Shared moments defining my journey

Consumed

Consumed is definitely the word of the week for our family. A country that Steven and I are passionate about and so many of our friends have been affected by the earthquake in Haiti. I feel as if life has stopped and we have been on our computers nonstop since it all happened.

I have been excited to see the amount of relief effort in which has taken place. I continue to be stunned at how much media coverage Haiti has gotten. I have been impressed with our President, former President Clinton and so many others who have taken time to stand behind and support Haiti. I will say that Clinton has brought me to tears a couple of times for his long-lasting love and desire for growth and change in Haiti. It has been incredible to see local news stations embrace our friends and give them a platform to speak out about orphans. In the midst of tragedy God’s beautiful interweaving has been intoxicating. He has been our only hope. God has been the rock for so many this week.

I love knowing that for our community, family and friends just because the news crews may leave in a couple of weeks our ongoing love and passion will continue for this great country. It is so dear to our hearts. We had heard before we took our first trip to Haiti that once you go you come back a different person. I can say that it was true for me. I was different and now tied to this country. This week has reminded me of how desperately I want to go back and of how badly I want to adopt from there one day.

I follow several blogs that have kept us in touch with what is going on. These are faithful followers of a God in which has gripped their hearts. It has been His strength that has pulled them through this tragic week. I have been so driven to pray for them this week. Please follow their journey and continually lift them up.

This is Licia’s blog who runs the Rescue Center: http://haitirescuecenter.wordpress.com/

This is Lori who runs the medical clinic: http://haitinurse4life.xanga.com/

This is a family who is passionate about adoption and who lives in Haiti. They live in Port au Prince and have given great info about what life is really like there now. http://livesayhaiti.blogspot.com/

This is an incredible ministry who has an orphanage where some of our friends have kids at. They do woman’s programs and make beautiful purses that support women, give them an income and support for their families. http://heartlineministries.org/

Heartline and Real Hope for Haiti are both reputable and incredible organizations to give to in the midst of this tragedy.

An easy way to support both of these ministries is to go to http://helphaitishirt.com/ and buy a shirt and 100% of the money will go to these organizations.

If you live in Austin (or if you don’t) there will be a benefit to raise money for Real Hope for Haiti Monday night. For more information you can go to http://musicforthecity.org/

There are great ways to help even though we are far away. We can still make a change and lift up those who are there giving every ounce of energy they have to the Haitian people!

Fear

The last couple of months I have been going through “Recovery” at my church. Recovery is a spiritually based program that mirrors the Alcoholics Annonymous’ 12 step process. I started out going to support a friend and found out that I needed to be there! What I love about Recovery is that it’s a place of healing. It doesn’t matter if you are an alcoholic, sex addict, seeker of approval, a person who lives in fear, or anything else that could take God’s place of control in your life. It has been monumental for seeing patterns, going to the root of those patterns and trusting God to change them in my life.

One of these patterns I have seen in my life is fear. I thought that fear was something small in my life that is somewhat normal. In recovery you typically have a sponsor who loves you, helps you walk through all of these hard discoveries and is there to help you think. My wonderful sponsor brought up the issue of fear in my life and really started questioning it. I kinda shrugged fear off and thought it was something I occasionally dealt with. The more I tried to shrug it off the more it wouldn’t seem to leave me alone.

I sat down to do my inventory of fear and was appalled at what came out when my pen hit the paper. Fear has interwoven itself in every part of me and is a bigger monster than what I had imagined.

It asked the question: what do I fear?

Let’s just say there was a long list of things I fear. These are a few. I fear my husband or son dying. I fear failure. I fear pursing my dreams. I fear traveling/living in other countries. I fear my own inadequacy. I fear the loss of others approval. I fear…. I fear…..I fear…

I started to see that the very things I fear are the things I desire most in this life. I want to go back to school. I want to have natural childbirth.  I want to run a 1/2 or full marathon. I want to live in another country one day.  I want to enjoy my family everyday I have with them! Below my fears are great passions trying to fight their way out. My pattern: I have a passion for something. I dream about it.  Fear comes creeping in and I squash it and say that I will deal with it later in life. It is a constant pattern that plagues my life and paralyzes me from taking risks.

It has been absolutely overwhelming to see all of this. That is the beauty of Recovery. We don’t know what is way down deep inside of us. Through these 12 steps you carve out time to really examine your life. For me I have scratched the surface, felt overwhelmed, been extremely broken over my own depravity and have laid my life down at Jesus’ feet again and again. I have gone back to the first 3 steps more times that I can count.

Step 1: We admitted we were powerless over our addictions and compulsive behavior, that our lives had become unmanageable.

Step 2: We came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

Step 3: We made a decision to turn our life and our will over to the care of God.

For to long I have tried to fix myself. That itself has been a continual pattern. It has been incredibly refreshing to rest at the feet of Jesus and know that HE is the only one who can fix me.

More to come…

9 months already??

Dear August,

Today you are 9 months old! I can’t believe its been that long. As I sit here thinking of our precious time together as a family, I am overwhelmed with love for you. I am so thankful for our family. You were the missing piece that we longed for. Everyday that we waited for you seemed to slowly drag by and now that you are in our lives it seems the days go by so quickly. You were worth every tear, every moment waiting and I would do it all over again just for you. We are crazy in love you!

I have loved watching your little personality come out. You are still so laid back like your daddy! You are curious and always wanting to explore everything. You will sit and play by yourself totally intrigued by something you have found. You are incredibly strong willed! I am still trying to figure out how to channel that one. 🙂 You are determined and will keep trying until you get what you want. Everyday we get to see more and more of who you are.

I love your big hugs, your huge beautiful eyes and your big smiles that show lots of teeth. I love when you crawl over to your daddy and I and pull up on our leg for us to hold you. I love your giggles and laughs. I love that you feel loved by us playing and spending quality time with you. (If you would like to cuddle a little more with us we would gladly welcome it!!) I love seeing you standing up in your bed waiting on me to get you after nap. I love how you hold on to me after I get you out of bed. I love watching you play with your favorite toys. I love driving around town and looking back at you in your car seat and catching you staring at me. I love that you like it when I sing to you! I adore your curls and the way your hair smells after we put your hair stuff in it. I like it when you follow me around the house while I am cleaning. I love watching you stand up and how proud you are of yourself. I could go on and on…I just love you!

I have seen a different side come out of your daddy. It is beautiful to see his love for you! You adore your daddy! Every step he takes you are watching. You love to wrestle with him and nobody does it quite like him. We laugh at you all the time. You have brought more strength to our marriage and love for each other. We absolutely adore you!

We are so proud of you and so excited for everyday we have together. I pray that you will find God early and live a life of adventure chasing after Him. I pray that you will dream big dreams and chase after them. I pray that you will always have confidence in the way God made you and use the gifts that are in you. You are already such a joyful child!

We love you August Henry Bush and are so thankful for the last 9 months!!!

ONE bag left!!

Alright crazy kids- ONE bag left! Who wants her??

$40- Great size and oh so cute! Anybody need a last min Mother’s Day gift??

Help us reach our goal!

Hello all! A few woman and I recently hosted a purse party in support of the woman’s program from Heartline in Haiti. We started off with 20 purses and our goal was to send NONE of them back!! We have just a few left and I was wondering if you guys can help us get them sold so we can send money instead of the actual purses back! We have just a couple of days before we have to turn the money in. These are the pics of the purses that are left. If you like one of them please email me at: marisjbush@gmail.com. We don’t want to send back any of them! Please let us know quickly!

These purses support women in Haiti and provide for their families! This is a direct way to minister to them. I am also still collecting ANY material, thread and upholstery fabric you may have to send to them. Anything helps!

These 3 bags are $45 and I would buy everyone of them if I could. They are so cute!

#1 – $45.00 SOLD!!!

#2 – $45.00- SOLD!!

#3 – $45.00 SOLD!!!

#4 – $40

#5 – $35-  SOLD!!

If any of you would like to repost this blog on your own blog that would be great!

ONE LEFT!

Guess who is 7 months old today?

Buddies!

Look at those sweet eyes!

This is one of my favorites!

August and Eli- you are almost 7 months old!! Time has gone by so fast!

Raising children in “safety”- what does God say?

My friend Kimberly just wrote an amazing blog about raising children in a “safe” environment. I have LOVED watching them parent their children and have already learned so much. I love her warning to us as parents about the advice we are given from those who have great intentions but may not be pushing us to where God wants us to be sometimes. Read more from her point of view here.

Raising girls

Obviously I have no idea on how to raise a girl, let alone a boy because mine is only 6 months old! I am teaching a 4&5 year old class at a church on Wednesdays. I am really starting to notice a huge difference between my boys and girls. The boys in my class will play with anyone. They don’t care if they have never met each other  before- as long as they want to play trucks, blocks or anything for that matter they are all in. I have noticed a HUGE difference in the girls. The girls really stick  to one friend. Its almost like they are secure when that friend is there and insecure when they are not. Its actually like pulling teeth to get them to play with anyone else besides that one friend. As long as they are accepted by one person they seem to be comfortable. I have no idea really what makes boys secure. It just really seems that friends are what make the girls secure. I can totally see this with girls the older they get. If this theory were true- how scary is that? I don’t want my daughter to continue down a path of always seeking her worth and acceptance from friends. Friends change. They move, they find new friends, they have good days and they have bad days. I want her to put her security in the Gospel. It never changes. It never has good days or bad. It will never leave her. It will take her through very hard times but in the end will be the rock she stands on to get through those hard times.

Any thoughts on raising girls or boys?

What do boys seem to put their security in?