Welcome to my circus.

August 22, 2018
by Maralee
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Moms Aren’t Forgetful, We Just Have Mom Brain

Moms get a bad rap sometimes. When we show up late or forget that thing we were supposed to do or accidentally put the TV remote in the fridge, people assume we’re flighty or irresponsible. Nothing could be further from the truth. We are just trying to balance the competing needs of our homes, jobs, spouses, churches, kids, the Boy Scouts, our in-laws, friends, and oh yeah, ourselves. Who can remember where the TV remote goes when your brain is consumed with how to simultaneously be at two children’s band concerts at once? All this juggling can mean our brains feel like swiss cheese and things are constantly falling through the holes. Why is this, you ask?

First of all, there’s the longterm sleep deprivation. I know, I know—my kids sleep through the night, why should I be sleep deprived? Well, they sleep through the night, except when they don’t. Somebody has a bad cough, somebody gets a fever, one of them has a nightmare, somebody’s “feet are too hot.” The reasons are endless, but they all mean that even if a child is capable of sleeping through the night, that may not mean the parent is. And even when I sleep, I sleep like I imagine firefighters do—with one ear always waiting for the alarm. I wear pajamas that might be able to double as outerwear if I had to run someone to the ER in the middle of the night for reasons I cannot fathom during daylight hours, but always seem to become apparent around 2 a.m. I may stay up way too late trying to cram in “adult time” or read a book or take a shower. I may wait until the last child has been asleep for thirty minutes before even considering going to bed because I don’t want to be immediately woken up by a child who was just wondering why whales are so big. And then there’s the disrupted sleep of waking up at 3, remembering you didn’t sign the permission slip or imagining the letter you’re going to write to that mom whose child has been mean to yours, or overanalyzing that thing your friend said to you that made you think she didn’t approve of your parenting choice. Moms don’t sleep well. This means that our brains can be a little slow to process that complicated information you just gave us and a little quick to forget to do that thing we said we’d do. Continue Reading →

August 10, 2018
by Maralee
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They’ll Only Remember the Good Parts

Another summer is coming to a close and again I’m wondering if I did it wrong. This seems to be the way I spend the last weeks of every summer— feeling guilty, feeling frazzled, imagining all the things I could have or should have done differently.

And it’s not just about the things we didn’t do, but about the things we did that didn’t go the way I hoped.

I was processing one of those experiences with my mom the other day. I took the kids on a little hike (really more of a nature walk) for the afternoon. In my mind, this was going to be a fun and carefree time of just enjoying nature. No screens! No pressure! No squabbles over toys!

And then reality hit.

Everybody wanted a water bottle, but nobody wanted to carry one. The nature center only gives out one map per group and half the kids are angry/crying because someone else is holding the map. Some kids will only be happy if we do the full hike that includes getting a view of an actual buffalo. Some kids don’t want to hike that far and will cry halfway through. Little girls are upset that they can’t pee into the woods like the little boys can. I didn’t bring snacks. A kid cut his hand by grabbing a blade of tall grass (I’m not even making this up. There was blood and everything). And on and on it goes. If you’ve ever been hiking with a crew of young kids, you know the drill.

www.amusingmaralee.com

So I was explaining to my mom what a bust the whole thing was because she only saw the pictures I shared and they were adorable. My mom listened to my description of the whole fiasco and said, “You’ll never regret taking them on that hike. They’ll only remember the good parts.”

I know she’s right because I only remember the good parts too. Some of my favorite childhood memories are the family vacations where we stepped outside of our normal routine. I’m sure there were fights. I know my mom didn’t always remember to bring snacks and I grew up in the days before water bottles were even a thing. We got hot, we got bored, we got injured, but we were together as a family. No phones, no friends, no screens.  Continue Reading →

August 6, 2018
by Maralee
1 Comment

If Other Kids Call You Poor

My Sweet Kids,

I know there have been times you have felt poor. There are vacations we can’t go on, the hand-me-down wardrobes, the times we didn’t send you to a friend’s birthday party because we couldn’t afford to buy them a gift. Little expenses that have seemed to be no big deal to other families have been enough to discourage us from participating in the activities you’d love to do or joining in on events other people are doing. When money is tight, every decision feels more weighty.

But while there are times you have felt poor, we have never been truly poor. We’ve done what we could to shield you from the stress of it all. As adults, we know the reality is that you’ve never been without food or shelter. Our bills have always been paid and we know where to go for help if we need it. We live within our means which have at times been meager.

Continue Reading →

July 27, 2018
by Maralee
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Adoption and The Truth as Best We Knew It

Last night my son brought out the adoption scrapbook I made for him just before we flew across the globe to bring him home. We’ve looked through that book together many times. We’ve wondered at the pictures of the tiny boy he was. We’ve read the words I wrote describing our adoption journey and his journey to our family. But as he pulled it out last night, I felt something new in my heart. I felt a little embarrassed of the words on the page. While at the time I thought what I was writing was true, now I know it was just the truth as best we knew it.

Over the years, that “truth” has changed. We have come to understand international adoption in a new light. It does not seem like the simple happy ending to a sad story we once thought it was. We get the baby we’ve always wanted and a child gets a family. It’s a win/win. . . except that over simplification doesn’t acknowledge all the losses involved.

The story I wrote and the story I continued to tell him was never a lie, it just wasn’t ever the whole truth. But I couldn’t have told him the whole truth because I didn’t know it myself. Last night when he pulled out that book, it was to show it to the woman who was in charge of his care at the orphanage. She knew more of the truth than I ever could have dreamed when I was writing those words from our Tennessee home. We have been blessed to have an ongoing relationship with her that helps fill in the gaps and keeps us accountable to the truth, even the uncomfortable truths.

As I felt that embarrassed feeling— embarrassed of my own naiveté, embarrassed of words committed to paper that may or may not have been true about his story (although they were the truth as best I knew it)— I knew that feeling wasn’t a new one.

As foster parents, we rarely know the whole story. A child is brought to us and we might be told why they were taken from their home, but the story we get may not be the whole truth. But we can only act on the information we’re given, so we press on, believing what we’ve been told, retelling this story to the children, creating a narrative to suit the limited information we’ve been given. It’s the truth as best we know it, but it’s never the whole truth. Continue Reading →

July 23, 2018
by Maralee
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5 Ways Lists about Marriage are Ruining Your Marriage

I love a good list. I love how they distill information into quick, bite-sized pieces I can easily digest. But I’ve found that I don’t love lists about marriage. Such a complex topic can rarely be handled well in a handful of bullet points.

I stumbled upon a site recently that had lists about marriage prominently displayed, including this doozy:

“5 Ways You are Unknowingly Destroying Your Husband and Killing Your Marriage”

Yikes. That is a lot of pressure on one little wife. I’m almost embarrassed to say I read that article, secretly hoping it had a foolproof method for keeping my marriage happy or that it would give some new window into my husband’s psyche. Spoiler alert- it turns out there is no simple trick to a perfect marriage, even if a list promises you one. How do I know? Because I’ve done my best to follow the marriage rules from day one and this is still the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. It’s not exactly the hand-holding, picnic on a blanket, gazing into each other’s eyes experience the pictures accompanying these “helpful” lists like to depict. At least not most of the time.

I have learned that being really good at following rules and internalizing lists does not mean you are really good at marriage. Marriage is so much more nuanced and complicated than “6 Ways to Show Your Husband You Love Him” can ever actually communicate. So if you need some encouragement to quit stressing over lists about marriage, I am helpfully providing you a list of reasons not to read lists about marriage.

1) Following all the marriage “rules” will not keep you from having marriage issues. I love following rules and I’m always sure life will be simple and smooth if everybody just does the same. But that’s the thing about marriage– it’s a two person game. You can follow the rules to the letter, but that doesn’t mean your spouse will do the same. And even if we both follow the rules, they aren’t always written with my struggles or my partner’s strengths and weaknesses in mind. When I believe I’m following all the rules, I can become oblivious to the ways I’m failing that The Rules never mentioned. I can become overly confident that my marriage must be awesome because I’m doing all the “right” things I’m supposed to do, never bothering to check with my spouse about what’s important to HIM. It has taken me surprisingly long to figure out I’m not married to the internet, so the internet’s opinion about my marriage shouldn’t be quite so important.

A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.
Proverbs 31:10

2) Breaking all the marriage “rules” does not destine you to marital failure. Every once in a while I look at married friends and think, “This marriage business is a mystery.” People can argue about money, whine about a burned dinner, leave dirty socks on the living room floor, and yet THEY ARE STILL MARRIED. Maybe not happily so, but maybe even happily so! We all want sweet, connected marriages, but the definition of “sweet” and “connected” may vary wildly between couples. Amazingly enough, it turns out there is no point system for winning at being married. So before you read some list about marriage and decide you are “unknowingly destroying your husband” maybe just ask your husband if you are destroying him. That may be a better indicator of the actual state of your marriage.

A wife of noble character is her husband’s crown, but a disgraceful wife is like decay in his bones.
Proverbs 12:4

Continue Reading →

July 19, 2018
by Maralee
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Hey Bride and Groom: Invite Some Kids

My family attended a wedding this last weekend and it was all kinds of fun. As we were leaving one of my kids said, “When do we get to do that again? To go to a party with all our friends?” I love that THAT is what he felt like this wedding was.

When we received that invitation, I left it on the counter for a few days. A few agonizing days. Do we try and find a babysitter so my husband and I can just go enjoy it without having to police our kids? Do we bring some kids who are better able to sit through a wedding ceremony without causing distractions? Do the bride and groom really want ALL of us there? Will they feel frustrated when they see we are RSVPing for a party of 8? For a few days, all I could think about was the negative aspects of bringing kids to a wedding. I felt self-conscious about our large family and didn’t want to be a burden.

But then I thought about the positives. I thought about the relationships my kids have with the bride and groom. I thought about what it would mean to their own understanding of marriage to see this ceremony happen. I thought about the beauty and solemnity of a wedding and I wanted my kids to experience it. I wanted them to grow up knowing that God is a part of marriage and that we make our vows in his presence.

I sent in the RSVP for our whole family. And I’m so glad I did.

www.amusingmaralee.com

There was so much beauty in having our kids there. They were fascinated by the ceremony. They had questions. They knew some aspects from having watched weddings on TV which made them more excited to see it in person. They loved seeing their friends there and it reinforced their position as valued people in our community. And the RECEPTION was the stuff dreams are made of, especially for my extroverts. They drank soda, ate cake, and danced until they flopped on chairs from exhaustion.

And let’s be real, they were also a bit of a disaster. They dug through my purse. They loudly asked unnecessary questions. They tried to stand on the pew to get a better view. They pinched their siblings when they got bored. One kid sustained an injury while standing too close to his brother who was enthusiastically dancing. It was HARD parenting work to make it happen. Would I have enjoyed sitting there with my husband, being reminded of our own beautiful wedding? Yes. But this was an experience my kids needed to have. Continue Reading →

July 12, 2018
by Maralee
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Radio Interview on Managing Summer Chaos

Every summer I feel the same mix of joy and dread as I anticipate the endless sunny days, the ice-cream evenings, the pool trips, the library adventures and the sprinklers. I love all of these special moments with my kids, but I also acutely struggle with the lack of structure and the constant noise and chaos of having everybody home all the time.

I was glad to get to talk to Stan Parker about how we handle things at our house. It’s been a steep learning curve of letting go of the mom guilt of not having a magical summer and embracing our family goals. We may not do a bunch of big trips, but by the end of the summer, I hope I know my kids a little better and we’ve grown a little closer. If you want to hear more of my thoughts about giving yourself grace, embracing the summer as a time of spiritual growth, and managing the difficult (but SO necessary) task of summer self-care, here you go:

Here are some links to my other thoughts on how moms can survive summer with joy and our sanity intact: Continue Reading →

July 10, 2018
by Maralee
3 Comments

If You Meet My Child Who Doesn’t Care About Charming You

We’re about to head out the door for a family reunion and I’m feeling angsty enough that I needed to sit and write before I can leave. This isn’t my usual response to the stress of getting a family of eight on the road, but at the moment I’m just feeling sad and overwhelmed and maybe explaining that in writing will help.

I’ve got a lot of kids with a lot of different personalities. In my home, they are all equally lovable and equally loved. They all frustrate and annoy me at times and make my heart feel so full of goodness and sweetness that it could burst. I love to parent them and I’m so thankful I get to be their mom. In my home, I am the queen of our schedules and routines. While there are difficult moments, we all know what to expect. But then we take this show on the road.

I have a child that struggles with new people, new situations and transitions. While he is a total delight to me and absolutely has my heart, he pushes me to the limits of my patience when we are in these new situations. But it’s not just my own frustration level that bothers me. My heart hurts for him and the way he presents himself to the world in those moments.

If you unexpectedly dropped by my house and wanted to talk for a few minutes, this would make him feel tense. Family and close friends don’t get this same response, but if a stranger or casual acquaintance needs something from me, all the worst behaviors will come out. He will respond to his own stress level by being just a pretty horrible version of himself. He’ll seem randomly angry or aggressive. He will do whatever he can to divert my attention, which often means behaving in an age-inappropriate manner.

In my calm moments, I know he needs some reassurance from me that this situation is okay. In my moments where I’m just trying to wrap up this conversation with the friend from church who dropped by, I feel angry. And I feel embarrassed for him. Not OF him. For him.

I know there’s this lovely idea out there that we shouldn’t care what other people think about us. He shouldn’t care and I shouldn’t care about it for him. But that’s some idealistic garbage that doesn’t reflect the real world. If you want to have a job or a friend or a spouse, at some point you have to be able to deal well with the stress of other people’s expectations without resorting to anti-social behaviors. It’s a hard life for people who actively push others away with the way they behave and if I could spare my child from that, I would.

I know what kind of reputation those behaviors can create. I know people aren’t seeing the whole picture of who he is. This response to stress and social pressure does not define him, but it does happen to be the behavior everybody sees when they first meet him. He does not make a good first impression. And he doesn’t really care because he isn’t overly interested in climbing the social ladder. Continue Reading →

June 28, 2018
by Maralee
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Mary Poppins was a Foster Mom

I watched Mary Poppins the other night the way I watch most movies these days:  a kid in my lap, a kid on either side of me, and a kid laying on the back of the couch behind my head. We are a snuggly bunch. It was so much fun to introduce them to the songs, the dancing, the imaginative story of this favorite childhood movie. I’m not sure how many times I’ve watched this movie in my lifetime, but this was the first time I realized it:

Mary Poppins was basically a foster mom.

She swoops down and steps in during a very difficult time for the family. The parents are not attending to the needs of their children and the children are acting out. Apparently, Mary Poppins has a lot of experience dealing with kids who need that healthy balance of structure and grace. She includes them in fun new activities. She has standards of behavior for them. She introduces them to members of the community who can serve as a support system after she’s gone. She teaches them to have compassion for others, even for their struggling parents. She helps the parents see their role in a new light. And she does it all with a song.

As outside observers to the Mary Poppins story, it is easy to see Jane and Michael as the victims. We see their disinterested parents. We see their running away, problems with authority, involvement with the police as childish and unhealthy ways to try and get the attention they crave. Sadly, the Janes and Michaels of the foster care world don’t often get that same empathy expressed to them. Their own failings or attempts to find love and attention can be seen as the out of control behavior of wild and rebellious troublemakers. They can be hard to place in a good foster home because of their juvenile record or history of acting out. It can be tough to see past the behavior to the root causes which make their behavior understandable even if it is still problematic. Continue Reading →

June 27, 2018
by Maralee
1 Comment

An Enneagram Type 1 Dreams of Heaven

Since I was young I have had a consistent fear. I have imagined the moment I will see Jesus face-to-face. I imagine him looking at the list of good things I have done. I can imagine telling him about how hard I worked and about how much I loved that work. I can imagine those good things bringing him joy because they were done in his name and they were kingdom work. They brought a little bit of the justice of heaven, the peace of heaven right here to earth, while still pointing people to the better reality yet to come. I can imagine feeling confident about all the good I tried to bring to a broken world.

And then I imagine Jesus patting me on the back. Or sometimes I see him taking me by the shoulders. He says to me, “You did all the right things. . . but you missed the point.”

That’s where it always ends.

I don’t doubt my salvation. I don’t doubt the reality of my faith. But for as long as I can remember I have struggled with knowing if I’m doing it right— whatever “right” might mean in the moment.

I don’t struggle with imagining I am doing the right things. I am so fully motivated to do the right things. But I see the people around me who are more connected with their feelings, more aware of relationship dynamics, more expressive of the highs and lows, more able to let go of the minutia, and I just wonder if I’m missing the point. Am I doing all the right things, but not in the right way? Not with the right heart? Should it all feel differently than it feels to me? If I were doing it right, would I experience more of the emotional/spiritual highs and lows I hear other people talk about?

These questions have haunted me. And then I found the Enneagram.

I’m not saying it’s a perfect way to define or understand your personal motivations. I don’t know that any one tool can categorize every human correctly and account for all the variances. I think it’s a tool that works for some people to help them understand the WHY of who they are and to start to see their motivations more objectively.

For me, finding out I was a One (known as The Perfectionist or The Reformer) deeply resonated with me. Ones care about doing the right thing. They care about justice. They care about finding problems and looking for solutions. They can seem critical of others, but there isn’t anyone they are more critical of than themselves.  Continue Reading →