Running for Change

It’s time to teach..

So as I sat and reflected what I really want to teach our children this year our adoption kept coming to my heart. We have put in endless hours of stacks, and stacks, and MORE stacks of adoption paper work, adoption training, psych evaluations, FBI screenings, county and state background checks, ridiculously expensive fingerprinting for immigration, more paperwork, interviews with our social worker, a lot of overnight fees, and a TON of tears of stress/anxiety/and joy. We are to the “sit and wait to receive word” stage. My hard work appears to be somewhat on hold for a time until Haitian social services matches us with our children. So, I thought, do I sit back and tell my kids “now we sit and wait, we’ve put in a ton, now we relax”? OR do I make this a teaching opportunity and show them how to be actively engaged in a good cause? The easy answer would be to say “Holy cow I did a ton to get to this point, I’m exhausted! Let’s just let things happen and wait it out.” But then this quote is ever present in my mind:

Life lesson to live by and always remember:

I want my children to always remember that anything in life worth having is worth working for. So instead of sitting back and waiting we become actively engaged. We try to make a difference, we help others along the way, because serving those around us can help ease our own burdens and make things feel easier in our own lives. All these thoughts were coming to my mind, but how? How do I stay actively engaged when my hands are tied and there is not much more we can do to speed up the process and bring our kids home?

We run for change, that is what we do…

Here is my chance to teach my children a few things. Number one, work hard for the things you want! I can’t wait for the day that we have our kiddos home and in our arms so we are going to be actively engaged until that day comes! Monday through Saturday we run/bike/row/ do whatever it takes to get a mile (or more) in no matter what, rain shine, sickness or health! Running will be our primary mode but realistically I have 6 kids and somedays bleacher blasting my stairs for a mile may be how I get that mile in!

Why not run a mile on Sundays? Another lesson for my children, we keep the Sabbath Day holy. So while we really wanted to run a mile everyday until our kids are home, I also want my children to learn the importance of taking Sunday to do the things we know we should be doing and dedicate this day to the Lord. So on Saturdays, we will run two miles!

The long awaited day has FINALLY arrived!

February 19th 2018 we got word that we entered IBESR, which means we are legally registered with the Haitian Social Services and official referral ready! We have been waiting for this day since the day our hearts were pulled to Haiti. It is a HUGE step in the adoption process, no one cares or even counts anytime you spent working to get to this point (unless you’ve gone through the process then you can appreciate and understand the crazy runaround it is to get to this point!). This is when your timeline truly “begins”.

SO yesterday we started our running journey! We wanted to start the day we entered IBESR so that we could tell our kiddos that we ran X amount of miles while we waited to have you in our arms. Unfortunately we had to bike at the gym on day 1 at 945 at night because we got snow for the first time in 2018 and we found out late at night that we had entered, so while we want to run..we also didn’t want to break our legs on day 1!

Our hope is to remain actively engaged in a good cause, to have others actively join us on our journey, to show our children that we are devoted and dedicated to them and are willing to work hard for each and everyone of them. We hope that by others following our journey that they can be lifted and inspired in their lives as well.

Youtube/Dtube channel coming soon!

We are working to get our youtube channel up and going so that you can really join us on our journey and get to know our family in a more real way. With the youtube channel we will be able to create ways to join us and get involved in community service projects, which we are beyond excited about!

The next few years may feel a bit heart wrenching at times but we hope to make the best of it and make a difference for others! All I know is that when my heart aches I can ease that by helping others!

Comment and tell us YOUR favorite place to run!

If you have stuck with me clear to this point, comment and tell us where you love to run so that we can get in as many awesome places as we can over the next few years! Running can get a little boring if we are running the same pavement everyday! Where do you absolutely love to run?? Or a beautiful must do run?? Let us know