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Meetcha Day

Today Suzanne and I finally got to meet Aidan and Eva. How was it? The photo above pretty much says it all but I’ll describe our experience anyway.

We arrived, eager and nervous, with two other families at the transition home this morning. Since the other families had already met their children the day before, we handed off our cameras to them while the AWAA staff fetched the kids. Aidan came running out of the house with a huge smile on his face and threw his arms around me. I’d been concerned about this moment: how would he feel about us? Would we connect with each other? I needn’t have worried. He’s a fantastic boy, sociable, affectionate, and full of energy. The other families who’d met him before us commented that he seems like a great kid and we were blessed to learn why. After spending a few minutes with Aidan, the staff brought out Eva to us. She’s a beautiful tiny bit of a girl who smiled easily and enjoyed snuggling into Suzanne.

We spent a couple hours at the transition home this morning, playing with the kids and taking photos of each other and the families with their children. We went out for lunch then came back to the transition home to see the kids some more and meet with the doctor and psychologist there. No significant problems to report at this time, for which we are grateful.

Aidan and I played soccer, kicked balls, played with cars, blew bubbles–fun stuff–while Suzanne and Eva cuddled together today. It was a magnificent time, enjoying these new children of ours.

Thank you again for all of your prayers and support. Our next hurdle is court on Thursday (Nov 4)–please continue to pray that we pass. We’ll see the judge after 1:30 PM in Ethiopia (that’s 5:30 AM in Illinois in case you happen to be up). As an added incentive, we can post photos after we pass since the children will then legally be part of our family.

Today was truly full of amazing blessings for us. We have so enjoyed the children and the other adoptive families here. The AWAA staff has been a delight as well.

Thanks again–much more to come.

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We’re coming, Sweeties!!

We are leaving tomorrow on a 24+ hour trip to the other side of the world to meet the children that were conceived in our hearts five years ago!  Michael pretty much explained everything that’s about to happen in his post from today.  I want to add to that our recent update from some dear friends whom we’ve never met. 🙂  As I type, the Braun Family are on their way back home to Texas with their new kids–a sibling group of 4 to add to their other 3 kids to make a “wonderfully crazy” family of 9!!  (Be sure to scroll down their blog to see pics!)  We have been in contact for several months as I found out they were adopting this sibling group that I met a year and a half ago on our mission trip.  With several bumps along the way, they were finally able to go this week for their Embassy appointment and bring their beautiful children home!

While there, the Braun’s graciously brought Aidan and Eva some care packages we sent a couple months ago, including a couple of those recordable Hallmark books where we record ourselves reading the books so that they can hear our voices.  Here are some of the Braun’s sweet remarks about our kids:

Your kids are so precious!!!!! ….I read your books from cover to cover with your kids individually.  Aidan loved it!  He was so surprised when he heard your voices, and grinned when Yonas told him that it was his new mommy and daddy.  He also loved the bubble maker.  I have the best pics of him.  He is excited that you will be here next week.  Your daughter is beautiful and very happy!  You will be blessed by both of your new kids….Thanks for letting me take care packages for you!  It was a joy to spend time with your children and love on them!

We are so thankful that the Braun’s got to spend time with our babies and tell them that we are coming very soon!  I know it is going to be an amazing week and that God is going to grow our hearts closer to Him, to each other, and to our kids during this week!  I am expecting great things from our great God!!!

Our third set of care packages
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On the eve of our departure

It is now the evening before Suzanne and I leave for our court date appointment in Ethiopia. Our first three children are all in bed now. We’ve spent most of the day packing: Suz and I are bringing a carry on and two checked bags each, full to the airlines’ allowance. Why do we need so much stuff? It’s probably not what you think. In fact, we could probably get everything we need for the week into three small bags–and that includes a bag dedicated to camera gear 🙂

We’re bringing care packages to several waiting children from their stateside soon-to-be families. We’re packing clothes, baby items, gifts, and all manner of other necessities for kids and staff and the transition home and orphanages. Boxes and boxes of toothpaste and toothbrushes, formula, baby wipes, medicines, cloth diapers. And Suzanne has done a fantastic job of getting everything in. With lots of empty bags for the trip home, we’ll have space to bring gifts for family and friends. Coffee anyone?

During our visit, we’ll get to meet and spend time with our children for the first time. These are days we’ve anticipated for months–it seems strange that they are finally here. This chapter of our story that began two years ago is coming to an end, all so that a new one can begin.

Many thanks and blessings to our family and friends who’ve supported us up to this point. We could not have gotten this far without you, and there are two kids on the other side of the world who we pray will be blessed immeasurably because of your love, encouragement, and gifts. Thank you.

Thank you.

In the upcoming days, please pray that our court appointment on Thursday, Nov. 4, goes well. We’ve been told that the appointments are brief–maybe 10 minutes–and that we have about a 75% chance of passing. If we pass, there’s a good chance we’d return to Ethiopia in December to bring home the kids. Immediately following our court appointment, though, we may have an opportunity to meet the children’s birthmother. This could be a very emotional meeting–pray for grace and peace. Please pray that God continues to open our eyes and move our hearts and hands (and by “our,” I mean the Church: all of us) to meet needs of “the least of these.”

If you’d like to follow along over the next several days, look for the “Subscribe” box in the sidebar to the right. You can have updates sent directly to your email inbox–easy. We’ll do our best to update the site during our trip as we’re able.

Thanks again–we’ll be in touch soon.

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Yes, We’re Crazy

A number of friends have asked us how things are going with the adoption process.   Since we received our referral in July, we’ve been in a holding pattern. We’ll need to travel to Ethiopia for a court date but court has been closed in August and September. We expect, though, within the next week or so we’ll get a call assigning us a date and Suzanne and I will then likely travel sometime later in October. That’s our best guess.

This intermission, though, has given me time to reflect. When people learn or ask about our adoption, responses vary from “That’s awesome!” to “Wow, you guys are so brave–I could never do that” to “Are you sure? That sounds crazy.” There’s a wide gray swath on the continuum between bravery and foolishness; most days, I’m in that gray area.

Our church is going through a series on love and, as a congregation, we’re reading Francis Chan’s book Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God. In the foreword, musician Chris Tomlin writes:

Crazy Love is the perfect title for this book. When Jesus was asked, “What is the greatest commandment?” he responded with “Love.”

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matt 22.37-40)

As Francis so brilliantly illustrates, the life Jesus calls us to is absolute craziness to the world. Sure, it’s fine and politically correct to believe in God, but to really love Him is a whole different story. Yeah, it’s nice and generous to give to the needy at Christmas or after some disaster, but to sacrifice your own comfort and welfare for another may look like madness to a safe and undisturbed world.

As I look back, our entire journey as a family has involved some manner of madness at each step. We had to undergo fertility treatments to have our first child and there was a real possibility that we could have had multiples. Instead, Erin was born eight weeks premature and Suzanne nearly died in the process.

The second and third pregnancies did not go well either–in both instances, Suzanne was debilitatingly sick for months. When we came to the hospital for delivery each time, the nurses remembered us from our first experience and looked at us with shock: “Are you crazy?” During that last pregnancy, Suzanne’s mom stayed with us for seven weeks. I was working full-time and in grad school and taking care of our other two children; we would not have survived that time without her help.  Do we regret the journey?  Of course not and we have three wonderful children.

Now we stand on the doorstep of inviting two more children into our lives, children from another mother on the other side of the world. We have not entered into this on a whim. Suzanne and I prayed through the fall of 2008 for God’s direction about this decision. We then spent nine months completing paperwork, being interviewed by social workers, attending training, reading books, being scrutinized by state, federal, and international governments. We will invite these two children into our not-so-very-big home on our not-so-very-big income. We are giving up our established routines and rhythms and some of the few comforts that we enjoy to stretch our lives and budget further. There are undoubtedly challenges in front of us that we can’t imagine. Frankly, it doesn’t make sense for us to adopt.

But we believe that the love of God compels us. I’m aware of how unlovable I can be, and even then I fail to grasp the depth of my own darkness. And yet God reaches into that darkness at tremendous cost to Himself and gives me hope and a future. Crazy–that’s the kind of love that God has for us. It’s a love that defies common sense and reason. When that kind of love embraces a person, it’s not uncommon for unusual decisions to follow.

***

In the film As Good As It Gets, Jack Nicholson portrays Melvin Udall, a self-absorbed obsessive-compulsive misanthrope who also happens to be a best-selling writer of romance novels (go figure). In one scene he dismissively tells a visitor to his apartment, “Sell crazy someplace else, we’re all stocked up here.” When it comes to crazy love, though, there’s always more room somewhere on the shelf.

Do our plans to adopt make sense?  No–I readily admit that and can’t justify our decision.  Do we know that adopting is risky, that we can’t predict how our new children will fit into our family?  You bet, and at times this is scary.  Seriously: who goes around looking for ways to make their lives more complex, forgoing what is known and safe and comfortable?  I don’t.  But in this case, I think God–who loves us relentlessly–has called us to demonstrate His love in a crazy way.  That’s the best explanation I can offer.  I trust, however, that if I play my part to the best of my ability, God will be faithful.

Giving in to God’s crazy love is dangerous and will lead you to into an unpredictable, possibly uncomfortable life.  What, though, is the alternative?  Consider that Jesus was often accused of saying crazy things.  On one occasion he told a crowd that if they wanted to be God’s followers, they’d have to eat his flesh and drink his blood.  Unsurprisingly, the crowd found this hard to accept and many walked away.  When Jesus asked his closest disciples if they were going to leave as well, his friend Peter responded, “Master, to whom would we go? You have the words of real life, eternal life. We’ve already committed ourselves, confident that you are the Holy One of God.” Indeed: to whom would I go?

So, yes, we’re crazy–but only because the love of God is crazier than ours.

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Saying “yes” to the referral

As Suzanne wrote the other day, we received our adoption referral from AWAA at the end of last week. Yesterday we signed the referral acceptance to say, “yes, we will accept these children into our family.”

Suzanne put together a “care package” last night for the kids as well. Another AWAA couple is making their way to Ethiopia soon and they will bring the gifts over for us. Included are some small toys and things plus a note from us for each of the kids.

We were also blessed yesterday when Suzanne’s friend Bethany stopped over with a couple of balloons to help us celebrate. Thanks, Bethany, for your thoughtfulness.

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Family Trip to Oklahoma

Each summer we visit Suzanne’s family in Oklahoma.  This year, we mixed it up a bit by attending a few days at a family camp at New Life Ranch in Colcord, OK.  Suz worked there one summer in college and signed us up for the first time as family campers.  Since the trip would take close to nine hours from our home in Illinois, we spent a night in Springfield, Missouri, where we swam at the hotel, ate at Lambert’s Cafe (where they throw food at diners), visited the Bass Pro Shops headquarters, and were nearly eaten alive by wild camels at a safari animal park.

We all had a great time at New Life Ranch.  I believe there were about 50 families there during our camp, and each family was assigned a staff member to help however the family needed assistance.  The first morning of our stay, for example, Suzanne and I took a trail ride on horseback into the hills for breakfast, so our staff assistant, Mr. Luke, took the kids to breakfast at the dining hall and had them ready to go for the rest of the day when we returned.  Sweet.

Each day began with a brief  group worship time after which the kids went off to age-appropriate Bible lessons and activities while the adults spent time learning about parenting.  Our speaker was Chip Jackson from Fellowship Northwest Arkansas church–he was terrific. Suz and I came away encouraged and with some good things to help us continue in our parenting journey.  After lunch, we had the afternoon free to explore the camp’s numerous activities and facilities: ropes course, climbing walls, swimming pool, waterfront with huge slides, mountain biking, horseback riding, rifle/shotgun ranges, and more.  Evenings involved more teaching time and group activities.  Although we spent only two and a half days there, we were all exhausted from late nights, early mornings, and full days.

From Colcord, we went on to visit Suzanne’s family. We’ve posted a few photos from our trip here, and there’s a video below of Suz and I going down the zip line at the ranch.  Although we signed up everybody to ride the zip line, only mom and dad were brave enough to climb to poles and go down.

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Erin’s Tenth Birthday Party

Another weekend in April means another birthday.  This year Erin hit double digits: she’s now a decade old.  To celebrate, she invited her girlfriends (and their American Girls dolls) over for a tea party.  Suz prepared some delicious treats for the day: cream puffs with chocolate syrup, heart-shaped brownies with powdered sugar, and fruit kabobs.  The girls played American Girl trivia, did some weaving, and went home with a tea cup filled with nice little goodies.

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Maura: Birthday and Bike

Maura celebrated two significant events this weekend: her sixth birthday and her success at riding a “two-wheeler.”  She had several friends over on Saturday for a “Princess and the Frog” themed event.  Suzanne, as usual, made an excellent cake for the party.

The girls colored pictures, ate cake, blew bubbles, played with sidewalk chalk, had an Easter egg hunt (not often that you get to do that at a birthday party–Maura’s idea), and played on the swingset.  Quite a time.

After church on Sunday, Suz took Maura and her bike out to one of the local baseball fields.  We’ve found that a baseball field has been good training ground for learning to ride a two-wheeler: the infield is firm enough to ride on but much more forgiving than the street when the kids fall.  Not much later they came back home and Maura was eager to show off her new skills.

Six years old and all grown up.  (BTW, Maura picked out her own clothes today….. )

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Swim lessons

The kids have been in swim lessons the last two weeks, which has left us all a little more tired than usual (thanks to later bedtimes).  Worth it?  You bet.

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So I went to this women’s conference…

I–Michael–attended my first women’s conference this past weekend, the Hearts at Home annual conference in Normal, IL.  As detailed on their web site, Hearts at Home

…believes that motherhood is a valid profession. From beginning to end, our events professionalize the career of motherhood. We want to make it worth your time, because for most moms, spending a full day away from home isn’t always easy.  Our speakers, workshops, and exhibitors are all selected for their high quality and pertinent information.

I didn’t attend as a participant but rather as a photographer.  Suzanne has been attending for the last several years and, by coincidence or providence, we happened to cross paths with Mark and Jill Savage at a marriage retreat last fall.  Jill is the CEO of Hearts at Home.  Over the past several weeks, we’ve been conversing with Jill and some other staff members at Hearts about assisting in various ways with the event.  One thing led to another and Suzanne found herself on stage speaking to 4,500 women on Friday (I’ll let Suz tell her side of the story) and I was photographing the event on Saturday.  You’ll find a brief post and some photos over at my photography site.

What was remarkable to me about the event was a) how well organized it was and b) how moving it proved to be.  I suppose I shouldn’t have been surprised at the organization of the day; after all, they’ve been doing this for well over a decade.  But it’s an event that’s run almost entirely with volunteers and what they do is truly impressive.  I’ve attended some other conferences (that, by the way, cost significantly more than the registration fee for this event) that did not run nearly as smoothly as the Hearts at Home conference.  Kudos to Jill and her staff and volunteers.

I was also unprepared for the emotional impact the event would have on me.  I alluded to this on my photography site.  As I was making photographs during the worship segments led by Christy Nockels, I wanted to join in with the singing.  As I listened to the speakers made photographs during the workshops, I wanted to take notes.  Later in the day, I told Jeanie Fields, the marketing director for Hearts, that I couldn’t imagine a husband not wanting his wife to attend this event.  It’s that good.

We’re grateful for the good work God is doing through Hearts at Home and would encourage all wives and moms to attend this terrific event.  To get a look at what took place on Saturday, here’s a brief slideshow for you (if it doesn’t show up, just refresh the page).