Adoption a waiting / older child

He's about to turn 11 at the orphanage 12/08

Currently we're filling out our paperwork for grants & no interest loans for our upcoming travel this winter.

Somehow we've found ourselves 'ok' with this situation.  There was a time when opening up a new charge card was fine, ok, no big deal, so we could make a purchase that we 'just had to have'!  Looking back all that feels very foolish and selfish.  Our lives were very self centered and about our comfort.  If it was chilly, turn up the heat, if was humid, turn on the AC - just do it, don't bother checking with anyone else or considering dealing with being uncomfortable.

Something happened on the way to West Virginia.... well it was happening a little earlier but the door was cracked open and the silence was broken when we brought the youngest of 5 to college.  Some of you have heard this story before so I'll give you the short version, if you'd like a refresher please read back to the early years of our blog - 2008, which just seems like yesterday.

Hubby returned from Kenya a few days before our travels.  He was gone almost 3 weeks.  I HATED being home alone at night.  I actually liked being on my own during the day - cereal for supper, tuna in the can for breakfast, whatever, whenever, just me and the dog and no rules!

"We can do something, we can have a whole family live in our upstairs."  . . . .
That was a little scary to hear.
His heart was breaking and he wanted to do something.

The school year was challenging and our lives were rather quiet.  We did a few fun things; a week at a light house being light house keepers, a few marathons (him, not me), skiing, small adventures, just us.

By May of '08, 9 months later, another school year almost closing, our pastor did a sermon series on caring for the orphan.  We almost missed this sermon b/c we were traveling - but since we'd missed the 2 or 3 previous weeks, which was really unusual, we made the effort to be in church - or God just made sure we didn't miss this one!

Pastor talked about possible excuses that aren't real reasons to say no to adopting.  Finances and age were our excuses.  However, adopting was almost a no brainer - we were so excited and scared! We kept saying we needed to talk 'about this' but really had our answer.  We knew that God had a plan for us, but we didn't know what it was.

Age? I guess we're not too old - How old was Abraham when he became a dad?
Finances? We needed to get some things in order - Hello Dave Ramsey!

Lucky for us there were a couple of families who had been through the process, or were currently going through the process that we didn't feel alone.  In fact, we felt very supported - and several families came on board to do international, domestic adoption, sponsorships and foster care.  This was a whole new world to us.  Church family was very supportive, some of our own family members were nervous and cautious, they weren't on board, and weren't around when we were having heart felt conversations about what we thought God was asking us to do.

Lucky for us again - (and honesty I know it's not luck, but LOVE, God's love, that we were open to His adventures as we could love the unloved.)  Our process went very quick.  We hit a snag at one point when we thought we were going to receive a referral for a 2 and 4 yr old sibling set of girls from India.  We never considered anyone younger than 2 b/c we (I) didn't want to think of someone else changing my child's diaper when I went back to work the following September.  Silly as it sounds right now, it was easy for me to say, 'over 2' is my preference, not knowing that over 2 is an older child.

Referral Picture 8/08

When it was time to get a referral we were shown 2 sets of siblings and offered a choice.  I know that looking at pictures of older children was a little scary for me.  I had other children, ages 19 - 27 yrs old, 3 step children, 2 bio kiddos (and another in heaven)  I knew what it was like to have babies, snuggle, love, cuddle and raise them.  I knew what it was like to snuggle, love, cuddle and read to my nieces and nephews and friends' children.  What would it be like to ..... raise someone else, not born from my womb?  born from someone else, who raised them in their cultures?  ... well, I did have step children - so I sorta, kinda, know what it's like to raise children without any borders in the home.  I know what it's like to love other people's children.  What I didn't know was how easy it would be and hard at the same time, to love another child who didn't ask for trauma in their lives, who didn't ask to have a story that everyone wanted to hear but no one wanted as their own story.  I didn't know that adopting a boy, 11 yrs old, would automatically make me proud of his beautiful singing voice, soccer skillz, awesome drumming ability and hurt for him b/c he's shy and forgetful and learning English - on top of being orphaned at the age of 10.  My heart breaks regularly for him - 'not fair' comes to my mind, but is never said by him.

Updated pictures 12/08
Honey is 5
Jack is almost 11

Referral Picture 8/08

I didn't know that I didn't know my friends very well when a racists comment would fly out of their mouth without batting an eye.

I always 'felt bad' for the awkward, lonely, dirty, neglected child(ren) in my classroom, but I never knew I had a voice in their lives to make them feel better, or included, or wanted - and now, through the adoption of my 'older' children my heart pounds louder for the unloved, unwanted, and different children.

We're waiting to travel to China for our next older waiting child - no more credit cards, no more mountains of debt to drag us down.  The only thing we need to focus on is this little one's trauma to begin healing.

Watching her brother's soccer game 9/11!!!

Doing what he loves! 9/11

oh yea, and to get that loan to pay for our trip across the world to bring our Stephen Francis home to his very loving family!