Birmingham
Born at St. Vincent’s Hospital in 1979, I entered the world on one of those watchful Alabama tornado nights. (Perhaps that was a foreshadowing of the chaotic life God had in store for us!)
My roots have now had 38 years to sink deep into the beautiful redemption of our city. As a family, our hearts beat for Birmingham. For eight years, we’ve had the honor of serving families in crisis and vulnerable children throughout our town. It has changed us, and as a result, our calling to this city “runs through our veins” as you might say.
As a cross-cultural family, the reality of our city’s history points to the restoration we long for our lives to reflect. As a result, we cherish this space, Birmingham, we happen to call home.
Moms
Once upon a time, my hot man and I walked around a parking lot; we had been married for maybe five weeks. I said I would love three kiddos — girl, boy, girl — each a couple of years apart. He said he wanted maybe two — five years apart; we would have a boy and then a girl, like his family.
Fast forward 16 years, and I have been a mama to just at 80 children, from newborn to 18.
{That was not the plan!}
And as many children as I have “mothered,” I have failed each of them infinitely more times. Motherhood slaps you in the face with your dependency and inadequacy. Not one of us will ever get it perfect. But, just like our city, I think there is perhaps an even greater beauty in the daily dance of forgiveness and restoration of “mommyhood.”
Blog
Practically, as a forever mom to six: Caleb (14), Benjamin (12), Daniel (10), and Isaac (6 months) — all from my belly; then Ayla Joy (4) and Bentley Hope (5) — through the broken, yet beautiful gift of adoption, I am scrambling moment by moment for simple ways to juggle this insane stage of mothering infant to teenage kiddos. What a gift to be a part of a community where we can share our blunders, as well as our joys!
As moms, we are our own most vicious enemies, as well as sometimes the queens of self-inflation. I know because I’m the chief of the 2:00 a.m. mind-racing, insecurities that I then scurry to cover with my celebrations that I ache to hide beneath. However, I believe our deepest beauty, as moms, emerges from those roots that have sunk, reflecting the glory of this daily calling of motherhood. What a treasure we are called to this together, rather than alone!
