Heart is filled

Great news. I think my body is officially on est time. My heart and mind are still in Ethiopia. I don't ever want to forget the things that I have seen or the feelings that I felt. I am so thankful that Ben and I decided to follow God all the way to Ethiopia. We are both forever changed. I would like to share something that God used for us to jump with both feet into this journey.

It is something from Beth Moore's study Breaking Free.

It goes like this (quote from her study)

Imagine going to heaven and standing by God as He lovingly shows you the calendar of His plan for your earthly life. It begins with the day you are born. Once you received Christ as Savior, every day that follows is outlined in red. You see footprints walking through each day of each week of your life. On many of the days, two sets of footprints appear. You inquire: "Father, are those my footprints on the calendar every day and is the second set of prints when you joined me?"
He answers, "No, My precious child. The consistent footprints on your calendar are Mine. The second set of footprirnts are when you joined Me."
"Where were You going, Father?"
"To the destiny I planned for you, hoping you'd follow."
"But, Father, where are my footprints all those times?"
He answers, "Sometimes you went back to look at old resentments and habits while I was still going forward, hoping you'd join Me. Sometimes, you departed from My path and chose your own calendar instead. Other times, your footprints can even be seen on another person's calendar because you thought you liked their plan better. At other times, you simply stopped because you would not let go of something you could not take to the next day."
"But, Father, we ended up OK even if I didn't walk with You every day, didn't we?"
He holds you close and smiles, "Yes, Child, we ended up OK. But, you see, OK was never what I had in mind for you."
"Father, what are those golden treasure boxes on certain days?"
"Blessings, My child, I had for you along the way. Those that are open are those you received. Those still closed were days you did not walk with Me."

We are so thankful that we have the chance to receive this beautiful blessing from God. May you all receive yours as well.

Thank you to Birtukan and Nesibu

We were fortunate enough to stay with such an amazing family. we are forever thankful and grateful to them. Birtukan and Nesibu

pictures from feeding program

Our last day in Ethiopia saturday

This morning we went to say good-bye to our boy. I must say we have a pretty funny kid. He could not be more perfect for our family. Today I was holding another little girl and swinging her around and he walked up to me grabbed my arm to put her down and do it to him. The funny part is this whole week he hasn't come up to us. It has been us going to him. I was only able to hold him once before this for the whole week. It was pretty amazing. I think that he connects that we are there for him hopefully he knows that we will back for him....
After our good-byes we went to Birtukan and Nesibu's feeding program. It is a program that they run on Saturdays to feed over 1000 children. What an amazing ministry. Birtukan herself was a sponsored child through World Vision. God has placed this program on her heart and brought her a husband that shares the vision. When we were feeding these children I have never felt so much love and kindness. These kids were awesome. Among this God has never felt so close. After the program, we decided to sponsor 3 kids. This sponsorship pays for school fees, yearly checkups, counseling, a meal on Saturday, school supplies and allows them to stay with their families. There are over 600 kids in the ministry that still need sponsors. if you feel that your family could help out in this way it is only $30 a month. What a great life lesson to teach your kids. They can have a friend completely around the world. If you would like to sponsor a child, please let me know and I can get you the contact info. It is only $1 a day. I think that we all can find a $1 a day.... Grace and Peace everyone.....

court day friday

We did not pass court today but I have a peace in my heart that God is in control. He knows what is best for our family. When I doubt and want to take over that control I just have to remind myself that His plan is always better than mine. Even though sometimes I think I have a really great plan. after court we went out to lunch. There were no other families here so it was just Abel, Ben and I. We had an unbelieveable time today. Abel took us to the top of the mountain which was 10000 feet above sea level. We saw the track that the runners go to every morning at 5:30 to train, a church at the top of the mountain, the first palace. All over the hill there were women who walked 4-5 miles up and back down to gather tree branches for fire later that day.. It was simply amazing. The women are so strong. This culture has such hard workers.

Court Day Friday

We leave the guesthouse early in the morning to go meet with the MOWA to figure out what is wrong with our dossier. We meet with the gentleman that is working on our file and sure enough there is white out on my police clearance letter. The lady at the desk accidentally checked the wrong box so she whited it out and initialled it. I just sit there and begin to ball my eyes. I am so sad that we are not going to pass court today. The gentleman reassures us that we just need to redo this paper and we will be fine. I absolutely love their culture in the sense that they view everything as a minor problem. I really wish that I had more of that instead of everything being so major. so we will redo the form and get it sent back as soon as possible. so we leave and head to the courthouse. We walk up the stairs and are led into a room full of people waiting to go before the judge. There are birth families, adopted families all sitting together. Racing through my heart is I wonder which one is my sons birth family. The feelings in my heart are so mixed. I am so happy that we are near the end of the process to bring our little boy home but I am so sad that his mother has to give him up. We are the only ones at court today from our agency so the next moment they call her name to come before the judge. I know who she is. My heart begins to fill with pain. I watch her walk into the room to speak before the judge. Moments later the door opens and they call our names to come in. We pass her in the doorway. She now knows who we are. We are in the room before the judge. My heart is torn in all these different directions. We are done with the judge and we walk out of the door into the waiting room and we are standing in the middle of the room I look at up and in the hallway I lock eyes with his mother. Our eyes are both filled with tears. I can't imagine what she is going through. I wonder if she thinks that I am good enough. I can't look anymore, it is too painful so I turn away. when I look back she is gone. I am so overcome with emotions at this point that I run into the hall with Abel and began to just cry. All of my emotions just come out in this hallway with people standing everywhere.

Thursday Court pre day for us Court day for 3 families

Today we will take the 3 other families to court. They all passed today. Yea!!! Thank you Lord. These families have been on a long journey and what a great thing to have great news before you leave. We were able to go to the orphanage while they were at court today. Today our little one let me pick him up. I walked with him outside in the courtyard looking at all the trees and flowers. I just look at him and have this overflowing fountain of love pouring out of me. I am so thankful that God picked this one out for us. He is so wonderful. Today he was also a little sick. Thankfully the next day he was back to himself. After the orphanage, we went to Bethany to meet with our social worker and get a briefing about court tomorrow. The Bethany staff in Ethiopia are so awesome. I cannot say enough great things about them. They really work hard for us adoptive families. Today was a long and busy day. shortly after we leave Abel got a call from Sisay stating that there is something wrong with one of our forms. Sisay tells us we will go to the MOWA in the morning and try to work it out. I just break down in tears. We have come all this way and now we are going to be delayed. I felt so defeated. I was up in my room crying and Birtukan comes up and asks me what is wrong she then begins to pray in Amharic for me. she has her arms wrapped around me as I am laying my head on her shoulder just weeping and she is praying. She prayed so intensely. I am not sure what she prayed but after 5 minutes I felt and overwhelming sense of peace. It was going to be ok. God is charge.
Tonight we didn't get much sleep.

Wednesday day

After the orphanage visit, Abel took us to a great restaurant for lunch. We got to hang out with the 3 other families that were there and talk about our day with the kids. After lunch, we went to the market to buy some gifts for home. For the 3 other families they were preparing for court. Tonight we will go to a traditional Ethiopian dinner at a restaurant. The food above is what we were served. Ben loved the food. After dinner, we got to see some tradional Ethiopian dancing. it was absolutely amazing. the Ethiopians are such kind, talented, beautiful people. We had a wonderful day today.

Meeting our boy Wednesday

We are standing outside the gate just waiting to go in. My stomach is in absolute knots. within a couple of minutes they are ready and we walk in. The children are eating lunch when we walk in. Ben notices him right away in the corner as I am still looking to find him. I follow Ben as he leads me over. There he is. My heart sinks with nervousness praying that he doesn't cry when he sees us. Ben bends down to say hi and he gives him a high five. I reach out my hand for a high five and he gives me one. i just burst out with joy and laughter and realize that his personality is perfect for our family. This little boy was matched perfectly for us. We get to spend about 3 hours today at the orphanage. The kids are really amazing. They are so kind, polite, joyful and full of energy. Our boy is opening a little to Ben but just watches me from a distance. We just take it slow not wanting to rush him. So I will take the little glances from him. We brought a bag of suckers so all the kids loved them.

Our trip Day 1

We were unable to get on blogspot while we were there so we journaled so we could share our experience. We arrived in Addis Ababa late Tuesday evening. We were greeted by one of the kindest, generous person, Abel. From the airport we went to our guesthouse. Birtukan and Nesibu greeted us warmly and then prepared some really awesome soup. Abel handed us our itinerary and in the morning we will meet our little boy. The first night I (jen) was up most of the night because I was worried that we would over sleep and not get up for the big day. So about every hour I woke Ben up to see what time it was. We ended up getting up around 5am. Tuesday morning we had the chance to meet some amazing friends, Luke and Megan. One of the most beautiful things about this adoption journey is the friends that you will make along the way. They met our little boy the day before and told us how cute he was. After an amazing breakfast which every morning birtukan prepares the freshiest breakfast. The juice is always mixed with fresh banana and another fruit. It was so great. (the picture above is us with our new friends standing right outside the orphanage before we meet our little boy)

Amsterdam

We made it to Amsterdam. We're waiting for our connection now. Not much sleep overnight for Jen or I but all is going well. The only hiccup so far is I converted the euro/dollar incorrectly, but we had a nice 40 dollar breakfast this morning! Jen bought 10 minutes in massage chair so i'm taking the opportunity to catch up. From here, we have about another 9 hour flight with a stop in the Sudan. It doesn't seem like Amsterdam should be less than half way from Detroit, but it puts it in perspective. Alek and Natalie - if you are reading this today we love you and miss you and everything is good. We're having quite the adventure. We love you all and will post again when we arrive in Addis.

at the airport

we made the first step of our trip. all of our four bags were under fifty lbs we had three at forty nine and one at twenty eight. guess which one was bens. the kids were so excited to see their cousins. please keep them in your prayers for complete peace and joy the entire week. we are so excited about this next step. we leave for amsterm at five thirty we will be in ethiopia tomrrow around two thirty pm michigan time. hope to post again when we get there.

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We are off to Ethiopia.

Things have been quite busy around here. Tomorrow morning we leave for our trip to Ethiopia.We are so thankful to our family and friends for praying for us through this journey so far. Today we had a wonderful lunch with friends Kurt, Juli, Tim and Maria. We are so grateful for their committment to walk with us in this process. Tonight my aunt Steph, cousins Cole, Cara and Amanda and Grandma Grace arrived to watch Alek and Natalie for the week that we are gone. We cannot express how much this means to us. We are forever thankful that we will be able to fully intake this amazing experience that is ahead with peace knowing our kids are being well taken care of. We ask that you send many prayers for my grandma, aunt and all the kids. We will continue to update our journey throughout our trip. We should arrive Tuesday evening, meeting Baby J for the first time on Wednesday. Thank you all again for your continued prayers.