Isaiah is coming home - eventually

I have recently found out that there are people who actually read this blog. I thought Kelley just wrote on here to chronicle what was happening in our live so we could look back and remember. Apparently there are others who read the blog and I'm sure are now thinking we are serious slackers. Kelley is still in Zambia with a very bad internet connection or often no internet, so she will not be updating the blog and the grammar will be much worse than usual. I have came home with the 3 oldest kids on June 9th. We are hoping and praying that Kelley and Isaiah will be coming home in the next week or two. They were supposed to leave on the 23rd, but were delayed at the last minute. Apparently some of the info from Zambia did not match up with the info the US Embassy found on Isaiah and all the paperwork had to be redone (birth certificate, passport, other stuff). This is taking longer than usual because of all of the holidays that Zambians enjoy. Good for Zambians, bad for Americans trying to get home. They have a holiday today and two next week on Monday and Tuesday.

Kelley's mom joined her in Zambia last night. This was a huge blessing for all of us. Kelley has her momma and we don't have to worry about Kelley and Isaiah anymore, because Kelley's mom can comfort and care for them for a week or two.

Isaiah is 2 1/2 years old. I think his birthday is January 21st, 2009. I know it sounds bad to say I think, but a couple of days ago it was July 15th 2009 and it just we just found out it is really the new date. He is a really funny and outgoing little boy. We really enjoyed him while we were in Zambia. Now we are missing him and Kelley from afar.

I'm sure Kelley will give a much better update when she gets home (hopefully July 5th), but until then, this is all I got. Obviously I'm not a big blogger. At least I have figured out how to post a picture. This is a picture of Hudson and Isaiah a couple of days before we left. Please pray for Kelley, Isaiah, and Kelley's mom to come home quickly and safely. We also thank everyone who has been praying for us and loving us through this process. We look forward to sharing how God worked in amazing ways in all of us over the last couple of months.

Luke

Our fancy rooms

Here is a picture of the kids rooms. When we first arrived, Kate walked into the apartment and said this is the fanciest place ever. We asked her why she thought that and she said "look at these fancy lace coverings they have over all the beds". I guess they have never seen a mosquito net. We all got a kick out of our luxurious bedding.

Our family at House of Moses

This is the orphanage we have been visiting. We were there the first 3 days we were in Zambia. Yesterday was the first day that we did not go to the orphanage because we went to Zambian church. It started at 9:30 and we got home at 2. A little different than Covenant Life. Steve, our Executive Pastor who is also adopting with us preached and did a really good job. The Zambian people were so gracious and excited to have us there with them. It was really cool that even though we are in such a far away place with such a different culture we could still come together and worship the same God. It was also really cool to see our kids playing with the Zambian kids. After about an hour I looked outside to see the kids and they were all holding hands, hugging, and just having a great time. Really cool. Tomorrow at 11 am we go to meet with the Department of Social Welfare. Please pray for us during this meeting as I think it kind of set the tone of what this whole process is going to look like. We want to especially thank all of our family and church family for all of your support. We have been overwhelmed by your prayers, emails, facebooking, etc. We love you all and will keep you posted.

Luke

Our group at the House of Moses

This is our group in front of the House of Moses.

Getting off the plane in Zambia

The long, long, long trip

Pictures from today

From Zambia

Hello, family and friends!

We are settling in in our apartment. It’s really big and nice (I use the term loosely, of course). But we have a lot of room, 1 and 1/2 bathrooms, big kitchen, and really big living space. The Jeantets came over for dinner last night so that we could all fit around the table together and talk in the family room. Their apartment is on the small side.

Zambia is wonderful! I don’t feel homesick at all here! I ALWAYS feel homesick when I spend the night away from home and I don’t here, so that’s so nice. The windows are open, the kids have a playground right in front of our apartment with a big grassy area to play in, so they can go in and out and play all day. I can see and hear everything through the open windows. There’s an American missionary family staying here for a few days, with kids close to our kids’ ages, so Kate and Will have had the best time playing with them on the playground. Of course, Jeremiah (the Jeantets’ 2 year old little boy) is very popular with them, too! The missionaries leave tomorrow, which is sad, but the playground will still be here.

We went grocery shopping yesterday. In the afternoon, we visited House of Moses, the orphanage we’re adopting from. The lady we met with said that she couldn’t help us with our adoptions till she met with the social worker from the government and that wouldn’t be till Tues, which was not the way we had been told the process would go. But we stayed for 2 hours and held the 16 infants there and fed them bottles, etc., and loved every minute of it! I was in heaven with all the babies! They were all under 6 months old and were so adorable. I wanted all of them, except the one who threw up everywhere!

So back to the adoption info.... We visited the orphanage again today and the older children’s orphanage down the road from House of Moses. We loved them all, but there were a few we thought might be “the one”. So at this point, we’re going to keep visiting and playing with the orphans, meet the social worker on Tues., and hope that they’ll tell us they have a little girl ready to be adopted.

We’ll update as we have news. Kate, Will, and Hudson were so good at the orphanages today. They played so well with all the kids. I was a little worried about Hudson because of his age, etc., but he loved them all and was so sweet to the little ones. I’m so proud of how all 3 of them are doing and how much they’re loving stranger kids and on top of that, strangers who don’t look like us. Today was really great.

We love you all and hope to have some good news soon!!

Getting closer

So much has been going on lately! It's been quite the roller coaster! As of this past Tues., we have confirmed our reservation for the cottage we'll be staying in in Lusaka (the capital of Zambia), we have talked to the officer assigned to our case at Immigration who assured us that she would hurry our application through to approve us to bring a child home from Zambia, the kids have started packing their suitcases, and we've bought our plane tickets for Apr. 26!!!

We are so excited! An added huge bonus is that we are taking British Airways from Philadelphia to London and London to Lusaka. This means that we'll be in London for almost a day on Wed., Apr. 27, so hopefully we'll be able to see some Royal Wedding preparations in person! I've been counting down to the Wedding and realized I would already be in Zambia for the big day, but how exciting that we'll be in London a few days before! But the biggest benefit, in my opinion, of going British Airways is that our other option was Ethiopia Air, and we've heard not so good things about Ethiopia Air, such as, the passengers clapping and cheering when they finally land because it was "up in the air" whether they would actually land or not. But of course, those were really cheap tickets so I was afraid that Luke would insist we go with Ethiopia Air, and I'm so thrilled that we're not. I imagine the trip is going to be enough of an experience without worrying about crashing over the Atlantic Ocean!

So we're making lists and consulting other lists and hearing about things it would've never occurred to us to pack, like travel sized toilet paper because there's no tp in the public restrooms in Zambia. So much to do!

I'm trying to enjoy every minute of the day now since it's like I'm 8 1/2 months pregnant and having the baby in 2 weeks. I'm appreciating Hudson being the baby for now and being a family of only 5 before everything changes.

It's definitely starting to feel more real and not like some far off dream that will happen "one day". Luke and I are taking our live typhoid vaccine, I'm cancelling Hudson's swim lessons I had scheduled for May, we're saying goodbye to Community Bible Study friends because the year will end while we're in Zambia, etc., etc. I'm getting used to the reaction of people thinking we're crazy for doing this, and it doesn't bother me anymore, so that's good. Kate, Will, and Hudson are excited to go play with the orphans and see a new country and Luke and I are excited for them. We think it'll be a wonderful experience for them and hopefully make them appreciate all our blessings a lot more than they currently do, and give them compassion for the orphans and the less fortunate.

Hopefully, my next update will be that we've received our immigration form which is the last piece of paper we need to travel. I forgot to mention we sent all our paperwork to Zambia and they should've received it yesterday so it won't be a surprise when we show up in 2 weeks and say we're ready to adopt a baby.

So that's what's going on with us! And watching the Rays is a nice way to make the days go by faster till we leave! The first week of the season was not nice but things seem to be turning around for them now!

We've been so overwhelmed by family and friends being so excited for us and supporting us, which is so nice. We're so thankful for that!

Update

We have some big updates! We finally got our USCIS appt. a month ago and had our fingerprints taken 4 weeks ago today. However, about a week ago, after extensive prayer and discussion, we decided to change course and go to Zambia with our good friends, the Jeantets, from church. We're so excited! They have been planning to adopt from Zambia for a year or so and hope to leave in about 3 weeks, and we're hoping to go with them. So instead of traveling in Dec. to Ethiopia we're traveling in Apr. to Zambia!

Some changes have to be made to our home study which our social worker is hopefully finishing as we speak. Then we will overnight the amended home study to USCIS so they can approve us to adopt from Zambia. This is what we're waiting on in order to be able to travel. We're really hoping for everything to be fast because we don't want to hold the Jeantets up since they're waiting for us and they're ready to travel. So for their sake also we hope USCIS hurries!

We will be staying for anywhere from 1-3 months depending on how long the adoption takes, so we've decided to bring the kids with us. They're so excited! As are we! I think it will be a life changing experience for them to live in Africa for a few months. Our 5 hour visit to the health dept. yesterday for immunizations was good practice for us to be out of our comfort zone! It was quite the experience!

There is much to do to pack for 5 of us not knowing for sure how long we'll be staying, etc., but we cannot wait to go and play with orphans and help where we can and find baby Zoe!! Nona is on stand by waiting to fly out to Zambia if we have to stay longer than 2 months since Luke will have to come home and go back to work. So we're extremely thankful for that. I wouldn't even want to think about flying home from Zambia with 4 children and just me. The Jeantets would love to help me but that's too much to ask of anyone except your mother!

We'll be blogging while we're there and updating about the trip. Thank you so much for your prayers for travel safety and travel hurry! And most of all, for the adoption to go smoothly and for Luke when he goes before the judge to plead our case, etc., etc.

"Zoe from Zambia" has a nice ring to it!!

USCIS

Well, we're waiting for a letter to come in the mail that gives us an appointment to go to Tampa and have our fingerprints taken for immigration. After our fingerprints are run through the system(s) and show that we're not criminals, we receive a form that is the final piece of paper to be included in our dossier. Our dossier will then be mailed to Ethiopia for them to approve and put us on the waiting list for a baby girl.

So, I'm checking the mail every day as soon as it comes and on Fri., we received the first letter that we have to receive from USCIS (immigration), which says that they've received our request to bring home an orphan and they're processing our request. Which is great news, and we were happy to receive that. But some people, we've heard, receive the actual appointment letter the day following the initial letter that says they're processing the request. So Sat., I ran out and there was no letter in the mailbox. And yesterday, I ran out to check the mail, only to remember it was a holiday. I felt so silly running out to the mailbox at my usual time and remembering Presidents' Day. I hoped no neighbors saw me!

And still nothing today in the mail... So hoping to get the appointment tomorrow... Waiting on God and His perfect timing...

On a happy note, we are LOVING spending so much time with Lisa and Danny and Michael and Kathryn, Luke's siblings and their spouses. Lisa and Danny are in town for 3 weeks before they move to Indonesia for 5 years to be missionaries. So we're seeing them as much as we can while they're here, which also means we're seeing Luke's brother, Michael, and his wife, Kathryn, a lot too, which we love. And tonight, Mimi and Papa are babysitting all 5 grandkids so the 6 adults can go out to dinner and a movie!! I'm so excited! I've been wanting to see The King's Speech for months and we're finally going to see it tonight (hopefully). It was sold out the last time we tried to see it. I love that I married into a sweet, close family who all loves each other so much. It's so wonderful. And Lisa has a fancy camera and has been taking so many pictures of the kids that I will post on the blog soon!

A funny thing Will said: He's so into Star Wars that we have to ration how much the kids are allowed to watch it because really, they all 3 love the movies. So they fight with light sabers and pretend to be Star Wars characters all the time. Hudson told me this morning that I could be Ventress, who is a terrible villain. But that's ok... Anyway, so they're into fighting and playing Star Wars and I've told Will I don't want him to say words like "kill", "murder", "shoot your head off", etc.,because he seems like he's saying them so often and it sounds terrible. So I told him to say the word, "defeat" instead. So at the family picnic the other night, he and Hudson were playing Star Wars with sticks they found on the ground and Will was starting to say some of those words, so I reminded him of the new word to say instead, and he said, "I defeated your head off!!" Not exactly what I had in mind, but still sounds better than the more explicitly violent words!

I'll update when we have some exciting news!

Edit

I meant to say Will was getting his 2 big toeNAILS cut out, not his toes themselves cut out or removed. I'm using Luke's iPad and I'm having a harder time than usual figuring out my blog so I just had to add a new post instead of editing the other post. No judging on my technology issues either!

Homeschool

We have started on a fun new adventure as of 2 weeks ago! Homeschooling! It's going so well so far. Kate, Will, and I are loving it and I'm so thankful that I took the plunge and did it.

I've thought about it off and on for a little while but really just long enough to say, "not for us". But I'm so glad we're doing it. We observed a group today called Classical Conversations that we'll be joining in the fall and I'm so excited about it! We'll homeschool 4 days a week and attend this group on Fridays with tutors to teach the kids in the classical style of learning, complete with Latin! I'm way more excited than the kids, I'm sure. It's so fun to be a teacher again. The kids are learning Bible verses every day, we're all getting along better, we're not rushed and frazzled in the mornings, and they can learn at their own pace. What's not to love? I should've done it from the get go but better late than never.

In adoption news, we sent our USCIS form off and are waiting for our appointment to be fingerprinted. This is the final step before we send our paperwork to Ethiopia and hopefully will be accepted and put on the official waiting list. I've been feeling like the Lord might want us to consider special needs adoption, but Luke is not feeling it so that's fine. I completely trust his judgment. It still feels like we have such a long way to go till we get our baby but homeschooling and Rays baseball will keep me busy till then. Pitchers and catchers report to spring training this Wed.! Hudson got a new David Price shirt today so we're officially ready for Apr. 1!

I went to the most wonderful adoption conference last weekend called Created for Care and was so inspired by all the families with multiple adopted children. A few Ethiopian toddlers were there and they were so beautiful. I can't wait for my African princess! I hope it's not considered bad form to dress her up in big bows and monogrammed outfits. The African American beauty shop I take her to may frown on that but it's going to be hard to resist!

We lost our camera cord so I haven't been able to post the pictures from Hudson's first basketball game but I'll hopefully be able to do it soon. Will is supposed to start baseball next Sat but he's having his 2 big toes cut out/removed because of infection from ingrown toenails so I kind of doubt he'll be starting baseball the very next day after his procedure. The nurse reassured me that they would give him a local anesthetic and he would just sit there and not know anything was going on but they clearly don't know Will, who has to be restrained by 2 nurses and me just to get a flu shot. Next Fri should be very interesting.

Kate and Daddy will be selling Girl Scout cookies outside the grocery store tomorrow night so that should be fun. She's also in a fashion show at a new children's store in Ellenton tomorrow which I'm super excited about because of the shopping I'll need to do after she walks the runway! No more school uniforms! We can buy adorable clothes for her again! I hope she stays petite so I can match her and Baby Zoe in cute dresses and leggings.

That's all our news for now. I can't believe what the Lord is doing in all of our lives. Kate has been a voracious Bible reader and quoter of Scripture to her younger brothers for a while now, which we've been thrilled over. But Will's little heart was growing hard and his attitude had been so defiant and unkind to all of us. In the few short weeks we've been homeschooling, we've seen such a change in him. He is coming back to the sweet little boy he was before he started public school and it makes me get teary eyed with joy and thankfulness. It's like I've got my Will back and I feel so blessed. My children are my greatest blessings, next to Luke, and I'm honored that I get to spend my days teaching and pointing them to Jesus. I'm sure we seem weird to most people but we're just trying to be obedient and it's always worth it.

Final home visit

We had our final meetings with our social worker yesterday and today and now we're finished with our part of the home study! It's a great feeling! Yesterday were the individual interviews with the social worker and Luke and me separately. Today she came back to our house and wrapped things up with us and talked to the kids. It was so funny that Kate had been so excited to talk to the social worker and tell her exactly why she wanted a baby sister and Will wasn't really into it and didn't want to "practice" what he was going to say when I would ask him why he wanted a baby sister. Yet when it was actually time to talk to the lady, Kate wouldn't say a word and Will talked her ear off! But it went well, and we're thankful to be almost finished with the home study. The social worker said she would have the final part written up this week. Then we mail it to our family coordinator who will put it in with our dossier, which is some other big portfolio of documents that goes to Ethiopia. So we're 1 step closer to getting our baby!

It's starting to seem like I'm pregnant with an Ethiopian baby at this point!! Hopefully in 9 months she'll make her appearance in our household, but we'll see....

After we put the room back together with the new bedding

On Mon. night, Luke, Mimi, and Kate painted baby Zoe's room in preparation for our home visit.

This week

We got bunk beds for the boys on Tues. so Hudson is officially out of his room and sharing a room with big brother Will now.

Home Visit today

We had a really nice visit with our social worker. She was so nice and easy to talk to. The house looked great and I think it went well.

Home Visit

We heard from our social worker on Wed.! She is coming next Sat., the 15th, for our home visit!! We're so excited! But there's much to do in the meantime. Sadly, Luke got sick in the middle of the night last night with a high fever and sore throat so he's not up to getting much done today. Of course, everything on my list of things to do before the social worker comes is stuff for Luke to do :) But just because it's handy man type stuff that I can't do. I'm doing the tidying and rearranging, etc. Good thing I polished my silver a week or 2 ago! That's one less thing I have to do.

All joking aside, we also want to paint the recently vacated nursery and we're hoping that the baby bedding and curtains that sweet Nona ordered will get here early next week so we can match a paint color to them and have time to paint before next Sat. We wouldn't worry that much about painting except that there's a good bit of drawing and hand tracing on the wall from when Kate was 4 and Will was 2. We still laugh about how she blamed it on Will at the time. It was perfectly traced hand prints and writing on the wall that even Will, as brilliant and Einstein-like as he is, could not have done at age 2.

Anyway, we have to put childproof locks on the cabinet that contains cleaning supplies, fix a hole in Will's wall, take the Christmas decorations down (don't tell and no judging), and just do general tidying. Oh, and Luke's been wanting to put bunk beds in the boys' room so we're planning to run up and buy some bunk beds today and hopefully set them up very soon. The boys are so excited. Hudson has done so well with adjusting to a big boy bed and sleeping in Will's room. But I think his biggest adjustment over the last few weeks has been giving up his "pappies". We got rid of those Christmas day and we had a dreadful naptime that day but other than that, he's done so well and has completely moved on from losing his best friend. It wasn't nearly as bad as I was afraid it would be. I'm so proud of my big boy!

We're so excited and nervous for next Sat. and glad that after that, we'll be one step closer to bringing our baby home. We've also decided on her first name and it will be Zoe. It suits her perfectly in Luke's and my mind! It's so much more meaningful to pray for her by name. Time to get to work on the house preparation!