Sentencia!

And when they arrived and gathered the church together, 

they declared all that God had done with them...(Acts 14:27)

We are not home yet, but we want to "gather" the church together and share all that God has done with us to bring us to this point today....

Sentencia.  

Adoption Finalization.

May we introduce you to our new kids

Marian and Katerin

Omar

Saimon

Our family at the Judge's office with our awesome agency representative,

Maria

God is good!  We are a new family of nine today.  Just 3 1/2 weeks after arriving here in Bogota, adoptions are final.  He answered our prayers for favor and quick finalization.  We are thankful.

I have been thinking about how all this started.  When Jeremy and I first talked about expanding our family back in December 2008.  We did not know how or when but we started praying.  I thought about that January 2010 when we told our adoption agency to put us on their radar for sibling groups or older kids.  That same month, 4 siblings were given to the care of the state and entered an orphanage in Bogota, Colombia.

I've been thinking about how God confirmed for us that we could love older kids just as much as we loved the babies on that first mission trip to Rwanda.  I remember first praying I Thes 3:11 "Now may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus clear the way for us to come to you."  And those 4 kids in Colombia were declared adoptable that same month.

And then we said "yes" to just hosting orphans for a vacation program last summer.  We did not commit to adopt them before they came, but we were willing to say "yes" to whatever God had in mind.

It was not a week after they left that Jeremy confessed, "I don't need to pray to know if this is the right thing to do, I know it is the right thing to do.  I need to pray for courage."  All those months we were asking the Lord, "Where are our children?"  And then He brings.them.to.our.home.

We said "Yes, Lord, do whatever You wish."

And we started the adoption process and only knew to follow Him one step at a time.  A hundred things could close the door.  He never promised that these kids would be ours.  And now we have passed through the final door.  

And they share our last name.

Here is a short video taken by Orphan Hope International last Fall as we began the adoption process

http://vimeo.com/32647939

Now what?

We will keep believing, trusting, following, depending, hoping. 

Thank you for your prayers, support, encouragement along the way!!

 God has done great things and we give Him the glory.  

The credit in NO WAY belongs to us.

We know that He has not called us to this task of parenting kids from hard places to leave us to ourselves.  We need you.  We need your continued prayers.

Give thanks with us today for ALL that God has done!

Enjoying some ice cream tonight as we celebrate!

Happy Birthday Jeremy!

Homemade cards and Chocolate cake--
Happy Birthday Papá/Dad/Jeremy!  

(He is called all three names at different times by different kids!)

We had Dad's "birthday party" at Mundo Aventura

What an adventure it was!
That's Jeremy and the bigs about to ride something I would never get on...

 See why??

I took the littles for most of the day

 SLIDING....that's my kind of ride

When we were all together I found myself constantly counting heads.  I can count to 7 in Spanish and English faster than you can say
"No más!"

Who cares if it's 60 degrees---let's get wet!

Happy B-day, my man
39 for the first time

What does patience look like?

The top two things we hear from people once they find out all 7 kids are ours are...
1. You must have a big house.  

To which I answer "Es bastante."  It's enough.

2. You must be very patient.  

And I just smile.

So what does patience look like?

Patience is....having some beds unmade.

Patience is....letting the cushions come off the couch and chairs for a big pillow fight or forts or flips on the couch (I don't let them do that, yes I do.)

 (only sometimes)

Patience is....WANTING everyone to be happy, but UNDERSTANDING that someone will usually be poubty, heading to time-out or time-in, or wanting what someone else has.

Patience is....finding my alone time at the kitchen sink doing dishes or folding laundry at the dryer.

Patience is....being called by my first name from my child.

Patience is....saying "I love you" everyday and everynight with a kiss even when it is not said in return.

Patience is....not losing it when I am being lied to. And asking for forgiveness when I do lose it.

Last night was pretty rough.  It was the first night I cried.  Sometimes dealing with the kids' coping mechanisms is really hard....on everybody.

 (one day the kids put on make-up, came up with a Halloween play, and we made Fall decorations)

Wesley was a zombie--which is what I feel like sometimes. ;-)

But His mercies are new every morning and this is what we are trying to teach the kids.  We can start anew.  Today was a better day!

Tomorrow I'll share some pictures from Jeremy's Birthday in Colombia!  :-)

Still counting

Blessing #10 ELECTRICITY:  We are back up and running after about 30 hours without power.  Friday morning power was cut--found out later that it was because the bill had not been paid.  We were told it would take about an hour and should be up again.....an hour passed, nothing.  By the late afternoon the office manager of the guest house showed us where candles were "in case" we did not get power before dark.  Here is how we spent our Friday night....

a nice candlelit dinner

#11 Thankful for a gas stove!  We had hamburgers and fries.

One big UNO game with a flashlight hanging from the ceiling

(this is really how dark it was)

 goodnight!

Today we spent some time on the puzzle and playing outside

 #12 All the electronic games slowly died and could not be recharged

 We love playing with other people's dogs!

 And we have taken on tree climbing

I have to reiterate #10 again....I'm really thankful for la luz!!  The pictures make our time Friday night look special and cozy, which it was, but you know, open flames, rowdy boys, and dark bathrooms are not a great combination.
Thanks all for your continued prayers and notes!  Hope you have a blessed Holiday weekend!

Counting our blessings one.by.one

I have avoided the computer the last few days and haven't even considered writing an update because, frankly, I was kind of....ticked, to put it nicely.  The day before yesterday we found out that Jeremy's wallet was not lost at home, but in fact, stolen.  And somewhere in Mexico.

I panicked.  I was trying to call credit card companies and the bank from overseas and the phone numbers wouldn't work.  Jeremy was out with the bigs and he wasn't answering his cell phone.  He had the ONLY credit card in our possession and I needed the number to get through to someone on the phone.  We found out that we would have to cancel that card as well therefore leaving us with just a few pesos in our pocket and no other way to pay for our doctor appointments.

So I started counting (about 24 hours later)....

blessing #1: The thief spent less than $60.
#2: After spending $85 on the first phone call from my cell, we were able to call the remaining companies successfully through skype. (Thanks, Todd, for your help!)
#3: Capital One sent an emergency replacement card within 18 hours.
#4: That card works.
#5: We were able to keep the doctor appointments and found out the Chest x-rays all came back clear!
#6: We also found out we got Judge #5, who is supposedly very good, and our rep expects Finalization within a couple weeks. We still estimate to be home by Sept 27th.
#7: Although the "honeymoon" with the new kids is over, we are deepening connections and learning more about one another.

#8: All the friends and family praying for us and sending encouraging notes!
#9: The kids like the arepas I make!

 

(for my southern friends, to me, arepas taste a little like hot water bread--minus the hot water)

:-)

Here are a few pics from our outing last Friday at el centro and Monserrat.

 (A new friend, Nick, who joined us for the day)

Puzzling

Okay we are ten days into it and I have started feeling overwhelmed.  You might think, "WOW, you made it 10 days before feeling overwhelmed?" But I think I have been kind of on auto-pilot the last 2 weeks.  I knew a little bit about what to expect, we had Nana here helping with the daily chores and loving on the kids, and we have a lot of people praying for us.  I set very small expectations because I wasn't sure how everyone was going to do.

Now as I look at the next few weeks that we will still be here, and even think a little bit about the weeks and months to follow once we get home, the feelings of....

How are we going to do this????

...set in.

It's kind of like looking at a 1000 piece puzzle as you just begin and don't know how you will ever get it done...

I know for my friends, school starts tomorrow and life is carrying on as usual for everyone back home.  I am glancing at facebook and see my homeschool friends getting their rooms organized and lessons planned.  And some have already been doing school for weeks.  I think about the 7 kids that are now enrolled in my homeschool~~and think,

There is no way! I'm not doing it.

But then God, tenderly reminds me---

STOP COMPARING YOURSELF TO OTHERS.

I focus on what is right in front of me right now

and we are making progress.

Good news and Bad news

The good news...

Thank you for your prayers!

We passed integration week!!

Today our paperwork was submitted to the judge!

YIPEEEEEEEEEEEE!

We had a great day visiting el centro and Monserrat.
(more pics to come later)

The bad news:

Today is the last day we had Nana--Jeremy, Katerin, and Wesley took her to the airport tonight.

WE WILL MISS HER!

all of us will miss her

Also 3 of the kids have to have chest x-rays and blood work
after having their TB tests read this afternoon. 
Appointments will be next week.
Keep that one in your prayers for sure!

Just a note about Thursday night--Katerin spent hours with us that evening asking questions and talking.  It was like after we passed the interviews, walls came down.  We talked about how God had brought us together, dating, college, family, and so much more.

 :-)