Springtime

english below

Nach einem harten 6tägigen Winter ist nun der Frühling eingekehrt. Während ich diese Zeilen um 10 Uhr abends schreibe, ist es draussen immer noch fast 20 Crad Celsius. Die Kinder haben heute eine spontane Badesession eingelegt. Tausende von Vögeln sind in den letzten Tagen zurück gekommen. Manchmal erheben sie sich alle auf einmal in die Lüfte und fliegen wie eine dicke schwarze Wolke über unser Haus und machen einen Riesenlärm. Für die jenigen von uns, die nicht Hitchcock geschädigt sind, ist das ein sehr überwältigend schönes Erlebnis.
Die Luft ist so sommerlich und die Grillen sind so laut. Was sich bei uns in mehrere Wochen nach und nach aufbaut, erscheint hier über Nacht. Texas ist also nicht nur sehr gross, sondern auch sehr schnell.

English:
After a hard winter seasons (6 days in a row;-)) spring arrived around us. As i am writing this at 10pm we still have 70 C° outside.
The Kids had a spontaneous swimming session in the lake today.
Thousands of birds came back within the last days. Sometimes they all fly off together and pass our house like a thick black cloud. For those of us who are not too Hitchcock influenced that is a pretty beautiful experience. The air smells like summer and the crickets are so noisy. What develops slowly within several weeks in countrys we are used to comes from one day to another in Texas. So Texas is not only big, but also very quick.

fosterkidsplaydate

Our last fosterkidsplaydate has been so intense and so beautiful.
God had continually put it on my heart to have a lot of structure and a lot of rules in those fun 2 hours we spend together every other saturday, even though it´s sometimes so hard. We had several situations were we were tempted as a team to give in and have it as our only goal to keep those kids happy for the time they are with us and to avoid any kind of major conflict.
Especially last saturday. So many kids were not acting accordingly. We had have several time- outs already. And than came Dan (name changed). This cute 8 year old boy just dropped himself in the middle of the classroom, in the middle of the story time. I interrupted the story and asked him to come back into the group but he didn´t react. As i told him he has to go into time out if he is not willing to come back into the group, he crawled under a shelf and clung tight to it. There was no way for us to carry him out of the room. He was too strong. I tried to win this conflict with all kinds of warnings and threats until i realised what it was all about. I leaned over him and whispered into his ear: "Dan, we care about you. We do love you and we want the best for you. Do you trust us? Do you believe that there are people who care about you?" After talking to him like that for a while, i sensed that a battle started within this little child, who had been let down so often already. Should he trust again? Should he make himself vulnerable? Should he allow himself to give and receive love? Should he take the risk to care about others and about himself? As i continued to whisper into his ear, his little body began to shiver and finally he let go of the shelf and jumped into my arms. This was such an intense moment for both of us. I know that he felt the same way. We had gained a victory.... together!
And this was my great lesson for that day: If we take Kids into our homes that had experienced any kind of trauma, we have to expect that they will struggle immensely. They will struggle to love, to hope, to dream, to feel.... and we have to accompany them in those battles. And we have to gain victory.... together.
As we are getting to know more and more fosterfamilies here in the area, i am so immensely proud of those families that sacrifice so much of their comfortable home to restore hope and love and peace in those shuttered souls. Have you ever considered restoring a life?

Houston im Ausnahmezustand

Eine Kaltfront hat Houston erreicht und Houston ist im Ausnahmezustand. All unsre Termine, Veranstaltungen und Jobs in den letzten Tagen wurden abgesagt. Die Strassen sind gesperrt. Nichts geht mehr. Wir geniessen die Ruhe in unsrer gemütlich warmen Scheune.
Wir können uns nicht beschweren;-)