Re-entry!!!!!!!!

ANY TIME I RETURN HOME FROM AFRICA, I AM TOTALLY WRECKED. AND THIS TIME HAS BEEN NO DIFFERENT. WHEN I VISITED ZAMBIA I WAS COMPLETELY WRECKED FOR THE CAUSE OF THE ORPHAN. WHEN I VISITED ETHIOPIA THE POVERTY AND ORPHANS WRECKED ME. BUT SINCE RETURNING FROM GHANA, I AM WRECKED ON SO MANY LEVELS. PHYSICALLY, I AM EXHAUSTED, BUT EVEN MORE SO THAN THE PHYSICAL EXHAUSTION, I AM EMOTIONALLY A MESS. THE PEOPLE OF GHANA WERE AMAZING, OUR NEW CHILDREN EQUALLY AMAZING. I HATED LEAVING THEM. I FELL IN LOVE WITH THEM INSTANTLY. I FELL IN LOVE WITH THE PEOPLE OF GHANA ALMOST AS INSTANTLY. I'M NOT SURE I HAVE EVER BEEN TO A MORE PEACEFUL PLACE FULL OF CHRISTIANS. CHRISTIANS WHO ARENT AFRAID TO PROCLAIM THE GOOD NEWS TO ANYONE AND EVERYONE. I LAYED IN MY BED EVERY MORNING LISTENING TO CHILDREN WORSHIP THE LORD FOR AN HOUR IN SCHOOL, PRIOR TO STARTING THEIR STUDIES. I LISTENED TO THE GHANAIAN PEOPLE SING AND PRAISE GOD FOR HOURS SUNDAY EVENING. I LISTENED TO THE GHANAIAN PEOPLE TALK ABOUT HOW IMPORTANT PEACE WAS TO THEM. CHURCH SUNDAY MORNING IS 3 1/2 HOURS LONG AND EQUALLY LONG SUNDAY EVENING. AND EVERYONE IN THIS COUNTRY AND I MEAN EVERYONE GOES TO CHURCH. ALL OF THE WORKERS AT THE GUEST HOUSE ARE EXCUSED FOR CHURCH ON SUNDAYS. THEN I RETURN HOME AND HEAR OF THE MOST HORRIFIC NEWS I COULD EVER IMAGINE WITH THE SCHOOL SHOOTING IN CONNETICUT. AND I LIKE EVERYONE ELSE SCREAMS WHY? WHY LORD? AND I HEAR EVERYONE TALKING ABOUT WHAT WE NEED HERE TO PREVENT THIS FROM HAPPENING EVER AGAIN. MORE GUN CONTROL, LESS GUN CONTROL, MORE SECURITY AT SCHOOLS........AND I JUST WANT TO SCREAM......WAKE UP AMERICA, WE NEED JESUS CHRIST, WAY MORE OF JESUS. AND THAT IS ALL WE NEED. WE NEED TO GO TO GHANA AND VISIT FOR A WEEK AND FEEL THE PEACE THAT ONLY JESUS CHRIST CAN GIVE. INSTEAD OF SENDING MISSIONARIES OUT, WE NEED TO BRING THEM IN. I AM SO BROKEN FOR THE FAMILIES OF THESE CHILDREN, I AM SO BROKEN FOR THE TORTURED SOULS HERE AMONGST US. IM NOT SURE WHERE TO GO FROM HERE. I FEEL LIKE MY WHOLE LIFE IS A JOKE AFTER RETURNING HOME. I AM BROKEN. I AM BROKEN. WE NEED AFRICA MORE THAN AFRICA NEEDS US!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mortal Brain Damage

Lessons learned......maybe....hopefully......finally!!!!!!!! I wonder how many times the Lord shows us something or teaches us a lesson through the Holy Spirit and just sits there shaking His head because we "Just Don't Get It?" In my case I'm sure it's quite a lot. How frustrating is it to try to teach your kids lessons over and over and you think "really, do they have brain damage?". How can they not get it? How can they make the same mistakes over and over and not change. Think about this example.....a man buys a treadmill.....returns it two weeks later and tells the clerk.....I didn't lose a pound with this thing....I want my money back. The clerk asks if something was wrong with it and the man replies.....I don't know I never used it. Seems silly right? Well not really. How many times have we prayed for the Holy Spirit to lead us in a different direction? Asked the Lord to heal a broken relationship, break us free from an addiction, help us to lose weight? And then we become frustrated because we think the Lord isn't working in our lives. We pray for change and expect God to do everything on our behalf with no effort from ourselves. Now I am sure the Lord has chosen to instantaneously break people from their addictions or heal relationships, but in my case I have learned that God wants active participation from us to bring about change and freedom from sin. The Holy Spirit invites us along in the journey and promises to be with us and in us every step of the way. I learned this lesson a few years ago and apparently due to my mortal "brain damage" chose to forget it ever so quickly. I prayed for the Lord to help me quit smoking. I prayed and prayed......oh how I prayed and begged and pleaded. No result. Hmmmmmmm! Maybe the Lord wants me to keep smoking cause he sure ain't taking my cravings away!!!!!!! Then one night I was praying and it was light a Holy Spirit lightbulb went off. The voice said "you have to take the first step.....I'm not going to do it all for you". Well HELLO!!!!!!!(see mortal brain damage). I did take the first step and it was amazing......not one craving during those months. Wow!!!! Lesson learned....NOT!!! Fast forward to about three months ago. If you read my previous post you will understand the divine message that we are supposed to adopt two older children from Ethiopia. What I left out was my little deal I made with God during that period. You see I told myself if God wanted us to adopt these kids then he would come up with the money for it.....of course with no effort on my part.....poof! It was going to just appear. I made up my mind that I would not go into debt for this adoption. So many times over the past few months I had given up. Well we can't come up with the first 4500 dollars so I guess that's it....the Lord doesn't want us to adopt. Then every once in a while I was sent a message through friends....don't give up, we can do this....then I thought OK so maybe God changed his mind....LOL!! Needless to say this cycle went on for months. He does...He doesn't....He does....He doesn't. Then last week the Lord once again revealed to me ever so gently, even though I deserved to be cold cocked in the head, that He wanted me to work along side him to bring these kids home....he wanted my heart and passion....not for me to stand by on the sidelines and expect a miracle. So me and my poor little brain damaged self went to work.....and you know what.....the Lord moved on the hearts of others just as I had been praying all along. My prayers didn't change.....I did. We are just like our kids.......hard headed and difficult to teach. I hope this is the last time I have to learn this same lesson.....but if my brain damage creeps back in.....rest assured....the Lord will be shaking his head but will keep on teaching.

We are giving away a brand new ipad to benefit the adoption of Helen and Haptamu. There are 50 chances left for a $50 dollar donation to the site on the right. You have a 1 in 100 chance of winning. Not only could you win a brand new ipad, but you are also helping two children become un-orphaned. No child should have to go to bed at night without a kiss from a Mom and Dad......Let's get them home!!!!!!!

God calls those who are not equipped......literally y'all !!!!!!

Gods call on my life has always been clear and the older I become, the clearer and louder His voice has become. Sometimes I wonder why me? Why couldn't I have been called to be a Sunday school teacher or one of those people who pass out bibles.....I could do that.....it would be pretty stress free. But I am called to love the unloveable, the forgotten, the nameless, THE ORPHAN. And let me tell you it is HARD. And let me let you in on a little secret....once you are called He doesn't let you forget what you are meant to be doing on this earth. It's so hard for my family to understand why? Why care about them? Why would you do this to yourself? Why can't you just be a normal Christian that goes to church on Sundays and Wednesday nights like everyone else? Some days I wish I was, I wish I could. But I can't. The Holy Spirit won't let me. He's like a nagging Mama you know. You see when you are in love with Jesus and you pray "Lord, give me your eyes, I want to see others as you see them....I truly want to be your hands,feet, and body" He answers you and not only opens your eyes but also your heart and soul for those. I don't want to be a safe Christian, I want to be fearless and take risks in this life and love recklessly.....I mean isn't that what we are called to do? And that brings me to our newest challenge. Two children were brought to our attention. A 15 year old girl and her 10 year old brother that desperately need a family and medical care here in the US. For some reason I thought we were supposed to inquire more about them. Do I think adopting older kids is scary.....HECK YES I DO. I have two teenagers that have lived with me their whole life and they scare the bejeezees out of me on a regular basis. So my plan was I will pray that when I ask my husband Mike about them, that if we are supposed to adopt them that his heart would be ready and he would say yes, however if he said no, then I would know from the Lord it was also a "no". In my mind I knew it was a "no" so no big deal right, I mean the man just said no recently to a little guy in Ghana that was so daggone cute, anyone would have loved, so there was no way he would say yes to two teenagers, I mean he would be out of his mind right? WRONG, as soon as I mentioned it, without even a pause, his exact words were "Yeah! Let's bring them home".....oh Crap Lord, now what's my game plan?????? So we started the process again, knowing we had no funds for this adoption, but if this is what we are supposed to do and the Lord says GO, who am I or money for that matter to stand in the way. Again, I started doubting, thinking there is no way we are going to be able to do this.....and so I pray again...."Lord, now listen, if we are supposed to bring these kids home, I need a sign. Not some pansy wansy one because you know I need one that smacks me upside the head. I want a big sign, a huge one....tomorrow". Ok so I am sure we aren't going to get some big one tomorrow....so I go to sleep that night, wake up and go to work, completely forgetting about my "so called deal" I made with God the night before. THEN my friend shows up, another nurse practitioner, that is also an adoptive dad and great man of God. We were talking about work and shooting the breeze then he says "we want to give you and Mike something to help with your adoption" and proceeds to hand me 1000 dollars. I was humbled and in awe but still didn't quite get it right away....(yeah, told you I was slow!!!!). So many hours later I was sitting outside our building on the stairs alone enjoying a minute of peace when it hit me. Yes....it took that long. I remember looking towards the sky and saying to myself " OK God, I get it" So even after all of these affirmations from God....I have still been a doubter. So the money came due for the agency, we didn't have the first deposit and we were going....actually have lost the referral for the kids......until He threw some God loving, orphan loving women in my path. So here we are, we have raised in less than a week 2500 dollars, over half of what we need for the first deposit to secure those little souls as "ours". And Traci, when you said " O you of little faith". Boy you had no idea. Just call me Thomas....... Thank you so much to all who have donated to get these kiddos home....I am humbled beyond words.

Manningisms

Well, Manning is notorious for his quotes. He is the six year old. We taken to actually giving his quirky quotes a name....Manningisms.

The other day he says as he is hugging his baby sissy "I love her so much, I am so glad I have a baby sister, I always wanted a black sister." I laughed so hard, I thought I would pee myself.

Then today he was hugging the baby and said as he looked at me "I think this is the best thing that has ever happened to me in my life." I giggled and he said...."What? I love my sister."

You would never even know this little one was adopted (well, minus the difference in skin color) because her three brothers love her as if she was born in this family. I am so thankful that I have such loving boys with a heart for compassion and love and God.

I was talking to Manning the other day and telling him that we are now related to the Ethiopians. I explained to him that the Ethiopian people were Cambria's family and now that she is our daughter/sister, the Ethiopian people are now also part of our family forever.

He must have took this literally, because he was asking what all nationalities he was made up of (and he is a mutt). I explained he was part Italian, German, Irish, Cherokee Indian, ........and then he added "And Ethiopian."
Of course I replied...."yes, part Ethiopian :)"

My son is a poopy mouth!!!!

so the upside of the sickness happening all around us is last night I happened to look over at the six year old who was apparently taking it upon himself to take his temperature orally with the thermometer I had just used on the wee one......RECTALLY!!!! And no it hadn't been cleaned yet. My first thought was "man I hope her giardia is completely gone" and amidst the laughing siblings, I quickly took him to the bathroom and did what every knowledgeable nurse practitioner would do, I made him rinse his mouth out with Listerine. Not sure if it killed the germs on contact but at least his mouth didn't smell like BUTT anymore :)

Ethiopian adoptions and we are still sick!!!

I can't help but praise God everyday for my beautiful daughter that I know was handpicked by God especially for us. She is so much like us, it's hard to explain. After reading the recent post about new happenings in the adoption arena I especially thankful the little one came home when she did. I must be naive but I had no clue all of the wrong doings were going on. I know there is bound to be some corruption to a certain extent, but was totally shocked to read the accounts of baby finders going into the villages.

I am hiring a PI to investigate into C's past to be able to tell her about it and hopefully make contact with her birth mother. I know nothing about her past except that she was relinquished and they could not find the mother again.

Oh and back to the sickness. Well after the pneumonia, the older boys all had the flu, and now as of two days ago little miss does also. I was so worried since she just recently recovered from pneumonia but it looks like the prayers are working because she isn't nearly as bad as my youngest son was with it. What I don't understand is all the boys had flu shots. Our ped. said there were a ton of positive flu's lately in kids that had received the flu shot. And although I have been completely worn out and exhausted from caring for sick kids the past two weeks, I am grateful that we live in a country where I can call up a Dr. for advice, walk over to my medicine cabinet and pull out what we need. I think about what it would have been like for little miss if she had pneumonia or the flu in the orphanage. At 7 1/2 month's old, she was only 8 lbs, full of intestinal parasites and I'm sure had a weakened immune system. I am not sure she would have lived through this at the orphanage. So while I am sad they are sick, I am very glad she is sick in my arms where she is being loved on continuously.