Brought to you by Milton Bradley

Today I played Chutes and Ladders with Owen and William and it made me think about the chutes I have slid down and the ladders I have climbed in the last year. This Thursday will mark one year since our house fire. The fire was both a chute and a ladder. At the top of the chute- a house on fire, and at the bottom- the complete upheaval of my family and our plans to adopt. But it was also the tallest ladder on my 2011 game board with the house fire at the bottom and our survival at the top.

This weekend, I must complete financially accounting for the over 1100 items that were lost in the fire. Working on this list has been a part-time job, especially this week,  and I'm happy to climb the ladder and see it end. But, darn, today it brought some chutes. I realized that everything left on the list were the baby things - the crib mattress, the boppy pillow, all of our baby board books. And perhaps the hardest thing for me was a necklace that listed my children's names and a medal of St. Gerard Majella, the patron saint of mothers. I loved that necklace but I have held off purchasing a new one because I thought I would be ordering one with 4 names on it.

The logistics of this list is that we can receive the full replacement cost if we buy the item or a depreciated amount if we don't and since our 11-year old crib mattress wouldn't be worth much and we hope to need one soon, today we bought a crib mattress for a baby we are still dreaming of. In true 6-year old style, William voiced what the rest of us were thinking "what will we do with the mattress if the baby never comes?"

I guess we'll just keep moving forward in the game, with its unexpected highs and lows, trying to see all of our chutes as ladders and all of our unfulfilled dreams as God's plan for something bigger.