A long week and it's only Tuesday

It feels like it's been a long week, and it is only Tuesday! Ted and I just returned from being in Albany all day. Today was the day for us to go to the Homeland Security office and be finger printed for the adoption. Since we were going to be in Albany already (a two hour drive from our home), I also took several documents that had to be authenticated at the state level with us, and Ted dropped me off on State St. where I ran in and did that. An authentication is something I had previously never heard of. For those of you who, like me, have never heard of such a thing, an authentication is a paper that says that the notary who notarized the document is indeed a licensed notary in the State of NY (in our case). For some states (NY being one) the documents must be authenticated at the county level before they can be authenticated at the state level, so yesterday I headed out in the morning for the hour and a half drive to Delhi to do that. As I wound my way past the farms and homes, taking in the last of the fall leaf show, I prayed confessing my fears, my self focus, and my wrong thinking, asking God for provision for all the different details in the adoption and in other areas of life, specifically thanking Him for what He's teaching me in the hard things, even though I don't feel very thankful. Lately it seems like there is a lot of hard....good friends moving away, my nephew and his family as he continues to battle with leukemia, our friends, the Bricks, whose daughter Mandy is trying to emerge from a coma as they spend day and night beside her, another friend who just found out he has cancer, others in our life who are making poor choices, sinful choices, that cause suffering for themselves and the others who are in their lives, and the thought of an orphanage full of kids in Haiti waiting to go home to be with their forever families, yet sometimes being sent back with the very families who gave them up to the orphanage, for reasons that don't make sense to our minds. It just seems like the evidence of the Fall is all around me. I had to get a hold of my thinking yesterday and remind myself of who God is and that He is not for a minute out of control, and He lets the trials sit on us for exactly the right time, not too long and not too short. I also had to remind myself that it isn't about my ideas of comfort or how things should go. God is God, and it is His glory and our ultimate transformation to be conformed to the image of His son that He's concerned with; therefore, He is willing to allow all kinds of things in our lives to bring about repentance and to bring glory to Himself. I find as we are studying Philippians that I am not at all like Paul (or Christ). I still tend to be more focused on my idea of how things should be and I hold very tightly to those things, but God, in His eternal goodness and mercy, brings things that pry my fingers loose. Sometimes it is little things that reveal my wanting to be in control, like finding out I cannot go see Spendy in December. Today I had a little melt down when I found out, at the Homeland Security office, that they are 6-8 weeks behind schedule in processing their adoption stuff. The NY office's turn around time is normally one week. Our home study will arrive there early next week to wait in the stack with all the others to be processed. I have been planning on going to Haiti in December for the last couple months and have been working like a mad woman to have everything ready in time. This morning I realized how I am really not in control at all. As the tears fell down below my sun glasses, my sweet husband reminded me of God's sovereignty. I am so glad he was with me today. Let me end by saying a few things off the top of my head that God showed me today. 1.) Ted was with me to comfort me and remind me of the truth. 2.)I had a day alone with him, which is all too rare, and we had time to talk about all kinds of things. 3.)I had not yet purchased my plane tickets. 4.)This might allow us to be able to be going down with Lori Mills (a friend from church who may also be adopting, who is not excited about traveling alone to Haiti.) 4.)Gretchen does not think we will lose much time because in December people go home and paperwork ends up sitting on people's desks anyway, so even if we'd gone done to Haiti, it probably wouldn't have made things go any faster. 5.)I was reminded again of who my attention needs to be fixed upon.

Pictures of Spendy from Haiti- October 2007

Me and Spendy

Looking out on Port au Prince from the balconey at St. Joseph's

Spendy and me

Shanley and Spendy

Mama and Spendy

A tired Spendy napping in his bed at the orphanage

Journal excerpt from week in Haiti

I wrote this on October 5th when I was in Haiti.

The time here goes slower- the day seems to last longer, and when I look at my watch, I am often surprised that it is only 10 AM or only 3 PM, when it feels later. At the same time, it is already Sunday, and on Tuesday I have to leave my little boy and this world here. It is a world you either like or don't. There is steady noise here- people outside talking, a guitar playing and someone singing, bottles being sorted outside, and of course the intermitant crowing of a rooster. Whenever I hear a rooster, I will forever think of Haiti. A child is crying in the next room. There are many here who are in different stages of adoption, some coming close to the end and others, like myself, painfully aware that we are at the beginning of a long process.

Spendy is napping here beside me- sweat beaded up on his upper lip. He is beautiful. He is daily changing since I've been here. He started out guarded, hardly willing to leave my lap or Shanley's lap; now he will play nearby. He is nothing like two year olds I am used to. He guards his books we've given him, never putting them down at the orphanage. He will sit on one of our laps, content, never saying a word, only watching. Today he started talking to me. Of course it is in Creole...a sweet little voice. His eyes are huge, and he is very intelligent- figuring out how things work, carefully building. I think he may be particular, liking things just so. He eats everything- ate up all of his breakfast here at St. Joseph's, ate a bowl of mush at the orphanage, ate cheetos and salami and bread with goat cheese for lunch....eats salad, avocado, meat, rice, beans- there is nothing he won't eat. I am sure it is the difference of never having choices or the opportunity to eat at any time other than the appointed time.

I am sure it will be hard for him when we leave- all this attention will cease. Will he realize we will be back, since Shanley came back after this summer? Will it take him a while to warm back up to us? Will it be less traumatic for him than I imagine, simply because this is what he sees- parents coming and going? I do not know. I know I will miss him, my little Haitian son.

I am a blogger now

The main reason for this blog is Spendy. As most of you know, he is a two year old orphan who lives in Haiti that we are adopting. We began this whole process when Shanley came back from spending a month at the orphanage in Port au Prince that is part of Three Angels Childrens Relief. She fell in love with many of the children, but Spendy tugged at her heart in a special way. Through her emails Ted and I went, in a sense, to Haiti . They caused us to make a connection with the children there. I found myself praying for "forever families" for the children who did not yet have them. As Shanley told us more about Spendy, how reserved he was, how he clung to her, how he began to open up after being given attention, we found ourselves hurting for this little one. I would pray, "Lord, I pray that you would move the hearts of the parents that you have determined for Spendy." As time went by, I found myself saying, "Lord, are we those parents?" "Compel us, give us a desire, urge us if this is what you have for Spendy and us," I prayed. All of our reasons for not adopting seemed small and wrong when put next to the words that the Holy Spirit inspired James to write: "Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world" (James 1:27). So here we are in the process of adopting Spendy and God has made it our fondest desire to do so. This blog will be a place for those of you who want to to keep up on what's going on with Spendy and the rest of us as we travel this adoption road.