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Posts Tagged ‘Avonlea’

When God Seems Silent

Posted in Adoption, Parenting - Raising Wee Men, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 27, 2025| Leave a Comment »

Yet he did not waver through disbelief in the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God. ~Romans 4:20 BSB

Over forty years I have waited. And maybe it’s not as many years as ninety-year-old Sarai waited for her child, but some days it feels as long, and still I wait. On my knees I have pleaded, wept, and wrestled with God over his decision not to give me a baby daughter. After four difficult deliveries with my wonderful sons, we decided to adopt—a baby girl as young as possible! I was in disbelief, and so excited. But something nagged at my soul, and though I knew what a dream I was giving up, we decided instead to add to our family a teenage daughter who was in danger of aging out. We felt called, we obeyed, yet her brokenness brought brokenness to us all, and for years it was a struggle.

When I felt at last a healing in my heart, and when the memory of the labor pains I’d endured had become fuzzy in my mind, I thought perhaps God might yet bless us with a child, naturally. But after years of stress and not understanding what my body had been shouting at me, I needed physical healing, too. And so there were years of going to extreme lengths to bring down the inflammation and grow strong. So many doctors. So many needles. So many pills. So much changing of the way I did life. Still, month after month, no baby came. And slowly, slowly, I thought of adoption again. Because God still called to me, and I did not yet feel done being a mama to wee ones–and had not stopped yearning for that baby daughter. Two children, I felt in my heart this time, if God wanted it so. But on a list I saw three siblings, with the youngest but 6 months old (a rarity in international adoption). John felt the same about them, and once more we started on the long journey of paperwork required for such a thing. Again, I was so excited, so in disbelief that these children might be mine! Those little faces! I poured over them 1,000 times a day.

And it seems from the beginning that nothing has gone right. Unexplained delays from our agency. Online scammers that took our money and our time as we tried to collect different documents.  And then, then—right when our dossier was across the world, ready to be submitted to the foreign government at last—we discovered our agency lost accreditation. This meant finding a new agency and beginning much of the process again. We wrestled with our agency for the return of our dossier, and once it had been flown back across the ocean and returned to us at last, I was able to mail it to our new agency . . . only for it to be lost this past week in the mail. Fifty-two dollars I paid to have it guaranteed overnight, and the Post Office said it was delivered, left outside, yet the agency searched and searched, and it was no where to be found.

I cried. I felt numb. And if I’m honest, I wanted to numb myself to God, as well. Cross my arms, and avert my gaze, and keep silent in my prayers. After all, a year of calling out to Him day after day for speed, and favor, and blessing on our adoption hadn’t done much good. Wasn’t He best kept far away? Far away, like David kept the Ark of the Covenant away. He hadn’t been best pleased with the way God handled Uzzah after he’d reached out to stop the Ark from falling. And I wasn’t best pleased with the way God was handling our adoption. But I saw, and was reminded what happened after that–the homes where David sent the Ark became richly blessed (2 Samuel 6:1-12). Those homes that held the symbol of God’s holy presence. David finally realized that even when we don’t understand what God is doing, even when we hurt, even when it seems He’s made a mistake, even when we’re angry at Him, closeness to God is always best. In his presence, is where we will always be most blessed.

I remembered, too, Sarai, who’s name became Sarah as representative of God’s covenant, and her place as the mother of nations. God had made Abraham a promise—his children would outnumber the stars! And Sarai had laughed, had doubted. Even then, God held to His promise and gave a son. “Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed . . . and was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God” (Romans 4:18, 20). God has not promised me another child. I don’t know His plans for the next year of my life. But I do know He has promised to never leave me (Hebrews13:5). The Amplified Bible puts it,

“I will never [under any circumstances] desert you [nor give you up nor leave you without support, nor will I in any degree leave you helpless], nor will I forsake or let you down or relax My hold on you [assuredly not]!

I can’t tell you how it has hurt to watch those babies grow a year older, so far from the circle of my arms. Still, like Abraham, I hope against all hope. But no matter the end result, I am choosing to stay right here in the circle of my Father’s arms, knowing He will see me through, knowing there is no better place to be. 

Avonlea xo

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Jane Austen, Sanditon & the Real Dido Belle

Posted in Books!, Jane Austen, Period Dramas, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 19, 2021| 5 Comments »

Romantic as they seem to us modern folk, stage coaches and sailing ships and horses weren’t the fastest or easiest way to travel the world–nor were they something that everyone in Jane Austen’s England could afford. Unless you were a sailor, a soldier, or a diplomat, you likely spent most of your life in The British Isles. Many never left the county or shire where they were born, and spent their lives with the people in their village. That’s why so much hubbub and excitement ensued when a new teacher, or minister, or peddler arrived in town–or when the gentlefolk from London came to stay at their country estates (we readers and watchers of period dramas could give you plenty of examples here!). Even if you were among the very privileged English youth who took the Grand Tour of Europe, you weren’t as likely to come into contact with non-Europeans. Many parts of the world were yet undiscovered by the West, or were shut away from outsiders, and so it wasn’t often that people saw–much less interacted with–people who looked different from themselves. It’s not like today, where most of us can freely explore almost every corner of our beautiful earth, and where we come in contact with people of different ethnicities and cultures almost every day–if not in real life, than on the Internet or TV.

The Cast of Sanditon

Sadly, the African slave trade was still in existence during Austen’s time, and it was this evil practice that brought many from the African continent into contact with Europeans. Much of this contact was in the Caribbean, where some British had plantations. In my post Jane Austen and Slavery I explored the abolitionists that Austen knew or admired, and the way she raised awareness of slavery in her book Mansfield Park (did you know there are three film adaptations?!). From Austen’s prayers, we can assume she held to the Christian faith–or at least held to the Christian belief that we are ALL descended from Adam and Eve, and therefore all created in the image of God. Not only did she point out the evils of slavery in Mansfield Park, in her unfinished book Sanditon, she went a step further by including a black character, Georgiana Lambe. Georgiana’s father was a plantation owner, and her mother was originally a slave. But now the young heiress has been taken from sunny Antigua and placed in England, in the care of Sidney Parker (heroine Charlotte Heywood’s love interest). In the mini series adaptation of Sanditon, Georgiana (Crystal Clarke) isn’t happy with her situation. But some good things do come from her stay in England–the friendship that forms between Georgiana and Charlotte (Rose Williams) . . . and a little romance, which Charlotte helps Georgiana keep secret from Sidney (Theo James).

Heiress Georgiana Lambe & Charlotte Heywood
Georgiana & sweetheart, Otis

Jane Austen sadly passed away before completing Sanditon, so we don’t know how the book would have been received at the time. But I couldn’t help but recognize the similarities between the fictional Georgiana and the real life woman, Dido Elizabeth Belle, whose story is told in the 2013 movie, Belle. I love searching for connections between fiction and real life! Could Austen have heard of–or even known someone who met–the real Dido Belle? Dido was the illegitimate daughter of a Royal Naval officer, John Lindsay, and a young black woman named Maria Bell, who was a slave on a Spanish ship that was captured by Lindsay. Their daughter, Dido, was eventually taken to England and put in the care of her great-uncle, William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield, to be raised on his estate in north London. It’s been speculated that Jane Austen intentionally chose Mansfield as the name of the estate and title of her book, Mansfield Park, in which she addresses slavery. Perhaps with the way her character Georgiana’s life resembles Dido’s, Austen also intended to make connections between the two women.

Dido & Elizabeth, Belle (2013)

As a woman of mixed ethnicity, Dido (Belle), like the fictional Georgiana, faced challenges in English society. The film explores some of the coldness and even open hostility that Dido likely had to endure, even as the niece of a powerful and wealthy man. But she was raised with a cousin, Lady Elizabeth Murray, and the two seem to have been best friends. One of the wonderful things left from this relationship is the painting we have of the two young women. Today, the painting hangs at Scone Palace in Scotland, which I visited many times when I lived there. If only I’d paid more attention!

Portrait of Dido & Elizabeth
Portrait of Dido & Elizabeth as portrayed in the movie

As Austen only wrote about 20,000 words of Sanditon, we don’t know exactly what she had planned for the life of Georgiana Lambe. Many have continued the work as they thought it should go, beginning with Jane’s niece, Anna LeFroy, who claimed to have discussed the novel with Austen (though Anna wrote quite a lot, she sadly didn’t finish the story). And of course producer Andrew Davies (Screenwriter for Pride & Prejudice, 1995) continued the story as he thought it should go in the 2019 miniseries, Sanditon. There, Sidney, who believes Otis is a no-good fortune hunter, seems to succeed in separating him from Georgiana. In the film, Belle, we also see Dido being pursued by fortune hunters.

Dido and suitor Oliver Ashford (James Norton)
Dido & John Davinier

While we don’t know Davies’ future plans for Sanditon Season 2, and the rest of Miss Lambe’s story, we do know that Dido fell in love and married a Mr. John Davinier, who–from what we can gather–truly cared for her. While the film portrays him as a minister and abolitionist, he was in fact a Steward for a wealthy employer. Dido was left with a modest inheritance from her father and uncle, and the two must have lived in relative comfort. They had 3 sons. Much like Jane Austen, Dido passed away in her early 40s. But for those years she had with her husband and children, I hope she was happy. I hope Andrew Davies will give Georgiana a happy ending, too. Jane Austen insisted that all her heroines have a happy ending, and so I really feel he must!

Have you seen the miniseries Sanditon or the film Belle? Did you notice any similarities between them? How do you think the story will end for Miss Lambe? Belle is the final film in my Countdown to Spring Weekend Movie Pick 🌷 – Find Happy Little Sigh on Facebook, Instagram, or MeWe for the complete list of 26 favorite period drama films!!!

Avonlea x

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Happy Little Sigh

Finding beauty in the everyday ❤

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It’s One of Those (London) Days

Posted in Beautiful Places, Misty British Isles, Parenting - Raising Wee Men, The Royals, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on January 9, 2018| 2 Comments »

The London days are the worst. That feeling I wake with, or that settles over me in the almost twilight of an afternoon, to be somewhere exotic yet familiar. Buzzing with activity, yet gracefully weathering the passage of time. Somewhere able to give me the rough grittiness of ancient castle stone and surround me with the intoxicating fumes of a double decker bus. Somewhere with all the imagined romance of a Charles Dickens novel, all the contemporary romance of William and Kate. Somewhere that can always give you a hot cup of tea, a good deal on a new pair of shoes, and a crisp set of white sheets at the end of the day. London.

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It’s hard, you know, when you’ve been to a city like that. Especially when you’ve been enough times that you begin to find your favorite haunts, your favorite stops on the tube, but where the scenery is still something like a living painting, dazzling before your eyes.

I get other sorts of days, too. Florence days, where I long for the lazy air of a sun-drenched piazza, pistachio ice cream dripping down the cone and over my hand, though I’m glorying too much in the beauty of it all to notice. Edinburgh days, when I ache for Princes Street, and shortbread, and hearts, dear hearts of friends.

But there is something about the otherworldliness of London that can catch like a gasp in my throat, and I have to breathe it out. Breathe it all out.

Because it took a million miracles to get us here. Here, in this little yellow house in the country in the middle of America. At the edge of the river and the edge of a town founded when America was still quite new. Here, where I wake and breathe in the now of my life.

Most of those miracles passed by unnoticed, like most every moment of an ordinary day.

A few of them seemed more like tragedies than miracles at the time. That house in the city. The break-ins, where they took so much, and yet left so much pain and fear and those awful dreams. The bat in our bedroom. The garbage. And the bugs.

And then there were those events that came about in such strange, unexpected ways that we had to look at each other, my husband and I, and we just knew. This house, which seemed a half-decade or more away, was scrolled past on the computer just for fun one Wednesday night. We didn’t know the thieves were coming that Sunday while we sat learning, praising, smiling in church. That we’d come home to find they’d been in our room—just there beside the bed, rummaging through the drawers and taking that pocket watch I bought him for our first anniversary. And the money and the phones, and worst of all the computers with the pictures of our babies and all those files of my research and words, lost. We didn’t know, and it seemed like the worst thing ever, and we didn’t know why.

Looking back, it seems as strange as ever. But so does this house. Six minutes from my mother, and six years earlier than we thought we’d be here. An empty house. Just waiting.

And then there are our neighbors—kinder, and with more joy and home-baked cookies than we know what to do with, and it feels like they’d been waiting. Just for us.

That night they came for dinner and I heard the story about the truck crash that ripped the top off the trailer like a tin of sardines and yet left their five-year-old son curled up behind the seat fast asleep. That night I felt it heavy upon us. That miracle. That grace.

And I could go on and say more about our baby. Our silky-soft butterball of a baby boy who joined our family in December. I call him Wonderbaby. Did a child ever laugh so much? I prayed over him, prayed over my stomach that God would give me a child of peace. And He did. Wonder.

 

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But I couldn’t see it all so clearly, wouldn’t treasure it so dearly, if I hadn’t first stood drenched, umbrella-less in the torrential rain that lifted us up and floated us here.  Here, to this house and this place in our lives. Here, where our hearts are full of love for our children, and for every hurting person who has known our pain and worse. Here, where we’ve dropped everything else and our arms are empty as we go running through fields in the gleaming sunlight to Him.

These are the days I’ll want back. These days of wonder and want. Of nappies and sticky hands. Of gifted dandelions, and legos, and laundry, endless laundry.  Of never, ever enough sleep, and staggering from bed to lift my smallest one and tuck him close so he can drink.

London can wait. We’ll take them one day, our boys, and show them where the Queen lives, and that roaring T-Rex robot in the V & A. And we’ll have our cream teas, and it will be grand.* But for now, here, where we live and breathe today, I’ll show them the wonder. The miracle of a God who doesn’t stop loving, who doesn’t stop thinking of them as if it’s just them. For every glimpse I’ve gotten, I want them to see more.

Certificate of Completion (1)

It took a million miracles to get us here. And for all the days we have to come, however many that will be, whether they are London days or laundry days, I want to live them with my eyes open to it all. To every miracle. Every gift.

Avonlea xo

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Finding beauty in the everyday ❤

*This post was originally written in 2013. The very next year, we did go to London, and these photos are from that trip.

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