Good things are coming...

So you were probably expecting this to be a post about how we only have two more nights in this house.  How Henry helped me pack up all his Thomas trains and tracks and said, "I guess this is really real because where my trains go, I'm going too.  Two more nights and then I get my new room!" 

But the post about the new house will have to wait. 

Why?

What could be more exciting than the new house?

This.  That's two signed and sealed referral acceptance letters.  That's right.  We've got kids! 

(And sorry if these descriptions are kinda cryptic.  I don't want to divulge too much identifying information on the interwebs that could possibly interfere with our adoption.) Our children are biological siblings from a town whose primary language is Swahili.  And because God likes to mock me with His sovereignty, the city where they are from was called Elizabethville under Dutch rule.  And we got the referral the day after we closed on the new house.  You know, when we actually had room for 4 kids.  One year to the day from when we learned that Grace had two younger birth siblings and we first thought that perhaps we'd be a family of 6 one day. 

Classic Jesus showing me what's up.  I get it.  I get it.  You've got this.  I'll just hold the tail while You skin this cat.

Our son, C, is a few months younger than Gracie.  Our daughter, A, turned 1 over the summer.  It is our fervent hope to have the kids home prior to her 2nd birthday.  From this point, the average time frame is typically 6-9 months.

We haven't yet decided 100% on what we plan to name our children.  With K and N, we planned to bump their African names to their middle names and give them family first names.  We had planned to call K an American nickname for his African name.  But our children's names given to them by their African birth mother are not your typical African names.  They are French and the family names we had picked out just don't seem to fit them.  We think we've settled on their names, but we aren't sure.  So we are going to hold those close to the vest for a little while.  So as for now, we are simply calling them their given names.  But Gracie calls her little sister something completely different.  She can say her sister's actual name, but prefers a nickname she has given her.

She is acting like a big sister already.  Bossy and planning to not share her toys. 

But we did get to send in packages for them to get at Christmas.  

For A. 

For C. 



Next month, we hope to send them shoes, but we don't know their actual shoe sizes, so I think we will try to get them some Crocs.  In order to insure that the packages make it through customs, it is best if we send them gently used items. Thankfully, I have friends who have kids roughly the same age as my youngest children. 


We are over the moon. 

A Tale of Two Paintings

Ummm...why is she sitting in fruit eating the bible? 

Notice that this little sweety in in a cart.  That would be my cart.  

For my youngest daughter's new room.  The room with the pale blue walls.

I Don’t Like to Talk About my flair…

So some of y’all have asked for an update regarding our adoption.  I’ve been hesitant to post something because a)there just isn’t much to tell, b) what there is to tell is sad, and c) I’ve cried and prayed and chatted with folks who’ve been in similar places so that now, I’m kinda done with it and am moving on.

But part of the whole purpose of this blog to tell my story so that I can’t forget all that God has and continues to do in our family’s life.  

So…

At the beginning of August, we learned about a sibling group, K & N.  K, the boy, is a few months younger than Henry and N is 15 months younger than Grace.  We found out about the pair of precious children on the eve of K’s 5^th birthday, so we bought cupcakes and sang for him with some friends.  I cried imagining that my boy was somewhere alone on his birthday.  We began dreaming of bunk beds for the boys and the plan to move to a larger house was born.

We soon learned that the kids were in fact waiting to be in an orphanage.  So we found ourselves in place we never imagined, praying our kids INTO an orphanage.  At the time, they were living with a gaggle of kids at the rural “hospital” where their young widowed birthmom left them when N got malaria.  So we prayed for their health and safety.  The village where they were was roughly a 4 days journey for our agency’s workers as there are no roads, phones, cell coverage, computers, etc.  News on their well-being was shotty.  But we continued to trust in the Lord.

We prayed for K’s transition into our family.  We never really worried too much about N, really.  She’s young.  She’s a girl.  But what had K seen?  What had he understood?  Who was he longing for?  Did he even want a new forever family?  Over and over we looked at his picture on our phones.  His smile beckoning us to bow down at the throne of grace over and over on his behalf. 

We learned that N had recovered from her illness and had been moved to a foster home.  A foster home!  But we also learned that the relatives from their deceased father were blocking K's adoption.  Did they want to raise him?  Was this just a power play?  Was this a ruse for something in return for a signature on a form?

We agreed with our agency that we were unwilling to even entertain any unethical requests.  Our facilitator made the journey once again to plead to keep the kids together, only to find that the family members who had initially said, “Yes, we will sign,” were no shows.  Our facilitator felt uneasy.  It was becoming more and more apparent that the sense of urgency we felt was a foreign concept in Africa.  And meanwhile, N waited in foster care.  Unable to be adopted by anyone because she was part of a sibling group that was potentially being split.  

We prayed.  We cried.  We begged for wisdom.  We spoke with our case worker.  Over and over again.  And we suddenly knew that the reason we had imprinted on that dear boy’s smile was not because he was our son, but because we were to be the ones to pray for him daily.  We chose to walk away. 

Walk away isn’t really the best way to describe it.  We will not be a party to preying upon the poor.  We will not “buy” a child when it’s very possible that his uncle wants to raise him.  I mean, if we die, our kids will go to their uncle.  That’s what family is supposed to do.  But we are also mindful of what can happen to a boy in Western Africa.  So we pray that K will never hold a rifle.  We pray he will never have to be anything other than a boy with a smile so brilliant it reached across the ocean and stole my heart.   

Please join us in this prayer.  And for all boys like him.

I will say that emotionally, this has been hard.  Harder than my miscarriages.  Harder than the lost referral of J.  Because it felt so hopeless.  It wasn’t that it wasn’t us who was adopting him, but no one.  I found myself faced with the following question:  Do I really believe God is the Father to the fatherless? 

Like most difficult things involving grief, the hardest part was telling the kids.  Gracie really didn’t get it.  She has prayed for K & N nightly, but she also prays for her stuffed animals.   But Henry, he cried.  I held him on the bed that had become known as K’s bed and we cried.  But it was in my simple and truthful answer to him that Jesus met me.

 

“Mommy, why can’t K be my brother?”

“Well, because he has a family member who wants him.”

“So he is not an orphan?”

I was stunned.  I had never really thought about it like that.  I was only thinking of how I would never get to hold him.

“No, son.  He is no longer an orphan.  God has heard our prayers.”

We also found out on the same day we told our case worker we would fight no more that J, the referral we lost from China, had been matched to his forever family.  So two little boys we had and will continue to pray for, were orphans no more. 

So with tears in our eyes, we rejoiced.

So now we wait.  We are grateful to be working with an agency that hires investigators and seeks to operate ethically in a country strife with corruption.  And let me say that I do not believe that the corruption in the DRC is unique.  Corruption is everywhere.  And extreme poverty feeds it.  But we will not.

We are currently waiting upon receiving another referral for another sibling group.  Today I went to get new paperwork for our dossier with our new address on it, so there will be no hold ups with immigration.  Once we receive and accept our referral, there will be another big check to write and approximately 6-9 months until we travel to get our kids. 

BUT…once we get that referral, we can start sending care packages.  We can send a gallon size Ziploc bag to each kid once a month.  My bags are out.  And Henry has picked out a train for his little brother.  And Grace a dolly for her sister.

Mes petits enfants, we are waiting for you.  Ever trusting Jesus to bring us to you.  K & N, you are not ours, but you are HIS.

A Real (political) Conversation

We took the kids with us to vote this morning.  Henry went with me into the voting booth.

Henry:  Why are you doing this?
Me:  I'm voting.  I do it because it is a privilege to live in a country that lets its people choose its leaders.  When I fill in this circle, it means that I want that person to be my leader.

I then went through each section (here in VA that was President, a Senator, a Congressman, and two Constitutional Amendments), reading him the names of each candidate and which political party each one represented.

Henry:  So you are picking the good guy, right?  Which ones are the bad guys?
Me: chuckling Well, you could ask different people that and they would give you different answers.  But let me tell you the truth:  it's complicated.  Each of these people has worked hard serving their country.  They've gone about it in different ways and have different ideas of what is best for everyone, but they are BOTH good guys.  Do they always make good choices?  No.  Sometimes they make bad choices.
Henry:  Bad choices mean sad consequences.  (This phrase gets said countless times in our house every day.)
Me:  Yes.  That is true.  And when an elected leader makes a bad choice, the sad consequence happens to a lot of people.  But every few years, we get to pick again. 
(pause)
Henry:  Can I go get my sticker now?
Me:  Yes.  You can go get your sticker now.  I'll even let you feed my ballot into the box.  (But that was a lie.  They didn't let him.  I had to do it.  But he carried it to the box for me.)

3…The Magic Number

This girl is three. 

We (barely) made it out of the terrible twos alive.  Her preschool teachers describe her as a party in a can.  I’d say that is about right.  Because most parties I attended in college were loud, left me sweaty, covered in unknown stains, and crying in the corner.  

I prefer the term "hot mess."

She is sassy and smart.  She is the ultimate Daddy's girl and loves nothing more than to be with, sit on, kiss, climb on, or dance with her Daddy.  When I make her mad, she says, "I'm telling Swoan!"

She is always on the move and can often be found standing on her head.  Her athletic abilities are staggering.  She can do pirouettes, hop across the room on one foot, run like the wind, do forward rolls, and leap from the couch to Sloan’s chair unscathed (which are about 4 feet apart).  And trust me, I have not tried to teach her any of these things.  And given her passion about all things pirate, she usually does all of the above while wielding a sword.  She is currently enrolled in a creative movement class and we are hoping to put her in gymnastics as well after the New Year.  Yes, I do think she is a bit young to have 2 classes a week.  But her temperament and energy level are such that I really do think she will do best when her schedule is booked and her boundaries are firm.  Henry and I will just happily read books and try to move as little as possible while she runs circles around us.

She has two imaginary friends with whom she does EVERYTHING.  Their names are Mrs. Fox and Mrs. Walker.  Incidentally, there is a teacher at her school named Mrs. Walker.  Mrs. Walker isn’t her teacher, but since Mrs. Walker is my friend in real life, she just might dote on Gracie a bit.  And Gracie loves her fans.  We once saw Mrs. Walker at a restaurant and she screamed louder than a tween at a Bieber concert.  At least once a day she asks me, “Remember when we saw Mrs. Walker?  I WUV MRS. WALKER!!!”  

She is a horrible eater.  She would prefer to just eat cheese, crackers, bacon, and Honey Banana Chobani yogurt.  She will pretty much do anything, including keeping on her sleep cap or pooping on the potty, for the promise of a chocolate chip.  And her heart is so big that it is unacceptable to her if only she gets a chocolate chip.  EVERYONE present must eat a chocolate chip with her.  So I take one for the team and eat the chocolate.    

She continues to love her Pinkie and loveys.  She is learning to sit for long periods of time while I do her hair.  Of course, this requires the help of Pixar and snacks, but yesterday I spent 5 hours braiding her hair in the hopes we don’t have to mess with it much during the next two weeks while we move. 

And now, I’ll leave you with her interview.  The answers in italics are my explanations of her own words.

Favorite color: Purple

Favorite Book: Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

Favorite Song: Jesus Loves Me

Favorite Food: Pizza and Candy!!!  (And of course she asked for candy after answering this) 

Food that is yucky:  beans (actually ALL vegetables are hated equally. She goes to bed without dinner a lot.  A lot.  But she weighs 34 lbs, so clearly, she isn’t starving.)

Favorite Restaurant: Angelo’s

Favorite Sport: Dance class!

Favorite TV Show: Little Einstein’s

Favorite Movie: Mary Poppins (We watch it at least once a week.  We are watching it now.)

Favorite Toy: Lego Soup (She likes to “cook” with legos at her kitchen.)

Favorite Game:  Hide and Seek (*ahem* not so much the seeking)

Favorite Thing at School: play toys with my friends and see Mrs. Walker on da pwayground

Favorite Place to Go: Costco

Favorite Thing to do with Mommy: Spin to music

Favorite Thing to do with Daddy: Cuddle

Favorite Things about Henry: I can’t remember. (I do.  I’d have to say that he has never once hit her or pushed her despite her constant fretting, pushing, sitting upon or toy stealing.  In fact, we’ve had to teach him to use his hands to pry her off of him sometimes.)

Favorite Thing About about Myself: I don’t know.  I gotta tink about it.  I SOOOOO funny. 

If I could go anywhere in the world it would be: Costco. 

When I grow up I want to be: I want to be Gracie Mommy.

3 words to describe myself:  energetic, silly, mischievous

My wish for the coming year:  to be a witch for Halloween.