Buried in the (over)loaded suitcase in my dining room is something I’m pretty excited about.
Having seen how deep breathing and stretching helps our littlest learn how to relax and regulate, I wanted to take something to China this time to help the little ones there do a little bit of this…and maybe their caregivers too.
There’s a story behind the story…as their always is. There’s a boy at the orphanage only a little younger than my daughter. He can sing songs like a rockstar and thought a video on my phone of Lydia climbing up a pole was downright hilarious. If she were there with me last spring, they would have been buddies. His name means Happy Sun. Her Chinese name means Beautiful Moon.
So, in honor of the sweet ones who wait and the sweet ones who have already come home, the book began.
We’ll try it out on this trip and see what needs to be tweaked in it to make it a more useful tool. I’m hoping it works for them…and I’m hoping the translations are correct.
At least my little Beautiful Moon seems to like it. Clearly, the stretching movement from side to side is a fave–hence the blurry picture.
My dining room has been a storage unit for several weeks now. It felt like an Amazon box arrived daily with some other goodie to add to the growing mountain of supplies. Every time the doorbell rang alerting us to another package at the door, I was celebrating…a celebration that eventually was paired with nail biting as I started to worry about how all these awesome supplies (oh, like over $700 worth!) were going to make it over there. Since I actually do want to take some clothing with me and one team member (a dude, of course) wants to only take a carry-on, I found someone willing to part with an old suitcase and decided I’d make that the supply case and check it under his name.
Can you just admire this for a minute with me?
He was two years old when we first started jamming to what our kids eventually termed “God music.” I had no smart phone then; cds were futuristic in and of themselves. I’d load up our minivan with a toddler, a newborn baby, and my coffee and what seemed like 200 bags of some sort and we’d listen to Him as we went to the grocery store or drove to the playground or made our way to some playgroup or Grandma’s house.
Philip and Jessica Morlan have 5 children, 2 of whom joined their family via adoption. They are passionate about connecting families to Jesus through God’s Word and teaching families how to disciple the children God has placed in their family. Philip is in full-time ministry with Seeds Family Worship as Ministry Director and Family Pastor. Jessica is a home school mom and also works rocks it as the Ministry Coordinator with Seeds Family Worship. And, this March, they are heading up North from their happy place in Tennessee to plant some seeds at Together Called and connect all of us to Jesus through praise and worship.