Every "first" is so sweet, we just love this little guy! He has been crawling backward for about a month, rocking for longer but now we have forward motion:) Here is Benjamin crawling-I know... my life just changed forever (sigh)!
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Sunday, September 11, 2011
We have a date!
We got a letter in the mail the other day, and among other things it said...
"...Your petition has been filed and a final adoption hearing has been scheduled on Thursday, Novemeber 10, 2011 at 9:00a.m..."
This is the day we have been waiting for since we took offical custody of Benjamin on January 19th! We absolutely can't wait to MAKE IT OFFICIAL!
"...Your petition has been filed and a final adoption hearing has been scheduled on Thursday, Novemeber 10, 2011 at 9:00a.m..."
This is the day we have been waiting for since we took offical custody of Benjamin on January 19th! We absolutely can't wait to MAKE IT OFFICIAL!
Thursday, August 4, 2011
So Lucky...
Often we are at the park or at the grocery store and people around us figure out that our kids are adopted. Usually this is when Bill is with me, as when he's not they assume my husband is black. Recently I had someone tell me, "honey, you were just the oven for those buns". OK... The most likely comment is, "Oh, they are so lucky". This comment is always directed at Andrew and Annabelle, as most people don't notice the baby in the bucket, or they think Benjamin has a great tan (as did one lady at the assisted living establishment Bill's grandma lives at). Meaning, my children are so lucky to be scooped out of their birth country, out of poverty, out of an orphanage and placed here in America. Although well meaning, there is a flip side to this. My children were placed by their birth moms somewhere they knew they would be safe. Somewhere they knew these children would be cared for and loved and better off. This means they will never know where they truly came from, who carried them and felt them kick from inside. They will grieve a loss we can never know. They will never know any biological siblings or know where they get their beautiful brown eyes. They will never know medical history, or family history for the ones they are biologically tied. We pray for Andrew, Annabelle and Benjamin's birth families every night. We will tell these sweet babies about the heroics that brought them into our family. Acts of God really, truly. The plan God had from the beginning of time for their lives and the journey that started with the act of their birth moms choosing to let go of the MOST precious gift. However that happened, they chose a better life for these sweet babies. Then, through more amazing acts of God's mercy, He chose us to be their family. Us, Bill and I. Many of you are also part of our family, blood related or otherwise and He chose you too. What a miracle!! If you know us, we were so sad without children. We have always known it was God's will for us to be parents, but after 5 years of trying, that seemed impossible. And then God moved and it just happened. By God's grace we have a filled all the bedrooms in our house. What a miracle right? Aren't we the lucky ones?
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
July 19, 2011
We received notice today that we can begin finalization proceedings for Benjamin's adoption. Court house here we come!
Sunday, July 10, 2011
And the story continues...
After about 2 total hours of sleep, we got up at about 6am and started getting ready to meet our babies! How does one get ready to meet one's children? Well, lots of praying and crying, packing and repacking diaper bags, writing in a journal to chronicle my last few hours before I became a mom, shower, make up (why bother with all the crying right?), try to eat breakfast (dry toast and tea with honey). Every minute I seemed to notice something else I was doing for the "last time" before I became a mom. It had rained the night before, so everything was damp and it was muggy and cool. We finally got into the van and started to drive to the care center. We got to see Ethiopia in the daylight for the first time. The dirt streets were lined with little businesses and people. We moved slowly (soooo slowly) towards our babies, and finally got to the famous "blue doors", the gate to the orphanage. Once inside we waited in front of the "family room". After what seemed like an eternity, 2 nannies emerged from the nursery and walked down the long sidewalk lined with laundry hanging to dry. There they were. Our first glimpse of our babies was as 2 tiny bundles. They looked much bigger than they were because were wrapped in layers and layers and layers of blankets and clothes. The nannies handed Annabelle to Bill and Andrew to me. And we were parents. Lots of tears, as we had waited almost 4 years for this moment. I still cry every time I think about it. After that there was much more crying, lots of unwrapping and kissing and hugging and did I mention crying? Everything in the whole world looked different after that moment. If you have children, you know what I mean. If you don't yet, you will, trust me. It's like your life is already amazing and full and wonderful and then BAM! More blessing than you could ever imagine right there in your hands in one moment. God had orchestrated so much to get us to this point, we never could have imagined how this miraculous journey would end, or rather begin. Thank you Lord, for the amazing gift of these children!
Happy "Gotcha Day" Babies!
Happy "Gotcha Day" Babies!
Friday, July 8, 2011
Getting on a Plane
Five years ago today Bill and I got on a plane bound for Ethiopia.
We had 4 suitcases, 3 boxes of dryer sheets, 14 girl outfits, 14 boy outfits, 56 socks, 14 pairs of jammies, 72 diapers, 12 burp cloths, 8 bottles, 104 bottles liners, 6 cans of formula, a gallon of hand sani, our dossier, about 10 pounds of dried fruit and $3000 dollars in new crisp bills. Of course we had tons of other stuff (problem pack anyone), but these were the items I had packed and unpacked at least a dozen times in the last 6 weeks. I stared at each outfit and marveled at how tiny it was and the thought that soon a tiny body would inhabit those clothes. Not just any body, but a son and a daughter. OUR son and OUR daughter!! Everything was soooo tiny! Little did I know how much tinier our little ones would be! I of course cried as we said goodbye to our parents. The crying continued as we checked in-I know you're shocked! I calmed down just in time for the ticketing agent to ask, "what is the nature of your trip to Ethiopia?" Bill said, "we are going to bring home our babies". And of course I cried all over again. We were excited and nervous all at once. We knew that in a few short days our lives would be changed forever, but we had no idea what that really meant. We talked and talked for the first few legs of our journey and then as we got closer to crossing international waters, we just started praying. I was so excited to go back to Africa, as the summer before, my life was changed forever by the trip I had taken to Kenya. Bill was getting more and more anxious as he had never been and didn't know what to expect. He had that "papa bear" thing going on and that's really hard to do when you cannot control one single variable. So we prayed. We prayed for our babies and their caregivers, and their birth parents and the people who worked at the embassy and our driver and our guide and any other families we might come across at the guest house. We prayed for our lawyer and all of the people working at the guest house. We prayed against stomach issues and water borne illness. And we were still over the Atlantic Ocean:) We spent the next 2 days in airports and on planes making our way to becoming a family of 4. Stay tuned for more of this amazing journey...
We had 4 suitcases, 3 boxes of dryer sheets, 14 girl outfits, 14 boy outfits, 56 socks, 14 pairs of jammies, 72 diapers, 12 burp cloths, 8 bottles, 104 bottles liners, 6 cans of formula, a gallon of hand sani, our dossier, about 10 pounds of dried fruit and $3000 dollars in new crisp bills. Of course we had tons of other stuff (problem pack anyone), but these were the items I had packed and unpacked at least a dozen times in the last 6 weeks. I stared at each outfit and marveled at how tiny it was and the thought that soon a tiny body would inhabit those clothes. Not just any body, but a son and a daughter. OUR son and OUR daughter!! Everything was soooo tiny! Little did I know how much tinier our little ones would be! I of course cried as we said goodbye to our parents. The crying continued as we checked in-I know you're shocked! I calmed down just in time for the ticketing agent to ask, "what is the nature of your trip to Ethiopia?" Bill said, "we are going to bring home our babies". And of course I cried all over again. We were excited and nervous all at once. We knew that in a few short days our lives would be changed forever, but we had no idea what that really meant. We talked and talked for the first few legs of our journey and then as we got closer to crossing international waters, we just started praying. I was so excited to go back to Africa, as the summer before, my life was changed forever by the trip I had taken to Kenya. Bill was getting more and more anxious as he had never been and didn't know what to expect. He had that "papa bear" thing going on and that's really hard to do when you cannot control one single variable. So we prayed. We prayed for our babies and their caregivers, and their birth parents and the people who worked at the embassy and our driver and our guide and any other families we might come across at the guest house. We prayed for our lawyer and all of the people working at the guest house. We prayed against stomach issues and water borne illness. And we were still over the Atlantic Ocean:) We spent the next 2 days in airports and on planes making our way to becoming a family of 4. Stay tuned for more of this amazing journey...
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Adoptive Fathers
Today we celebrate Father's Day.
I was struck today by the number of adopted fathers we have at our church. Fathers whose children do not resemble them in any physical way (and not because said children look like their mom). These fathers don't get to announce at work that their wives are pregnant and get the reassuring back slaps and comments about their manhood (it's weird, I know, but you have seen and heard it too). They may announce they are adopting, and get dissapproving glances and the stories that begin with, "ooo-thats rough, I know this guy who" and the story ends with something tragic like "and it didn't work out". Fathers who see their biological bloodlines come to an end and their heritage as an adoptive dad begin. We have three children who will never know their biological fathers. What they get instead is an adoptive dad. A dad God chose for them from the beginning of time. Not to share genes with, or to share a physical likeness. God chose to have another man lend the genetic material, and for the adoptive dad to do everything else. We are constantly reminded that adoptive parenting is so different than biological parenting. As an adoptive parent, you cannot control where and who your children come from. You have no idea what happened to them before they came into your care, or how those experiences will effect them as they grow. So we are extra careful. We research and then ask advise and then research some more. We cannot simply put our kids on a schedule to eat and sleep, we have to attend to their every need just to get them to trust us. We are forever mistaken as the baby sitters, or the step parent or second marriage. We cannot discipline the same way as biological parents because we don't often have a blank slate of a kid, we have a kid with baggage. We have social workers checking in on us making sure we are doing the right things and saying the right things. We are even called adoptive families, not just families, but adoptive families. We wear the badge proudly as we know this is how God has made our family to be. But sometimes, we just want to be families. We want to forget the underlying tension of having children with an unknown past. We want to not have people look twice at the grocery store. We want to go to a "Home Depot Build It Day" with other adoptive dads and not have everyone assume we are a gay couple because our kids don't look like us. So today, on Father's Day we recognize those dads. Dads who recognize more quickly than most that our children are not really ours. They belong to God and are a gift from Him. Adoptive dads, who for just one day get to be just plain dads. Happy Father's Day Dads!
I was struck today by the number of adopted fathers we have at our church. Fathers whose children do not resemble them in any physical way (and not because said children look like their mom). These fathers don't get to announce at work that their wives are pregnant and get the reassuring back slaps and comments about their manhood (it's weird, I know, but you have seen and heard it too). They may announce they are adopting, and get dissapproving glances and the stories that begin with, "ooo-thats rough, I know this guy who" and the story ends with something tragic like "and it didn't work out". Fathers who see their biological bloodlines come to an end and their heritage as an adoptive dad begin. We have three children who will never know their biological fathers. What they get instead is an adoptive dad. A dad God chose for them from the beginning of time. Not to share genes with, or to share a physical likeness. God chose to have another man lend the genetic material, and for the adoptive dad to do everything else. We are constantly reminded that adoptive parenting is so different than biological parenting. As an adoptive parent, you cannot control where and who your children come from. You have no idea what happened to them before they came into your care, or how those experiences will effect them as they grow. So we are extra careful. We research and then ask advise and then research some more. We cannot simply put our kids on a schedule to eat and sleep, we have to attend to their every need just to get them to trust us. We are forever mistaken as the baby sitters, or the step parent or second marriage. We cannot discipline the same way as biological parents because we don't often have a blank slate of a kid, we have a kid with baggage. We have social workers checking in on us making sure we are doing the right things and saying the right things. We are even called adoptive families, not just families, but adoptive families. We wear the badge proudly as we know this is how God has made our family to be. But sometimes, we just want to be families. We want to forget the underlying tension of having children with an unknown past. We want to not have people look twice at the grocery store. We want to go to a "Home Depot Build It Day" with other adoptive dads and not have everyone assume we are a gay couple because our kids don't look like us. So today, on Father's Day we recognize those dads. Dads who recognize more quickly than most that our children are not really ours. They belong to God and are a gift from Him. Adoptive dads, who for just one day get to be just plain dads. Happy Father's Day Dads!
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