Yesterday we got the news that a fellow [Home Country] family has received some devastating news. The G family has been in the process for so long and was so close to bringing their daughter, Zia, home before the Embassy instituted their new 3-6 month investigation policy. Now they are facing a much longer wait before their process can be finished. This is tough enough to deal with but in the past few days the G’s have also learned that Zia is in major medical danger. They have been able to have her seen by doctors and specialists in [Capital City] and the results of these visits have confirmed that this young girl needs medical attention now. If they could, the G’s would bring her home immediately so that she could receive the care she needs here in the states. Unfortunately, the Embassy still has not issued her visa and there is no way, right now, to make that happen. So the G’s are doing the next best thing. Momma G is on her way to [Capital City] to be with her girl and advocate for her medical care and try her best to get Zia an expedited visa due to her emergency medical situation. Momma G has no idea how long she will be there or what will happen with Zia once she gets there. She is stepping out in extreme faith and love and she needs our help. Firstly, she needs our prayers! I can’t imagine heading to [Capital City] without knowing what was going to happen and when I was going to come home. Then pile all the heartache of having an extremely sick child on top of that stress. And then there’s the ridiculous amount of financial stress that this will bring to the G family. Everything is expensive in [Capital City], especially adequate medical care which the G’s will have to pay for out of pocket. This is the other area where we can definitely help! Another adoptive family, the P’s, have stepped in and set up a donation page for this sweet family. Please, if you can, help them out! Help this sweet girl! She needs to come home immediately and get the help she needs from her family and from doctors who can make a difference. You can visit the page “For Miss Zia” here to read more and donate. Please do. And please pray for Momma G as she travels and for her husband and daughter who will stay behind. And pray that the Embassy will issue Zia a medically expedited visa so that she can get the care that she needs. I know y’all are awesome and I know your hearts are so big. Let’s all show the G’s that they are not alone!

Friday night update: Zia’s health declined so much today that the doctors had to perform emergency surgery – expensive emergency surgery! Zia is stable right now but in ICU. Please pray for this sweet girl and donate if you can!

Monday’s anniversary made me feel grateful. Today’s anniversary makes me feel old. And grateful. And thrilled that I am still married to my best friend in the whole world! Happy Anniversary L! I love you 9 million times more than I did when I married you 9 years ago! And I’m looking forward to 90 more! Yes, we’re planning on growing extremely old together.

We were just babies. And now we have babies. How weird is that.

I can’t believe it’s been six months since we met our babies! How did this even happen??? Time has moved so quickly since they came home. It seems like they’ve been here forever and it also seems like just yesterday that we all stumbled sleepily through the front door. They have changed so much in the past six months and we have really gotten to know what completely awesome kids they are. They also, apparently, are feeling comfortable enough with us to show us their dark and disgusting sides too but at least we finally feel like a normal family – poopy pants, hissy fits, attitudes, and all. When they give me two minutes of peace and quiet (patience, it could be 15 years from now), I plan on sitting down and writing individual updates for each of them but today I just have time for a few pictures and a HAPPY SIX MONTH ANNIVERSARY TO US!

Here we are, 6 months ago today, just hours away from being parents!

Just minutes after becoming a family of four!

Loving every minute of this!

Proud papa!

And here we are 6 months later, minus Daddy because he’s taking the picture. 

AMAZING!

Also, God is always GOOD!

We were blessed today to spend time with an amazing group of people at a local church here in our hometown. They held a fundraiser for Sister today, led by G’s awesome preschool teacher, and I can’t wait to share the final totals with y’all! Trust me when I say, it’s going to be a great number! I am so overwhelmed by the love and support that we have been shown during this process. It’s just nuts. Seriously, every night after you watch the news and are just convinced that we live in a scummy, scary, stinky world – just call me and I’ll be glad to remind you that there is love and there is hope and there are some wonderful people in this crazy place. To put it in a super nerdy and super awesome way, there’s some good in this world Mr. Frodo awesome blog readers, and it’s worth fighting for. Thank you so much for fighting with us! Together we are going to bring Sister HOME!!!

And we’re going to bring her home to these two beauties!

Reckless.

Well, it’s 12 a.m. and I’m one hour into my first shift on “Concussion Watch ’13.” Every two hours, people. This is gonna be a fun night.

After waiting through months, and weeks, and two rainy evenings, A had his very first tee-ball practice tonight. He (and I) were so crazy excited that this day had finally arrived. A was bouncing off the walls all afternoon and was literally jumping up and down with excitement when we finally got to the ball park. He did not lose a bit of that energy once practice started and half-way through, he harnessed all his strength and power to barrel into one of his baseball friends in a very special play I like to call the “Who needs brain cells, anyway?” That sound you heard this evening? That crack you thought was thunder? That was A’s skull slamming into his equally hard-headed teammate.

I was actually standing a good distance away when this happened supervising G who was playing with a pre-school friend. But I saw the collision and I immediately heard A’s infamous shriek of pain. I have to admit (don’t judge me) that I, at first, wasn’t very concerned. I may or may not have rolled my eyes a little and explained to the other mom with me that A tends to be a little dramatic when he gets “hurt.” L was there immediately to make sure he was fine and he gave me the thumbs up of “no big deal” while Coach slapped a helmet on A and said, “Why don’t you bat now?” A stopped crying quickly and stepped up to the plate. I moved on with my life. Five minutes later, L walked over and handed me his phone. On it was a picture of A, batting stance style. I glanced at it quickly and said “He looks great!” Then I almost gave myself a concussion as I whipped my face back to the phone and screamed, “What is that thing on his head?!?”

This was that thing on his head:

This was my poor baby’s first baseball injury:

Ugh. It makes my stomach hurt just to look at that thing. My stomach reacts this way because a) it’s my boy and he’s injured and b) it reminds me of the Japanese “bagel head” fad that seriously creeps the peeps out of me. So, the bad news is – my stomach hurts. The good news is – A is fine. We called the doctor and the nurse took us through a series of tests with A to rule out any serious damage and he passed with flying colors. He’s feeling good, although he said his head hurt “just a little bit.” Well, I guess so. The doctor said it’s normal for injuries in this area to swell up so much and to just watch him closely and bring him in if he starts acting odd. I said, “define odd.” Just kidding, I take it back. I don’t think I’m even allowed to tease A for at least a year week day since I initially shrugged off this very real injury. Getting up every two hours to check for a concussion can also be a part of my punishment since it’s certainly feeling that way right now. But I’ll do it for my boy. At least until it’s his “thumbs-upping-let-my-baby-keep-playing-when-there’s-a-grapefruit-on-his-sweet-forehead” daddy’s turn.

1 a.m. wake up update: A got up fine and answered all my questions appropriately, if not politely. He apparently does not like to be awakened in the middle of the night. Join. The. Club, dude. And tell your sister.

Disgusting.

So yesterday was a beautiful day here in Georgia. It was sunny and about 70 degrees and pretty much one of the most beautiful days we’ve had in a long time. I am so ready for winter to be o.v.e.r. Not a fan of being cold. Not at all. A is right there with me, asking every single day, “Is the cold gone?” One of his new favorite things to do in the morning is to sit in front of the storm door and feel the heat from the sun through the glass. He’ll stay there until it starts to get chilly and then he sighs and moves on. I feel the same way, buddy. We want SUNSHINE! We want HEAT! Luckily, we live in the South so we’ll get it soon and plenty of it! Yay! Bring it on! G seems to be pretty ambivalent towards temperature. If anything, she runs a little more warm-blooded than the rest of us. That might explain why she never wants to wear clothes. It’s pretty much a complete 180 from when she first got home and wanted to wear all her clothes. Now she pretty much always wants to be naked. Usually, she’s content to just be topless but lately pants have also become too much of a burden to bear. “Mommy, me not told (cold)!” Yes, I understand that G, but you have to wear clothes to pre-school. It’s kind of a rule. No shirt, no shoes, no schooling. I’m not sure what she’s gonna do when it’s actually warm enough to wear less. She can’t wear much less than she does now. Sometimes when I think about it, I picture G unzipping her skin like that Shel Silverstein poem that always gives me the creeps. But, honestly, I don’t think we’ll have a problem. I don’t think her desire for denudement has anything to do with temperature, I’m pretty sure she just likes being naked (which could be a whole other issue to work on). So at least, when it’s warmer, she won’t get hypothermia.

Anyway! Back to yesterday. So we were enjoying this lovely day by spending as much time as possible outside in the sun. And one of their favorite activities when playing outside is jumping on the trampoline. Oh, thank the Lord for the trampoline. That is probably my favorite gift ever. And it wasn’t even for me! But the hours of peace and quiet it has given me plus the amount of energy it has allowed them to expend in a small confined outside space has been magical. Hooray for small-scale, netted, reasonably safe trampolines!

So they were jumping on the trampoline and I was watching them and trying to soak up as much sun as possible before it disappeared again and the rain moved in. Feeling a bit cramped in my fold-out chair, I decided to take my turn on the magical kid-occupier while A laughed at how apparently ridiculous I looked. I only made it about 3 1/2 minutes before, being an old lady, I had to stop and take a potty break. “Where you going, Mommy?” asked A. “Mommy’s old and has to pee.” I answered in my withered old crone voice. “Oh no Mommy! You no go inside! You can use my cup!” exclaimed A. “I’m sorry, your what?”

His cup. His disgusting cup full of urine that apparently he’s been peeing in for the past three days. Gross. I mean, gross. And he was so proud of it. “I not pee in grass, Mommy! I pee in cup!” (We do have toilets, by the way.) Ew. Ew. Ew. Ew. And, of course, he had propped this cup up again the house and, let’s just say, his aim ain’t so great. So there was also a nice pee-halo surrounding this holy chalice. Ew again. This was also about 10 minutes before he picked up a piece of dog poo, threw it up in the air, caught it, and then drop kicked it across the yard. What? What is wrong with the male species? How nasty can they be? This isn’t just my son, right? There are others out there who are just as disgusting, correct? I mean, I had a little brother and he was pretty nasty, but anytime he was found handling dog poo, it was only because my older sister and I made him do it. Or that time he got in trouble for peeing on cars as they drove past our house, well that was because my friend and I told him to. So I never knew if boys in general were pigs or he just got stuck with two evil sisters. But – boys – gross, right?

I guess though, in A’s defense, it’s not like he rubs his food all over his belly before he eats it. He doesn’t keep his bread warm in his armpits or anything until he’s finally ready to chow down. No, that would be his little sister, G. So maybe it’s just kids? Maybe it’s just my kids? Maybe it’s me! Nah, if it were me I probably wouldn’t want to vomit at the sight of the pee-cup or the “pit-a bread.” So, yeah, my kids are weirdos and pretty gross.
And I LOVE them!

If your two most recent posts are mostly all about how you’re “back,” you might be a redneck slack-ass blogger. My bad.

Where have I been? Nowhere special. Mostly here, at home, shamefully in front of my computer not writing any blog posts. I have a few excuses but mostly they are just excuses, not actual justified reasons for not blogging. We have been busy getting all our papers in order for Sister’s process, we did have one crazy week celebrating G’s third birthday, and I did spend the last 10 days realizing the parental horror of being incredibly sick and STILL having to deal with your kids 24/7. But, again, none of these factors make great excuses because they would have all made for some awesome blog posts. So what it all boils down to is – I’m lazy. I actually lay in bed one night last week and wrote a hilarious blog post in my head about the trials and tribulations of parenting while feverish. It was pretty much the best thing ever written. Like, ever. But I was too tired to get out of bed and type it out so you’ll just have to take my word for it. So, I’m sorry. I will try to do better. Starting, tomorrow! Just kidding, starting now!

So here’s a quick update on where we are with Sister’s process. We are all paid up for now (Yahoo!!!) and we are officially under contract again with our agency. Our home-study is completed and we are getting ready to send in all our dossier papers. We got some GREAT news a few weeks ago when we were told that almost all of our dossier from last year can be used for this process! That is amazing and will save us so much work! We just have a few forms to update for this process and we are waiting for one little paper to come back so we can send it all in! We are so excited to be this far along already. We really thought it would take months to get to this point since we had to raise so much money but y’all have been awesome and so we are moving right along!

And here’s a quick update on how adorable my kids are: Ridiculously.

To prove it (and because I’m easing my way out of my laziness), here are a few examples taken from my Facebook page from the last month:

Steve (on Blue’s Clues): Will you help us find out what Blue’s favorite story is?
G: No! Me eating!

Cleaning the playroom on a Saturday afternoon:
Me: Y’all have too many toys for just two kids! We need to get rid of some toys or get more kids!
A: Get more kids!
Me: You want more kids?
A: Yeah, then they can clean the playroom!

G (to her friend who came up to me this morning and tried to tell me about her slinky? twinkie? pinky?): “No! Not your mommy! G mommy!”
Sorry, pre-schoolers – I’m taken.

Playing with A before bed. The game is “First one to…”
Me: Touch your nose!
A: Clap your hands!
Me: Stand on one foot!
A: Poot!
He won that one. Big time.

And here are a few pics from G’s birthday party! She was so beautiful and so excited to have all the attention to herself for awhile. I’ll never forget her sweet face as she sat behind those three glowing candles on her birthday cupcake as we sang to her. The happiness and awe in her beautiful eyes just made me want to cry. It kind of makes me want to cry right now. It was just perfect. Just like her. I love that girl.

Some of you may have been wondering where we disappeared to over the past few days. Don’t worry, everything is fine. There has just been some activity on the interwebs lately about certain people who have been stalking adoption blogs, trying to stir up some trouble for families in the process and families who have already brought their children home. So I decided to take a little vacation from the public eye while I checked this information out. I’m concerned about what I discovered but I am not going to stop blogging over the actions of a few extreme individuals. Y’all have been with me through this looooong journey and I want you to continue to share this new one with me, with us. This blog has brought amazing people into our lives and has helped me create friendships and an internet family that I am not giving up. For the safety and sake of my children, I will, however, be changing a few things on here. From now on, I will not be referring to our future daughter by her beautiful name. She will just be called “Sister.” I have already changed my previous posts to reflect this change. So, please, if you already know her name, do not use it in comments. I also will not be sharing pictures of her beautiful face on the internet this go-round. If you know us and see us in person, feel free to ask to see a picture because she is gorgeous and we’d love for you to see her sweet face. Other than that, I’ll be blogging as usual and I’ll re-evaluate if need be. But, for now, welcome back!

Happy “Is it over yet?” Valentine’s Day from our family to yours!

I mean, seriously. Buying valentines, helping a 3 and 4 year old write names on valentines, driving to Walmart at 9 o’clock at night because you forgot to buy valentines for teachers, fighting all the other slackers for the last 5 boxes of chocolates, getting two crazy excited toddlers ready for their Valentine’s Day parties, bringing home two sugared-up sweethearts and keeping them from bouncing off the walls – by twelve o’clock today I was done! And so was our warm and fuzzy Valentine’s Day. Because at two o’clock, we were sitting in the doctor’s office waiting for another 5 vaccinations. (I hope this isn’t getting to be a family tradition.) Happy Valentine’s Day [A] and [G]! I love you so much I’m gonna let this nice lady inflict massive amounts of pain on you now!

Oh my. And a very special Happy Valentine’s Day to my lovely husband [L] who somehow managed to squirm out of this visit. You. Owe. Me. So let me just say that this visit might possibly have been 20 of the most painful minutes of my life. These kids do NOT like shots. And they are completely comfortable with letting the world know it. Yes, that sound you heard today was [A]. Wherever you are, that was [A]. It had to have been that loud. Or maybe it just seemed that loud to me because I was the one holding him down with my ear right next to his ridiculous, screaming mouth. The best way I can describe the 5 minutes that passed while [A] was being tortured in the pit of despair got his shots is this: [A] has the strength of King Kong and the scream of Fay Wray. So imagine wrestling that beast to the ground while that screech is going full blast in your ears. Also, just so you don’t become too focused on the physical pain in your head, you can also focus on the intense emotional pain in your poor Mommy’s heart as he screams over and over, “Mommy, please! Mommy, stop! Please Mommy please!” Kill. Me. Now.

[G] was actually a little bit better, relatively speaking. She is smaller and she’s not a screamer, thank goodness. She didn’t require the two extra nurses like [A] did. But she’s a thousand times more pitiful as she just cries and begs for it to stop. Ahhhh, if you want a real broken heart for Valentine’s Day, take your kids to the doctor and load them up on shots. This is also a very effective formula if you want a massive headache.

Now we’re home and [A] and [G] are curled up in front of the TV watching the Chipmunks and eating candy and popcorn. (They had originally chosen to watch the Jonathan Taylor Thomas version of “Pinocchio” but they both freaked out when that creepy puppet came to life. And I do not blame them one bit. That thing is “Polar Express” scary.) They are waiting patiently for Daddy to come home from work and bring us all comfort pizza. And then after that, they will have their special Valentines Day cookies for dessert. Because this day won’t be perfect until somebody throws up.

Happy Freaking Valentine’s Day!

Yesterday it was raining. And it was cold (well, it was 45 degrees which is cold by southern standards and much too cold for me). So, when I heard the mail truck stop at our house, I sighed and reached for my sweater and umbrella. I knew I didn’t have to go get the mail while it was raining. I could have easily waited until it stopped or I could have been even lazier and let [L] get it when he got home. But I didn’t. I wanted to get it quickly and I wanted a few quiet minutes of peace while I did it. So at 2:00 on Thursday, February 7th, I went and got the mail.

I ran to the mailbox in my sweater, sweats, and flip flops. I cursed my cold, wet toes and my obsession with wearing flip flops even in the most ridiculous of weather and then I picked out the two envelopes from inside. One was junk. Another offer from another company who wouldn’t care if I ruined my life and my family with credit card debt as long as they got their 20%. That one was going in the trash. I looked at the other. It was from some one I didn’t know. Interesting.

When I was once again warm and dry, I picked up the mystery envelope and opened it. It, predictably, contained a letter. As I started to read it, a check fell out of the folds. I bent down to pick it up and my eyes skimmed over the amount. And I froze. Completely froze. I stayed frozen in my hunchback pose for probably a good 30 seconds in shock before I began to cry. In my kitchen on this cold, rainy day, I just started to cry. Because I had just picked up a check for $12,000. I was holding a check that would allow us to begin Sister’s process as soon as today. A check that will bring our girl home. Words cannot express how I felt in that moment. I wish each and every one of you could experience what I felt just for one minute. Shock, joy, excitement, complete bewilderment. Even total guilt that I had ever doubted that God would work this out. And love, oh so much love, for the many people who have shown love to us throughout this process. The wonderful family who has donated this amount wishes to remain anonymous to the general public and I will, of course, respect their wishes. But – you know who are you are and I know who are you and I want you to know that we are so very grateful and we are so very humbled by your giving and loving spirit. Thank you for helping us bring our family together.

Once I pulled myself together, I managed to call [L] to tell him the news. His shock pretty much equaled my own and his joy might possibly have exceeded it. I then had to call my mom and tell her the good news. She was at work molding young minds but she stopped for a moment and took my call. She probably knew I wouldn’t be calling except in the event of something extraordinary. This definitely qualified. When I told her the news, she let out a shriek and I heard her class of 4th graders gasp in concern. To calm their fears, she started to tell them our story. They had already been told about [A] and [G] and knew that they had a sister who we were trying to bring home. I heard her tell them that in order to get started, it would take $12,000. When she laid out the total I heard a chorus of elementary exclamations. They completely understood that we were looking at raising a crazy ton of money and they were overwhelmed by how were were possibly going to do it. Then she got to the good part. “Went to get the mail…opened the letter…from someone she’s never met…there was a check…for $12,000!” Silence. Collective shriek. Then her entire room of 4th graders erupted into applause. And I broke down in tears again.

So what does this mean as far as our fundraising? Only good things!!! This means we can begin her process immediately because we now have more than enough to pay for our home-study, country, and agency fees. And now we have a really great head-start on our travel, transportation, and end of process fees. We still have a ton of money to raise before everything is said and done but I feel like a huge weight has been lifted right off of my shoulders. These coming months are going to be hard enough to deal with. Having such a huge financial burden taken away so early on makes me feel like I’ll actually be able to handle it! I can’t believe how much you all have done to make this happen. I am so excited about the journey that we can now begin and the difference that it is going to make in the lives of all THREE of our children! Speaking of our children, I bet you’re wondering how I explained all the tears and hoopla to the cutie patooties who already live here. When I opened the letter, they were in their beds conspiring against taking a nap. They were nowhere near sleep and they were peeking out of their room no doubt wondering why their mommy was having a breakdown on the kitchen floor. We have decided not to tell them we’re trying to adopt Sister until she’s legally ours so it was hard to explain exactly why I was so happy. But, as it turns out, they didn’t really need a why. They are kids and kids want to be happy. And they are sweet enough that they were just happy that I was happy. So I went to their room, got them out of bed, and explained that we needed to celebrate. Requiring no explanation for why, they spent the next 3 minutes jumping up and down, screaming, and praising God with me. I can’t even imagine how excited they’re gonna be when they realize WHY we are so happy right now. And I can’t wait until they are older and can hear all the stories about the many, many people who made such a difference in all our lives. I can’t wait to tell them about yesterday.

Because yesterday was a great day.