Being a parent is...

Being a parent is the most wonderful, most exciting, most magical thing on this earth-it is also the hardest, most painful job. I love my children-all of them. Some I wake up and have to choose to love & that sucks, a lot. Can you imagine that? Doesn't that sound horrible & that I'm some sort of heartless monster. That is how it feels sometimes and sometimes I realize that it is just part of the adoption process. Life in any home in the world is not "normal" and the Freng Family is no exception. Except we get the fun, added challenge of being a "pastor's family"-yeah!!! All in all it's good but there are times (when I'm letting my sin nature overwhelm me or when I'm just being a person) when I'd prefer to not be in the fishbowl. That is a whole other blog post though. Today I want to let you in on some funny (at least to me) happenings around here & how God works in ways I can't even imagine!
First, Jasmine's teacher has two children (grown-ups now) that were adopted from the Foster Care system. Talk about God's hand in all of this. She gets it-or at least more than your average person.
Second-The Yankton School District is utilizing the Boys Town curriculum & teaching the kids basic manners and skills-awesome. Unfortunately, because I'm immature this is how these conversations play out at home-see below.

Jasmine-Hey Mom, I have something to tell you. You know what-if you are doing something & someone else asks you to please stop doing it...well, you should stop doing it.

Me-Really, wow. You mean that if for the past year when you weren't listening to me and doing things that I didn't like if I would have just asked you to stop then you would of. Wow-why didn't I think of that...I really need to tell Dad about this, this is genious, pure genious. So...when someone asks you to stop doing something, you should...

Jasmine-stop, yeah my teacher said that.

Me-Wow-I love it. Maybe we should try that here too, not just at school.

Jasmine-yeah, my teacher is really smart.

Me-Huh!

The next day we have virutally the same conversation about telling people we are sorry when we hurt them. I especially like this one because remorse is not a feeling most neglected kids feel & it's hard to learn. I did selfishly point out that I believe that Dad & I had told her these things for about the past year. But she just reminded me how smart her teacher was & that once she explained it-Jasmine really got it.

Praise God for good teachers!

Someday, maybe someday, I won't be the village idiot to my children. But for now-it's an okay place to be!