We have raise 5 wonderful children! We love them with all or hearts and I have to say I think they have "turned out" quite nicely!! Not all five are a finished project but they are well on their way!
Our five older children have been raised more "mainstream". They had many activities, many friends, the went to public or catholic schools. Our friends were the parents of their friends. We basically did what everyone else was doing but we still had a bit of a flare that was all our own! We had lots of fun and lots of busyness!
When I look back I can see a few mistakes we made. We let our children go to their friend's cabins and miss time with Grandparents, we were at times too busy and lost our family time, we put too much importance on our children's friends and what others were doing and we did not outwardly share our faith we kept it hidden inside (we still have a tendency to do that). All of these mistakes I do regret and would love to have a chance to do it all over again but that is not an option.
Instead the Lord has given us an opportunity to do it all over again not with our birth children but instead through the blessings of adoption! This time around we are making some changes. In fact our birth children have had to do a double take and question us at times. They were happy with how they grew up and they are not always so certain about our new philosophy. Usually they come around and can understand our thought process but they still are cautious about completely agreeing with us. We are okay with that - there is not one right way to raise children. All children are unique and have different needs. We are trying to meet the needs of our new children... and to be honest we need to meet our needs also. Happy parents make happy children. I love working hard, I love giving tons of love and time but I am not a martyr- I know when I need a moment to regroup!
What are we doing differently this time-
We are homeschooling our adopted children. They have already spent too much time away from us and we want them with us. We want to make up for the lost time. This is for their benefit as well as ours!
We are trying to be more open and sharing with our faith. We are trying to walk with Jesus in front of the children and ask them to share this wonderful journey with us. We want our children to have an appreciation for God's creations.
We are showing our children all that family has to offer. With a family a child's needs are met, they are safe and secure, and their is laughter and fun. They can learn about the world in a safe environment. We would like to teach them many of their social skills within the family environment and a few friends.
We like going to the beat of a different drummer and making our own decisions. We do not want to follow the masses in a direction that may be the wrong one for this family. In other words we will not do what others are doing just because others are doing it- hope that makes sense!
We are unique and we want to embrace and celebrate our uniqueness!
We plan to make many of our family decisions through prayer and through God's direction. We love how he has guided us so far!
We would like to do a better job at encouraging our individual children's interests and talents in a low key way.
Each day we are moving forward with God's peace in our hearts. I want my heart so filled with God that their is no room for anything else!
We are more committed to enjoying the simple pleasures that life has to offer. Slow down and see the beauty! Be peaceful and pray! (Okay I know that adopting a bunch of kids is not exactly slowing down and creating simplicity but that is the plan and that is the direction!)
We feel good about our decisions. We feel we are making healthy choices for this family! To many of you bloggy loving, Jesus loving, adoption loving people out there this is not a new direction. To us, it actually is and we are loving it!
