Austin is Going to State Tournament!

Austin is going to the State Wrestling Tournament!!! He placed 4th at the state qualifying tournament today landing him a spot at the State Tournament! He should have gotten 2nd place but... He was so nervous and just did not do as well as we know he can. 2 of the guys he wrestled he should have easily beat but simple mistakes cost him precious points, he was never pinned though. One of the guys that beat him we later found out won 1st at the state tournament last year, and Austin had actually done really well against him! He only lost the match by a few points. Austin's first match he won with a pin which was really cool. We are so proud of him!!! Just to go to State his first year wrestling is so awesome! I don't care if he gets last place at State, though something a little higher would be cool, I just want him to have fun and enjoy the experience. :) Wish him luck at the State Tournament on March 14th!!!

Just thinking...

So, as I'm driving to work this morning I start thinking about my baby boy. I am wondering "what is he doing right now?" It is a weird experience having your child half way around the world. Does he need a diaper change? Does he need a bottle? Is he laughing? Is he crying? Is he sleeping? I often figure up what time it is in Ethiopia and imagine what he may be doing right then.

I really hope we get a court date within the next week. It will be nice to have "a date", something to count down to. A group of families that accepted their referrals just before ours were given court dates last week, they all seem to be for that first week in May. I am estimating we will get court date of mid-late May and travel mid-late June. Unless of course something goes wrong and our court date is rescheduled which would majorly stink!

Ok, I am not supposed to share any "identifying info" on our little guy until after our court date but I am dying to share at least little tid bits! I have been reading other blogs to see how much info others are giving on their children. I hope I don't give more info than I am supposed to but here we go. I can't release his name, since we are keeping the name the orphanage gave him, but I will call him "Nathen" for now. He is so beautiful, I can't wait to share pictures. :) He is now approx 4 months old. He is healthy but tiny due to his previous circumstances. He is gaining weight fast though. He he has a slight birth defect which we feel is very minor. We have been doing a lot of research and joined a group for parents with children that have limb differences. He is perfect to us! We are just so excited and can't wait!

I found a great website that makes all kids of t-shirts and apparel. They have a huge selection of stuff geared towards adoption and specifically Ethiopia adoptions. Here is the website: http://shop.cafepress.com/ethiopia-adoption I am going to end up with a hefty bill from this place. They have the coolest stuff! It is so hard to pick just a couple things, I want it all. :) This is too cute!

Getting ready...

Monday we went for our travel immunizations which equaled to about 5 billion 4-inch needle shots. Ok so I am exaggerating it was only 5 shots, but the needles were 4 inches! Plus we got our prescription for Malaria medication. I took my shots like a trooper, Nick on the other hand yelped like a little girl. Hee Hee! We were sore for several days and I can just now hold my arms up past shoulder height. We are now immune to Polio, Yellow Fever, Tetanus/Diphtheria, Hep A & Hap B, and Typhoid. We go back next week for another Hep A/B shot and then again in 2 weeks to make us totally immune. Monday's visit took us 2 1/2 hours so I already warned the health dept they better have me in and out this time.

Ok, so as we are going over the list of needed immunizations with the lady at the health dept she continuously mentions, as she names each illness and how horrible it is, that it is "rampant" in orphanages and we must get the immunization if visiting the orphanage. HELLO! My child is in that very orphanage, what is protecting him???? The thought had never crossed my mind until then. I don't have a clue what vaccinations, if any he has gotten. So I emailed our social worker asking that very question. Unfortunately I have not yet heard back from her. I know they have had a very busy week, 3 referrals came in this week and I am sure she is busy answering all of the parents questions just has she did mine. At the same time though I am a little worried. I will feel much better once I know he is at the House of Hope. I know the nannies at the orphanage are taking great care of him but it is just different at the HOH. I am praying daily that God takes care of my little one until we get him home. He is half way around the world and we are months away from being able to hold, comfort, and care for him.

Austin has wrestling qualifying for State Tournaments next weekend. I really hope he does well. It would be awesome just for him to make it to State his first year! Plus it is costing a lot of money just going to qualifying so it will stink if he loses and we end up with a really short day. He is a natural at wrestling but I think he will improve a lot next year. At practice he does all the different moves perfect but in an actual match he does not always think about what he needs to be doing. I think this will be "his" sport though. Baseball is now starting which is running together with wrestling, things may get a little complicated over the next few weeks. Nick is coaching Austin's baseball team so it adds another level of difficulty since he has to be there to coach even if Austin has wrestling. We need to start thinking ahead on this sort of stuff before signing up for everything.

Between now and the end of the school year we will be sooooo insanely busy. At least that should make the time fly until we travel to Ethiopia and bring our little one home. Then we will have the nice slow summer to just relax and enjoy spending time together as a family. GOD IS GOOD...

Ok, so I have seen many fellow bloggers that do "favorite photo Friday". While I honestly just can't keep up with them on this I would like to post a great picture of Austin and Olivia when they were little. I was looking back on how cute they were when they were little, what happened?!?! :)

It's A Boy!

I have not posted in a while because we have been VERY busy! :)

We are very excited to announce that we have received our referral for a beautiful baby boy! I can not yet release any pictures or details about him until after our court hearing but I will sum it up in one word AMAZING! Hopefully we will have details about court and travel dates in the next few weeks. We will be keeping his name so unfortunately I can't release that yet either. I am dying to tell everyone everything about him but I can't... Not yet anyway. I will probably have a 2 page blog entry once I can tell all. :) Until then please pray for our little guy as he waits to come home.

Ok, I know what you are thinking...I thought they wanted a girl. Truth is God had other plans. We really did not care if we got a boy/girl or what age. Since we had put an age range of 0-4 we assumed we would get a referral for an older child. Since our youngest is a girl 5 years old we figured another girl would be easier. I still have Olivia's clothes she has outgrown and they could even room together. Well I had been telling Nick for a while that I "kind of wanted a boy". I just had that mommy gut feeling that told me a boy was right for us. Then one day a little baby boy was posted on our agencies waiting child list. He took my breath away... I immediately called Nick and had him pull up the info and pics. It was love at first sight. Something told us this was the child God intended for us. There are a few significant dates that connected us to him that I felt were God signs to me. Maybe they are just a coincidence, who knows, but it meant a lot to me. He has a few medical "issues" that put him on the "waiting child list", but we felt the issues were minor and that he deserved a family just as much as the "healthy" babies. The reason we wanted to adopt in the first place was to help a child in need. We knew adopting a child from Ethiopia would have risks and those risks we are willing to take. God blessed us with 2 biological healthy children and now he has blessed our family with an amazing little boy. Well, after having doctors reviewing his medical and researching everything possible to make absolute sure we were making the right decision, finally the day came and we officially accepted our referral, yeah! Even though this has been like a 2 week process I guess today is the day I can finally switch my "Lilly Pie" countdown ticker from "waiting for our referral" to "waiting to travel to Ethiopia and bring our little boy home". :) We are so excited and can not wait. We recently received some comforting information regarding his medical issues and he is growing like a weed. I can only imagine how he will change and grow between now and when we travel to bring him home.

Monday I just about had a nervous breakdown though, we found out our home study was about to expire. I did not even realize it expired! I knew our fingerprints and CIS approval expired but did not even think about the home study. So, we are now in the process of running around like chickens with our heads cut off getting fingerprints done, background checks, medical reports, etc all over again. My social worker with our agency gave me some comforting words, you are almost there... :)