Go West!

Where does the time go! Nothing new to report on our adoption. We are currently exploring other options, but we haven't committed to any direction yet. While we have been waiting we have put our time to good use. The last week of May we loaded up the car and grab my 10 year old niece and headed west...well actually north and west. We took a ten day vacation up through South Dakota where we went through the Badlands, Mt. Rushmore, Custer State Park, Minuteman Missile NP and then we continued west to Yellowstone. It was an extraordinary trip. We also stopped off at Devils Tower, the Corn Palace and Sioux Falls Park. I could babble all day about the trip, but I will just let some pictures tell the story! Jeff is already planning our return trip when we get our own kids, hopefully that happens soon because I am ready to go back!

Grizzly Bear and cub at Yellowstone NP

Jeff and Tori hiking in the Badlands
Jeff and Tori at Norris in Yellowstone, Tori was catching snowflakes. Snow in May is a novelty for us Missourians!

Tori and Me at Mt. Rushmore

Still hanging on

Well, here it is the middle of May and no word on the adoption. Jeff has asked me if maybe we are just supposed to be dog parents...and after all things considered I have to wonder. I realize that anyone reading this is looking to hear about our adoption journey and not everything we do to fill our waiting period, but it seems so sad to just let the blog sit here and go un-updated month after month! So...

In April we took a camping trip to Southeast Missouri and visited Elephant Rock SP, Ft. Davidson SH, and Johnson's Shut-ins. It was a really great trip. It was really amazing to see in person the devastation that occurred when the Taum Sauk Reservoir broke and flooded Johnson's Shut-Ins SP. It happened about 4-5 years ago and they are still working to restore the area.

Jeff standing in front of a boulder that was carried over a mile by the water that rushed out of the Reservoir breach.

Me about midway up the scour channel beneath the repaired reservoir.

Now we are preparing to take a trip west to visit Yellowstone, Mt. Rushmore and anyplace else along the way. My niece is going with us as we plan to use her as bear bait ;O)! We should have a great time and hopefully some really awesome pictures and maybe when we get back we will know what our next step or direction or plan is for building our family.

Where does the time go!

Well, as is apparent by our lack of blogging nothing is happening on the adoption front. I knew it had been awhile since I had last posted, but I didn't know it had been that long. We still have an empty room and many days fighting off the despair is difficult. We question our path, our motives, ourselves... I have been doing a study on the book of Esther and of course the most famous passage from it is, "Who knows, maybe for such a time as this you have been placed upon this earth." It serves to remind that I do not control the time God does. However, my argument to Him is that He is eternal and to him an hour is like a day and a day is like an hour. Being human a day is just that, a day and they keep passing by unmarked. The author of the study also pointed out though, "God never takes His eyes off us or off the wrist watch" and the same eye that is on the sparrow is also on the wrist watch. But is it His or mine! I can just imagine God's wrist watch and the many hands and faces it must have! Well, we still hold on to our hope (some days better than others). Until such a time!

Long Overdue

This update is long over due, but my life seems to have hit fast forward for awhile. As of October 8, 2009 Jeff and I are approved and are now among others just like us hoping that we will be picked by a birth mother and entrusted with her most valuable possession. Now what... well... we wait. I don't think it seems fair that such big news to us should end with such a disappointing sounding action, but there you have it.
It is an interesting story. For months our paperwork was with the agency and then finally we heard from them with corrections. During this time we felt moved to join some other prayer partners to pray that God would remove whatever obstacle was blocking the process. Well, we made the corrections sent them off and began waiting. And we waited AND waited. Finally, we decided to call and see what was going on. When we called and asked for the lady that we had been working with we find out that she no longer works there...can you say deja vu? Okay, don't panic... So Jeff left a voice mail and we waited to hear back. The next day we called (we learned from past experiences that the squeaky wheel gets the oil) and got the same voice mail. Finally, we tried on the third day and they returned our call. The new lady said that she had our paperwork and noticed that it had been there awhile and that they would get on it the following week (this is Wednesday afternoon) Thursday we are notified that our application has been approved! We felt that our prayers for the obstacle were answered quite completely. So now to praying we get picked! Maybe we could actually have a Christmas baby, okay that might be stretching it, but anything is possible now. We are closer than we have ever been to finding Baby G!

Baby steps

Well, it has been over a month since my last post and there has been a lot going on that has kept us busy. We received some of our paperwork back from our agency, some minor corrections, but it turned into a big fuss over two little words! It all boiled down to the petition to adopt, when it would be filed in our state and when our insurance would cover the child. It was such a mess. Jeff had to have his employer send four different employment letters defining when coverage would take place. We did finally get it defined in an acceptable way, but boy was it time consuming! We finally got all the corrected paperwork sent back in and are hoping and praying for a quick approval of our application so we can get in the system. Three years is a long time to be pregnant, even if it is only on paper! So that is the update and while it is only a baby step forward, it is still a step forward and not backward!

Sonshine, children's camp and still waiting!

So here it is nearing the end of July and nothing new to post as far as the adoption, but don't think I haven't been busy!  Starting at the end of June I spent a week as a counselor at my parents' church associational camp.  My niece is diabetic and is not yet at a point that she can manage it completely independently so without someone there she wouldn't be able to go, so I went.  It was a fantastic week.  At the start I was a little dispirited because I ended up not having my own cabin of girls as I had been expecting, but then I read Gal. 4:27 "Be glad or barren woman, who bears no children; break forth and cry aloud, you who have no labor pains; because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband." Yes, I have a husband! LOL.  Yes, I know that Paul is speaking allegorically.  But it spoke to me at that moment and I realized that each and everyone of those children at camp are mine to cherish and love on for the week that we are together.  So that is what I did.  Seeing those kids smile and light up knowing that many of their homes were far from perfect was deeply satisfying.  I didn't have to preach to them about God or Jesus or try to convince them to become saved, I just loved them as Christ loves them.

My niece, Tori, playing Truth or Dare with her cabin mates.  Razzberries up the arm!

Bus ride to the pool, we sang the entire way there and back!  I was leading of course!

So, then after an fun and exhausting week at camp, I spent the Fourth of July at my parents house celebrating my sister's birthday.  Jeff and I went home the following Monday and spent a week at home.  Then we headed back to my parents on Sunday and Jeff and my dad layed ceramic tile in their bathroom.  On Tuesday evening I hopped a train and headed to my brothers home(less) --he actually moved out of his apartment in Warrensburg, but had to stick around for a few days afterward-- and the next morning He, five teenagers from his youth group and myself, loaded ourselves into a 15 passenger van and drove 11 hours to Minnesota and the Sonshine festival.  There we spent four cold, but none-the-less awesome days camping and rocking out to Christian bands, such as Skillet, Toby Mac, Hawk Nelson, Matthew West, Barlow Girl and that is just a few!  We experienced three very different kids of preachers and locker room showers with strangers and many other strange and new adventures.

The youth group with a wandering preacher man, Bart, front and center.

Less than half of the tents that make up what is referred to as Tent City at Sonshine Festival.

HAD to stop in Auburn, Iowa and get a picture with the "World's Largest Bull", Albert!  My brother, Jon and I holding up the bull.

During the Hawk Nelson Concert, Toby Mac's band--Diversity and David Crowder were standing off in the wings watching and Hawk Nelson called them out on stage.  I only got a video of part of it with David Crowder, but I don't think David Crowder quite knew what was going on!

So now I am home and not real sure what to do with my time, but I am sure something will come along, it usually does.  Until then I will just keep on waiting and watching.

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us."  Hebrews 12:1 

Memorial Day and Other Nonsense Ramblings

For the first time since Jeff and I relocated we actually celebrated a holiday with our friends.   Normally we would either visit my parents or if he had to work, we stayed home and it wasn’t much different from any other day.  But this year we celebrated!  We spent an enjoyable afternoon visiting and eating and going from sitting outside to sitting inside while it rained then back to sitting outside.  I can’t really complain except that the homemade ice cream didn’t set up so that was a bust.

     One of the families that are our friends have an 18 month old daughter and are expecting their second anytime.  Their oldest, Adi, is just as cute as a button and it is always a joy to see her, but there is always a hint of sadness mixed in as probably many PAPs can understand.  She played in Baby G’s room today and I actually had to go in and straighten it up after they left, not that they left a mess, just restoring it to its normal state.  It felt nice to see that the room had been played in and enjoyed by a child, it made the room feel less empty and desolate.  I walked with Adi down our hallway, which is almost as long as a bowling lane and the quick little pad pad pad of her bare feet on the wood floor is a sound I hadn’t really realized had been missing.  Well, some days are harder and some are easier.  We are just waiting to hear something and that is okay, but if someone had said three years ago that we would still be waiting for our first Baby G, I would have thought they were crazy and told them so.  The Gobble Family has a poem posted on their blog called “Wait” and while I won’t post it here, if you are waiting as we are I highly recommend reading it.

     Sometimes, I think to myself, why is this taking so long and I am ready now, don’t delay!  But other times I find myself thinking am I ready?  Are we ready?  maybe it is okay that we have all this time and we should be taking more advantage of it.  While still at other times I think, what if we just stayed the two of us?

     I ran across an ad the other day on craigslist that was looking for women to donate their eggs and so I clicked on the link to see and it was going to pay $5000 for each harvest, and I thought WOW! that is even better than donating plasma!  LOL!  Only the max age was 30 years.  I am going to be 32 this September, I guess my eggs are too old!  I never really thought I was that old, but I guess it isn’t too far off, according to a nurse friend of mine you are a high risk pregnancy if you are 35 or older, hmmmm, that oughta make any momma to be feel good!  

     I am really just typing these thoughts as they come into my head with no rhyme or reason.

     My mom came to visit this weekend and we went shopping at some baby stores.  Didn’t buy anything for our Baby G, we actually bought a baby gift for my brother to give to his friend and wife.  They are the proud new parents of a bouncing baby boy.  It was fun to wander around and look.  Two of the stores we visited were boutiques, but the third was Baby’s R Us, which is an exciting thing here because they finally put one in with the Toys R Us.  It isn’t quite as impressive as the one up in Chesterfield Valley that I have been to, but it is way better than not having one at all!  Not to mention that now we can get stuff bought online shipped to the store.  Well, I guess I am going to quit rambling for now!  Happy Memorial Day, may we never forget why we are free!

Poison Invasion

The mother vine!  Jeff couldn't believe it had its own branches!

The "original" vine from the beginning of the world!

Another shot of the mother vine.

Well, I don't really have anything new to report on the adoption front, but I thought that it was time for an update on other things!  Our camping trip that I wrote of in my last post was literally a washout so nothing to tell there.  The most spectacular thing going on right now is our battle to stop the invasion of the killer poison ivy.  It has earned that name because I HATE it.  I had ran into a patch of it last year while I was picking gooseberries which grow wild and abundantly in the woods surrounding our house.  I was so immersed in picking that I don't even know where it was that I got it.  Now, that I know that we have some on our property I am a little more wary and try to keep my eye out for it.  Well, as it turns out it is nearing gooseberry time again and I have been keeping a close eye on some of my closer plants so I know when I should start picking them.  Being that they are in the woods and the woods have ticks (another evil of nature!) I decided that I would cut some paths near some of the plants that are on the edge of the woods so I could keep a close eye on them without having to spray with deep woods off everytime.  So I begin to mow and as I am mowing an area I look around and notice pretty green leaves of three.  At first I thought oh they are just some other kind of brush plant, but then I realized they were getting bigger and looked nothing like the plant I thought they were.  I ran in the house and got on the internet, to double check my suspicions and correct I was!  Not only was there a little poison ivy, but it was rapidly taking over, then I noticed a vine that I had never really looked at climbing a tree in our yard and realized it was the mother of all poison ivy.  Thankfully, I have not gotten the oils on my skin, but I did take some precautionary measures and ran in the house and washed any exposed skin off with my Bert's Bees Poison Ivy soap, I wasn't taking any chances!  We have since bought Roundup poison ivy killer and Jeff went on the offensive, killing (hopefully) the ivy we had found, unfortunately as we became further enmeshed in our offensive we found more and more!  If I had found the mother of all poison ivy vines, today we discovered the original poison ivy vine that God put here during creation!  Jeff didn't even think that it was poison ivy at first, stating, "it has no branches, I don't think it is poison ivy."  The problem was he didn't look high enough up the tree!  Normally I would just let nature be, but with a dog that runs in the woods indiscriminately and I being allergic to it, poison ivy MUST go!  

Anchor's Away!

Well, our paperwork is officially gone.  As of today we are waiting!  I am excited and apprehensive and to be quite frank I don't know what to do with myself now that I have all this free time!!  Hopefully we won't have much to post in the way of the adoption until we get picked, but that is not to say I won't entertain my fellow bloggers and readers with our adventures while we wait.  We have a lot of plans for the coming weeks/months.  In a couple of weeks we are going to go camping. We haven't settled on a place yet, but we do have it narrowed down to two places which are the Buffalo River OR Taum Sauk either one offers great hiking.  We are also planning on installing a fireplace in our living room, we still have a little while for that, but it will probably be rather tumultuous when we do it.  Couple that with helping plan my mother and father-in-law's 50th anniversary party, create a scrapbook for them as a gift, mother's day, my brother's b-day and graduation (MA) and anything else that crops up I should have plenty to write about!!  Here's to hoping the time goes by quickly and we hear something soon!

Going in Baby G's Room

     Well, it hasn't been quite as long as I thought since my last post!  That being said we have been pretty busy.  I took some time away from the blog world for a awhile because I didn't know what else to write and I couldn't bear to read others blogs.  I have also been swamped with paper chasing and a much needed vacation.  We are officially nearing the end of our paper chase now just a few more pieces and we can say that we are back to waiting.  We are going domestic, in case I didn't mention that before.  We are going with Mercy Ministries, which is actually a home for young ladies that are struggle to get out difficult situations. They have an adoption agency to assist in placing babies that are born to mothers in their programs that choose to adopt them out.  We don't know how long the wait will be because it depends on the birth mother picking us, but we are hopeful.  That being said we went into baby G's room for something other than cleaning.  We had quit going in it as the wait became longer and longer with our Kaz adoption and totally avoided it when that adoption collapsed. But, I have been so full of hope and renewed excitement that I had to go in there and start dreaming again.  We are not so eager that we are ready to run out an buy things or even really look at baby things, that will wait until we have been picked and maybe even until it is finalized, but for now there are some finishing touches that need to be made to the room BEFORE we bring a baby home and we are ready to tackle those.

     On another note, since we weren't travelling to Kaz we decided to take a much needed vacation.  So at the end of February we went on a short 3-night cruise to the Bahamas.  It was so relaxing and gave Jeff and I a chance to get away and reconnect after the tumultuous weeks prior.  The weather was beautiful and we got good and sunburnt, something that doesn't happen to us Missourians in February!  

Me snorkeling, the weather was beautiful and so was the reef and the fish, but boy was the water cold!

Jeff and I after Snorkeling in Nassau, Bahamas.

Jeff walking on the Beach at Coco Cay Island, the cruiseline's private island.

Jeff and I on the deck of the ship as we departed Port of Miami.

The End of One Journey and a New Beginning

Well, it has been almost two months since I last blogged, but now it is time to give an update. About four weeks ago I sent our agency a letter asking about our paperwork and information I had received about another of their PAPs paperwork not being where it was supposed to be and there being no record of it ever having gotten there in the first place.  I just wanted to know what was going on and why our paperwork has not moved.  They sent me a response that denied knowing about this other PAP and told me in a round about way that I should pay attention to their weekly updates, which I read religiously.  Then they went on to give me hope that it was possible that our paperwork was much further along than we suspected and it was possible that we could just get a call to travel one day and never know when we reached the MOE or had a region assignment.  Two working days later we received a cryptic email simply stating that they had information regarding our paperwork and we needed to set up a time to speak on the phone about our dossier.  TWO DAYS!!  Right after you give us this hope... Well we finally connected with them to learn something so shocking I was at a loss for words.  Our paperwork NEVER made it to the MFA where we were told it was.  WHAT!  You mean for the last 8 months when we thought it was at the MFA and they kept reassuring us it was there and leaning on the slow down in Kaz as the reason, that it had never left the Consulate!  Deja Vu, this sounds a lot like the other PAP that I had heard about and they deny knowing about....

Well, that is our story, but it is not the end.  After we got off the phone with our agency we decided on our new course of action.  We couldn't go back to Kaz right now, it was just too painful and the emotions were still raw.  We had, at one time, considered getting on a list for a domestic adoption, but were dissuaded from doing so.  Now, well, now we felt free to pursue this option.  So, we set the wheels in motion for that course.  My heart hurts for that child we would have met in Kaz and I still see the face of a brown haired brown eyed child, just beautiful, but not to be.  We feel misused, misguided and basically lied to.  Thankfully, our trust is in the Lord and not in the agency WE chose to work His miracle.  Everything doesn't happen for a reason, we as humans still have free will and even the best plans go astray, but God works for the good of those that trust in Him.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

Post Christmas and the New Year

Okay, so if I was a good blogger I would have added probably five posts in the time between this post and the previous post, but I am not a good blogger.  On the upside anyone reading to follow the adoption hasn't missed anything because there is nothing to report.  Our paperwork is updated and everything is now in the unending holding pattern that we seem to be in.  On an upbeat note, we bought a snowsuit for our Baby G in the hope that we get to travel before winter is up.  We have been putting off buying one because we won't need it if we travel in the summer months.  Here's hope.  

Thanksgiving came and went without much to speak of.  I fixed the turkey for Jeff's family's Thanksgiving.  I have a family recipe that I use and my mother-in-law knew it.  However, she misinterpreted it to be a GERMAN family recipe (I am a good deal German, my mother was a Juedemann and my father is a Wehmeyer)  I had everyone asking me how I "made a German turkey, did I stuff it with saurkraut?"  After clearing that up everyone seemed to really like the turkey, the white meat was so juicy.  I would pass along the recipe, but then I would have to kill you!!  LOL!  After Thanksgiving everything switched into high gear and I was off to the races gearing up for Christmas.  

Christmas...Was fun, nice, full.  We did not spend our time sad over the fact that one more Christmas has gone by without our Baby G.  Instead we looked forward  to the hope that next year we would share our love, traditions and excitement with our little one.  We went to our usual Christmas tree farm to get a tree and it was pretty slim pickings, but we decided that we would rather have a crooked bare tree (it wasn't Charlie Brown bare) and support our local tree farm to ensure that it will be there to share with our little one than to go find a perfect tree at a tree lot.  So our tree leaned a little, but it had character!  For Christmas every year I get an ornament for our tree for both Jeff and I that I think is representative of our year.  This year's was a Hallmark ornament shaped like a tear drop with a clear star hanging in the middle and the town of Bethlehem nestled in the bottom, but it was the words that were on it and the box that really won me over.  Inscribed on the ornament was the phrase, "Hope shines bright."  On the box was written:

"The world was dark, a place of uncertainty, waiting for an unknown future.  But in the extraordinary glow of the star over Bethlehem, heralding the arrival of the Light of the World, hope shines bright, as the future is forever changed."

Thank God for Christmas and the hope that it gives to this world through Jesus, but also for those that are one this journey of adoption along with us, thank God that hope shines bright and that someday we will have our own small Christmas miracle that will change our futures forever! 

Happy New Year!

Updating and everything in between

Well, here we are in November, I just can't believe the time flies by so fast.  Our paperwork is still somewhere in the sea of Kazakhstan.  I am beginning to think that someone spilled coffee on it and just threw it away, but then I read others blogs who were registered at the MFA around the same time and their paperwork hasn't moved either.  I realize that right now I could blame my agency, but that wouldn't really be fair since the paperwork is out of their hands, I could get frustrated at the process, but what good would that do me, I entered this process knowing that no matter how stable a process may be, it is ever changing in the world of international adoption.  Some days I don't want to read other blogs because I just don't think that I can bear to hear that they have a region assignment or that they are going to meet their child, but then I read them anyway and think someday that will be Jeff and I!  Ours prayers are fervent as we pour out our longing to have our child in our home.  There is a plan, THERE IS A PLAN!  Things will come together and when they do we will have a better, deeper understanding of this journey that we are on and we will be better equipped to face challenges in the future.  Things are bright and there is a light at the end of the tunnel, there are just a few curves to go through that are blocking the end.

"The Lord is good to those whose hope is in Him, to the one who seeks Him; It is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord."  Lamentations 3:25-26

Running, fall and other some such topics

Well, here we are in October!  I really do enjoy this time of year.  The leaves are starting to change and the temperatures are getting cooler and with these cooler temps comes CHILI!!! Yep this weekend is the official 3rd annual Gertson Ghoulish Chili Cook-off!  We have been trying to get things ready and by that I mean finish laying ceramic tile in our master bath and closet.  We are going to have a house full of people, as many as 30+ including kids and one bathroom, that will NEVER work, so Jeff, bless his heart, is working like a mad fiend to get it finished before Saturday so I can return the clothes to their rightful resting place instead of in a pile on the spare room bed and then I get to clean, clean, clean!  I also am scheduled to work 4 days this week, which is good, BUT I would have loved the time to get things ready for Saturday.  Oh Well!  

Took our puppy for a run this evening and it was nice and invigorating.  I run down a gravel road for a little while and really get to bask in the beauty of nature and the season.  Just the other day there were still walnuts and leaves on the walnut trees, they are now bare as a newborn baby.  It goes by so fast.

I have been doing a women's Bible study at my church for the last five weeks.  It is called "Discerning the Voice of God" by Pricilla Shirer.  It is a really great study for where I am at right now with our adoption.  It has challenged me and encouraged me.  She doesn't give a magic equation that guarantees success, that depends on the individual, but she gives guidance as to how to better tune in and test what you hear.

Our adoption is still in the same place it was before, hasn't budged.  It is all good though because God is working and moving and all things will happen in His time and no sooner.  In the mean time we have been busy updating paperwork for our dossier.  I was terribly stressed about this until I took a look at the dates on our USCIS papers and realized that I had a lot more time than I was thinking I had, so now I can breath!  YAY!  

Words of Wisdom:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.  Romans 15:13

Encouragement for the trip

I have been running across different scripture, some are new and some are old verses that I have marked and I thought that I would try to share one every so often with the hope that they might lift and encourage my fellow bloggers as they have encouraged Jeff and I on our journey.

The vision is yet for the appointed time; It hastens toward the goal, and it will not fail.  Though it tarries, wait for it; For it will certainly come, it will not delay.  Habakkuk 2:3

The JOY that comes after the trials

No, this is not an announcement pertaining to the joy that comes after much trial and suffering, but rather a personal revelation.  It is often times difficult to keep feelings of happiness and excitement and anticipation in adoption as month after month goes by with little movement or news.  Just the other day I was experiencing one of those down days, you know the ones where you go to the room that you have designated the baby's room and feel all sad that it is just a room you are looking at and not a baby sleeping in that room, well, after much prayer and thought and more prayer I began to see my way through the fog and found my faith on the other side.  This process is long, it is hard, it is painful and arduous, but is it worth it...yes!  And I haven't even gotten to the end of my journey, whatever end that may be.  It grows us all in some way.  All these thoughts were summed up this morning by something I heard in church.  "[Jesus] looked to the Joy after the cross; after the suffering."  That was how he got through the horrible ordeal of the cross, by looking to the joy that came afterward.  Now do I think that my adoption journey compares to the suffering on the cross... not even close, but it is suffering none-the-less.  As Halloween approaches I am reminded of the plans we had for picking out pumpkins this year with our Baby G, that is not going to happen this year, but oh how much greater the joy it will be when we DO finally get to enjoy it with our little one in tow! Christmas will be so much sweeter and all the days in between that we get to share and learn and grow with Baby G.  Do I wish that all this was happening now, this year... yes, but I am going to choose to look to the joy that comes after the trials and the waiting and waiting AND waiting.  For now I will take up my cross daily knowing that joy comes in the morning!  

What a ride

So it's that time again, time for me to come up with something provocative to say, something full of meaning and significance, a profound announcement, but alas that is not the case. The most recent news was from the Committee of Child Rights Protection stating that dossiers that specified a gender would be returned.  I felt sick for all the families that have come so far in the process only to have to start the wait over again if they chose to continue in their decision to adopt from Kaz.  Not to say that a childisn't worth the wait, because he or she is, but the wait is the hardest part...Well, needless to say Jeff and I are not among these PAPs and do not have to make the difficult decisions they are.  We determined early on that we didn't care if we were gifted with a boy our girl, we just wanted a child to share our home, hearts and lives with.  So where does that put us, the same place we have been for the last four months, the MFA.  Yep we haven't moved.  We are gearing up for the fall and as we do we find ourselves thinking, "Last year we thought we would have our baby here to share this with."  I love Halloween, it rates just above Christmas as far as I am concerned and last year aswe searched and found a local pumpkin patch we became excited about the prospect of sharing the experience with our child this year, not to be.  Well the point of this entry wasn't to be sad.  On a happier note, we have added a new furry family member.  His name is Mooshoo and as soon as I get a pick I will add it to the blog.  This was an unplanned adoption, someone dumped him by our house and he found his way into our yard.  He is a little yellow tabby, though when he arrived he was a little worse for the wear.  He had a ouchie on his nose (usually caused when they throw them from the vehicle in a hurry) and his front canine is missing (I don't know if it will come back or not)  He has adjusted quite well with the rest of our motley crew and even our older cat, Chopstix, plays with him and doesn't his at him anymore.  If this adoption doesn't go through soon we may have to open a zoo at this rate!  Actually, no more pets we are at maximum capacity.

The other exciting thing is our chili cook-off.  We have in in October of every year, actually this is just the third year for the cook-off, but for two

years prior we had a halloween party. Anyway, I have been working on a theme and decorating ideas for the house and of course what I will wear for a costume.  It is always great fun and good food!  This year I am going with a mad scientist lad and running the invitations like a want ad and old newspaper clippings, but the best part of all is the picture I photoshopped of Jeff...

Yes, I set his eyebrows on fire, no it is not supposed to look totally real, think more tabloid sensationalism!  I laughed the whole time I did it.  At any rate it will be fun.  

With all the uncertainty in the IA world especially as we are experiencing it, I have had a lot of encouragement from some unlooked for sources, but I will just end with we started this race and we intend of finishing strong 

Therefore, since through God's mercy we have this ministry we do not lose heart...We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.  II Corinthians 4:1, 8-9 

What a FUN Video!!

Anyway, My brother sent me this video and I thought it was great and well, doesn't really have anything to do with adoption , but it does show that no matter where you go in the world people are people and we aren't really all that different!!  Enjoy!  Do you think they would dance with me in Kazakhstan? LOL!  It on the left side of the page!

Ramblings of a mad woman and other such nonesense

So, I have just been wanting to post on our blog, but with no new news to share and nothing exciting happening I have been at odds with myself trying to think of what to write about.  I have finally given into my urge to write and am dedicating this entry to my mad ramblings.  

I have recently watched the movie "Nomad: the warrior".  I won't say that it was my all time favorite film and that it is a must see for everyone, but for me it was poignant and enlightening.  It enabled me to catch a glimpse at the beautiful country that our child is from and that glimpse only makes one that much more eager to immerse yourself into their culture and heritage.  The movie really excelled in getting across how much pride the people have in their heritage and traditions.  Their history is deep and is woven into the steppes that they call home.

On another note, my agency sent us a weekly update and with it was a link to a utube video of the Kazakhstan national anthem.  It was beautiful and like the movie reverberated the pride of the people, their unceasing and unwavering commitment to the country and the land they call home as well as their way of life.  Along with the link our agency also sent the english translation, but it didn't really do the anthem justice.  It is so much stronger and proud and hauntingly beautiful in the language it is sung in.  Unfortunately, I am not familiar enough with either the Kazakh language or the Russian language to differentiate between the two.  

So now I come to the part of my entry that really starts to ramble...the adoption, our wait, and my ever increasing eagerness to take one more, even small, step forward.  Everyday we wait for word that our paperwork has moved, wishing that it would and thinking of all the families before us that have been waiting that much longer.  One day we will be one of those families.  I also think about those families that are just a step or two behind us and wonder how they will weather this waiting game and what they will be thinking when they reach the stage that we are at.  I know that everyday that passes is one less day that we have to wait and one day closer to Baby G.  We still haven't made a decision whether we will both make two trips or if I will stay for the duration and only Jeff will make two trips.  I so want to make just one trip, to have the time not only to spend with our little one, but also to immerse myself into the culture and the people.  I love to experience the different cultures on a personal level rather than a tourist level.  Here I go rambling on about traveling and as far as we know we haven't even made it to the MOE, much less gotten a region assignment or LOI.  I am out of words or at least words that when put together create a coherent thought so I will sign off for now and continue waiting, knowing that everything has a season and will happen in God's perfect timing even the creation of our little family. 

Make-overs and the Fourth of July

Well, it has been another month since my last post and while adoption news has been slow with no new updates our lives have been pretty busy.  We have spent the last several weeks now doing little upgrades in our home, like replacing light fixtures and landscaping the front yard.  We have more to do and today begins our attempt to ceramic tile one of our bathroom floors.  These things have all needed doing since we moved in, we have just kept coming up with excuses why we couldn't...Well, here goes nothing!  On the fun side we celebrated Fourth of July with my parents.  It has always been a big holiday in my family, one because any excuse to BBQ and make homemade ice cream and light explosives all in the same day is a good cause for celebration, but it is also my sister's birthday.  For year's she thought that all the fireworks were for her.  I have met other people with 4th birthday's and they thought the same thing.  What a bunch of egotists!! LOL!  We had a wonderful time.  Saturday we tried to go out on my parents boat, but after much time spent working on it, we put it in the water and it would only go backwards!  I suggested just motoring around the lake backwards, but nobody was too keen on that idea!  My poor dad though he just works and works to keep the old boat going, but it is a 1977 Formula, that's as old as me and while I don't consider myself that old, that is REALLY old for a boat!  We then spent Sunday by the pool and visiting.  It was nice and peaceful.  Hope to have some adoption news soon!

Paka!