Calgon, take me away; Jesus, take the wheel!

Well, have you ever had one of those days? Maybe a week like that? or even a month?  Last week was one of those weeks for us here in the Urness house.  Kyla my oldest came down with a virus that kept her home from school all week.  This is her first year of school, so to miss the week before Christmas break with all the ornament making, pajama wearing, and general fun to be had was truly devastating to her! She was a trooper though, she understood why she couldn't go and how she needed to take time to get better.  So all week I played referee (in my pajamas because adding more laundry was not a mission of mine.....surviving the week was the mission).  I tried to keep the 3 littles away from her so that she was not to spread the virus and we all be out of commission for the rest of December. Do you know how hard this is?  When you can't send kids out to play, you can't go anywhere, and you can let them be alone in a room for too long by themselves because you are sure to come back to a room with crayola markers all over the wall or one another! We have been blessed with meals being delivered to the house for the past 2 1/2 weeks and it has been awesome!  Truly awesome! This week though, it gave me life! **Side note, I did manage to get out of pajamas for the drop off of these meals.  Not that the friends would have cared, because they are cool like that and I'm lucky to have them in my life**

Have I mentioned how this is my favorite time of the year?  I have loved this time of year since I was a little girl.  Even before I really knew and understood what Christmas was about.  I was always the one who could not wait to put up the tree, decorate the house, and buy presents. And I still do!  The thought of going to the mailbox and seeing pictures of friends and family both new and old, far and near warms my heart.  We open Christmas cards with the kids and talk to them about who the people are and how we know them and maybe share a funny story or two. Last week I would have spent time addressing our own cards to mail out.  Key word there is "would". In all the craziness of having a sick child, keeping the rest of the family healthy, and helping Tucker understand who a mom and dad are....we just can't do it this year!  You are reading that correctly.....No Christmas card from the Urness' this year! So Sorry folks..we love you all dearly but.......it's just not gonna happen! I have saved every envelope of the ones we have gotten this year though, because if by some  miracle  we can get it together by Valentine's or Easter...there may be a surprise for you in the mailbox!!

I know what you may be thinking, you nay sayers out there. "They are way in over their heads this time" "Why would they adopt a child with special needs" "They are falling apart at the seems" Trust me when I say that I have already had those thoughts run through my head and I have decided to give them all to God. They do no good running through my head, they do no good being verbalized and really there is no good in writing them down except to understand that I don't need to have the answers right now, I just need to know that God is enough to help us through this.

The past 2 months have been a wild and crazy ride. One that we have enjoyed and learned a lot from.  The one thing I have learned the most is that I don't have to have it all together, that I don't have to put on this pretty face like my life is exactly how I planned it to be.  My plans went out the window the day I decided to follow Jesus. Adoption is hard.  It is hard work everyday to help a child understand what a family is.  How do you teach a 2 year old what a Mom is? Or what a Dad is? I would say a majority of us reading this have had a mother and father since birth.  The knowledge of what their role is in your life is so embedded in your core  you don't even have to think about what that means. They are your parents and have been there for you through it all...the good, bad and ugly. Nothing is really known about Tucker's birth parents.  All we know is that he was left on the steps of the orphanage on December 29th, 2014 wrapped in a blanket.  He was left approximately a month after he was born.  I don't say this to imply that his birth parents did not care or love him, I truly believe this was a very hard decision for them and one they thought about every day for the month they had him. That was the last time he knew of a family.  Since then he has been in an orphanage, fighting for love, fighting for food, fighting to be cared for, fighting for a family.  

Bob and I will be married 11 years this January.  If you would have told me 11 years ago on my wedding day that I would be a mommy of 4 and one of my kids would be adopted; I would have laughed in your face!  We were both very young in our faith and truly did not know what it meant to follow Gods plan.  We had a lot of spiritual growth we needed to do, and He has been faithful to walk by us holding our hands and pushing us to learn more about ourselves and more about His plans for our lives. The life we have now is not one that we planned but it is definitely the one we want to be in because it is full of Gods presence and grace.  

Thought about making this our Christmas card photo but I did not have enough brain power to figure out how to photo shop our pantry door out of the picture.  BTW these four and brothers and sisters through and through, their love for one another goes deep!  

Chick Fil A let me trade two kids in for two Rudolph!  

Tucker got a hair cut for the first time, and the only smiles came after it was all over and he was eating dinner.  I feel like he looks 2lbs smaller!