What NOT to Expect when you're Expecting

Raising a family very well is always what I expected to do. Growing up in a big family of 7 kids/2 parents, and having perfectionist tendencies, I expected I would be a role model for women less blessed with the mothering instincts, home making skills, wisdom and confidence as I. I would be wise about my choice of spouse - he would be educated, have a secure, medium-high paying job and would adore me. We would have 5 children - 2 girls and 3 boys, own a comfortable house in the suburbs, and live a fairly glitch-free life because we would make all the right moral choices. *record scratches abruptly*

Pffft. Ha! As most of us know, life does not always go according to plan. God decided to humble me a bit by sending me 4 boys that were up to the task of being my children. Yeah. FOUR......boys. Four beautiful, fair-skinned boys with dark locks and eyes of blue and green that elicit verbal expressions of admiration from older girls and mothers where 'er we go. But, four boys who present both constant and new challenges to their mother and father every day. Three of our four boys, to our dismay, were born with or developed "issues" that make life difficult, very difficult, for them to deal with people and the world around them in a typical way.

For our boys, having a mother that is a perfectionist that fell into depression from the stress of things not going her way and a father who often feels like a deer in headlights because of the unusual things that come up in our family that he just doesn't know how to handle, doesn't make life any easier. Though I read all the popular books on what to expect when beginning to raise a family, the roller coaster ride that is raising this family has been been both unexpected and incredibly humbling. It's been crushing really, but we are beginning to be take a much more down to earth approach to being parents now. This down to earth approach has begun to help and heal our family and we are better than we started out. This blog documents the journey - past, present, and future - of our mission, as we have chosen it, to grow boys.