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

Wow!

It's been awhile since I posted! So sorry for the lack of communication. We arrived safely in North Carolina on June 14th despite Tropical Storm Alberto trying to drown us. We found a house about four days later only to find out that we couldn't close on the house until August 1st! It was good -and bad- to know that the general who owned the house couldn't even do anything to speed up the transportation office; he couldn't get movers in until the 30th of July. Just this once, it would have been nice for rank to have greater privileges. :)

So we stayed in a two-bedroom apartment with no internet access until we moved in here on the 3rd. I actually had to go to the library to check email. I mean, how uncivilized is that?? I realized how completely spoiled I was, and Daniel and I both realized that, books and La-Z-boy aside, we really don't need the other 80% of what we own. :) It would have been nice to have one more bedroom in the apartment, though, since all the kids were sharing. Jackson liked it tremendously because he had company for the first time since he was born. The girls liked having him in there a little less. I tried to call around to find another place to stay since our wait would be a long one, but I couldn't find a place that had the triumvirate: it had to be furnished, it had to be short-term, and it had to accept a big basset hound mix named Roscoe P. Coltrane. No deal. The apartment stay was actually not that bad; the only thing that made it stressful was that we had a downstairs neighbor who complained about the noise because she slept during the day and worked at night! How in the world am I supposed to keep four children and a dog quiet enough for someone below us in an apartment building to be able to sleep during the day?? We tried to get out soon after breakfast and stay out until lunchtime. We definitely explored Fayetteville! My mom and stepdad graciously took in the displaced persons, and we spent some time in Tennessee as well. What a gorgeous drive over the mountains!

So we are (somewhat) settled in our new place, and it's beginning to feel like home. The girls like having stairs and a fireplace - their only two requirements for a home. Jackson enjoys the stairs as well and tries to break his time record each day for sliding down backwards on his belly. Ouch! I enjoy having big pine trees and not being able to hear my neighbors when they talk in normal voices. Roscoe enjoys sleeping on the sunny deck. I think Daniel will enjoy his study (think wall-to-wall books) once he's able to actually sit down with all the projects yet to do in the house. He's in Germany right now for work, but he returns on Thursday night.

We have been in IBESR (Haitian social services) since April 17th, and it sounds like dossiers are starting to move a little faster through the system. We're praying that Adah and Nathaniel will come out of IBESR in September and be ready to come home in October. We really don't like the idea of them being in Haiti for hurricane season, but we trust that the Lord will protect them. He can certainly do a much better job than we can!

Well, I need to get our day started since we are back to school. Shiloh's favorite subject is art, I believe, judging from the prodigious amounts of artwork she creates. I bought several art books to help with her technique, and we'll be exploring different mediums as well. I'm enjoying learning Latin along with Shiloh, and Cora's favorite subjects so far are math and science. Okay, whose child is she?? I guess my Dad's engineering brain skipped a generation. She especially likes bugs, so we've been checking out books and videos from the library on beetles. Wow, I really like to read about beetles (said sarcastically). I'm with Shiloh when she says, "yuck." But I admire how the Lord gave her such an interest, and I'm doing my best to feed it. :) She really wants to catch the HUGE spider that hangs out outside our kitchen window, but I draw the line at spiders. I'm letting the spider stay there for now to encourage her observation, but sooner or later the spider has to die - whether naturally or by my hand, I can't say. I guess I have to live by my own rule when I tell the children, "if it's outside and it's not trying to hurt you, you need to let it live." Abigail is learning to read, and has just started blending three letter words. What a big step! As long as I keep the lessons very short, she wants to "do school" each day. She's also learning math concepts and some handwriting. I want to start earlier with her on correct positioning of the pencil in her hand since I've had to correct Shiloh's and Cora's to their - and my - exasperation. :)

I hope to post more often now that we are settled. Thank you to all of you who prayed for us throughout this move. We are very conscious of the Lord's mercy to us.
Love,
Casey

Moving Day

Well, we are packing out tomorrow, so tomorrow night will be spent at a hotel here in town. The kids are excited about that, and I am, too - I love hotels. We'll stay there Thursday night, Friday night, Saturday night, and Sunday night. And Monday morning it's off to North Carolina! Actually, we'll stay in Savannah that night. So we still have a ways to go before we get to our new temporary home. We've reserved a room at an extended stay hotel that has two rooms and a kitchen. Right now I don't really care about the lack of space; I'll just be glad not to clean for awhile! Keeping a house clean for showing was a pain. :)

Getting ready for this move has been a good thing. We have been donating or throwing things away left and right, and I like that organized, uncluttered feeling. Our version of spring cleaning is to move. It's not a system that would work for everyone, but apparently it works pretty well for us.

We're all well here, which is amazing considering the chaos of the household. Usually we have immune systems crashing, but I'm praying that we all make it through this move with not even a sniffle.

Daniel and I celebrated ELEVEN years of wedded bliss yesterday. :) It's so hard to believe that we've been married for eleven years and that we've known each other for fifteen. God has been so gracious to us to preserve us through those ...um...difficult...early years. :) We give Him all the glory, and we celebrate the fact that we are stronger now than we've ever been. May the Lord grant us MANY more years with one another. I'm eager to see how He changes us and where He brings us! It's all good with Daniel as my partner in life. Okay, enough with the mushy stuff. :)

Well, goodbye warm, sunny Florida. Goodbye, sandals all year round. Goodbye, lanai where I can sip my coffee on December mornings. Goodbye, pool water that is ninety degrees.

And back to reality...goodbye, hurricanes that can wipe us off the map! Goodbye, "love bugs" that smash against my windshield by the thousands in May. Goodbye, houses in cloned neighborhoods where the building is out of control. And goodbye, snakes in my hose box! :) I won't miss certain things, but I sure will miss being warm all the time. I REALLY hate being cold. :)

I'll try to post when we arrive safely in North Carolina.
Love to all-
Casey

A Not-So-Brief Update

We have not officially sold the house, but we have entered the government buy-out program, and Prudential Relocation Services apparently bought the house from us for $10.00. Now THAT'S a good deal. :) They will consider any offers we receive, and if we don't receive any, they will give us an offer based on two appraisals we had yesterday and today. We'll receive a check for 75% of the equity at that time, and the remainder of the money upon closing about June 30th. We'll also receive a letter to our lender assuring them that we can go ahead and put an offer on a house in NC because the sale is a "done deal" in the government program. Hooray for that! We might have an offer this evening (the buyers are supposed to sign the paperwork today) but it's Prudential's decision to accept it or not. We'll wait and see!

Meanwhile, we're packing out on the 8th, picking up on the 9th, and leaving on the 12th. If you haven't checked your calendar, that's NEXT WEEK!!! Wow. I can't believe it. I need to organize homeschooling stuff this weekend, and we need to make lots of lists. Other than that, we're relaxing and spending as much time as we can with friends and with each other at the pool.

By the way, I attended my first ever homeschool convention last weekend, and here's what I learned:

1. There are way fewer people wearing denim jumpers than I thought. I was a little disappointed.

2. Those pull-along carts are not for dorks, as I first thought - you really need them when you go into the vendor area and buy everything in sight.

3. Don't go into the vendor area if you want to have enough money to feed your family the next week.

4. Homeschooling families tend to have a lot of children. (*disclaimer* I know this is not always the case; it just seemed like there were ten thousand children there, which was okay, because they were not my children and I had no responsibility for them.)

5. The tapes of the sessions come in handy when you elect to skip sessions to lie around the pool. Lest you hurl insults at me like "you homeschooling slug," just know that I already know that. And three hours at the pool by myself is worth it.

6. Homeschool veterans are VERY wise, knowledgeable, and usually funny. They are a great resource.

So that's what I learned at the homeschooling convention. I had a WONDERFUL time of refreshment, encouragement, and relaxation. The hot tub helped with the last one, I think. :) I'm flying down to Florida for this homeschool convention next year. Florida's convention is supposed to be the swankiest, and I just can't come down from "lap of luxury" to "just ordinary" for my homeschool convention experience.

Oh, one more thing... I saw a T-shirt at the convention that said, "I'm not talking to myself. I'm having a parent-teacher conference." :) I like that.

Hope ya'll are doing well!
Love,
Casey

And you wonder why...

...Jackson thought his father was a terrorist and screamed when he saw him in the kaffiyeh?

Daniel says the next time he goes, he'll bring back a "man-dress" to complete the look. The kaffiyeh just doesn't accessorize a polo very well.

Nice House for Sale

4 bedrooms; 2 bathrooms; 2 car garage; large kitchen with island; ceramic tile in all hallways, kitchen, family room, and bathrooms...You can have the refrigerator, the washer and dryer, and maybe a really cute small child if you're willing to pay our listing price.

Anybody interested? We'll give you a good deal! Get it now before the government does in the buy-out program!

Love,
Casey

I Almost Forgot!

Shiloh had her portfolio evaluation on May 2nd, and she has been officially promoted to the second grade!!! Yea! She did a marvelous job, and I think she showed the evaluator every project she's done all year. Mama and the kids are taking a much-needed break this week, and then we'll continue with some light schooling until the move. We celebrated with a dinner out and then Daddy ended up coming home two days later, so this past week has been a wonderful one. Abigail was going around shouting, "Shiloh's in the second grade, Cora's in the first grade, and I'm in preschool!" She thought Shiloh's promotion meant her official promotion, too, which I guess it does.

Love to all!

One thing to cross off the waiting list

Daniel is HOME!!!!!! After finding a house in Fayetteville (or so we thought, but more on that later...) he called Wednesday night to see if we wanted to pick him up at 9:00 the next morning. Well, of course! We BARELY made it in time because of traffic; we ran from the van all the way to the gate and arrived just as the first group was coming off the trams. Phew. It was a good thing he was in the back of the plane. The girls had dressed in their Sunday best and made signs for Daddy. Jackson made a sign, too, although it was a little less understandable. :) The girls ran to him as Jackson watched from the stroller. Jackson didn't seem strange with him at all...he wanted to hold Daddy's hand as we walked to baggage claim, he wanted to hug him, and he called him "Dada." He didn't want to let go of his hand for Daniel to get the bags off the conveyor belt. :) He's been fine with him the whole time except when Daniel put on the kaffiyeh he brought back with him (the Middle Eastern headdress). Then Jackson totally freaked out, screaming "Mama, Mama, Mama" until Daniel took it off. Apparently Daniel looked like a terrorist to him.

So we've been enjoying the two unexpected days as well as the weekend with him where we got to worship together as a family again. How glorious! We've been to the Children's Museum of Tampa, the pool a couple of times, and we've played a number of games of Uno. The kids have also been catching up on some Daddy lap time, and Daddy reading time. Abigail just came into our bedroom this morning, looked around, and said, "Where's Daddy?" I said he had to go work today (he's saving leave for the move). She said, horrified, "Back to Iraq??" :) She was much reassured to hear that he'll be back for dinner, although I think she still thinks he's coming home for dinner from Iraq.

So the housing situation is...on hold. Daniel found a place he put an offer on, the owners counter-offered, and we declined the counter-offer. The owners don't seem to understand that the property will most likely be appraised by the VA at much less (going by the comps for the area) and that they are supposed to accept the VA appraisal. The wife of the couple is the one in the military and she's already gone on to the next duty station. The husband, who is from Trinidad, doesn't speak English and has been left behind to negotiate the home sale. :) They don't have a realtor, so our realtor has been trying to explain everything to them. We don't feel like fighting them when we still haven't sold this house and because we have a second, more-appealing choice that's closer to church and work in Fayetteville. I was dragging my feet on that one because the kitchen was small, but we've been creative in coming up with solutions that might work. Our biggest problem now is to get this house sold. :) Daniel has completed the paperwork for the federal government buy-out program, but he's encountering problems with the command at Ft. Bragg in living up to their end of the deal. If they sign for relocation, they agree to the buy-out program where, if our home doesn't sell in sixty days, they take over the sale of the house. If they receive an offer in the 30 days subsequent to the sixty day marketing period, then they will review the offer to accept it or decline it. But if it still isn't sold by the end of that thirty days, then they will buy it at "market value." We know that that market value will be less than what we would want for the house, but at least it will be off our hands. And because the market was so crazy last year, we still stand to make a profit even after only owning the house for a year, so we're very thankful for that. We have until the 25th (or around there) of this month to sell it on our own, which we would prefer to do, obviously. We're meeting with our realtor today to adjust the price again. We didn't put it on the market before April 1st because all indications were that it would sell pretty quickly, so now we're in a time crunch to try to sell it before we leave so that we can afford to buy a house in North Carolina. Otherwise, we'll have to rent, and we might have to make two house payments for 1-2 months. Yuck. We're doing all right, though - just thankful to be together as a family and thankful to be moving to the real south in about a month. :) Here, every third car has an Ohio license plate - no offense to my Ohio family! :) :)

Well, I'll just share an Abigail comment before I sign off to start the day here. I can hear children neighing in their rooms, so the horses are up. :)

At church last night, the pastor was preaching on troublemakers in the church. When Abigail heard the word troublemaker, she turned excitedly to me and said proudly, while pointing at her chest, "That's me! I'm a troublemaker!!" Well, I guess it's good to be aware of your role in life and to be proud of it. :)

Love to all-
Casey

Nothing profound

Hello everyone!
I find I have little motivation to write on the blog now that I can't post pictures of the kids! That was 50% of the reason to blog, so I really ought to get moving on trying to find a network with password protection. Things have been a little busy, though! :)

We had an open house on Saturday, to which no one showed up. That's a nice waste of a very clean house. Oh, well. I did enjoy my Sunday afternoon nap in my sparkling house! Roscoe had a beauty treatment at Petsmart so even he was clean. He tried to take advantage of it by jumping up on my bed. Ha! It only worked for about ten minutes or so. :) We had a "preview" this evening where an agent came by to see if the house would suit his clients before they actually took the time to come out. Since I haven't heard anything from my realtor, I'm assuming the agent decided against it. That's all the activity thus far, so we'll probably reduce the price at the end of this month.

It's pool season again, so we've been three times so far. The first time I refused to get in all the way, because I prefer the air temperature to match the water temperature. It's a good thing it's Florida, and that often happens! We went today, and Abigail is now out of her inner tube and in a floatation vest. She still swallows way more water than I would like her to, but she's improving. Cora is gaining confidence re-learning skills from last year, and after all the trouble to actually get Shiloh to take off her vest, you would think now that she was born in the water. (No, I'm not that weird and all natural, although I know someone who is! :) ). Her latest feat is to tread water. She looks a little funny while she's doing it, but it's effective. Jackson's just a happy boy in his baby inner-tube, and his favorite thing is to try to lean wwwaaaaayyyy over and put his face in the water. Yeah, that's a good idea. Twice he ended up snorting water, but he kept trying anyway because his sisters kept laughing. The need to impress women starts very early.

I went to the housing office today on base to sign some paperwork in order to go to a briefing to receive a pack-out date for moving. Because, of course, they can't give you the pack-out date on the FIRST visit; that would be too easy and non-bureaucratic. Thankfully and mercifully, we were out of there in thirty minutes flat, and the briefing was scheduled for the 18th, which means Daniel gets to go instead of me with the four children. I told a friend of mine that I was going to let the children run wild in the office (and my mom suggested letting them look grubby and sticky, too) so that the people working there would shout, "just give that lady a pack-out date - just make her go away!" But I didn't have to put my evil plan into action. Too bad. Abigail could have had some fun.

And so life goes on, and we're in The Waiting Place right now (ever read Oh, the Places You'll Go!) where it seems like we're waiting on the Lord for pretty much everything...for our house to sell, for Daniel to return home (VERY SOON!!!!), for a place to live in North Carolina, for a pack-out date, for moving, for settling in, and for bringing our children home from Haiti. This too shall pass, however, and I'll be so thankful when it does.

I'm Still Here

Yep, I'm still here, but not much is going on. We've had our house on the market almost two weeks, and we've had one showing. We were supposed to have two on Tuesday, but they both canceled. AFTER I cleaned the whole house and mowed the yard, of course. :) So the market has just about come to a standstill. It had to happen sooner or later, I guess. Honestly, I think I should be more worried than I am, but...I'm just not. The Lord will bring a buyer in His timing, and in the meantime, I like relaxing more than I thought I would be while selling a house. :) I would be relaxing even more if my DVD player worked and I could watch "Wives and Daughters" for the sixth time. Thanks, Tullys, for getting me hooked. :)

We're finishing up our school year, which is a wonderful feeling. Cora has finished her core curriculum, but we're continuing with reading and math. I think I might go ahead and start her math for next year since it's already arrived. I love the smell of new curriculum! :) Shiloh has to finish up her phonics program. I figure she probably doesn't need it, but it never hurts to reinforce the foundation. She will have her portfolio evaluation on May 1st or 2nd to determine if she's passed the 1st grade. We're doing some math review, and I'm so relieved to see how far she's come in a year. Abigail is eager to start school, but I don't know if it's better to wait and start her with Adah when Adah arrives home, or to go ahead and get her going. I'm still thinking on that.

Jackson, my child prodigy, is singing the ABCs and counting to 20. Ha! Fooled you. Are you kidding? This is the child who didn't walk until he was 15 months old. He's barely speaking 15 words, much less counting to 20. :) But he's a very smiley boy, and that makes up for his lack of motivation. :) He's also pretty cute when he roars like a lion.

Well, back to the nice, quiet life. I think I'll make myself some vanilla almond tea and read my "Southern Lady" magazine. I need to take advantage of the calm before the storm!

A benign photo

I thought this one would be okay to post, and it didn't hurt that I thought it was too adorable not to share.

Just a boy and his dog surveying their territory (which is not much to look at in Florida, but just wait until they get to our land in Tennessee!)

Love to all!

An English lesson and a Medical lesson

These two lessons come from my most linguistically interesting child, Cora. She is the one who will ask me, "Mommy, how have you been doing thus far this morning?" Thus far? Mom and I suspect she's a 50 year-old British lady stuck in a 5 year-old body. Anyway, I've been trying to break her of the habit of saying, "I amn't doing that" instead of saying "I'm not doing that." And then I started to think, "Well, why don't we say amn't if we say 'don't'?" Who the heck thought up the English language???

Secondly, Cora was Dr. Houseworth this afternoon in our household, and apparently Shiloh needed an operation. So, putting her stethoscope around her neck, she proceeded to tell Shiloh, "Lie down on the couch. You need a caesar section." Okay, so that's PARTLY correct (and still Latin), but she left out one of the more crucial parts. It's a surgical procedure, not a salad. So I don't think I'll be trusting her with anything more than a band-aid, or, as she calls it - because she's a 50 year-old British woman in a 5 year-old body - a "plaster."

Exciting day in the Houseworth household!

Good evening everyone!!!! We have great news to share. Our official referral came through today, and we are the proud parents of two little ones (whew! the easiest labor yet!! :) ). Our Haiti babies have names and faces now, and we are so thankful that we can see them in our minds as we pray for them. Our new daughter is named Adah Catherine, and she was born November 13, 2003. She's actually bigger than Abigail at 33 pounds. Our new son, Nathaniel Ericson, was born February 26, 2006 and he's a strapping 10 pounds and 20 1/2 inches. We pray that they will be joining our family by Adah's third birthday. Things are moving so slowly in Haiti right now with the processing of paperwork, but we are hopeful that when the new government takes control in April, the paperwork will speed up. It's hard to wait after seeing their faces, but we'll depend on the Lord to keep us patient. We're just rejoicing that we know who they are, and that they seem to be very healthy. Everyone is excited here, and Abigail is looking forward to sharing her very own bunkbed with Adah. She's insisting that she get the top bunk, though. :)


Here's a funny story about putting our house on the market, which also happened today (it was a big day, to put it mildly). We were driving along in the van discussing how we're going to sell the house and move to North Carolina. I said, "As soon as the new owners are ready, they'll move into our house." Abigail said, "Won't it be crowded, Mommy?" :) So we started over with the explanation. I then explained how we were trying to be reasonable about our asking price so that the house would sell quickly, before Daddy comes home. Cora said, "Why don't we make the price less, like $3.00?" I said, "No, sweetie, $3.00 is a little low." Shiloh said helpfully, "Maybe $3.59?" :) I'm not sure she'll pass the "comprehension of monetary value" portion of her portfolio evaluation. When I told her the real price we were asking, her eyes bugged out. "I don't think anyone's going to buy it if you ask that much!" Thanks for the encouragement, Shiloh.

Happy Tuesday

Well, I know I haven't been here in a while, and that's because I've been contemplating shutting down the blog. My mom called to tell me something scary...in the child porn ring that authorities broke up about two weeks ago, an investigator was asked where these evil, disgusting people get their photos of children, and the investigator said from browsing family websites. Well, that just turned my stomach. So I'll just be posting musings about life in general from now on, with no pictures. And how fun is that?? I wanted to be able to share with you how fast the kids are growing. What I'm going to try to do is find a network that provides password protection for blogs so that only those I want viewing the blog can have access. Blogspot used to provide something like this, but they don't anymore (to my knowledge). Meanwhile, here's a picture of our couch potato Roscoe P. Coltrane, not that he's a replacement for pictures of the kids. :) I don't understand why we allow our dog to get up on the couch (we never intended to!) but I think it has something to do with his big, brown, pleading eyes. He usually lies on his blanket so he doesn't get the couch all hairy, but his blanket was in the wash, so he made do with the pillow. :)

Here's a funny Shiloh story, though: We're doing a unit study on the human body, and I was reviewing the body parts we've gone over to test for comprehension. I said, "Shiloh, what does the brain do?" She said, "It's sorta like a Mommy." I said, "What? How is it like a mommy?" She said, "Because it tells the body parts what to do." :)

My friend Jeanne said she thought the mommy was the heart of the home, but apparently the mommy is the brain, too.

Have a good day!

p.s. I'll be removing all the pictures from the blog in the next day or so. I'll send out an email when I find a network where I can host another blog for free.

Update on stomach flu

Now Abigail has it. She started throwing up last night. She handles it pretty well except that she starts yelling in the middle of throwing up, "I wanna brush my teeth! I wanna brush my teeth!" I don't blame her. I want to brush my teeth too and I'm not even the one who's throwing up. Good thing I'm not a sympathetic vomiter. She doesn't have a fever, which is a relief after Jackson. She's resting in my bed right now in between spells. She's asking for some of "Jackson's juice" - pedialyte - so we'll have to go out and get some. Oh, I really hope the other two don't get this. :)

The Pitiful One

Jackson just had the stomach flu and he's slowly recovering. He had just decided to venture off my lap and do a little bit of exploring when he hit the lip of the door out to the lanai with the walker he was pushing, flipped the walker, and landed on his face. Well, it was back to my lap for the rest of the day, although he tried to remain cheerful. You can see his "cheesy smile" in the picture along with his fat lip. Poor baby.

Right before Jackson got the flu, I received a forwarded email from my homeschooling group, and as Jackson went through the flu, I worried more than usual and thought about this family quite a bit. All of you prayer warriors out there, please take a look: www.candacejoy.org This family amazes me with their strength in the Lord in the midst of what must be a terrifying ordeal. Their experience humbles me and makes me more willing to stop the household for a few days just to snuggle with Jackson and tell him I love him. I didn't sleep on the floor in his room like some better moms I know :), but I think I cleaned up the messes with a more cheerful heart than I would have otherwise.

Enjoy your kiddos, everyone...they're precious, aren't they?

GREEN LETTER DAY

I was going to say red letter day, but apparently I already used that title. How unoriginal of me.

Well, our dossier is on its way THIS VERY MINUTE by FedEx to Haiti. Okay, it won't leave until tomorrow morning because I missed the cut-off by about ten minutes, but it is STILL ON ITS WAY and should arrive in Haiti by the 14th. We are very excited!!

Molecules

We read about molecules this morning in Shiloh's reading lesson. We learned that the faster the molecules in something move, the hotter it is. The slower the molecules move, the colder it is. Then we did an experiment to test this, and Shiloh enjoyed it. So this evening at Steak and Shake as she's drinking her chocolate shake and shivering, she says, "Mommy, the molecules in my shake are moving veeeerrrryy slowly." Science in real life. And what better way to experience it than with a chocolate shake from Steak and Shake?

Abigail the Fearless

We went to our homeschool co-op today, where the lesson was about animal food chains. I got out of teaching the lesson because I still don't have a voice, and one of the other moms graciously filled in for me. That's inconsequential, so of course I thought I should share it.

Anyhoo, one of the moms in our church, who also homeschools but does not belong to our co-op, offered to bring her snakes and give a little presentation to the kids. Yes, snakeS, as in five of them. I don't even remember the different types she showed us, except the Burmese python. Here's what I learned about the Burmese python: it's BIG. I mean, it's REALLY BIG. Theirs isn't full grown yet, and they're stunting her growth so she doesn't get too big too fast. (She knows all about snakes, so I don't think this is animal cruelty.) They feed her only once a month, and she's about 13 feet already. She could grow to be about 23 feet. They don't feed a big snake like that little old rats. Oh, no. Don't read on if you're squeamish...they feed her bunny rabbits! Ugh. At this information, poor Shiloh turned around with a look on her face that said, "Please tell me that is NOT true, Mommy!" Burmese pythons are the third largest snake in the world after the anaconda and the reticulated (sp?) python. Why you would want to have the third largest snake in the world for a pet is beyond me. Apparently a lot of other folks in Florida who thought having a Burmese python would be a good idea thought better of it, released them into the wild, and this is happening: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2005/10/1006_051006_pythoneatsgator.html

Okay, enough with the grossing you out. Sorry about that. The POINT of the whole blog is to tell you that Abigail did not hestitate to walk up to that Burmese python, who could crush her and eat her, and hug it. Yep, she hugged it. She also pet all the other snakes and decided she liked the rough one, whichever one that was (it likes to fake out its predators by pretending it's a rattlesnake - does that help?).

I was so proud in a weird, repelled-at-the-same-time kind of way. My little girl is practicing dominion over the animals at a young age. Good for her.

p.s. If you want to know about how snakes shed their skin and what can happen if they have a "difficult shed," I'm the gal to talk to. It's amazing what you can learn at homeschool co-op.