Refresh

This weekend my friend Brandi, treated me to a wonderful weekend event called Refresh.  It took place at Overlake Christian Church on Friday evening and all day Saturday.  This was the first ever Refresh Conference and was for "connection, support and healing for adoptive/foster parents.

We heard amazing speakers and there were about 200+ people in attendance.  I have never been around so many people who could understand what my life is like-the joys and the sorrows of adoption.  Some of the talks I heard were

• Dealing with Difficult Children by Gary Benton
• Anger and Arguing: Avoiding Both to Parent with Humor by Claudia Fletcher
• Hope in Hard Places by Lisa Qualls & Kathleen Hamer

We were also totally pampered with delicious goodies all weekend, bubble baths, lotions, free coffee bar coupons, amazing worship.  I feel like I have come away from the weekend with a new perspective and ideas.

One thing that I am really struggling with right now is how to make our family work.  It has taken 3 years for me to comes to terms with the fact that we are not a "typical" family.One of our kids has experienced severe trauma in their early years and in order to parent her right we need to do things different.  To be honest, things are not working well for us right now.  Things our not structured enough for Naomi.  We love our loose schedule which is one of the benefits of homeschooling.  But Naomi has a hard time with it.

This weekend I was blessed to talk with and hear Lisa Qualls speak.  She also is a homeschooling mom with 7 bio kids and 4 adopted.  She said that some of her adopted kids need to be in traditional school for the structure and for everyone else at home to regroup and have a break.  When I heard that I cried because in my mind everything should be equal and the same for all my kids even though I know what we are currently doing isn't working. 

Other parents have hired people to come in and help them for a few hours because kids who have experienced trauma can be so all consuming.  Darrick and I feel like we have a lot to think and pray about.  We want to do what is best for each of our children and also what is best for us as a family.

Port Gardner Open House

 Last night Port Gardner had their 1st semester Open House.  This semester the boys took "The Science of Sound", "Super Sleuths" and an "Art Class".  Once again they really enjoyed their classes.  Darrick and I enjoyed seeing all their hard work and projects.  Naomi even had one on the wall!

Micah's Wire Sculpture of a wolf

Micah's African Mask

Jacob's Sound Science Project

Micah's Sound Science Project

Celebrating Jacob's 9th Birthday

Can you tell what Jacob is in to this year?

Rosabelle

 At the beginning of January, Naomi got her first pet: a hamster she has named Rosabelle.  One of the other chiefs that Darrick works with was looking for a new home for the hamster since her children are now older.  Naomi is learning how to care for her and clean her cage.  She enjoys putting her in her ball and watching her roll all around the house.

 Now someone else at Darrick's work is trying to give us a puppy that will be born at the end of February...

New Year-2012

Things have been busy but one thing on my list is to keep up with our blog.

The end of 2011 left us with two big questions about what God wanted for us as a family.

We ended the year with our 2nd failed adoption.

It was time for us to pick our next set of orders and so far nothing in WA was available.

So we started off 2012 with a fast.  A food fast for Darrick and I and an electronics fast for the whole family.  The big thing Darrick wanted to deal with was anger.  It is something we knew could rear its ugly head after his deployment as a sign of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  It took awhile but it happened.  It has been hard for us both to deal with.  He is getting help and has people in his life that are now helping him through it.  The big thing that I wanted to deal with was our failed adoptions and if God was saying we are done having kids then I need to be at peace with it.

We also met with each of the kids and had them make 3 goals for the year.  One that has to do with their relationship with God, one thing they want to learn or try and one way they can help others and/or our community.

Darrick and I both have peace and feel that God is telling us that we are a family of 5.  We need to focus on the 3 children that God has given us and teach them His ways.  This verse really spoke to me Acts 10:2 "He and all his family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly".  I also have a sense that God is calling our family to do missions in some way or sometime.

We want to take this year to build our relationships with the kids.  Micah and Darrick have started meeting every other Saturday morning for breakfast and Bible Study.

We also got an answer about our orders.  Darrick will be stationed at Naval Station Bremerton, WA so we don't have to move!

The sweetest Christmas List ever

Happy Adoption Day!

November 14th was the 3 year anniversary of Naomi's adoption day!  Our tradition is to bring out all of the stuff we brought back from Swaziland and display it.  She gets to invite two friends and their families over and we have ice cream cake.  We started the night watching a cultural movie from Swaziland and then some people tried the dancing.  Her friends all made her cards and we all sang "Happy Adoption Day to You".

Fall in WA

Fall has arrived with its cooler weather and beautiful colors.  Well it has been here for awhile but we just took some pictures of the beautiful colors in our back yard and wanted to show you.  One tree in our backyard has gone through a variety of colors from green to orange to red and now yellow.  We also have ornamental plum trees in our back that have turned from purple to red.  Among these beautiful trees we have big evergreen and pine trees too.  One night there was a beautiful full moon and Darrick took a picture.

Jacob wrapped up his soccer season with his last game yesterday.  It was a very chilly 38 degrees at his 9am game and the players and supporters were freezing.  Thankfully Jacob's team won which was a great way to end the season.  They had their party at the Everett Skate Deck and we all decided to roller skate.  Darrick and I have not skated since we were kids and Jacob and Naomi have never skated.  We had to so much fun and Darrick and I even got a few chances to skate holding hands.

Reformation Day

Case Closed

Today we got a call that we were not expecting.  It was from our social worker.  To get the story straight I had to ask her to repeat it to me and I still feel like I don't totally understand.  But here is what she said:

After she did our updated homestudy, she submitted it for us to get our license to adopt.  But because we moved she sent it to the old district and apparently because we are in a new city now, we have a new district.  So she got the old district to send it on to the new one.  When the new person in charge got it, it was past the 30 day time period you have to submit it. Our social worker asked her to overlook it and they would not and the district closed our case.

So what does that mean you may wonder?  Well we went from being licensed foster parents to renewing our license to now not having a license at all.  And as far as they are concerned we need to start the process all over again from square one.

Our social worker apologized over and over and said if we want to start again she will fill out all the paper work for us and all we have to do is sign.

We are still trying to get over the shock and decide what we want to do.  Is this God closing the door?  Is this Satan getting in the way?  Is this a test to see if we will hang in there?  Should we pick a new agency?  Are we supposed to adopt again?  Maybe not local, maybe international again?

Please pray with us as we try to hear God as He leads us.

Time to go Funky

BEFORE Front

BEFORE Back

AFTER

I like keeping my hair interesting.  Usually I just get different cuts when I feel like a change.  I have been wanting to add some color to my hair for awhile.

Before Darrick left for his deployment, he asked me to grow my hair, the whole time he was gone.  So I did and it got really long.  He really liked it when he got home.  He has been home about 6 weeks now and I was getting an itch to cut it.  Darrick said he was fine with that.

So I made an appt. and today went to get a new look.  I had a picture of a style I liked and a picture of hair with red highlights.  When the stylist showed me the colors I thought it would be fun to add other colors too.  So I told her red, purple and blue and let her do it how she thought looked best.  She first had to bleach parts to get the color to take.  Then she added the color and then she cut it.  She did not let me see it the whole time.  Then at the end she turned me around and I was shocked and happy.  It to me a bit to get use to but now I love it.  What do you think?

We are Addicted! Geocaching!

We just watched a show that we taped on DVR that was on PBS called Geocaching.  As soon as they started explaining what it was and how to do it, we couldn't wait to start!  If you have never heard of it, it is basically modern day treasure hunt with GPS.  You go to the website and make a username and password and then you are ready to go.  You then put in your address and you will be amazed at how many geocaches are right next to where you live

We found that there was a few right in Forest Park!  The kids were dying to go so off we went to try and find one before it got dark.  We had to follow the GPS.

We found it!

Log Books

Writing in the log book

All the stuff inside!