Invasion of privacy

It has been three months since my last post. That's like 10 years in blog world.

The idea of blogging has become more and more odd to me in the last year.
Like I think our lives are so interesting that everyone wants to read about it. Now don't get me wrong, I love to read blogs. I love to read about what God is showing other people and how I can glean from that. (I also like to look at blogs that have nothing to do with anything spiritual at all....sshhh.) But, the Fickeys? Really? Generally NOT interesting.

And when I do think things are possibly interesting enough and actually sit down to spill my guts, are you getting this false sense of who we really are? Is who we sound like we are on this blog really who we are in real life?

Sometimes yes. Sometimes no.

Sometimes we have an unending faith and trust in God's provision and amazing things happen like in this post. But sometimes Mitch and I have knock down drag outs in the middle of our kitchen because the stress of not being able to pay our bills overwhelms us both.

Sometimes I can see the truths God has revealed to us and the path it's led us down and it makes my heart excited that God has entrusted us with these things. But sometimes I wonder how difficult it would be to fit all of us in a hole in the ground and hide for a few years until everyone has forgotten about the declarations of faith and obedience we made. Because that would be way easier than actually following through with these plans.

I could go on with those "sometimes" forever. But, my point is, we are not blog-worthy. We are a normal family who is poor most of the time, occasionally selfish and mean, very silly and immature behind closed doors (and with some choice friends who love us regardless), we get the whole parenting thing wrong a lot, and still have a VERY LONG way to go in our spiritual walks. Very.

Which leads me to the reason for this blog post: What if you couldn't hide your flaws behind awesome blog posts and adorable pictures of your kids looking precious and happy on face book? What if someone planned on walking into your house in three days to take a good look around in every nook and cranny of your home? Looking for metaphorical skeletons and what not. And then what if they proceeded to take each one of your kids aside and ask them questions about your parenting? Like "how do your parents....(gulp)...punish you?". And then after that, sat you down and asked you a million questions about your childhood and your marriage, etc? Sounds like the easiest stress-free Saturday ever, right?

.....Our home study visit has been scheduled for this Saturday, Dec 10 at 1:30. All of those above things will be on the agenda.  We are excited/overwhelmed/nervous/just plain scared.

People keep telling me, with the most precious and sincere hearts, "you guys will do great. ...your family is perfect.... nothing to worry about....you are wonderful parents." But here's the thing. That is not even a little bit true. Yes, we love our kids a lot. Who wouldn't? They are adorable. (most of the time). But our family is not even close to perfect. We yell. A lot. We punish. A lot. My closets are disastrous. My drawers are even worse. And we have this kid, named Sam, who speaks his mind and has zero filter. So the chance that something could go wrong are not as slim as some might think.

But, I have to keep faith that God wants this for us. And that this social worker is not out to dig up dirt on our family and keep us from adopting. And even though I keep telling myself that over and over and over, there may or may not have been at least 2 days dedicated to completely cleaning and purging my house (including said closets and drawers) and there may or may not be some bribing happening of the littlest one to assure he is on his best behavior.

So, please pray for us this Saturday if you get the chance. (and love us at all??). We will need it. And also, please refrain from bringing by donuts and fireworks for my children that morning.

Once the home study is done (and approved). Next step will be filing paperwork with the US government for immigration approval, then fingerprinting, then passports, and then.....the wait list. I have been asked a lot recently how long the wait will be for a referral. And honestly, I have no idea. It could be 6 months, it could be 2. We chose not to specify boy or girl or a specific age (just 0-3 is all we said), so that could mean a shorter wait time. But, like I said, we really don't know any of that yet.

For now, we will just be trying to make it through Saturday.

I will update you next week. Keep praying my friends. :)