Leaving tomorrow!

We leave tomorrow morning for Ethiopia!

Here's a Christmas song that I heard for the first time while driving home from Detroit on Monday.  It's a fun medly of Christmas songs...but at the 2:18 minute point the song struck a real chord with me.  Listen to it...really, please listen to it!

Merry Christmas!

5 Days!

Only 5 more days until we board a plane to Ethiopia!  That means we'll be meeting H & M in 7 days!  That's next week!  It still doesn't really feel "real" yet.  I wonder when it will--probably when we go through the orphanage gates and are just about to see H & M for the very first time.

Last week we were on our last family vacation as a family of 5 (we were also joined by my parents & brother as well as Aaron's parents, sister & brother-in-law).  We went to chilly Orlando, Florida.  We had a wonderful time despite the record low temperatures.  We layered on our clothes, put our hoods up, bought gloves at a local gift shop and spent the entire week at Universal Studios. 

The kids had a blast (as did Aaron & I).  They were just at the right age to really enjoy the parks (Universal Studios & Universal Islands of Adventure).  There were quite a few highlights for me.  Isaiah volunteered to go down onstage during an "animal actors" show and had a dove land on his head and then he gave some commands to the yellow lab from the movie Marley & Me.  The new Harry Potter attractions were amazing!  Oh, and Butterbeer--so good!  We spent quite a bit of our money on Butterbeer. 

We also went out to dinner at a really good Ethiopian restaurant.   The food and the service was wonderful.  I'm so glad we had a chance to do that with all of our extended family before we left for Ethiopia.

Aaron's parents gave us (including the kids) and his sister & brother-in-law, tickets to Cirque du Soleil for an early Christmas present.  It was quite a show.  If you ever get a chance to see it I would recommend it.

Despite the cold weather, the kids had fun swimming in the heated pool. 

We had a couple of our flights cancelled on the way home and ended up driving the last stretch from Detroit.  I'm excited to print the following picture and share it with H and M next week.  I wonder what they'll think of it.

So, now it's time to get everything organized/packed for our next journey.  God is so good.

Have a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year!

New Chairs

Yesterday we bought 2 new chairs for our dining room table.  We're one step closer to being ready for H & M to come home.

Orphan Sunday

Last Sunday was Orphan Sunday at our church.  Aaron shared a little of our adoption story as well as a heartfelt message.  The audio for the sermon along with the videos used in the service are below.

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Video #1

Hope is Fading – Orphan Sunday from Allan Rosenow on Vimeo.


Video #2



Reflection Song (played during the offering time)

Plans are made!

We have our travel plans figured out.  Yay!  I love having a plan.  We (me & Aaron, our 3 kids & Aaron's mom) fly out at 10am on December 20th, arriving  Addis Ababa, Ethiopia at 9:50pm on December 21st.  We'll be staying at a nice guest house (Ethio Comfort Guest House) along with many of the other families traveling for court from our agency.  We are going to be collecting donations and small gifts for the children at our church for the next few weeks.  Our kids are excited about playing "Santa" to the children in the orphanage while we are there over Christmas (we'll be there over Christmas time here in the US, but Christmas--or Ganna--is celebrated on Jan. 7th in Ethiopia).  We will be able to visit H & M for 2 hours each morning and then we'll take in the city during the rest of the day.  Our court date is on Thursday, December 23.  I'm hopeful that everything will go smoothly.  We will leave Ethiopia at 11:25pm on Wednesday, December 29 and return home to Wisconsin at 5:45pm on Thursday, December 30.

Your prayers for our court date, safe travel, our health and for H & M would be wonderful.  My prayer, and maybe yours too, is that H & M would be ready for this change that is about to happen in their lives, that all of us at home would be prepared for this change, and that H & M's past hurts would be healed more each day.

We will meet H & M in exactly 6 weeks from today!

AHHHHHHH!

We got our court date!  December 23rd!  We'll be in Ethiopia for Christmas with our new kids! 

We're hoping to be able to take our 3 kids along with us...we'll see if all the details work out for us.

Aaron needs to make new plans for our church's Christmas Eve service.  I know it's going to be difficult for him to not be there for one of the largest servcies of the year, but I also know he's excited to go to Ethiopia.

Ahhhh!  Where to start, where to start?!

A Little Push

Sometimes we need God to open our eyes and give us a little push.  Read the following blog entry by a woman living in Haiti right now.

http://allthingshendrick.blogspot.com/2010/10/reality-is-weighty-thing.html