Short Post

 I accomplished four doctor appointments today - two in "town" 45 minutes away and two more over an hour away. I then came home to a huge mess, since my children all tend to be little piggies; 30 minutes after walking in the door, there was a remarkable improvement. Since my brain is fried and the crock pot dinner got made but never turned on, I'm concluding early with a few pictures. 

Tori's "Easter" corn-rows - 

"King of the World" (compliments of Burger King) - 

Julia's Plans

 Julia told me that when she grows up, she wants to be a toddler in a tiara. (No, I do not watch, nor endorse that show in any way - in fact I'm in quite anti-beauty pageant all the way around.) This has not detoured Julia in the least from  thinking that it would be the most wonderful thing in the world to tour the beauty pageant circuit. Once her sisters broke it to her that she may not be able to enter as an adult (the youngest she could be since her mother won't let her until then,) she said she would just run the beauty pageant then. 


These pictures are what I got when I got out the camera to take a picture of her new no-top-teeth smile. If you DON'T want a picture like this, you have to coach her to not pose!

(If anyone gets fake tanner around here, it needs to be me after seeing my glowing white legs in yesterday's Easter pictures!)

                                                     Jenny

 

Easter 2012

Happy Easter From our Home to Yours

I didn't realize the camera was on the wrong setting until this morning, so the only egg dying picture that came out from yesterday was this one. 

Gabriel went with his girl-friend, Alayna, to a family reunion this afternoon, so we did our egg hunt this morning before getting ready for church. (A benefit of living in the country is being able to hang around outside in your pajamas!)

Gabriel and Magnum - 

Gabriel and Alayna - 

Julia lost her other front tooth yesterday - 

Day Highlight

 This morning we headed to the Amish to get wood to fix the trailer, plants for the garden and baby chicks. We didn't come home with any baby chicks, but we did come home with this - 

He is a nine week old cross of German Shepherd, Australian Shepherd and a bit of border collie. We had planned on getting a full German Shepherd, but were concerned about the hip problems that often occur, so went with a safer mix. 

The kids were pretty thrilled with him and he seems pretty thrilled with the volume of attention he received today. 

We think his name is Magnum (after the old Magnum P.I. show that JD watches with the kids); here he is with 7 of the 11 kids he will be tasked with caring for.

Quiet

There is plenty going on, but I am taking the advice of a little skunk on Bambi who said, "if you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all." 


So, instead of saying much, I made apple pie. No one complained about my silence then.

Here's an awesome song I've listened to over and over. As much joy as this life can hold, it doesn't feel like home.

New Van, New Chicks and New News!

We picked up our new (to us) van today. It is fairly new, a 2011 and only has 10,000 miles on it. It should last ten years and maybe, just maybe, I won't be forced to drive something quite that enormous at that point. As we stared at it in the dealer parking lot today, we commented that it isn't everyone who rolls into the Ford dealer in a 12 passenger van with the complaint that they have out-grown it! While I searched for the perfect van for the last several weeks, the only thing I asked every dealer was that I wanted one that was NOT white. I don't have anything against the color white, other than there are a hundred of them in my county alone. Of course, I got white - thank you Ford who decided to make 95% of the vans the last few years white. I would like to apologize in advance to the other large families in the county when my children open your side van door and throw in their grassy cleats before they realize that they are at the wrong van! 

We took Julia and Elijah to the dealer today to fill out the paperwork; here they are watching the Chipmunks while they waited. 

Here they are at the opening of the new white van. (I think I'll paint some shooting flames down the side or something.)

Julia found a tree to climb during Dad's last few words with the nice salesman who filled the tank for us before we left.

There she is! I know you are thinking church van, but there are little options for people like us at this point. 

While JD went back to work, the little guys and I hit Tractor Supply for grass seed, lime, chicken feed, (a small cool toy tractor)  - 

AND  six baby Americana chicks. Americanas lay "Easter" eggs that are pretty shades of blue and green. 

We had some chick bonding time before moving them out to the baby cage in the hen house. 
Nothing brings a family together more than baby anything. That long box in the picture is a big sun umbrella I bought at Ikea for the deck - it made a wonderful temporary chick condo. 

So, our exciting new news is that our first trip to Ethiopia for court could be much sooner than I anticipated; it may also be sooner than JD is even able to leave the country since he is in the middle of a re-compete for his job contract. In that case, I will be going without him, with a power of attorney. We are not willing to leave our little girls there any longer than we have to. There will still be a three month wait after our court date until they are cleared to come home, but the sooner the first trip, the sooner the second. 

Super-Girls

 Since I had to cancel the girls and my planned trip to Ikea last week, last night we took the seats out of the van and headed north. Our primary goals were furniture for Alyssa, who sold her antique furniture because she likes the modern look, and a wardrobe for Alei, who just has too many clothes! First thing, we headed to scratch and dent and there were two dressers that we all loved marked half price just because they were displays. We bought them, loaded them in the van and then headed back in. Alyssa was able to also get the vanity that matched the dresser marked down, then she chose a darker night-stand and bookcase. Moriah (who wasn't due anything this trip) lucked out and scored the second half-price dresser. Alei chose a white wardrobe to compliment her current black furniture. 


What surprised me was the girls getting to work this morning building their furniture! Now, I could handle the bookcase, but I wouldn't have attempted the vanity or wardrobe with all the drawer runners. They both did great. It took Alyssa most of the day, but she built all three pieces on her own. 

Alei was smart enough to recruit James for her wardrobe. James is quite gifted in the building department and we all rely on him more and more. It's funny how the human brain is wired because he has always been very interested in building things and now is proving to have absorbed a lot from all those hours he watched JD when he was smaller.

I also spent some time today rearranging some of the other furniture in an effort to make things more organized. Since Alyssa bought a new bookcase, she gave her old one to Alei, who gave her old one to the little girl's room, so I could take their old one and use it in the playroom; it all resulted in a much more organized playroom. Tomorrow, I am planning on moving on to the school room.

Selah's Story

The rhythm (or lack thereof) the last few weeks has made me shake my head a few times and wonder how I'm going to mesh this life with two new children. When JD and I had 13 quiet hours in the car driving to PA and back, one of our conversations ranged on our ages and the volume of small children we are going to have. In fact, at the moment, our youngest are 2, 3, 4, 5 and 7! We have sons that are five months apart and daughters that are 10; adoption has a way of making the impossible possible. While I know there are lots of older people adopting like us, the reality of our ages when our final batch are finishing high-school is hitting me, (it hit JD a long time ago and he has worked through it.) 


When we began our Ethiopian adoption, we asked for siblings and actually did our home study for up to three. We were told siblings were rare and were also told that Ethiopia discourages the adoption of two unrelated children, but makes special cases in the event of special needs. Before we were offered Bella, we had pretty much been scared away from the idea of adopting two unrelated children for the fear of having them on different court schedules that could require four, instead of two, trips to Ethiopia. When we saw God work so obviously in the referral of Bella, we both immediately thought that we needed to re-open the door to a second child. We told the adoption agency that we were open to a second of the same perimeter as the first. We were told that our second child would also have to be paper work ready (most aren't), MOWA (the governing body that handles adoptions in Ethiopia) would have to approve a second unrelated child and they would have to approve us for an 11th child since 10 is Ethiopia's recommended maximum number. There was also only a few weeks to locate a child to keep Isabella's court schedule. We agreed to let the agency look at the different orphanages that they are allowed to place from and all agreed that it would be God's hand if a second child actually was presented. About a month went by when I received a call from our agency that told me that another child had been located. She was in a different region and there were some additional costs to processing in different courts. There are also additional costs to adopting two unrelated children, since Embassy paperwork has to be doubled when they are not biological siblings. We agreed to look at the referral.


I don't know what happened to me at that point, but I realized that I had just landed in a whole new camp in this adoption. While I had a hope of maintaining our current life and just bringing Bella on board, it hit me that bringing two little girls home from different regions, different families, different challenges and possibly even different languages, there was not going to be a smooth and easy adjustment. I realized that we were going to have to make major changes to accommodate both of them, especially Selah who will be five and has been in the orphanage far longer. Although we adopted Ben and Julia in almost the same scenario, fear really set in. I had serious concerns about claiming any second child and at the same time, I couldn't fathom actually walking away from her little picture knowing that she may have never be adopted. I really struggled for two weeks. I talked to a friend and my sister who were both incredibly helpful in the reality of understanding that fear is never from God; and while that doesn't mean we were supposed to proceed, it did mean that I could start to evaluate the decision without taking the fear into account. I finally found peace when I realized that we were being called to lay aside our "normal" lives for the fall and only focus on what these two little girls will need. Once again, that means that my already-at-home children are also being called to give up their normal fall activities to sacrifice for their new sisters. Once I laid aside what I had planned for our family for the fall (including the new Classical Conversations that I was so excited to put them in,) bringing two little girls home looked much more exciting than fearful. 


I want people to know that while we are excited beyond measure, there is still an element of fear. I struggle with the reality of adding two more members to our often already chaotic life. I remember dealing with African parasites and all the other "just came to America" medical care that my Liberians required and I shake my head. But, God flung the door wide open for Selah. She was found in an orphanage towards the Somalian border where she has been waiting for a family for almost three years. Amazingly, she had the beginning stages of prepared paperwork and the adoption agency is planning on submitting their cases in court on the same day. MOWA pre-approved us adopting two unrelated children and also gave pre-approval that Gabriel doesn't count as a child these days since he is 20 and didn't live at home last year. I honestly prayed for God to slam any of these doors shut, if we weren't supposed to come home with two, but they all opened wide. Now, I'm very attached and can't picture heading to Ethiopia and not seeing Selah's little face standing next to Bella's. I haven't gotten word yet, but am hoping that she has been moved to the transition home with Bella and they at least getting to know each other a bit and be some comfort to each other while they wait.


I received a call from Homeland Security the other day verifying Moriah's birth date; the lady told me that my paper would be on the way shortly. This is the last piece of American paperwork that has to make it across the ocean. After that approval, we can be submitted to court and it's only about an eight week wait!


Here's the only part of Selah's picture I can show. Elijah looked at it and said, "we didn't know that she was going to have blue Crocs!" 

Home School Success

Elijah (3 1/2) - Do we live in Australia?
Julia (5 1/2) - No, Elijah, we live in Alaska!


Well, at least they have heard of places other than Virginia, right? That's a success, right?


                                                                                          

To PA and Back

I have to sing the public praises of my sister since she altered her weekend plans to care for my tribe with no notice, while JD and I headed to PA to see his Mom and three of his sisters. We will know the next few weeks exactly what Grandma is facing medically. We had a wonderful weekend, it seemed much longer than our normal weekends since it was quality time without the demands of the children. 

As I was loading this picture on the blog, Elijah ran in and said, "that's Grandma - I haven't seen her in MONTHS."  He shook his little head and said, "she looks so beautiful!" So, Grandma, know you look beautiful and you have some fans down in Virginia that hope you can clear a week to come see them soon!

I didn't realize how close to the end of the month we are until my sister asked if we could take her to the airport next Saturday - she is Africa bound! Wish we were, but that will come.