.

Here's my reminder at work of these decisions. 

So how about you??  "What are you chasing lately?"

Maybe the answer is not a negative. It may be completely positive and wonderful!!! The point is to just check in with yourself and see how you are doing. Check in on what you are focused on this week. Answering this question might just provide you some internal insight. :)

May This Easter Weekend Remind You...

Digging into Scripture: Do You Choose a Fork or a Bottle?

May I share a pet peeve of mine? 

It drives me crazy when I'm watching a biblical sermon and the person sharing says, "I am going to read scripture XYZ but don't worry about turning there in your bibles..." 

REALLY? Oh, I do know some of the rationalizations. We project the verses on-screen for the ease and convenience of those who forgot their bibles, for guests, or to save time. Some say it's for the elder who can no longer read a bible due to their failing eye sight. Well, maybe...but overall, should we really be encouraging others not to read along in their bible? Yeah, that makes this 'Berean' cringe! [Acts 17:11]

Most of us have heard lessons where the believers are encouraged to spiritually eat solid food and not just milk. [1 Cor. 3:2, Hebrews 5: 12 & 14] But then instead of handing them a "fork" to dig in for themselves, believers are handed a "bottle of milk," fed on-screen scripture and a canned sermon created by some other guy. (no need to pretend like we can't tell when a message has no new, original thoughts on the scriptures... anyway, I digress.)

This opinion is simply drawn from my personal observations that those who are the most spiritually happy and continually growing over the long haul are people who activity engage during their relationship with God. [Whether at home or at church during service] 

If statistically, around 65% of the population are visual learners, 30% auditory, and 5% learn kinesthetically, should we really streamline one of the engaging parts, like reading in your own bible? And no matter what, let's not just sit back and let someone plop a bottle in our mouths! Maybe we should be patient and encourage people to turn to the scriptures themselves? I mean, it is important we know where to find them, right? And if a guest or fellow Christian does not have a bible with them, can't we offer to lean over and share ours? Do we really consider this courtesy too old school? And even if someone says, "you don't have to turn there in your bibles..." maybe you should really TURN THERE IN YOUR BIBLE or your electronic device! :)    

Anyway, by definition, this pet peeve is technically a minor annoyance but it is something I was reflecting on during my drive to work so, who knows, it may be a topic others want to reflect on as well.
_____________

In case you are curious, here's an interesting table on Dominant Learning Styles:

	Characteristic	Learn by		Instructors should use for emphasis	Instructor should use for reinforcement	Action words
Visual (about 65% of the population)	Visual learners need to see what they are learning	Watching, Reading		Charts, bold colors/patterns, outlines	Writing notes, concept maps, graphics	See, look, draw
Auditory (about 30% of the population)	Auditory learners need to hear when they are learning	Listening, Discussing		Key ideas through voice inflections, tones	Speaking aloud	Hear, say, speak
Kinesthetic (about 5% of the population)	Kinesthetic learners need to move around while learning	Doing, Being physically involved		Analogies, anecdotes,  examples	Writing on flip charts and simulating tasks	Feel, do, demonstrate

Spiritual & Personal Retreats

Then Jesus said, "Let’s go off by ourselves to a quiet place and rest awhile." Mark 6:31

Retreat. In a spiritual sense, a retreat is not only a place of refuge, seclusion or privacy but also the very act of withdrawing for safety and security. In about a month, myself and a small group of friends are going on a mini-retreat. We will travel to the country to rest, have starlight devotions, sunrise prayers, fellowship and will spend some time teaching one another. I'm excited to get away to a quiet place for some refreshment. I found some thoughts on a site called Travel Soul Therapy - Discover Your Freedom, that shared how to get prepared for a retreat and how to actually be on retreat. I thought I'd share bits and pieces below. Enjoy!

How To Prepare For Transformative Retreat.

• Clear Intentions.
  As you set out to go for a holistic retreat, consider your intentions for it. Attempt to respond clearly to why are you going. The clearer you are, the more you will be receptive to change — the results you are looking to get. It is like preparing the soil. It doesn't matter whether you are going to simply relax and recover from pressures of ordinary life or you're going for a spiritual nourishment and training. By setting up clear intentions for personal retreat, you eliminate wondering and confusion while in it.


• Take Self-Nurturing Essentials.
  With understanding the purpose of the retreat, take the essentials that support your movement in that direction. It would be counterproductive to take along anything that would be a distraction from your experience of simplicity. Choose your inputs carefully. It could be a nurturing book, guided meditations or relaxing music if silence feels a bit extreme. It is good to remember that whole purpose of retreat is to minimize input that keeps us distracted. Take a notebook to record your realizations and insights.


• Suspend Attachments.
  Before you are going on retreat prepare the world for your absence. You could set up automatic vacation email responses. Announce on the Facebook that you will not be available. Let your clients, employees and all people in communication with you know that temporarily you will not be available. This is important for the purpose of minimizing outside interference with the retreat process. It is like a surgeon preparing to perform an operation: she changes clothes, sterilizes hands and puts gloves on, engages attention and so on. If she gets interrupted with business outside the operation, it would be a detriment to the outcome of a procedure.

How To Be On Retreat.

• Relax.
  Put a foundation for a personal retreat — relax. Tell your mind to disengage from habitual treadmill of doing. Gently allow yourself to move into simply being with yourself. Slow down in all mundane activities; from brushing your teeth to biting into food. Turn your attention to immediate environment and sensations of your body.


• Spiritual Practices.
  Use spiritual practices to effectively support your internal transformation in retreat. As much as you allow yourself practice immersion into silence. Silence is the environment in which it is much easier to observe your own perception and its effect on relationship with the world.To further increase personal transformation on retreat and to bring relaxation to mind overstimulated by tasks and fears generating compulsions and anxieties, you may want to implement a regular practice of meditation. 

• Recognize Insight.
  Remarkable quality of retreat is its progressive increase of mental clarity. In time some realization is bound to happen: you might notice that the way of being you left when you went for retreat is not something that you would like to return to. You might see much clearer what is more valuable to invest your energy. You may be encouraged to change some priorities or you may desire a completely new life vision.

These are such great reminders for me! If you would like other inspirations, quotes and ideas about retreats, then check out my Pinterest page: Personal Retreat Ideas.

Respite Care as a Single Parent

drawn by the youngest

This was my first weekend to have foster children in my home for respite. Respite care is valuable because sometimes foster parents need someone to look after the children but the state requires that only certified individuals with proper training and FBI background checks should be used so this limits options and can create a challenge in an emergency or other situations, like going to a doctor's visit where it's not ideal for children to tag along.

In the case of this weekend's respite, the foster mom's mother had a stroke and she needed to spend extra time caring for the needs of her parents. Sometimes respite can be planned in advance but often there is little notice. I wanted to update friends on how the weekend went and also provide some tips that I learned for anyone out there searching for advice because when I did "pre-respite" research there was not a lot of practicals out there! [Especially for a single, with no kids who is providing respite for the first time.]

Some key information to find out:

1. Drop-off and pick-up days and times
2. Type of meds the children take (since pysch meds need to be double locked, etc...)
3. Any trauma and abuse triggers, food allergies & foods they refuse to eat
4. Kids' routines for eating, bedtime, naps & favorite activities
5. Behavioral/medical issues: how quickly a child escalates, bed-wetting issues, how they do with pets, how they react around the opposite sex and if they ever try to run away
6. If the children need car seats...
7. The emergency number for the specialist on call [which I did use!]

I bought lots of activities & food children usually like but here is a list of some items that were a HUGE success with the girls or that I found valuable:

1. For Activities: Hula-hoop, jump ropes, bubbles, beach & footballs, puzzles, sidewalk chalk, paint with water books, pom-poms, legos, Disney movies and my STOMP movie [I have used this movie to bond with kids from 7-15+ since they are always fascinated by them] 
2. Food: build your own pizza, fruit, milk, gummy fruits, hot cocco, water & ice, cookies to bake that break apart, golden oreos. [Foods that one/other refused - chicken nuggets, veggies, gold fish]
3. Kids radio [the girls slept better with the radio on a Spanish station], night light, bed-wetting mattress covers [I have one for each child's bed but wish I'd had three], pre-printed visual instructions [below]

When the girls, ages 7 & 10, arrived with the case worker, they came in and started to watch cartoons which allowed us time to discuss the medical logs and the girls' medicine in details. When it comes to the medicine, one thing I learned is that I can't have both kids standing there at the same time because it can get confusing with the kids talking and errors can be made very easily. I kept all the girls meds. double locked (inside a locking medical bag, then inside a new tool box that locked) and kept the keys in my pocket the whole visit. After the caseworker said goodbye, I showed the girls around the house. Immediately the girls said they were hungry. Often children who have experienced neglect can become food hoarders or what I call "food focused." These two sweethearts were definitely food focused so the whole weekend was a balancing act of the eating schedule. After eating dinner and dessert we watched a movie. The girls would ask for food about every hour. Fortunately for me, these girls accepted being told no. *whew* The girls were excited to meet the cats so I showed them my pre-printed sign that explains to them how they should treat pets. I found it online and I don't remember the source but it was great. My Trickle cat, who is practically a therapy animal, did wonderful with the girls! I also created a sign in the bathroom that explains some things to do for good health and it made a big impression. For instance, as the girls were brushing their teeth one night, the oldest said, "Miss! My sister rushed the brush!" (see below - LOL) so we were able to discuss why it's important to take more time brushing our teeth. :) The girls also started requesting water after seeing the section about the Otter. I have a print out about how to call 911 in an emergency too.

The first evening we talked and the girls asked if we could pray before lights out. The oldest slept through the night but the youngest woke up after sleeping for about 5 hrs. She said she couldn't go back to sleep for fear of bad dreams so she made a bed on the floor next to mine and we talked for about 2 hrs while she colored and told me stories about her family. We all woke up around 7:30am when the oldest came to tell me she wet the bed. I knew pre-visit that she was having some challenges in this area so I did my best to make sure she didn't feel embarrassed and just told her, "No problem...we'll take care of it." :) Much of their visit consisted of playing and doing laundry! ha. The girls were super helpful and serving to one-another and me. At one point, I heard the youngest in the kitchen puttering around. I called her name and asked her what she was doing but she was quiet so I walked in the kitchen and found her cleaning and organizing my fridge! So I learned quickly that the girls thrived when given tasks/chores they could complete because they wanted me to be proud and also for me to give their foster parents an A+ report.

picture drawn for me by the oldest

We spent most of Saturday playing outside using all those activity items I mentioned above and watched some movies inside. Since the girls are originally from Puerto Rico, I asked them often to use Spanish when they counted, named a color, and name people in their drawings. The girls loved this!! I do not live in the same town as the foster family, so I don't know if I'll get to see these girls again. One of my personal goals was to try to take every opportunity to build them up and share positive things. The girls drew me pictures so I made them encouragement gifts and talked with each one about how much I believed in them and encouraged them to dream big. I then put my "art" in small picture frames so they could carry them home. On Saturday night we created a huge pallet in the living room so we could pretend to be camping. I did need to wake up around 2am and do laundry though so I moved the youngest back into the bedroom and after the mattress pad was clean and dry I spread it on the floor for the oldest to go back to sleep. Sunday morning we picked up a bit and packed their things. When the fosters arrived, the girls were SO excited to share all that they had done. Even things I had showed them or shared with them that they didn't seem to care about originally, they shared them with excitement to the foster family, especially my framed dream list & my album showing "her vacation with cheetahs." HA. 

I bragged on how well the girls had done and I was very proud of them. There is, of course, so many more details to the weekend but too much to type. I've included some pictures below and am sending a huge THANK YOU to all my friends who prayed for me, encouraged me by text or sent scriptures by email. The respite visit, or "respect visit" as the youngest one calls it, was great and God allowed me to wrap these special ones in a little more love and care this weekend.

drawn by the oldest

puzzle for 12+ the oldest LOVED doing puzzles

my gift to the oldest

my gift to the youngest

The cats and I relaxing after a busy weekend of kid'os! 

What was it like adopting a sibling group...?

I found this discussion online and I thought it was great! There was no image I could pin but I had to find a way to save it to my board :)

In response to the question, "What was it like adopting a sibling group...?" some responses were:

• We are getting certified, and originally, the "top 3" potential adoptive children on our list was a single 14-year old girl, a single 12-year old boy, and a single 9-year old boy. There were two minor delays that were mostly out of our hands in the certification process, and we believed/ believe that God was delaying it for some reason, but still encouraging us to plan on adopting soon.The "top 3" have all gotten adoptive families! This is wonderful, especially considering most older children/ teens are never adopted. Now we are more seriously considering adopting a sibling group of 3 or 4. We already have two biological children, a six-year old and a 10-month old. 

• We adopted a sibling group of three. Adopting a sibling group can be a great choice--it was for us. Firstly, adopting a sibling group made the transition to this family easier for all of them. They have been able to be with each other which has made them feel far more content with the process. In addition, having the three of them together means that all of us can talk about their first family together--they remember their family whom they talk about and it comforts them to know they shared the experiences to a large degree (it makes them feel less alone and less at fault).The hardest thing about adopting siblings is that each child needs a huge amount of individual attention as each is going through a different grieving process and each adjusts at his or her own pace. We were not prepared for the amount of time that we would give up. Sometimes our oldest just needed me to sit with him for hours without saying a word. He was processing all of the change and needed to feel like he wasn't alone. He didn't need me to "do" or "fix" anything, but he needed me to be there for the very few times that he would ask a question or say something to me. The time for us was just about being there for each child in the way each needed. Honestly, it took almost a year for us to even have the time to keep up on yardwork, housework and socializing with friends (at least those without children). Of course, it was absolutely worth it.I think it was a wonderful choice for all of us. Our children are older so they can tell us that they are happy here and are glad that they are together. I'm just happy to laugh and play together. 

• We have fostered for the past 12 years and have had many sibling groups. Overall, you need to remember that children of this age who are in care will have a lot of emotional baggage and deep seated feelings of rejection which may manifest themselves in behavioral difficulties.Don't underestimate how thankless and draining trying to help children like this can be. If you have other young children, it is likely they would miss out on lots of your attention as children with histories of rejection often 'need' lots of your attention and can get jealous and possessive easily. Of course there will be lots of happy moments too but don't expect the children to be instantly gracious and feel lucky to be 'chosen'. They have a void that cannot usually be filled that easily. You will have to work hard and realise that you may not be able to heal their wound and not to take it personally if you can't.

• We have adopted a sibling group of 7. Actually, we adopted the first 5 and now we have custody of the 2 youngest, but to me, they are ours adoption or not. Having 7 natural siblings is the most amazing, beautiful, breathtaking thing I have ever done. They look alike, act alike, even have similar disabilities. I love them so much and I feel surrounded by their biology, even if we are not their biological mothers. The only thing that breaks my heart about it is that we couldn't take the oldest because of his mental problems and him hurting the others. But we still have visits with him and I think about him every single day. I love him, too. I cannot tell you how a sibling group will mix with your other 2 children because we don't have any natural children. I just can't tell you how awesome it is to watch my kids every day and see how close they are. I am thankful that we were allowed to keep them together.

Top 5 Reasons I Have a Living Room Treadmill

#5 - Constantly reminds me to workout because I must walk past it multiple times every day. 

(especially to go to the kitchen - ha)

#4 - It's not called the "Living" room for nothing! Since this room gets the most use, it makes exercise more a part of my life.

#3 - My couch isn't far when I need to collapse after a hard run. LOL!

#2 - TV, DVD, and music are already set up.

and the #1 reason I have a living room treadmill...

I'm always running towards the cross!!

See it? :) 

What a great reminder to help me meditate on Jesus!

Hebrews 12: 1b-2 "...And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne.