Tag Archives: Love

Our 3rd Adoption Anniversary

“One million reasons why, you shouldn’t even try.
After all you’re just one heart, a single candle in the dark.
And there are shadows here, feeding on your fears,
That you don’t have what it takes – who are you to make a change?”

“Whatever you do, just don’t look back.
Oh somebody needs the light you have.
Whatever you do, just don’t lose heart.
Keep on pushing back the dark,
Keep on pushing back the dark.”

Today we celebrate the third anniversary of the day our adoption of the four younger kiddos was finally finalized. Three years ago, this day appropriately fell on our Thanksgiving day, which made it truly a day to be thankful for.

The above video shows our adoption journey, which began June 2014 with our first hosting trip.  It took two years, four hosting trips to the US, and three international trips to Eastern Europe later, before we could FINALLY say “It is official”. None of it was easy, none of it came without heart wrenching decisions and tears, but every single second was WORTH IT! I can’t imagine life without these kiddos in it.

At the time we were ecstatic to have finalized the adoption of our four, but we were also deeply saddened that the oldest had decided not to be adopted at that time. However, as our last post explains, we are now overjoyed that he also made the decision to be adopted and his adoption was finalized almost a year ago. We will have to update our video as we near the anniversary of our second adoption of our oldest young man.

I have said before that I came into this adoption journey with the wrong mindset that I was saving them. The truth is though, that they have saved ME. They have saved me from my selfishness.  They have saved me from my greed.  They have saved me from focusing on things that truly don’t matter in the end.  They have turned my heart outwards instead of inwards.  They have focused my heart on those things that are eternal, instead of the things of this world that will pass away. They have been a true blessing to our family. THANK YOU JESUS!

Now that I am on the other side of our adoption journey, I want to encourage you to pursue your passion, whatever it may be.  Live without regrets!  Take that leap of faith!  JUST DO IT!  Whatever you have been given, use it.  Whatever your talents are, employ them.  Whatever you are dreaming about, GO FOR IT!  It is never too late.  Have no regrets! Don’t let fear stop you, fear is a liar!

BE BOLD!

Take to heart these four points I learned from a sermon about where faith takes us…

—to the point where we need to make decisions that involve BIG RISK
—to the starting point of long journeys
—to the point of waiting for the impossible
—to the point of giving everything you have

Sometimes we just need to step out of the boat and have faith that even though we can’t see the end, God knows the ending, and he will never leave us or forsake us.

(song and lyrics are from “Pushing Back the Dark” by Josh Wilson)

Replace fear with FAITH

(posted with permission from my oldest son)

It seems like a blink of an eye, and at the same time, it feels like a lifetime ago that I was mothering just a few in my home. I stand in awe of this story that I have NO doubt at all our Father in Heaven has knit together.

(the first photo I saw of my beautiful children!)

I think about where I was almost five years ago and see how our hosting and adoption journey has grown my faith by leaps and bounds. At some moments, I was in danger of losing hope entirely.  It has always been my faith that has pulled me through the roughest patches.

Our adoption story has not been perfect. There have been amazing highs and terrible lows. We set out to adopt a sibling group of five with the hopes of bringing them back together under one roof. At our first hosting of the three boys we discovered that our two girls had been separated into a foster family while their three brothers remained in the orphanage. This was clearly heartbreaking for my children, especially our oldest son who had been in the caretaker role for all the children while they were in the orphanage together for several years. He was not able to speak about his sisters without welling up with huge tears.

(our first hosting of the boys – the girls were too young to host)

However, adoption journeys are often slow and it was the same with ours. It took about two years from our first hosting until we were finally able to travel to bring them all home. As we prepared for our trip we were told the devastating news that the oldest of the five siblings, now 14 years old, a child who called me “mother”, a child whom I loved dearly, was unsure he wanted to be adopted (after writing on paper during our first hosting “I no go back”).  He said he loved our family and wanted to continue to visit, but the teenager he had grown into over the past two years now wasn’t sure he wanted to leave his friends behind. I can’t even express the disappointment, pain, confusion and grief that swept over my heart.

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(our first host visit with our girls)

Imagine proposing to someone you really love and think will be excited to marry you, and then they say “no”. This is the closest comparison I can come up with.

This “no” to adoption from our oldest son really threw us for a loop and had us questioning everything we were doing. This was coupled with several other events (a move to a new city for my husband’s new work position where we didn’t know a soul, several deaths in our family, another knee operation and recovery for me, and a hacker stealing thousands of dollars from our bank account, among other struggles). I felt like I started the hosting and adoption journey off strong. Despite the changes and difficulties, I was able to keep God in focus. Yet, with each new circumstance that occurred, I felt myself weakening, slowing and tiring.

It seems when I am physically tired, I am often spiritually tired as well. And when you’re tired, or lonely, or grieving, or stressed, it is SO easy to believe lies. 

Satan is the father of lies and he wants to replace your FAITH with fear, but fear is a liar!

Interestingly, I read in my devotional,

“Fear is dangerous to your hope and means your trust in God has failed.”

As soon as I read it I called my husband over to read it as well. That was exactly what was happening!!! I felt the fear coming the previous year. I had written a blog post called “Fear is a Liar” to that effect. I KNEW what we were supposed to do. I KNEW the right answers. I KNEW we were to trust in the Lord no matter what and make our FAITH bigger than our fear.

Yet, I let tiredness, sadness, doubt, and mistrust creep inside instead.

And it was ugly.

It contracted. It pulled in. It withdrew. It withered my heart, my love, and robbed me of my  joy.

We began to question everything we had worked so hard for up until that point. We wondered if this was the best use of our resources in caring for children, especially if our goal was to reunite siblings and it looked as though we would be leaving one behind in an orphanage alone. We started to listen to what the world was telling us and not what God had been telling us from the beginning.

Maybe this WAS a dumb idea.

Maybe we SHOULDN’T be spending so much money on this. 

Life would be SO MUCH EASIER if we just kept the status quo.

Thankfully, I had some wonderful, faithful friends who talked me through my thoughts. Friends who got down on their knees and prayed for us. Friends who gave us wise advice. One friend reminded me that it was not OK to fear.

My own words back to me.  Fear is a liar.

And that was exactly what was happening.  The fear was eating me up. I let it consume me. It was dangerous to my hope. The fear consumed my hope, and my loss of hope meant my trust in God had failed. And if I was honest with myself, my trust in God had failed.

Where was my hope?

(at the end of our hosting with the girls, right before our first in-country trip)

Yet, He will ALWAYS find a way to speak to our heart, mind and soul if we let Him.

God began to speak to me through friends, songs,  Bible verses, and perfectly timed sermons. One of the most convicting sermons was given to us right before we had to give our final decision to our official referral. Pastor Luis Martinez was a guest speaker at our church and gave a short sermon he called “Stepping out of the Boat.” His four point sermon was this:

  1. Faith takes us to the point where we need to make decisions that involve BIG RISK.
  2. Faith takes us to the starting point of long journeys.
  3. Faith takes us to the point of waiting for the impossible.
  4. Faith takes us to the point of giving everything you have.

I also had a little talk with God after some serious praying for hours on end. I stumbled upon a devotional in a store and I said to God, “Ok Lord, I am going to pick up this devotional and flip to today. If you want us to continue on this path, then this devotional will speak to my heart and make perfect sense. If we should stop, then this devotional entry will not make any sense.” I know we aren’t supposed to test the Lord like this, but I was desperate. I furiously flipped to the page for that day and was struck to see the title of the entry was, “The Courage to Change”. The tears flowed.

Yes. Did I have the courage to change? I was so very fearful of change! Yet – we had always said we had the ability to take in these children and change their lives for the better. Now the question really was:

Did we have the courage to step out of the boat?

I knew after reading that devotional that my answer was YES. I knew that I had let my hope and trust in God falter, and that I needed to continue in my hope that He knew what He was doing and He was weaving together our story for the good of us all, even when it didn’t make sense to me at the time.

We continued on our journey. We traveled and stayed in country with all five of the siblings in hope that maybe the oldest would change his mind by the end of our visit. He didn’t, and although that was hard, we soldiered on knowing we were providing a better home for the four who deeply desired to be with us in a loving home.

(Reunited together in-country trip #1)

We traveled back home and I continued to feel the sting of our story not being tied up in pretty bows at the end. We still didn’t know what “the end” of our adoption journey would look like. There continued to be sadness and worry over “the one we left behind”. With the other children adjusting, and more than doubling the size of our children at home to seven, there were some mornings that I didn’t think I would be able to pull myself out of bed and make another meal for another child. I begged and pleaded with Our Heavenly Father and He faithfully got me through each day to the next.

As hard as it was to come home without my oldest son who called me mom, we did. I was thrilled when he agreed to stay with us during our third and final trip in-country to complete the adoption process of his brothers and sisters.

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Reuniting siblings in-country, trip #3

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As our final trip came to an end, the orphanage threw a party to say good-bye to his siblings, which was difficult for all involved. As we sat down at the table, they turned on some music and I was shocked to hear a Christian song that had been encouraging me throughout our process play:  Lauren Daigle’s “I Will Trust in You.” Ohhh my heart hurt. I wanted him desperately to change his mind, yet he continued to believe he should stay. So I prayed as she sang,

“When You don’t move the mountains, I’m needing You to move
When You don’t part the waters, I wish I could walk through
When You don’t give the answers, As I cry out to You
I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in You”

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A fun game!
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A silly game of putting on funny clothes!

I asked Him to continue to watch over this son we were leaving behind and to continue to give me faith and trust in Him during this difficult process.

As we came back home, this oldest son agreed to host visits with us. The last visit was eight weeks for the summer. It proved to be the very best hosting yet. There was so much love, joy and peace. I felt he really bonded to our family. I was reassured that finally he was going to say “yes” to adoption. We had some heart to heart talks during that summer and again via text once he left back. He finally moved towards a “maybe” for adoption. My heart was leaping with joy. I began the adoption application and paid our first adoption fee in good faith he was going to say yes. I was honestly ecstatic. I felt certain that God was finally bringing this missing piece of our puzzle home.

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(near the end of our 8 week host visit post-adoption of the four siblings)

Then he traveled back and with time and distance creeping in, he again moved towards a “no” and I again was devastated. I just couldn’t understand it. Why? Why would God write our story this way? Why did this child choose to remain in an orphanage over our family? What was wrong with us? What was wrong with me? What should we be doing differently? I again sunk into grief. I again had to tell my friends and family that bad news that he said “no” after telling them “He said maybe; I think he is going to say yes.” It was a rollercoaster of emotions for sure.

(at the airport sending him back after our last hosting)

I had to check my own emotions because I was so hurt it was hard at times to continue to pour love into this oldest child who kept calling me mom. This child who continued to call ME to help solve his problems, despite the fact that I was an ocean away. It was so confusing to me and it hurt. Yet, I knew that God always loved me, even when I pulled away from Him, even when I denied Him in my younger years. He was always there patiently waiting for me to return to Him. So I knew that I was to model this same unconditional love to this son, despite his rejection of adoption. And so this is what we did. We continued to try and parent him across an ocean.

Then his orphanage shut down and he was forced to make some hard decisions. Life for him was about to change and he had no choice. It wasn’t until then that he FINALLY began to hint around to the fact that perhaps he truly did want to join our family. Perhaps he should have said “yes” to adoption. At this point, our first adoption case was completely closed, meaning we had to start from square one again as though it was a completely new adoption. This meant all of the paperwork, the dossier compilation, all of the fees and all of the trips again. Yet, I was joyful to begin this process once more. I complied the dossier in record time. I completed everything that was in my control as fast as I could, as I knew we were coming up against his 16th birthday and deadlines that could prevent his adoption as he was getting too old, as well as law changes that were coming into effect in-country that could halt adoptions. Then we had to wait for the courts to finish their steps. This waiting was extremely hard on everyone. We were hoping to have him home by the beginning of the summer, but then that came and went and we were still waiting.

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(after the court hearing that allowed us to bring him back to the US)

Finally, we got the news we had been waiting for, we were able to travel to pick up our son! God arranged the timing of this adoption trip to fall during the Awakening Europe event. We couldn’t believe our good fortune to be able to attend this event with our son. It spanned an entire weekend and was held in multiple languages, including our son’s. The testimonies were powerful, the music was spirit-led, and the presence of God in that arena was overwhelming. On the final night of the event, my precious son felt led to open his heart to Jesus and accepted Him as his Lord and Savior. I can’t even tell you how amazing this was! We were all moved by the verse we sang repeatedly that last night from Lindy Conant’s “Take Courage” song:

screen shot 2019-01-21 at 11.26.41 amFinally, those two years of continued “no” to adoption made a little more sense.  I realized that all along God could see into the future where I couldn’t. God knew that my son needed to be in that arena that weekend. God knew my son needed to be moved by the testimonies and music in his own language. God knew that my son’s “no” to us all those years was partly because he needed to be there that specific weekend to be able to say “yes” to His Heavenly Father.

Someone said to me early on in our process, “adoption isn’t for the faint of heart”.

The Merriam-Webster online dictionary has the following definitions for “faint of heart”.

  1. :  lacking the courage to face something difficult or dangerous —usually used in the phrase not for the faint of heart.
  2. :  faint
  3. :  lacking courage and spirit :  cowardly
  4. :  weak, dizzy, and likely to faint
  5. :  lacking strength or vigor :  performed, offered, or accomplished weakly or languidly
  6. :  to lose courage or spirit
  7. :  to become weak

It didn’t really hit me how powerful that statement was until I went through it. Now I can confidently say, it is true! Adoption of older children is not for the faint of heart. Adoption is HARD STUFF! You absolutely cannot lack courage, spirit, strength, or vigor. You cannot become weak. You have to be strong. You have to be brave. You have to ask the Holy Spirit to provide you with everything you need. I can promise you right now that if you complete an adoption process, you will most likely go through some hard times. You may even sometimes feel like giving up.

Adoption of older children always begins with loss, the worst kind of loss there is, the loss of parents. Not only is there this trauma of losing one’s parents, but usually there have been other types of abuses and traumas as well. You are going to wade through the brokenness. It is going to stink. It’s messy. BUT – if you aren’t faint of heart, if you are strong and courageous, you will reap a harvest of the most beautiful flowers imaginable by the grace of God. A child is redeemed- a family is restored – just as we are invited and adopted as children of God into His family (despite all the brokenness we have dealt with in our own lives).

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Not some things, but ALL things.

Rest in this promise today, my friend. No matter what you are facing, don’t lose heart. Don’t lose hope. Cling to His promise to work it for good. You may not realize it at the moment. You may not realize it until years later. You may not even realize it this side of Heaven. But you can trust His promises. He is faithful, He is good, and He wants the best for you in the end.

(first family photo of everyone upon returning home after Trip #1 of second adoption)

 

Providential Relationships and Mr. Owl’s Journey in the Around the Worldpress Amazing Race

A few weeks back my pastor did a sermon on Providential Relationships. I’ve been thinking about this ever since, and how often it seems that God places just the right people or circumstances into my life at just the right time. Mr. Owl’s first destination on his journey in the Around the Worldpress Amazing Race began because of this very kind of relationship.

As I said in my first post ever, “How do you do it?”, often at the start of a journey we can’t see where it will end. As we look back though, we can see the path emerge. We can begin to understand the why and the how of being led in certain circumstances.

Some people may call this fate. Some may call it coincidence. I prefer to think of it in terms of God’s providence. One of my favorite life verses is:

And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.— Romans 8:28 NASB

Personally, it is such a hope-filled verse.

God is working behind the scenes, directing all things towards His purpose. He takes our free will into account, yet He is the one in the driver’s seat. He is working it ALL, the good, the bad, the ugly, towards His divine purposes even when I don’t believe it, or I don’t see it, or I don’t understand it at the time or this side of Heaven.

And so it is with my own story. And so it is with my adoption story. Before I even came back to God, He was working in my life preparing me for my calling to adopt my children. I didn’t know what was to come, but He knew. Now as I look back, I can connect the dots. I can say, “Ohhhhhhhh, now I understand. Now I see. Thank you, Lord”. To connect all of the dots leading up to our adoption would take several posts, so I am going to focus on the dot that led to Mr. Owl’s first destination on his Around the Worldpress Amazing Race.

My family had moved from California to Michigan and I opened a home-based preschool for a few years when my first son was very young. As a new baby Christian, only coming back to the Church after many years as an atheist (THANK YOU church janitor, with your sweet and simple consistent invitation to your church. Your short, providential relationship, one where I don’t even know your name, changed the course of events for my entire family!), I felt a strong call to make it a Christian-based preschool. This was the first big stepping out in my faith for me. The first child that God placed into my care was without a doubt in my mind, a powerful providential relationship for both of us. Caring for her absolutely prepared me for adopting my children who did not know English, and it also proved to be a much-needed, powerful care placement for my first student as well.

This lovely girl, we shall call her Jewel (for she is a gem!), came from China to America at the tender age of four and spoke no English. Her Chinese parents spoke Chinese to her at home, but they desperately wanted her to learn English and to connect with the English-speaking children of her new city.  Wanting the very best for their daughter, they enrolled her in one of the most expensive, top reviewed childcare centers in the city. Jewel spent three months there and learned ZERO English words. She seemed to withdraw from the children and the teachers there, and her parents were concerned. They began their search for a new care setting for their daughter.

Through a series of what I prefer to call God’s providence, Jewel’s mom “happened” to catch a post that my Christian realtor had lovingly offered to post on her blog about my moving into the area and beginning a Christian preschool from home. What are the chances? This is the ONLY contact I got from that post, but of course, I am convinced that was THE contact I was supposed to make. Jewel’s parents enrolled her as my very first student. We were all a little concerned. She was older by a year than my son. At the beginning, it was just the two of them (until other students enrolled) and obviously they were opposite sex, would they make a friendship? There was also the concern that she did not speak English, and although my background was in teaching, I had little training in ESL methods.  But what I DID have, was FAITH, HOPE, LOVE,  and DETERMINATION.

This proved to be enough. And of course, God’s will never fails.

Early on, Jewel’s mother shared with me that Jewel told her my son was the nicest child she had ever met in China or in America. That is what she needed the most. She needed unconditional love in her childcare environment. She needed trust. She needed those caring for her to be reaching out to her in intentional, loving ways, despite language barriers.

Caring for Jewel taught my family the lesson that it doesn’t matter if we speak the same language as the person we are with. Everyone understands the language of love. Everyone understands a smile. Everyone understands a hug. Everyone understands a hand held out to help up a fallen person. We don’t need to speak the same language to feel these things, to understand these things, to trust these things.

Jewel quickly learned English, and our family was amazed at how fast children’s brains can learn new languages. She has grown into a lovely young lady, already taller then her mom. She excels in school, plays the violin and piano beautifully, and swims competitively.

Jewel’s family were the very first people to offer to help in our Around the Worldpress Amazing Race. We sent Mr. Owl to Jewel’s grandfather in China, who enlisted the help of a local second grade girl. She is the daughter of Jewel’s mother’s childhood friend who was touched to hear about our adoption story and wanted to help with the project. Following are the two letters the little girl wrote back to us. The English translations are below.

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To Mr. Owl: Wish you a very pleasant journey and happiness forever.

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To my family and future hosts: Dear friends, I am very happy to have a chance to introduce you to my hometown: Xitang, China. I hope you’ll like it.

Below are the wonderful photos of the little girl in Xitang, China holding our signed letter and Mr. Owl. If you are wondering how to pronounce “Xitang”, you can click hear and listen to three different audio recordings of people pronouncing “Xitang”.

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My children were in awe to see her holding THEIR letter with Mr. Owl, in this new, distant land. They peered over the photos to see what they could spy in each.

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They quickly realized that it must be somewhat cold there right now, due to the warm jackets, yet their trees have green leaves. They also noticed that there seemed to be a lot of water there, with boats and homes and/or businesses that were right on the waterways. Once we looked up Xitang, China we learned that it is an ancient, scenic water way town with nine rivers that criss-cross throughout it. Due to the beauty of the town, it has been a popular tourist destination as well as famous for landscape paintings.

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Looking at the photo below, my children all jumped and yelled “those look like pelmeni she is eating, but in soup!” Pelmeni are somewhat like a ravioli almost, filled with meat, and are commonly eaten in Latvia and Russia with sour cream, ketchup or vinegar.

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It is amazing to me that even though our world is so large, at the same time it is so small,  especially in this day and age where technology and the internet can connect people across the globe in seconds. We should never underestimate the power we have to connect with others. We each have a story within us, and our stories can inspire, help, encourage, teach and lift others up. We should be willing to allow God to use us in other people’s lives, as well as to allow God to use other people in our own lives.

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The Around the Worldpress Amazing Race was born from a genius idea over at Cyranny’s Cove. My connections with her in the blogosphere also led to my new favorite pair of travel socks, because you know, God’s providence can even lead you to discovering some really awesome travel socks, if you let it.

THANK YOU LORD, for bringing people into my life at just the right moments. May I always be brave enough to listen to Your urgings and promptings. I would also like to say THANK YOU to Jewel and her lovely family. Thank you for sharing your gem of a daughter with me for the short time I was able to care for her. She taught me life-long lessons that impacted an entire family and helped bring four orphans home forever. THANK YOU to Jewel’s loving grandparents, I know how involved they are in their grandchildren’s lives, and I am thankful that they have offered to help in our little project. THANK YOU to the little second grade girl in Xitang, China for sharing her stunningly beautiful hometown with us. Thank you and your mother for taking the time to bring Mr. Owl around Xitang and share your photos and letters with us. We loved your photos and your letters and we wish you peace, love, happiness and many blessings forever!

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image reprinted with permission from hearlight.org, see here

Haters gonna hate, hate, hate…

Not everyone will like you.

Not everyone will understand you.

Some will form ideas about who you are and what you stand for based on nothing more than superficial interactions with you, or brief knowledge of some basic facts about you. Some will even go so far as to gossip about you, or worse, do something to actually disrupt your life.

The Bible clearly tells us that we are to love each other. Paul exhorts us to try as hard as we can to be peaceable to everyone we meet. Jesus goes a step further and tells us to love our enemies. He knew we would be faced with people who hated us. When you are caught in this situation, you need to remember…

I know this is easier said then done. This continues to be an area that I personally need to work on. I want everyone to like me. I would be a liar if I didn’t admit that sometimes I like to play the role of a mind-reader, assuming I know what others are thinking about me. But the truth is, I’m NOT. I really don’t know what others are thinking about me and honestly, it should not matter.  I should not care what others are thinking of me.  The only one I should be worried about judging me is the ultimate judge. He is the only one that I should worry about. And I already know where I stand with Him.

I was talking about this with a friend and she gave me some wise advice. She suggested that we need to be careful not to be double-minded. For example, if I trust God to take care of my family through this adoption process, but I don’t trust that I am only accountable to Him, then I am being double-minded. She reminded me that God is an all or nothing God. We can’t pick and choose the pieces to have faith in. This was eye-opening for me.

As much as we may want others to like us, there is only ONE that we are accountable to. There is only ONE who’s opinion of us we should worry about. The rest doesn’t matter.

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The Power of a Love Note


After 21 years of writing and hiding notes for my oldest daughter, I was blessed to be the recipient of HER notes the other day. I found them when I was having a tough time. And oh my, it is truly uplifting, affirming and just plain lovely!!!!Who wouldn’t want someone to take the time to write a few nice things about you and then hide them for you to find?How would it change your day to find a note like this, encouraging you, appreciating you, inspiring you?Since it is Valentine’s Day, I encourage you to BE the LOVE around you. Perhaps today is the day that you could leave some love notes for the people in your life to find?!?! Simple, cheap, and leaves a HUGE impact!

Grandma Mary

Grandma Mary (or Gigi as her great grandchildren called her) was a second mother to me. Growing up she lived right around the corner from me, and if I wasn’t at home I was at Grandma’s. I was always walking around the corner to her house to get some good food and spoiling like only a Grandma can give.

When I think of Grandma Mary, I think about selfless love. She loved EVERYONE and was always happy to help anyone out. She didn’t have a mean bone in her entire 4 foot 8 inch body. I can honestly say that I do not have one memory of my grandmother raising her voice…ever! Even when all seven of us grandchildren had to have been driving her crazy!

She was always happy to serve others, especially her family, in a selfless act of love. It made her genuinely happy to cook and bake for others, and that was her true gift. She was always up late at night, waiting for her pie to cook, or her bread to finish baking, sitting in her favorite rocking recliner, saying her rosary, which she faithfully said three times per day. She was never one to go to sleep early as there was always something for her to do! She was a self-professed night owl, and the grandkids loved that about Grandma. We never had to go to bed early when we slept at grandma’s house, and we always knew Grandma would order us pizza and let us eat candy into the night.



Sundays were the most special day for Grandma, as she carried on her Italian mother’s tradition of Sunday spaghetti dinner. I remember these family gathering times vividly as a child, as they are some of the fondest memories of Grandma’s. Walking into her house to find my cousins, the smell of spaghetti sauce and fresh baked apple pie, wondering who was already at the house and who was yet to come, the sounds of kids playing, adults laughing and talking, and inevitably the piano being played. Kool-aid and lemonade were the drinks of choice and dinner was spaghetti, meatballs, pork and salad. Sometimes, when we were really lucky, homemade raviolis or gnocchi (gnoches as Grandma called them) took the place of the spaghetti. We would hardly finish our dinner when Grandma would be telling us to eat more, or trying to get us to eat multiple desserts. Everyone was always too skinny for Grandma and no one ever ate enough to satisfy her.


Grandma liked traditions and she carried on other traditions from her mother as well. Who could forget the Easter dolls? Even the older grandchildren would beg for them, and then as adults we would gobble up the ones Gram would give to our own kids that were too young to enjoy them. Or how about her famous crustells, or “crystals” as the grandkids called them, an Italian potato dumpling fried and rolled in sugar. I remember her making those many late nights, on a random request, for anyone. Or pizzelles, an Italian waffle cookie that Grandma called “chumbells”. She would make those chumbells on an old cast iron set that was her mothers.  She could barely lift it to turn it over on the stove! And of course, the other request from her grandchildren – homemade french fries. I blame Grandma for my deep affinity for homemade french fries! Again, it didn’t matter what time it was, midnight or later, all you had to do was ask.

That was pretty much true for anything with Grandma…all you had to do was ask and she would always give whatever she had to anyone. She may have been short in stature, but she towered over with Love. Her example of unconditional love is one we can all follow.

I believe that anyone who knew Grandma Mary would only have lovely things to say about her. She was truly an amazing woman. She always wore a dress, she never drank, never smoked, never swore, she never even raised her voice. She was a peacemaker. She had one photo of herself in her gym shorts and said that was on a dare from her younger sister, and this was probably the most racy thing from her past.  She was the sweetest, kindest person, who was loving towards everyone! She served others selflessly. She loved with action!

I can think of so many ways that she touched the hearts of those around her, and I cherish these memories. She will always remain close in my heart. Forever. I always think of Grandma’s Love when I read 1 Corinthians 13, because this is the type of love that she exemplified…

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Grandma Mary didn’t have much money, she never worked outside her home, she never even left the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, but what she DID have was faith, hope, and an overabundance of Love that she gave freely to anyone and everyone.

We can all learn a little from Grandma on how to love the way God asks us to. This was Grandma’s greatest gift of all, one that keeps on giving, LOVE…

Your ways are not my ways…

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Of course, Dear Lord, Your ways are not my ways. Your thoughts are not my thoughts. Some things are left a mystery until the end. 

Sometimes I cannot see, or even begin to understand, the why of a certain situation. I could drive myself crazy trying to figure it all out.

Luckily, I don’t have to. Because I have YOU to trust in. You to hold me. You to comfort me. You to guide me.

If I would only always remember to turn to You first. So quickly I forget. Every decision first to You. How fast I am to grumble, complain and cry out!

Forgive me Lord, when I close my fists instead of opening them in thanksgiving for all you have done for me. All for good. No matter if I see it that way or not right now.

Always You are faithful. Always You work for the good of those who love You, who have been called according to Your purpose. Thank you, Father.

And when I forget, forgive me. When I forget the power of the Holy Spirit, Mighty Counselor, lives in me.

In ME?!

How can I forget? How can I not listen? He is right here, always guiding, probing, directing.

It is ME who does not listen. It is me who denies. Me who questions. Me who ignores. Forgive me.

Help me to always trust.

Always depend on.

Always follow.

Always ask.

Always listen.

Always do.

Thank you, Father, for everything. The good and the bad that are molding me into who You want me to be. Help me to turn to You at the mountaintops and in the valleys. You are always there working it all for my good.