Christmas is full of remembered trauma for our family. For many kids who come from hard places, not every memory is explicit, but there a...

I don’t think it’s accidental that we celebrate Advent and Jesus’ birth at this time of year. It’s a dark season. We’re quickly approachi...

2020 is the year that all of the Slagell girls got combat boots. Yes, it's trendy. Yes, it's completely within our preferred style vibe. ...

For a person who has based the bulk of her internal value system on this particular word for over a decade, hope and I have had a real re...

Do you all know about Advent? It’s my favorite season of the year. The four weeks before Christmas where we spend our time and energy get...

This quarantine started with tears for me. Grief over what I sensed instinctively was coming, particularly for my high school senior. Wor...

When we began fostering, I thought that every child that entered our home would stay forever. We got into this to expand our family, and w...

This past year, in a hard and painful but right-for-right-now decision, we let our license as a foster care home expire. We spent the who...

I’ve heard and seen most of the anecdotes and memes the internet has to offer regarding this particular topic. Ones like this: “I followe...

On a June evening, five years ago, we sat in an ER room with our youngest, just a year old, and we were not certain she was actually goin...

Advent is my favorite season of the year. Not Christmas. Advent: those four Sundays preceding Christmas. Advent comes from the Latin word...

I’ve always been a words girl - taping index cards of poetry and verses and phrases up all over my house. Most of my wall-hangings have w...

Being licensed foster parents for ten years and adoptive parents for eight of those years has taught us a few things. We frequently get a...

So you’re like, just a stay-at-home mom? It wasn’t the first time I’d gotten that question, and it won’t be the last, I’m sure. Truth be ...

On a winter’s day this year, I logged on to my computer to check my eldest daughter’s recent team roster to see if I remembered any of th...

My oldest daughter, due to a variety of known and as of yet unknown issues, has been recommended for a root canal. Our dentist pled incap...

Ten years ago, I opened this space with the intent of making it a record of the time we spent in the world of foster care. I called it Ex...