Trashy

Parker has recently been given a chore disposing of all the debris we generate around here. The less-fun part of the task involves running up and down the stairs collecting trash from the various receptacles around our home.  He doesn't seem to mind at all though for the privilege of then tossing everything into the back of his pick-up truck.  Lesser jobs call for the more agile, commuter-sized Skidder.  Apparently he's counting it all joy (do you see the look on his face?)... especially when his efforts are rewarded with a little cash to learn with.   

The Whole Story - the End!

Now that we’re nearly six months removed from the beginning of our ill-fated adventures in Sub-Saharan Africa, I figure it’s time I finally start wrapping things up.  I’ve told most of the story starting here, and ending here at the point where we left the orphanage that was home to the boy we thought would be our son.  What I’ve neglected to relate are the specifics of just how well God cared for and protected us through what was and is a very difficult trial. 

Looking back, we wonder at the ways God protected us from Annie, the dishonest orphanage director.  Though our initial concerns about the adoption centered around whether we felt equipped to parent a child with Ernest’s level of needs, we quickly realized that the real question was whether we could complete an ethical adoption of any child with her in control.  Annie was our only link to the lawyer, the courts, and Ernest’s surviving family.  She obstinately and repeatedly asserted that a boy who cannot utter a sound was a talker and a leader.  She maintained that a boy clearly exhibiting many signs of Cerebral Palsy was perfectly healthy.   She never waived from her obvious lies, even when those who know Ernest best contradicted her.  If she was willing to lie about what we could see, what else had she lied about?  Had she bribed officials?  Had she really obtained the necessary consent from Ernest’s uncles and aunts?  Had she told them the truth about what adoption would mean?  Had she told us the truth about the results of Ernest’s HIV tests?  There was just so much we began to doubt once we realized we couldn’t trust Annie.  God protected us through her refusal to make any other child available to us for adoption.  He protected our wallet when she refusing to meet with us on the night we were to pay her for her services and those of the lawyer.  And He even protected us through the loss of our cell phone shortly after leaving the orphanage.  (We later found out she tried frantically to contact us that day… but oddly hasn’t initiated any contact since.)

Another evidence of God’s grace lay at the end of the road away from the orphanage:  our dear friends, Brian and Anita Biedebach.  In our moment of need we had a home to go to, friends to hug, and their children to love on.  They loved us in such practical ways, opening their home to us and preparing one of the most delightful meals we’ve ever had.  We arrived at their house in Lilongwe on Thursday afternoon, December 2^nd, and we really hadn’t eaten a meal since leaving Los Angeles the previous Saturday.  Anita prepared what she knew from Danny’s previous visits to Malawi to be his favorite dishes, and while the food was very tasty, it was the love contained therein that made it especially delicious.  I don’t think we’ll ever be able to eat Malva pudding again without tearing up at the thought of their kindness towards us. 

We were able to stay with the Biedebachs for 2 nights and then moved down the street to the home of another missionary family from our church, the Floreens, to make room for Anita’s family who were gathering in from around the world to spend a rare Christmas together.  Matt and Rachel welcomed us without hesitation, though they could barely distinguish us from Adam.  Unbeknownst to them and us at the time, they’d be stuck with us for another two weeks!  There are only 5 flights a week out of Malawi, and there was no room for us on any of them.  Despite our best, and sometimes desperate, efforts, we were forced to return home on our original flights, scheduled for December 19^th.  But even in that, we can see God’s amazing grace towards us.  We spent those two weeks seeing and enjoying Africa - an opportunity we never would have taken if not forced.  Though some of the hardest days of our lives were lived out in Africa, we also made some of our happiest memories there.  (I’ll later post pictures of some of the wonders we experienced.)        

Another of His graces in the fact we were “stranded” was the realization that Alyssa, Parker and Reagan were not missing us one bit.  I was somewhat miserable at times, wishing that since I could not hug and bond to Ernest, I could at least cuddle the three precious treasures God had already blessed us with.  But He had other plans – plans to comfort me without their aid, and plans to give our children a very special three weeks with their grandparents.  Papa and Tilly volunteered to move in to our home in our absence and the kids were beside themselves with excitement.  I truly think they all would have been disappointed if we had come home early, and looking back, I would have been too.

Our marriage was yet another recipient of God’s grace and mercy.  Trials like this could easily tear a marriage apart, but our hearts were knit even closer.  We were in agreement throughout this process and we’ve never blamed one another for any of the hurt (yet another reason to be glad I didn’t nag Danny into a 2^nd adoption!).  Our only conflict was over whether we should go home if given the opportunity.  I wanted to go home; he didn’t.  As it turns out it didn’t matter, but my heart was quickly pricked by Scripture to submit to Danny, and Danny was gently encouraged by a friend to love me no matter the cost.  What started with conflict became another opportunity for our marriage to be grown.

There’s really no end to what could be said about the ways God demonstrated His love towards us.  We even see His grace in all that He’s allowed us to forget in these succeeding months.  But it can all be summed up in the song we sang that first Friday morning in Lilongwe, during chapel at African Bible College.  I will never be able to forget the way we worshipped, singing these lyrics from the depths of our broken hearts: 

Blessed be your name
In the land that is plentiful
Where the streams of abundance flow
Blessed be your name

Blessed be your name
When I'm found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed be your name

Every blessing you pour out,
I turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say...
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be your glorious name

Blessed be your name
When the sun's shining down on me
When the world's all as it should be
Blessed be your name

Blessed be your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there's pain in the offering
Blessed be your name

Every blessing you pour out,
I turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say...
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, Blessed be your name

There was indeed great pain in the offering, but by His grace, we chose to bless His name on that road marked with suffering, even when He took away the thing we wanted most. 

Gotcha... a little late!

It's bad enough to run out of time and brain cells for real blogging.  It's even worse when your computer-that's-on-its-last-leg stops letting you even upload photos!  Then add a little panicked "Did you really fail to back up any of our Vietnam photos onto the external hard drive?!" discussion with dear husband (they're there, thank the Lord!).  What do you get?  The transformation of a pathetic Gotcha Day post into a even more pathetic tardy Gotcha Day post.  Sunday marked four years since God gave us the tremendous privilege of becoming this little girl's parents.  Reagan has enriched our lives in more ways than I could ever begin to recount.  She is generous, strong, sweet, independent, and a perfect complement to our family.  For all of the countless strangers in Vietnam that stopped to tell us what a "lucky baby" she was:  the joy is all ours! 

What bloggers do when they've no time to write...

(...i.e. post pictures of their kids).  I've not really been feeling the blogging vibe lately, but since this serves as my only real journal/scrapbook I'm compelled to at least throw in a few photos once in a while.  We spent our afternoon today at Mickey's place today enjoying some glorious spring weather and our favorite rides before we get kicked out for the summer rush.  It almost looks like they're having fun, doesn't it?  If not for mama's camera the day would have been positively perfect!  

Easter cuties

Do they come any cuter than this?  Well, behind your own children, I'm sure these must be second in line, right?  Sunday we all dressed up to spend a wonderful day celebrating the resurrection of our Lord with our chuch family, and then with a crew of family, friends and neighbors.  It was almost like Christmas in our backyard for all the eggs and gifts, and these three wasted no time tracking them down.  Reagan was given a head-start with the "little kids" and cleaned up!  I guess there are some advantages to being the same size as your one- and two-year old cousins!

My Muse

I'm not much of a photographer, but I do enjoy my second-hand DSLR and charming subjects like my only favorite nephew.  Since my sister thinks an iphone is camera enough, and Lincoln tends to avoid looking anything like himself in pictures, capturing his little personality is a fun challenge.  Don't you just love the red locks, dimples and slight gap in the front teeth?  I'm entering this very unprofessional photo in a little contest for less-than-professionals over at my bloggy friend Nancy's Ordinary Miracles and the Crazy 8.  Yes, eight.  That's six kiddos: four bio, two adopted from Vietnam, and they're in the process of becoming foster-certified.  All that and she manages to maintain a fun blog with stunning photographs.  There are still a few days left to enter if you want to throw your hat in the ring!

                                                 



Play Ball!

 Saturday marked the beginning of softball season... our first!  Danny grew up playing ball and is famous (infamous?) for his "tomahawk" swing , and I spent a lot of my childhood watching the Seattle Mariners.  For Alyssa, Parker and I, however, this was our first foray into little league - or rather, a very low-key version sponsored by our local parks and rec.  Reagan was a great little cheerleader, and the big kids had a blast.  The only dark spot of our day was waiting for us on the countertop when we arrived home: 

Wolfie's bowl, sans Wolfie.  The goldfish Parker won at a fall carnival decided he'd had enough of life in a bowl... and jumped out.  Needless to say, this story doesn't have a happy Nemo ending.  Fortunately none of the kids were particularly attached to their pet, and Wolfie took a rather unceremonious trip from the countertop to the trash can.  

Magic Shoes

You might not know it just from looking at them, but these "farkly" shoes (that's "sparkly" for those of you that don't speak Reagan) have the power to motivate four year-olds to learn to tie.  Reagan came home from a date with my mom last week with these darling light-up treasures.  The girl was so determined to wear them that she didn't bother waiting for anyone else to form the bow for her: she sat down and did it herself!  Never mind that it took 10 minutes and didn't quite follow conventional methods; by the end, she had two perfect little bows on two perfect little feet.  In the days since, she's gotten quicker, neater, and even more determined to light up our world with her "farkles."

Green decorating

No, not the hyper-conservationist type green.  I'm all for taking care of the earth God has blessed us with, but He's given it for our use.  This post is a little bit lighter than that.  Like houseplants light.  I love filling my home with live plants, and maybe by sharing a few photos I'll be able to inspire some of you to enjoy them too.  My main inspiration for acquiring this collection began with a lack of the other kind of green.  I love plants for the same reason I love mirrors: they fill a lot of space for not a lot of cash.  Here's the little pony wall that separates our dining room from our family room.  The first shot is a nice collection of some of our favorite photos, knickknacks and mementos.  It's pretty enough, but lacks height, life and color.  Add a $5 plant in a clearance blue pot, and it becomes much more interesting. 

Here are few larger examples of space filling:

This beautiful Vietnamese pot (under $40 last summer at Costco) and plant ($18 at Sam's Club) distract attention away from our hideous builder-basic fireplace. 

This one sits in another clearance pot on an orange "Homer" bucket (draped in an old tablecloth) to fill the corner behind the couch in our living room.

Another larger specimen ($8 at Target with the pot) makes a neglected corner of our kitchen feel... less so.

I have plants in my bathroom (each less than $8 with the containers):

Plants in my kitchen:

I can't remember how much it cost to make this little terrarium, but it was cheap.  I bought supplies enough to make several for gifts, the plants themselves were the smallest cheapest ones Home Depot carries, and the glass jar was one I had on hand for serving drinks but never used because the little spigot thingy never worked right.

I love this little vignette of a dollar store rose, $1.49 pot that originally came with and housed paperwhites (Target post-Christmas clearance), my $2.50 bird from Michael's and little "designer" plate, also from Target ($3 maybe?).

I don't even mind fake greenery, as long as it's not trying too hard to be really green.  Does that make sense?  If not, maybe the pictures will.  Neither of these little beauties cost more than $4:

And two of my favorite new additions came courtesy of my favorite MIL, who somehow thought I could better care for some of the beautiful plants she inherited after her hard work at our church's Shepherd's Conference:

I've never had a fern or an orchid before, so I'm hoping I can keep them alive.  The funny thing is, my plants (like my goldfish) seem to live unnaturally long lives.  Honestly, I think they thrive on neglect.  Maybe other people just give their plants too much attention.  I don't feed them (the plants that is.  Our goldfish do get food fairly often.) I only water them occasionally and give them a good spray or wipe down once in a great while to combat dust.  All that to say: don't be afraid!  Plants are beautiful, inexpensive, and good for the environment!

Spring?

Spring looked a lot like summer today: crystal clear skies and mercury in the 90s.  Except unlike summer, our Disneyland passes weren't blocked out!  So off we went with my mom to enjoy a glorious afternoon at the happiest place on earth...     

 

It just feels like I've been blogging

Though I haven't actually posted anything in a while, my blog and I have been spending a lot of time together.  Since I'm not into scrapbooking, journaling, or any other means of documenting our family life, I publish my blog each year in the form of a book.  The first year my mom did it for me as an incredible Christmas gift.  She painstakingly arranged it, had it printed, and then bound by a real publisher.  It's beautiful.  Since then, I've done it myself using Blurb.  The result is less professional than that first book, but considerably easier. It works and looks a lot like Shutterfly or other photobook sites, with the added advantage of "slurping" the text, photos, and even comments from blogs almost automatically.  They don't offer a lot of pretty backgrounds or papers, but I think the plain black and white format I used highlights the content well.  It's also relatively inexpensive compared to other sites.  My latest photo-heavy creation was $70 with shipping for 130 pages.   The FedEx guy delivered it yesterday and I'm thrilled to have my little "journal" sitting on my table top - not just my laptop.  So now you know where I've been.  Don't you think you need one too?! 

Happy Spring!

So today doesn't really feel like spring - we had such torrential rains all day that we were drenched to the bone between church and the car, and passed five car accidents between church and home.  But last weekend was glorious!  The kids insisted on swimming, despite the fact that the pool still isn't warmer than 60, chasing each other through the sprinklers, and sunbathing on the patio.  Anyone else ready for pool season?

The Whole Story - Leaving

(Thank you all for bearing with me! I'm getting there!  This is part 8, so if you would like to catch up, just click on the titles for An Intro, Getting There, Meeting Ernest, Still Day One, The Choice, Annie, and Lystra)

Almost immediately after meeting with Lystra that eventful Thursday morning, we decided we needed to further express our concerns about adoption Ernest to the orphanage director, Annie. She rather coolly welcomed Danny, my parents and me into her living room, where we sat down to a discussion that would forever alter our lives, and the life of a precious little boy.
While being careful not to implicate Lystra and further compromise her position at Kondanoni Children’s Home, we rehashed the obvious: Ernest is not at all the healthy, thriving little boy Annie had so vividly described to us. We reminded her of our responsibility to the children God had already blessed us with, and the tremendous level of lifetime care Ernest would demand. We expressed our doubts whether we would be able to adequately provide that for him. We admitted just how incredibly exhausted we were, both physically and emotionally. We asked her if we might be able to take some time to go to Lilongwe to rest, get counsel, be comforted by our friends, and try to determine what God’s plan was in all of this.

I was in tears. Danny was in tears. My mom was in tears. I’m pretty sure even my dad was in tears. Annie was completely void of emotion. She sat there with as much interest and expression as she might have been if we were discussing the weather. Now it’s one thing to see a woman cry and not respond with some level of compassion. In my opinion, it takes a completely different level of callousness to fail to react to an obviously broken man. Yet Annie’s only response was to continue to maintain that there was nothing at all unusual about a 3 year old who doesn’t even babble. She said “it’s your decision” as if it was no big deal for anyone either way. Nevermind the fact that we’d travelled halfway around the world to joyfully welcome a new member of our family. Nevermind the possibility that a little boy would grow up without the love of a mama and daddy.

We expressed again our desire to step back from the situation – at least for the weekend, since our court date wasn’t until the following Monday - to give ourselves the best opportunity to make a wise choice. Annie agreed, but quickly pointed out that we owed her for two night’s lodging in the orphanage guest house. The four of us stepped outside, Danny pulled out $120, and he and my dad went back inside to settle up with Annie.
It is for that particular part of the encounter that I’m grateful I was not present. As Danny handed her the money, she angrily insisted “You know what your decision is going to be. If you choose to drag this out, you’re just going to cost me more money!” As he’s stated since, it’s hard for Danny to hold his anger in check on the freeway, let alone in the face of the woman who has put his family through so much unnecessary pain. Yet God graciously held Danny’s tongue in that moment. He begged her not to press us for a decision, but ultimately told her that if she was going to insist, our answer must be “no.”

Within moments, we had Kondi’s car packed to the gills. Lystra came over to give us a tearful send-off. We hugged her, hopped in, and made the painful drive down the dirt path away from Ernest and our dreams of what might have been. God’s grace had sustained us thus far, and we had no doubt he would carry us safely into the loving arms of our dear friends just 150 miles away. 

Fun in Seattle, by Alyssa

Hi, my name is Alyssa, Laura's daughter. For my birthday in November my Gaga and Papa got me a plane ticket to Seattle. This weekend we left. This is who went: my Aunt Sasa, Gaga (my grandma), my mom and I. One of my favorite things we did was going shopping. One of my favorite things I bought was boots for the snow (kinda like Uggs) from Fred Meyer, of course! Now here are some pics we took!

Room service!

Mama's old house

Mama's favorite restaurant - the one our bird is named after

We really liked our sundae