Life as an Asker

Last night I went to pick up my race packet at the DECC for the “wheels off half marathon.”  This weekend has held the inline marathon, half marathon and 10K for years, but the half is sort of a new deal.

Well, I entered the big exhibition filled hall and seriously, it was like being at a trekkie convention, but I don’t watch Star Trek.  I’m normally running when that show is on.

There were booths selling in line skates, hats, ear phones, snacks and full body, inline skate suits.  People who looked like they would more likely be on motorcycles filled the hall.  Then there were the ‘tweens standing with their parents.  Or others who apparently couldn’t wait to strap on their wheels and were skating a bit around the edges, helmets and all.

This morning it was dark as pitch at 5:15am when I left the house.  It was a BRISK maybe 30 degrees.  I was wearing double layers of everything with extra layers in my handsome race bag provided by the race (imagine a large black garbage back with a cardboard sign with my bib #).  I ate my granola in the dark, hoping to get it into my mouth, while I forgot that when I eat driving down hill, my ears clog.

I raced to park in the aquarium lot (free for members!) and was surprised to find the parking lady already there, making sure no freeloaders snuck in.  (Huh, spell check doesn’t like “snuck.”  Sneaked?)  I asked her what short stick she drew for that job today.

Once I jumped on the shuttle bus, I sat next to the lady I recognized from the night before, picking up my packet.  We discovered our kids were in Kindergarten class together, she lived blocks away and next door to another of Calista’s best friends.  Small world.

We shivered in the bus as they must have felt the need to “acclimate” us to the temps.  It was like the AC was FULL ON.

up at 5 after a fitful night sleep: not the prettiest selfie.  but looking forward to the great view during this race!

At the start, there were 1/2 marathon in-line skaters and runners all mingled together.  At first it was so dark, I almost got run into by a skater.  That continued to happen as I peed 3-4 times, met 2 students and tried to keep myself loose before starting to run.  I heard personal trainers in my head “relax your shoulders” “keep space between your ears and your shoulders.”  I think I was hunched for 45 minutes at least and eventually couldn’t feel my toes.

It wasn’t until mile 5, almost an hour of sunshine and a fairly normal pace for me that I started to warm up.  I was grateful for the thick hat, my gloves and the warm sun on my back as the wind came off the Lake for most of the time.

We got to run the I-35 tunnels.  The road had lines it in and after 10 miles of sunshine, a few crappy nights’ sleep and running 10 miles, I almost felt dizzy.  The kids, Brian and my parents saw me at mile 10.5 and again at the finish.  I ran over the finish line with my arms up and gave a “whoo-hoo” when the announcer said my name.

This race gave me a goal all those mornings I hit the pavement, desperate for a break from this crazy family life I’m leading.  It gave me space to myself each Saturday morning during my long runs.

Now what am I going to do?!

I am a SAHM.  I am trying to embrace the “stay” part.  I’m not very good at it.

This was the beginning of the week, warm and able to go out and about!

So this week, as the winds have shifted (Mary Poppins hasn’t arrived, unfortunately) and the hits us like a cold brick and happily my boys have some kind of virus, I am trying to stay home.  It is not a lot of fun.

I am an extrovert.  Staying at home with 2 boys who regularly grunt and make up languages is not my idea of a super fantastic day!  I like to get out with actual adults and work out and eat and play at a playground.  But between freezing my toes (and XS – he refuses to wear socks except at Kids Club at the Y) and this virus, stay at home we must.

can you tell which kid had to be awakened from a nap to brave these crazy MN days?!

So as I stay at home, the blogs keep coming.

I would like to know how many extroverts who “stay at home” actually stay home much…

A few other thoughts this week from Mr Prince.

He tells me when he thinks we should go “up” “right” “home” or not while I’m driving.  Seriously.  On the interstate he got mad one day (pterodactyl scream) when we took the off ramp instead of going on the way up north on 61.  Then when I came home today from dropping baba on campus, when we took “our turn” as he calls it, he about peeled the faux leather off the seats.  He wouldn’t get out of the car so I left him in the van in the garage for a bit.  I was too cold to wait it out.

He also refuses help in public restrooms.  He gives me The Hand, shakes his head and if he could, would tell me “mama, I got this.”

Contrast that with yesterday, when he was screaming my name for a few minutes while I desperately was trying to wipe down my positively sticky floor.  It had been about an hour since I had started and I was DETERMINED to finish.  Calista and Elam were out there with him so I couldn’t understand the problem.  Eventually Elam yelled “niao niao mama!”  So I had to stop said floor scrubbing, go plead with this kid to come in, then tell him to leave the shoes on and march into the bathroom.  Please.  Just go to the bathroom.

He regularly seems to “need” me to help him at home.  But man, put that boy at Target and he is suddenly independent and ready for college.

Obviously the solution for this and my daughter who forgets to flush is to build a Target-like bathroom stall with automatic flushers in my house.  Perhaps a heated one for the garage might be nice.

thank goodness I have a helper!

poppy thingies

We received a neat package from friends this week.  Tobiah opened his and said “wow” – one of his favorite sayings.  Calista opened the big kid gift and that left Elam asking, “Where is my present?”  Well, he proceeded to pick up the packaging air filled “poppy thingies” and said, Oh, I get these!

Then he and the other 2 started stamping on them, popping to their hearts’ content.  It was a perfect wind-down activity to quiet ourselves before bed.  Thanks Sharon and Rick!

“wow!” is one of his favorite words!

these kids get to have so much fun together! I wish I had grown up with my sisters! It would have been a RIOT.  Calista said right before this pic – I want to photobomb!

bros

99.9% of orphans will ever be adopted from people in the US, leaving the rest of the world quite a handful.

WARNING: if tragic stories are too much for you to read just now in your life, please don’t continue.  I will be quickly sharing some stories I have read about orphans, the brokenness about their world and how I am processing the response I have.  If you jump in again after the website link you’ll be safe:)

______

I have been plowing thru that stack of books on my shelf.  Some have been too painful to read (birth moms, most in their early teens, forced to give up their babies for adoption in the 1950’s) or simply tragic (Mei-Ling Hopgood had a great adoption story but once she met her birth family, let’s just say they weren’t all she’d hoped for).

I’ve read about orphans who’s mothers gave up their virginity when their daughters were Calista’s age.  A cleft lip baby boy left to cry and starve to death in a room in the house.  Monkey attacking a baby boy and his “big” sister dug a hole through their mud hut to rescue the two of them.

Then these kids (some) grow up and are seriously, mentally ill.  They harm themselves.  They suppress their memories of the tragic and eventually, when it comes out, it is just too much.

Then there are the statistics.  How many kids thrive and live in the US compared to a country’s orphan numbers.

You can read more here:

www.allgirlsallowed.org/infanticide-china-statistics

Interestingly, Brian had CSS students over last night.  As I was wading thru “going on a bear hunt” for XS’s 10-12th time that day, I was overhearing a few of them practicing a Gospel diagram we use called the Big Story.

The first part says, “Do you ever look at the world and think, what the heck?!  There must be something better!”

Yes, oh $(#! yes!

We adopted because we look at the world, the millions of orphans, the needs around us and the kids we already love and said, what can we do differently to help make a difference?!

It was really hard to find ways to volunteer with a 3 and 5 year old.  So now, my 4 and 6 year old are teaching English to a Chinese orphan with major speech needs.

It was a bracing 55 degrees this morning!

Calista left for school today and I cried.  I’m not ashamed to admit it.  She is a rock star.  XS is a hero but seriously this girl deserves … something really neat.  She read “going on a bear hunt” 6 of those 12 times yesterday.  And I think she did again today.  She pushes XS on the swing.  Reads while I do the pile of dishes I piled up tonight due to the crazy meal lack of planning: I did a Chinese noodle dish for XS (requiring a pot, steamer and wok) leftovers for the kids and a separate pesto (thank you Rebekah) garden tomato (thank you Terry) and chicken (thank … You Jesus?!) dish for me, just because I wanted to.  Brian is away and I guess I’m coping through food.  Don’t judge me.

Okay so Calista, she’s amazing and putting that leader, teacher and compassionate big sister on the yellow bus was just about heart wrenching as it was 12 months ago when she left me alone with Elam, I mean went to school.

However, I had the conscious thought (it was 3:00 in the afternoon and I had had a nap) yesterday: I cannot imagine only having 2 kids.  Then today, I actually admitted to my neighbor it is easier having 2 boys than 1.  And I think I believe it.  They beat each other up, poke each other’s eyes, ram into one another on their bikes and do things in the bathtub that make me yelp.  But they also chase each other for fun and share toys now that XS has learned “me too!” or “my turn!”

Last week XS’s English turned into sentences.  See above or even, “Elam pushed me.” Every school bus today was “jei-jei school bus.”  (Jei-jei is big sister).  It has made a big difference.

So the world is broken, disturbingly so.  But the orphan that is now an Asker is in a place where he can learn to speak a new language (while we try to keep up his first language).  His big sister and brother are learning to care for a kid that has different, challenging needs.

The world is broken because we are all so fragile, orphans or no.

I am just grateful we can endure by seeing him who is invisible. (Hebrews 11:27)

We hand picked these beauties in an embroidery shop. Not an embroidery clothing shop but the hang on the wall, 2-sided amazing Chinese embroidery which is becoming a dying art form. These outfits just couldn’t be left behind. The $500 wall art could.  And for the record, I disagree God is invisible.  Just look at these faces.