Because of the Rain

Thankful.

My heart is bursting with gratitude right now.  It's no secret that our financial situation over the past several years (since I quit working to stay at home with our children) has been grim.  We are educated and ambitious but things just werent falling into place for us.  Jobs came but they were meagre.  Kevin was working long hours for pitiful pay. We're naturally cheerful people but lots of days felt like wading through another dreary, rainy day, we were dying for some sunshine.

I found a journal entry from five years ago, it was written on the day that Kevin was laid off during some structural reorganization at the beginniing of the economic downturn.  I was fearful, but optimistic.  I was sure that this was just a small bump in the road and that the quick climb to the top would resume.

Here we are five years later.  Humble, humble, humble.  Today's Paula stands here now with an understanding that success is fifty percent hard work and fifty percent blessings from God.  Everything that I have is because of Him. Everything.

There's a quote that hangs in my living room that says that "Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass.  It's about dancing in the rain."  

I tried to brush it off, I've said its silly, I've said it doesn't matter but the truth is, this financial challenge has brought me to my knees more than once.  The most difficult part of it, was accepting help from others.... or worse, having to ask for help.  It's humiliating.  It shouldn't be, but it is.  I really prided myself on my independence. I moved away from home at 18 and never looked back. I worked and saved all by myself. I really believed that. 

I cried to The Lord I asked him to take this from us PLEASE.  I dreamed of the day that buying diapers and groceries wouldn't be a big deal.  When paying bills wouldn't cause me to break out in a cold sweat.  We were on shoe string budget always teetering on the edge of disaster. 

Kevin went to interview after interview.  Each time I fasted and prayed that if it be Thy will please let this one work out.  Time after time, they didn't.  I doubted, I got angry, I got depressed, felt hopeless. But mostly I just tried not to think about it.  But it was always there, weighing me down, stressing me out, filling me with guilt and doubt.

 Then one day, as I explained to a very upset three year old that she could not have any more candy I saw a clear type between my relationship with my daughter and my relationship with my God.  She begged and cried and pleaded for more treats, I calmly denied her pleas because I love her and because I understand that if I let her eat all the candy that she wanted that she wouldn't grow healthy and strong the way she needs to.  Of course she didn't understand, her requests for the candy continued, she was very distraught. But I love her too much to let that happen.  For the first time I clearly saw myself, begging for "candy"  Maybe my desires were righteous but still not right.

That night, after I had tucked my girls into bed, I fell on my knees and prayed like I hadn't prayed in a long time.  I didn't ask for the challenge to be taken away, instead I asked that my Will be aligned with God's.  I want to WANT what Heavenly Father has planned for me.  I know he has a plan for me and I know that it will be better and more wonderful than anything that I can plan for myself.

This became my new mantra, "please Lord, help me align my will with Thine."

A few nights ago, my prayer changed. I found myself saying thankyou.  I had been saying thank you for months but my attitude had been that I would dance despite the rain. I was grateful for our home, food, our health, a job this exercise in gratitude always made me feel better.  But that night, for the first time, I wasn't dancing in spite of the rain, I was dancing BECAUSE of the rain.  "Thank you, Father, for blessing us with the opportunity to struggle financially."

The more I thought the more reasons I came up with to be thankful.  We learned; humility, compassion, Kevin and I were now unified on our money philosophy, I was forced to extend myself in creative ways to earn money for our family while still staying home with the girls, I uncovered and developed talents that I didn't know I had and more importantly we saw first hand that all of the effort and support and prayers from masses of people who love and support us could do nothing to achieve something outside of the Lords plan for us ALL blessings come from God. And so much more!

Two days later,  Kevin was offered a job as Assistant Vice President for a  Bank of America branch. 

He popped into the room where I was rocking the baby to sleep and mouthed, "I got it!" I screamed in joy, we both cried a little and a feeling of a literal weight being lifted off my body occured.  I can't describe the feelings of joy, and gratitude and humility that I feel.  We are blessed.

Because of the rain, I have blossomed.  Thank you.

Wish we all could be California Girls... And one Boy

Kevin had a big interview in California this week and since he would be driving there, the girls and I decided to tag along. Because... Ocean!!!

The week before I prepared Kylea for her first encounter with the ocean. We watched you tube videos, looked up photos and her favorite thing was discussing the sea life. During dinner one night she lit up and chatted excitedly about turtles, dolphins and crabs (careful... Crabs punch, at least according to kyky they do) then she fell silent for a minute, obviously deep in thought, "mommy? I want to see the mermaid!!!!" 

I briefly considered describing the difference between real and mythical creatures but... Why destroy the magic of childhood imagination?

She could barely sleep she was SO excited for our adventure. Was our best trip yet. Ky has gotten so big and handles the whole thing brilliantly 

( packing my most valuable possessions)

 And by some miracle Neila fell asleep! Car seat naps are rarer than unicorn tears in our house so we were pleasantly surprised it happened.

(Fun fact- that blankie was mine when I was a baby)

We arrived all napped and ready for some ocean time! I don't know if words can express just how stoked Kylea was. It was like Christmas morning times 1000. She couldn't wait to go to the ocean and she mentioned many times that she hoped to see mermaids!

That face! Pure joy, anticipation and excitement. 

I didn't bring the camera so we didn't capture much of that first visit but it was perfect. Kyky charged into the waves in search of mermaids, squealing with glee. Neila got her little toes wet, dug around in the sand then got cold and sleepy so we snuggled on the beach buildings sand castles while kev and ky splashed around in the ocean. Kyky instructed him to hold her then pointed a tiny hand to the open sea and commanded "Go daddy! Find mermaids!!!" And then away they would run into the crashing waves.

We spent a sleepless night in a kind of scary Motel 6

 It's always reassuring when you are instructed to double bolt yourself in your room for  safety. ( insert sarcasm here) but that's not why it was sleepless. It was sleepless because of anticipation of big interview the next day. 

The interview happened bright and early the next day. 2 hours! Kevin said he felt great about how it went and they said they would get back to him in 48 hrs... Fingers crossed!!!

We couldn't leave without one more trip to the beach. Kylea had a blast yet again and this time Neila was better rested and had much more fun as well. 

We are back!!!

She may have taste tested the sand once or twice.

I love her lady like pose with her hands.

Too much fun! She didn't want to go home! "But, I want to go to the ocean!"

Adventure can be exhausting but totally and completely worth it. Best family adventure yet!

Little You Means More to me than All the Pearls in the Sea

"You can't play with us!"I heard the words and ran around the corner in time to see the golden haired bully dole out her blow.  The toy cracked against Kyky's skull and she collapsed to the floor.  This was the pinnacle of almost 2 hours of exclusion and manipulative and downright mean acts against Kylea from this girl. She cried.  She cried like I've never heard her cry.  It was the gut wrenching cry of a bruised body and a broken spirit. I parted her hair and saw the purple bump that had already formed. My insides turned to snakes and my knees shook a strange sensation came over my body. The kind where mothers gain super human strength to lift cars off their children. Mother bear emerged.

  I scooped her up.  I hugged her tight.  I told her it would be alright.  Her offender leered, satisfied that she had succeeded in excluding Kylea. I focused on my small one, fighting off my base instincts, with enormous effort. 

I stroked her silky hair as she sobbed into my shoulder and the room seemed to dissolve in front of me.  Into memories I fell. Or more appropriately emotions.  Drowning in grief and rage.  The pain of every exclusion, insult and put-down of my past compounded on me like some kind of sick twist on empathy.

NO!  Not my baby!  Not my vibrant, smart, kind and beautiful baby.  Not this child that we have raised so mindfully.  My every living moment since her first breath has been dedicated to building her up.  We nursed and cuddled we walked the floors.  We take deep breaths and timeouts.  We whisper instead of yell. We teach, we supervise, and we understand that we are raising a person and not just managing a child. We have been so dedicated that the realization that not everyone shares this goal was like a punch to the gut. Like someone sucked all the air out of the room.  

Shakey and unsure that I could maintain my composure, I fumbled over my words as I gathered our things and made my way to the car with a weighty pit in my stomach.

We drove home.  I turned on her favorite song and she sang along.  Then she says, "Mommy?"  I turn the music down and gaze at her tear-stained face in the rear view mirror.  "yes, love?"
"why my friend hit my head?"

What to say? This was the first time she's ever been acted on hatefully or violently, to my knowledge. It must be bewildering.  Today we learn that the world is not filled with friends and good people who take care of us and love us.  Today we learn that there are people who are mean.  People who hurt us. People who are NOT our friends. Today we lose just a little bit of that childhood innocence.

I answered as simply as I could, "She is NOT your friend. Friends are people who make us feel good. Friends are people who treat us with kindness."

It made me unspeakably sad to have to go there.  It occurs to me that this is just the first of many times that people will treat her this way.  There will be more offenders. People who hurt on accident and people who hurt you and smile when they see your broken spirit. This is unfortunately part of the human experience. You'll ask why. You'll wonder why me?

 So, to future Kyky and Neila I'll say, I can't tell you why.  I don't know.  I do know that it's because they're hurting and jealous.  And I can tell you that no matter how much it hurts, it's always a lie.

My mind flies away to a fictional land created by Kathryn Stockett, in The Help.  A land where Aibleen scoops up tiny Mae Mobley who is ceaselessly bullied by her self-centered mother and whispers.

"You is Kind.  You is smart. You is important."

That's what all this effort is for.  I can't protect you from all the storms and evil of the world.  I can't create a world where bad people can't get to you. 

I can celebrate the good parts with you. And I can tell you over and over, you are kind.  You are smart. You are important and you are fiercely loved by me and most of all by your Heavenly Father.  I can tell you until you internalize it.  Until you understand your inherent worth.  I can repeat it until it becomes an irrefutable part if you. I can repeat it until the day when no matter who comes along trying to drag you down that they won't succeed.  You are priceless and wonderful and a gift to everyone you meet.  And THAT is the truth.

*addendum*

I've had a huge number of people contact me privately about why I didn't DO something. I didn't even know so many people read this! 

Rest assured, I contacted the mother and was very candid about the situation and definitely overstepped my boundaries in offering what I felt were fair consequences. I also removed kyky from the situation so no further emotional or physical abuse would occur. The mother was very apologetic. All is well. 

Out of the Mouths of Babes

Lots of times motherhood is hard. My most recent frustration has been solving the mystery of the black hole in my house. You know, the place where everything disappears, especially; cords to every little-used electronic device, left shoes and hair ties. The only person to recover items from the mysterious hart family Bermuda Triangle is, kylea. So yes it's tough. But even though it's  frustrating that 3 year olds can't seem to remember that crayons don't go up your nose and tiger growling at your baby sister isn't nice they seem to intuitively "get" things that we grown-ups just don't. 

I took the girls to the grocery store to get a few items we were low on today. The girls giggled and kyky copied Neila's screech sounds and then they giggled some more. As I was making my way to the register I saw another mom pushing her two children in the cart that looks like a car. The child in the driver's seat was crying loudly. I thought to myself, "I'm glad my girls aren't doing that today." And gave the mom a smile hoping to convey solidarity. 

We wheeled up to the register and ky helped me unload the cart in her typical animated fashion. She sniffed things and made dramatic yucky faces or exaggerated yummy faces complete with licking her lips for each item respectively before she tossed them onto the conveyor belt. 

Before we finished, the mother with the crying child pulled her cart up behind mine. Her child was still crying. I noticed the year stained face belonged to a little girl, probably 3 years old. I noticed her quivering lip as she tried to pull herself together, I noticed how cute the bow in her hair was, I also noticed she had Down syndrome.

Kylea didn't notice any of that. The second the cart pulled up behind her kyky smiled brightly and said, "hello friend!!" She then excitedly showed her the dragon fruit that we were purchasing and a few other of her favorite items. The girl smiled she didn't respond with words but her tears dried and in their place was a giant smile. 

And a little child shall lead them. Lead them to a place where our differences don't make us too different to be instant friends. 

Bedtime

I have a lot of back blogging to do but I don't want miss the present while trying to catch up. Here's a snapshot of life as it is right now. 

Bedtime last night-

Kyky is tucked in bed, Neila is crawling around the floor chewing on toys, I'm reading a story out loud to them. Suddenly kyky interrupts. 

" mommy"

" yes, beansy?"

".... I mad"

Her expression is calm and she's reclining on her pillow with her hands behind her head.

" you are? Why?"

"Yes. I so mad, mad." She sighs dramatically but her expression is still cool as a cucumber.

" ok" 

She then calmly sits up, buries her face in her pillow and screams into it as loud as she can then says

" ahhh, that's much, much better" 

Neila erupts in laughter and then starts making sharp screeching sounds. As if to say, encore!

" oh good! I'm glad you got those big feelings out." I say, trying to keep a straight face. 

" mommy.... Read the story"

Returns to her reclined position

I'm Ready

Maybe you noticed and maybe you haven't but I haven't blogged in a long time... like a really long time.  Not because nothing is happening, LOTS has happened and I'm actually wracked with guilt that my sweet little Neila has aged to the ripe old age of 9 months and hasn't had the monthly update that Kylea got.  We had a really rough decision that we made and I think I've been waiting until I was ready to write about it to return to blogging.  I didn't anticipate it taking so long.  I also wanted to have lots of time to properly articulate how I was feeling about the situation and give it it's due diligence.  That's just not going to happen, not with two kiddos.

Here's the not-so-short story.  Neila was allergic to Tekoa. I suspected it for weeks before I finally admitted it.  I only admitted it after having to take my poor sweet 6 week old Neila to Primary Children's Hospital at 3 in the morning because she was having a very difficult time breathing.  She had a slight cold but was so very congested the poor little thing couldn't breath hardly at all. The respitory tech at the hospital tried to suction the congestion out of her nose with their special machinery but had to take time out to search for the smallest tube, her nasal passages were so swollen and irritated that the normal newborn tube couldn't be forced into her nasal passages.  

The doctor came in and discussed her diagnosis.  Neila had rhinovirus (the common cold) and was probably suffering from another irritant as well.  That other irritant was eventually discovered to be, Tekoa.  It was Mother's Day we sat in a dark hospital room trying to get a grouchy Kylea to lay down on the hospital bed and take a nap and holding my baby, who after 3 bouts of suctioning, was finally able to breath enough to get some sleep.  Tears squeezed from my cheeks as I thought of my third child at home curled up in his crate with no clue what was coming.  Worst Mother's Day ever.

We had waited for Tekoa's birth, tracked his first 8 weeks of life with excitement driven all the way to Denver and taken him back to Salt Lake with us.  He made us proud, taught us lessons brought us unimaginable joy.  He was a watchful big brother to Kylea.  He watched over her during those first months when she was in questionable health under the bili lights, never complained when she crawled on him, pulled his ears and dressed him like a princess.  He was the perfect dog.  How could I give away the perfect dog?

We all cried, a lot.  With a heavy heart I petitioned our community for individual who would be willing to add our beloved Tekoa to their family.  I personally interviewed at least a dozen families, and met with several others.  It was coming down to the wire.  We had interviewed just about everyone and there just wasn't anyone that was jumping out at us.  We met with a lot of good people who adored Tekoa but we just weren't sure they were willing to give him the same treatment we would.   

Then the phone rang.  One more family wanted to meet him.  The knock at the door came and in poured a man a woman and their several children.  The woman told us of their deep love for Siberians.  They had owned 2 Sibes before they had children whom they loved dearly and were devastated when old age finally took them.  She had brought a scrap book filled with photos of their beloved sibes.  The children were perfect with him played respectfully with him and were thrilled by his tricks.  Tekoa delightedly performed his "bang-bang" trick (play dead) repeatedly to squeals of glee from the children.  I was happy but couldn't conceal my emotion when talking about the logistics of Tekoa and once again I was crying.  The woman wrapped her arms around me and cried too. She told me she knew how it felt to say goodbye to a beloved family member.  We thanked them and shut the door and told them we would be in contact.

We didn't need time though....they were the ones. the only ones I could picture loving him the way he deserved.  Kevin ran down the stairs and told them we wanted them to have him.

They came the next day.  Tekoa jumped gladly into their car puppy smiling the whole time.  As we walked back toward the house Kylea screamed out what I think both Kevin and I's hearts were screaming, "NOOOOOOOO!!!!! MY WOOOO WOOOOO!!!!!! NOO!!! NOOOOOOOO!!!"  We all wept uncontrollably.

In the days that followed I blubbered endlessly.  I may or may not have wept while dramatically singing Sarah Mclaughlin's "I will Remember You" as I vacuumed up Tekoa's fur.  I guess I have a flair for drama.  But I felt like I was betraying him.  I wept again when I opened the pantry to prepare dinner and saw the giant space where the bucket for his dog food used to be.  I wept when neighbors asked me about Tekoa and what had happened. He left a hole, a palpable void in our lives.

We LOVED that dog!  He never missed a walk in his entire life, ever.  Except on the days that he went to doggy daycare and played with his doggy friends.  It's been several months now and I still miss him.  I think I always will.  His new family writes us and sends us photos.  He's happy and healthy and is bringing another family joy.  And that's all we really want for our kids, right? Happiness.

woo and his new brothers and sisters