Foster care about did me in this past year, but God carried me through just like He did every year before that. I know it’s so easy to post about our ‘highs’, so I just want to be honest and say how incredibly hard this journey still is. I don’t follow God and have faith in Him because life is easy..actually the opposite...I need God to get through every single day. Losing my bother to addiction, moving, taking in a sibling group of 3, while in the middle of adopting Evie, multiple biological parents leaning heavily on us, and all the trauma these kids had to endure coming out in ugly heartbreaking ways. Amongst other things not listed here. Each moment so full of joy is always mixed with some heartbreak. Oh how I’ve learned there is nothing good in me apart from the goodness of God at work in me. I wake up and have selfish thoughts many days and don’t want to pour out myself another day on the behalf of someone else.....the ONLY way this is possible is because of God. We love because He first loved us. That is it. No other motivation could keep me walking out this calling on the hardest days. The days when I am just. so done. Sometimes I get focused on how hard all this is for me and need a reality check of how hard this is for the girls. 

Friday I was so proud watching K get superintendents honor roll! This girl has amazed me coming from failing and being held back twice to literally being the highest achiever in her class. There is this excitement in her accomplishment, but this heartache in that the person she really wanted to be there in the crowd cheering for her isn’t. Her sister came home from school last week showing me all her schoolwork and pulls out her MLK paper that’s says, ‘I have a dream’ at the top with a fill in the blank and she wrote “I dream that one day it will be safe to go back to my mom”. When she handed it to me she said, “My dream will probably never come true though.” Knowing this is likely the case your heart shatters yet again for a little girls pain that words can’t possibly fix. This week having their bio mom message me and she is having another ‘good streak’ while things have been crumbling all around her for so long and sometimes it’s just too little too late. I spent so much of Friday crying because I think walking with her as she rises and falls over and over brings back the same hope and pain I had watching my brother struggle in his addiction. Having a front seat watching how drugs destroy a person and tear a part the lives of almost everyone around them is almost unbearable ...addiction is one of the closest things to living hell I can imagine. It gets so incredibly heavy watching someone literally losing their life and you just want to scream and shake them to make them stop before it’s too late. Meanwhile decisions have to be made for her girls as someone has to pick up the pieces and life has to go on. These 3 sisters have been with us longer than any foster placement. The ‘baby’ walked into our home as an 18 month old and will walk out as smart sassy 3 year old. I spent so much time hoping for a quicker resolution because I knew with more time would come more pain. The clock is ticking for when they will leave our home forever and pretty much anytime I’m alone and think about it I spend a good while crying over it. Our hearts will break, but it will have been worth it. There is so much to say about their time in our family, but it will have to be a separate post.😅 There are still many unknowns with this case and the past month I don’t even know what to pray for anymore as there is now so much wrapped up in this that no matter what happens somebody gets hurt. I literally just have to pray His will be done. God sees the whole picture and it’s somehow working towards a beautiful end. 

I will keep praying and showing up even when every single day is so hard and I don’t know if I can do this. Day by day God will carry us through just like He did for every single day of the last 495 days since our paths first met. Because I’m telling you this time last year I wouldn’t have believed you if you had told me we’d make it this far. Many of the things I feared most in this case have happened and God was already there making a way when there seemed no way. Conversations I had to have that I made myself lose sleep over and be so stressed about were actually moments Gods presence and plan were more clearly seen. So whatever may come Gods grace will continue to meet us there. There is a battle raging all around, but I know the war is already won. That doesn’t mean we can stop fighting though....people all around desperately needing others praying and interceding on their behalf for God to do what only He can and make beauty from ashes. So stay the course, don’t give up, fix your eyes on Jesus and your mountain may not be moved but God will give you a strength inside of you that you didn’t know you had to climb it. Day by day, sometimes minute by minute, you will get through this. Then one day you’ll look back and realize each day isn’t quite so hard anymore and because of the fire you walked through your understanding of Gods love is so much stronger and purer. Tested and refined by fire and more grounded and rooted in God than ever before. You will be able to look back and thank Him...for even this. The very thing you begged Him to remove you from became the thing that pushed you into the One you needed most. This season has taught me at the end of yourself there really is God. ❤️❤️