No toys

Wow ... Has it really been two and half months since our last blog post?? Time has been both crawling and flying. We are settling into life with four kids and emerging from the bubble that seems to come with every new baby. Kyler is sleeping better (I sure hope I didn't just jinx it) which makes life for all of us much more pleasant. Praise Jesus!

I haven't written a post about parenting before, because frankly, parenting is overwhelming ... I feel like I never quite get it right ... I'm never quite where I want to be in this whole parenting thing. But, I have been learning and observing and I am blown away by my girls lately.

About a year and a half ago, I read a blog written by this mom who had recently taken away all of her kids toys. She was tired of cleaning them up so she took them away. All of them. Say what? I thought she must be insane ... I mean, did she want her kids to ever play by themselves? Or get along? Or survive? I thought to myself that I would NEVER be able to do that. I judged her. Ha.

I have said to Peter a few times in the last three months how much I don't want to judge other people and the choices they make, especially in their parenting ... Every single time I have judged someone else and how they parent, I have found myself doing the exact same thing at some point down the road. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. The Lord must just chuckle when He sees me, my judgy (is that even a word?) thoughts, and the future because He just knows what is to come.

Anyways, when we moved to Honduras we got rid of a lot of toys. A lot. But, we still brought some. I wanted the girls to be able to feel at home when we arrived and so I brought the things that they loved the most - dress ups, books, dolls, and a few stuffed animals. I am glad we did that because I really think it helped them with the transition. But lately, I have become so sick of cleaning up toys and asking for them to clean up toys that I did the same thing. I packed up all of their toys and put them away. Everything except for books went up and away in the closet. And, you know what? That mom whose blog I read was a genius. My girls were upset at first, but other than the initial push back, they haven't noticed. They have been playing outside, playing in their room, and actually figuring out how to get along. They have been so much more creative and have been working out arguments among themselves so much better. I am loving seeing their creativity. Today, they have made tents and explored outside. They made a "fire pit" and a talking circle. It has only been a week since we made this change, but I couldn't be happier. I am interested to see if there are other changes in them as time goes on.

Today, I am impressed with and thankful for simplicity. Sometimes the simple life is more difficult and challenging, but I am learning to be grateful for it and to take joy in it. Today, I am thanking God for how He works and what He is teaching me through the lives of my girls. (I'm also trying hard to decrease the judgments that I make today knowing that soon they will come back to get me ;). )

Tent time! 

They found the rocks, the sticks, the chairs, and the towels from around our house to make their very own fire pit :)

- Katie

She's Here!

We are excited to announce the arrival of our daughter, Kyler Seraphim Stockton. She has been such a joy. We are so grateful that the Lord blessed us with another little life. Adjusting to life with four has been, honestly, a bit overwhelming, but we are slowly figuring out our new normal. The other girls are smitten with their new sister and continually beg to hold her and love on her.

While we were in Phoenix, we had the opportunity to have our pics taken by an incredible photographer, Mel Bosna of Lulliloo Photography. My sister-in-law entered an online contest that Mel was offering for a free mini-session. My sister-in-law won and then gifted it to me as an early Christmas present because she knows that I love Mel's work. What a fun gift! And even more fun that we got to have them taken after Kyler had arrived so they are of our new family of six.

Thank you so much, Lulliloo Photography, for having a giveaway and capturing our family so well :) And thanks, Kimber, for such a fun Christmas gift :)

The Insignificant Things

Have you ever noticed that life is hard? Peter and I have been talking so much about this lately. It seems that no matter where we go, who we meet, or who we talk to, life is hard. It doesn't seem to matter what kind of background people come from. Rich, poor, Honduran, American ... life is hard and it hurts. The cause of the pain and the pain itself may look different, but the pain and the difficulty is there everywhere I turn.

Here in Honduras we see so much extreme poverty and so much death. It can feel overwhelming at times. For me, my role in this poverty can be confusing. How am I to help the community? What can I do to truly ease the pain? Anything? Nothing? At times, it feels that the weight of the poverty and desperation I see all around me is resting on my shoulders.

Today I went down to the hospital to have lunch with Peter. When I was there, I saw a mom who had her baby with her: a baby that obviously had some type of disability. The baby was large yet unable to move correctly. The mom seemed to be struggling to hold the baby. She was poor. She was there alone. Hurt radiated from her. I didn't know what to do or how to help. I felt powerless. At the time, my own baby was screaming bloody murder, so I needed to get home. I prayed for her and her baby and asked the Lord to give me another chance to talk with her, to minster to her. And then I drove home, IN MY CAR, to a beautiful house that has electricity, a clean bathroom, and a kitchen full of food. Yes, we have sacrificed to live in Honduras, but still we have so much. And I prayed, Lord, why me? Why was I born into the family that I was? Why was I born into the opportunity that I was? Why not that mom? Why not her baby?

"To him who has been given much, much will be required." And I think, the Lord is requiring a lot from me. But, just because he is requiring a lot from me, does not mean that I know what He is asking. I am not someone who feels like I hear the Lord speaking to me very often. But, I do know that the more I listen and free myself from distraction, the more I feel His gentle promptings throughout the day. I don't often feel a strong sense of a big vision or direction that He is leading. Usually it is just a small promoting or feeling that He wants me to act, a person he wants me to reach out to: to give food, to write an email, to give a hug, to offer a smile.

I am not a naturally extroverted or overly-friendly person (if you didn't know who was writing this post, now you know it's Katie :) ) so these small things often feel huge to me. It is hard for me to reach out, hard for me to lead, hard for me to initiate, especially with someone I don't know well. Usually the Lord and I have a conversation about how I don't want to do whatever he is asking, he continues to prompt and so I obey. I doubt his ability or desire to use me so much of the time. And often the things that He asks of me seem so insignificant. I pray and trust that He knows better than I do, that He will take my "insignificant" efforts and make them significant.

And as much as I hate and don't understand the poverty and the hurting, I am choosing today to obey, to help, to reach out, and be Jesus in whatever small ways I can. The things that I am doing will not right the injustices that I see or take away pain and poverty, but I'm praying that He will take the small and insignificant things and make them significant.


- Katie

Run Over By a Bus

It started out like any normal clinic day. I ride my motorcycle down the hill, search for a pen in my Consulta (clinic room), and look over the patient charts on my desk. I see several of my patients throughout the morning, and Katie comes down the hill to have lunch with me like normal. When we finish lunch and I'm walking Katie to the car, I see a commotion at the front of the hospital. People begin running towards the front of the hospital where a big school bus, painted Honduran Blue, pulls up to our front door. Several men jump out and carry a young man several feet onto a stretcher where he is unceremoniously dropped. I tell Katie I won't be home for a while.
The patient is screaming and rolls over to reveal a gaping hole in his right low back which spills out a wave of dark maroon blood onto the floor. The nurses start yelling and pushing him toward the emergency room. Once we reach the emergency room we find out he has been run over by the same bus that dropped him off; he dropped his cell phone, fell out of the bus trying to retrieve it, took an unfortunate bounce and the rear tires rolled over him. He is breathing well and talking coherently now but pale as glass of milk in Antarctica.
We quickly begin resuscitating the patient and activate our walking blood bank. One of our fine emergency doctors here, Abby Miknaitis, saw how hypotensive the patient was and combined a bed sheet and part of a crutch into a life saving pelvic binder which slowed his internal bleeding and saved his life.  We began preparations for massive transfusion of blood and we found out the patient had the fairly rare blood type of B+. Christine Bell, our lab manager, had been in on her day off and began taking units of blood from known B+ missionaries as well as calling local people to come donate; her timely efforts saved his life. Abby, Mark Merritt, and myself all were able to give whole blood to my patient immediately. Our surgeon Dr McKenney was able to whisk the patient to the operating room to control his internal bleeding and use screws to try to partially reconstruct his decimated pelvic bones. I counted seven fractures in his pelvis.
The first few days were touch and go for him but God had a plan for this young man. Everyday when I round on him, I call him by his new name Alex Milagro (Alex the miracle). Please pray for him as he has many months ahead of him until he is able to walk and has many complications which can still occur. Alex had multiple lethal injuries and I was able to watch from the front row as God orchestrated his survival.  Give God the glory and watch and see what He does with this young man's life because God had miracles lined up and waiting.

If you get run over by a bus, this is the crew you want to work on you. 

Bag of Peter's blood that was being transfused into the patient. 

- Peter

Picture Update

We thought you might like to see an update of what the girls have been up to last couple of months in pictures. We are so grateful for your hand in making it possible for us to live and work in Honduras. God is at work, moving and changing lives, including ours!

They LOVE playing in the rain … which is good because it rains A LOT!

We found stuff to make a flag cake for July 4th! Kenna had been requesting it and she was so excited!

We have sooooo many bugs at our house, of all types. These pictures of our the ants that have invaded off and off over the past month of living in this house. Yes, that big pile is all dead ants. 

They love to read! And we love seeing them all snuggled up together reading.

We found water colors in town … the girls had been begging to paint … I think they liked it :)

Pictures out the window driving into town to get groceries … it takes us about 1.5 hours to get to the grocery every week - 3 hours round trip.

It is so HOT where we are … The girls often sit out in front of our house in our "pool", aka bucket :) On this day, Koley was singing with the toucans in the nearby tree.

 The engine on our car quit working this month, so Kinzie was getting rides with Peter to school. She doesn't mind at all.

Kenna dislocated and fractured her elbow earlier this month. She was happy once she had a cast and ice cream :)

Thanks for being a part of our lives! We are grateful for you!!

Community

Since we decided to follow the Lord's call to Honduras, I had been told by many different people that the hardest thing about being a missionary is the other missionaries with whom you are serving. Honestly, this seemed a little crazy to me. I thought: How is that possible? These are people that are also called to be here in this place, at this time, just like I am. Though we may be very different people, we are all believers and hand-picked by God to be here at the same time. It can't be that bad, right?

When Peter was in medical school, we had the opportunity to travel to Kenya and work at Kijabe, a mission hospital there. It was a hard two months, but really good at the same time. One of the things I said walking away from those months was that I felt like people there had an opportunity to do community like God has called us to … they lived together, worked together, fellowshipped together … they truly shared life and experienced community. Often in the States, I feel like it is so easy to be an island and to not truly do community. Often, community is spread between so many people (work, church, play, family, etc.) that it can feel hard to really be invested in true community and true relationships, hard to find authenticity and vulnerability. I'm not saying it doesn't exist, but in my experience, its hard to come by and hard to maintain. When we were in Kenya for those two months, it seemed so much easier; I was excited to dive into that type of community in Honduras.

When we arrived in Honduras, all the people we met were so kind. They struck me as people who were seeking to follow the Lord and His calling on their lives. I was excited to live in community and to get to know these people more. I still am. But, you know what? It's hard. Not because of these people; these people are amazing. But, I am forced, on a daily, often moment by moment basis, to be in true community with people. I am forced to be in relationship with people. All the time. Even when I'm cranky. Even when I would rather be left alone. Even when I would rather run away (yes, I tend to be a runner in relationships when things get hard). I see these people at work. At church. At Biblestudy. When I drive into town. When I wake up in the morning. When I have parenting wins. When I have parenting fails. When I am impatient with everyone around me. When I am sad. When I'm happy. When I'm at my best. When I'm at my worst. All the time. We live in community. All the time.

I don't think the hardest thing about being a missionary is the other missionaries. So far, I think one of the hardest thing about being a missionary is being forced to examine myself, how I do relationships and how I do community. It's being forced to be real and vulnerable and to love the people around me even when I don't feel like it. I have to … Talk to people when I don't want to. Confront others when I am frustrated. Apologize and admit when I have been wrong. Forgive and let things go. Support people and be there for them even when I'm exhausted. Love outside of myself. Love like Jesus calls me to love. It's hard. Its good. Its real. Its true. Its rich. Its love. Its community. And it is what God has called me into.

It's hard. Jesus is showing me things about myself that need work. He is showing me how to love better, how to do community and relationships better. He is showing me how to live and love outside of myself. I don't get it right all the time. I don't think I get it right even most of the time. I am grateful for a God who loves me through all of the mess and gives me more grace than I could ever deserve. And I am grateful to be in a place that is teaching me what it truly means to live and love in community.

- Katie

Stockton Baby #4

We are so excited to announce that in September of this year, Stockton baby girl #4 will be joining our family!! We couldn't be happier and more excited to meet her!

We will be coming back to Phoenix for her birth. We arrive in Phoenix in the middle of August and will be staying through the middle of October. We would love to connect with you during this time and to introduce you to the newest member of our family. Thanks so much for being a part of our lives!