Nursery Rhymes by Firelight

Home from China FAQ and a plea for help

2011-10-03T20:02:00.007-05:00

I have had zero time for blogging since we've been home. Once we got back, we dealt with health issues for all three kids and I sprained my ankle. I still don't have time to blog, but we are desperate to get this information out. Thank you to all who have been praying for us.

How is your family doing?

We are equally struggling and doing well. We love having three kids and the transition to that has been very smooth. However, each individual child has been struggling with the changes, and that has been exhausting for us. We've been overwhelmed at the immensity of our kids' personal challenges.

How is Brendan adapting?

We are past the honeymoon period. He and Aidan get along great. He doesn't like Iona much yet. Brendan has been attached to Daddy from day 1, and that has not changed. When Pete went back to work, Brendan would not look at me at all by the afternoon. That has gotten better, but even tonight Brendan got very upset at me wanting to put him to bed...he definitely wanted Daddy. We have the biggest power struggles with him at meal times. He is learning that we love him but we are also in charge. I am learning patience.

Has he learned any English words?

Brendan understands a heck of a lot more than he can speak. We've been home just over six weeks, and we've seen more confidence in him in the words he says. He is speaking a little louder, where before he would barely even whisper to us when speaking English. He can say hi, more, please, please may I be excused (with help), Aidan, Iona, Daddy, Momma, apple, cars, book, the ABC song, amen,

Is Aidan feeling better?

For those who didn't hear, Aidan was having chronic diarrhea that started about 2 weeks before we left. It was not bad while we were gone, but then returned just as we came home. We could not keep up with it and he was losing weight. The doctor ran a bunch of tests, and we discovered that he had too much yeast in his gut. He is now dairy-free, sugar-free, and white flour-free. He is taking a strong probiotic each day, and now he can tolerate some of the above foods in small amounts. We will be doing this for the next few months and then see what he can take.

How is Aidan doing with his new brother?

Aidan has adapted really well with all the changes. He shares a room with Brendan and has been willing to share all but one set of his toys (including the ninja turtles!). He loves having Brendan in the bunk beds. He has been a great leader, helping Brendan with some of the day-to-day routine. And he does it happily. We have seen an increase in anger in him, and a few more tears than usual. Just before we traveled we had to stop his occupational therapy for his sensory processing disorder (he is sensory-avoidant) due to insurance changes. We've realized that his anger comes when he is in "fight" mode, and we need to work on helping him self-regulate. We need to find a new therapist (probably out of town) who is covered by our insurance, does specific sensory therapy, and will allow me in the room so I can learn. Until then, we're trying some things with him around the house.

How is Iona doing?

This could be a whole post in itself. Iona had a difficult time with us leaving her to get Brendan, and we didn't realize just how much for a little while after we had been home. We are working to rebuild trust and felt safety with her and disarm her fear. She has been over-the-top defiant, screaming and laughing at inappropriate times. She does seem to enjoy Brendan, and sometimes they play together so beautifully. We've learned to decode Brendan's squeals to know whether he's happy or not, and usually she is involved. We've had to change most of our parenting strategies, and it's been a hard but good exercise to unlearn what isn't working or helpful. I just went to a conference with speaker Karen Purvis, author of The Connected Child. I'm not going to rehash the conference, because I think Karen, Jennifer, and Angela each summed it up in amazing ways, and I just don't have time. It was SO worth it for me to go, and we bought some videos to help us learn and process the material and parenting method. I had already read most of the book before the conference and had started some of the technique the week before, and we were seeing some progress. Then I went away and got some awesome information and encouragement and rest. This last week has been incredibly difficult, and we started school on top of it. We've wondered jokingly at various times if Iona has SPD but is a sensory-seeker, and at the conference I became even more convinced. When we find an OT for Aidan we plan to get her tested as well.

How are you two doing?

We are having fun with our newer, larger family. Nothing major has caught us off-guard. However, we are exhausted at the end of each day and don't know how we are going to get done what we need to in the evenings and wake up and start all over again. Only with Jesus. We are thankful for Purvis' book and the new strategies we are learning. We are also on a waiting list with our home study agency to receive play therapy in our home for our kids for free...we should be able to start in the next couple of months. We are excited to get some new parenting tools from that.

How can we help?

We are thankful to all who have asked this. I have not really known how to respond, because, due to attachment-building, we can't really leave the kids with a sitter and go out. Here are some other ideas:

Come over and hang out with one of us here with the kids. Bring your kids if you want (as long as they are healthy!). The other one will get out for some respite time. We will not ask you to parent our kids, but we'd love it if you could hang out with the others when we have to hunt one down. If you educate at home, maybe we could work out some combined school time.
Help us clean our house. This is very difficult when we are cooking, teaching, and dealing with orphanage dust.
Pete will be on a business trip for 4 days in Oct. I could use support especially on those days!
Invite us out to a park. We would rather not go to other people's homes just yet, but a park would be delightful, especially with the weather so nice.
If you have another idea, please offer it up!

We would call YOU personally, and we really want to hear how YOU are doing, but life is a bit exhausting at the moment and the mental energy to do that has disappeared.

Please call me (home phone preferred, but you can try my cell) or email me. I am barely on Facebook right now, and since they've made all their changes I don't get email notifications of new messages.

Lifesong Zambia

2011-10-03T20:02:00.001-05:00

Brush to Berries from Lifesong for Orphans on Vimeo.

"Simply giving this person money is treating the symptoms rather than the underlying disease and will enable him to continue with his lack of self-discipline... a better solution would be to develop a relationship that says, we are here to walk with you and to help you use your gifts and abilities to avoid being in this situation in the future'" (An excerpt from the book, When Helping Hurts)

Lifesong is serving the people of Zambia... the orphaned, the at-risk, and the poor... by utilizing the land that is, like the people, so full of potential. Lifesong farms-Zambia reaped its first strawberry harvest in June, and local grocers have been purchasing the berries. With additional acres to farm, we are hoping to process some of the berries and begin marketing Lifesong Farms Strawberry Jam.

By harvesting fruit, we are able to serve more orphans by providing the gift of a job at Lifesong's gardens and self worth to an orphan's caregiver. We are also able to provide future employment for our kids as they transition into adult living, develop a system to raise funds to help cover operational costs, and develop expertise that can be replicated in multiple countries where Lifesong serves. Most of all, we are seeking to glorify Jesus as we teach others how He walked.

**GIVEAWAY:

1st PRIZE: Lifesong is giving away a 1-night hotel stay for the LIVE ORPHAN SUNDAY event in Kansas City!!! Let me just tell you, this event will be FABULOUS!!!

2nd PRIZE: Lifesong is giving away FREE Gobena Coffee for 1 year - 2 lbs per month shipped straight to your home.

HOW do you enter? Well, I'm glad you asked! There are several ways to enter. PLEASE LEAVE A SEPARATE COMMENT ON THIS LIFESONG POSTING FOR EACH ENTRY, including your email address so Lifesong is able to contact you!!!

1. Share how the Lord is working in and through your adoption/orphan care ministry (1 entry)

2. Re-post this Zambia blog posting on YOUR blog to share what the Lord has been doing at Lifesong Zambia (1 entry)

3. Tell about an Orphan Sunday event you had or attended in the past (1 entry)

4. Tell your plans for THIS YEAR's Orphan Sunday on Nov. 6th (1 entry)

5. Re-post this on your facebook wall (1 entry)

6. Re-post this on your twitter page (1 entry)

7. Post on YOUR blogs, facebook, or twitter and tell Lifesong that I sent you (1 entry)

8. Tell what you think about the 'Brush to Berries' video - what moved you, what stood out to you, what are you excited about? (1 entry)

9. Become a fan of Lifesong on facebook here (1 entry)

10. Send an email to info AT lifesongfororphans DOT org asking to receive our monthly updates (1 entry)

PLEASE leave a separate comment on Lifesong's post for EACH entry, including your email address so they are able to contact you!

***Giveaway starts immediately and ends at midnight on Monday, October 3rd.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday

2011-08-18T05:10:00.003-05:00

Tuesday in China we had our embassy appointment. Embassy in China is so much different than embassy in Ethiopia. Totally different building setup, and our guide could not go in with us in China. It went pretty easily. After we got back, we did a group picture on the famous staircase. We met the group for dinner that night at the Chinese restaurant in the hotel.

Wednesday we went to Shamain Island with another family from our group to do a little more shopping. We had lunch at the infamous Lucy's. Now we can say we've been to Lucy's restaurant in Ethiopia and China. After we ate we looked up and saw mousetraps in the ceiling. Oops. We did get to the pool one more time in the afternoon, and then we just grabbed dinner at the little convenience store and Starbucks. We also got our packing done.

Thursday morning (this morning) we took a private car from our hotel in Guangzhou to Hong Kong. We were worried about carsickness, but we should have worried about the crazy driving!! I just kept praying that God's covering would be over our car. We had a wonderful driver who got us door to door in just under 3 hours, but it was a wild ride! You cannot pay me enough to drive in China. NO WAY. Even the driver said Chinese driving was crazy. Hong Kong driving was much more civilized. We did get to see some nice scenery on the way, and Brendan did very well in the car. No one threw up. We were handed forms to fill out to leave China and to enter Hong Kong right as we left the first hotel, and I ended up having to hand it over to Pete partway through filling them out because I was starting to feel sick.

We got to our Hong Kong hotel at about lunchtime, got checked in, and ate in the hotel. Then we all took naps, since Pete and I didn't sleep well last night. Did I mention I am thrilled Brendan takes a 2-hour nap each day? After naps, we inquired about taking the hotel shuttle to downtown so we could take photos, but by that time it would have put us back to our room pretty late, and it was more expensive than we thought. We went to the hotel playground and then walked around the airport a little, locating where we will need to go in the morning and getting some cheaper food to eat. We hope to get to bed early tonight because we need to leave our room, ready to go, with luggage, by 6 am. By the time you all are going to bed Thurs night, we will be taking off for home!!

We are so ready to be done with hotels, airplanes, and eating out. Aidan and Iona, we can't wait to give you big hugs!! We will call you from Detroit on Friday afternoon!

Sunday, Monday

2011-08-15T01:28:00.002-05:00

On Sunday I skipped out on the folk art museum trip with the group because I had been up most of the night with an upset stomach. I started on the Cipro I brought with, and I'm feeling a lot better now. I just mainly laid around a lot Sunday during the day. We did get to have pizza for dinner with a family from our travel group, which was nice.

Today we went shopping near the embassy and got a lot of souvenirs. We also had Brendan's tb test read...no tb! It was really hot out...in the 90s. I hear there's been cooler weather back home, and we are looking forward to it!! Brendan had his first frappicino and Subway sandwich and seemed to like both. He's napping now. Later on we plan to go to a steak house in the hotel for dinner, since today is our anniversary. We hope to take Brendan to the pool later when it cools down a little. If not tonight, then tomorrow. :)

Brendan is such a happy little boy. He's become quite the chatterbox with us in the room. We've enjoyed watching him play with play doh and bubbles for the first time. He has a few English words: hello, Iona, Brendan, yellow (we only heard this once). We are itching to get home and reunite our family...we think he and Aidan will get along very well.

Tomorrow is our embassy interview, and then we'll get his visa on Wednesday afternoon. Thursday morning we'll take a van to Hong Kong for our flight out Friday morning. We'll be home Friday evening!

Thursday, Friday, Saturday

2011-08-13T00:38:00.003-05:00

Sorry I haven't written in a few days. It's been pretty low key, and we've been traveling.

Thursday in Zhengzhou, we basically stayed around the hotel and rested and packed. We did go next door to a bookstore and found a few books for the kids in Mandarin. We also got the rest of our paperwork in hand from our guide. We had a good time laughing with Teresa about cultural confusion and funny language translations.

Friday morning we left for the airport for our flight to Guangzhou. The flight was almost 2 hours long and pretty uneventful. Brendan was excited to go on the plane, but once he was on, he was a bit unsure. We noticed him crying at one point on the trip, towards the end. We made it in one piece and got our luggage pretty quickly. And we found our guide, Amy, right away.

Guangzhou reminds us a lot of Hawaii. It's very beautiful and very hot. It's a bit easier to breathe here, too. It felt so go to be in the hands of a guide who speaks almost perfect English and who really understood us. (Amy is Lineker's wife.) Our hotel is very swanky. Amazing. It's a nice change from the previous part of our trip. And Brendan loves it because our window looks out into the pool. :)

Friday evening we met up with one family from our travel group and went to dinner. Brendan and I went to bed pretty fast after that. Poor kid had basically no nap, and I was exhausted too.

This morning we had breakfast at the hotel...SO MUCH better than all the other hotel breakfasts we had. We will be eating a lot better here. :) We then had the kids' photos taken and the medical exam completed. We found out Brendan has a hernia, so we'll get that checked out when we get home. He passed the exam, even the eye test, which we were really thankful for. Then we did some grocery shopping and bought Brendan a pair of shoes...he loves them because they light up. :) This afternoon we have our paperwork party and we'll drop off our laundry, and then we're doing a group dinner at the Japanese restaurant at the hotel. I hear they have unbelieveably good steaks.

Tomorrow we are visiting a local folk art museum and just relaxing. We can't take Brendan to the pool until Monday, after his tb test is read. He's so excited to go to the pool. Our hotel has a little playground, and there are two more within walking distance from the hotel.

Aidan and Iona, we miss you so much! We are coming home in about a week now! Sending you lots of love and hugs and kisses.

Wednesday in Zhengzhou

2011-08-10T07:03:00.000-05:00

On Wednesday morning we went with Teresa to the hospital around the corner so Brendan could see a doctor. We had to go in and request an appointment and then wait until our number was called. Someone in the hospital lobby gave her a doctor recommendation, so she requested an appointment with that doctor. The doc only sees about 27 patients on Wednesday mornings, and we were #25. We were thankful for God’s intervention there.

We decided to walk to a nearby mall to get some sandals for Pete while we waited for our appointment. We were able to see the mall ceremony for the opening of the building. The ladies inside marched like soldiers and spoke in unison when we went in. It was definitely a different experience! We were able to find some sandals on clearance, thankfully, so we got those and then went back over to the hospital to wait.

I am SO thankful for the medical care we have in the US. Wow. We were at a University hospital. It was dirty and loud. We went over to the pediatric outpatient area and sat in this hallway with all the other waiting families. We sat outside our doctor’s exam room. By the time we got there, they were only a couple of numbers away from our number, so we just stayed there to wait.

When it was our turn, Teresa, Brendan, and I went into the exam room. The doctor sat at a table with about 4 students who were watching and helping. There were a few other families in the room at the same time, and we waited on a bench in the room until it was our turn to come to the table. Once we were called up, the doctor examined him and talked with Teresa. She translated here and there and I gave my input too. The doctor was very kind. It turns out we fed Brendan too much food and too much variety…he is used to eating the same small meals every day and this was just a jolt to his system. We got prescriptions for meds for his fever and tummy. The doc was delighted that we were adopting him and was just so patient and kind with us.

We left the exam room and went over to pay the bill and then to the pharmacy area to have the prescriptions filled. It was very quick. The total bill was less than $25 I think (meds and exam). We walked back to the hotel and Teresa explained how to administer the meds.

Since then, Brendan seems to be feeling a lot better. He is full of smiles and laughter when we are alone. He is distrustful of crowds, and I don’t blame him. (Note to those coming to see us at the airport…you will probably not see him smile that night. Just give him time.) His fever has not returned, and we’ve severely limited his food amounts. He wasn’t too happy with us when we said no to some foods at dinner, but at the same time I think we built a huge amount of trust with him by getting him medical care when he needed it. Naptime today was the first time he did not cry himself to sleep. And his tears were silent ones before…the child does not make a lot of noise. He is very soft spoken. You need to lean in to listen to his words. Tonight we heard him say “hello” for the first time!

Brendan is painfully shy, as I’ve said before. He did not use a lot of words at the orphanage, so I’m curious at how his English will develop. It will definitely take some time. It will be very interesting to see, in about 4 months or so, if he is still a painfully shy little boy.

We took him to a park this afternoon, about a 10-minute walk through the busy streets of Zhengzhou. We could see it from our hotel room, and finally today we decided to venture out and get to it. When we first approached the park, Brendan just stood there and looked around. It made us wonder if he had ever been to a park before. We showed him how to do a couple of things, and pretty soon he was laughing and running around. It definitely was not as nice of a park as we have in the states, but it was pretty fun. It was right next to this track we see people running in throughout the day, doing tai chi, playing soccer, etc.

Tomorrow should be pretty low key. We will be getting the rest of our paperwork in hand. (Teresa will go get it and bring it to us.) We’ll be packing our bags in the evening, because on Friday we need to be at the airport by 10 am or so to fly to Guangzhou.

Tuesday in Zhengzhou

2011-08-10T01:53:00.001-05:00

Tuesday morning we had breakfast at the hotel and then met Teresa for our appointment at Civil Affairs to finalize our paperwork. It was much less chaotic there that day, though we could tell Brendan was not happy to be back there. We did get to see the family adopting Brendan’s friend from the orphanage again that day. We hope to see them in Guangzhou too. The official didn’t really interview us as much as we expected, and overall the meet was very easy. We got our forms from them and left.

Afterwards we went to the notary office to sign some paperwork. The notary was very kind, and we got to take a photo of our family with her. She is like a Supreme Court Justice in the US. Our guide will pick up our remaining paperwork on Thursday and bring it to us.

When we were done with the meetings, we asked our guide to go with us to a grocery store to get some things we needed. She helped us get bottled water, pop, and food for Brendan to eat for lunches in the hotel room. We were SO thankful and felt a lot better about getting through the rest of the week. The grocery store was right near McDonald’s, so we stopped in and picked up some lunch for us to go. It was nice to have something similar to home, even though it was not exactly the same. (The western food in the hotel is not made the way we would make those same dishes in the states as well.)

We got back to the hotel and just had a much better outlook about our week. We got along much more with Teresa, we had food and water, and we knew we only had a few days left there.

After Brendan’s nap he seemed a little off. We did play in the room and also took a little walk outside and played in the hotel lobby. After dinner, we realized he was running a low fever, and he had been having diarrhea. We have him some Tylenol and a bath, and his fever broke not long after he went to sleep. We decided to call our guide in the morning and get him to a doctor. If he has a fever for our embassy medical exam on Saturday, they will not allow him to travel until he is better, which would mean a delay in our embassy appointment as well. We are praying he gets better soon.

Gotcha Day!

2011-08-09T00:56:00.000-05:00

This was a chaotic day, nothing like my expectations, which I tried not to have in the first place.

We had to be down in the hotel lobby in Beijing at 5 am to go to the airport. We were given a bagged breakfast since we had to leave before breakfast opened. I ate a little. Some of it I couldn’t eat (fruit with skin I couldn’t peel) and some I didn’t like (hard boiled egg). I just ate a couple of small muffins; my stomach was in knots about the day ahead.

Our check–in at the airport went smoothly. We knew our bags were overweight for a China domestic flight (44 lbs per person), but we didn’t think it was by much. Sherry, our guide, talked the staff into letting us go through with no charge. We also got through security without hassle. We got to our gate about 45 minutes early. We even saw travel friends get through with a miracle…they had 4 people traveling with about 10 bags and had thought the rule was 44 lbs per bag. Ugh. The Lord parted the waters and caused the belt at check in to be broken, lots of chaos, and ultimately they got through what they thought would be $300 of fines with no fines at all!

Our flight was easy…we think we might have been seated in business class. Lots of leg room. About an hour flight. When we got off the plane, we got our bags and met our guide. She asked if we needed to use the bathroom before we left. I said no. BIG MISTAKE. (I had to but wanted to get to the hotel first.)

When we got in the van, we discovered from Teresa, our local guide, that we were not going to the hotel but straight to meet our son. (Exactly what happened to us in Ethiopia; this only happens about 1% of the time. It happened to us both adoptions.) Our guide in Beijing, Sherry, told us we were most likely going to the hotel to unpack first. So we had no toys for him in our carry on. No snacks. No gifts ready for the orphanage staff. And she said we’d only be there about an hour.

We also discovered pretty quickly in the van that Teresa did not speak English as well as we were used to with Sherry. We had to explain our questions a number of times. This proved to get worse with time.

We got to the Civil Affairs building, and we were ushered into this lobby area. (I tried to go to the bathroom, but the Western toilet was disgustingly dirty—imagine the worst you’ve seen and triple it—and the squatty potties had to toilet paper. We had been carrying around tp but did not bring it with us in our carry ons.) There were only a couple of people there at the moment, but we were told 17 families were coming that morning to get their kids. Little did we know…

Brendan was not there yet, so our guide went into a room to start figuring out paperwork. A few minutes later, some nannies walked in with Brendan and another little boy, both who looked TERRIFIED. We approached him and started to talk, and the nannies were trying to introduce us, but he would have none of it. He just closed off emotionally. We could not get anyone to take many photos or videos. And then Brendan wet his pants all over the floor. Poor kid. While the staff cleaned him up and got him new pants (no underwear, as we discovered later), other staff pulled me aside and sat me down to do some paperwork. By this time we could see other families getting their kids, lots of crying (parents and kids), and other people taking nice video and photos for those families. It was very loud in the room, and Teresa was trying to translate the form for me to fill out and having difficulty. She would ask questions and get yelled at. We would sign forms, and she would get yelled at about how we did it wrong. (I should say the yelling was directed at her, but we have no idea what they were saying.) Screaming babies. Lots of people speaking different languages. And I felt robbed of my gotcha day because I couldn’t even find Pete and Brendan at points. Every time I would get up to try to sit with them and see our son, I was pulled into more paperwork. And then I was told we needed to make our orphanage donation then. So I had to sit and count large stacks of RMB in the middle of the crowd. And then they recounted it. About $5000 worth.

By this point we were a bit upset. We had tried numerous times to ask questions of the nannies that we had about Brendan. We kept getting brushed aside. Thankfully, Pete had gone out to the van earlier and dug a couple of toys out of the suitcase. He literally just came to us with the clothes on his back. Not even anything from the care package we sent him.

The other little boy that Brendan came with turned out to be going home with a family from Kansas. We got to sit down with his mom and exchange information, since we were told Hudson (the boy’s new name) and Brendan were friends. (Sure enough, later as I looked through Brendan’s photos I saw Hudson in many of them.) His mom was really nice. This was not her first China adoption, and she had used our agency in the past. I’m looking forward to staying in touch with her. I hope we see her at the embassy meetings.

At some point in all of this we were able to take photos with the nannies and Brendan and us outside the building. Pete tried to explain that we wanted to have on video the nannies giving Brendan some well-wishes and then have Teresa translate. Never happened. They just didn’t understand us. We did get to ask our questions and felt we got satisfactory answers.

Teresa told us it was time to go, so we all piled in the van. Then we all had to get out, because she said we had to take the family photo for the documentation. (I actually had mentioned this to her earlier because we knew this was taken on that day, and she told me we didn’t do that until the next day.)

By the time we were really ready to go, it was lunchtime. We had been at the CA building for 2 hours. The driver and guide offered to take us to a local restaurant instead of the hotel, so we agreed. Once we were seated, we asked the guide for help with ordering, since in Beijing all the ordering was done for us ahead of time. It took about 30 minutes to discuss back and forth with the guide what we would be willing to order. I asked for a bottle of water, and it took forever to explain what that was. They brought me mineral water, which I did not want. We finally got them to bring a bottle of Sprite. By this point I was in tears. The staff ended up bringing me a bowl of special soup used for people with coughs, because they thought I was sick. It tasted like medicine. Nasty. It turns out we ordered too much, and most of it I didn’t like. Too spicy. Pete ate some, but when Teresa started laughing at him at how he was using chopsticks, he got mad at her. At least Brendan ate a meal he was used to. One thing Sherry told us in Beijing was not to let him eat too much at meals so he wouldn’t get a stomachache. Teresa and the wait staff kept bringing him more and more food. We finally put a stop to it, and they didn’t really understand why we were denying him more food. I ended up just eating rice. We paid the bill (and I noticed we ended up paying for the driver’s and Teresa’s meals too).

At this point we knew we needed to call in the big guns. We knew we couldn’t survive for the rest of the week like this with no one who could understand us. We decided to call the national guide when we got back to the hotel. Teresa gave us our room keys, and we asked for help with locating a supermarket for us to buy water. She vaguely gave us directions and would not offer more help than that. “It’s just down the block,” she said.

We got up to our hotel room and we noticed there was only one large bed. We asked about a bed for Brendan, and they finally brought us up a large crib. We called Linekar, the national guide, immediately. He got us switched to a different room with two beds. Pete told him about the difficult time we were having with our guide, and he said our province is a very hard one because not many people speak English well. He said there was a 5 star hotel in town, but it was twice as much money. (We are in a 4 star hotel.) The nicer hotel had more staff who spoke better English. We decided to stay put, since Brendan was already moved around so much today, and we didn’t know if we could afford the new hotel. He offered to get us a new guide, but it would take a couple of days. He told us to call him with any more issues we were having. It was so nice to finally have someone understand our needs.

In the midst of all of this, we laid Brendan down for a nap, which we found out he takes every afternoon. He was still so, so scared. He laid down and tears began to roll down him face. He made no noises, just cried silently. We sat with him and snuggled and prayed with him for a while. Finally, he fell asleep and took a decent nap. We tried to sleep, but we could not. We were actually a bit worried about Brendan…we wondered if there was some hearing loss or mental delays due to how painfully shy he is. (We knew from the referral paperwork that he was shy, but this was Just. Painfully. Shy.) And it didn’t help that he wouldn’t make eye contact or speak.

I went out in search of the grocery store. I got some directions from the bellboy, but I walked around for a while without finding what I was looking for. I came back to the hotel and asked for more help. The bellboy walked me partway there, and then pointed out exactly where I needed to go. What made it harder was there was construction in between me and the store, and I had to walk around it (on the street, mostly, with China traffic). I finally found the store and went in. I found the water, but it was all expensive mineral water, not the cheap spring water we had been drinking the last few days. I walked back to the hotel, and we called Linekar again. He called Teresa and had her call the hotel to bring us up a bunch of water to our room. They brought us two more individual sized bottles.

By this time Brendan was awake, so we took him down to dinner at the hotel restaurant. We looked at the regular menu, and then they brought us the room service menu. We ordered club sandwiches for us, and they came with French fries. After we ordered, I realized we couldn’t eat the lettuce or tomatoes in the sandwich. We nibbled at the bread, but the meat tasted funny, and there was a layer of egg instead of cheese. The fries were pretty good, though.

After we were all done eating we went back to the room and gave Brendan a bath. He smelled pretty horrible all day, but we wanted to give him some time in his orphanage clothes since the smell was more familiar to him. The bath went well. Then Pete started playing with him, and he really seemed to open up. They were laughing a lot, playing with toys, and being silly together.

By bedtime we were feeling a bit better about the day.

Beijing day 2

2011-08-09T00:55:00.000-05:00

On Sunday morning in Beijing we were able to go to an international church for worship in the morning. It was amazing—definitely a highlight of the trip. We had to show our foreign IDs to get in the door. The best part was singing the doxology with Christians in China, knowing we would sing it again with our church back home at the airport.

Next we visited a jade factory, learned about jade, and did some shopping.

After lunch, we went to the Great Wall. Amazing. No words. I didn’t climb much because it was so steep and pretty warm outside, but Pete went up a few towers. Pete put photos on facebook.

We drove back to Beijing and had dinner, and then we went to a Chinese acrobat show. We were all very tired and ready to go back to our rooms and pack, but it was still worth seeing. They would give our local Gamma Phi Circus a run for their money.

Back at the hotel, we repacked and got ready for the morning, when we would go to meet our son!

day 1 sightseeing in Beijing

2011-08-06T18:43:00.003-05:00

Yesterday was a FULL day of sightseeing and a lot of fun.

We met our travel group families at breakfast and in the lobby. (ET families, we've decided we are traveling with some twin families…like the Mitchells, the Schmidts, and the Moles families.) J

We got on the bus (our tour bus) and first went to Tiananman Square. LOL—we were not allowed to discuss politics or take pictures of anyone in uniform. There were lots of people everywhere we went. I think there were a couple hundred thousand people in the square. We took some photos and then walked over to the Forbidden City. We walked all the way through, from front to back, through each gate. This was were the emperor’s family lived. No one goes in, no one comes out. (hehe--I was singing the Oompa Loompa song in the shower this morning.) The buildings were magnificent, and we got to see one of the golden thrones. My absolute favorite part was the Imperial Garden. I loved the smaller buildings surrounding it and all the interesting plants and rock structures. By the time we got back to the bus, we had been walking for 2.5 hours!

Then we went to lunch, our first taste of authentic Chinese cuisine. So good! This was probably my favorite meal so far. We ate at a table for 10 with the food on a large spinner in the middle. You just spin the glass when you want a dish moved closer to you. My favorite parts were the leeks and the cucumbers.

We got to visit a pearl factory store and learn about how pearls are found and the difference between ocean and freshwater pearls. Pink freshwater pearls come from China—no where else. We saw some very beautiful jewelry and bought a little.

Next we went to Summer Palace, but it had rained while we were in the pearl shop and so the photos were all hazy. There is a beautiful bridge and a man-made lake that we saw. Across the lake was the palace itself, where the emperor rested.

Then we went to a Silk Factory and saw how silk blankets were made. We even got to try to stretch the silk out for a blanket. We oogled over all the pretty fabrics and the adorable baby clothes.

We drove by the Olympic Village and took some photos of the Bird’s Nest and surrounding buildings. It brought back a lot of memories of the Seoul Olympics for me. The buildings are not really being used now but are owned by the government.

We went to a Tea House and participated in a tea ceremony. We got to try 5 kinds of tea. My favorites were the jasmine and fruit teas. The ceremony was very entertaining…we laughed a lot! Then we got to purchase some gifts.

Finally, we went to a Chinese duck dinner. I didn’t like the food as well, and by this point I was ready to collapse. It was all I could do to stay upright in the chair from jet lag. I liked the taste of duck…it reminded me a lot of turkey. I liked the little pieces I took off the plate myself, but I didn’t like it when they offered it wrapped in an injera/crepe-like thing with vegetables. I wasn’t feeling the best anyway by this point, so I was grateful when we left.

When we got back to the hotel, I put on pjs and was asleep about 5 seconds after hitting the pillow. J

Aidan and Iona, we love you and miss you a ton. We can’t wait to skype with you in the next couple of days so you can meet Brendan. We meet him tomorrow! Please give each other lots of hugs for us and have fun with your friends. We love you!!

at the airport

2011-08-04T12:20:00.003-05:00

In about 23 hours, we will be in China. My stomach is in the usual knots from flying, even though I've done this so many times. I miss my kids, all three of them. Lots of mixed emotions. I'm excited to get going!

Thank you all for your prayers and notes of encouragement. Please keep praying for us, all the way there and back! We are excited to see what God wants to show us in China.

Here is the standard suitcase shot. Praying we see them all in China when we get off the plane!

leaving this week!

2011-08-01T20:26:00.003-05:00

We are leaving for China this week! We'll take the kids to our friends' house on Wednesday afternoon and go to the airport Thursday morning. The kids are having a ton of fun with packing.

We're down to the last few things that can't be packed until the last minute. I'll finish laundry tomorrowish and try to clean a little.

In one week we will meet our new son. In Iona's words: "Brendan's coming. I'm freaking out about it!"

His bed is made. We bought him a pillow tonight. His bag is packed, filled with new clothes and new toys for the trip.

We're coming!

hair day!

2011-07-17T21:49:00.004-05:00

On Friday I took Iona to an AA salon for the first time to get her hair done. The appointment was during her naptime, so I was nervous about how it would go.

She did so well! She was almost falling asleep at times. The stylist showed me how to detangle her hair without her screaming. I was shocked that Iona only said once that it hurt.

I was so impressed! And I loved the atmosphere in the salon. The ladies were even sharing scripture with each other! I wish I got a picture of her hair all detangled and out, because it was amazing, but I'm sure I will see it again like that sometime. The stylist detangled and braided all in an hour and a half!

Iona fell asleep on the way home, and then as soon as we walked inside she woke up. I set her up with a video and got these photos. She was so tired.

A funny: She went to the bathroom while we were there, and while we were in the bathroom, Iona points to the garbage at the hair extensions and says, "Mom, someone left their hair in there."

timeline and travel

2011-07-17T20:51:00.005-05:00

For those who care, this is our list of dates when we reached each step of the process of Brendan's adoption:

Dossier to China: 3/11/2011

Log-in date: 3/18/2011

Date of referral: 12/10/2010

Letter of Intent: 12/16/2010

Pre-approval: 12/27/2010

Referral acceptance: 5/7/2011

Travel approval: 7/12/2011

Travel dates: 8/4/2011 through 8/19/2011

We leave in 2.5 weeks! Crazy! We have a couple house projects we are trying to finish up, and otherwise we are checking travel things off the list. My computer was very sick this weekend and we had to buy a new one...while I'm happy with the new one, I wish it could have happened in a month or two!

I will try to post a little more in the coming days and weeks, and I'll try to post daily while we are in China.

Please pray:

--for protection around our family before, during, and after our trip.

--for our kiddos here at home.

--for peace for us that our kiddos are here at home.

--good travel...we had such a horrid experience getting to Ethiopia that I am dreading this trip.

--good relationships built with the two families we are traveling with. We don't know anything about them yet.

--for our first meeting with Brendan to be peaceful, and us to minister to him well if it is not.

--for Brendan to be mentally and emotionally prepared for all the changes about to take place in his life.

--for God to heal his eyes, whether supernaturally or through the doctors here in the states.

--for us to be able to communicate with Brendan and vice versa.

--for our trip home with Brendan (and no translators!) to be smooth and fun.

--for Aidan and Iona to bond well with Brendan.

--for our first days, weeks, and months home to go well.

--for me to finish preparing for our homeschooling year and to know when we are ready to begin.

--anything else the Lord brings to your mind!

Nesting and adoption update

2011-06-18T20:04:00.005-05:00

I've been too busy to blog lately...so sorry I haven't kept everyone up to date on the adoption. This week we are expecting a phone call from our agency saying we got our Article 5, which is the last approval we need before travel approval. We should get our travel approval about 2-4 weeks later, and then we travel 2-4 weeks after that.

Meanwhile, we are in the middle of a health insurance company change, including most of our doctors. We also had to complete Iona's annual report for Ethiopia. And we've been nesting...we went to IKEA to get more shelving and have been moving just about every bookshelf around our house. We got bunk beds for the boys, ordered Brendan's dresser and car booster seat, got travel books, got a new camera, etc. We took a short trip to St. Louis. We went to our first homeschool convention and bought the rest of our curriculum for next year.

Today we took a break and went to Wildlife Prairie State Park for their Olde English Faire and got to see knights, pirates, ninjas, jousting, and all manner of middle ages stuff. Aidan even got to throw some real throwing stars. We hung out with good friends from college and their kids for the day, and they offered to take our kids the whole time we are in China!! HUGE answer to prayer on so many levels.

And somewhere in all this prep before we leave I'm trying to do some homeschool planning for the new school year...

RA and Show Hope

2011-05-10T22:35:00.003-05:00

Mother's Day ended with both children puking, and I woke up Monday morning and joined them. We all laid around in front of the tv on Monday, because that was about all we could do.

Monday afternoon we got a letter in the mail from Show Hope saying we got a $2500 grant!! Then, less than an hour after another session of puke, we got a call from our agency saying our RA arrived! This means that China has approved us to adopt Brendan. And this means you can now see him!

We also found out that we will most likely travel in August. And if we receive our travel approval in July, like expected, we won't have to pay the additional $2750 we thought we would have to due to changes in post placement requirements. So as soon as Pete got home from work, he had to head over to the Fed Ex office to send in a form to USCIS.

We got the Welcome to Travel email Monday as well, and I was once again overwhelmed by all the next things that need to get done. I can't believe we're not done with paperwork! And then it hit me...we are traveling to China in 3 months! So much to do!

We are praising the Father for all His good gifts to us, even in the midst of sickness.

waiting

2011-05-04T21:59:00.004-05:00

I feel like I'm in phone-stalking mode again. We are waiting for "THE CALL" from our agency telling us they have received our RA (referral acceptance). Technically, we will probably not hear back until around 5/18, but now that it's May I'm getting antsy. We have our I800 and DS230 documents complete and waiting, so we should be ready to submit as soon as it comes.

Meanwhile, we're trying to finish the school year, going on field trips, and prepping the house.

You know you are adopting when things break and craziness happens. All in the same week. I'll just leave it at that.

We're beginning to think about Brendan's care package and working on the video we'll release of him when the RA arrives. We've been applying for more adoption grants.

Next week is Iona's 3rd birthday, so maybe I'll post photos. :) She will tell everyone who will listen that she is SO excited to be 3 because she gets to go to AWANA and ballet.

The week after is our adoption fundraiser garage sale. Our garage is half-full, and we're getting leftovers from other sales soon. Let me know if you have anything to donate to our sale!

Shoe Saturday

2011-03-24T14:04:00.001-05:00

Edmund Gives Back from Lifesong for Orphans on Vimeo.

Edmund is just one example of many who have been helped by Lifesong Honduras, and are now giving back. I love how he obviously cares for these kids and even gives what little he has away so they can have shoes! What a great example.

Here’s a question for you… How many pairs of shoes do you have?.

10? 20? 30? (eek!)

The kids at Lifesong Honduras have one pair each… sometimes two (a pair of boots to serve in). Wow.

This Saturday join us for Shoe Saturday. Simply count your shoes… and get your kids in on it too. Have them count theirs. And then tell them about the children in Honduras. Tell them about Edmund who sacrifices his own money so children in the village can have something on their feet. Then as a family pray. Thank God for His faithfulness and His blessings on your family. Thank Him for raising up men and women and children in Honduras to care for the poor, the orphaned, the vulnerable. Ask Him to continue to provide and watch over them. Ask Him raise up supporters so Lifesong can continue to serve in Honduras.

We are reaching for a goal:

Please pray that we can reach this goal? Maybe God wants to use you? Will you prayerfully consider joining us?

Maybe you can't give $30 a month... Maybe you can give more. Today we want to encourage you to give your best!

One commitment we've received was a one time gift... Another commitment was matched by the donor's employer... meaning his gift has now quadrupled! We are so excited to see people rise up and give what they can!

Thank you to those who have committed so far.

We have 15.5 commitments.

Can we make 100?

We have 7 days... 84.5 commitments to go.

With your help we can do it!

Meet Edgar

2011-03-24T13:57:00.001-05:00

Edgar is 15 years old and in the 10th grade at Lifesong Honduras.

On June 5th, 2009 his father was shot and killed because he didn't want to sell his property, leaving his mother alone to raise Edgar and his brothers.

Recently Edgar's family decided to move to another state and wanted him to join them. However, even though it was hard to watch them leave, he was determined to continue his education at Escalon. After being there for 3 years, Edgar understands his need for education as a step towards a better life.

When asked about these major trials he has had to face in his young life, he simply says,

"It's just like "Pastor Guy" (Lifesong Honduras director) always says, "we should never give up."

After graduating Edgar wants to study in the medical field. He desires to use these skills to help people in need and give back as he has been given.

With your support we can continue to serve more kids like Edgar.

Our goal is:

We have 16.5 commitments.

We need 83.5 more.

Please prayerfully consider joining us as we strive to bring joy and purpose to orphans in Honduras! YOUR DONATION WILL BE DOUBLED by a gracious giver!

Contact us at at info@lifesongfororphans.org to make your commitment AND be sure to tell them tha we sent you from our blog!

Hear personal stories and check back for progress through the end of the month!
*All administrative costs are covered, so 100% of your donation will go directly toward helping orphans!

the realization

2011-03-22T22:37:00.002-05:00

I remember the moment like it was yesterday. When Aidan realized he was going to share us with a sibling. He was four.

We had driven to the library and parked across the street in our little two-door coupe. Aidan was chatting with us about his sister coming home. He got all sad and weepy and said, "But you're MY mommy and daddy!" At this point we were all crying. We got into the back seat with him (no small feat) and held him and told him how much we loved him, but that we loved his sister too.

That moment happened tonight with Iona.

She was sitting up in bed, well after lights out. I walk upstairs to find out why she is calling me. She looks really sad.

Iona: Mommy, why is Brendan living in our house?

Me: What do you mean, Iona? He's not here yet, but he's coming soon to live with us.

Iona: But you're not HIS mommy. You're MY mommy!

Me (hugging her): I am Aidan's mommy and Iona's mommy AND Brendan's mommy.

We went round and round about this for a little while and then she got all goofy and got herself into trouble.

I'm so blessed by my kiddos, and I'm so honored that Iona sees me as her mommy, no questions asked. I know the questions will come one day, but I'm thrilled at her attachment to me and her starting to think through having a new member of the family.

Meanwhile, Pete and I are reading through Ann Voscamp's One Thousand Gifts, and we've both just started our "gift lists." I'm excited to see what God will do in our hearts and in our family as a result.

Spring break!

2011-03-21T21:58:00.002-05:00

We are on spring break this week and enjoying the rest. This week we have a bunch of doctor appts, but I hope to spend some time at local parks, spring cleaning, going through the kids' clothes, and just generally goofing off and having fun with the kids.

The kids and I have started seeing a chiropractor. My neck has been in a lot of pain for a few weeks, and I've aggrevated an old injury that never fully healed. We've been sick so much this winter that I thought it would be good for all of us to go, and we have some pre-tax medical money we need to use up before we lose at the end of the fiscal year. The kids like going to the "popcorn doctor" and are responding very well to treatment. The doc also thinks he can work with us on Aidan's sensory processing disorder, so we shall see. And my headaches are gone. I still have a lot of pain, but I'm slowly getting more range of motion. We've only had 3 visits.

I'm starting to think through next year's school plans. We will continue with some curriculum and change a few things. The biggest change is that we will add Brendan and Iona into our school time. And I'm considering switching to a year-round model. But, for now, I'm making my supply lists and saving up money for new curriculum.

Definitely will use: Story of the World Vol 2 (history), Math U See Beta (math), Apologia Zoology 1 (science), First Language Lessons 2 (grammar), Handwriting without Tears gr 3-4 workbooks (handwriting), Writing With Ease 2 (writing), Harmony Art Mom grade 2 (music and art), and a literature list of books from Sonlight/Ambleside Online/other sources, Confession of a Homeschooler's Letter of the Week curriculum (for Brendan and Iona).

Considering: Spelling Workout C/Spelling Power/Sequential Spelling, Veritas Press Gen-Joshua (Bible), character and hymn study resources on Simply Charlotte Mason's site.

Pete and I are planning to go to our first homeschool convention in June, so we're hoping for some ideas and clarity and a little getaway!

DTC and LID

2011-03-21T14:32:00.004-05:00

Our dossier went to China last week and we have a log-in date of 3/18/2011. We now wait 2-4 months to receive our RA, or official referral acceptance. (Since we received the referral before China approved our paperwork, they want to make sure we are good candidates for adoption before releasing our son to us.)

Once we get our RA, we'll get travel approval about 10-14 weeks later. And then we'll travel 2-4 weeks after that.

Meanwhile, we have more paperwork to complete! Our I800 and DS230 MUST be complete and ready to go when we receive our RA, so we are beginning work on those forms and supplementary materials now.

Our fundraising is going very well, but we still need more! We've raised almost $7000 of our $17000 goal for the last part of our adoption expenses. This includes our last agency payment, airfare for 3, in-country expenses, and fees we will need to pay in China when we travel (for the orphanage, etc.). We are excited at what God has done already in a few weeks! We have a few ways to give: t-shirts (reduced to $20), half-marathon, and Lifesong.

You may notice that I just became a blogger for Lifesong for Orphans. They have helped us so much with our adoptions, and we are thrilled with this opportunity to help them get the word out about ways you can get involved in orphan care.

2011-03-21T14:31:00.002-05:00

Tortilla Tuesday!!

Next Monday we will be kicking off an exciting 10 day blog-a-thon to spread the word about what's going on at Lifesong Honduras. We will be sharing personal testimonies from changed lives, peeking into everyday Honduran life, and giving some tools to spread awareness in your families.
One of these tools is a little something we like to call (da-daDAAA!):

Tuesday, March 29th we will be dedicating 1 meal to eat what the children in Honduras eat on a daily basis... and we want you to be a part of it! We will also provide some great topical questions and discussion guides for you to share with your kids on what life is like for children in another culture.

Would YOU join us?

We'll share more as we get closer to the 29th, so mark your calendars, get your camera ready and head to the store to get tortillas, rice, and beans for the whole family!

2011-03-21T14:05:00.002-05:00

Honduras Blitz from Lifesong for Orphans on Vimeo.

What if every time you gave a dollar to orphans it became one more?

One more dollar towards food, education, shelter?

One more dollar towards sharing the Gospel and providing Biblical mentorship?

One more dollar towards changing the life of a child?

I love to use this platform to advocate for those in need... and thanks to a generous donor every dollar given to Lifesong Honduras will be matched… up to $120,000! We praise the Lord for this amazing gift and invite you to be a part of it.

Over the next 10 days we are teaming with Lifesong and are hoping for 100 1-year commitments of $30 a month. Just think, for about $1 a day a life in Honduras can be forever changed.

Partnering with Tree of Life Missions in Honduras, Lifesong for Orphans is able to work toward providing hope to the hopeless, help to the helpless and healing to the hurting. TOLM reaches kids through a program called Plan Escalon. (Escalon is translated "escalator" and is used to describe the children's escalator out of poverty/brokenness.)
Through this program we strive toward:

Providing an education to the poorest of youth

Providing food to the poorest of youth

Providing vocational training & micro-business opportunities

Providing free medical and dental clinics to those in need

Training young people to give back to their communities

Reaching people in the jungles of the Mosquito Coast

Stay tuned for stories, personal testimonies, and fun ways to spread awareness and instill a heart of giving in your kids!

Our goal is:

Will you help us? 100 commitments in ten days is no small feat, but with God it is possible. We have seen Him move mightily in His people to serve orphans and we pray that this ten weeks will be a testimony of that! Together we can make a difference in the lives of these kids! Together we can do more to bring joy and purpose to orphans!

Contact Lifesong at info@lifesongfororphans.org to make your commitment AND be sure to tell them that we sent you from our blog!

Hear personal stories & follow the progress on our blog all this week!

Check back often to hear personal stories and get updates on the progress. Please join us in prayer as we ask the Lord to raise up 100 commitments!

sickness

2011-02-15T20:02:00.004-06:00

Aidan, Iona, and I have been swapping sicknesses since Christmas break. It's all, thankfully, been respiratory, but it still stinks. We've had to skip activities, homeschool co-ops, and lots of church as we take turns getting better. Both kids are mostly better now, and my cold is getting worse. The weather is supposed to perk up this week, so I hope we can get outside for some Vitamin D. For the last couple of big snowstorms, the kids were too sick to play out in the snow. Boo.

School has been rough going with all the sickness around. We've been able to basically keep up, but we've definitely had some lighter workload days. I'm just glad we can keep moving forward even when sick. A few of our subjects are due to finish within the month, so pushing those back a week or two is not a big deal.

Grants and loans

2011-02-15T19:42:00.002-06:00

Last week we found out we received a $2500 no-interest loan for our adoption and a $3000 matching grant. We are so thankful to God! Here is the letter we are in the middle of sending out:

Dear Family and Friends,

“A father to the fatherless…God places the lonely in families” (Psalm 68:5, 6)

Many of you know we have felt called and directed by God to adopt another “fatherless” child into our family. We adopted Iona from Ethiopia in 2008 and brought her home when she was 6 months old and only 11 lbs. She is now a fierce 2.5-year-old bundle of energy and full of joy. Aidan and Iona adore each other, most of the time.

We have stepped back into the adoption journey and are pursuing Brendan, a 4.5-year-old boy from China. We have decided to adopt through the “waiting child” program in China, and we only waited 1 hour to be matched to our son. He, however, had been waiting one and a half years for a family of his own. Brendan has a special need called bilateral strabismus, which means he will most likely need glasses.

Why China? That’s a long story, and one we would be happy to talk more about in person! Basically, the Lord led us to pursue an older child for this adoption, and the Lord had long ago laid an Asian child on our hearts for our family. He orchestrated an amazing set of events in the past year to direct us to China, and we are excited to meet our son soon!

At this point, our dossier (portfolio of documents) is almost complete and should travel to China within the next month. We can’t share Brendan’s photo here until our dossier has been received in China and officially approved, but we carry the photos around and love to show him off! We are hoping to travel to China sometime in the fall of 2011 to bring Brendan home.

There are so many things God has used to prick our hearts and move us to adopt; here are a few:

Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress (James 1:27)

So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” (Romans 8:15)

The biggest challenge for us is not opening our hearts and home to another child, but it is in finding the finances to make this happen. We estimate our total cost for adoption fees, document preparation, home study, airfare, travel, attorney fees, etc. to be $27,000. That’s certainly money we don’t have, but we know God is faithful and is leading us to trust Him. By God’s grace we’ve been able to pay the initial $10,000. We honestly had no idea how that would all work when we began, but little by little, as we have needed each part of the funds, it has been available.

There are two ways you can help:

1. Prayer—Please pray God would tenderly care for our son in China until we are able to bring him home, that God would prepare Aidan and Iona for the upcoming changes to our family, and that God will give us wisdom, discernment, and insight as we raise our children to know Jesus Christ. Please also pray for our first months home as we learn to communicate with Brendan and meet his needs.

2. Financial support—Will you please consider making a tax-deductible donation to help us pay the remaining $17,000 in adoption expenses to bring our son home?

Lifesong for Orphans (www.lifesongfororphans.org) has graciously given a matching grant of $3,000 to help pay the “ransom” to bring Brendan home.

If you would like to be a part of this adoption, you can send your tax-deductible gift between now and April 10, 2011 to the address below. Lifesong for Orphans is a trusted organization administering the funds on our son’s behalf and will pay adoption expenses out of funds received.

1. Please make checks payable to Lifesong for Orphans and put “Juvinall Adoption” in the memo section of your check.
(*Note: In following IRS guidelines, your donation is to Lifesong, which retains full discretion over its use but intends to honor the donor’s suggested use.)

2. Mail checks to:
Lifesong for Orphans
Attn: Juvinall #1766 Adoption
PO Box 40 / 202 N. Ford St
Gridley, IL 61744

3. You may also give online via Paypal at http://www.lifesongfororphans.org/donation.html and clicking on “Make a Donation.” Please put “Juvinall #1766 Adoption” in the item line.

Thank you for investing in the Kingdom through prayer and finances—it will be an investment with an eternal return (Matt 6:20)! We’ll send you our new family photo when we return home. Please pray this entire process will glorify God and fulfill His purposes!

Make Pete's Playlist! adoption fundraiser

2011-01-06T22:08:00.005-06:00

Hi friends! I have so many posts in my head and I'm not sure when I'll get them all up here, but for now, we are putting together another adoption fundraiser.

On April 30, Pete will be running the Illinois Half Marathon. This is his third half marathon and he's hoping to break the 2 hour mark this time!

You can help make his music playlist for the race! For $10 each, you can choose a song for him to run to that day. If you would like to pick the last song, the one he crosses the finish line with, it will cost you $100. If he runs out of room in the playlist, your song choice will be included in his final 10-mile training run before the race.

You are free to hand us the money or pay via Paypal. With Paypal, please include your song choice in the Notes field. Thank you!!

referral!

2010-12-21T22:08:00.003-06:00

We received a phone call on Friday, Dec 10 with a possible referral!

On Monday of that week we submitted our application for the waiting child program, and on Friday around lunchtime we had a phone interview to clarify our specific requests and answer any questions we had.

ONE HOUR LATER, we got the CALL!

He was on the shared referral system and not yet reserved for our family, and we were able to take the weekend to talk with doctors and pray and consider him for our family. On Monday the 13th we indicated to our agency that we wanted to pursue him, and by Thursday the 16th our electronic acceptance was submitted to China. On Thursday morning we also received an update with answers to questions we asked about him.

We are delighted to welcome Brendan into our family! (We are keeping his Chinese name as his middle name and can't post details until our dossier is officially accepted in China.) He is 4.5 and will turn 5 in June. His special need is called bilateral strabismus, which basically means he probably only needs glasses.

Today we received a BUNCH of new photos of Brendan, as the original ones we received were over a year old. SO CUTE! Can't wait to show you!

Next steps:

We just recently submitted our I-800A to USCIS and hope to receive the all-important paper from them by February.
We are working on certifying and authenticating the rest of our dossier so it's ready and waiting.
Once the USCIS paperwork is received and we notarize, certify, and authenticate it, our dossier will be ready to go to China...hopefully still in February.
Possible travel dates? August or September we think, though with adoption, all things are subject to change without prior notice.

T-shirt sale thru Dec 14

2010-11-29T11:36:00.003-06:00

Hi friends!

From now to Dec 14, you can order our Simply Love China t-shirt for the low price of $20, including shipping! Do you have any Christmas gifts to purchase? Please consider one of our t-shirts, and your Christmas shopping will also help with our adoption expenses!

Paper pregnancy

2010-10-14T22:24:00.002-05:00

Yes, we're still adopting. Sorry I haven't posted in a while! Once school started, I just have felt like my available time has disappeared! Add on that adoption training and paperwork...and two IV staff living with us this year...

We are STILL waiting for our homestudy to be completed. We started this in June! We thought it might be done in the next week or two, but we found out this week that some fingerprinting results we are waiting on will take an extra 4-6 weeks longer than we expected. So here's the new projected timeline:

Finish homestudy by end of November (4-6 week wait + meeting with SW + review copy
Homestudy signed off on at state level--done by Christmas (3 week wait at the moment)
(Meanwhile, finish gathering, notarizing, and certifying dossier documents.)
Homestudy submitted to USCIS by the beginning of January
When we submit to USCIS, we plan to fill out the waiting child application for our agency, and because of the age and gender we are requesting, we are expecting an immediate referral.
Also after USCIS is submitted, we will start filling out adoption grant applications.
Dossier to China by beginning of March
Travel possibly in June or July

All adoptions come with hiccups, delays, etc. For the most part, this latest hiccup has not been earth shattering (writing out the timeline was hard though!). Since we have been through this before, we know God is lining things up for us to get the little boy He has planned for us. It's hard to get too upset when we know how He has worked in the past. We're just trying to take one day at a time and stay close to the Word and to each other, watching and waiting.

We still have a bunch of Simply Love shirts left. You can see them here. I think the only size we have run out of is the women's medium, but the men's version is a nice alternative. I won't be ordering more until we can sell most of what we have in stock.

Please continue to pray for us: for our trust in the Lord to remain high, for our son to be cared for while he waits, and for few hiccups in the process.

First quarter update

2010-10-14T20:45:00.003-05:00

Hi friends! It's been a while since I've posted...this is one of a few I have planned.

We are just finishing week 8 of school. We are enjoying the time spent together and much of the content. It's been hard to keep Iona happy, as I have not had the time to spend coming up with ideas for her from Before Five in a Row. I'm hoping to sit down with the material soon. So we've played around with spending schoolwork time at different times of the day.

Here's a rundown of how his subjects are going:

Bible--Aidan really likes his Old Testament Overview, although we are on course to finish this after only half a year instead of a full year. He loves drawing the Bible stories, so much that he prefers doing at least two pages a day instead of the one page planned in the schedule. We decided not to go ahead and get the New Testament version for spring, but just to work through another devotional once we finish. Aidan is also going to AWANA and memorizing verses there.

Writing--Writing with Ease is SUPER easy and we both really like it. The excerpts from literature have drawn us both to want to read the longer works, and we are keeping a list. :)

Spelling--Aidan likes Spelling Workout A a lot, and he can do large parts of the lessons on his own. While this is nice, I'm not yet sure how much he retains. This may be an area where we switch curriculum next year.

Reading--The Ordinary Parent's Guide is going much better this year than last. And Aidan is doing awesome at the readers we are working through. It's been fun to watch him pick up a random book and just start reading.

Grammar--First Language Lessons is also super easy. We are enjoying the topics in the book and Aidan is retaining it well.

Handwriting--Aidan is almost done with HWT already! Since he writes in most other subjects, we will wait on cursive until second grade.

Math--Saxon Math 2 is going much better than math last year. We are a little behind my original schedule, but we are making great headway. This year we are doing one minute math drills, and that is the hardest part for my little budding perfectionist.

History--SOTW1 is tons of fun. We love doing the projects together, although I don't think I'll be mummifying another chicken anytime soon. I've heard mummifying an apple is much easier... Aidan really looks forward to this subject.

Science--We decided to switch last minute to Astronomy, and it is going well. We've done some fun experiments, and Pete has done a bunch with Aidan as well.

Literature--This is one of my favorite subjects, of course, and Aidan loves to color or draw while I read aloud. Pete and I have pulled a few books from the lineup because of Aidan's tender heart, and we will revisit those at a later time. In general, the list we are working through has been fun.

Art and Music--Harmony Fine Arts is amazing. Aidan has made some neat art pieces when trying to copy some of the greats. The kids both love to dance around the kitchen to the classical music each week.

PE--We have continued with swim lessons this semester for both kids since Aidan was not ready by the end of the summer to stop without losing a ton of ground by next summer. He's picking up so well that we think he'll go back to taekwondo in the spring (and Iona to gymnastics).

We've been on some fun field trips as a family to a pumpkin farm and to see a Chinese orchestra.

We also decided to join a homeschool co-op, so every other Monday we spend the morning there. I work with Iona in the 2's and 3's class, and Aidan takes classes in Ancient Rome, PE, and Crafts. It's a nice break for us and it gives me some special time with Iona.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with how the year is going. I will be looking for ways to take us away from the kitchen table so much, as I feel we are spending too much time there, but otherwise things are lots of fun.

winner announced!

2010-08-09T20:14:00.002-05:00

The winner of our giveaway in the t-shirt blitz is Melissa G! Thanks again to everyone who purchased a t-shirt or two to support our adoption.

We still have lots of t-shirts available. If you didn't get a chance to order, the store is still open. :)

Stay tuned for info about upcoming fundraisers. Iona and I are both sick right now, so I'll get to this as soon as I can.

China Shirt Blitz and Giveaway!!

2010-07-20T20:10:00.004-05:00

Hi friends!

Between now and August 7, we are having an adoption t-shirt blitz to raise money for our next adoption from China. The next payment we are trying to raise is $1800.

You can see the shirts here.

Shirts are $27 each and will be mailed 7-10 days after your order. I have an inventory on-hand of Men's and Women's sizes. As my inventory runs out, I will order in batches of 25 to save money. Feel free to write me a check or pay via Paypal. (If I don't have your size, please be patient as I collect orders for the next batch. I am willing to order youth sizes if there is enough interest.)

With each shirt you order, I will enter you in a giveaway for this handmade bear, Frazzle!

My Aunt Eva has made bears and dolls for as long as I can remember, and I have wonderful memories of the bear and doll clothes I received from her as a child.

Aunt Eva has offered her "bad hair day" bear, Frazzle, to us for this giveaway. Please visit her site to see the other dolls animals she has made! (Adoption peeps: she has just made a China doll for me to show my friends, and she's working on an Africa doll. Watch her site for these new ones!)

If you have already placed an order, please let me know if you would like to be entered for the giveaway!

First Grade Curriculum

2010-07-09T15:03:00.004-05:00

I've been wanting to write this post for a while, but I'm finally getting a chance to sit down and do it.

For this next school year, I purchased Homeschool Tracker Plus to help me plan and organize school. It took a bit of time to get it started, but so far I really like it! I was able to download some lesson plans and tweak them, and creating my own lesson plans was pretty simple. I really like their online forums as well...I can even get a daily email of the topics discussed. This program should be useful for all the kids throughout their schooling.

I will say that we are following a classical model of schooling and we use The Well-Trained Mind for the basic structure of classes and curriculum, with some changes.

We will be using the following curriculum:

Bible--Grapevine's Level 2 Old Testament Overview
Language Arts: Writing--Writing with Ease Level 1. Thanks to the advice of a friend, I just bought the workbook and not the text. I also went to Peace Hill Press's site and downloaded the workbook pages so that I could print them off instead of copy them. If you do this, you still want to buy the workbook because it tells you what to do each day in addition to including the worksheets.
Language Arts: Spelling--Spelling Workout A and B
Language Arts: Reading--lessons 141-end of Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading. We went through lessons 1-140 last year. If I had it to do over again, I wouldn't have necessarily stopped at lesson 140, but just stopped whereever we landed at the end of the school year (after 140 preferably). Susan Wise Bauer recommends getting at least to that lesson by the beginning of first grade. Finishing this won't take us the whole school year. We also will be supplementing with Sonlight's reader's list for first grade...we're using the Reader's 2 schedule. We already started with The Beginner's Bible a little this summer because Aidan has caught the reading bug.
Langauge Arts: Grammar--First Language Lessons 1
Language Arts: Handwriting--Handwriting Without Tears My Printing Book. We are not using the teacher's guide this year. I really think we COULD use a regular handwriting program this year since Aidan is doing so much better with his writing, but we opted to stay with the familiar and let him go through just the workbook at his own pace. He doesn't seem to need the extra activities for fine motor that the teacher's guide gives.
Math--Saxon Math 2. We had a difficult time by the end of Saxon Math 1. Math often brings tears in this house. We decided to stay with Saxon one more year at least and try to change things up a bit as far as what manipulatives to use. Aidan is excited to start math again, which is encouraging!
History--Story of the World 1: Ancient Times. I am super excited about this. We're actually starting history a couple of weeks early because there are so many chapters and because I want to beat the rush to the library for some of the supplementary books for each chapter. I also bought the workheet pack for level 1 on their site so I can just print out the worksheets I needed instead of copying them. I have an older edition of the workbook, and the pdfs are the newer edition and much nicer.
Science--Apologia's Zoology 1: Flying Animals of the 5th Day. I am excited that Apologia has now made Notebooking Journals for each of their elementary science books! We are looking forwarding to studying bugs and birds and such.
Literature--Sonlight's Read-Aloud books for first grade. I have collected all of these through Paperback Swap over the last year. I'm already starting to collect the 2nd grade books. We loved the books from last year. We are supplementing with books listed for first grade in WTM; these go with the history curriculum. We are also pulling a few from Ambleside Online's literature books.
Art and Music--Harmony Fine Arts First Grade. We're using the option 2 group in Art.
Health/Character--Generations of Virtue has a curriculum for Preschool-Grade 4, and we will gradually use that this year. I don't have any of the books, so I added them to my PBS wish list and will also check the library.

For PE, Aidan will continue with taekwondo. Over the summer both kids have been in swim lessons, and we will decide soon whether to keep them in it or not.

We also have the chance to join a local co-op, which meets once every 2 weeks for the morning. We just sent in our registration for it, so we're hoping to get our first choice of classes.

I also gathered together the worksheets for each subject that uses them for the whole year. I divided them into six-week groupings and then paperclipped each week's workheets. I store them in file folders for each set of six weeks. (So I have bible, history, math, and writing clipped together for each week.) I know we will get off of that pre-planned schedule, but I have all the stuff printed off and ready to go. I got the idea for this here, though we will not be saving the worksheets after the fact in this way like she mentions. Instead, we'll file them in 3-ring notebooks per WTM.

We're making a timeline this year!! I'm using Homeschool in the Woods Timeline CD and we'll make a timeline that includes history and bible combined. I made a test timeline myself this past week and I'm really glad I did!! I did it in 2 evenings for the whole year, and now I'll be going through and marking which figures go with which chapters. I did a notebook timeline, in case you want to try to do this too. I think when we don't have little ones, I will graduate to a wall timeline, but I'm afraid Iona might try to pull stuff off the wall right now.

Simply Love China shirts are here!

2010-07-02T21:08:00.006-05:00

Our t-shirts have arrived!! Thank you to Kari for the design. :)

For men, we have M, L, and XL in stock. The shirt is a medium blue. The front says "Simply Love." in white letters. The back has an outline of China in blue.

For women, we have S, M, L, and XL in stock. The cut is slightly slimmer than the men's shirts. The shirt is black. The front says "Simply Love" in white letters. The back has an outline of China in pink.

If you would like a size other than the ones we have in stock, let me know. I will keep a list of who wants what size, and as soon as I have enough requests to place an order, I will. Please know that it may take a few weeks for you to receive your shirt because of this.

The cost for the shirts is $27 each.

Thanks so much for supporting us in this next adoption!!

Changes come

2010-06-17T20:10:00.003-05:00

It's been an emotional week here at our house.

We got a call from our agency on Tuesday and found out that Thailand is making major changes to their adoption program. They do not seem to be adopting out healthy children. Wait times are unpredictable.

We were encouraged to look into the China Waiting Child program. We did. Our hearts broke over the supposed "special needs" on that list of children. And we discovered the wait time for these kids is not as long as the healthy infant China program.

So we prayed. Cried. Prayed. Talked. Dreamed.

God seems to be directing us to adopt from this waiting child list. We can only adopt one at a time, but because we are interested in an older boy, it looks like we could get a referral very quickly.

When we originally chose our agency, we did so because they worked in Thailand. Now that we're adopting from China, we are planning to switch back to the agency who brought us to our daughter in Ethiopia. We lose our original application fee from the other agency, but we gain a familiar group of people. It feels like we're coming home.

We heard news today that our homestudy is going to be 3-5 months before it is ready to send in to USCIS. Our paperwork is on our social worker's desk, but 5 families are ahead of us. Once she finishes with it and does our training, it will take 6-12 weeks to get the approval of the one person in our state who needs to sign off on it.

It's hard to wait, but we are trusting the process, trusting that God will bring us directly to our son. We are encouraged and excited!!

God stories for Thailand...Counting Fish

2010-06-14T22:39:00.005-05:00

So Friday afternoon I was SO discouraged when we received our agency packet. It was a whole bunch of paperwork to fill out and training to do and bills to pay, and it wasn't even our dossier stuff yet! I called our agency and asked some questions, but I'll have to speak with the person in charge this week to answer some of my specific questions. I was just simply overwhelmed. I totalled up what we owe at the moment and it was more than I thought, and I could not begin to figure out where that money was coming from.

This is how God answered when I cried out to Him:

Our church's missions weekend was this past weekend. Friday night was a jewelry party for Women at Risk International, a group that ministers to and helps rescue women and children involved in the slave trade around the world. I knew they worked in Thailand, which is why I really wanted to go. I had balanced our checkbook that afternoon and had no idea how we would even get through the month, but I really wanted to purchase something small to support them. I don't even wear much jewelry! I got there just as the consultants were finishing their sharing and the group prayed together. I got to talk with a consultant about their connections to Thailand, and then I just walked around, browsed, and chatted with my friends. I noticed one of the tables had some books, so I decided to buy two of those: Sold and Princess. While I waited for the line to go down, I just walked around and talked to other women from church. Later, while I was still waiting, a friend came up to me and said, "I think God told me He wants me to buy you something here. What would you like?" I was astounded! We talked about it for a minute and I showed her the books. She took them from me and walked away, saying, "I'm buying these for you." !!! (If you know me at all, you know how much I love books, too!!)
A few people came up to me and said they have things for us to sell at the garage sale. OK, more than a few, all since Friday.
Sunday morning, during worship, we sang two songs from Urbana 2000, which was the convention where we both felt called to cross-cultural adoption. We cried as we sang "Santo Eres Santo" and "Jesus Shall Reign." The guest speaker gave a wonderful sermon on missions as well.
Today, I sat down with that packet from our agency and actually filled the entire thing out! It really didn't take that long. I flagged a few things for Pete to sign and us to find out. We still need to do the training, but it felt great to get that done.
I got a hold of the person who will be printing our t-shirts and started the process on that. Hopefully in the next week or two we will be posting on both our blogs how you can order those shirts!
We got a phone call tonight from someone who has a lot to donate to our garage sale, including furniture! (I specifically told someone on the phone not an hour before that we did NOT have any furniture yet!)
Tonight I sat down to balance the checkbook with the statements we just received. I found a bank error in our favor that I need to call about tomorrow for about $71. (They sent a charge through 3 times instead of just once.) Then, I realized another error on our own end to the tune of almost $500!!

I was VERY encouraged by this post this afternoon, so we've decided to keep track of these instances for our adoption.

God, you are SO good!

It's the little things, you know?!

Thailand

2010-06-11T15:26:00.003-05:00

We are adopting again! This time we are going to Thailand for 1-2 children age 6 and under.

Adoption paperwork is heavily underway. We are about to turn in a stack to our homestudy agency on Monday. It's all completed and notarized and copied, but we just need one more piece in there. We sent in our application to our placing agency, and today we received the next packet from them along with the training we need to complete.

Along with the paperwork comes the bills!! Right now we owe $1000 + $2200 + $670 + $180 + $120. That's $4170!

Since we just paid off our credit card a couple of months ago, we are trying not to use it at all unless we have to for the adoption. So we are praying the money in!

We are having an adoption garage sale on July 1-3 to raise this money. Please let me know if you have anything to donate for the garage sale!!

We will also be selling t-shirts this time, and we're hoping to have a t-shirt table at the sale. I'll be posting a t-shirt blitz on the blog soon!

Please pray for us when you think of it. We're at the next few steps of a long journey, and we'll need you to hold us up!!

Iona is 2!

2010-06-08T22:34:00.002-05:00

Iona turned 2 in May! You can see some pics here and here. It was hard to get very good photos because she is always on the move!! She got a tutu that day and some doll accessories, and as soon as she got the tutu on she was off, pushing her baby in her stroller...umm...I mean running through the house behind the stroller!

She is so much fun these days. She says the funniest things! She speaks very well for her age, and she really loves to play with her brother and wrestle him. She can count to 10 and sometimes higher. She loves to help me with chores as well, which can be good and bad! Iona just started swim lessons, and it's all I can do to hold her back from jumping in. She is learning how to sit with her legs crossed on the side of the pool!! It's a hard thing for her! Once she gets in the water, she tries to copy her brother. She is even practicing now in the bathtub. :)

Happy birthday, my sweet baby!! You are getting SO big! You've grown so tall recently and are such a joy to be around! It's fun to watch you take in the world around you, whether you are scared or excited or in awe. YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL!

PS--I'm planning school for Aidan in the fall, and this week I've been thinking about how to contain Iona while Aidan and I focus on schoolwork. I admit, at times I am terrified of what will happen! I know some people recommend having a box of toys specifically for school time, but I really don't know if that will work for her. I'd love to hear from some of my homeschooling friends about how they handle schooltime with a 2-year-old!

so things have gotten a bit busy...

2010-04-25T19:54:00.003-05:00

We're moved. We've been here just over a month. We love our new house!! The kids constantly want to go outside and play on the new swingset. They've made friends with the neighbors. We have to watch Iona closely because she likes to take herself right outside when the door is open!

95% of the boxes are unpacked. We're still finding the right place for everything. We've started a garage sale pile. :)

We have 3 weeks left of school. We'll finish the main subjects this week and then take the next 2 weeks to finish all the extras. I just went curriculum shopping for next year...so excited about what's coming in the mail over the next few weeks!! This may sound strange, but I absolutely love the challenge of planning out the school year. I'm going to try out a new program, so we'll see how it goes.

I am back at work 3 nights/week, but I'm hoping that will end soon. (It's a temp job, but reoccurs every few months.) I'd like to find some more editing clients this summer so I can make a bit more money for the time spent.

I finished judging a book award. I've done this one for a few years now and really enjoy it. This year it was a bit stressful with the move as well, but I managed to read 13 books in less than 3 months and still move to a new house. Ah!

The half marathon is next weekend. I hurt my knee last weekend while trying to run 8 miles. Umm...I should say I was trying to catch up on the training schedule...the longest I had gone before was 4.5. The knee seemed to heal after a few days of rest, ice, stretching, a short bike ride, and an hour-long Wii workout. I went out today for 2.5 miles and limped home. I am planning to call the doc in the morning and make sure I'm still good to go for 13.1 miles. Pete, however, has rocked the training schedule. And my sister is amazing as well. I hope I can keep up with them!!

These past few weeks I've been meditating on some "running" passages in the Bible and trying not to let my heart give up on this half marathon. Letting God change my heart and tune into His. Ouch. He's opening up the raw areas and working deep. Funny...I will be starting The Voyage of the Dawn Treader with Aidan this week, my favorite Narnia book, and I seem to remember this theme in the book. Hmmmmmm.

Still praying through the adoption details. Still waiting for tax returns so we can get started. We're hoping to at least start our home study soon.

Next week we're taking the family to St. Louis for a few days. We're going to the zoo and some museums. It's a celebration for being almost done with Kindergarten, and we'll be down there anyway...we're going with our best friends too!

Iona's birthday is coming up soon...I'll be sure to post pictures of her party...

countdown

2010-03-15T21:10:00.003-05:00

We are moving in 10 days!! Pete and Aidan have both been sick and are almost over their colds. I'm smack in the middle of mine. Thankfully, Iona has been doing OK. She seemed a little congested today, but nothing too bad.

We are taking a 3-week break from homeschooling. Everyone is excited for this break, but packing and unpacking is keeping us busy. It's so nice that we can flex our school schedule with life! Once we return to schooling, we have about 6 weeks left until we're done for the school year. I have lots of fun, school-related things planned for the summer, and I'm REALLY looking forward to planning out Aidan's 1st grade year. I'm itching to get started now, but I need to get my new house unpacked first. :) I read an amazing article on 1 Cor 13 for homeschool moms today...

I have not been able to run now for almost a week. I am feeling woefully underprepared for this half marathon coming up...

Iona has been VERY curious lately, and the boxes everywhere add to it. A common phrase out of her mouth lately is "What's that?" Over and over. She discovered where I keep her "pretties"--her hair beads and other hair supplies and has been found, multiple times, with bags of beads open and "stirring" the beads with her beading tool. I finally had to put it up and out of reach. And tonight she was caught curiously examining food in the garbage...the stray pieces of carrot and cabbage that I shredded, and the eggs that had been cracked... Ick. She's also been wanting me to hold her and rock her like a baby...she pretends to "sleep" in my lap or next to me on the couch, covered with a blanket and thumb in mouth. So cute!

Aidan started AWANA a couple of weeks ago and is having a blast! He just got his vest and new book and is working hard on learning his verses. I can't wait until Iona can join him when she turns 3. He seems to be taking the move fine. He's excited about the new house and his new room and new swingset. He's expressed some sadness about leaving our house, especially his stick and rock collections. :)

T minus 10 days and counting...

considering homeschooling?

2010-03-15T20:53:00.002-05:00

When I get interested in something, I read everything I can get my hands on to learn about it. When we decided to homeschool about a year ago, I spent spring and summer reading as much as I could--books, Web sites, magazines, etc. I wanted to pass along some of my favorite homeschool resources.

Books (get the most recent edition):

The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling by Debra Bell
100 Top Picks for Homeschool Curriculum by Cathy Duffy
The Well-Trained Mind by Susan Wise Bauer and Jessie Wise

Helpful Sites and Blogs:

Favorite Curriculum Suppliers:

I also order directly from the company if needed.

My favorite tip is to place holds from home on library books you want. You can do this for books the library owns or on ILL books. When they are ready, the library will call! This has saved me SO much time!!

How He Loves

2010-03-01T21:26:00.002-06:00

I have been running a bit lately, getting ready for this 1/2 marathon. I love to listen to worship music when I run--don't care so much about the tempo, but I just want some lyrics to think on as I pound the pavement.

Today I've been pondering some things with God and wrestling with Him over some idols, and this song came to mind. I LOVE running to David Crowder. LOVE LOVE LOVE his lyrics. Funny, I saw him live in Seattle and didn't think much of him at the time, but he's really grown on me. Some of his lyrics are really deep!

Wow.

handwriting

2010-02-25T19:27:00.004-06:00

Handwriting has been really hard for Aidan. He got glasses when he was 4, and it was amazing to see how well he could draw shapes after that!

This year for homeschool we decided to use Handwriting Without Tears for his handwriting curriculum. Can you believe we finished the kindergarten curriculum last week? Aidan has consistently wanted to move faster through the workbook than the "schedule," so I've let him. He loves to do the workbook page and then color the pictures.

Now that we're done, I have him writing his uppercase and lowercase alphabet on separate days as practice. For the other 2-3 days, we're working through book 1 of Draw Write Now. LOVE IT!! We're using HWT's Draw and Write Notebook to do the lessons.

I bought book 1 at the beginning of the school year because I thought it would be a fun activity book for Aidan since he LOVES art. I wasn't sure if writing the 4 short sentences for each lesson would be too much for him, but he is doing so awesome with the drawing and the writing. Today I let him color his drawings with colored pencils, and you would have thought I had given him the moon!

Yeah, my boy LOVES art. Any kind. We bought him a STACK of $.10 notebooks at the beginning of the school year and it was the best purchase! He has filled about 10 of them with his drawings...they started out as just ninja turtle after ninja turtle, and now he draws creatures he makes up, draws his toys while they model for him, and lots of picures of the family.

I think I'm going to buy the complete set of Draw Write Now books this summer and then sell this copy of book 1. We can work through them slowly over the summer and then when we finish our first grade HWT cirriculum early...

It's so amazing to see his progress in handwriting after all the specialists we've seen for his motor skills. God is so good, and Aidan is so determined! He is such a huge blessing.

Meanwhile, Iona has taken to drawing because she sees her beloved big brother doing it. She scribbles all over a paper and then says, "Ta-Da! Mommy, see!"

next adoption?

2010-02-14T20:42:00.003-06:00

We've been getting really excited about starting another adoption this summer. Right now the short list includes Russia, Ethiopia, Thailand, and Swaziland. Not in that order.

Please pray for us as we pray through this huge decision! We hope to announce the news sometime this summer, after we move and settle in.

I just filled out a ton of paperwork to change our address for our foster care license. It doesn't end!!

SOLD!

2010-02-14T20:26:00.002-06:00

We had an offer on our house in the afternoon after our open house. After going back and forth many times, we accepted a deal on Sunday morning!!

So we had our houses labeled 1, 2, and 3. While we were waiting for our house to sell, we had finally decided #1 was just too much money and out of our reach. Sunday afternoon we went to see #2 again. We were about to put an offer on it, but we were not at peace. It was a lot smaller than we remembered from the first showing. We went home and spent some time with our realtors, and we decided to go and see #3 again...of course we had to give the homeowners time to get out!! Finally, late afternoon, we went to see it again. WE LOVED IT!! We got to see it with the sun shining in the windows. We realized that once we took #1 out of the picture, this house looked a lot more appealing. We are very overwhelmed by God's grace, giving us the PERFECT house in so many different ways. Pictures are on Facebook.

We're still waiting to hear our close date. Our buyer wants in on March 15, but our seller would prefer to get out by March 30. Thankfully our realtors are working that all out. We have the basement almost completely packed.

The garage door turned out to be a relatively small fix, and our repairman was able to fix another problem with it at the same time. We're so thankful!!

We're taking a small break this week to go visit some adoption friends who are traveling nearby from MA. We're excited to see the Laughners again and anyone else who can come as well!

We had fun celebrating Valentine's Day this weekend with the kids. Aidan and Pete made sugar cookies with icing and got to use a bunch of fun cookie cutters. We gave the kids tiny boxes of chocolates. And tonight we had take and bake pizza for dinner. :)

Happy Valentine's Day!!

sponsor a child

2010-01-28T22:40:00.003-06:00

My friend Karen is organizing sponsors for a care center in Ethiopia. She only needs 5 more children sponsored!

We are sponsoring a 4-year-old boy named Zerubabel. He's the sweetest thing! He is in the back row of the picture on Karen's blog.

Be sure to read previous posts on her blog for more information on Kind Hearts, the care center.

Could God want to use you to care for orphans?

house hunting

2010-01-28T21:40:00.003-06:00

Our house has officially been on the market for 8 days. We've had 9 showings, and we hear 5 people are VERY interested. We have an open house planned for Saturday morning.

We totally feel like we're back waiting for a referral!! Every time the phone rings my heart leaps, hoping it's our realtor saying she has 1 or more offers for us. She and I even chatted multiple times today. But we still wait.

Meanwhile, we have 3 houses we are very interested in. We could see ourselves happy in any of the three. And 2 others, just in case. We've listed all the pros and cons for each and have gone round and round about an order for them. But we can't move forward until we get an offer, and we are trying to wait until we make an offer to do our taxes (because of the $6500 tax credit we can get).

Did I mention 9 showings in 8 days? Our vacuum died at the beginning of the week. We do have a backup, but it's just a canister vacuum, the kind with the long hose. We need a new one. We've priced the one we want out, but we are trying to wait to see what kind of floors we'll have in the new place. Oh, and the area rugs we bought? They have black borders. That show all the dirt. No matter how long it's been since you've vacuumed.

So tonight, as we are preparing to leave the house for another showing, I hit the button on the garage door and then promptly backed into it. CRUNCH. After we finally left the house, we called our realtor so she could let the realtor coming tonight know we planned to fix it in case his client asked. We got home from our errands and I called our insurance agent and a local garage repair person, who just "happened" to be coming near our house tomorrow anyway. It makes me sick to think we might have to replace the whole door before we move, but we'll see.

We're trying to move a little faster in homeschooling so we can prepare to take 2-3 weeks off for the move. Aidan's having no problem with the change in pace...he's actually doing better in math and seems to enjoy learning to read a bit more. I've been putting off the science experiments having to do with bread rising because of the mess while we are trying to sell, but since we need to stick around tomorrow for the garage repairman, we just might attempt it. And he can zip his coat by himself now!! All that occupational therapy is paying off!!

I finally bought winter running gear tonight so I can start training for the half marathon. I think this means I actually need to get outside and run now. I plan to start next week. Pete is already running 4 miles. Makes me sick.

We had a little issue a few weeks ago of Iona taking off her clothes in bed and throwing everything, diaper and contents included, out of the crib. Thanks to suggestions made, the onesies are working! Iona is looking more and more like a little girl and is really trying to converse with us. Aidan and Iona seem to be getting along even better. He just loves to make her laugh and comfort her and hug her. She has been trying to delay bedtime by continuing to ask for another hug from Aidan. Tonight she asked, "Ina give Aida a hug?" So cute!!

I'll let you know what happens with the house!!

bible in 90 days

2009-12-23T18:30:00.002-06:00

I KNEW there was something else I wanted to blog about earlier, but I couldn't remember when I actually sat down to write.

I've recently started reading this blog, and she's been talking about a bible reading plan that reads through the entire bible in 90 days--Jan 1-March 31. I signed up on this site to do it. I'm not getting their bible, but I'll just use mine, use their reading plan (under "listen while you read"), and listen to the weekly lessons online ("hear weekly lessons").

It's a huge task. I know I can't do it on my own. Anyone want to join me?

lots of updates

2009-12-23T13:20:00.002-06:00

I wrote earlier that I had gotten a part-time job. Well, they never did call me in to work, and then I received a letter that there had been budget cuts with the client and I may or may not call in. But I am welcome to get put on the list for the next job coming in the spring. Ugh. Thankfully, I did get a surprise editing job that brought in a nice chunk of money and made me realize how much I missed that. I updated my editing Web site and hope this next week to work on some editing tests in hopes of getting more work. I just love going to a coffee shop in the evening and working.

We tried out Stolen Moments Menu Planning this month, and we ended up scrapping our meal plans partway through the month because we didn't like a lot of the recipes and we were looking to go over budget for groceries. The good thing is that we did find some fun recipes and we've been eating out less. And we discovered the freedom in planning all three meals each day instead of just dinners. I've been doing it on my own and it's going well. It's nice to not have to think when it's time to cook--I just look at my list and see what the plan is. I plan and shop once a week.

We finished the 2nd quarter of homeschooling yesterday. We're all pretty excited for a break, though I'm curious to see Aidan's response by the time we get ready to come back. Today I tried out a Bible curriculum I'm thinking about for next year with Aidan, and he LOVED it. It's a combo of Bible and art, which he loves. He was able to process and discuss the passage well and kept saying how fun it was. And he had fun using colored pencils. :) I also asked him a lot of questions about how homeschooling is going and what we could do better or differently, and that was really helpful. We'll be making a few changes in the spring. Overall, we are all loving it.

Perhaps the biggest news is that we are hoping to get our house on the market by Feb 1 to try and take advantage of the current homeowner's tax credit (we would need a contract on another house by the end of April). We would need to sell our house first, so we'll see how it goes. We are praying for God to orchestrate all the details, because they just boggle our minds. First up, next week we are going to start removing carpet in the hallway and living room. Pete is off work all next week, so we're taking advantage of that. And he has a short list of little things to repair as well. It should be loud and dusty around here until we get that done.

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!!

taekwondo and hair

2009-12-05T15:06:00.003-06:00

Today Aidan earned his orange striped belt in taekwondo!! You can see pictures posted in the flickr album. He performed his kibon, broke a board, sparred, and then got his belt. It was super fun to watch him, although Iona got bored after a while.

This morning I "did" Iona's hair for the first time! Pictures are up on flickr. I didn't think it was long enough, but the ladies I talked with at Aldi last week assured me it was. So today I gave her a bath, put product in her hair, and then started with coils. So cute!! She loved getting to eat gummies while I was doing it. Her hair is still pretty short in the back and it's not staying in the best right there, but the rest is really fun. I don't know why I waited so long!!

Before I did the coils, I watched the videos on Shuruba to see what I was doing, and I was encouraged that the age of one of the "models" was close to Iona, with the same length of hair. After I did her hair, I ordered my first beads and snaps and beader and rubber bands. :) I'm looking forward to trying flat twists and some of the other styles with the beads and snaps.

I also wanted to point out the flickr photos of my new nephew, Gavin! I am leaving soon to take the train up to my sister's house for a couple of days to help her sleep with a newborn in the house. Her hubbie RJ just went back to work, so I'm going to come and help with cooking and cleaning and cuddling with little Gavin while she rests. I'm excited to get a "break" from here, but I know I'll be busy there too.

working

2009-11-17T23:34:00.003-06:00

We've been trying to pay off debt for a while now, and we decided a few weeks ago that I really needed to get a part-time job to help things go a bit faster. We want to move next summer and we want to adopt again, so now every time we want to spend money, we (try to) ask ourselves if it's worth more than a new house or an adoption. We'll see if that helps us curb the excess.

I got a temporary job last week scoring standardized tests. I will be scoring the composition portion at the high school level. It'll last a couple of months, and I have my resume out at a few other places for when that is done. If they like me, I could be called back for future projects. I think it will be fun. I'll be working three evenings during the week and then Saturday afternoons.

I read about Stolen Moments Menu Planning on Money Saving Mom's site. Since I didn't win her giveaway for a free year of this service, we signed up tonight for one month with MSM's discount (good through the end of the month). I already coupon, menu plan, and shop sales, but I'm excited to see how this might help us. I've been feeling in a rut for a while with breakfasts and lunches, so I signed up for her Complete Plan for this first month. Since I will have less time home while I am working, we thought it was the perfect time to try this out. I'll let you know how it goes!

I also recently bought Owlhaven's Family Feasts for $75 a Week. She includes some Ethiopian and Korean recipes, two of my favorite cuisines. And I LOVE almost all the recipe ideas in the book. I'm excited to try many of them out. Owlhaven is a fellow adoptive mom!

Aidan turns 6!!

2009-11-17T23:28:00.003-06:00

My miracle baby turned 6 this past Saturday. Pete put our Flickr photos on my blog, so just go to the album for Aidan's 6th birthday party and you can see the fun.

We celebrated with grandpa and a few friends at Chuck E Cheese. We didn't do their birthday package, but we just ordered some food, brought our own cake, and just played. Aidan wanted his icing ninja turtle green, and we gave his mini turtles a bath before we used them as cake toppers. His friends Kiri and Atticus came with their families and played with us there. Aidan got some LEGO sets, a bunch of games, some books, some turtle figures, and a fun Wolverine-like claw that makes noise--he calls it his Shredder claw. Grandpa came to the house after the party and stayed most of the afternoon, helping Aidan play with his toys and just hanging out.

For dinner he asked for hot dogs and mac and cheese, and then we watched Monster's vs. Aliens together.

It was a nice, relaxing birthday (except when I was literally CHASING Iona through Chuck E Cheese), and I didn't even have to clean!!

Halloween 2009

2009-11-01T20:11:00.001-06:00

the voiceless

2009-11-01T18:04:00.003-06:00

So last week I found out I have the flu. We think H1N1, but I was never tested. I've been sick for almost a week now, with no sign of being near done yet. Fever has been gone since Wednesday, thankfully, but yesterday I woke up with no voice.

I never realized how much I like to talk!

So Pete challenged me today with the question: so what is God teaching you through this?

I feel like I have so much swimming in my mind since that question. This is my attempt to record and make sense:

the orphan--so many have no voice!! 143 million!!

Orphan Sunday is next weekend. I've been praying for orphans, for people to adopt, for parents who are sick or make difficult decisions, for finances to come through for friends who are adopting.
Some friends are going on a trip with Children's Hopechest to Ethiopia. Read more about their trip here. Consider a donation! Did you know that $15 will feed one Ethiopian child for a month?
What is God calling us to do? We know that adopting Iona has been one of the greatest joys God has given us. She is such a fighter. In Ethiopia, 1 in 5 kiddos die before age 5. In calling us to adopt her, God gave her LIFE!! And God opened our eyes to a bigger picture of His love.
I've been in a women's bible study at church on the book of Proverbs. God has been challenging me with these passages:

Prov 15:1--A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.

Prov 15:4--The soothing tongue is a tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit.

Prov 29:11--Fools give full vent to their rage, but the wise bring calm in the end.

I've really been thinking about and trying to watch the way I speak to my kids. Not yelling. Choosing words that give life and don't crush them. Encouraging them lots. Loosing my voice has made me sit back and think through that more, thinking about what I would say if I could, whispering words to them that make a difference.

I've also been pondering God's voice in Scripture. God's powerful voice to create. What God's voice sounded like to his people. The people who raised their voices to God. How God speaks into the lives of his people. So much to think about.
It's been really hard for me to not kiss my kiddos on the lips (for fear of spreading my illness), read them stories, etc.
I'm slightly stressed that we're behind in homeschooling, but we're really only a few days to a week behind in certain subjects. I can't start up again until I can speak.
I've been praying my voice is back by Tuesday, when Pete leaves on a business trip for the rest of the week. Please pray!!
I've wrestled with how many times I've wanted to say random things to Pete and I can't. How much do I speak words that are meaningless? Are my words lifting him up or tearing him down?

Please pray that I can continue to make sense of all this and what God wants to teach me. And please pray I LEARN it this time!!

trade as one

2009-10-28T20:09:00.000-05:00

sick, sick, sick

2009-10-28T17:28:00.003-05:00

Right before we went apple picking, the kids got sick and got put on antibiotics. Congestion but no fever. They both finished their meds and were not better. So another 10 days of meds went by. Our doc even said we could do a second round of the second med if we wanted to make sure it was cleared up. We decided not to, even if they were still sick. They seem fine now, although today they were both coughing just a little. They finished their meds today.

I, on the other hand, have an unconfirmed case of swine flu. Boo. All day on Monday I was feeling a little off, and it just got worse as the day went on. By evening I was achy and my throat was scratchy. In the middle of the night I ran a fever. Tuesday Pete thankfully stayed home with the kids while I was in bed all day. Aidan was supposed to have a field trip, but it got canceled because the leader's family was sick. I finally went to Prompt Care in the afternoon in my pajamas. (This should tell you how bad I felt--I would NEVER do this otherwise!) After a 1.5 hour wait, they agreed that it was most likely H1N1 and that I would be better in 5-7 days.

Pete went back to work this morning and I parented from the couch most of the day. He came home at lunch and did a little school with Aidan. (Tuesday Aidan was happy there was no school, but by today he really wanted to "do school.") I think they might do some more tonight after taekwondo.

Pete has a conference to go to next week, so please pray with us that 1) I feel better soon, 2) the kids don't get it from me, and 3) Pete doesn't get it. We have sanitized the house and are continuing to do so when we can.

Thanks to good friends who have offered to bring us dinner this week. Looking forward to gondolas tonight.

apple picking

2009-10-28T16:57:00.003-05:00

Earlier this month we went apple picking with the Treat family. We were SO excited to finally meet them after lots of conversations online and on the phone. Erica's kids are each about one year older than ours, and Eben and Aidan got along smashingly. :) Iona and Abel are from the same transition home in Ethiopia.

We played in the kid area at Curtis Orchard for awhile, had lunch in the cafe, and then went apple picking. It was very crowded that day and a little muddy, but we had a really good time with them and the kids did wonderfully. Since the Treats are living nearby for the next year, we hope to do more with them. They are also homeschooling using the Well-Trained Mind, like us. I heard lots of fun stories of what I have to look forward to with Aidan for next year. As we were getting ready to go, there was a little accident with Pete's camera...it bounced on the concrete. His nice camera. Thankfully the Lord spared it and it still works.

reunion!!

2009-10-06T14:48:00.003-05:00

In early September we took a family vacation to Branson for the AWAA Ethiopia reunion. How special it was to put faces with names and people with blogs!! We were gone almost a week and were able to meet many dear friends face to face for the first time!!

Next year's reunion will be in Nashville. We really hope we can make it to that one midst moving into a new house and all.

Above are photos from day 1. Will get the rest up soon...

new Apologia title coming out

2009-09-14T13:57:00.003-05:00

I'm really excited about a new Apologia title coming out called Exploring Creation with Human Anatomy and Physiology. It's one of Jeannie Fulbright's elementary science texts, due out next semester.

Aidan has been asking a lot of "how does my body work" questions lately. Yesterday, it was "how did God use my body to heal my owie?"

We're not planning to start using the Exploring Creation series until next year, and I already have three of them on my bookshelf that we bought used, but I am excited about this one coming out for a few reasons--Aidan's interest and my desire to stay with the series until he gets into the junior high texts. Right now I think I have Astronomy and Zoology 1 and 2 here. But even if we don't use Anatomy and Physiology next year, it would be nice to have a text like that one here to help answer his questions in a way that honors God's glorious handiwork in our bodies.

the many words of Iona

2009-08-29T09:41:00.004-05:00

Iona has a ton of words now, and I just wanted to document what she can say at 15.5 months old. I may be adding to this as I think of more.

mama
dada
all done (signs and says)
more (signs)
please (signs)
up
open
Aidan (sounds like ada)
yuck (sounds like uck)
shakes her head yes and no
yes
no
cup
poop
night-night
bear
ducky
cracker
hot dog (this is what she calls most foods)
off
shoes
socks
eyes
ears
nose
mouth
hair
be-bo (belly button)
wet
hug
muah (kiss)
book
elmo
ball
bath
hi
bye
have that?

readoption day

2009-08-29T09:29:00.003-05:00

With our lawyer.

Our family.

With the judge.

On Monday we were able to finally readopt Iona! She came to the US as a resident alien though she was legally our daughter. The readoption process allowed us to legally change her name and made her a US citizen. We'll get an IL birth certificate with our names and her new name on it.

weapons

2009-08-23T14:58:00.004-05:00

I loved this post.

Aidan is a total boy. His dress up bin is half-full of nothing but weapons--discards from friends' collections, clearance Halloween costume parts, an old jump rope, and even weapons made out of paper towel and wrapping paper rolls and just rolled up construction paper taped together. He loves to go in the basement and fight with swords any time we will do it with him. He's even gotten his sister in on the action--she can wield a sword, at 15 months old, with the best of them. She just laughs and laughs! Aidan loves to take his swords outside and run around the yard fighting imaginary enemies. We don't let him play with guns, although he did acquire a small water gun from somewhere.

Sometimes his obsession with Ninja Turtles is irritating--instead of drawing a picture about the Sunday School lesson at church he wants to draw a turtle and his matching weapon. He even has notebooks full of them. But, as one of the SS teachers always reminds me, this is who God made him to be.

I pray that he will be a man who fights for honor justice and truth and will know how to wield the Word of God so that he falls more in love with Jesus each day. And I pray God will give him unique eyes to see the spiritual warfare happening around him and fight through prayer, surrendered to Jesus.

And I hope to even teach him a little about the artists the Ninja Turtles were named after. :)

pictures

2009-08-20T20:45:00.004-05:00

These were taken on Aidan's first day of school.

Me and Iona with Kristen Lunceford and Selah in the Chicago suburbs.

My mouth waters just looking at this plate. This was our Ethiopian meal in Evanston on Sunday.

Danielle Black and Selah, me and Iona, and Karen Bowman and Natalie. I love how the moms look excited and the kids couldn't care less.

first week

2009-08-15T10:36:00.003-05:00

We've completed our first week of homeschooling. Whew!

We fell "behind" in the middle of the week due to a last-minute field trip to Sugar Grove Nature Center, but by the end of Friday we were almost completely "caught up." Not that it really matters, especially this early in the year. Some of my highlights this week were seeing Aidan "get it" with writing some of his numbers and watching his excitement when we did a few science experiments.

Iona gained 3 lbs and 2 inches in the last 3 months. And the doc confirmed she's getting her molars. That explains a lot from this week. But she was a real trooper with the homeschooling goings-on around here...I even got her to sit at the table and eat a snack and play with some small toys for quite a while when we did art yesterday. We do a lot of the school time when she is sleeping, but she enjoyed watching the art process.

Yesterday we watched Randy and Amy's daughter Kiri for the morning as we thought Amy might be having her baby, but alas, no go. It was really a good situation all around, but we just want to meet the new little princess. Even with our visitor for the morning, we got SO much school done yesterday and had a ton of fun with it.

This afternoon we're going up to Chicago for a whirlwind trip. Tonight we're having Chicago pizza with the Luncefords. Tomorrow for lunch we will be in Racine, WI for a baby shower for my second cousin, also known as a big family reunion on my mom's side where everyone will get to meet Iona. Then for dinner we'll be back in the suburbs for an Ethiopian dinner with the Bowmans and Blacks. Then back home that night. We're excited to see our friends again. Today is also our 11-year anniversary, and while this will be a fun family trip to celebrate, I think we'll do a date night by ourselves sometime soon. :)

I'll try to post pictures next time...

exercise

2009-08-10T23:25:00.003-05:00

So I'm back at it again. Early this year I started running and after two months I ran my first (and only) 5K. I came in second to last, but I finished. I had big plans to run a half-marathon by this time this year, but after the 5K I stopped. All forms of exercise. Done.

This summer I've dabbled a bit with walking and running, and thanks to my friend KP, I decided this week to start the Couch to 5K program. Don't know if I'll do another 5K this year, but at least it breaks down the running into manageable chunks.

So Saturday night I went for a 30-minute walk. Sunday night (it was a HOT one!) I did my first couch to 5K walk/run for 30 minutes. Then tonight I walked with a friend for an hour. The plan is to try to get out every night for a short time. If I set certain days to go work out, I always find an excuse. I hope this way I will actually do it most of the time.

My legs are SORE tonight. But it's really nice to get out of the house without kids...I usually listen to a talk or music on my iPod. It's a nice break. Hopefully I'll finally be able to lose the last of my Aidan baby weight.

Just watch, I'll do all of this and then we'll get pregnant again...

That would be nice!

first day of school--kindergarten

2009-08-10T23:11:00.003-05:00

Today we started homeschooling Aidan. It went remarkably well! I think I learned a lot as well. I felt like we rushed through this morning...I think I was really concerned with how to fit everything in and how long each subject would take. All and all, we were done in 1.5 hours, but we split that up a bit. I hope I will be a little more relaxed tomorrow! But we both had fun, and I even got to play with his playmobil castle with him a bit before Iona woke up. I'll post photos sometime soon...

I was disciplining ALL day though. I think both kids had time outs before 9 am. Iona melted down all day, though. She even took 2 naps. I finally determined she must be teething something awful...she was drooling MUCH more than usual and was very clingy and crabby. We go for her 15-month appointment this week, so I wonder if we'll discover more teeth by then, or maybe the beginnings of molars...

referralversary and cloth diapers

2009-08-05T21:54:00.008-05:00

One year ago today we got "the call." We had waited 9 months and 5 days for our referral. It was such a happy day here! Iona was almost 3 months old in these photos.

Iona's getting so big!! Almost 15 months old now.

She is outgrowing some of her cloth diapers (just the ones that are sized S-M-L; most of them are one-size), so today I took the kids to my favorite local diaper store to make a purchase. Fun!

We got two more one-size diapers and three size large diapers. One for nighttime and four for day. And we got a really fun wet-and-dry bag in pink swirl. Now I don't have to carry the big diaper bag everywhere! And maybe I can go more than two days between washes...we'll see.

In Iona's diaper wardrobe are: Swaddlebees, Blueberry (including a couple minkys), Knicker Nappies, and Tiny Tush. Tee Hee!

The Big Curriculum Clean-Out

2009-08-02T10:29:00.002-05:00

I am taking part in a slew of giveaways through a homeschool blog I read. From Aug 2-Aug 15, many homeschool moms will be giving away gently used homeschool resources. What a great deal for newbie homeschool moms like myself!!

Please click here for more information. You can enter her giveaways and then see who is linked in the comments section for even more from other readers.

Let me know if you win anything!! I'll let you know if I win too. And maybe I'll find more fun homeschool blogs to read!

our family's favorite books

2009-07-30T14:04:00.002-05:00

This is one of Iona's absolute favorite books:

The Belly Button Book by Sandra Boynton.

I was going to post a pic, but alas, it's out of print!!

Iona laughs and laughs when we read this or other Boynton books. Be bo!!

We are super excited that Mo Willems has a new Elephant and Piggie book out, called Elephants Cannot Dance! We adore ALL of his books--Pigeon, Elephant and Piggie, Knuffle Bunny, Naked Mole Rat, and Leonardo are all part of our family. And Time to Pee! is a classic. :)

some fun links

2009-07-25T08:49:00.003-05:00

We enjoyed sitting around the computer and looking through these this morning...

Last week at a local park we got to see a turtle laying eggs. We went home and looked up videos on you tube of turtles laying eggs, and we laughed and laughed at this video.

Like legos? We adored the use of legos here and here.

Aidan is the family inventor, and it was so neat for him to see what can be done with drawing and inventions and some of his favorite toys.

until next summer...

2009-07-24T20:25:00.003-05:00

So it's been an AGONIZING few days as we've been hashing and rehashing the whole move idea.

Here's what we've decided:

We are not putting our home on the market until somewhere in April-June 2010.
Our goal is to try to pay off as much debt as possible between now and then (more on that later). By then we should only be a month or a few away from "debt-free except the house."
We are lowering our price range for a new place to one where we can afford a 15-year loan. This is totally doable where we live and we would still get a lot of house. We would be done with house payments by the time Iona started college.
We are going to work on the home improvements our realtor suggested we make between now and then. We've already fixed one small thing, but we still need to get a new vanity for the main bathroom and...the big thing...rip up the carpet in the living room and hallway and refinish all the hardwood upstairs.

Have any of you had hardwood floors refinished? How do your small children do with the wood versus carpet? We may wait on this part until closer to the move, but we'd love to know what you think. We're collecting estimates like they are baseball cards. One guy today "forgot to write down" our appointment at 8 am this morning. I told him he lost the job. Boo. We seriously have had someone here (or supposed to be here) at 8 am for the past few mornings. And we have someone coming Monday at...you guessed it...8 am.

So I've decided to apply at the local community college for a teaching job...English Comp. Part-time--just one class to start with. This would seriously help with our debt reduction plan. And it sounds like I just might like it!! Please pray--they are hiring a number of new English Comp teachers. The whole thing is a God thing. Long story. I was able to get my transcripts today, and tonight I'm working on my curriculum vitae and cover letter.

I'm pretty darn excited. About all of it.

For now, we're having fun driving around and dreaming big.

house hunting?

2009-07-20T22:17:00.003-05:00

So we went out again tonight to drive around and look at neighborhoods. It's been a common activity for our family lately. I think the kids are getting bored with it. And Aidan is NOT happy about leaving the only house he has ever known.

Yes, we are more seriously considering a move to a larger house in town. With a fence.

I'm waiting for our realitor to call us back so we can have our initial discussion. We've narrowed it down to some very specific areas of town. We're hoping Pete can still bike to work, but we know we may have to break down and buy a second car if we find the right house. We're going to try our hardest, though.

We also called a local roofing company and are getting an estimate on Thursday for a new roof. Then we'll talk to our realitor about what we NEED to do before it goes on the market. We discovered we MAY NOT need to get a new fridge and oven/range...they still have more years than we thought. But we want to see what else should do to the place.

We've been looking at the house hunting Web sites at local houses for sale, driving around and picking up sheets out in front of certain houses for sale, and figuring out what we can afford. It's exciting and scary at the same time.

I'm not looking forward to packing. Or keeping the house ready to show. But we're praying God will go above and beyond our best effort and smooth out the way before us. (Or redirect us quickly.)

We would love to pay off debt first. But that could be a couple of years. And we're hoping to get pregnant sometime soon. And we need a fence.

Time to pray again.

children's music

2009-07-17T20:06:00.003-05:00

Our library's summer reading program tonight had a FREE concert with Jim Gill. We found one of his CDs at the library a few weeks ago and we've really enjoyed dancing around the house and singing along. We were SO excited that he performed a bunch of songs from that CD at the "family room concert."

LOVE IT! If you haven't heard of him, please look for his music at your local library or music store. Did I say he's also an author? He performed "A Song Opera" for the crowd tonight, and it was hilarious. Even Iona got into it!

We're a little picky about our kid music around here. Ok, we're music snobs to some extent. Jim's music is just pure fun.

He reminds us in many ways of Dan Zanes, who is a big family favorite.

We let Aidan pick out one CD and got Jim to autograph it for Aidan and Iona. So fun!!

teeth and taekwondo

2009-07-14T20:26:00.003-05:00

Iona seems to be getting more teeth coming in. I can't seem to tell where they are coming, but she's chewing on her hand and drooling buckets. And she's started BITING. Never went through that with Aidan. She's been wrestling on the floor with Aidan and biting him on the back. He runs around with wet spots on the back of his shirt. She has only hurt him one time, but now, of course, we are on the lookout for it more. She did bite me once today, but she learned pretty quickly that it wasn't appropriate. Thanks to a friend's suggestion, I gave her some crunchy food with dinner. She got to try a frosted mini wheat and thought it was amazing!

She also is learning to climb on the furniture. She can climb on the chair with no problem--we've had to move some of the things we kept out of her reach over there. She can ALMOST get on the couch and gets REALLY mad if we don't help.

On the plus side, she has learned to say "hug" and "hi" recently. She'll go around and say hi over and over again--so cute! And she will come up to us and hug and kiss us pretty often. She and Aidan play together so well for the most part. She hates to see Aidan in time out--she tries to either sit with him and hug him when he's crying or keep peeking at him.

Aidan has been taking taekwondo at this wonderful local gym. This Saturday he will be testing to move up to the next belt--white with a yellow stripe. He has to do the star form and also will get to break a board. It's so neat to see him progress in this. He loves it so much because he gets to be like the ninja turtles. He's really growing in his coordination. We are so excited for him! We've also had Iona in a mommy-and-me gymnastics class and she is doing very well in there. I think she's the littlest one, but she amazes us with what she can do there. We think we're going to keep her in it through the school year to give her some one-on-one time with us.

We're gearing up for school starting in a couple of weeks around here. I can't believe the summer is going so fast! We haven't spent as much time this year in the water or at the park, but it's been hard with Iona's 2-nap schedule. As of this week, I lay her down for an hour in the morning but she usually doesn't sleep. It's good for her to have some time by herself, though. But what's nice now is that if we have something going on in the morning, we can go out and do that and not interrupt the nap-she-never-takes in the morning. And when school starts, I'll have an hour of uninterrupted time with Aidan to work.

We talked with Aidan tonight a little about how school may not always be in the morning for us. On certain days, when we have something big happening that day, school may be in the afternoon or evening or not at all. He had a rough time with that info, but by the end he seemed to come around. We've learned he needs to be mentally prepared for changes like that...just like his mommy! We specifically mentioned the day we readopt Iona, which will happen in the morning. On that day we'll probably do some school in the afternoon. Or skip it. We'll see.

Speaking of homeschooling, I just came across this WONDERFUL site, and I'm excited to dig into it more.

We're starting to get the itch for a bigger house. We need a fenced yard for our kids--living on the corner next to train tracks with no fence isn't the most ideal, although after visiting Ethiopia we are so blessed and thankful for what we have. We're also looking for more bedrooms as we think of adding to our family. We'd like to pay off debt first and put on a new roof and maybe fix a couple of other things around here, but we'll see what happens. We had talked about moving away from the area at one point, but we have no leads at the moment. I guess we'll see what God wants to show us when He is good and ready for us to move.

please pray

2009-07-11T13:15:00.004-05:00

We're praying for adoption friends Jason and Erica Reed this weekend.
They were supposed to pick up their daughter in Ethiopia in just a couple of weeks. Please join us in prayer for them.

Other families in our adoption program are also facing huge health issues with their children in Ethiopia. Please pray also for the Lane and Tapper families.

And our friend Kim just had a horrid experience with racism. I know we will probably face this at some point, but we haven't had it this rough yet.

God, please comfort all my friends who are hurting. We know you can heal and redeem. We trust you even when we don't understand.

My strong Iona

2009-07-05T18:59:00.004-05:00

When we first picked up Iona from Ethiopia, we knew she was a strong little one. Very malnourished (11 lbs at 6 months old), but very strong. She was crawling, pulling up, and holding her own bottle. We thought we would be bringing home a little blob of a baby, but we had to babyproof immediately. By 9 months old she was walking. This last month she did some other amazing things--my little gingerbread baby.

Iona is now 1 week shy of 14 months old. This is what she did tonight.

I think I see a crib tent or some sleep sacks in our near future.

At least she's not doing this:

library photos

2009-07-03T23:50:00.005-05:00

We completed the library reading program this last week and went to the library to claim our prizes. Aidan was delighted that the theme this year was on wild animals. Here, he got to meet the gorilla statue in the library.

Here is Aidan with the snake at the library.

And here, Aidan told us he was the gorilla's baby. We laughed so hard!

family time

2009-07-03T23:37:00.002-05:00

It was so nice to have Pete home today with no major agenda on our schedule!

We decided to take the kids after naps today to our local zoo. We got there just in time to see the big cats get fed. We saw the sun bears, gibbons, leopard, and tiger get their dinner. So cool. We walked around the zoo until closing time and then went over to the nearby playground and sprinkler park. The kids were in their regular clothes, but they sure didn't mind! We took off Iona's shorts and let her run around in her onesie and cloth diaper. She boldly walked up to the sprinkler area, got her feet wet, and then slowly walked toward the sprinkler itself. What a surprise!! She immediately ran toward daddy with her arms up and a look of "what the heck!" Her princess side came out--not wanting to be a part of it at all. However, she watched for a while and then got back down and did it all over again. :)

Aidan boldly ran right in the middle of the sprinklers and got soaked, laughing wildly. What a change from a few years ago! He would have never done that when he was younger. He went back and forth between the playground and the sprinklers. And for the first time, when I announced that it was time to go home and eat dinner, the little stinker ran away from me right into the water! Let's just say we had a little talk about that on the way home...

I feel guilty that this was the first time this summer that we've gone to one of the local, FREE sprinkler parks. I think we'll be back soon. Maybe even this next week.

On another random note, I just finished reading Lisa Samson's Embrace Me. It's by far the best Christian fiction I have read this year. And that is saying something. Wow. Highly recommended!

Aidan's bug friend

2009-06-26T20:44:00.002-05:00

Remember yesterday's post about Aidan and his fly friend?

The madness continues.

We have spent the last 1/2 hour here in the house chatting about his fly friend. I found a dead fly and threw him away, and Aidan was really upset that it might be his little bug friend. I told him there was probably plenty of other bug friends in the house after the garage sale today. We talked about the chance that Raphael, his fly, might die or disappear, but if that happens he could always find another fly. The new fly could be Raphael II. Aidan thought he would name it Leonardo. I asked him how he would tell his multiple fly friends apart, and he said they would wear headbands that were different colors!! Now the boy wants to make headbands for his fly friends and hand it to them so they can put them on.

Oh brother.

I think we need a pet. And not a fly, either.

garage sale and update

2009-06-25T22:10:00.005-05:00

So I've been quiet because I've been getting ready for a garage sale this week. Today wasn't as busy as I expected at the sale--I think the heat is keeping people away. We'll see how things go tomorrow and Saturday. We're hoping to get enough money to get these shelves from IKEA for our homeschooling supplies. We have some other things on our wish list, but we'll see what happens. :)

There were so many funny conversations with the kids today. Aidan is just hilarious! Pete posted about it here in today's post. We've told him he can have the money from the toys of his that sell at the sale. He's excited about getting to buy new things, but he's coming out to the garage every few minutes asking if his things have sold. Then he's either sad because they haven't or sad because they have.

All this going in and out has given us a nice family of flies in the house. Aidan caught one between his fingers today and brought it into Iona's bedroom to show her, letting it fly away. He named it Raphael. Nice. It's not the first time he's caught flies in his hand.

We went to see a presentation this week given by Wildlife Prairie Park in Peoria. It was here in town thanks to the library reading program. They had a toad, a skunk, a snapping turtle, an albino snake, and an owl to present to the kids. Aidan's favorites were the snake and the turtle. Of course. Exactly the ones momma DIDN'T like. The snapping turtles mouth still gives me nightmares.

We've enjoyed having Pete home this week from work. Iona got strep throat earlier this week and had a very high fever, but she's doing much better. We've been doing some fun free activities around town this week. On Sunday Pete is DJing a wedding up by my dad's, so we're going up with him and I'll take the kids to visit a friend. We may even get to go to IKEA to get the shelves...we'll see.

used curriculum sale bargains

2009-06-20T10:43:00.003-05:00

I just had to post the deals I got this morning at our local homeschool curriculum sale:

The Light at Tern Rock
The Hundred Dresses
A Grain of Rice
The Apple and the Arrow
In Grandma's Attic
Five True Dog Stories
Capyboppy
Mr. Popper's Penguins
James and the Giant Peach
What Your First Grader Needs to Know
What Your Second Grader Needs to Know
Usborne Children's World Cookbook
Usborne First Book of America
Geography Songs
Exploring Creation with Zoology 1: Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day
Exploring Creation with Zoology 2: Swimming Creatures of the Fifth Day
Exploring Creation with Astronomy
The Story of the World Book One: Ancient Times (text and activity book)
Saxon 2 Teacher's Manual

Total Cost: $71.50. What a steal!!

I didn't need much for this coming year, but I found a bunch of the read-alouds I'm using. I did find a bunch of my curriculum for next year and after.

Dancing Children

2009-06-18T22:57:00.001-05:00

OK, Aidan WAS wearing his seatbelt, but the stinker, we think, stuck it behind him when we weren't looking. Looks like we'll be having a little discussion about it in the morning...

The Many Faces of Iona

2009-06-18T22:49:00.001-05:00

Gingerbread Baby

2009-06-17T18:44:00.002-05:00

I just read this book to Iona tonight for bedtime and it perfectly describes my little munchkin.

"I am the Gingerbread Baby. I am quick. I am fast. I am clever. I am smart. No one can catch me!"

Today we moved Iona's changing pad down to the floor off of the dresser because there's been too many times this week alone where she has been about to take a flying leap off of the dresser. 13 months old! She would also try to climb off the dresser feet or head first, slowly, as if I wouldn't notice.

Then tonight, at dinner, she stood up in her high chair WHILE BUCKLED IN. Thankfully we were sitting right there! The high chair is now in storage and the booster seat has joined our table. At least it's not as far for her to fall if she tries that again. Whew!

Yesterday she turned the laundry basket upside-down and climbed up top and stood up! She's also a HANDFUL when we go outside and play.

Maybe I just don't remember it well, but Aidan was not a daredevil like Iona is. I know, I know, every kid is different, but we're not used to this yet!

I Need Africa More Than Africa Needs Me

2009-06-16T00:33:00.003-05:00

15-year reunion and vomit

2009-06-15T22:15:00.007-05:00

Last week I found out a group of my friends from high school were getting together in Naperville for dinner on Sunday night. I haven't seen them since high school and only recently reconnected with them on Facebook. One friend was going to be in town from Seattle, and the rest live in the Chicago suburbs. Pete and I decided to take the family up there to see my friends again.

We left home around 4 pm Sunday and got to the restaurant just before 6. We were supposed to meet at Lou Malnati's, but plans changed at the last minute and we went to Giordano's for Chicago-style pizza. Yum! It was SO nice to see everyone again!! This was the crowd that, through their friendship, led me to Christ way back in the day. We hung out with everyone until about 8:45, when we left to drive home. I'm so glad we reconnected in person, and I hope I can stay in touch with them better!

On the way home, Pete looked back at Iona and discovered she had thrown up on herself and the carseat. Ugh. We drove a few more miles to an exit with a gas station and had to buy paper towels and more wipes to clean up the mess the best we could on the road. Thankfully, I had brought ANOTHER change of clothes. (We had the outfit she was in, pjs, and a spare outfit. We had put the kids in pjs when we left the restaurant, and Iona threw up all over those.) We think she just ate too much and the food was a bit rich for her--at least it smelled like Chicago pizza! We finally got home at 11, put the kids in bed (after changing Iona AGAIN since her clothes were wet from the wet carseat), and I spent the next 30 minutes taking off the carseat cover to wash and cleaning out all the crevices. Ick. You know you're a mom when you can touch your child's vomit. We realized this was the first time we've had to clean up vomit for our daughter! I'm sure there will be other times...

She seemed ok today and has had no fever, so I think she just ate too much. We were thankful that the mess was pretty contained. It could have been much worse.

This is the first time I've posted photos on my blog, and they posted out of order. The first one is Aidan's ninja pose. He doesn't like to take normal photos anymore. :) The second one is me and Iona just before she got sick. The poor girl's diaper was soaking wet and leaking onto my shirt at that moment. The third picture is of us and the girls. Our trip was SO worth it to see you all again!!

Desire by Phil Wickham

2009-06-13T03:10:00.001-05:00

OK, this is my third night in a row of not sleeping. I couldn't get this song out of my head. Enjoy!

what is God up to?

2009-06-12T13:33:00.003-05:00

So, the night I started this blog, I was up until 4 am. Couldn't sleep. That doesn't usually happen to me. Granted, my mind can run and I can take forever to fall asleep (whereas all Pete has to do is roll over), but I never am up that late. Unless I have a crying or sick child. Or when I was in college.

Last night, even with the little sleep from the night before, I was up with Pete until at least 12:30. Granted, I got a 2-hour nap that afternoon, but still. I should have been exhausted. But we were listening to the expositor series from when God first pricked our hearts about adoption, way back in 2000. You can listen to the same one here. Pastor Ken Fong was speaking about God's adoption of us into His family. We both wept as he brought out his daughter and shared with her how she was pre-loved by them.

Little did we know, almost 10 years ago, that our adoption story would be similar to the Fongs. Infertility, for many years. A long wait. We laughed as we heard him reference Tim Keller. We had no idea who he was back then. Our church uses his material all the time!

We DO know that God is pricking our hearts again for another adoption. We don't know when. We don't know where. But we know that just as He pre-loved us, we are pre-loving another child. It's a holy mystery. We prayed together for clarity last night. And we're praying we can enjoy this moment of waiting to see what the next step is.

Because He first loved us.

curriculum for 09/10

2009-06-11T19:19:00.004-05:00

So Aidan wants to homeschool starting this summer, but I've decided not to start it formally until fall. This summer we're just casually working though workbooks and participating at both local library reading programs. We signed up Aidan for a class at the zoo that will meet 3 times over the summer. He will even get to interact with a real-live wild animal! We're part of a co-op this month with the homeschool group from our church, where Aidan is learning about art, birds, and poetry. And Aidan's in taekwondo. Sounds like a full summer to me!!

Anyone who knows me knows that when I get interested in something, I research it to death. I think I lived and breathed homeschool books and Web sites for a good couple of months. I talked with lots of friends who homeschool. And I finally came down to these options for grade K:

History and Literature: Sonlight

Grammar: The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading

Math: Saxon Math 1

Bible: Sonlight

Handwriting: Handwriting Without Tears

Art: Usborne art books here and here

Music: Pete will be teaching this

Science: using Sonlight's list, but we'll just explore it on our own

PE: taekwondo and a homeschool gym program through our local Y

So here's some questions for you veteran homeschoolers:

What do you use for a literature component in the early grades if you don't use Sonlight?

What do you use for a Bible component in the early years?

We're all itching to get started. It was a happy day today when the mailman dropped off some boxes from amazon! Pete won a $100 gc to amazon through a contest at work, and I had gotten a $5 gc from Swagbucks, so we were able to order some last few things there for free! And I actually got most of our books here and by having an Usborne book party.

why we are homeschooling

2009-06-11T19:02:00.003-05:00

Pete and I decided to homeschool Aidan in the fall for his kindergarten year, thanks to this post. There are a lot of reasons:

wanting to be a large part of Aidan's learning--both in what he is learning and in his excitement over the material
wanting to teach him how to think critically--I don't feel like I learned this so well in school
wanting to make learning a lifestyle for our family, not just something that happens in a certain chunk of time
wanting to see his heart be captivated by God's world
wanting to help him catch up with some of his delays one-on-one instead of the small bits of time he got in the public school (though we LOVE his teachers from last year!!)
wanting to learn with him

I'm posting this here more for me, as I want something to look back on when things get hard.

We don't know if we'll do this all the way through his schooling, but at this point we are planning on it. I'm pretty excited about teaching him to read and some of the subject matter in the later years as well.

The above-linked post was the one that God used to get my attention about homeschooling. I've looked into it in the past (I wrote a paper on it in college and also wrote a book review on this book). I even got to interview Susan Card about the book. But at the time it was just a curious thing that others did.

Pete and I have always planned to send our kids to public school. We'd love to use a private school but, at this point, there's no way we can afford it. So when I read Ann's post, I was shocked at my reaction. I was shaking and couldn't stop reading it over and over and thinking about it. I finally sent the post to Pete and asked him to pray that weekend. We went on a date night (already planned) a few days later, and that's when we started talking about it. I was astounded that Pete was VERY supportive!! We did have some concerns, which we spent the next few weeks researching. We came to the conclusion that homeschooling was the best option for our family at this time.

The funny thing? I asked Aidan about what he thought about it after we made the decision, and he wanted to start right away!!

How God Provided for Our Adoption Expenses

2009-06-11T16:33:00.004-05:00

In March 2007 we applied with our adoption agency, AWAA, to adopt a baby girl from Ethiopia. We had no idea how we were going to pay for it at all, but each time a payment was due we had the money. Here are some of the ways God provided:

Both Pete and I received extra side jobs (mostly freelance)--this helped especially with the smaller amounts due

We received a matching grant from Life International, now Lifesong For Orphans, and in total raised over $9000 thanks to the gifts of friends and family.

We read this book and got inspired to go down to one car. We sold both cars and bought a van.

We received a grant from the Lydia Fund.

We made use of the Adoption Tax Credit, which we received after the adoption was complete.

We received a no-interest loan from the ABBA Fund.

We took out bank loans and used our credit card to help with expenses until we received the tax credit.

We held 2 garage sales with item donations from people in our church and raised over $1000.

We are so incredibly blessed to see how God provided for this adoption. How will he provide for the next one?

Huh?

2009-06-11T03:35:00.003-05:00

I suppose you're wondering about why I chose this title. Maybe you're not. I feel compelled to share anyway.

One of my absolute favorite bands is Over the Rhine. I got engaged to their music, I gave birth to their music, and I've danced many nights with my love to their music. Their songs make me cry, contemplate life and love, dance, and worship the King. I think we own every album. We try to see them live any chance we get. Simply amazing.

Nursery rhymes by firelight is a line from one of their songs, My Love is a Fever. One of my favorite OtR songs, I might add.

It also hints at children's literature, poetry, parenting, homeschooling, contemplation. All passions of mine. Thanks, dear one, for the idea. You know me so well.

What do I title this?

2009-06-11T01:29:00.000-05:00

I've resisted this whole blog thing for years, but my husband is making me. No, not really, but he's strongly encouraging this new venture.

I don't know what to write. Ever felt that way?

I have a lot swimming in my head right now. I can't sleep. It's 1:15 am. The kids are asleep. I should be too.

I can't sleep when my mind is racing.

Thoughts of the last hour and a half:

when to adopt again and from where
the desire to get pregnant again and how that all fits in
the need for a house with a fenced yard and more bedrooms than our little ranch if we have more kids
the things we need to do to our current house before we move
the desire to exercise and lose weight but the seeming lack of time to do this
how much time I waste every day
the desire to journal more (hoping to practice some of these things here in this blog)

So here's hoping and praying I can keep up this new habit. I'm excited to write again. I pray it's worth reading.

I'm always telling Aidan to ask "help please" when he wants help instead of demanding it. God, help please!! I need your wisdom and peace!