Update On Adoption

I haven't given an update on the progress of our adoption in a little while so I thought I'd share the wonderful things that God is doing. Our first portion of money has been raised and our dossier, along with that money, is in Haiti right now being worked on. The pastor that heads up the orphanage told one of the people in our group that he thought it would be 6 months to a year before we could get them home. I don't know if this means from the time the dossier was turned in or if that was from now to 6 months to 1 year. We know that God will brin our sweet girls to us in His timing so we wait on Him knowing that He has a will for our family's lives.

We have been praying about how we are going to be able to raise the 2nd $6000 orphanage fee. We have felt God saying be patient and wait on me. So we've been trying to rely on the Lord and not stress about the money portion. I got an email 2 weeks ago stating that we were awarded a grant from Show Hope! This is just amazing. We were told by MANY different people that it would probably be a waste of time to fill out the applications (the apps took about 3 hours to fill out) because we aren't going through an adoption agency so they wouldn't be able to award us anything. We kept praying about it and Micah and I decided to fill out the paperwork to three different organizations offering grants, Lifesong, Show Hope, and Abba Fund. Abba Fund sent us a letter almost immediately and said that we did not qualify for a grant from them so we figured we'd probably get letters from each of the others saying the same thing. Well, this grant from Show Hope is a good portion of that $6000. All in all, we probably only have another $3600 to raise! This is amazing!!! We need $1200 more for care fees (we pay $200 a month for 12 months). Then, there are fees for what's called readoption, when they get to the states they will need birth certificates. And then we'll need some of the second portion of the orphanage fees! We'll also need to travel either to Miami or to Haiti to pick up the girls which that can vary from about 600-1500 dollars depending on if we have to travel to Haiti or to Miami and how long we'd have to stay at either place. (Travel fees are not included in the $3600.)

God is so good! Just remember if God told you to do it, He will provide a way for the finances, the energy, the paperwork, all of the resources necessary to accomplish what He's told you to do. We are all called to help the orphan and the widow (James 1:27). This will look different for every person. Ask God what He wants you to do and He will show you! Thanks again to everyone who is supporting us monetarily and by prayer. They both help out so much!

Riding Bikes

This week was a big week for Alyssa. She practiced and practiced until she is now finally able to ride her bike all by herself. After all of the "I can't"s over and over again, she finally said that she'd do it. She wasn't scared anymore after she figured out that she could do it if she practiced and now can start and stop and balance on her bike without any help! She's so proud of herself. Two years ago, though, when she was first trying to learn how to ride Micah had told her that if she didn't know how to ride a bike then she would never be able to ride a motorcycle. She loves motorcycles and wants one someday so that motivated her big time. Well, now that she knows how to ride her bike she asked when she was going to get her motorcycle. We had to explain to her that Daddy didn't mean that she'd get a motorcycle whenever she learned how to ride but that when we do get a motorcycle she'd be able to ride. Oy! How do you explain these things to a 7 year old. Anyways she's so happy about learning how to ride she wants to do it ALL the time. Good motivation for Samara because she wants to be right alongside Alyssa. It shouldn't be too much longer before she knows how to ride her bike as well... and then there's Nattie. I'm not worried about her learning. She will take her cue from her sisters probably like she always does. I haven't taken pictures of her on her bike yet but when I get them I will post them.

Fun at the Creek and Geocaching

Yesterday Auntie Erin showed up to hang out for the weekend. We love Auntie Erin and wanted to do something fun with her so Geocaching is like an adult scavenger hunt. You can go online to geocaching.com and then punch in coordinates in a GPS to where the "treasure" is. When you find the treasure you get to look at it take one thing out if you want to, but if you take one thing out you have to put something in of equal or greater value. It's a lot of fun to do these treasure hunts but we didn't find any today. I don't think our GPS is good enough for the coordinates. Anyways here's a picture of us in the car trying to find our first set of coordinates.




After we geocached and found nothin we decided to go to the creek. We brought the girl's swimming suits and water shoes and two boogy boards that they could float on. So we started pulling the girls on the boogy boards and wading in the water just a bit. It felt good on a hot day like today. Especially after geocaching, searching for treasure in the hot hot sun! We then got a little deeper and a little deeper. Before we knew it we were swimming (literally) in the creek. We had gotten to a part that even the three adults couldn't reach in parts. Thank goodness we had those boogy boards to keep the girls on! We found a rope that was tied to a tree so Micah swung on it into the creek, then Erin, then Alyssa, followed by Samara, then of course Nattie had to try it. Okay then it was my turn. I got ahold of the rope and stood on the tree roots that everybody else was standing on, and then I got scared. I hadn't planned on being scared. It was just a rope tied to a branch on a tree that you swung out into a creek with. My (almost) three year old had just done it. Wow. Anyways I got up the guts to do it and there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of. It was so much fun. The girls had a blast too! We will be adding that to our list of Saturday adventrues for sure!

Micah and Erin trying to build a dam to make a place that the kids could ride their boogy boards down on. They loved it.

Nattie got tired of being in the water so Mommy got out with her. She wanted to sing for the camera and take pictures with the camera. She's so cute! I'll post some videos later of the songs that she sang for me. Well, I'll try to remember and try to find enough time to do that.

Samara going down the "water slide".

Syssa going down the "water slide".

So all in all it turned out to be a great day! Even though we weren't able to find anything while geocaching. Better luck next time I suppose.

Feeding the ducks and...

I watch two beautiful girls during the week and so I decided to take all five of the girls to feed the ducks. Well, it turned out that there was more than just ducks to feed. The fish ate the bread, and so did the turtles. I didn't even know there were turtles in the river! It was so much fun to see the girls faces as the turtles swam up to eat the bread. Here are some pictures of our adventure.

To Homeschool or Not to Homeschool... That is the question

Micah and I have talked about whether or not we should homeschool for a long time now. It's what I really want to do. I want to teach my kids Biblical principles, which we feel are the most important things that they will learn anyway. I tried last year while Alyssa was going to school to try and teach her the Bible when she got home from school. This did not work out well at all. She was so tired when she got home from school that she wouldn't pay much attention, which would frustrate me and in turn frustrate her. We are looking into a school that they would go two days a week and be home the other days for homeschooling. I REALLY like this idea. It would be awesome to get them into this school. We are looking into it more and hopefully can get them in it. I will most definitely homeschool Guerline and Fafane when they come. I don't want to put them in school without knowing much English. Although we got to Skype with them last night and they are learning English! I'm so excited. Maybe by the time they get here they'll know how to communicate, at least a little. In the meantime I'm trying to learn as much Creole as I can before they get here too. Any suggestions would be EXTREMELY helpful!

LOVE

Today love is on my mind. The very being of God is love! If we are striving to do the will of our father then we must also BE love. Not just show love to people that we like but be love to ALL! The other day I was driving, oh the pleasures of driving, and a lady got on the shoulder of the road to get two cars ahead and tried to cut in front of me. Well, I wasn't going to have any of that so I tailed the person in front of me so that she couldn't get in. She persisted for a while but I was NOT going to budge! I was there first, and besides she needed to be taught that she shouldn't break the law by going on the shoulder of the road to get in the front of the line. (Wasn't she taught anything in Kindergarten about how important it is to stand in line and not get out of line!) I was so convicted that night. I knew that if my kids understood what I had just done they would know that it wasn't very loving. Even though she was in the wrong with what she was doing I still was not right. So I'm awful at quoting the Bible but I know it says this in there, I just don't remember the passage. If you know the passage please leave a comment so I remember. This is also kind of a Kim paraphrase because I don't remember it exactly. It says in the Bible to know what you are supposed to do and not do it that is sin! WOW! Sin isn't just doing bad things, it's knowing that we are supposed to LOVE and being unloving, sometimes on purpose and sometimes without thinking about it because it's been sort of engrained in us. My goal for the rest of this year... and the rest of my life for that matter, is to be loving especially when I know somebody has done the "wrong" thing... like go on the shoulder of the road to cut me off.

By the way, I may get to Skype with my precious princesses tonight! I'm so excited!!! My heart aches for them! Please continue to pray for them and for the adoption process! Pray for my heart! My MOMMY'S Heart. Blessings to ALL!

Third of July FIREWORKS

We went to Six Flags and watched fireworks there on the third of July to beat the crowd out for the 4th. We saw some fireworks from our house on the 4th but loved being able to get in and out of Six Flags with relatively no problems. Except on the way out they only opened one exit gate when there were four that could've been opened. The person in charge that day probably got an ear full of unhappy, sweaty, crowded people! Oh well, it's just another way that we can learn patience I guess. They did end up opening all four gates... eventually.


Waiting for fireworks to begin.


The girls were getting antsy so we pulled up a youtube Dora video to keep them occupied while we waited.

Alyssa waiting.

Samara waiting.

Nattie waiting

Still waiting!

The fireworks were awesome just like last year! But unlike last year we had Alyssa with us to share in the excitement. I have THOROUGHLY enjoyed having my sweet girls at home with me this summer! I have been teaching Samara how to read and Natalie has joined in a bit. Samara is reading easy books and Natalie is learning her letters and their sounds. Alyssa is learning all types of things. They all LOVE doing schoolwork and they especially LOVE starfall.com. I do too because they know how to navigate it very well. Even Natalie knows how to go to what she wants and then click on it. Sometimes she right clicks instead of left clicking and comes and gets met to click off it, but usually she does wonderfully. They are the lights of my life!!

Rain in the Gutters

One day it was completely sunny outside, this was last month, and it started to rain. The girls were so excited that it was warm and they got to play in the rain. After the rain stopped they decided to play in the gutters where the rain was gathering. So fun!

Samara

Alyssa

Natalie

My girls!

Playing in the mud in the road.

Our girls and new pictures I've received

These pictures aren't in any specific order but there are some of our girls at the orphanage and some in their hometown of Deye Mon. So happy to see that they are more healthy than they were while living in Deye Mon. We just recently found out that Deye Mon is about 200 years behind the rest of Haiti. They don't have electicity or running water. They don't have much food. In fact mothers would have to carry their children, or walk with their children, for miles upon miles to take them to the mission so that their children could have a meal to eat and then they'd walk back home. Our girls got dropped off at the mission because their mother couldn't take care of them anymore. We know that their mother is still alive, but I believe she's still not healthy and doesn't have a lot to buy anything with, and their father died before the earthquake. We don't know a whole lot but we're starting to be able to piece a few things together about them. Anyways here are some pictures, old and new.


Guerline is in the blue dress, Fafane is in the I love NY shirt, the other two are going to some friends of ours, they are Berlinda, laying on the ground, and Marguerite, in the orange dress.


Guerline, Vagline, who goes to our church here in the states, her parents were able to get here off of Humanitarian Parole before it shut down, and Berlinda.


Guerline and Fafane are on the outsides, and on the insides are their cousins. This is when they still lived at the mission probably about 2 years ago.


Guerline, I think this was in January of this year, after the earthquake.

Guerline while she still lived in Deye Mon.

Fafane catching tadpoles while she still lived in Deye Mon.

Fafane is the one to the very right and Guerline is asleep on the floor.

Guerline

Guerline while she still lived in Deye Mon.

Fafane is the one in the middle with her eyes poking out over the top of the blanket. I believe this is at HCRM.

Fafane is the one on the left.

Guerline while she still lived in Deye Mon. I got to talk to the girl sitting down. She is AMAZING! She was able to help our girls out while they lived in Deye Mon! She has had some great stories to share with us about our girls and has done an amazing job in helping keep our kiddos healthy!

Lonise is on the very right, her parents were able to get her home on Humanitiarian Parole as well, and our Guerline is right next to her. So beautiful!

Fafane, Lonise, and Guerline.

The Fab Four! Guerline, Fafane, Berlinda, and Lonise. These girls were found together and went to the orphanage together. Lonise is home, Berlinda has a family here that is in the process of adopting her, and then of course our girls have a family waiting for them too.

The Fab Four goofing around!

The Fab Four

Update

Quite a few people have been asking me about our adoptions and how they are going. Here is the update. Our paperwork is almost finished! It's getting translated to French right now and then after that we send it to the Haitian Consulate for "legalization". After that we can send our dossier (just a fancy name for the compilation of paperwork) to Haiti. We don't necessarily want to mail it because we don't want it to get lost in the mail system so we may wait until the 28th of July to send it because we know people who are going at that time. It may reach Haiti at the same time if we sent it with the people that are going and if we mailed it anyways. I don't know how long it takes to get things to Haiti. Anyways it's a small decision in this process and we will do what the Lord leads us to do, even in this small decision. Thanks again for everyone's prayers and support! We have been told that this process will take from 6 months to 2 years. We have also been told that it can take 2-3 years. And then we were told by yet another person that it will take over 3 years. We have been praying about this and we know God's bigger than anything! We are praying our girls home by December!!! If anyone wants to join us in this we would appreciate your prayers! Thanks to all of you that have been supporting us through prayer!!! This is just speaking in specifics to cry out to God for these kids. The group that we are adopting with are also praying for December so if you are a prayer warrior then please pray for our whole group. I think over 40 kids at HCRM are represented in our group! AMAZING!!! I pray that God just shows HIS power in all of this. It will only be by a movement of our Almighty Creator! And we know He is WILLING and definitely ABLE! Thanks again!

5 Haitian kids

There were 5 Haitian kids that were able to come to their forever families today! Kens5 did a news story on them. Here's the link if you want to check it out. http://www.kens5.com/video?id=96730049&sec=547077 You'll have to copy and paste it I think. I'm so excited! These 5 got here on student visas. This gives us hope that maybe our girls could make it here soon! I am almost done with the paperwork on our end. I think in about 2 weeks it will be completely finished and then I can send it to Haiti and they can start the paperwork on their end. If you can imagine the process for paperwork there is a lot bigger of an issue than it is here and it took us almost 2 months maybe more to get our paperwork done. Plus Pastor Jean Fritz has something like 40 or more adoptions to do!!! That's going to be a lot of work. Continue to pray for our Guerline and Fafane! We still need quite a bit of money to bring them home as well. We are trusting that God will provide but I also believe He sends angels in the form of you and I to help fund things like this. Again if you have any ideas for a fundraiser, want to do a fundraiser for us, or would just like to donate money to us, please let us know. Thank you all and God bless you!!!

God is good!
All the time!
All the time!
God is good!
Thank the Lord that these kids are home! Let's pray the rest out as well!
By the way the names of the kids that are home are Nahomie, Julie, Wisnick, Love Mael, and Kimberly. So AWESOME!!! It makes me a little jealous because I want our girls home but I know that we will get our girls in the exact moment we are supposed to have them here.

Skype

I absolutely love Skype. Even from a third world country like Haiti I am still able to talk to and see my girls! It's amazing. It's quite choppy and delayed but it still works. The girls like to just sit and stare at you because you don't know what they're saying and they don't know what you're saying! Alyssa, Samara, and Natalie fight to see themselves in the bottom of the screen and fight to see Guerline and Fafane too. It's so funny. I was able to Skype with them yesterday and today. I truly have loved it. Thank you to all that have allowed me to Skype with my girls. It's truly a blessing to be able to see them and talk to them even though they have a blank look when they look at me. I can't wait to get my paperwork done and the money we need raised so we can get them home as soon as they can get the paperwork on the Haitian side done. Lord, give me the strength to wait on you! The song called Hosanna that we sing by Hillsong is a wonderful song, one of the lines in it says "break my heart for what breaks yours!" I truly believe that it breaks God's heart to see these kids as helpless and homeless as they are! My heart is broken for all of them not just ours... although ours are special to us! Anybody who has any interest in adopting from Haiti or from any other country for that matter, don't hesitate to ask God if it's right for your family. And be prepared for the answer. All Christians should be looking out for the widows and the orphans so whatever that looks like to you, whatever it is God has called you to do for them, DO IT!! God will provide all the rest.

Friendship

Friendship is so important in this life! I want to share with you a few quotes I found on the internet this morning that are awesome!

"Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born."
- Anais Nin

"A friend is one who walks in when others walk out"
-Walter Winchell

"A friend is someone who is there for you when he'd rather be anywhere else."
- Len Wein - Sent by Paulo Louro

"A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart, and can sing it back to you when you have forgotten the words."
- Sent by Donna Roberts

"A friend is one who believes in you when you have ceased to believe in yourself."
- Sent by Lysha

"Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you."
- Elbert Hubard

"Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up."
- Bible: Ecclesiastes

"Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather is one of those things that give value to survival."
- C. S. Lewis

"The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches, but to reveal to him, his own."
-Benjamin Disraeli

"It's the friends you can call up at 4am that matter."
- Marlene Dietrick

Friendship is truly a strong connection! Thank you to all my friends!

Micah's trip to Haiti

Here are just some of the ton of pictures Micah brought back from Haiti. Some I have no idea how to explain. If you have ever been to an orphanage you may just understand that it's not something you can explain. It's so much different than you could ever think.



This is Fafane and Guerline with the cars that their Daddy brought them.


Being silly. These are some more people that went with Micah plus the kids they are adopting.


Jumprope! One of their favorite things to do!

Looking down from the upstairs balcony.

One of the nannys.

The street outside the orphanage. It's on a steep hill so you kind of have to get a run at it to get up it.

Braiding hair

Daddy with his girls!

At the Baptist Mission in Haiti.

Standing outside. Pastor Jean Fritz is amazing! That's him in the white and blue shirt.

Guerline. They all wear clothes that are way too small for them. I can't wait to get them home and get them clothes that fit them properly! Lord, make the process go by quickly and smoothly.

Guerline being camera shy.

Fafane eating a footlong hot dog. She also had a piece of pizza. The girls were so hungry (grangou).

Micah with his girls.

The footlong!

Eating... Yummy!

Fafane saying my daddy.

The girls really clung to Micah. It happens when they know you want to adopt them... and even when they just want you to adopt them or sometimes for no reason at all.

Guerline taking a picture.

On the computer with Skype. We love Skype!

Guerline on the ladder. They hang clothes to dry on the rooftop and they use this ladder to get up there. It rains a lot at night but the clothes end up getting dry somehow.

Looking down off the balcony again.

Should I jump in? They don't get baths very often so I'll bet it'd feel good if she was able to get in.

Beautiful!

Sunglasses

Eating Ice Cream! Yummy.

Random kids being silly.

Micah was so awesome with the girls. He taught them little bits of math with playing cards. How awesome is that. They caught on quickly he said.

Star-tacular!

Such a sweetheart!

Stephania looking at pictures that Micah was taking.

Guerline taking a picture of Micah.

Where Guerline slept each night, on the floor!

Babies sleeping. How awesome is this!

Taking pictures of herself. I have a ton of pictures of Guerline but Fafane is my shy one.

My Guerline loves to be silly.