Christmas Eve we spent relaxing as a family, eating breakfast for dinner (our Christmas Eve tradition), and going to Christmas Eve service at our church with our neighbor, Jack.
Christmas Day was spent with Randy's family, church in the morning, lunch, playing at the park,
games in the evening, more food, and a time of gift giving, both to each other and also gifts to the baby Jesus (in the form of some reading aloud of the Bible, Christmas songs played on the piano, and a search for the Christ child with some clues, like the shepherds and magi).
The day after Christmas we spent some time in our yard with our 92-year old neighbor, Jack. Isaac broke in his new baseball glove a bit after we opened up a present from him, the game Ticket to Ride (a train game...fitting since he worked for the Santa Fe Railroad for over 40 years).
On Wednesday my parents came into town for a couple days. We had fun relaxing, cooking, playing games, and traveling to Visalia to see the extended family. At our get-together with my dad's side of the family Audrey played a short piece on the violin with her teacher, Kathleen (who also happens to be my cousin's girlfriend). After three months she is starting to get the hang of this new instrument!
During this Christmas season we also had our final meal around our oval table with some of Randy's work friends (unfortunately, no picture...there were so many of us we didn't think of it until some of the guests had left). We then had our first meal around our new table with our friends, the Co family.
We have been saving up for quite a while for a new table, with the seed money coming from an inheritance from Randy's grandparents. We wanted to spend the money in a way that helped remember them well. Randy's grandpa was a wood-worker and Randy's grandma was a fantastic cook who would spend days preparing meals for their large extended family gatherings around the holidays. We thought it only fitting that we purchase a table. Our own was just large enough to fit our family plus one or two, which meant that even inviting one other family over usually excluded the kids to a separate table. It was great to eat our first meal with both families seated comfortably around the table (and there are 2 leaves in the hall closet to expand the table as our family grows).
Speaking of a growing family, I would be remiss to not include some of our adoption story in my Christmas post. This year we have continued our journey towards adopting a boy through Fresno County Social Services. At this time last year we were only one class away from completing our requirements for licensing. Once our paperwork went from the foster to the adoptions side of the County, however, the process has been anything but speedy. It took months for us to be assigned a case worker, more months to schedule a home study, and now more months of waiting for a phone call to have us come in and read a child's file (for potential placement). We have friends that have adopted and waited years for everything to come to fruition. But these friends have adopted infants, or had to deal with international paperwork. Aren't there hundreds of kids, if not thousands, in our county that need stable, loving homes? Although I know that all things come in God's timing (not our own), my heart was so heavy entering the holiday season, knowing that the boy I will someday call my son is still in another home, whether it be a loving foster home or a tumultuous, abusive or neglectful home.
It is the hurt of an expectation unmet. It is a mother's tears, quickly wiped away, while watching her children sing, smile, play and laugh, and wondering if her other child (her unseen one) is doing the same. It is the heart's ache to know that my child is here, but not yet safe in my home. And my prayer that my Lord would keep him safely in His arms until the time that I can hold him myself. It is my heavenly Father growing in me a deep longing for another child. It is the tenderness of His Spirit to bring a dear friend (and fellow adoptive mother) from thousands of miles away to listen and empathize with my story over a glass of wine. It is the relevance of His Word to remind me of Simeon and Anna, that waited not just a year, but decades in the Temple, hoping to see the Savior, the promised King and Messiah.
In a season filled with gifts, both given and received, I chose this year to receive. As our family prepares our hearts and our home for another child, we are reminded that we are incapable of this task in our own strength. As we remembered the gift of this little baby, Jesus, we were reminded to receive all His gifts with gladness (gifts of patience, kindness, gentleness, generosity, marriage, family, and our current children), and take the time to appreciate them! He is the one that renews our hope and helps us to be truly ready for all He has planned for us in 2012.
1 comment:
Beautiful post, and poignant picture. Thank you for your real-ness. We love you all and anxiously and expectantly wait with you, praying so often. Thank you God for your many blessings, of which the Macks are many.
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