Thanksgiving--City Mice travel to the Country

Howdy! We were so thrilled to be invited to the Kemp farm to celebrate Thanksgiving with LOTS of our church family! We took our Zyrtec & Claritin & rounded up the mice for lots of new Louisiana adventures. We ate tons of food, went on a hay ride that was kind of like Space Mountain (lots of dips and turns in darkness), climbed mountains of sand, had 4-wheeler rides, rode horses, learned to "rope", climbed trees, and bounced on a trampoline with NO net. Minus our sinus headaches today, there were no injuries. We had a wonderful time, and JP even begged us to spend the night...but Mommy loves her king-sized bed:( I am thankful this Thanksgiving that God's ways are higher than our ways...he leads us by still waters and restores our soul. I am thankful for how our family has been embraced by our new church family. I have enjoyed our life as a family of four, but i am VERY thankful that before next Thanksgiving we will be a party of 5!

Christmas Picture REJECTS

So, just because i'm weird, i thought i would post 2 pictures that did NOT get selected for our family Christmas card. I would love to hear your suggestions for the caption. The top one i thought looked like "Instead of the 12 Days of Christmas, we will be having Mom's 12 Days of Cream-of-Unusual Casseroles". The bottom one is just the boys attempt at smiling.

Imaginary Friends and Pretend Cousins

Yes, i know this is our adoption blog...but i just had to post about T's many imaginary friends and cousins. First introduced to our family was Jake. Jake is a fun-loving imaginary friend of T's who is an "expert at trains" and has a Nana that feeds the boys all sorts of cupcakes, cookies and sweets. Jake also has a "intendo" and his Nana lets them play video games all day long. We've pretty much figured out that "Jake" is T's "Paris Hilton"/ spoiled kid with the "perfect" life. Second, last week T said, "Don't ya know" with a really Sarah Palin/Canadian-like accent. (T also does a great heavy Southern & British & French accent) When asked where he heard such a thing, he simply said, "from Fran". I can honestly say I cannot think of a single Fran, or where he even heard the name...so i asked, "WHO???" He explained that Fran was his cousin. She is a girl. She is a squirrel. Yes. So not only does Christopher have an uncle (Matt) that is also his second cousin (my cousin who married DH's sister), he also has a cousin who is a Canadian squirrel. Third, today I learned about Frank. I foolishly thought he may be related to Fran (due to the similarity of their names), but again, i was wrong. Frank is a human pumpkin farmer, who apparently has fallen on bad times, because he has to go to Albertsons to buy his pumpkins. On a happy note he does play the banjo often, which T and Jake witnessed on their field trip. I am in awe of T's great story-telling ability, and JP enjoys it now too. He used to yell "LIAR" whenever Jake's name was mentioned, but now we have a wink system, which is accompanied with a very condescending, "that's nice, Nibbles" from big brother "Jerry".

Louisiana Saturday Night

I can hear the Alabama song still in my head... We went to Tiger Stadium last night for the boys' 1st college football game (thanks Russells!). T drank 1 1/2 large hot chocolates and admired the tubas the whole time. JP soaked it all up--he loved doing all the cheers and chants, the marching band, and the hot chocolate (did I mention it was freezing?). He couldn't understand why the people kept booing their own team. LSU "fans" can be fickle. It just reminded me again how "other"(DH's word for different) God is from us. His love is an everlasting love. His love has purpose; it is not a whim. In church today we listened to how we were adopted as sons in Christ, according to God's good pleasure (Ephesians 1). It spoke to me because I know with what purpose, love, devotion, and steadfastness we pursue our little girl. I know that we have loved her before we have met her, seen her face, heard about her history. Just a smile on my face today, not just because LSU pulled out a victory in the 4th quarter, but because I know God has a particular love and purpose for me, and our ever-growing family.

6 Monthiversary DTE- Random thoughts and updates

So....6 months of having our paperwork in Ethiopia. The cravings have kicked in. The weird dreams have officially started. The pounds are creeping on. They don't call it paper-pregnancy for nothing! So, I've just been marinating this month (like a Thanksgiving turkey) in God's good promises. I've been learning alot about the life and ministry of George Mueller. I've been collecting girls clothes. (Thanks friends!) I've been attending Thanksgiving feasts and homeschool groups. I've visited with family from far faraway. It has been a good month of waiting, we are experiencing "the tree of life" stage (Proverbs 13.12). JP lost his first top tooth. He says it helps him whistle better. T is happy hiding or causing much mischief stating, "you felt it in the old trick!" No matter how many times we laugh and tell him its "you FELL for the old trick" he insists in saying it his way. Also overheard this morning around 6.15am...christopher softly calling "daddy!" (repeat about 6 times). JP encourages him, suggesting he call for mommy instead, since Dad was not making an appearance. T replied, "BECAUSE...Mommy does not get out of bed while it is still dark." True. True. We still have not named our little girl, so if ya wanna make suggestions, then do so in the comment:)