The answer to frustration

As I have mentioned, I’ve been really looking forward to making progress on The House of Goodwill.  There is so much that needs to be done to set it up to be an airbnb: yardwork, painting, cleaning, installing a fence and having a dock built.  And I continue to be frustrated in my attempts to move forward.

Every week for a month, I’ve been expecting to spend most of my week at The House of Goodwill.  The house is two hours away from my home/house, not a bad drive at all.  Every week we need to come back for a few days to retrieve mail, mow the lawn (my son also does the neighbor’s), get allergy shots and take/drop off our foster kids for their family visitations.

But for different reasons, we keep having to spend the bulk of our week at our home/house.

This week, it’s for my son’s graduation.  (A very good reason!)  Despite COVID, there will be an actual graduation ceremony, and my parents are flying in to town to attend.

Because of our work on The House of Goodwill (not to mention the full-time foster parent job that I thought was ending two weeks ago), our home/house has not been able to receive much attention.  (Translation: it’s a huge mess that I wasn’t planning on addressing until fall, when the other house is completed and the foster kids are gone.)

We had to leave The House of Goodwill on a Wednesday (I had just finished my five day/one room painting project) because I had two foster kid doctor appointments on Thursday at home.  I realized there was no point in returning to The House of Goodwill over the weekend, as I’d only have a day or two before I’d have to come back here again to tackle getting my home/house ready for my parent’s visit and graduation festivities.

So when I left The House of Goodwill, I realized I would not be back for about 10 more days.

So much for progress.

God really, really, really wants me to develop patience.

If nothing else, foster parenting has taught me to really let go of my own agenda.  I can focus on my frustration, or (try) to let it go and let what will be, be.

I saw this quote by Joyce Meyer in Guideposts magazine this month, and it hit me perfectly:

So I got up at the crack of dawn yesterday, put my best attitude of patience on, and took the foster kids to their (three hour!) semi-annual physical at the health department.

They made the three-year-old wear a mask (due to COVID); this did not start our (three hour!) visit off well.  He cried and cried because he had to wear a mask; the two-year-old cried and cried because he was too young to wear one.

(And this was BEFORE the screaming/crying/thrashing that came from having blood drawn, getting multiple shots and having instruments stuck in their mouths and ears.)

 

I think this photo pretty much sums it up

Patience.

Thank you God that my son made it to graduation!  Thank you for family visits.  Thank you for my (two) houses to clean and take care of.  Thank you for the foster kids.  Thank you for it all.

Trust (and thanksgiving) are the answers to frustration.  Thank you, Joyce, for the reminder.