love your toddler as yourself: a "normal" day

Today, loving the Lord my God with all my heart and soul and strength, and loving my neighbour as myself, here in rural Tanzania, looked like answering an emergency phone call at seven am; getting up and changing diapers instead of the hoped-for sleeping in; making a care package of blankets, clothes, bottles, formula and supplements for a friend struggling to feed her newborn twins; hanging long lines of laundry in the hot sun; answering questions like “what happens to spiders after they run away” and “if I get in the bath, will my hair melt?” while answering the door and answering emails; scouring books and websites and messaging friends for ways to help a neighbour who has chronic stomach troubles; paying school fees for clusters of shy and bashful students who come to our door hoping for help; reading through the Psalms on the couch, bible in my lap, while my boys sit next to me and watch a video about cows (and another about gravity); tying Kai to my back while standing over the stove and stirring caramel; problem-solving for Visible Grace from the small screen of my iPhone; fielding requests from maintenance workers on the back porch while Abram meets with a fellow teacher on the front porch; practicing David’s memory verse with him over a lunch of chicken and sweet potatoes; nursing consecutive babies while chatting with two of our college students; filling water bottles and charging phones for neighbours and workers without electricity; sending Kai to the clinic with our nanny to be tested for malaria, and sending David, James, and James’s baby doll along as well, because they want to "go bye bye"; laughing with joy when Mary reports that, at James’s request, the nurse gave his doll a malaria test, too; talking to our lawyer and social work about potentially adopting Kai; planning a certain four year old’s birthday party and inviting our neighbours; planning backup childcare for tomorrow because Abram is preaching and I cannot handle four young children by myself for four hours; and lying in my hammock with David during naptime. 

(I wrote this a couple weeks ago on a particularly busy day- so busy I didn't even have time to post it. Today, everything looks similar, but different.) 

PS- David turned four!

PPS- I have a few pictures that won't upload, and I am running out of time, and if I don't post this now, I never will, so here it is. I'll try to post pictures another time. Grr. 

Frequently Asked Questions

I get the same exact four questions, over and over, so I'm going to spend the next few (…four, to be exact) posts answering them!

Number one, and most frequent:

What about Visible Grace/what's your job now/how does it work/what do you do?

I'm so grateful to my friends who have stood by my side over the last decade, supporting both me personally, and Visible Grace. I would never have been able to get VG on its feet, and I would never have survived (mentally, emotionally, physically- it's a tough job!) without good people on my side. I also want to say thank you for the unbelievably kind responses we got to our last post. To be honest it was a little scary and hard to write, but I felt nothing but support and understanding and love from you, my dear reader-friends. 

Last year when we were making some tough decisions, Abram and I both consulted family and older, wiser friends (including the Visible Grace board) before committing to anything. During that time, we- me, Abram, the board, some good friends, family- all reached the same conclusion, and this might totally blow you away:

I am sort of not great at admin. Or at being a director.

And I hated to admit it, because, well. Because I was doing it, and I wanted to be good at it, and, oh yeah- I want to be good at everything.

But I was secretly relieved to not be in charge of VG anymore. 

Right now, we have an incredible team up in Kenya, and each of them is doing better at their job than I ever did. (It helps that each of them is only doing one job, instead of four.) And this frees me up to…well…be me. To do the things I love.

To take pictures.

And laugh a lot.

And tell stories.
And dream about who these kids will become someday. 

And spend time with my husband (what? working 20 hours a day, seven days a week isn't conducive to a healthy marriage?!).

And - most importantly- to focus on our growth, our goals, and the relationships that really matter within VG.

So, at the moment, the house parents and Kenyan manager get to make the tough decisions. The hiring and firing, the discipline and budget problems. And the details I'm not great at- budgeting, spreadsheets, accounts. Abram and I sit on the Kenyan board, which means we go up for meetings 3-4 times a year, and we spend a lot of time emailing and calling the staff and board. We also serve as the sort of ambassadors to the American board- joining via conference call for many of their meetings, emailing with advice about vision and development, as well as serving as a sort of cultural translator, between the African staff and the American board members. 

My personal job, at the moment, is "sponsorship coordinator". This means I am responsible for finding and maintaining sponsors for all of our kids. Sending kids' artwork to the sponsors, updating them via Facebook, updating the VG blog (don't look at it right now. I'm going to update it after we go to Nairobi next week), emailing them about the kids…ahem. 

To be honest, I haven't done a great job this year- not because I've been in Tanzania, but because being in Tanzania, being pregnant, and being newly married has (almost) kicked my butt, and then on the days I had more time and energy- bam, the power and internet would go out. But, I'm getting better at it, and upping my game. Really. I am! Really!

I'm kinda-sorta the social media person as well, which means writing newsletters, updating our Facebook page, promoting the upcoming auction (November 8!), and running our Instagram feed. When I'm not in Kenya, the house father, Steve, sends me pictures of the kids.

When we go to Kenya next week to visit the kids and board (and my doctor)? Well. You can expect roughly seventy-five thousand new pictures.