It's been awhile since last posting. It's so hard to write about just sitting around waiting for things to happen. Waiting for my boys Ephrem and Anteneh to come home. Waiting for this amazing baby to be born.
Hello, my name is Thea and I am............just waiting. (tick, toc, tick, toc)
I am now 38.5 weeks pregnant and waiting. Waiting to meet this little one who God has so graciously allowed me to grow under my heart at the ripe old age of 43 nearing 44. We do not know the gender, and no, I have no inkling at all. And if I did, I would be wrong; I always am. This pregnancy has been nothing short of easy. It's been beautiful and healing in so many ways. I am relishing every moment of this pregnancy and have taken nothing for granted. Here are some pictures for you to enjoy....and possibly make fun of. It's ok. I can take it. My two youngest girls are assisting me how to show off a belly.
On the adoption side of things, our boys have their birth certificates (B.C.'s are not routinely obtained at birth like they are in the US) and they now have their passports. Now, all we are waiting for are the following: the visa medical, interviewing the aunt that relinquished the boys and the embassy approval for the visa. After all this is done, we will be notified of the date of our embassy appointment.
Both Steve and I have decided that we will not be traveling to Ethiopia to get them but have them escorted to the US. As impersonal as this seems, we both strongly feel that we need to be rested and ready for them to arrive as opposed to recovering from jet lag and potential illness. We want to be on our game as this is going to be a huge change, if not just plain traumatic, for our boys. I will rest assured that as they travel to their new home with us, that they will be accompanied by someone who speaks their language and can answer all their questions about flying for the first time. I pray this decision to have them escorted brings some amount of initial comfort to them as their life changes forever.I will ask for prayer in some areas that have been weighing on my heart. Will you pray that this birth goes gently? I am not afraid, but birth is an awesomely powerful event that takes great stamina. Like the last five of our nine children, this blessing will also be born into our arms at home.
Also, our boys will be grafted to our family tree with severe trauma in their past. Will you pray that the Lord gives us insight, patience, loyalty and an extra dose of love to help them heal from their past? We are ready for them, but we are not prepared as we have no idea how they will choose to cope with what they have been through. Pray that the Lord will give us the ability to convey protection and a sense of belonging to our boys. And lastly, pray that at some point our boys will someday, if not immediately, cling to Christ for their ultimate security and protection.
Thank you friends. I just need to tell all of you who read this blog, how much I have enjoyed your comments and encouragement while we have taken this amazing journey to grow our family. It has meant the world to me.
Upon conversing with my sweet friend today, a memory surfaced that brought both of us again to a gut cramping laughter. It was traumatic enough to blog about in my past failure of a blog...so I thought I would re-post it here and share it with you.
One morning my family and I were invited to a church by our family babysitter and dear friend, Marli. She was going to do a dance performance, which I have to say, was expressive and emotional enough to bring me to tears. She is Psalms with feet...
It was a good service with a sermon that spoke volumes on loving when we don't feel like it and being committed to this way of thinking....as Jesus was. He broke bread, his last meal, with someone who would betray him to his death. He broke bread with someone who would deny his name three times and he washed their feet with unending love for them. That's love......when you do it when others don't deserve it and expecting nothing in return.
And on this particular morning, I would join the ranks of not deserving anyone to be kind to me.
The service ended, and I was relieved as we did not put our sweet young things in childcare as they had proven to be a challenge during the sermon. We walked out to the lobby where people were chatting. Realizing we were new faces, a nice young man walked up to our family and introduced himself as Scott.
In retrospect, I would have advised Scott to seriously reconsider approaching us for a nice chat.
My husband and he started to converse and because they were men, it inevitably came around to inquiring as to what each other did professionally. Scott stated he was the owner of a software company and Steve asked what the name of it was. Scott just stood there.......pause, pause....even a longer pause. It was as if he had been asked the square root of 1,00,031. It became obvious that he had heard Steve's question but seemed to not remember his own company's name.
Eventually, after an awkward amount of time passed equivalent to the amount of time needed for Jesus to come back, Scott verbally produced the name of his company. Thinking this was weird, and kind of funny, I say "Geesh ! It took you THAT LONG to remember your own company's name?!" All of you that know me well, know that I am capable of just being straight forward but with an endearing smile on my face.....but nonetheless painfully direct. Scott then looks at me and says "Oh, I have a s-s-stuttering problem and sometimes the easiest things refuse to come out."
I look around.....desperately longing to be someone and somewhere else. Trading places with the ant dying under the sole of my shoe would have sufficed at this moment. I would have given my life savings for a vacuum that could suck back memories and words from an event....my life savings, I tell you.
Socially, there was no hope for me with Scott so I quickly excused my 90 week pregnant self and our attention grabbing triplet stroller to go talk with Marli purely for damage control reasons...although, I will readily admit to not having a whole lot left to damage.
With my departure, a look of pure relief came over Steve's face.
When our whole family was neatly tucked back in our van and ready to leave, Steve gripped the steering wheel tightly and stared straight ahead and said, " A stuttering problem?? Holy cow Thea, REALLY? I seriously can't take you anywhere." And again, a chastisement that should have reduced me to a puddle of shameful tears rendered me drowning in a wave of laughter void of any muscle control nor oxygen. Poor Steve.
Let me stop right here and give you some insight with Steve and I. First of all, he is still in his learning curve, after 17 yrs. of marriage, regarding what he really got himself into when he married me. Also, the two most frequent phrases he speaks with utter sincerity to me are:
1) Are you normal?
2) NO YOU DIDN"T!!! (Oh, yes I did sweet man.)
But I know, in secret, he has admitted that he loves this about me. I am the social canary in the coal mine to him....because I say and do what he would love to. He stands in awe half the time that I actually live to tell about it. I think he is dumbfounded that we still have the amazing amount of friends that we do.
Well, how does anyone end a story like this? ....except just to say that we all lived happily ever after; we survived to tell about it and we will never go to that church again.
Th-th-th-that's all folks!
