Now it's Saturday

Now it is Saturday and Steven is at work,  I am for sure in my heart that I'm going to get my boy soon.  I had no official word on this at the time but I felt God's hand all over this situation and I just knew that it was going to be soon.  I decided to work on my house that day because I was not nearly as prepared as I had planned to be for his arrival.  I had storage boxes full of stuff that needed to be sorted through, and clothes that needed to be washed-because what if I did have to go get him soon?  How much time would I have to pack?  My thoughts would get the best of me at times on that day and I would think What Are You Doing? It could be months before you can bring him home?  Years?  But no, I knew he was coming home soon so I continued my work.  And later, very soon later, I was glad that I did.

The Beginning- January 15, 2010

Now it was Friday and we were for sure the boys were safe.  The five story building that housed the orphanage was damaged but still standing and the children had been moved across the street using tents as shelter on a concrete slab.  They were soon moved to the guest house (where we stayed while we were in Haiti in September).  Steven and I felt much better about them being there because it was up the mountain a ways and away from the chaotic streets of earthquake aftermath.  We knew that they had very limited food and water and we were taking suggestions and trying to cover every angle on what we needed to do to get to them.  I remember trying to pray but I was so tired that my prayers didn't seem to make any sense.  I was getting constant text messages, e-mails, facebook comments, and calls from people who were praying for Pax and I knew that people were praying.  So for a while I just stopped trying and let these people intercede on my behalf.  I felt very peaceful about this.  People I didn't even know were praying for my son -this was so amazing to me.  A lot of the updates we were receiving came from a ministry team in TN that actually had an intern at New Life Link (where our boys were).  They made it in very quickly and our children benefited from this, a lot.

The Beginning- January 14, 2010

I call this The Beginning because it was the beginning to the end of a journey.  A very long 2 year journey to get our son home from Haiti.  So the next day, which was Thursday,  Amanda and I met with a couple of attorneys- one who specifically specializes in immigration and she was particularly familiar with Humanitarian Visas or Humanitarian Parole which is what we needed to get the boys into the country.  The Steve's went on to work that day as we were going to need money as well as visas to get these boys. Amanda and I met at her house that morning and went downtown to meet with the attorneys.  We got the proper paperwork submitted and we also sent requests to our local and some not so local congress people in hopes that they may be able to help us score the visas that we needed. 

The Beginning- January 13, 2010

The night of the earthquake we just sat around gazing at the T.V. and computer screens-as well as answering the phone and replying to text messages with what little.....and I mean little, information that we had.  Lucy, from KAS was keeping us as informed as she could.  I specifically remember talking to her around midnight as she gave me all the information she had at the time.  The next morning Steven and I already had plans to run to Owensboro (for what I don't remember) so we met up at Panera Bread with Steve and Amanda (Joshua's parents) and had lunch.  At that point I think we had gotten unofficial word that the boys were safe but I can't remember for sure.  Amanda called later and said the Messenger-Inquirer wanted to do an interview at their house in Owensboro so Steven and I drove back to Owensboro that evening to participate in hopes that the article may gain enough public interest to help us get our boys home.  At this point we didn't know much besides the fact that we needed visas to get them out of Haiti and we needed them fast.

The Beginning- January 12, 2010

Tuesday-January 12, 2010 started out as a normal kind of day, drop the kiddos off at school then I go to staph meeting (yes the misspelling is intentional).  Then I usually have lunch with a friend and go back to work until time to pick the kids up from school.  Pretty normal day.  That is until shortly after we got home on that particular Tuesday and I decided to check my facebook while dinner was simmering on the stove.  My dear friend Amanda-who's son Joshua was in the same orphanage as Pax - had just posted a comment about the safety of the kids at New Life Link and desperate for information on the kids.  Confused,  I picked up the phone and called her right away.  As she answered the phone she was trying to hold back tears and I knew something wasn't good. An earthquake had rocked the homeland of our boys, and the damage was bad....very bad.  Not to mention, the epicenter of the quake was in the area that the orphanage was located.  She gave me what information she had and we hung up as to keep ourselves open incase any information came in about the boys.  As soon as I got off the phone I turned on the television and watched news on the internet the rest of the night.  We were also able to follow some missionaries that were in Haiti at the time of the quake via Twitter and we kept in touch with the director of our adoption agency.  Basically the whole night was filled with gathering bits of information where we could, on and off the phone, on and off the computer, watching television, and getting Twitter updates, just hoping to see something that would give us some hope.  I felt at peace about their safety.....but I was a mom who needed to get to her son, and right away!

Crazy Days

Well,  I haven't had much time to update my blog lately but I have had a couple of requests for an update-so for my two readers, this is for you!!  As we have had a completely insane beginning to our year it ended up being a bittersweet blessing, through the tragedy of an earthquake that forever changed the lives of thousands upon thousands of people-we were blessed to welcome the newest addition to our family....Paxton.  I want to be able to share this experience with those many, many people who prayed our baby home so I'm going to blog as carefully as I can through the crazy days of this year as it is calming down a little, this is also for Paxton's benefit so when he is older he will have something to reference that is a little more accurate than my memory.  Check back tomorrow.....

We're baaack!

You may not have even noticed that we left, but we did.  And for an entire week at that.  The day after Christmas we headed out around 6:30 in the morning to cold, cold Northern Indiana.  We first stopped at Darrian and Shaylen's grandmother's house in Bremen, IN and left them there to spend some time with Mammaw Alice, Aunt Lori, and their cousins.  Then Steven, Jadeyn and myself headed over to Hammond, IN to spend some time with Steven's brother and his fam.  We visited Albanese Candy Factory in Merrillville....

We went to church on Sunday morning and then Cindy and I went out shopping on Sunday afternoon and I got almost all of my Christmas shopping done for 2010.  It was very cold and snowy so we spent a lot of time chatting in the living room where it was warm too.  On Tuesday morning we loaded up and went back to Mammaw Alices so we could spend some time there as well. 

The kids had Christmas dinner at Mammaws while we were gone, looks like they had a good time.....

Aunt Lori had a New Years Eve party with good food, and lots of card playing....

Mammaw is picture crazy, she has to get us all.  Many, many times!

We ended our journey around Lafayette, IN visiting Steven's BF Chad and his fam...but I guess we were tired of the camera at that point because we didn't take any pics. hmmm..Maybe next time.