This, that, and a big picture dump

Can you count how many children are helping Daddy? SIX! All SIX are here! Under one roof! It is still amazing to me what God has brought about, and we are so thankful! We trimmed our tree with everyone's help on the 15th. Adah enjoyed any ornament that had to do with Mama and Papa, and Nathaniel preferred to eat them, so he got to watch. Daniel's strange get-up was to remind him that this time last year he was in Afghanistan - not this year!

















Playing outside and finally enjoying cold weather (well, cold for us!)













Adah wanted to try on the backpack, so she put Cora's baby doll in it. Obviously, she thought it was hilarious.

Adah was introduced to dunking her cookies, and after looking skeptical, she gave it a try.
She decided she liked it very much!


Daddy reading to ALL the kids!
Introducing our daughter, Macy Gray. :) I took her hair down in anticipation of taking her to the salon later that day. On the way to the salon, we got a flat tire and then it needed to be replaced (oh, yeah - THAT was a fun day!) so her hair had to wait another day. She REALLY looked cute when she put her pink-framed sunglasses at the top of her forehead. At first, she didn't like the look, but when Papa kept telling her that she was beautiful, she decided she looked pretty good. :)

Adah loves to lounge!
Shiloh prepares for her piano recital on December 22nd. She did a FABULOUS job even though she nearly gets stomach ulcers before the event. After the recital, she sighed a deep sigh and said, "Well, THAT'S over for another year." :) She played "Little Drummer Boy" with hand-drum accompaniment from Cora and "Ding Dong Merrily on High."

And here's Shiloh's polar opposite, Cora Milene, who couldn't WAIT for the piano recital. :) She was very disappointed because their piano teacher left her second piece, "O Come All Ye Faithful" OFF the playlist for the evening! She only got to play "We Wish You a Merry Christmas." So she's decided she wants to play "O Come All Ye Faithful" for the church talent show and cookie exchange. Shiloh looked pleadingly at us NOT to ask her to play at the talent show.

And for another big event of the week - Adah's and Nathaniel's baptisms!!! We had them baptized on Sunday, the 23rd. Adah wasn't sure what was going on, although we tried to prepare her by telling her in Kreyol what was going to happen. She also saw a baptism the week before, so maybe that helped. She went up to the front trustingly, though, holding Papa's hand pretty tightly. She gasped a little when the water went over her head because she HATES cold water. Nathaniel was a total ham, kissing me loudly, saying "Boo" to the congregation, smiling at everyone. He tried to put his hand in the baptismal bowl, and then laughed when the water came down over his face. He also tried to lick the water up by slurping. It was a BLESSED day, and we were overwhelmed with thankfulness that the day had finally arrived to add our new children to the covenant community. I was glad I had tissues!

Pastor Webb with Elder Espinoza getting ready to baptize Adah.
Adah is done, and I am handing Nathaniel to Pastor Webb; he wasn't too sure about it!


Pastor Webb prepares to baptize Nathaniel

We pray after their baptisms - Lord, THANK YOU for the work You have done in our family! May they ALL never know a day without Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior!

Nathaniel and Mommy chill out after the service...notice the water and drool on my shoulder!! :)

Nathaniel LOVES kisses!!



The two "A"s in their beautiful dresses. Adah originally tried on the pink dress and really loved it, but it was too small. We were REALLY hoping she would realize it was too small so that we wouldn't have to go through the battle of taking it away and explaining to her what was going on. Thankfully, her sweetness shone through, and she decided that Abigail should have it. When Abigail put it on, she complimented her over and over: "Bel! Bel!" Pretty, pretty.

Well, we are off to enjoy the beautiful weather here and to meet our neighbors' new little girl from China! We wish you a VERY merry Christmas, and I will post pictures at the end of the week!
Love,
Casey

Um...what's happening to our food budget??

I just have a few random photos to post before I head to bed. I haven't downloaded the camera in a few days, and I need to get around to doing that tomorrow. (Maybe?) These pictures were taken before it turned cold again, and now our Haitian kiddos are freezing. Adah wants the water WARM before she washes her hands, but we're trying to convince her that waiting for five minutes for the water to heat up is not good for the budget. Somehow I think she doesn't get that. Daniel was making fun of her whining to get her to laugh, saying, "Wah wah wah - dlo fret, wah wah wah - dlo cho," and she thought it was HILARIOUS. (dlo-water, fret-cold, cho-hot) She repeated it over and over in the van on the way out to piano lessons this afternoon. And when Shiloh exited IHOP this evening and whined about being cold, Adah chimed in with, "Shi-loh, wah wah wah - fret!" Yep, she's catching on to English really well, since she understood what Shiloh was saying in English and managed to make fun of her in Kreyol with that knowledge. :)

And speaking of the budget, these kids are eating their way through it! We're being very careful not to let them overeat while still letting them know that they can have plenty of everything, and they are both champion eaters. We planned to go out for Indian food tonight, but it was CLOSED (*sigh*) so we ended up at IHOP. When we were done, everyone's plate had been cleaned. Adah and Abigail helped me with my pancakes, Jackson and Nathaniel helped Shiloh with her eggs, Nathaniel helped Daddy with half of his meal, and Cora helped Jackson out of one pancake. Everyone seemed to have enough by the end, but next time we're ordering Nathaniel his own meal. On Saturday he will have been home for two weeks, and I think he's gained weight in that two weeks. He's scrawny, so that's a good thing. We have to beef him up for his hernia surgery in January. The surgeon told us that it was not going to close on its own because it was too large, so he's going in in January.

In other totally random news, our neighbors across the street are returning with their new daughter from China in two days!!! We are so excited to see them. The reason we were out and about tonight was to get to the party store to decorate their house for the homecoming, and the girls are thrilled about the lawn sign we found announcing, "It's a Girl!" How neat that we are sharing this experience together. We have commiserated with one another about the length of the weight (21 months for the both of us), the problems with USCIS, and the problems with international adoption in general. If our government and the governments involved would listen to us, we would have the problems solved. :)

Oh, and I don't mean to make everything here sound all peaches and cream all the time. I really must learn the Kreyol words for "please stop whining!" :) Our spunky, opinionated daughter decided that she wasn't happy that we told her not to climb her sister's ladder to the top bunkbed. She decided she was so unhappy with us that she would not eat her lunch, and when lunch was over and put away, she then whined that she didn't have her lunch. Ah, Adah, you shall soon learn that you are not dealing with amateurs and we love you too much to let you get your way all the time. And besides that, haven't you heard of rule number three in the Houseworth house? :) Don't worry, anyone who thinks we're heartless since she just came home just under two weeks ago...we gave her plenty of snuggles, kisses, backrubs, and funny faces to cheer her up. She just wanted to whine. She quit whining to hear a movie I put on and then resumed whining when it was over thirty minutes later. That cracked me up.

Okay, I REALLY have to go to bed now. We have a full day tomorrow.

Love,

Casey

The Day of Drama aka A Very Sad Girl and Very Tired Parents

So we brought Nathaniel to the doctor last Wednesday to get checked out, and everything went very smoothly. The only thing he didn't care for was the band-aid he got on his finger after they pricked it to check his iron level. We brought everyone to the doctor on Thursday so that we could go to the lab afterward to get Adah's and Nathaniel's blood drawn for the gazillion tests they need to run on them.

Not a good plan.

All was going smoothly until, RIGHT after a height and weight check, the nurse tried to prick Adah's finger to check her iron. This was AFTER Daniel told her that Adah doesn't speak English, after he told her that we were having blood drawn at the lab, and after he told her that she might be pretty nervous because this is all new. Adah completely lost it. Daniel sent a nurse to get me from the waiting room where I had the other four children. He and Abigail were trying to calm her down enough to get her undressed for the actual exam. She had her hands over her face, and she was wailing. :( We had gone over with her in her Kreyol picture dictionary what would happen, and we were trying to do that again. She wasn't even opening her eyes. Poor baby. We knew she had no idea what was expected of her and why this was happening to her. We eventually got her undressed and she sat in Papa's lap still wailing. Our pediatrician, who is AWESOME, came in and completely ignored her. He started talking to the other kids, laughing with them, and then examining them one by one on the table. (He even discovered that Abigail had pinkeye! But that's a whole other story.) Then he took Jackson and Abigail outside to put birdseed in the feeder outside the window. By now Adah was curious enough to peek out from behind her hands a little to see what was going on and why the others seemed to be having such a good time. She allowed the doc to examine her, although pretty unwillingly, and she wouldn't look at him. :) Daniel and I looked at each other and thought, "If the doctor's visit was this bad, how in the world are they going to be able to draw blood from her??" She's 48 pounds. FORTY-EIGHT pounds. Cora is 48 pounds. We took deep breaths and decided that we ought to just go for it. She managed to give her sisters a smile on the way to the lab, and that made us feel even worse. She did SO well getting her chest X-ray, and we prepared for the big fight of drawing blood. We warned the lab, and they brought in a huge guy to hold her down. Poor Daniel, who HATES needles and needs Valium to have an IV put in him, held both kids on his lap as they drew blood. Nathaniel did fine, and I cuddled with him while Adah went in. I heard her scream, and then I heard quiet and I thought maybe she had knocked everyone out and run for the door. But no!! She relaxed when Daniel said, "fini, fini" after they got the needle in, and they were able to get all the 52 tubes or so of blood they needed. Okay, it wasn't 52 but it was A LOT. Daniel came out a little white and said, "We need to get food in them right away. I mean right now." So we went to Fazoli's where Adah had two bowls of spaghetti, a piece of pizza, and three breadsticks. The end. And we figure that if she still likes us after we put her through that, then we're ahead of the ballgame as far as attachment goes. :) She talked about the "piki" (shot) a lot, she wanted the bandage off as soon as possible, but then she willingly gave hugs and kisses. Phew. The other kids were a little stressed, so everyone took a rest when we got home. We're waiting a couple of months to get her vaccinations, that's for sure. The good news is that their bloodwork came back normal, except for an iron deficiency in Nathaniel. He's on iron supplement drops, and I think a better diet will help tremendously. He doesn't like vegetables, but when we've insisted that he eat them, he will. So maybe when he refused at the orphanage, they didn't bother to push the issue. I mean, who has time to do that when you have so many other children to look after? (And what am I talking about? Like we don't have so many other children to look after ourselves?? :) )

I've posted some pictures from our first week together. I think we are still in a honeymoon period (other than the doctor's visit, obviously) and things are still going extremely well. It's like they've always been here, which is so weird. Right now, Shiloh, Cora, and Adah are happily coloring Christmas printouts I got off the computer. Adah chatters away in Kreyol, the girls attempt to understand some things, they use sign language, and they keep coloring. It's a beautiful thing.

Some funnies:

Adah likes to give our dog Roscoe treats. We've been working on having her say please and thank you for things. So after she gave Roscoe a bone yesterday, she leaned over and said, "Roscoe, mesi. Mesi, Roscoe." She wanted him to say thank you, and then she laughed at her own joke. She has a great sense of humor.

Adah is very bothered by Abigail's wet hair after bathtime. After they put their nightgowns on, she drags Abigail back into the bathroom to brush her hair. Abigail goes willingly, which says a lot about how Abigail feels about Adah, because when I think of Abigail, I don't generally think of the word "willingly." :)

There is a wedding picture of Daniel and me in the hallway leading upstairs. When Adah passed it the other day, she said, "Papa and Shiloh?" Apparently I have aged - A LOT. :)

Some sweet things:

Nathaniel LOVES to have his belly kissed. He will point to his belly and say, "Mama! Mama!" until I do it over and over again. He has an ADORABLE laugh.

Nathaniel loves Jackson's sword. Thankfully, Jackson has an extra and is willing to share.

Adah is now referring to herself as Adah, and she wrote her name on her school paper yesterday "Adah Jeanvil." Now we have to work on the Jeanvil. Poor kid. Just when she got one thing down... We have not pushed the issue to change her name; we have just all called her that, and she now refers to herself that way. We pray that this will not be a loss to her in the future but that she will understand why we did so.

Adah loves to draw pictures of us, label them "Papa" and "Manman" and put them up everywhere. She loves to pick out pictures of families in magazines and label everyone with our names, including her own and Nathaniel's. It doesn't generally matter if the families are black or white...on Saturday Daniel apparently was Will Smith. That's okay with me. :)

Adah told Daniel she loved him last night for the first time. Yeah, she's a daddy's girl. And I LOVE IT.

Well, I better get going and vacuum. The social worker is coming tonight for our first post-placement visit, and we want to make a good impression. I think we should probably hide all those liquor bottles, then. What do you think? :) Just kidding, y'all. Man.

Love,

Casey

Continuing the Story - LONG POST!

Bad view of the Consulate from the street - our driver was trying to hurry us along - lovely, isn't it?














The Presidential Palace in Port-au-Prince - on one of the only nicely paved streets.





























Statue of Alexandre Petion; Petion was ruler of the southern part of Haiti from 1807 - 1820. This part of Haiti was made up of mostly fair colored Haitians who were born free. He distributed the land to the military.















Part of the UN complex; heavily guarded with razor wire and such; most of the nicer homes had razor wire, gates, dogs, and broken glass embedded in concrete on top of the walls surrounding the houses; our guesthouse also had a guard who manned the gate.

So the story continues...
We arrived for our visa appointment before the Consulate actually opened - yea for our driver, Samuel! We were shown into the Consulate and checked for hazardous material. Adah thought it was funny when she was checked. They took our phones and our cameras, and our driver said the Consulate would call him when they were done. We were the first ones to arrive, and we came before most of the employees showed up. :) The regular person who handles the adoption visas was not there (of course), but a substitute worked hard to get the paperwork in order. While we were there, we met another adoptive mom and her 8 year-old daughter. She had been in Haiti for four months waiting for her daughter to be released from the Ministry of the Interior (where we had been stuck with Adah's paperwork for almost 8 months!). The mom traveled down, leaving her husband and 6 year-old daughter at home because it looked like her orphanage was going under and the children being cared for there were in jeopardy. She said things were starting to get better, but I was thankful that even during our long wait, we didn't have to worry about the orphanage itself going under! She was finally there to get the visa, and I hope she got out the next day. Her daughter spoke excellent English, and the mom said she was already losing a lot of her Kreyol. It's a little sad that Adah will lose that part of her heritage as well. Realistically, we just can't maintain her skills, but we will try to get some video of her singing some songs.

We were told that our visa packets would be ready for pick-up at 2:00 IF the computers were working, and we were done at the Consulate by 8:15 or so. Another driver from Agence Nacia, the organization that processes the paperwork for adoptions, had already shown up to take us to Dr. Bernard's office. We went there to plan the rest of the day. Dr. Bernard suggested that we head to the orphanage since we had brought a lot of donations, and we also wanted to get some pictures for Adah and Nathaniel. Samuel brought us to a gate that led to an alleyway. The alleyway led to the orphanage (technically a "creche," since orphanages in Haiti don't adopt out the children), and we could only get there on foot. It wasn't paved, just a rocky dirt path, so Daniel and Samuel hoisted the HEAVY bags of donations onto their heads to walk to the creche. I wish I could have taken a picture, but I was busy holding Nathaniel, watching my step, and holding Adah's hand. Nathaniel had gone through his diaper (he has an umbilical hernia that makes it difficult to keep diapers where they are supposed to be!) and I was wet as well. Yuck. We arrived at the creche, and the first thing I noticed was the NOISE. This was a concrete building, and the voices bounced off the walls like crazy. They were happy sounds, which was nice to hear, but it sure was loud. They had been popping popcorn in the basement for a snack for the kids, over an OPEN fire. Yikes. We were brought up about four flights of stairs to the little kids' floor. The other floors are for the older kids who were in school. Everyone rushed up to Adah and Nathaniel at once, shouting their names and examining her baby doll. Nathaniel was taken from my arms and taken to his nanny, who helped me change him. She took charge of him the rest of the time so that I could take pictures of all the little ones. Adah's nanny found her, kissed and loved on her, and then asked me if I wanted her to fix Adah's hair. I gratefully said yes! Meanwhile, Daniel was handing out the bags I had sewn for the nannies. I included a little shampoo, conditioner, lotion, and lip gloss. Honestly, the reaction was not what I hoped for. I didn't expect abject gratitude like I had just done them the greatest favor ever, but I didn't expect the total INgratitude either. Immediately, arguments sprang up among the nannies about who had gotten a better bag or who had not gotten a bag at all. I didn't know whether to post this part, but I want to give a totally accurate view of everything that happened. Interestingly, over the past week that Adah has been here, we've been teaching her to say please and thank you when she asks for and receives things - this is something new for her. She's also very grabby and when we go out, she expects to get something and will pout if she doesn't. Maybe this idea of entitlement is a cultural one, although I could never claim to be an expert after spending so little time in Haiti. Dr. Bernard's house staff, who are under his supervision and interact with him daily, were much more polite in their dealings with each other and with us. It was very interesting. We left the donations of clothes, toiletries, toys, candy, and hair bows with the orphanage manager to hand out so that we didn't have another situation with the kids like we did with the nannies.

Anyway, I was so glad to see that the creche was a happy place and the kids seemed to be content, because the place itself was Dickensian. The babies were getting their baths; the nannies sat them on a chair in a tub and washed them that way. I got as many pictures as I could for the still-waiting families, and it made me so sad to see them all in their "cages," the cribs that are stacked on top of one another. The orphanage is so overcrowded because kids are not going home to their families due to the processing problems. A new orphanage is being built next to the guesthouse an hour out of Port-au-Prince, and Dr. Bernard says he hopes to have all the babies moved there by next summer. The nanny to child ratio is very good at New Life Link, and our kids had specific nannies who took care of them all the time. Adah's nanny was THRILLED that she had a mama and a papa, and she kissed and hugged us about ten times before we left. One of the most touching things during the visit was an older girl named Alexandra who came to me and asked to have her picture made with Adah. The creche makes an effort to pair older girls and younger girls with the same nanny so that they develop a sisterly relationship. Alexandra was part of the Hope for the Children of Haiti orphanage, the sister orphanage for older children. She gave me a note to give to Adah, and I read it when we got home. It was overwhelming. It was written in very good English (Hope for the Children of Haiti's goal is to graduate the children with skills that will help them better Haiti), and it expressed Alexandra's desire that Adah would grow in the Lord, love her new family, and never forget her. She said she was sad that Adah was leaving, but that she wanted Adah to know that she always had a sister in Haiti. Phew. That was emotional. One of the other older girls came by to ask if I knew her adoptive mom (I did) and she wanted to pass along her love for her. She wanted a picture with Nathaniel, so I have two precious pictures to give our children. I wanted to get one of Adah with her three favorite friends, but they were in school.

We left the creche, and Daniel tried to push the door shut. It wouldn't shut, so he was going back to shut it, but Adah was pulling on him with all her strength; she didn't want to go back. Later in the car on the way back to the office, she started crying. Poor Papa just held her and rubbed her back. This is tough thing for a little girl to handle. Driving around town brought us face to face with the utter poverty in Haiti. I posted pictures of the Presidential Palace, which is indeed beautiful. But we didn't get pictures of the sights that were common everywhere else. Trash was EVERYWHERE. Clothes were laid out on tin roofs to dry, if the dwellings had roofs at all. Otherwise, we saw socks hanging off rebar sticking out of cinder blocks. I am sure that we saw the worst of Haiti (except for Cite Soleil, the absolute worst slum) and had we gotten into the countryside, we would have seen some of the beauty I've appreciated on a missionary's blog. However, what we saw was depressing and oppressive beyond words. And that is what is normal in Port-au-Prince everyday for all those children we saw walking to school, all the ladies carrying bundles on their heads, and all the men standing by the road with shovels waiting for work. We are INCREDIBLY blessed to live in such a prosperous nation, and I admire the resiliency of spirit it would take to find any measure of happiness in a place which requires so much just to survive. And yet it's just normal life there, and I feel like a typical American snob talking about how depressing I found it, when clearly the Haitian people don't find it depressing at all.

Anyway, Adah recovered when we got to Dr. B's office, and we settled down to wait for the visa packet to be ready. Nathaniel was ready for a nap, and he actually laid down on a bed that Dr. B. has in the back room of his office. I laid down on a couple of chairs put together, and Daniel and Adah hung out. Daniel discovered that our daughter is a genius (no, really! :) ) when she began drawing people in our family and writing their names above their heads. She drew Cora, and then wrote "Cola" above the head because she can't say CoRa. She was also writing the alphabet and Daniel was telling her the English pronunciations for each letter. She was more interested in teaching him the Kreyol pronunciations. She listened to my iPod for awhile as well. :) She liked the Kreyol Bible songs, but she liked my workout music more, including the Army cadence songs I use for running. Around lunchtime, we heard beautiful singing and realized the office staff had broken for devotions. They were singing a hymn with guitar accompaniment. We smelled something baking, and it smelled delicious. The office manager brought in some lunch, and it was some sort of meat pastry, like we used to have in England. The meat was spicier, though, and very good. Adah was HUNGRY, and she tried to eat three of them, which would have left Nathaniel with none. I managed to save it for Nathaniel. We chatted with Dr. B. a bit about the state of adoptions in Haiti (not good) and the solutions (there are none). Typical of the communication we've experienced thus far with our adoption, someone from the office had gone to PICK UP our visa packets and we didn't know they were there until Dr. B. casually announced that they were making copies of the paperwork. That was IT, the last of the paperwork, the only thing we needed to go HOME!!!!! We got on the cell phone to make plans to return home the next day instead of Saturday. We got the new itinerary by email at Dr. B.'s office, and we returned to the guesthouse by dinnertime. Adah and Nathaniel both fell asleep on the way up the mountain. We passed a quiet evening with dinner, bathtime, Bible reading, prayer, and then bedtime. Daniel and I began to pack, and I began to feel a sense of urgency that I just wanted to get HOME as soon as possible. I wanted to leave right then if I could!

The next morning, we said farewell to Dr. Bernard and his wife Claudette, got a good picture in the stairwell of the guesthouse and headed down the mountain. Adah was sick again from nerves, and this time the plastic bag came in handy! She got sick over and over, poor baby, and then fell asleep. (She definitely wasn't sick with a tummy bug or anything; she was FINE other than her nerves!) Samuel had the radio tuned to an American station, and they were starting to broadcast Focus on the Family. Get this - the topic was adoption. Here we were bringing our kids home, and we were listening to Focus on the Family IN HAITI on adoption. Several people were giving their adoption stories, and we were looking at each other tearing up. :) We arrived at the airport without any problem, found an airport attendant willing to help us, and got through security with Adah only throwing up once. We settled down to wait for our 10:20 flight. Daniel chatted with several Mennonite missionaries who were traveling home on furlough. Nathaniel did his best cute faces for everyone. We walked out to the plane, and Adah went crazy with delight when she first saw the plane. She started dragging me with her because she was so excited! Alas, excitement was not good for her tummy either. She threw up again, but not much came up (I know, too much information). The rest of the flight went without any problems, and I was never so happy to land on U.S. soil in Miami. We didn't have any problems with immigration, but we didn't realize that we would be detained for an unknown length of time in customs. Yikes!!! Another adoptive mom who brought home two little ones from Guatemala had already missed her connecting flight. The customs officials were NOT helpful and were in fact pretty rude. Thankfully, we did make it out of there in time to get to our connecting flight to Atlanta. The flight was ahead of schedule until we got onto the tarmac. Somehow we left an hour late. I was too busy dealing with Nathaniel's naughtiness and I didn't realize. Daniel and Adah were in the front of the plane and I was in the VERY back. She only threw up once before the plane even took off, and then they had a grand time the rest of the flight. Nathaniel and I had a battle royale, however. :) He wanted to get down; I insisted that he couldn't. He gave me everything he had with two year old behavior plus orphanage behavior- hitting, scratching, and biting. At least there was no screaming. :) I thanked my friend Kelly for making me a sling so I could tuck his arms in, cinch him down, and hold him very tightly to keep him from misbehaving. By the end of the flight, we had come to a truce, and he started falling asleep. The lady next to me and the lady in the next row up were so sweet and encouraging to me. One of the ladies said, "Honey, you don't have to apologize for nuthin'. I know about kids, I raised ten of 'em myself." :) Because of the delay in Miami, we missed our flight in Atlanta, and the next flight didn't leave until 9:15. So much for getting home early. I had pretty much had it by then. :) I called Mom and whined to her. Daniel kept it together for both of us, booked us on that flight, and got some food in us. Thank you, Lord, for giving me a husband who sees what needs to be done and does it. Thank you, Lord, that he takes such good care of me. He let me go off by myself for a bit to take a breath. On our last flight, the two people who were sitting in seats next to me were willing to exchange seats with Daniel and Adah so we could all sit together (they got the bulkhead seats that Daniel and Adah had, so we didn't feel too guilty about asking them to switch! :) ). Daniel helped me deal with Nathaniel, but he was SO much better the third flight. And Adah was an old hand at flying by then - no throwing up!!! We were giddy with thankfulness - and exhaustion! We landed in Raleigh at 11:30 or so. Adah experienced cold weather for the first time, and she didn't care for it! I don't blame her. Daniel got a Mountain Dew, put both car seats in the car, and prepared to drive home. I called a friend who lives in Kuwait since it was breakfast time by then for her. :) Adah struggled to stay awake, because she wanted to give her sisters the lotions she picked out for them at the Atlanta airport. Nathaniel fell asleep right away. Adah recognized the house from a picture I brought down, and she announced "lakay mwen!" when we arrived. "My house!" She ran inside, asked which way to go, ran upstairs, asked which way to go, ran into her room, got right in Abigail's face, and said loudly, "Abby gale! Abby gale!" She gave out the lotions, asked if the bed under Cora's was hers, promptly undressed, and got into bed. We coaxed her out to go to the bathroom, got Nathaniel ready, put them both to bed, and then got ready for our first night ALL under the same roof.

Whew! This has been a book...I didn't intend for it to be this long! On my next post, I will put up pictures of our first week together and talk about some firsts. We are SO enjoying being a family of eight, and it is already as if they have always been here. I am thankful to be able to say that Nathaniel is doing MUCH better with his behavior. We've had lots of snuggles and Daddy has been using his Daddy voice. Nathaniel doesn't normally try to strike out now when he doesn't like what's going on. I sure was worried that we had A LOT of work to do after that second flight from Miami! We are working on making better eye contact with him, and we know that attachment and bonding is a LONG process. We are enjoying his giggles and belly laughs tremendously. Adah has also amazed us with her strength of spirit. In a few short hours on the flight from Port-au-Prince to Miami, she went from understanding everyone around her to not understanding ANYONE around her (in addition to the fact that she is now surrounded by white people!) and she is still laughing. She plays wholeheartedly, and she tries to join in with whatever the kids are doing. She actually likes our dog (that is HUGE!) and gives him bonbons (cookies). She also likes to help around the house, asking where certain plates go and taking them to the table. On the down side, she has a serious pouting problem that we will be working on. :) She didn't want to wear the dress I picked for her this morning, so she started crying. Daniel and I remind each other that she is emotionally much younger than five, but we're still starting to set boundaries by telling her that the number three rule in the Houseworth household is no whining. :) There are only three rules, and No Whining made the big three.

Next post...the doctor's visit. It was worse than we thought it was going to be, and we are glad it's OVER :)














Adah jamming to the workout music on my iPod.














Nathaniel with his nanny at the creche.


















Adah with her nanny - a very smiley and sweet lady!














One of the cuties in a school uniform at the creche. They LOVE sunglasses, and we walked into the 2 year old classroom to find them singing Christmas carols with sunglasses on! :) I wanted to post more pictures from the creche, but I didn't want to do it without parents' approval. I thought this little one was incognito enough.















Daniel discovering how truly brilliant our little Adah is. She is in our equivalent of the first grade, so she writes in cursive - she just turned five!

Well, I better go pay attention to my family now. We're finally decorating our Christmas tree tonight!

Love,
Casey

This Time Last Week

Well, at this time last week we were waiting in Dr. Bernard's office to receive our visas for the children. We had already gone to the visa appointment at 7:00 that morning, and we visited the orphanage after that. How crazy that it's been a week already!
Here's the beginning of the complete story since I finally have time to sit and post (unless someone wakes up from a nap!)
We flew into Port-au-Prince last Wednesday night, and we arrived a little after 6:00 due to a delay. As we stepped off the plane onto the stairs (they don't have walkways), Daniel remarked, "It smells just like Pristina." It was a lovely smell of burning tires and trash. I was really nervous about arriving after dark, but the Lord provided for us...shortly after we boarded the plane in Miami, a man walked up to us and asked, "Are you Daniel and Casey?" It was Dr. Bernard, our orphanage director! He was flying home to Haiti after being in Boston for meetings, so he and his wife Claudette were able to help us navigate immigration, customs, and baggage claim. After FINALLY claiming our bags (all four arrived - yea!) we began the wonderful experience of trying to get to our transportation. A whole host of men descended upon us and tried to put their hands on our bags in order to "help" and get paid for it. Dr. Bernard designated one person, and then they all fought with him about whether they could help. Samuel, our very distinguished-looking driver, came to the rescue and manhandled everyone. Dr. Bernard then told us not to be surprised if our kids were there to greet us because of the delay in the flight. My heart jumped into my throat! Sure enough, when we arrived at the tap-tap (a converted pick-up truck meant to carry just as many Haitians as can cram on - often brightly colored with murals and Haitian proverbs) our kids were there!!! Adah gave a little wave and a big smile. Nathaniel's nanny handed him to Daniel as soon as we got in, and she encouraged Adah to come sit beside me. And then we were off through the incredibly bumpy streets on our way up the mountain to the guesthouse. It took an hour to get there, and Daniel and I tried to take in the fact that we were sitting with the children that we waited so long to meet! Adah shyly showed me her toys and about halfway up the mountain she stretched her hand over to rest in my lap. Nathaniel just snuggled with Daniel and sucked his thumb. He ended up falling asleep on the way, even despite the bumps. We didn't see much on the way up except for people trying to sell their wares by lantern light or candlelight on the streets. Some of the streets were incredibly narrow, and they were ALL bumpy. Samuel must have known exactly where each of the bumps were because he stopped before all the big ones. We finally arrived and were greeted by two other adoptive parents and their little ones. After settling in to our HUGE room, we were invited downstairs for some dinner. The nanny had explained that she tried to feed Adah before coming to the airport, but when she told Adah that they would be going to pick up Mama and Papa after she finished eating, Adah pushed her plate away and announced, "Fini!" :) So she hadn't eaten anything. We had chicken, bean sauce, a spicy cabbage dish, a vegetable casserole, and salad. The kids ate really well, and the chicken was delicious. Dr. B.'s wife is a great hostess.
We decided not to try baths the first night because everyone was exhausted, so we put them in their jammies, Adah decided who was sleeping where, Daniel read from the Kreyol Bible, we prayed, and then we put them down and hoped for the best. :) They were asleep in minutes, and Adah was snoring!!! We felt incredibly blessed, overwhelmed by the experience of meeting our kids, and TIRED. We prepared for the next day, and hit the hay. After resting for a couple of minutes, Daniel said, "You sleep here with Nathaniel, I'll sleep over there with Adah." :) He was already taken with her, and she with him.
We were up the next morning at 4:30 in order to be at breakfast at 5:30. We had to get down the mountain for the visa appointment at 7:00. Adah did not want to be woken up, but she dressed quickly when she saw the cute dress we brought for her. We had fried plaintains, bananas, eggs with onion, and peanut butter sandwiches for breakfast! :) Adah tried the grapefruit juice and made a hilarious face. She did not care for it. On the way to the visa appointment, we discovered that the mountain road bothered her. She was telling us that her tummy hurt, and we got a plastic bag out quickly! She went to sleep, though, so she made it without any problem to the Consulate. It was hard to see her in pain, poor baby.
More to come...we need to get the two older girls to piano. I'm so thankful that Daniel is home for such a long time to help with this transition!! :)
Love,

Casey

Daniel with the kids on our first night

Casey with the kids on our first night

On the tap-tap on the way down the mountain to the visa appointment

Reactivated!

Hello again everyone!

I've missed writing on the blog, but I've certainly enjoyed others' blogs in the time I've been gone! I particularly enjoyed one mom's blog as she chronicled the journey to bring their three kids home from Haiti, and I liked the fact that she has continued writing during the early days of their homecoming. I wanted to remember this time in our lives, but anyone who knows me knows that I have a terrible memory. So I thought that re-starting the blog would be a good way to capture these first weeks as a family of EIGHT. :) Now that the explanation is out of the way, on to the good stuff.



Adah Resilia Houseworth and Nathaniel Erickson Houseworth arrived home on December 7th, 2007. (Okay, technically it was December 8, 2007 since it was 1:30 in the morning!) Adah means "beloved addition" and Nathaniel means "gift of God," and these are the names we chose for them. Adah's birth name is Tania, and Nathaniel's birth name is Erickson. We used Adah's birth mom's name, Resilia, as her middle name when we found out that she had died when Adah was nine months old.


Before I begin the long story of the trip to Haiti to pick them up, let me post a picture first and then catch up later when I have time. I wanted to get this post out as quickly as possible so that everyone could see the new members of the Houseworth family!! This picture was taken in the Atlanta airport before we boarded the last of three flights to come home. After being up since 5:30 that morning, we were boarding at 9:15 p.m. for the flight to Raleigh because Delta caused us to miss our connection in Atlanta (I'm not bitter). We were bone tired, but we were SO HAPPY to be on U.S. soil with the children. More to come...



Love,

Casey