Stupid things people say...

Gonna let you in on a little secret. Our family is made up of 3 countries. We are not a biracial family. We are a multi racial family. We forget this. We think we look like everyone else's family. We have heard some pretty stupid stuff over the years. We have heard some pretty offensive stuff too. While walking between stores awhile back we had a carload drive by slowly, honk, flip us off and yell out many racial slurs... most of the stuff is stupid and honestly people for the most part dont mean it, I am sure... BUT...

Lady at previous church: Are you planning on telling your kids they are adopted or keep it a secret.

Me: DEFINITELY keeping it a secret

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Another Lady at previous church: Isnt it horrible to change a diaper of a child that isn't yours? I mean diapers are bad enough if they belong to your own child, but someone elses? Terrible.

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Another lady at previous church: We will need a copy of your boys medical files so we can send a letter out to all Sunday School parents to let them know that there will be AFRICANS in their childrens classes... and they may expose them to AIDS... due to the fact they are from AFRICA... (really)

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Another lady at previous church (see any patterns here): I have always wanted one of those - (pointing to Molly Shen in my arms) I need to ask my husband again and maybe he will let us get one as a early Christmas present.

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Everytime I look at your kids it just reminds me of puppies in the pound

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Grocery clerk to kids: Which ones are the REAL brothers and sisters?
Molly Shen to clerk: We are all real brothers and sisters. we all look alike and we all have the same mom.

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Honestly, these are all things we have heard... It has gotten to be a joke almost when we go somewhere to see how many heads we can turn and "what" comments we will get...

So, here is the deal...
Dont
ask me which kids are my REAL kids. they ALL are my real kids (as opposed to fake kids i guess)
Dont
ask me about their REAl parents. If you are my BFF or family or need to know, I will tell you. AND I AM the REAL parent.
Dont
expect me to divulge personal details of my childrens life stories if we arent close. If you need to ask, I am probably not gonna tell you.
Dont
recommend DOG shampoos i should try, because your BLACK poodle has hair just like my son.
Dont
justify to me that your child is making squinty eyes at my daughter because your family doesnt really "do" orientals. (really??)
Dont
(in front of my children especially) ask me to tell you why they were thrown away, discarded, abandoned etc by their birthparents. Again, if you needed to know, I would have already told you.
Dont
ask me how much money my children cost. Buying children is ILLEGAL. I didnt buy my children.
Dont
ask me why I didnt just have kids of my own... ( I did have biological kids, but they don't look like me either and you assume they are adopted as well)

I dont think I am being oversensitive. These are things we hear on a daily basis... I only dont hear them if I dont leave my house OR i go somewhere without my kids... I know other families that go through the SAME thing. And honestly, for the most part, I believe none of this is said in a malicious way... I try to smile and educate or just let people know they are crossing lines that for some reason they dont believe exist...

The best thing??? Ask me about adoption. Look me in the eye and smile. Tell me my family is beautiful. That means the world. I nearly hugged a lady at Costco who did that exact thing.... but I didn't want to freak her out!

Beautiful

"God ordains broken things in order to make all things whole" I love this song. I can hardly make it through without the tears falling. I dont know why. It just gets me. Everytime. Molly loves this song. She falls asleep to it every night. She doesn't understand the words, but it moves her to tears.. She says she doesnt know what it is about, she just feels that it is how her heart feels about God. And it makes her cry. Not sad tears, but those happy tears... Heart tears...

Silence

I promised a few funny conversation posts and those will be coming, not everything is tragic around here... and sheesh with this group there is plenty of opportunity for funny but not tonight.

This morning in church we spent time praying for our dear friends the Croffs, who will be leaving for China in a few days.  They plan to go to orphanages and be with the children... They talked of what an "emotional" journey it will be and I was instantly transported back to my emotional journey to China.  Even now there are no words...

Our house is filled with noise and laughter... sounds that some days make my head feel like it will explode... and the ring leader of the noise is my not so quiet Molly Shen.  She begins FULL conversation the moment that her eyes flutter open.  She talks WHILE brushing her teeth, while chewing her food and usually falls asleep in the middle of a sentence... she even talks during the night in her sleep.   Sometimes it is all I can do to not cover my ears and scream.  It drives her siblings wonky...  but it is music to my ears and it makes me smile.  It hasn't always been so.

Molly was handed to me at 18 months and she didn't make a sound.  She didn't cry, she didnt coo, talk or scream. She was silent.  When we went to visit her orphanage we entered a large concrete building that housed about 200 babies and infants.  And the silence will forever haunt me.  There was no crying.  There was no laughing.  There were no baby sounds at all.  The absence of sound still chills my soul. 

Molly remembers the silence.  She has pictures that we took that day, of her bed, of her room... She says she used to cry when she was a baby so that someone would hold her or talk to her... she specifically says she cried and cried for someone to "rock rock and tell her hush it is all ok",  she cried and noone came.  No mommy came. She says she cried until she stopped.  I ask her why she stopped and she looks at me and shrugs and says "why cry?"  Silence still haunts her...

The silence will always haunt me, but it is now a reminder of how far we have come... and it makes me smile (and groan) when I hear that blood curdling, high pitched, shrill voice of hers come barreling down the hallway.  The silence will always haunt us, but there is no silence here.

long forgotten blog

It has been a long time. A really long time.  I thought I was done blogging... our story had changed so dramatically that there was no way to even blog... BUT we are back. AGAIN.  This has been a year from Hell, yet many good things too, old friends made new, new memories, ...

I am a single mom, of 5.  Yes somedays this seems bigger than it is... but it is...

My little kids have faced nightmares that no mother dreams their children will have to go through...

We have had to retreat to our little yellow house... no school, no church, no activities in order to protect little innocent children from evil. 

But, we have seen friends, true friends and family.  The ones that when faced with an ugly situation dig in next to us...

BUT we are back.  Still wounded, still hurting, still untrusting,

And so I will blog from my little yellow house... we will continue to survive... until we can begin to live again. 

2 years ago...

2 years ago we were in Africa... Gotcha Day... Africa was beautiful and we will be forever changed for having been there... We made wonderful friends and experienced everything we could. We hugged and held so many little faces... we are still praying for some that are still there... waiting after 2 years...

Our 2 years hasn't been without its struggles, but seeing all 3 littles snugged together reading a book under the blanket is amazing. They have come a long way... we are a family....

dont tell her...

Conversation from the back seat:

Yordi: How old is mom?
Molly: She is ** but don't tell her because that is really really old and she will feel bad if she finds out.

great. apparantly I am old.  

new shoes...

Well, it happened for the first time yesterday... nearly broke my heart.  We decided to look for sandals for Molly while in town.  She fell in love with some over the top lime green ones.  She tried them on and then took them off and put them back on the rack. I asked her what she thought... were they keepers. She replied "no, I don't think I like sandals anymore.  They show my toes and people will laugh."  She has always loved little foot... she now sees that it is different.  She doesn't like that.  I knew the day would come... We settled on some adorable strappy gold ones that look a bit like her sisters... and we bought 2 pair.  2 different sizes... no use pretending that they are close in size anymore... little foot doesn't have to slip around in a too big shoe.... so... if you can use a size 9 right foot and an 12 left foot pair of little girl gold sandals... let me know... I just happen to have a pair...