We're Glad You're Our Dad

Last night I asked the kids what they love about their dad. Caleb said, "he plays army men with me." Colton, then said the same thing-all the kids laughed. Hermela said, "He works hard for us and he plays fun games like "hammer down" (rough housing, swinging kids around and throwing them into the air-in a very safe manner of course). Meron said she likes that daddy plays babies with the girls and Caroline said, "I love my dad." All were great responses and highlight a lot of Nick's great "dad" qualities. He works very hard for our family, even homeschooling our kids two mornings a week while I work. He is definitely way more fun than I am and the kids have a great time playing with him. His "army man" playing abilities are exceptional and he's great at coaching baseball, teaching the kids to fish, launching them into the pool, riding wheelies on their scooters, fixing things that need fixing and all sorts of other essential "dad" skills. We are grateful for you and the kids are really glad that you're their dad!

Advocating Update #2

On our refrigerator, we have the pictures of 4 Ethiopian orphans. One is Meseret, our sponsor child with Trees of Glory. The other three are orphans that are on our agency's waiting child list-and have been since last year. I started advocating for them a month or so ago and last posted about the financial details of their adoptions and the grants and reduced country fees that each of them have been assigned here. ***UPDATE: K AND M HAVE ZERO AGENCY FEES AND ZERO FOREIGN FEES AT THIS TIME***

So it has been about three weeks since that post and still no families. No one has picked them. These children still wait.

What does it mean to wait? I found three definitions of the word (my comments are in red):

wait (wāt)

1.to stay in a place or remain in readiness or in anticipation (until something expected happens) -Like your mom and dad finally come to bring you home.

2.to be ready or at hand-They are so, so ready to be loved

3. to remain temporarily undone or neglected-They are surely undone and certainly feel neglected

The last group that travelled said that these three children are longing for a family to call their own. They have witnessed countless children coming and going.

When will it be their turn?????

Who will pick them?????

Here is another peak at these precious children.

This sweet girl is about 9 years old and has a quiet and cheerful disposition. She has been waiting for far to long to know she is loved. **ADOPTED**

These siblings, a sister age 9 and a brother age 11 need a family to belong to-a place they can thrive and grow and know they matter.

Please forward this post on to anyone that you think may be interested in any or all of these children. For more information, please contact IAG at www.adoptionguides.org.

Happy Birthday Meron

Meron woke up super early on her birthday. She had been counting down the days and on her special day, she too wanted to wear her new Ethiopia dress. She beamed with delight when she put it on and thoroughly enjoyed all of the extra attention she recieved.

All three of our girls have birthdays within 4 weeks of each other which had pros and cons this year. The biggest pro is that nobody had to wait long for their turn to be the birthday girl. These days, the more "the same" everything is for the girls the better-same pajamas, same shoes, same bathing suits.... It makes everything a little easier.

So after Hermela and Caroline got new bikes for their birthdays, Meron said, "whereza me bike?" I asked her why she thought she was getting a bike (which she was) and she said, "Hermela and Caroline told me." So it is a good thing that they all got very similar gifts this year or we would have been dealing with some major disappointment.

I've mentioned before what a hard worker Hermela is and how uninterested Meron is in helping or doing work. So I put Meron and Caleb (another one that is slightly less motivated in the work department) in charge of putting all of the shoes away in the cubbies. Well, you'd have thought I asked them to make the shoes before they put them away. There was crying and laying on the floor and it took nearly 20 minutes to finally complete a job that should have taken about 5 (looks like I haven't been giving enough work lately:). This was the day before her birthday. I told her that she was almost four and I knew she could do it.

They next day, when she was 4, she did the same job with ease and without complaining. She kept saying, "I'm four now." I'm using the "your 4 now" card while I can and so far, she's been doing a great job and even volunteering to help out.

She has made huge progress since she came home 4 1/2 months ago. We are able to work through situations without as many tantrums and they are definitely shorter now. She is communicating entirely in English (which is a little sad because nearly all of her Amharic is gone). The rate at which the girls have learned English is amazing. I'd love to spend 4 months in Ethiopia and see how much Amharic our other kids and Nick and I could pick up.

Meron chose to have ice cream sundaes for her birthday. Hermela keeps calling them "Sunday ice creams" (you know-the kind that you can only have on church days:). The girls say the cutest things. Meron's newest thing is jumping off of steps. She says, "watch my jump mommy" instead of watch me jump.

Meron has been talking more about her mom in Ethiopia. I don't know how much she really understands, but she'll bring me the phone and ask me to call her. It's hard to explain to her that we can't do that. Last night she had me pray for her. It makes me so sad for the girls that they have experienced such a great loss. I pray that we are able to help them work through all of their feelings and that they know that we love them and God loves them.

We love you so much our big 4 year old girl. We pray that you will grow up to love the Lord and to love and help others.