Good news!

Hi all! I arrived home in Tulsa late Saturday night. We found out on Friday, the 11th, that Sammy had all his waiver paperwork back in and we were able to leave the country. We cancelled our flights with Britsh Air (which we had learned needed a transit visa to go through London per Sammy's Ethiopian passport) and went to the travel agency to change our tickets to Turkish Air so we could leave that night, at 2 am.

The trip to Ethiopia was very good. The beautiful sights and abject poverty we saw were very sobering. The disparity between the rich and the poor in Addis was sharp. But the people were beautiful. We enjoyed spending time with the four other families staying at the guest house during portions of our stay, and we very sad that the two other families traveling with us, were not able to leave Friday like we were - we were waiting on waivers for four kids between the three families - only two children received their paperwork back on Friday, and the other child was waiting for his sister's paperwork, so his family was not able to leave.

It was, of course, so good to see my family at home. Graham looked bigger than I remembered - I guess that comes from carrying a 17-month old around for two weeks.

So much to say, maybe I'll try to post again, once my head is a bit clearer.

Oh, and the day we left Ethipia, we learned that Lidiya Sissay passed court and is also officially an "Emory". I'll try to post some photos of her and Sammy later in the week. We got to meet her family in Ethiopia, two aunts (from mother and father's sides), two grandmothers, her half-sister, and her young three-year old cousin. so many women in her life, but no men. Her parents died about six years ago. While we don't understand why her aunt could not care for her; although she is relatively poor, we are honored to have her in our family. And yes, she does have the most delightful smile you've ever seen.

So good to be home! We were gone right at two weeks - left Sunday morning after Thanksgiving and returned Saturday night almost two weeks later. Couldn't have hoped for a better turnaround on our paperwork.

All my kids have beds!

Aha! We are buying a crib this weekend. We, being the kind folks that we are, gave our last crib to a man doing some hauling for us who had just had his third child. Thus, we were "cribless". One of my sister-in-laws in Kansas City who has a children's consignment sale twice a year (kind of like Just Between Friends) located a crib and a changing table for us. So now all my children have beds! Yeah, Just need to get our kids home now to their new beds!

July is half over!

I just realized as I was typing up an email to friends about the adoption, that our official paperwork went to Ethiopia 1 1/2 months ago. Wow! I guess there is still hope that the kids will be home in 2009.

Again, to recap. We are waiting on a court date/s - we anticipate a few before our case passes and the kids are officially Emorys! I try to stay busy (yeah, a concept for me!) and pray a lot so I don't stress out too much. God's in control and I can't wait to see how He orchestrates all the particulars to get the kids home and see us as a family of 7.

Lydia has been at a Girl Scout camp this week. Her good friend asked her to go, and although we thought she might be a bit young, she was "up for it" & seems to be having a good time from the postcard we got today. (Really weird that they allow almost no contact with child during the week - although we are allowed to email her and they print the emails and give them to her in the mornings). We will pick her up in two days.

Elise and Graham and I have been hanging out when I've not been working - and I told Elise tomorrow is "her day" - we'll do whatever she wants to do as long as we stay at home - I anticipate it might be a "movie marathon" day. We'll let Graham tag along I said.

We are all traveling to Texas the last week of July for fun in the sun! Ha. Better be water involved since Texas is, inconceivably, hotter than Oklahoma. Yes, we're in the "dog days of summer" - numerous, consecutive days over 100 degrees!

But, I'm not complaining, because this winter was much, much too long!

Thank you, God, for the sun!
I guess that's all for now.

Hello World!

Hi friends!

I said I'd never get a Wii, an I-Phone, or join Facebook, - now it looks like I'm going to become a blogger. It is a new world! (but I'm holding out on the I-Phone and I still have a landline) I'm mainly starting a blog so those of you who are interested can read what I know about the adoption process here, rather than me bombarding you with emails.

My passions are learning about other cultures, teaching English to the wonderful immigrants I've gotten to meet, snuggling with my kids, learning about diseases related to poverty, advocating for children with HIV, and reaching out to orphans. God has been so good to let me be involved in all these areas - my passions. Wow! But maybe they were His passions to start out with. Pretty cool - that I'm in tune enough to feel like they were just my own desires.

I have three beautiful, wonderful, unique children. And we are so fortunate to be adding nine-year old Lydia #2 to our family as well as baby Samuel (13 months) - finalized name to be determined. Although the name "Samuel" is pretty nice. Names are so important - so I won't belabor that point. (Besides the fact that my husband and I aren't totally "synced" on the names for the baby) It's all up for change anyway.

Todd and I celebrate our 10th year of wonderful marital bliss next month - yeah, the first five years I wouldn't call marital bliss. Ha. Yeah, this is year number 15. Todd is a wonderful patient man who has put up with much from being married to a Pfanstiel. Yes, there is Grace in the world! He also gave me the gift on Mother's Day this year of being able to say "Yes" to two beautiful children from Ethiopia instead of one now, one later. Truly a gift!

I've been teaching 11 years for the YWCA Multicultural Center here in Tulsa - teaching ESL that is - yeah, not the computer language, but the Second Language as in ENGLISH. I've been blessed to meet many interesting, beautiful folks through this experience. I kind of fell into this job when I finished my Master's Degree from OSU in 1994 and love teaching Adult education. It's truly a gift to be teaching students who want to be in class! Also, I've been teaching at night so I could homeschool during the day.

I also work part-time for my dad who is a pediatrician here in town. That's been a blessing to be involved in helping him and working flexible hours, most at home.

In the past we've hosted international students in our home as "homestay" students. That was wonderful - we've become fans of Korean food and real Russian food and have met some "new family members" . We'll probably be taking a break from that now, as we'll soon have five children! Wow, never knew I'd be that mom - although as I think back upon childhood wishes - I always wanted to be a mom. And a teacher. Worked out pretty well.

We have been homeschooling for the past few years, but I'm kind of at the end of myself regarding homeschooling this year. Need to get this house cleaned from top to bottom before our new children come home. I'm scared about this transition to school, so I won't talk about it - I've changed my mind about twice a day, since we considered putting the 3 in our neighborhood school this year. But if all goes as plans, I'll be enrolling them tomorrow.

Yeah, kind of looks like I had four jobs last year - trouble is that was really the case. But God's grace was there. I didn't shout at my kids every day! Might want to add I love being busy. In case you didn't notice.

Well, I know many are interested in the adoption - so I'll try to post what I can about that.

We are waiting for a court date for our Ethiopian beauties - although it might be a little while, since Ethiopia is having major infrastructure issues (ie. electricity outages) and August and September are usually the rainy season where I understand the roads are basically impassable thus court is not in session. So realistically, we won't have a court date until, at earliest, October.

After we pass court, (which typically doesn't occur on the first court date) - we'll travel within two months to get our kids.

I'm pretty "laissez faire" about the adoption process - I can't control any of it; so I just pray as much as I can. We do want to get our kids home as soon as we can though so they can access some more consistent healthcare which they are in need of.

Thanks for reading this far.

You may not see much more from me until the kids are in school in a month.
Faith