Weekend

This was a very hard weekend for me. Since Fil is gone we got to spend the weekend ourselves. Sometime it gets hard by the end of the day and for some reason a trip down to Boston wasn't as much fun when Fil comes with us (mostly since I wasn't able to have an adult conversation during the trip). On the other hand the boys for some reason cannot stop talking.

Anyway Fil made it up north to Phoenix this weekend to see some of his old friends and he ended up seeing almost all of them. Our missionary friends were back from England so he got to see them and most of his college buddies. You have no idea how jealous I was when he called from a party when they got together. I wished we all could have been there. It has been so long since I've have seen everybody and I have to say that I heard all of the stories so many times that it feels I know most of you even though I met you only once. I know Fil misses all of you very much and it was hard on him to leave this afternoon. We always thought for some reason we would end up back in Phoenix area and here we are in New England. I guess God has different plans for so for now. I promised to take the kids down to Boston this Saturday to visit the aquarium. We got to walk by the ocean and found this very fancy apartment community. Here are the boys standing by a yacht that looked very cool. There was a several of them and a lot of smaller boats as well.
There were pretty flowers along the walk way.
Sam took this picture. I think he is old enough for some photography lessons from mom. He did a good job by the way. We are in the picture after all.
Here are the boys exploring the world of starfish.


I am always looking for some nice pictures. Here I was admiring this lamp while Nate .....
was trying to take apart the water hydrant (that boy is such an engineer).
And since there was time left in the day we stopped by one of my favorite stores IKEA. You got to love this store growing up in Europe. And my kids love it as well. Here is Emma on one of her favorite toys (we got to start thinking Christmas here anybody paying attention?)
And the boys will always find something dangerous to play with.



Thank you so much to all of you who took care of my hubby in Phoenix I wish I could have been there to take pictures to update my collection on our fridge. And I hope that some of you will make it to New England one day.

Thursday

First of all let me say that we miss Fil very much (just in case you haven't noticed). My heart goes out to those women whose husbands travel every week. I don't think I could do that.Anyway today was a beautiful day in New England. Dry and warm. Not hot not sticky. Just perfect. I finally got to put clothes out to dry and we even headed out to the pool. Well the boys were convince that it was hot enough for the pool. Nate lasted 15 minutes in the water before he started shaking, Sam made it for 30 minutes and Emma 40 minutes (well she only got her legs wet like me). So we moved over to the park and had a good time there instead.
I have no idea how I will do it next year with 4 kids. They are so busy and all over the place. The boys continue to have dumb ideas and trying to copy stuff they read in comic books (thanks Fil). Last night Nate was jumping off the boys bunk bed with a towel wrap around his neck like fly boy (the boy in the comic book did it was their explanation why they did it). I decided not to go to ER and spend the night there with three little kids. Since Nate was just crying about his hand but nothing seems broken or swollen we waited until the morning. He complained a little bit when he was writing this morning but I wasn't sure if it was an injury from last night or he was just trying to get out of writing. I love my boys but something I question what they carry in their heads (I am sure uncle Vit will enjoy this story).

Emma loves going down the slide.

Anyway we are all in one piece and no broken bones.
This is a rare picture since it is getting harder to get them all in one place at the same time.
Yesterday I was also thinking about our little girl a lot. Everyone knows that Laurel is in Ethiopia now and I was wondering if she will be able to take some more pictures of children that are ready for referral. People started asking when and I have to say that it can happen any day or in few months. I cannot wait to hold her in my arms. Anyone else getting antsy?

School

Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord.

Colossians 3:17,23

We are slowly starting up with some school work. As you can see it looks very overwhelming at first. I already spent a few days reading ahead and it looks SO BIG. Yes I am laying on the binder with the schedule for this year for the boys. They (the binders) keep getting bigger every year. But I have to say even though it looks overwhelming it is all very nicely explained and it makes my life much easier. We did s full days work today and to my surprise we were done in 2 hours. There are only a few thing that I will have to change like our kitchen table that got too small this year with all the papers and books. Other than that we all set to start rolling.

Sticky Tuesday

Today we had nice sticky weather here in New England. It is usually at its worst in August so I don't know why I am always so surprised. At least the temperatures were in mid 80's (could be much worse).

Anyway we went to the Palace theater in downtown Manchester to see a show Seussical the Musical . I wasn't so sure how Emma would react to it but she did great. We got to see the whole show even though she got very squirmy at the end. After that we went to a park to have lunch with our friends.

On the way to the car we passed this church and I had to take a picture of it. It was the perfect light and place.

In the evening before the kids went to bed they helped me water the flowers around the house. As you can see they ended up watering each other. They sure had fun.

And just in case they were not wet enough they poured buckets of water on each other.
Oops! I guess that one went the wrong way.

No shower needed this evening. Just in case you are wondering where Nate is he was in time out for not listening.

We also miss dad a lot.

Treasure Hunt

Today was the big day for our annual Treasure Hunt (well this is our second year but it was as much fun as last year). For those who do not know I homeschool my kids. This will be our third year and we are loving it. I have nothing against public or private school this what we choose to do for our kids for now. I am taking one year at a time with the option if it is too much to send the kiddos to school.

Anyway for now we are too busy learning at home. Since I grew up in Europe this is a new thing for me so I am learning as well. Like how the American school system works plus I am adding a lot when I feel they are lacking something like geography etc. This year I planned another treasure hunt for the boys to find their school stuff. I usually collect all of it throughout the year and then put it all together. We are mainly doing Sonlight since we are all book readers. Last year I drew maps this year I went with my digital camera with pictures from around our house and yard with few clues they had so solve. Here is Sam working on some of the clues.
Here are the boys trying to put everything together. One of their tasks was to make lemonade for everybody and they had to find everything they need to make it.



Here they are making lemonade.
Oh, and they all had to drink a glass. I guess that is one way to keep the kids hydrated (including dad).
The boys were in a treasure hunt spirit right from the beginning. They even carry swords and shields around (Sam had a backpack to put stuff in). Here they are attacking our tree out front to get another clue. They have such a great imagination.
And after they found the real treasure we all sat down for at least an hour to look through all the books for next year. We have a lot ahead of us.
As you can see it is not exactly "few" things. We can not wait to start school.
I am writing this post outside. I am sitting our back yard and enjoying nice cool evening. Man I love technology.

Beach Day

Yesterday we spent the whole day at the lake. Since Fil finished the work that needed to be done for his business trip he took few days off to spent some time with us before he leaves. This worked out great since Friday was a very hot and humid day. We spent the whole time at Newfound Lake. This trip the water was warm even for me and I have to say that we all were in the water the entire time. Here is Fil throwing his boys up in the air and they loved it.
And here is Emma busy playing on the beach. She didn't like when I went our for a swim. She just wanted to keep me closer the her I guess.
We all had a great time and we will miss Fil when he leaves for his business trip.

Time Line

I wanted to look back at our adoption time line. It seem we have been looking around at other blogs and chats to see how long everything takes. So I sat down and wrote down our own since probably someone will want to know sooner or later. I was a little worried about the next two weeks since Fil is leaving for a business trip to AZ and that we would get a referral while he is gone. We wrote our coordinator at AWAA about our situation a few weeks ago and learned that she will be traveling to Ethiopia at the same time while Fil is gone so we probably will not have to worry about a referral. Don't get me wrong I can't wait to see the little one but I want Fil to be around when we make the decision and not do it over the phone. I can't wait. Anyway here is our journey so far.

*We sent our application to AWAA January 29th 2007.

*We were approved February 7th and the official paperwork (Dossier) began.

*February 27 we received our birth certificates and marriage licence translated. We were both born outside USA and were married in Europe so we required translations as well. If any of you are looking for a good translation company we highly recommend LZTranslation. They are out of Texas. Texas had a very easy document authentication procedure for translations which was important to us. LZTranslation were very quick and the cost was very reasonable as well.

* March 14th we took I 600A application to INS.

* March 17th - 1st home study visit

* March 24 th - 2nd home study visit

* March 29th finger prints for both of us

* March 31st - 3rd home study visit

* April 22nd home study done, approved and in our hands

* May 14th Physical exams done. This took the longest to get done. We ran into so many problems along the way I will try to write about that some day. I laugh now but it was not funny at that time.

* May 18th I-797C approved . We received the letter the day after we submitted the completed home study (very fast). However, after reading it stated that we were approved but for 0 children. Since the INS office is only 15 minutes away from our house Fil made appointment right away and I stopped mowing the lawn put all the kids in the car and went to get this fixed. We all got a good laugh at the INS office about it and they fixed it right away. I am so thankful to God for the INS worker. He is so friendly and helpful each time we went.

*May 24th dossier done and sent out to Virginia to our AWAA office via FedEx

*May 31st dossier authenticated

*June 15th our dossier arrived in Ethiopia.

We have been waiting ever since. I have to give credit to my dear husband for such a quick paper pregnancy. He is very good at that. We have dealt with different governments around the world before and it is not an easy task. It requires passion (which I do not have) and also lot of information that keeps changing constantly. Thank you honey I couldn't have done it with out you. I LOVE YOU VERY MUCH.