Gotcha

Somehow we've made it. One whole year since the incredible day (in a series of long hard days) that changed everything. The day we took legal custody and physical possession of our baby girl. In the adoption world, "gotcha day" can mean a hundred different things due to the hundreds of ways children come into their forever families. The range of emotions can vary from celebration and parties, like a birthday, to hushed grieving and silent recognition. Every adoption is born out of loss. Even when all choices are positive, there is still a loss. I say this because in our family there are multiple figures in our sweet Sarah's life who won't remember today with the joy that we do. For her birth mother,  it was a final goodbye to regular visits because we live across the country. For her aunt and uncle and cousins who fostered her for her first ten months,  it is a day they lost a loved daughter and sister as she became niece and cousin. We know that there is pain there and don't celebrate without recognizing that Sarah too had to grieve those relationships in those specific forms. Her routine and schedule and home all changed on that day while my very dreams came true. While my heart was completed, theirs took a bit of a hit. I'm grateful that Sarah's foster journey was able to keep her with family. I'll never be able to express the gratitude I feel that my sister and brother in law were able to foster her while we worked tirelessly to get our home study and legal nonsense done and bring her home. She will always be able to have a relationship with them, and with her beautiful birth mother and biological brother as well as cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents. I have so many friends in the adoption community who don't have knowledge of their child's early life or a connection to their birth family now. Friends who have children who grieve birth families that fell apart, or foster families, nannies or a culture they left on the other side of the world. We have to acknowledge that. Our kids deserve their hurts to be recognized. Even in the midst of our shout from the rooftop joy. So for us, gotcha day is about Sarah's 37 weeks in the womb of a mother who fought for her, who tried tirelessly to do everything she could to be the best mother she could. It is Sarah's first ten months, loved by a family that knew she would one day leave but did not treat her as so. And her gotcha day is that incredible day that we claimed her as our own. A day that all the waiting ended. We left her foster home mid-morning that cold Monday and immediately stopped at Target. I needed a moment to process  before we started a long day, so we walked around Target, bought a baby car mirror and just stared at her. For the first time we could legally take her anywhere we wanted. Then we had a quiet lunch with her birth mom and hit the road. I think I found reasons to stop at two more Targets before we got from Saint Paul to somewhere in Iowa. We had dinner at a Buffalo Wild Wings and told every person we could that this is our daughter. She's going home today. We ended up getting a horrible Norovirus that night but she slept like a champ. Our second day of travel was delayed, but got us south of Kansas City. And then around 4:00 on Christmas Eve eve we pulled into our driveway. To greet her we had decorated a tree in our front yard with pink lights. Pink like her sweet cheeks and the tutus and all the precious baby girl dreams we had dreamed for so very long. We wanted everyone who drove by to know that our daughter had come home! So this year to celebrate today we strung those same lights on the mantle and chalk board. Her lights. Our favorite Christmas gift a year older.

Happy gotcha day sweet girl. We honor today all of the people who love you, and joyfully remind you of how very much you are wanted here. Forever, Mama

Glory above, Glory below

Seasonal Affective Disorder. It's real y'all. Usually it gets called the winter blues. People in cold climates start running low on vitamin d and sunshine and being warm and develop depression related specifically to the weather. A little sunshine and voila. All better. The opposite can be true though too. Even though I'm not exactly an outdoorsman ( stop laughing. Seriously, I hear you) I DO enjoy outside time. I love feeling a breeze on my face and hearing little nature sounds. I grew up in Wyoming and Colorado and returned to Colorado for college. There is nothing better than lying on Colorado grass in early fall when the cool wind starts blowing. In September. The past few weeks here in Tejas have been HOT. And now that the pool is closed, kids are in school and friends have scattered to the non existent wind... My SAD kicks in. I MISS mountains and trips to Estes park and cherry cider from the cherry store on the way. I miss old town and coffee from the Northern. I miss martini nights on Linden and the intramural fields on campus at night and the oval and aspen. I ache to have a VIEW. By yesterday I hit my low. I stayed in bed most of the day. I ate more than one drumstick. (The frozen kind dipped in chocolate...)  I made my husband cook dinner. I pouted. I whined. I moped. I cried. Weather channel promises that in ten days it MIGHT get down to 69. Our high might be 89.  There might be a little rain. So when I woke up today I was determined to change focus. How to survive the next two weeks? We used to always plan a beach trip for Labor Day weekend around Lucas' birthday. That won't work this year so I looked up a few short drive away destinations and found it : innerspace caverns in Georgetown Texas. A quick two hour drive away. We poured some iced coffee, loaded up the kids and were off. We got to Georgetown at lunchtime and so we stopped at an adorable place called Monument Cafe. They have somehow captured the FEEL of a historic restaurant but without feeling pretentious like some do. The food is somewhat farm to table with local suppliers and local roasted fair trade  coffee. Breakfast all day. Pies to drool over. Biscuits while you wait.  Bacon vinaigrette on your fried chicken salad.  Get my drift? Eat it all. The boys were wowed by the ambiance and limes in their water. 

After lunch we drove the two minutes to the cavern, which is right in town and just off the highway. That surprised me until we learned that the cave was discovered when they drilled core samples before putting in the highway in the late 60's. The tour takes about an hour but ours went a little long because someone got a little fainty. It was WARM at 72 and 80% humidity with very little ventilation to protect the living cave, but the dark felt amazing. It was like stepping into another world for a little while and was definitely what this summer worn mama needed. The kids were full of wows and thank yous and hugs. And so was I. Our creator covered it all y'all. What we see above the ground and what we would only see below when we built roads.

These secret caverns, full of beauty and mystery and life. Life we can not contribute a single thing to and only damage should we try. It is His beauty. Just like our lives, they exist for His glory, but often we wall ourselves up. Caverns hidden under the ground. 

Maybe we are waiting for the next job, the next baby, the next class, the next project, the next season.  What if our tough days are just God drilling core samples?

Just God revealing our hidden caverns and the glory he is growing there like living stalactite and stalagmites. 

What if our frustration and resentment are just stone barriers he is slowly whittling into beautiful formations to show off his glory? What if pools of refreshment lie just beneath the darkness of our self pity, ready to be illuminated by his truth?

I still miss Colorado. And I still hate Texas in September. But October is coming... And until then I'll remember that glory lies beneath as well as above. And joy. Joy always comes in the morning. 

Noonday Collection Blog Train! {One year In} **GIVEAWAY**

{Welcome to Life Unfabled, our family blog about everything and anything but mostly about our adoption these days. If you are new around here I want to invite you to grab that cup of coffee and hang out on my virtual couch this morning. If you found me through the Noonday Ambassador blog train I hope you've learned so much more than I can teach you about this amazing group of women and artisans I now call sisters. They inspire me every day. Make sure you catch up on yesterday's post HERE and check out this afternoon's post HERE}

 One year ago I began my Noonday journey. My sister became an ambassador, and after years of a very slow learning curve regarding justice and retail shopping I immediately fell in love with the concept that is Noonday. One year later I'm still in love, but it has become so much more than a concept. To keep things simple here are my top four lessons from a year of Noonday. 

Lesson 1. I'm not the wallflower I thought I was (or thought I had to be).
 Growing up I was known as being shy. I was quiet in new situations and preferred to keep my friends close and limited in number. Anything that smelled of popular scared me because I was so sure I would never be the cool kid.  I lived in the cold shadows of life when it came to social experiences. When I joined Noonday and learned the business model the idea of having to intentionally reach out to strangers and ask them to let me into their home, and then style them and their friends... I thought I would never be able to do it. But that scared high school girl has grown up, and my icons of fashion have changed. I'm no longer intimidated by the cool kids, because we are ALL the cool kids. My favorite fashion icons are my noonday sisterhood. Women from every walk of life who are joining their amazing creative talents together to raise one voice loud and clear for our artisans- those beautiful, stunning, examples of grace and dignity that remind me every single day to just. get. over. myself. It is not about me! I become less so they can be more, and this time, the shadows could not be filled with more warmth and joy. I love getting to know my hostesses and am encouraged and inspired with every trunk show. 

Lesson 2. Put another layer on.
Before Noonday I had maybe four necklaces that I wore. Rarely. I remember being in the 8th grade or so and going with my mom to a jewelry party. The presenter said during her presentation that to make sure you look your best to always take off three accessories before leaving the house. BLASPHEMY! If you feel your style is lacking a little something... try ANOTHER LAYER! Sometimes your arm party just needs a little more oomph, or a necklace needs a friend. I make myself wear every sample I have at least once. I'll be honest, when I preview each line there are always pieces that I question... until I wear them and learn their story. Then we become best friends. Forever. Make your style your own and break a rule every day. 

Lesson 3. Take a #selfie, but make it deeper than skin.
Each season we do the ambassador instagram style challenge. Y'all... it can be so hard. All of my insecurities come roaring up and I truly want to win ;-) but I always struggle with hitting that share button! What if people get annoyed? What if I don't edit out enough proof of the cupcakes ive eaten this summer? Is my hair ok? Am I ok? I'm not as pretty as her. Her photo skills are rad. Why does every picture my husband takes of me  make me look like a whale choking on Jonah?    Seriously, just getting real with ya. The reality though is that when I wear Noonday, I do also feel beautiful. I feel beautiful because my work is the act of telling YOU about redemption. Redemption of lives through the purchase of jewelry. When you shop Noonday, you give my family income and help us towards our adoption. When you place an order and customers over the globe sell out items, Noonday get to place new orders from our artisan groups. Those orders mean new employees, higher wages and more opportunity. Lives of challenge become less painful. Children with limited futures get to go to school, and new commerce in their community gives them hope of a future career. Mamas don't have to live their life living just to keep their children alive. As Jalia from our Ugandan group told us at conference, because of your orders... they dream much bigger dreams now. So even though I often feel insecure I also feel strong. and yes, I feel beautiful. Redemption IS beautiful. 

Lesson 4. Be brave
A year ago I said yes. I sent in my application email and invested my time and resources. It was scary for a while. Guess what? It isn't any less scary! My heart still races every time I call a potential hostess. I still get super nervous that I'll not say the right thing or forget to tell a story, or lose a customers order at a trunk show. But you know what? I don't. Everything works out fine. My sister ambassadors and the artisan stories encourage me to dig deep and be brave.  So my challenge to you? BE BRAVE. Book a trunk show. Contact me, or submit the form on the noonday website  to find an ambassador near you. This is worth it friends. Your time, your energy, your courage. After a year I can proudly say that I am STILL a Noonday Ambassador. Want to join me? I'd love to talk to you about becoming an ambassador yourself. Or maybe your Brave is ordering that pair of earrings you think might be just a little too big- or maybe you will choose to give five gifts for the holidays this year that have a double purpose. Whatever your BRAVE is, as my fellow ambassadors like to remind me #rockandroar!

****If you are still here, maybe after a bit of a warm up on that coffee, I would love for you to enter and win a La Noche bracelet, in midnight. This is my all time favorite bracelet from Noonday and is truly a spectacular piece worth 42$  Use the rafflecopter below, and good luck!! 

****

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/97649df51/" rel="nofollow">a Rafflecopter giveaway