Haitian Giveaway

Hi All ~

I LOVE following blogs - and I follow ALOT. So much that I think my husband wants to throw the computer out the window sometimes :-)

I've added a link to a blog that I follow quite often. This is a gal from MN!!!! She is an amazing lady with a BIG heart for the children of Haiti. She is working on starting her own 'home' for children infected with HIV. She wants to give them a loving, nurturing environment.

She is thinking of creative ways to help her raise money for her new adventure. Please go over to her website and check it out!!! She has some pretty amazing Haitian art to giveaway!!! Go quick though because it ends tomorrow!!! (Oops - I meant to get this done sooner!)

http://www.becausehecalled.blogspot.com/

The Big Questions...

Why did THIS have to happen?

Why are things not going how WE had planned?

How is THIS supposed to be used for God’s ultimate plan?

Why does God allow THIS to happen?

These are some very common questions I’m sure many of us have asked ourselves and God at some point in our life.  Cory and I ask some of these questions a lot – and we are trying to learn how to STOP asking the question. Asking the question doesn’t matter. Life happens, and you move on. Sometimes renewed – sometimes heartbroken and shattered. Sometimes you know the answer and find clarity– other times you grasp trying to find an answer so you have something to hold on to. Stop asking the questions...

Instead – ask God to give you the peace you need to keep going. Ask him to give you the wisdom and the courage to rely on him. We will never understand it all – so why do we keep trying?

The past few days (…weeks…years), our hearts have been very heavy and we have been asking some of these same questions.

* Cory’s dad has his scan on April 11^th, and we did not receive the news that we wanted. The cancer spots on his liver have grown, and he has also gained new spots.

* My brother continues with his chemo treatments.

* Today we received an email that the other little girl that we had in Haiti also passed away. Both girls that we loved with literally all our hearts are now in the arms of Jesus.

* We have struggled with ‘unexplained’ infertility for over 3 years.

* There are many others with illnesses, broken hearts, and unforeseen circumstances.

So many instances to start asking the questions of "Why" . We can sit here and yell, asking the same questions and still not understand anything – or we can move forward  with confidence. We likely won't understand, but we know that God is with us as we take our next step.  We don’t know what tomorrow will bring but we have our time right now. Our hearts are heavy…but we continue on…because there is no other choice.

The one thing that I keep thinking back to is the book Heaven is for Real. If you have read it, I’m sure you know what I’m talking about. If you have not read it – READ IT!  I was just talking with my sister-in-law last night about that book. Reading it gives you such a sense of peace. A peace about dying – a topic that is often too difficult to talk about.

I know my father-in-law has been heard making the comment “I win either way” in relation to his cancer. If the Lord decides to give him many more years on Earth, he wins by being able to spend more time with his family. If the Lord calls him home, he wins by being in eternal heaven forever – waiting for the rest of his family to meet him there. He wins!

It’s hard finding out that our 4-month old and 1 year old girls in Haiti have died - it hurts with words that we can’t describe. But after reading the book Heaven is for Real, I just keep picturing baby M. laying peacefully in Jesus’ arms – with her little smirk smile that makes her look so peaceful. Hearing the news today about our other little girl passing away hurts too, but again I picture baby A. sitting in Jesus’ lap, giving him her little sassy scream and smile! Our trips to Haiti really opened our eyes to the precious time we all have in our life. Life may be short – or it may be long. We have no control – just the choice to love with all our heart everyday of our life that we have.

Ups and downs

Cory and I keep plugging away with the 'paperwork' phase of the adoption. We had our homestudy visit on Tuesday at our house and it went really well. This should hopefully be our last homestudy visit, and now we just wait on our social worker completing the paperwork. Then we will submit it to our agency, who will likely want some changes (usually inevitable :-)   - but it is better to get the language accurate now so we don't run into snags in the future!

Once we get the approval from our agency on our homestudy, we work on submitting our 1-600 form into the United Statesd Citizenship and Immigration Services. They are essentially giving our adopted child permission to enter the US. So still some running around to do!

For some clarification, we do not have a referral of a child yet. That could be years away at this point as there are still so many changes going on and no one is really sure of where they will go. Once we get all of our paperwork submitted and approved, we will get put on the child waiting list. Hopefully we will get monthly updates on where we are 'unofficially' on the list.

Other than that, life is just going on as normal. We are just anxiously awaiting for spring to arrive! I LOVE warm weather!!!

We ask for prayers again for Cory's dad as he heads down to Rochester tomorrow for another scan. Hoping that the chemo is shrinking the cancer in his liver! We also ask for prayers for the children and volunteers at Children of the Promise. They have a nasty little bug going around, and we have found out that the little girl that we had on our last trip, passed away on Thursday. Our hearts are broken... This little girl was being adopted by a Haitian couple and they were literally just days away from taking her home.

New Experiences

One of the great joys of going through an intercounty adoption, is having the opportunity to learn and try new things and really push ourselves out of our little 'rural' comfort zone. Cory and I are busy in the 'paperwork phase' of the adoption. This means that we are busy getting fact sheets, physical examinations, copies of birth certificates, marriage certificates, and countless things notarized!!! We are also in the midst of doing countless hours of training. One of the workbooks that we are going through really makes us focus on the everyday life of adoption. It really makes us think on many levels on what we may experience before, during, and after the adoption while also trying to picture what our child is experiencing as we bring them home.

One of the 'tasks' to do was make an Ethiopian dinner or go to an Ethiopian restaurant.  If you know me, I was ecstatic about this assignment. I LOVE food....and I LOVE trying new food - I may not always like it, but usually I will at least try it. Many people always ask us about the food during our trips to Haiti, and Cory and I have no complaints. It's different and it's good! I mean, in Haiti, we get to eat PASTA for BREAKFAST - that is seriously a little piece of heaven for me!!!

So, Cory and I headed down to the Cities this weekend to help cheer on the MACCRAY Boys' Basketball team, so it was a perfect time to force, ask our friends to go with us and try some Ethiopian food.

We found a restaurant that was close to where we were in downtown Minneapolis. Our friends, as great as they are, weren't very sure about the Ethiopian food so we first stopped at a bar and grill for some hamburgers. After they were 'full', they were more willing to go with Cory and I on our experience.

We ordered the sampler platter because we figured that would give us the best overall experience of trying many different things. I'm sure our faces were priceless as they laid the plate down in front of us. I've been doing some looking on the internet, so I knew what to expect....our friends did not. They were looking around for the silverware until I explained that there is not silverware, you eat the food by breaking off pieces of a bread called Injera. Then you just scoop up the food in the bread and eat it. Again everyone was a little hesitant, but they were all willing to at least try it!

I, for one, didn't think it was that bad and enjoyed sampling all the different meats and vegetables. Some of our other friends also really enjoyed it....some said they were full and couldn't eat any more food :-) We also enjoyed a glass of honey wine and an Ethiopian beer.

Overall it was a very interesting experience and I'm very proud and thankful for our friends who are willing to share this experience with us!!! They are all amazing!!!

I wanted to take out my camera for a picture, but I figured I would look a little strange in doing that. If you are really curious, look it up on the interent. I'm sure it will make you all extremely hungry!!!

Uplifting News

Many prayers have been answered - as my brother Justin's cancer was found to be SHRINKING!!! Halleluiah!!! Heidi's scan also came back looking good! Now we continue our prayers for Cory's dad, who has his next scan set for April 11th!

For Ethiopian news:

We've been updated with some encouraging news - or we are taking it as encouraging news!  When we were notified of the drastic reductions potentially coming to Ethiopia, we knew some of the reasons stemmed around corruption. We also found out then that within days of that announcement, the director of MOWA and several other staff members were terminated.

The Joint Council has since reported that MOWA has completed their staffing changes and are working at full capacity to complete adoption cases. They are not putting any restrictions on the number of cases each day so we continue to pray that their drastic changes will not go into full effect.

It also appears that new cases continue to move forward. It is still unknown whether or not MOWA will issue a formal statement regarding how they will process cases, but it does not look like to be at the drastic decrease they originally proposed. The hope is that many groups will come together to support the government of Ethiopia in strengthening the process for ethical adoptions to continue. The main focus is not necessarily on the numbers that they will process each day, but in staff doing their jobs.

So Cory and I continue to plug away during the paperwork stage of our adoption.

Prayers for my family...

Today, we ask for prayers for our family. My brother Justin and his wife are both headed down to Rochester today to get scans done tomorrow. May Heidi continue to have a clean bill of health, and may we find encouraging news with Justin.

We will be praying...

What does this mean...

What does it mean...

First I want to THANK EVERYONE who has gone and signed the petition.  We don't know if it will make a difference yet- but if it does - then each and every one of you can say that you MADE A DIFFERENCE in the life of a child (or thousands o f children)!

There are still many unknowns at this point. There are many advocacy groups, including Joint Council on International Children’s Services (JCICS), working in Ethiopia right now to hopefully find a 'better solution'. This is the advocacy organization for families and agencies in the field of international adoption. Over the last few years JCICS have been very involved in Ethiopia and the result of this involvement has been very positive.    

I also wanted to share a little more 'history' behind this possible change. There are two primary issues as to why Ethiopia may be looking at such a drastic reduction, 1) the assumption that corruption in intercountry adoption is systemic and rampant and 2) the Ministry's resources should be focused on the children for whom intercountry adoption is not an option.

If the Ministry continues to plan on processing only five adoption cases per day, it could mean that our adoption would now be a 7-year process!  They will be processing only 500 adoption cases vs. the 4000 they are currently doing each year! That is 3,500 children who could be with their forever families that are now going to be living in orphanages.

Hearing this information was obviously quite a blow for Cory and I, so we ask for continued prayers as we navigate our hearts through this journey. May we have discernment in knowing the difference of where God is leading us, versus what our own hearts are so badly wanting. We are hoping that within the next few weeks, we will have a better understanding of where these changes may be going...