If you think my hands are full, you should see my Heart!

I love that saying and it speaks all to well of our home! Tess left. That was sad. So now I'm on my 2nd day ON MY OWN! Oh yes, believe me I have plenty of help to call on, but independent me LIKES to do my own work. I have always enjoyed a challenge, so here it is! It has been going good. I will not say it not a lot of work and it's all easy, but I am amazed over and again how good it is going. The 3 musketeers, which would be Oliver and Isabel and Addie LOVE to play outside. We have been having nice weather and those 3 have spent hours outside. It has taken some teaching for Addie to learn our boundaries, but she is doing better. The 3 play very nicely! Not always, but USUALLY! There are very few fights and when there is a fight it is usually between Oliver and Isabel! It is just amazing to me, tho I do know it may change. When we got the girls if we had to reprimand Addie she would look at her toes, cross her arms, and slowly sink to the floor, quiet but unyielding. Which then we would hold her firmly for a long time, which truly works wonders on her. Now she takes a "no" from us much better. She definitely still has her times, but most often she will look at me and tell me "ok"and usually not do it again. She is not a difficult child and really wants to please us. And she IS NOT MEAN. I expected the worst from a neglected 2 yr old, but she has never YET hit or bit or done anything mean to the other children. She shares quite nicely, though she definitely does grab too! :) (What 2 yr old doesn't???) Was she taught? Is it her personality? I don't know, but both our new girls are sweet to the bone! That has made it so easy to bond and LOVE them and I thank the Lord for that. Two nights after we got them Addie asked for mama. I asked her, "May I be your mama?" She said, "Yeah" and went to play. It doesn't all make sense to us. She is full of hugs and kisses, says I love you and calls me Mama and Marv daddy. She can count correctly to 5 and sometimes she makes it to 10.  Oh, how we'd love to know about their life before us. Baby girl is getting into a good schedule. She wakes up at around 5am for a bottle, but then goes back to sleep until around 7. The other children have been waking up around 7:30. Baby girl has a nap at about 10am and sleeps for 2 or 3 hours. Then she has another nap in the afternoon when the other children are sleeping which is right now! All are sleeping. Her congestion has gotten much better, though she still constantly has a runny nose. But she is working on her first tooth, too. Hard to know what causes what. The girls' car seats smelled strong of smoke, so it could be she is just getting some of that gunk out of her system. Who knows...Sometimes she is fussy, but usually now she is very happy. She loves to eat and is very chubby, floppy, and cuddly. So different than skinny lil Isabel was! Birth parents rights are not terminated yet. So far birth mom is firm in her decision and birth dad is awaiting his sentence, but we will feel MUCH better after rights are terminated. Children must be in our home for 6 mo before we can petition to adopt them, but after birth parents rights are terminated really nothing would stand in the way. So please keep prayin! I forfeited my nap for this post so your better enjoy it!

NEEDED: Octopus Arms

Anyone have any to lend???? :) It has been going amazingly well. Our dear supportive congregation had a food shower for us and so our freezer is full! My niece, Tess, came last Saturday and will be with us for 10 days. We may be in the honeymoon stage, but if we are I thank God we had one! :) Baby had some rough nights or maybe I should say Mama had some rough nights with baby! :) But the last couple nights she has only woke up once in the night. Addie has been having some pretty severe nightmares that last for hours, but the last two nights they have lasted only maybe 10 minutes or so. Oliver and Isabel definitely have had some insecurity issues, but it is getting better. I would say Addie is an exceptionally good 2 yr old. She is not a trouble maker. And she has very few temper tantrums or meltdowns. We feel blessed.

Our story

Hello friends.. (for internet safety I have deleted some details) I know many of you are just waiting to hear the correct and detailed story of our last week, so here goes... Last Tuesday was Sewing Day. I usually TRY to go to sewing unless I have a valid excuse. :) Well, I had no excuse, but did not feel like going and so I didn't. At 10am I got an email from our social worker (SW), that said she had received a call from a birth mom who wanted to relinquish her rights to her 2 children TODAY. As I was digesting the email, SW called and wondered if we would be interested. She said, "They would be perfect for you!" She told me to let her know by noon if we would take them. Oh my........... A whirlwind of thoughts. "Yes, No, Yes, NO, YES, NOOO." Was it right? Was it wrong? Etc... I called Marv. He said he'd be home at noon and we would talk about it then. (I expected a quick "No" from him, but no) The turmoil, the confusion. I called mom and my sis, Caddie. They called some of the rest of my family and asked for prayers for us. Caddie called a friend who was at sewing and asked if some of them would pray. The news spread about the massive decision we needed to make so quick and after lunch at sewing Trevor led a special prayer for us. Many, many prayers headed upward on our behalf during those 2 hours and oh how we felt them. Thank you FRIENDS! Meanwhile Oliver and Isabel were taking advantage of their distracted mom and got into the bathtub crayons and had written ALL OVER the walls, furniture, toys, etc... upstairs. Thank goodness they were washable and most of it came out or off, but it took a LOT of scrubbing. So THAT occupied my wheel spinning morning. I knew that proof of divine direction would be if we both felt the same. At about 11:30am I was talking to Caddie and she asked if I had ANY feeling one way or the other. I thought about it and when I thought about it I knew that if I had the tiniest feeling it would be to say YES. After I voiced that, the feeling grew stronger and stronger and with it came peace and rest and calm. Marv came home. We talked. Husband asked me the same thing, "Do you have any feeling one way or the other?" I told him my feeling was to say "Yes". He told me he felt the same way. I could hardly believe it. At times I have been anxious for more children, but Marv was always just fine with waiting 4 yrs on Colombia. He told me to say "No" just felt wrong. I agreed. We both felt so calm and peaceful after we made the decision to say "Yes". I repeat, the rest we felt was profound. So I called SW and told her we would love to take the girls if they needed a home for them. All afternoon we knew we had made the right decision and it felt good. At the same time I doubted if birth mom would actually follow through, but that was ok. Whatever will be will be. It was in the Lord's hands. M was planning to leave at 5pm to drive to -------- with Dave. They were flying out at 6am Wednesday morning for a poultry show in Minneapolis. SW said she would let us know by 5pm Tues. if this was a 'go' or not. If it was Marv would stay home. Well, we waited and waited to hear. At 5pm Marv left and we still hadn't heard anything and couldn't contact SW. Marv said to let him know by 5am Wed. if he should stay in -------- or keep with the plans and fly to Minneapolis. I went to folks for supper with Terry's and Candace and family. I waited and waited to hear SOMETHING, but nothing was heard. Finally SW calls at 10pm and said ,"Ok, birth mom is done. You need to be here tomorrow at 1pm to pick up the girls. We still knew NOTHING about the situation. All we knew was that we felt we had made the correct initial decision. All the peace and calm came crashing down. Questions.. questions... questions.. What about Colombia??? Race???? Health???? Abuse???? Drugs??? Alcohol???? Was this fair to Oliver and Isabel???? Could we handle it???? 4 children 3 yrs and 2 months apart??????????????????????? 4 children at age 26 and 29??? Lindsey came over for night to help me get ready to leave for ------- in the morning. Late that night we found out the children were Caucasian and that birth mom did not want to meet us. We did not care about race, but the other was a relief. I didn't know if my nerves could handle meeting birth mom. (Having Isabel's heartbroken birth mom give her baby to me was extremely traumatic for me.) Marv in -------. Me at home.  That night was black. Darker than black. I think I cried a billion tears. Little sleep. The next morning Candace and I left at 8. We left Oliver and Isabel at Terry's. It was so hard leaving our dear children and going to pick up some strangers that were going to turn our life upside-down. I wanted to RUN. RUN back to my comfortable place, but alas we were driving, driving to -------  away from our comfortable life. All I could think about was everything we were giving up. Delete fun trips planned. Delete being with my friends. Delete camping trips. Delete. Delete. Delete. ETC... Would I ever dig out of it???? Would I ever see the light of day AGAIN over piles of laundry, cooking, cleaning, bathing, feeding, etc... etc.. Not to mention grocery shopping???? Life looked impossible and impossible looks black. Sorry friends that's just how selfish I am. We arrived in ------, went to pick up Marv from his hotel, grabbed a Quiznos for a very unsettled yet starving stomach. We met SW and her 21 yr old daughter (adopted from Ukraine at 14 yrs old) at a ------ about 2 blocks from where birth mom was meeting her social worker. SW reserved a room at the ------- and we sat down to sign papers. Tears streamed. Papers that we did not want to sign. Forboding papers. Stacks of papers. It felt as though we were going to sign our life away. After going over them we finally signed. After we signed it seemed the sun started to shine again. It was like the devil was after us, but after we signed he gave up. SW and daughter took our suburban (thank God we have a Suburban :) to go pick up the children and bring them to us. We went outside and sat in the warm sunshine to wait. We could actually talk and laugh again, the sunshine warming our hearts! We waited maybe 45 minutes and then they rolled in the drive. We went to get them. Addie immediately held out her arms to daddy and called him daddy! It hasn't changed. She LOVES her daddy. I took Violet. They were and are beautiful, sweet natured girls. Both have dark brown hair with big, hazel eyes and olive skin. We fell in Love! So we started home. Both slept most of the way home and were very happy when they were awake. Just have had to wonder over and again what thoughts are behind those big eyes.
  Oh, the adjustments of the first days. We had all the help we could use, but there are SO many things that only Mama or Daddy can do. I am not usually an emotional person, but oh the overwhelmed tears I cried or I should say we cried. We got the children on a Wednesday and on Friday about noon I realized that I had not cried yet that day! It was a good sign. Then about the time my tears quit Merlin's started. Watching Oliver and Isabel adjust was hard. Truly we did not have enough arms. Oliver grew into a big boy overnight and I rebelled. I didn't WANT that to happen. Where was my little boy? Isabel just wanted to be held and how I wanted to hold her and I did, but at times it was impossible. On Thursday, I went for a walk and when I had to turn around I cried. I longed to just keep on walking. Walk into the sunset and disappear. But along with all the adjustments we LOVE our children and never doubt the Lord had brought us here, but I won't say it isn't a load and I won't say it's all been easy.

Funnies and faith

  Well, we keep plugging along through papers :) When our old home study agency sent our file to AAA, many documents were missing???? With many docs missing and many expired it made the most sense to do a whole new home study. So that's what we are working on. Now in the hands of AAA I am amazed at how thorough they are. I had to be on my toes with our original agency to make sure everything was done correctly. Now with AAA I can relax and know that it is getting done RIGHT! It helps so much. Plus they are much cheaper. We didn't know any different before, but now we do! I am so thankful.
    Two days ago in the police station waiting to get our fingerprints done out of the clear blue sky O loudly questioned "Daddy, did you shot someone?" I have absolutely no idea how that even popped in his head, because he doesn't even know what a police station IS! There were only a few people in there at the time, but I had to wonder WHAT they ever thought. It struck mine and Marv's funny bone and we could not stop laughing. The opportune timing of 3 yr olds! lol :)  We just got home from visiting friends and enjoying the sand and sun in Belize! Once again Marv and I fell in love with the beautiful brown Latin American children. It renewed our faith that no, we are NOT out-to-lunch waiting 4 yrs on Colombia. Our hearts are there. Gonna keep waiting for our chocolate :)