Reflections

A Ghanaian girl with Buruli Ulcer.

A new post on The Superman Club. Mostly just me thinking out loud.

Hidden Blessings

Hopefully, this Superman blog post is a little more uplifting than the last couple.  :)

Delay of 4-7 Months

It gets worse.  Click here to read the details.

Embassy Delays

I am afraid the newest post is mostly bad news. (But there is also some very good news at the end of the post if you can make it through the whole thing....)

Passports

A new post to our other blog. Hint: The boys have passports! (Luckily, I can post their photos here since this site is not so public.)

It's Official!

Jason and I in Kenya.

Click here to read our new post on The Superman Club.

Resubmitting Documents

My research partner and I in Ghana with two of the girls from our village.

Click here to read our newest post on The Superman Club.

Questionable Lab Results

I have posted to The Superman Club blog.  Click here to read it.  By the way, many people have asked why we titled our adoption blog The Superman Club.  A while ago, I saw a t-shirt that said something about Superman being adopted that I thought was cute.  Actually, he was more than adopted - he was internationally adopted.  If Superman can do amazing things, so can our boys.  It's a pretty good club to be a member of.

Family of 6!

I suppose it is about time to announce on this blog that we are adopting two boys!  I have stalled because I wasn't really sure where to start and I am still in disbelief that this is all really going to happen.  When someone finds out for the first time that we are adopting, they usually have many questions for us and I have so much to tell.  I am not good at abbreviating our story yet and I often find myself boring innocent question-askers to sleep because I forget that they may not have wanted to hear every detail of the last year.  So instead of explaining everything in this post, I have created a separate adoption blog, thesupermanclub.blogspot.com.  I still have more to add, but most of your questions can probably be answered there.

I want to record this experience for me to remember and learn from, for our boys to have as a journal, and for others interested in adoption to have a resource to pull from or relate to.  Boyer Blurbs is not searchable, but since the adoption website will show up in search engines, I am keeping that one anonymous and using pseudonyms to protect the kids.  When I post to The Superman Club, I will try to remember to put a link on this blog, so that you can check it out.

Oh, yes... the boys!  Their names are Andre (age 3) and Luke (age 1) and they are from the Democratic Republic of Congo.  The court system in Congo has legally approved us to be their parents (woohoo!) and we are just waiting for the last couple of documents before we can leave the country with them, which should be very soon.  We are so excited to welcome them into our home!  The girls talk about them as if they are already part of our family and ... well... they are, so we hope that we can hold them in our arms soon.

 This is a photo of the girls before we sent the boys a care package that included these two cuddly animals.

Moments of the Month

The photo above shows how I know that my girls are awake in the morning.  While I am getting ready in the bathroom, they stick their limbs under the door.  And no, I do not have four children (yet), the girls are sticking both their fingers and toes under the door at the same time.

A favorite line around our house lately has been, "Somebody needs a nap today," (with the word "somebody" drawn out for emphasis).  But the line doesn't come from the parents.  The girls say it to each other if one of them is being whiney.  As you can imagine, the whiney child loves being told that by her sibling.

Claire is our more adventurous eater.  She loves vegetables (she has been known to finish off entire bowls of broccoli while our backs are turned) and will try just about anything if she is in the right mood.  Recently, she wanted to try salsa and upon discovering that she liked it, she began eating it alone by the spoonful.

For Christmas, Gabby received some Hello Kitty underwear from Target.  As I was folding a pair recently, a word caught my eye and I read what one of them said: "I am as heavy as three apples!"  Excuse me?  Did I just read that right?  Indeed, I did.  It repeats that phrase over and over on that pair of underwear, with a picture of a kitty holding three apples.  I am not even sure if being as "heavy as three apples" is a good thing or a bad thing, but I know it is a weird thing.  Who comes up with these phrases?

A week-and-a-half ago, Gabby was kneeling on her chair at the kitchen table and we suddenly heard a loud clunk of a child falling.  We are used to this sound, so it didn't really phase us, but we turned around to see Gabby laying on the floor and crying a bit louder than usual.  I distracted her and within one minute, it was over.  Five minutes later, she was asking for ice to put on her shoulder.  Strange.  (How does she even know that ice helps wounds?)  I asked her to raise her arm and she couldn't without pain.  I called our in-house physician over and after a pricey evaluation, he gave me the look - "it's broken".  We could feel the bone sticking out a bit.  Luckily, she is young so the recovery shouldn't be too bad, she just needs to wear a sling for a while.  That night as I tucked her into bed, she said, "Mom, will I have to go to school in a wheelbarrow tomorrow?"  It took me a minute to realize that she meant a wheelchair, but I was able to reassure her that no, she would not need a wheelbarrow or a wheelchair.  :)

January

We have already been enjoying this new year!  Here is some of what we have been up to in January....

We began the new year by letting the kids stay up "late" to ring in 2013 as we watched the celebrations in Times Square.  (They have no idea that we actually did a search for last year's celebration on You Tube and celebrated at 8:00pm.)  They enjoyed the countdown, the sparkling cider and couldn't get enough of saying, "Cheers" and clanking their paper cups together.

We enjoyed some fun parties: a gender reveal party for two different babies (both boys!), Jen hosting book club, and Sarah's baby shower.  Here is Sarah below with her two hostesses and twin boys almost ready to see the world!

One of our friends had his 40th birthday and a group of us went to a place called Suncadia to celebrate in some "cabins" in the snow.  25 kids in one place meant a whole lot of food and fun together.

Gabby went tubing for the first time.  She was reluctant at first, but once she went, she had a great time and wanted to go again!  She wasn't even traumatized by the fact that her hat flew off half way down the hill and that she took down a friend at the bottom.

 The kids weren't the only ones to have a fun time.  This is us after enjoying the (indoor) swimming pool and outdoor hot tub, but before the karaoke madness....  So many laughs and memories!

The girls had a fun playdate with one of Gabby's friends from school.  They decorated cookies and enjoyed playing with a house full of toys other than their own.  I love that Gabby doesn't even have to look at her cookies as she frosts them.  A true pro.

The kids supposedly put on a show for us, but there were a lot more costume changes than scenes.

At the end of the month, B came to visit!  While he was in town, we all went bowling.  The girls had great scores, thanks to their bowling ball slide.

(At least I know by looking at these two pictures what my husband will look like in about 25 years... not much different.)

These girls sure do love their grandpa.

I just thought Claire was cute in her bowling shoes.

On Saturday, we went on the Seattle Great Wheel - the huge ferris wheel on the waterfront.

Gabby was a little nervous to be so high over the water, but she got over it pretty quickly.

We were glad to finally have an excuse to go check out one of the largest ferris wheels in the US and it did not disappoint!