My family has recently been given a great deal of help. A local business took a few days off and sent a construction/painting crew to our house, working on a great deal of my deferred maintenance.

Each morning I need to prioritize what needs to be tended to, and my children’s needs always come first. I’ll pay attention to each of them long before I’ll worry about calling a plumber to fix a leaky faucet. With this many children, I have IEP and SST meetings, teacher conferences, therapist sessions, and the usual doctors and dentist appointments to attend.

I’m experiencing a total blessing this week as there have been electricians, plumbers, carpenters and painters fixing up what we’ve broken or used up. There’s a huge demand on our resources, a large family creates a lot of traffic, and the usage on everything is multiplied astronomically.

One of our volunteers shared with me that maybe she too feels called to adopt children. That thrills me. My kids acted so sweet and loving last night when dinner was served to us by these folks, that I felt compelled to explain that this was not always the case.

Read my posts for awhile, talk to others who do this, and if you still feel so called, I’ll the first one in line to help you. The need is great for dedicated families who’ll stick with the children through some very trying times.

While ultimately rewarding, this middle part, especially adolescence will wear one’s parenting patience out. My middle schoolers are testing way too many boundaries lately. If I could go a week without a principal calling me, it’d be a great week. The kids need to learn consequences now, while the lessons can be learned, it’s too late to break rules when there’s police involvement.

We’ve had many challenges lately; we’ve encountered emotional roadblocks, judicial system procedures, and some very bone-headed, immature choices that have resulted in many problems to overcome.

Having this help today for our family was just the medicine we needed to help us to cope, to recover and get back on track.

Photo Credit Cindy Bodie