I had one of those, “No not my kids,” moments the other day while our Social Worker reported back to us on the parent-teachers meeting held in our children’s private school. “The principal told me the boys have been causing trouble in the school and they are a handful,” she said. “Yea Right! Like what? Tell me one thing they have done!” I replied indignantly.

Well, she said, “First of all, they took all the mothballs out of the urinals and were using them to play marbles….” I couldn’t hold back my laughter… Ok it did sound like something they would do… but to me it’s clever! And it shows creativity!

“Then, some of the boys were taking food out of the garbage and making each other eat it.” “Ew! They wouldn’t do that!” I said. But, they did. ..

“And one of the boys stole a spoon from the lunch room.” “No way!” I said. Yes way…

Ok I guess our boys aren’t perfect angels. But what kids are? I love that our boys have personalities and that they test the boundaries at times. Of course I want them to be disciplined and to make good choices, but I also want them to be kids and enjoy life. Our children come from very very very complex backgrounds full of abuse, neglect, poverty, abandonment…the list goes on with mostly negative experiences. The process of undoing all of these bad habits or effects on their lives will be life-long. We are learning about each one of our boys’ individual needs; no two are the same, and we have 50! So you can understand the challenge we are faced with. But God is in full control, and I am so happy that He loves them even more than I do or any of our staff members do.

And aside from these minor behavioral issues, the school is very happy to have our boys THeir teachers, who are absolutely amazing, just love our boys with their whole hearts. I could not have even imagined some of the developments that have already taken place in our children since they enrolled in this school. This is truly a gift from God for our little trouble-makers :0)