Shower Gifties

This feels a bit silly, but here goes:




"Becoming Americans" outfits from our gracious hostess.

Awesome books from many awesome ladies.

Cute outfits from Grandma C.

Awesome software from Grandma H.

We also received many cool toys which I put away before thinking to take pics. Fingerpuppets, playclay, learning activities, oodles of treasures, including a swimming pool! For real! One I can sit in and cool off. We were truly showered in presents!

Showers! and not the rainy sort to which we are accustomed

I've been weepy all day. I had no idea how much my first shower would strip off all that fortitude and "we're fine" that I've been carefully cultivating. My mom's friends gathered around and absolutely spoiled us with generousity, both the practical giftie sort and the even-more-precious goodwill sort. Apparently I really really needed that.

Maybe it was that a shower is such a community thing. Our community of friends is now 'pregnant' too. No longer is we the lone crusaders charging the paperwork mountain. Each little package represented some busy woman's time and energy invested into Andy and Juliana. Other people got into their cars, went into stores, and anticipated the children's needs and future.

If you are reading our blog because we are linked to the blog of someone you care about that is adopting: THROW HER A SHOWER. Even though I told my hostess, I really don't think that she will ever really know how much she blessed me.

Okay, both cats and both dogs are gathered around my chair casting worried looks at me as I am bawling and typing. All typos are either tears or kitties on the keyboard.

New Look

What do you think? Of course, now that it is finished, I want to do it in blue and include the picture of the blue church in Khab. Next time insomnia hits, that will be my little project. Until then, purple swirlies to you!

Wer sind Sie?

Okay, so my stat counter reveals that someone in Germany is regularly checking in. How about leaving a comment with some hints as to who you are? You can even comment in German if you wish.

Tschuss!

Suzanne

Happy I-171H Day!

We were fingerprinted on July 6th (edited: actually June 6th, no time travel) and quite stunned to find our I-117H in our mailbox today, which means it arrived on Saturday, the 17th. That is wonderfully fast and we are very grateful. It is the last piece (that we know of) of paper. We just have to get it notarized, apostilled, and FedExed now, but we are old pros at that.

Oh, "What's a I-117H?" you ask. It's the essential document that lets you bring a child or two back into the US with you. Without it, nothing happens. Our old one was expiring.

In other news, I've fired up a new blog devoted to house pictures: Fazenda.

A Wee Step Forward

Two bits of news:

Our dossier and the children's dossiers will be filed with court during the last week of June. Our judge has 60 days from filing to either request more paperwork or to schedule our court date. This would put us, at the latest, in court the last week of August.

Two families with our agency had smooth and successful court hearings yesterday; no new paperwork was requested. These two families are the first ones for our agency this year, so their experience sets some expectations for us.

Have a lovely evening,

Suzanne

Not adoption news

In sad news, two of Jamie's colleagues died in a plane crash yesterday. They were flying out to a jobsite in Montana. The charter pilot guy was the man who the company always uses for moving their staff around; he's picked Jamie up a few times from the airport and brought him home. The passenger was someone Jamie had just spoken with that morning and is the man who covers for Jamie when needed, say, for example, when we go to Russia.

My worst nightmare: waking up happily married one morning and going to bed a widow. May God protect us and comfort the men's families.

Other news, all trival compared to the crash:

Jamie picked up the headboards for the kid's room so we should have kid's room pics posted this weekend.

Jamie took his big test. We'll find out how he did next month sometime.

I'm hand-writing this entry on my notepad laptop which reads my writing and turns it into text.

See that little red dot on the cluster map? That's my mom, niece and aunt, trekking through Israel which they describe as rocks and churches and churches made of rocks. I'm pretty excited about having an Israel dot on my map.

Though we've hoped to go on trip two in July, we are bracing ourselves for August (though still secretly hoping for July).

RELEASE LETTERS

I know, three in one day is quite excessive, but we just learned that our release letters have arrived! Great rejoicing here. Now we await a court date.

Two Posts in One Day (no extra charge)!

Found two cool things in blogland today while waiting for the slow load rate of my online class I am teaching:

Cool Thing #1: 20 Ways to Support an Adoptive Family

Cool Thing #2: We've Been Quoted by a REAL Author who not only has a real contract from a publisher, but also has some really lovely and intelligent nieces who look a lot like three of our lovely and intelligient nieces. :)

An update for no particular reason

It’s June 1st and we had hoped to have our release letter by now, but no. The release letter, as best I understand it, is from the Federal Keepers of Children Left Without Parental Care releasing them to the jurisdiction of the Local Keepers of CLWPC. It basically states that the kids have not been promised elsewhere and we are free to move forward. So, we are still waiting for our release letters.

Happy news includes the following:
o Other families with our agency have been getting court dates about three months after their last trip, so I am hopeful that we will also. This puts us into Russia mid-July. HOT!
o We are making progress on our house. Our bedroom and the kids’ bedroom are all pulled together except for headboards, which are en route. Jamie has built the lovely bookcase/stairwell guard. Aforementioned toilet, sink, and carpet have all been installed.
o Two of our lovely nieces (we have 4 between us, all grown, or nearly so) blessed us with visits this week. This always makes us happy.

Prayer requests, for those so inclined, include:
o Traveling mercies for my mom, niece, and aunt who are adventuring through Israel right now, and also for my dad and brother who are also traveling on their own separate adventures. I’m always a bit uneasy when my loved ones are so far-flung.
o Jamie’s big exam in this coming Wednesday. He has been industriously studying for weeks and weeks, so we are hopeful that he will be successful. It’s a really hard one.
o And of course, that our release letters come, our court date be set, and our judge be generous.