New Post on the Adoption Blog TOO :)

We still update our adoption blog occasionally with adoption stuff & there's a new post there too! Lots of time on the couch, I'm telling ya!

Still Waiting

I've been meaning to post an update, but life with four kiddos is just plain busy & doesn't allow much time for blogging. You know the "dream job"...it ended up not being the next step for us. It was hard during the month or so that we were in a "holding pattern" with it, but early on I had a feeling it was too easy of an answer. Not that it would not have been a great challenge & ministry to be a part of, but just that this season of change was going to push us a little farther out of our comfort zone. During that same time, there was an opportunity to stay with Depot in a different capacity, and we struggled with going that route for the security of a job in this economy even though it's not where we felt God was leading us in the long run. We wanted to be wise & take care of our family, but we wanted to be willing to step out in faith if that is the direction we felt God was leading us. It was a difficult season to be in, but God was so good to make the circumstances such that we knew He was calling Nate Dogg to walk away & wait for God's plan for our family. So, that's what we did. He told Depot our decision and they thought we crazy. Maybe we are..., but we are crazy in love with a God who has much bigger plans than we do. They asked him four times to change his mind and couldn't believe that he didn't have another job lined up. They told him he could change his mind anytime...a week later, a month later, or even after his severance ends. I'm sure knowing that does provide my heart of sense of security, but I truly believe that my peace is coming from the Prince of Peace. I believe that the stirring we both began feeling last fall (& really years ago before the hustle & bustle of kids & responsibilities) is from God. I sense Him saying, "I gave you this dream, watch me unfold it." So, here we are. Waiting. Watching. Not only is Nate Dogg is the job market & hoping to find a calling not just another J. O. B., but I'm hoping for a call any day now that will lead me back to school counseling. With my babies all in school & my license freshly renewed after the class I took last fall, I'm ready to go. I'm ready to spread my wings and take my little light for Jesus to a new school (besides my kids' school). Who knows what the next few months hold for this hurricane....only God & I'm ready to see the view from the other side of this, but soaking up the grace & new mercies I'm finding daily in the meantime.

His Guiding Hand

Wow! Where to start?! Months ago...when we started feeling God moving us. We didn't know what or how, but we felt that change was on the horizon. Promotion within Home Depot, maybe...moving our family to a new city? We didn't know, but we were trusting that God knew what was best for us. Then, 2 weeks ago, Nate Dogg had a last minute work meeting scheduled & things didn't look good. Although we had been hoping for an open door for promotion, all of the sudden, we realized God may be closing the door at Home Depot for us. Moments before Nate Dogg's meeting, I sat down to check our home email only to find his first request for an interview after having his resume out since last fall. Okay, Lord, thanks for the reassurance, but I know this is you saying He's about to lose his job & it's going to be part of your plan for us. I got a sick feeling in my stomach & started feeling shaky. I texted Nate Dogg with the interview news & waited for his text to tell me that his job had been eliminated...that text came 15 minutes later. The rest of that day & the following day are a blur. I cried until my eyes couldn't cry anymore, but even as I cried I felt His peace that passes all understanding. That's the only way to describe it when you have 4 children & live on one income & you get news that the income will soon be no more, but you know God's in control & you aren't fearing. In the days following, as fear would creep in, I claimed God's peace & promise that He held the future & had a plan for our family. I said no to fear or worry & yes to resting in Him. Of course, Nate Dogg began exploring his options & being proactive in finding plan B, but he did so with a good attitude. He said that his attitude was all he had & he was not going to let this "bump" in the road get him down. We laughed & keeping smiling & waiting for God's hand to appear. Thankfully, we didn't have to wait long. Remember, He showed His hand through that email we received right before Nate Dogg's meeting. Then, He showed His hand again when Nate Dogg had a meeting with a recruiter scheduled within the week following the bad news with Depot. He has now met with the recruiter again & has a meeting scheduled tomorrow with a potential "dream job" for him. It gives us both goose bumps just thinking about the opportunity & you can't wipe the smile of Nate Dogg's face. As he jokingly put it yesterday, "Either this is God's plan for us or someone is playing a nasty trick on me by dangling this in front of my eyes". We are choosing to believe the first. We are hopeful that this is where God is moving us. But we know that even if this job isn't where He is moving us, He is using this as a stepping stone to getting us where He wants us to be. He knows where His hand is guiding us & we are resting in this knowing that it is not us but Him working in us & moving us to exactly where He wants us to be! What a journey! God is so good...even when the news that you dread hearing comes!

"As for God, His way is perfect, the Word of the Lord is proved,

He is a shield to all who trust Him."

Psalm 18:30

Reunion in the USA

The much anticipated reunion for the princess & her Ethiopian cousin/sister finally happened! It has been a long 3 months of waiting, but the princess has been amazing! She was both excited & nervous as the big day arrived! As we drove up the interstate on our way to Lexington, Kentucky, where we had arranged to meet, she was a little quiet but at peace for the most part. The closer we got, the more excited she got & the nerves seemed to melt away. Right before we arrived, the family called & we figured out that we drive the exact same vehicle, color & all. That made her so excited! She asked us to crank up "Party in the USA", & we found that so appropriate! The girls' first get together in America! Woohoo!

The girls were all smiles as they embraced & greeted each other. I just tried to keep from crying, as I had promised I would! We spent a quiet day together at the Kentucky Horse Park & the princess said she was so happy to simply be spending the day with her "sister". (The girls are technically first cousins but were raised together, as sisters, & who are we to change what they have always known each other to be. Yes, the princess knows they are cousins, but we have talked about how they will always be Ethiopian sisters in their hearts. In Ethiopia, terms for family relationships are very fluid. She was so relieved when we helped her know that she can continue to call her her "sister" even in America.)

The girls exchanged Christmas presents & the princess was so proud of the gift she chose for her sister & the gift her sister gave to her. Don't you just love the light in her sweet eyes as they exchanged gifts!

The conversations were limited between the girls. I'm sure they felt like they were in the spot-light & a little foreign to one another. They did enjoy playing tic-tac-to & playing with their moms' digital cameras together. :) It was a sweet day. I do think if we had it to do over again, we would have done a shorter meeting for the initial meeting & at a place where the girls could have some more private time with less pressure for conversation (we tried to find a fast-food place with a playground or a park but were unsuccessful). Lessons learned. I'm sure the meetings will get more & more enjoyable & relaxing as time goes by. Our experience with reuniting the princess with her BFF in Nashville, helps us know that this is likely. The first few times were very quiet...until they were able to play without the parents looking in on them & just be themselves. If anyone ever finds themselves in a similar situation, I would highly recommend doing a very brief reunion at the airport (mainly for the child's security of knowing that they will indeed get to reconnect) & then another brief meeting (maybe at park for picnic & playtime) a month or six weeks later. Then, increasing the length of the meetings gradually over time. That would allow for gradual reintroduction & processing of the experience. Just a thought...all that matters is that the girls have been reunited! The promise we made to our daughter & her Ethiopian family many, many months ago, has been fulfilled. Now we can write them a letter & send pictures of the girls together again! And, we can look forward to making many more memories for the girls together!

A Letter of Love

What a month this has been! Last Friday, we were preparing to head up to the mountains for a weekend with Nate Dogg's family. His mom called to discuss some plans & then proceeded to tell me she had something to tell me & not to react. What!? Who's sick, who died, what's going on? Then she said they got mail from Ethiopia! You see, we left Ethiopia knowing that the princess' family wanted to maintain contact & even had lots of pictures from her life in Ethiopia that they wanted to share with us. We have written & written through our agency with no response. When her cousin's family traveled, we knew they would be meeting with her family & we sent another letter & some pictures with them. We decided to slip a little piece of paper with Nate Dogg's parents' P.O. Box address in with the pictures. It was just a whim but a well-thought-out whim. ;) We prayed it would work, but we didn't know if they would "get it" & understand what it was. Well, obviously they did! Woohoo! We were thrilled by all the letter said & with the sweet picture they included of the princess on her 2nd birthday! The letter was full of love, faith, & peace. What an amazing woman Momma Emodish is! We are thrilled beyond words that we now have established reliable contact with her family! I can't tell you how amazing it was this week, when the princess was trying to pick out of baby doll that looked like she did when she was a baby & she looked up at me with bright eyes & said, "Get the picture...then we'll be able to see which one looks like me"! Most of us take for granted all the pictures we have of ourselves & our children. I once read about the obsession that many adopted adults have of pictures of themselves as babies or young children. That is often the only connection they have to that time in their life & the only proof that they truly are "normal" people just like everyone else. I'm so thrilled that my daughter has this now! And, can I just say, she was beautiful! She is even holding up 2 fingers, as if to say, "I'm two"! So sweet! And, it was taken in better times for her family, when they had a nice home with blue walls...just like she has told me! A letter & picture full of love, so much to be thankful for & to be cherished forever!

Girls Weekend

Well, you know you've been a bad, bad blogger when you have to reset your password before being able to login to update your blog. ;) What can I say, 4 kids keeps me on my toes! Now, I'm hoping to do 3 posts in one day!

Earlier this month, the princess' buddy from Hannah's Hope (our agency's orphanage) came for the girls' 1st sleepover. The girls (& the mommas) had a BLAST!!!! It was so good for our souls! Throughout the weekend, as I watched the girls laughing & enjoying each other, I thought about God's amazing provision for these girls. I remember looking at pictures of our daughter from Hannah's Hope & always seeing this other beautiful girl in so many of the pictures....wondering who she was & what state she would be going to. One day, my sweet adoption buddy, Charisa, emailed me & said something to the effect of "I found her family!". I could hardly believe it when I connected with the girl's mom & found out they lived in NASHVILLE! God placed these sweet girls, who are the same age & spent their orphanage days together, within 3 hours of each other on the other side of the globe! Girls need good girl friends..someone who knows where you've been & can honestly say, "I know how you feel...". These girls will always have that...their mommas will see to it! We're already working on our 1st girls' weekend getaway for January. Looking back to the months before we brought our princess home, I was quite obsessive about locating all the families of her orphanage-mates. I knew those connections would be so valuable to her one day! However, I could've never imagined that things would work out this way! Isn't God so good like that...to take a dream & make it come true in bigger ways than we could've ever imagined!

Experiencing jumping in leaves for the 1st time...

Sharing an afternoon snack of injera & shiro in front of the tv...

Sipping their Ethiopian coffee together...a special sleepover treat for

girls who grew up drinking coffee with their Ethiopian families...

BFF :)

Quick Update

Wow! What a crazy few weeks this has been! Most of you know that our princess' Ethiopian cousin has come home to America. The princess has been waiting for this all summer long & the prospect itself brought her so much peace. However, the weekend that she arrived in America ended up beginning a tough time in our daughter's little heart. It had been almost a year since she cried about her past, but she began crying at night before bedtime & dwelling on her feelings through out the day. It seemed the experience of knowing her cousin had left Ethiopia brought many of her emotions to a head. This was such a good thing b/c we were able to openly discuss things. Up until now, we were mostly using play therapy & other subtle techniques to help her work through her feelings of fear, saddness, & grief. One of the most challenging aspects of this time for us, as her parents, was balancing helping her through this time while also helping her as she began a new school year. In the middle of that first week, I often thought, "God, why now?", but I quickly realized that God ordained that to be the time b/c beginning the new school year gave her feelings of excitement & joy to provide relief for her more intense emotions. Now, more than 2 weeks later, she has worked through this time & found new peace. This week she finally received the picture of her cousin coming home to the airport which apparently her little heart really needed to be at peace. We are so thankful for this! She had wanted so badly to be able to be at her cousin's airport welcome, but we had helped her realize this wasn't the best thing for her cousin. She had asked for a picture, & it seems this picture helped her to be able to experience it for herself even though she couldn't be there. Now, she is back to talking about Etopia with hope in her eyes & peace in her heart. It's a good place to be...for her & for us, as her parents!