Nelson Mandela's in the Bathroom

In my mom's bathroom, she has the following excerpt from Nelson Mandela's inaugrual speech hanging beside her toliet (they were originally written by Marianne Williamson....I have no idea who she is just thought I would give her props too.) I was in there yesterday (yes, I go potty) and I read this again for the first time in awhile. I have nothing to add here; it was just a great reminder to me of how to live out the Gospel. Let the words sink in as truth and be encouraged!


“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

"Death and All His Friends"

I went to a funeral last week. I hate going to funerals. There are the obvious reasons why funerals are hard, but they always end up stirring up in me a handful of "extra" emotions.

I've never really made peace with death. I'm not sure if I ever will this side of heaven, it's just so unnatural, but I know people who say "I'm ready to go whenever the Lord takes me." That's not me. Well, I should say, I'm not scared of the actual death part, it's the days, months, years before that I dread. Really, I fear the fear. Does that make sense? I'm afraid of the sadness and the tears and the "lasts". Once I make it to heaven I'm all good. I'm hoping to look like Gisele and dance like Beyonce, but I can't stand to think about the goodbyes before hand.

Coldplay has a song called "Death and All His Friends," and it seemed like an appropriate title for this post. There's the death death that's and obvious death, but what about all of his friends? The little deaths we face while everyday while we're still here. The death of a friendship, a marriage, a dream, an expectation for a child. You name it, we face "mini" deaths all the time.

So, what do we do with these kind of deaths? How do we respond? It's not unlike the choices a person with cancer has to wrestle with. And as far as I can think, there are three of them out there. We can kick and scream and fight and live in anger and bitterness towards God. We can live as a victim and give up. Or, we can somehow, through God's grace and mercy, make peace with where we are and suffer well. Suffer rightly...with a purpose of bringing glory to God. I tell myself all the time "Either God is sovereign or He isn't. There's no in between."

Last week, the January 22nd reading out of "Jesus Calling" said this....pretty much what I was wrestling with after the funeral. (These readings are written as if Jesus were speaking to us."

"Strive to trust Me in more and more areas of your life. Anything that tends to make you anxious is a growth opportunity. Instead of running away from these challenges, embrace them, eager to gain all the blessings I have hidden in the difficulties. If you believe that I am sovereign over every aspect of your life, it is possible to trust Me in all situations. Don't waste your energy regretting the way things are or thinking about what might have been. Start at the present moment- accepting things as they exactly are- and search for My way in the midst of those circumstances."

Okay, God. I get it. Again...

Oh, shut up! You're so annoying.

We don't say shut up at our house, but that's my favorite line from the first Madagascar movie. It makes me laugh out loud every time I hear it. King Julian is totally undone by Mort's constant badgering and that's his last ditch effort to get some peace and quiet.

For the past three weeks, I've felt like King Julian with 4 little Morts living in my house. I can't count how many times I've quoted King Julian in my head. The constant needing, constant touching, constant fighting over everything from who gets Wii remote number one to who's the smartest finally got the best of me. Christmas break was exhausting and some days down right Jack and Diet Coke worthy. But this morning, I kissed two of the four Morts goodbye at 7:33 and suddenly the world seems a little brighter.

I really do love my kids. There are moments where I'm so proud of them and catch glimpses of the hard work of parenting paying off. Moments when my kids stick up for a brother or sister to a bullying friend, or they play with the boy who is the class outcast. And I probably laugh harder with my kids than with anyone else. But, honestly, there are days where I just don't know if I can take hearing one more "Mom! Where's my.....Mom! can you get me.....Mom! Why does my butt have a crack?" Ugh, it just never stops.

Last week, I had just sent Jerod an email telling him that I didn't think I was cut out to be a mom of four. I was overwhelmed by all the demands, the talking, the laundry, the meals, the fannies to wipe. I hit send and stared at the computer with tears rolling down my face and I said a quick prayer that God would give me the grace to get through yet another day.

What I had missed while I was typing was that Jeb and Collins had begun to fight over a little Bakugan toy. Jeb had it first and Collins wanted it in a bad way....and with Collins, what baby wants baby gets. It was just a little "mine, no mine" tussle when I first looked over but it got ugly quickly. As I stared at the drama and tried to figure out what to do, two things went through my head...one, I just don't have the energy to handle this again...I'm just going to let them give each other their own consequences and two, letting this one go should at least be really entertaining.

Sure enough, Jeb and Collins end up wrestling on the floor over the Bakugan and at one point I'm 99% sure Jeb had Collins in a choke hold. And when the WWE wrestling is over, Jeb comes away with the Bakugan and starts to walk over to me to tell me all about the terrible brawl that just took place on the kitchen floor. Tears are streaming down his face and I can tell he's totally traumatized. Collins had disappeared, but I figured she just fled the scene. I was wrong. In pure Collins form, the next thing I know, she's rounding the corner, eyes wide and wild and her arm cocked back with a tennis racket in her hand. She's headed straight for Jeb, and poor buddy has no idea what's coming. She starts whacking him in the back and in her rage she hits herself in the forehead. Now they're both whaling and what's even worse is I couldn't do anything to help because their terrible mother is laughing so hard she can't even through her tears to comfort them. They just stared at me like I was crazy and eventually walked away to go play.

Jerod called right as all this all was ending. He had gotten my email and was calling to check up on me. I answered, but still couldn't really talk because I was laughing so hard. He asked how I was doing. I told him that after this good laugh I thought I was going to make it. He told me I was emotionally unstable. I laughed even more at that. Maybe I am, but I hung up and thanked God for giving me grace for the day even if it had to come through a good slug fest between two determined toddlers.

I Wan Dew It!

And that's just how she says it. Collins said her first full sentence a few days ago and in pure 4th child fashion it was "I wanna do it!" (Insert hard shove to Jeb's shoulder and a push off the chair.) She's never lacked confidence.

Collins is doing great. We've had two visits to the International Adoption Clinic here in Birmingham and I think if they passed out grades she would be an "A" student. All of her immunizations were up to date and there were no surpises with her labs or physical exam. She's 50% in height on US charts which is kind of weird (she's tall) and about 30% for weight (she doesn't miss a meal just like her momma.) Attachment and bonding wise they said where she is after a month of being with us they normally don't see until children have been home after 6 months or so. Apparently, God thinks I'm a wimp and can't handle much because comparatively she's been an "easy one."

On a day to day practical level, life is getting much easier. I don't even notice that she speaks Chinese anymore. It takes me a minute to figure out why the cashier in Target is staring at her so intently as she sings Wheels on the Bus in Chinese. I was able to leave her with my mom the other day while I ran to Wal-Mart for about an hour. You would have thought I had gone to Hawaii for a months vacation. Mornings are so much easier. She doesn't wake up and attach to my leg. She'll go play with Jeb or watch cartoons in the other room! Gasp!

Jerod and I have watched her fit right in with our family. We laugh and are in shock that they make Sinclair's in China; she's definately one of us.

Are You There, Denial? It's Me, Allison.

We've been friends for a long time. Well, as long as I can remember. You're my go to when things get rough. If I yell at my kids and don't want to say I'm sorry, you're always there to help me move on and rationalize. If Jerod does something that totally ticks me off, I just turn to you and you make it all go away. You and I can just go on about our busy, little days no matter what the circumstances. Thanks for always being there. I can always have so much more fun when you're around.

I've always had this unbelievable ability to just shut down when life gets not so fun. I can so easily turn off those annoying emotions and act as if life is just peachy. It may be a generational sin kind of thing because my dad does it, I do it and Connor is showing early, but strong, signs of the denial gene. This "disease" presents itself in two main ways in my life: one, I'm rarely wrong and two, no one ever upsets me. Ever.

Just ask Jerod about how often I'm wrong....almost never. And if I am wrong, well, I'm gonna die trying to convince you that I'm not. I can rationalize my way out of anything....there's a perfect reason I'm 2 hours late and I didn't call you, I needed to be really angry and yell at you for what you did, I know I said I would help you, but listen to this great reason why I can't. The list goes on and on, but bottom line, I just like to claim "grace" and move on with my life. I mean, I'm sorry, okay. Can't we all just get along and go shopping or something?!

If there is a good side to living in denial, it's that the same denial tactics apply to you too. Making some bad decisions in your life? Well, who am I to call you out? I have lots of issues. Unrepentant? The Holy Spirit will convict you not me. If something I know and you don't may hurt you or upset your life, I'm probably not going to tell you about it. If I act like I don't know it, then maybe you never will either and we can all move on in blissful ignorance. And, hey, if you hurt my feelings, I'll act like nothing happened. I mean, isn't that better than having to have a deep, drama-filled "talk" about it?

The problem with my way of dealing, is that it's all just a lie. When I smile at you and tell you I'm fine, it's a lie. When I ignore the temper that just emotionally leveled my 6 year old, I teach her that acting like that is ok and it's not. The only kind of peace that denial gets you is a cheap, false peace; not real peace at all. I love the line in O.A.R.'s song "Shattered" where he says "All that I feel is the realness I'm faking." Sums it up. Real peace comes from letting Christ work in you and through you. And all of that resentment and frustration and disappoinment that has built up underneath that "peace" has to come out somehow. It's "escape" looks different for everyone, but it's gonna explode somehow. For me it comes out as anxiety. Others it comes out as an addiction. The "best" case is when it looks very holy like staying busy at the church and being Miss Volunteer 2010. When I'm saving my life and everyone elses by playing ignorant, I'm basically giving God the finger and telling Him He's just not big enough. "Ok, God. You handle spinning the Earth and keeping the planets aligned and I'll handle my mom, my marriage, my kids, my whatever."

I was just wanting to read the Christmas story the other night when God made me read John 3:19-21. John puts living in denial this way:

"This is the crisis we're in: God-light streamed into the world, but men and women everywhere ran for the darkness. They went for the darkness because they were not really interested in pleasing God. Everyone who makes a practice of doing evil, addicted to denial and illusion, hates God-light and won't come near it, fearing a painful exposure. But anyone working and living in truth and reality welcomes God-light so the work can be seen for the God-work it is."

Ummmmmm, thanks God for the swift kick in the butt. I get it.

26 Things You May Not Know About Me

I have a new friend. Her name is Sharon. She lives in Georgia and we've only seen each other in real life once. But that doesn't matter. I feel like we've known each other forever.

Sharon's daughter JingJing and Collins were in the same orphanage in China and we found each other through a Yahoo group for adopting parents from Putian City. We just kind of connected right away. There's always a connection between adoptive parents in general. It's like soldiers that have been through war. It doesn't matter if you fought in the same war or not. War is war, and if you been there, few words need to be spoken to understand what another soldier has been through. But, with some people, there's just more. I don't know how to explain it, but as Christians I think that connection is God's Spirit within us. Anyway, Sharon and I are total opposites really, but there is this weird comfort between us like we've known each other forever.

Jennings, Collins and I drove to Atlanta yesterday to meet Sharon, JingJing and her sister Ella Kate for the first time. It was really a disaster of a day (not with Sharon or the girls!) that I will write about soon, but driving home I saw a falling star and it start this crazy rabbit trail of thoughts. It reminded me of a story from when I was 6 which led to thinking that there is so much about my life that Sharon doesn't know. It's not "game changing" kind of stuff. It doesn't change who I am today, but there are 32 years worth of events that she missed. So, I decided that I would give everyone a look into the first 32 years of my life. Some are funny; some aren't. But, in no particular order, here are 26 Things You May Not Know About Me....

1. The story that I thought of was that when I was 6 or so my best friend Jennifer Unger and I were in the backseat of my mom's car. She asked us what we wanted to be when we grew up. I went first and said that I was going to be an astronomer. I loved the stars and was in awe of space. Jennifer went next and told mom that she really just wanted to be a Solid Gold dancer.
2. When I was 5 I fell down a flight of stairs to our concrete basement floor and cracked my skull open. Aren't you glad I didn't die?!
3. I graduated Summa Cum Laude in Industrial Engineering from Tennessee. Apparently, the fractured skull made me smarter.
4. I love to pick my toe nails.
5. My first car was a 1991 Plymoth Sundance...NEON blue. In college we named it "The Bird" because amazingly it "flew" me and my friend Gotch to visit our friend Claire in New York City. Yep, The Bird was on Broadway.
6. I believed in Santa Claus until I was in 5th grade.
7. My freshman and sophomore year of high school I carried my Bible to school everyday.
8. If I could be anything in the world, I would be a world traveling food critic. I love to travel and I never miss a meal.
9. I hate knees and feet.
10. I was Christened in the Episcopal church, sprinkled in the Methodist church, dunked in the Baptist church and now I go to a Presbyterian church. I think I'm covered.
11. My first job out of college was working at Chick-fil-A's home office as a wait for it, wait for it....computer programmer?????
12. I was a Vol Hostess for the Tennessee men's basketball team.
13. My favorite color is Kelly Green
14. My parent's divorced when I was three.
15. My dad lives in Truckee, CA right outside of Lake Tahoe. I have a half brother Will who is in college and a half sister Jillian who is in high school.
16. I thought I may want to go into politics, so my senior year at Tennessee I took a semester off and did an internship with the Tennessee legislature. I realized pretty quickly I didn't have the energy to be a politician. I can't smile and small talk for that long.
17. I sucked my thumb until Kindergarten. Now, my left thumb is significantly shorter than my right. Coincidence???
18. Fish makes me throw up. Literally.
19. I strongly dislike country music.
20. I really like rap music...censored versions only though.
21. I love fast cars. Someday, probably in Heaven...if we get to drive, I would love to have a Porsche 911 Carrera 4S Cabriolet. Charcoal gray.
22. My motto for 2010 was "All in." Haven't decided on 2011 yet.
23. Contrary to what most people think, I was never a cheerleader.
24. Technically, I'm an only child.
25. The best concert I've ever been to was Coldplay in Birmingham last March. Can never be recreated. Close second was U2 in Oklahoma City with the Black Eyed Peas.
26. Jerod and I met when we were paired up together in a wedding. He was a groomsman and I was a bridesmaid. Awwww, how sweet.

K.I.S.S.

No, I'm not dead. No, I'm not sick. No, I didn't run away and leave the Chinese girl behind. Quite honestly, I'm just all emotioned out. Wink. Wink. Part 2 may have to wait years because all that deep thinking and gooey emotion kind of made me nauseous. Before last Monday, I had been on a crying, emotional roller coaster for 5 solid weeks. Nothing happened that I can remember, but last Monday marked the end of my emotional binge. I'm sure the relief is temporary, but I've had a solid week of what I call "business mode" and I've gotten so much done! My kids and husband my leave me, but, man, life is getting organized and streamlined. Cuttin' out the fat!

I'm not a big fan of acronyms. I generally think they're cheesy and immature. (Remember LYLAS? Ugh. Never was true.) But, K.I.S.S. has been my motto for this great week of productivity.... Keep It Simple, Stupid. Sure. Sounds great. Who needs fluff anyway??? So, in honor of this Holiday season or just life's craziness, here are my great discoveries from the week for how to have a simpler life. (In bullet form, of course.)

• All you need for fall is one pair of boots. One. That's it. Find one good pair of cognac or neutral colored leather boots and wear them everyday, with everything....black, brown, gray, navy, skirt, JEGGINGS, dress I don't care, just wear them. (See below for my pick...Steve Madden, Candace, $99)

• Stop counting to three with the kids. Really. It's a waste of time. They know it and so do you.
• Go old school. Remember when Monday night dinner was meatloaf night. Tuesday was roast. Wednesday was gravy steak. You get the point. I'm bringing the old school dinner rotation back, baby! Easy meals that everyone likes that are fool proof...that's what I'm going for. And if you don't like it, you don't eat.
• Three Christmas presents each. That's it. Gotta problem with it? Call Santa cause I ain't listenin'. Oh, and Santa doesn't make Lego's, Polly Pockets, puzzles or Lincoln Logs anymore. I just don't have time to find the extra special Jedi Knight Prince of Persia Power Ranger you lost.
• Throw out all your old makeup. It just takes up space and breaks and gets everything else nasty. All the products you need out everyday is what you use for your "basic face." For me that's foundation, mascara, blush and gloss. (For a night out, just add red lips instead and you're done. Total glamour.)
• Don't do anything for your kids that they can do themselves. I knew I had been "doing" for way too long when Jeb asked me to just please come watch him go potty. That's disturbing! He's 4. Have I really been going to watch him potty all these years? Gross.
• Learn to say no. Nooooooo. No. No, thank you. Good luck with making 500 iced cookies... suckerrrrrrr! Doesn't matter how you say it, just figure out a way that you can get it out and just say no. There are a ton of "good" things that we could all do but are they the best things for us to spend our time on?
• Finally, and most importantly, if you color your hair out of a box, just buy whatever's cheapest. I've tried every brand out there and can't tell one bit of difference. Save yourself money and go buy a latte instead.