A Reflection

I began blogging in July 2006. We were on our way to Vietnam, to bring Lucy into our family. The blog was a way to show our family (especially our other children) what we were experiencing while we were across the world from them. It was also a way for me to write the feelings of my heart, for Lucy to have some day.

After 5 weeks of roller coaster worthy experiences, we came home.

And I kept on writing.

But the writing became less about Lucy and adoption, and more about me and mothering. It became a way for me to write letters to my daughters-the kinds of letters they might read when they were mothers themselves. I wanted them to hear and to see the reasons I did what I did because I was there mother. So someday when they wondered what they should do or how they should proceed with their own child rearing they might refer to me, but to the me that was really "in it" - not the sugar coated "back when you were young..." kind of talk, but straight talk and real photos of messy countertops and tearful sacrifice.

After a while (and a move away from "home"), my writing changed again. It was still a daily letter to my girls, but it became a little bit more. I had met and was associating with many mothers who were just younger than I. Not only were my kids a little older than theirs, but I had more of them (most often, many more). I heard from these great women a smattering of phrases like these;

'I don't know how you do it.'
'I would go crazy if I had more kids.'
'I couldn't do what you are doing.'

I wanted them to change their minds. To see their great potential. It wasn't that I wanted to promote large families. It was that I felt in those phrases I heard a smallness, a lessening of great character. Having a large family had not been my design. John and I were very happy with the idea of 4 children (a large enough crew for my intense desire for tidy kitchens and John's desire for peace and quiet). But promptings came, the heavens spoke. And we decided to listen. We had to change, to grow, to give up. To give ourselves over to the truth that God would make more of us (and would take from us that which was not needed or eternally attractive) if we would be what He asked us to be. Messy kitchens and seizmic noise levels included.

I wanted this to be a "you can do it, if you are asked" kind of space. I thought about monetizing the blog, about networking with other bloggers, about finding an "angle" a "niche" of sorts, to draw more readers to me. I toyed with these thoughts (I sometimes still do) until it was time to decide.

And then I realized something I didn't really like. The blog had become less about any of those things, and lots more about myself. Not that self expression isn't valid-it is. But I wanted people to read what I wrote. I cared that they listened to me. I wanted to be an example, its true. But I also wanted to be, well, liked. I wanted others to want to read the things that I had to say.

An element of pride had entered the process, and so I took a sharp step back.

I'm ready to write again-but for the reasons I began this blog from the start. For it to be a place for the kids to know me, back when I was the mom of their younger selves. And for mothers who worry and wonder if they can become what the whispering voice of heaven suggests that they ought to become-a mother of more than "a few". To help them, and help me, remember that when we give ourselves over to what God asks of us, He can make of us more than we are.

I hope there is something of worth, should you continue to read. I pray I will be true to my design, my intent. And that if I stray from the sincerity I feel now that I will be reminded, and know that its time to put blogging away.