Three more months

As some of you know, we are petitioning for custody of Dave’s six-year-old cousin. His parents are divorced, the mother had custody of him and has lost it do to drug abuse. The father (Dave’s uncle) is voluntarily giving us custody. If we don’t take him (and he is removed permanently from the mother) he will go to foster care forever and loose his extended family.

Dave attended court on Wednesday (in Ohio) and what we hoped would be the end, isn’t. The judge gave the mother three more months to show improvement in a residential drug treatment program. It’s very frustrating. She has been given a year to get off drugs and lost custody of her son in June. Isn’t that enough? I don’t really understand what three more months will do. So on December 14th she will go to court again. This time, if she hasn’t shown “improvement” the mother will loose permanent custody and our lawyer will (again) state that we are willing to take him. Showing how much faith the judge has in this mother; she has set a temporary date in February for a custody hearing.

Is it horrible to pray that if the mother were going to fail, she would do it sooner than later? I don’t want her to do just what she needs to do to slide by and get the kid back only to go through this again in another year. The older this kids gets that harder it will be on everyone. It would also be nice to get the child before we go to Iceland.

Please pray. I do have peace about this and know that it’s all in God’s timing.

Girls' Night Out

Tera, Meghann, Natalie, Jessie, Hallie, Sara, Nicki, Sam and Stacy; Thanks for a great night on Friday! I think much fun was had by all. Maybe we should form our own bowling league. :) Or not.

To the rest of you; I hope to see you next time around. You missed a great time.

What's all the fuss?

It seems that a lot has been said about homeschooling over the past few weeks. We all have our opinions but you know what they say about opinions…. It all boils down to the fact that as Christian parents God has made us responsible for our children’s education. He didn’t tell us to homeschool or to send our kids to private or public school. He just wants us to be in charge, not anyone else. Of course I am passionate about homeschooling, I feel that it’s where God has called me. My prayer is that whatever method you choose, you do so because you feel that it’s where God has called your family to be.

We could argue all day about good verses bad experiences. There are some things that I enjoyed in public school that my children will miss. But, there are also tons of things that my kids get to do that I could have never experienced because I had to be in school. These arguments are not valid. This is just how life works, we get one chance and there’s not enough time to do it all.

If you have participated in this discussion because you feel passionate about where your family is then I think that’s great. If you have participated because you feel like you must defend yourself, then please look closely at why you are doing what you’re doing. Please don’t get so stubborn about your position that you close God out of your decision making process. No matter what form of education you choose, please remember that these are precious souls we’re dealing with. It’s not about our politics or us.

I had a wonderful public school experience, so did Dave and I’m sure my kids could get by just fine there. We have just chosen (been called to) a different route. I like to compare it to something that most of you are familiar with, Church. Some need and enjoy the programmed route, some like the more organic, house Church route. We have chosen the more organic route. It’s where God wants us. I love my friends who go to Big Church and I love my friends who public school.

(For those of you who only have kindergarten, first or second graders, I would love to have this conversation again when your kids are 13.)