{BOO}

More random picts

Jet lag looks good on us!
Hanging out after church
The neighborhood where we stayed

{pictures}

{Thankful}

There is no way to truly express our gratitude to everyone who has stood beside us during this journey. I believe God gives us a community of believers and supporters to act as his hands. For all of the God's hands that have hugged, helped, clapped and wiped tears, Thank You!



For all the God's hands who have prepared delicious food for our family...Thank you.



For all the God's hands who have logged on and prayed over our prayer request...Thank you.



For all the God's hands who have picked up the phone to encourage us...Thank you.



For all the God's hands who have given baby items so that our sweet little boy is lacking in nothing...Thank you.



For all the God's hands who have supported us financially...Thank you.



For all the God's hands who have not smacked me upside the head when I blabbed on and on about the adoption...Thank you!



For all the God's hands who have spent time telling others about God's story unfolding in our lives....Thank you.

And to our Lord, thank you for choosing us for this journey, trusting us with another one of your children, and dying for us so that we can all be in heaven together.

{Update}

Wow! Where has a week gone?! We ARE alive, just to squelch the rumors, and starting to thrive I might add.

All three kids are doing great and settling in. I have tons of help, wink-wink, and we are trying to carve out time to spend one-on-one with the big kids.

Jet lag is a dirty beast! The first 3 days Dave, Bizi and I were up at 3AM, just awake....la de da...nothing to do but eat Mexican casserole. Yesterday I was up at 4:30am and today we made it all the way to 5:14!!

Bizi went to the Dr. last Friday. He has put on 3lbs! His outie belly button is actually a hernia. We are going to watch it for a little while, there is a small possibility of a surgery in the future. Overall, she was impressed with him. Some small developmental delays, but he is improving daily by leaps and bounds.

I will try to get some new pictures up soon! Much love to you all!

{Home Sweet Home}

The End!


Or is it just the beginning????

{MOS}

Just talked to Dave-O and he said they screwed up the visa. They put him down as a girl. WHAT IS UP????? AUGHGHGHGHGHGHGH!!!

They said it would take a couple of days to fix and Dave told them that we don't have a couple of days, so they said to come back in an hour. He is going to pick up our tickets then heading back to the embassy.

Please Lord, let the embassy fix it fast. We just want to come home.

Turn out the lights...the party's over!

Today is the day! Dave is heading to the Embassy at 10am to pick up the visa and we are heading to the airport at 2:30pm to catch our 6:15pm flight. We land in OKC Wed. night at 8:25pm.

GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME AND ALL THE TIME GOD IS GOOD!

Pray us home!!

God is good all the time..

And all the time GOD IS GOOD!

Today at the Village Market we ran into the same man who did our Visa interview at the Embassy. We asked him if there was any way to pick of the visa early so that we could make the 6:15pm flight and he told Dave to come at 10AM!! WOO HOO! PTL!

Now we just need two seats to open up on Ethiopia Air and we will be heading home Tuesday!! Please don't tell the kids just incase we miss the flight.

We have nothing to do the next 2 days, so we might go on a day safari or something like that. Not sure yet, but hanging out in the room with no TV or air conditioning for 2 days does not sound fun.

Please pray for two empty seats!!

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

The Good

We will have a Visa on Tuesday and are attempting to fly standby Tuesday night!! We will leave Thursday at the latest. We are praying for the visa to be ready early!!! It is time to come home, I miss my kids!

The Bad

Ya know how I hate to borrow things......yup you guessed it....the big stack of DVD's that I borrowed have dissapeared. Morton's I promise I will replace them once we get back!!! I'm so sorry!! THAT IS WHY I NEVER BORROW ANYTHING!!!!

The Ugly

My hairy legs!! We have been in such a hurry the last few days that shaving was a no go. Today I'm sitting with a skirt on and almost gagged. I am a hairy beast!

Homesickness is also ugly. I'm beyond ready to come home and hug my babies. I'm ready for a microwave and air conditioning. I solomly swear (holding up two or three fingers or whatever..) to never gripe about doing laundry again. Just not wringing it out by hand will be heaven!

Have I told you how perfect Ethan is??? HE IS PERFECT! Sweet, smiles all the time and totally bonded to both of us. Wait unil you see him do his smooshy nose thing. You will be instantly smitten!

I had a woman ask me if he was mine and when I said yes, she said "Are you sure?". Jana told me that they probably think Dave is a good man for forgiving me! I don't care what people think....he is mine and is a perfect fit into our family. I couldn't love him more if I had pushed him out of my body.

Speaking of...he is sitting in my lap, drooling on my arm and ready to go to bed.

I love and miss you all. Please keep praying us home!

Pictures

{Nairobi}

Just a quick update...internet is iffy, and we have not had electricity this morning. We found an error on Ethan's passport. They have him marked for a female and not a male. We are working very hard to find a way to fix it so that I don't have to go back to Rwanda this week with him. After a very frusterating day for Dave and Jana at the Rwandan Embassy (frustrating due to the electricity being out there also, not the people) looks like we will have a new passport issued in Kigali and Dave Jenkins will fly the new one to us. This whole fiasco was just so that a hard working missionary could get a little vacation!

We have been to the dr. here in Nairobi and should have bloodwork back on Wed. We then have an appointment at the US embassy on Thursday. PLEASE pray that they will agree to give us Ethan's visa on Friday or Tuesday of the next week. Due to 2 Kenyan holidays and Columbus day, the embassy is not issuing visa's the next week and told us we would have to wait an extra week to get it. That would be a week after our plane leaves to come home. UGH! Our prayer is that they take pitty on us and will rush ours through. If I had my kids with me then I would happily stay an extra week, but my heart hurts for them so much that I fight all day not to cry. (I loose quite often)

The trip as a whole has been a life altering experience. So much of what I thought about Africa was WRONG! I realize there is so much I don't know about the world, about people and life in general.

Please pray for us to have wisdom to know when to push our way through and when to be patient. Please pray for us to find favor in the eyes of those who look at our paperwork throughout the rest of the journey.

I can't wait to hug you all!

Rachel---I want to hear all about your week in Ethiopia! I thought of you often this week, and hope you made it home saftely.

Lee--Pray us home sweet friend

Mom--quit worring! We are fine!

JNice--Ethan is so cute in Joel's clothes! I thank God for you every time I change him!

Sisters--Just wait until you squeeze this new addition to the family! He is wonderful and silly like the rest of our kids!

Kitty--Tell your mom to get on the Gold phone!

Keli--Girlfriend, you are going to sail through your trip! There is not going to be anything left to go wrong by the time you get over here. I have cried harder for your babies than anything else on this trip. It's not fair that I can't bring them with me to a family that will love them. I have never felt so frustrated in all my life.

Everyone else--I love you and thanks for keeping up with us!

The spell check is not working and you know me...so please overlook the bad spelling!