September Update

Hi All,

I think I realized a few weeks ago that I hadn't updated you all about the fact that the courts did end up closing, but were open a bit longer than usual into the rainy season. The courts should re-open sometime next month to begin hearing adoption cases again. So hopefully we'll get our first court date in October since our paperwork will have been in Ethiopia for several months by then.

We got some good news about a week ago - three of the other children we had considered adopting have found families. This is really exciting! Maybe we'll get to meet some of these families when we travel, since it seems like we all may be at about the same point in the process. I really had feared they wouldn't find families and wanted to adopt them all myself!

We had our fund-raising garage sale last weekend. It was a lot of work! We started the day with someone taking/stealing our garage sale signs and having no shoppers for about 30 minutes. I had trouble not getting angry when I realized what had happened. Don't know if the city took them or just someone who wanted some nice signs to re-use for their future sales.

We were able to raise about $400 during the sale. I wasn't really bummed that it wasn't more - but garage sales really make you understand the value or should I say "liability" of having "stuff" - you can't get much money out of it when you sell it later. Definitely should make one rethink the purchases in the first place, eh? And I've admitted it might be my first and last garage sale - I really don't love the haggling. The same day as the sale, someone committed to giving us at least $500.00 toward the adoption, closer to our travel date. So that ended up being a really good fundraising day after all. :)

I've been blessed to have some opportunities now to make some extra money during the day when the kids are in school - so I think I'm done with fundraising for the present! At least garage sales, anyway :)

Our good friends here in town brought home their lovely two-year old daughter from Ghana today. She was a sweetie. I had a great longing when I met her to have my baby Samuel home to snuggle with. Didn't want to be jealous, - it definitely helps to stay busy so you don't think those thoughts too often! But so glad she's home. Good to be reminded that there is that joy at the end of the wait.

I've really been enjoying having my kids in school. We have a great neighborhood elementary school and I'm just glad not to have the responsibility for managing all their schooling this year. And I'm actually enjoying helping with the homework - lots of fun reading, like Little House on the Prairie. Just didn't seem to find the time to do much of that last year when we were homeschooling. And reading to my kids is one of my favorite times of the day, if I'm not too tired (yeah, I remember my mom falling asleep when she read to us at night too - I am that mom now!)

Oh, our fingerprints finally went through after various problems. Todd didn't have to drive to OKC again to re-do them. I guess they were "readable" - so that's good.

Okay, I hope I've covered all the new developments here. We might get some more new photos of the kids in the next couple of weeks as another family is traveling this week to pick up their new children.

I'm also hoping to start learning how to download my photos so I can post some new ones of the kids here - Lydia is doing "'pioneer day" this Friday and has a really great dress to wear.

So stay tuned - I will post something before Samuel and Lydia Sissay are home. :)