Baby Names

I love the joy my kids at school have over my adoption. They often get into conversations with me about adoption and our baby. Funny though, these conversations usually come during the times they want a "distraction" from doing their work. I definitely keep things moving in our class, but I always joyfully stop to talk adoption, and I think the kids know this now! ;) So today, during math, they wanted to know why (as one girl puts it), "They haven't given you his picture yet!" (meaning our referral). That quickly turned into, "Mrs. Oren, the very first day you bring him home, will you please promise to bring him to school!" Then, "Will you let us pick out his name?" To which I replied, "Mr. Oren and I will decide his name in the end, but I would love to hear your suggestions! We aren't 100% sure what his name will be, so we are open to your ideas." This spurred on quite the discussion and two little girls insisted on pieces of paper to write them down. Here are their ideas.

**Note: you will need to read phonetically for a few of them. Due to the list, I think they think that "Bible names" must be more spiritual than other names. My favorite spellings are Luck (Luke), Daved (David), Mich (Micah), and my absolute favorite name choice... Psalm. Haha. So random it's hilarious.

And, while we're on the topics of names, we are totally open to suggestions! So please, bring them on!! We have a running list of about 10 names... a few we really like, but haven't settled on one yet. This past Saturday we went out to eat at the Macaroni Grill and they have paper down as the table cloths and provide crayons. We had a fun time writing all the different names we like on the table, trying them out with "Oren", writing them in print and cursive, and all different colors. It was quite fun. Our waitress was a little confused. I asked her if she liked to read what people write on their tables. She said yes. Then with a questioning tone she said, "Looks like baby names?" and I said yep... a baby boy! She looked at me very confused. I'm a pretty small person and if I was pregnant, I had to be very early, but if I was that early, how could I know it was a boy?! Obviously we told her of our adoption and then it all made sense. :) I'm willing to bet though that after we left she was wondering about some of the names we listed. We like less common names and there were quite a few on there, as well as some funny names we were just joking around with. This was one moment I wish I had a cell phone camera to take a picture of our lovely table name design. It was pretty cool! :) But really, we'd love to hear what names you like!
**too bad this cutie doesn't have brown skin. hehe**

The Process Update

Wow, this is hard. What a process. We are so ready to add to our family. So ready to have the son God has picked out for us. We still move ahead... bold and confident.

Another friend we've met during this process received devastating news. Their baby girl died in Ethiopia. It breaks my heart and tears fill my eyes, even writing that. There have been a few precious babies who have met Jesus in the last several months. It's hard to understand, hard to understand how God is working. Jon and I are going through a study together on 1st and 2nd Peter and wow.. those trials? hope? It's all coming together, but not quite in the easiest of ways.

Most days, I have a deep seated peace that fills my heart, knowing that it will happen... our baby will come home, in God's perfect timing. But of course, our humanness gets in the way some days and we want things to move in what we feel is our perfect timing.

This is the general run down of the adoption process:

• Dossier (paperwork) gets sent to Ethiopia & you get on the waiting list; then
  
• Referral- they call you with the baby that will be yours. You get pictures, medical/family history, etc.; then
  
• Court- a worker from our agency represents us in court. Hopefully you pass the 1st time. This means you are now the legal parents of your baby; then
  
• Travel- once you pass court, you travel 4-6 weeks later to bring your baby home.

Right now we are in the waiting stage for our referral. Currently, due to many different factors, the time between referral and court date has gotten VERY long...about 4 months. This means, that if we get our referral in March or April, and nothing changes in the court timeline, we could be looking at the end of the year before our baby is home. That is due to the Ethiopian courts closing from mid August until the beginning of October. So if we don't get through court before the August closing, we have to wait until they re-open for a court date. How hard it will be to wait those extra months, already knowing who our baby is, and watching him grow up through pictures. So the thing heavy on our hearts right now??? The legal system: please pray for another judge. If they can get another judge into court within the month, we could see the system start to move again, and we might have a chance of getting through.

The director of our agency took a last minute trip to Ethiopia to check things out, make improvements, and see what is going on with court being so slow. (Court is what needs to move in order for all these babies to get home to their families). Even though we were told possibly the beginning of March for a referral (when we find out who our baby is), we are leaning our minds towards April (which seems to be more in line with other families timelines). So anyway, here's the message we received from our director who just returned from her trip to Ethiopia. The colored text has been added by me to explain things).

The trip was very productive. I'll summarize here and give more info later:

Baby Care: Many improvements were already underway and it has been very helpful to have volunteers available to watch and make suggestions. (As of last weekend, there are currently 70 babies at the orphanage). Charts are being kept for each baby with feeding monitored. Diapers are being changed more frequently. We are in the process of hiring two new nurses and will have a nurse on duty around the clock. Twenty two laundry and baby workers have been added since the first of the year and their training is being monitored. We have had advice and suggestions from a number of professionals, both local and adoptive parents and are very grateful for their help.

Toddler Care: I think I mentioned that our toddler population has grown and we realized that they needed more space and more stimulation. We have identified a large compound with a large old house and a huge outdoor area. We are thinking of moving the Opportunity House and the older toddlers to this compound. There is space to separate the children but they can participate in some activities, such as music, together and it would be a nice environment for all of them.

Legal (This is what I will be referring to as "court" once we receive our referral):

I met with Samson yesterday (Samson is AAI's legal representative and works with every case that is heard in court. We signed over power of attorney to him in our dossier). He said that the Ministry of Woman's Affiars (MOWA) is getting clearer as to what they want for each case. (Recently, several families haven't been passing court the first time due to a missing document from MOWA). They held a training about 10 days ago that Samson and two other staff attended. The hope is that there will be more consistency so cases presented will have everything needed to pass court the first time. Samson said that the Network of adoption program managers met with the Ministry of Justice recently and they have promised an additional judge. Samson believes the new judge will be in place within a month which should mean a shorter wait for court dates. (This will hopefully make the wait time from referral to court date about 2 and a half months instead of 4 months).

Guest House: The current Ritmo Guest House has not met the needs of many families, especially those with older children who stayed their with their adopting parents. Gail has identified a new and lovely home with a yard and landscaping, that is actually closer to Layla House than the Ritmo. It has five large bedrooms, a huge living room and is bright and airy. There are several large rooms behind the house where the older babies will be cared for. This should be available for families in March. The old Ritmo will be closed and the new Ritmo will be used for Computer Lab, sponsorship office, and will have two small rooms which can be used for volunteers or overflow families if needed.

These were the major issues that needed attention and I think we are moving in good directions in all of them. We have a wonderful group of volunteers and Ivy and the teachers are doing an outstanding job. We appreciate the support of the adoptive parents as we continue to provide in the best way that we can for the children and the adoptive parents.

I leave for home tonight. I arrive very late Thursday night and don't expect to spend much time in the office on Friday. I am sorry I have been unable to answer email the last couple of days, but I'll get to you as soon as I can.
Merrily

So that's the current news on our adoption. Sorry if it's very confusing. We are still trying to nail down exactly what happens at each stage. Again, please continue to pray for the babies. That God heals those who are sick, and keeps the healthy from getting sick. Pray that another judge comes and court moves quicker so babies come home quicker! But until then, we wait...

2 Months on the Waiting List!

Vocabulary Refreshers :)

Referral- The time when they call us with who our baby boy is! We will finally see his face and hear his name! SOOOOOO exciting!

Dossier- Our massive mound of paperwork approving us as adoptive parents. This got sent to Ethiopia on December 3, 2008 and was the day we officially got on the waiting list. 

I called today for our 2 month update! I didn't get to talk with Merrily (the director) because she is in Ethiopia and will be back in the office next week. I was told not to expect a referral in February, but maybe the beginning of March! So that is way fun! One more month!!! (maybe). But honestly, I'm not even setting my heart on it. I've heard of people who were told "this week" and it ended up being 3 weeks later! But I've also heard of people who were told not for 4-6 weeks and they were called back that day! I asked about how many families are on the list for boys ahead of us and she said they don't give out numbers because they change so much (people switch gender requests, people come off holds, etc). I'd still rather have a general number to work with though. They are still doing referrals of boys for families whose dossiers were sent in September, and referrals of girls for families who dossiers were sent in August. Referrals slowed for awhile due to the overcrowding issues at the orphanage and such. But they said several more referrals will be going out next week when Merrily gets back. They wouldn't tell me roughly how many dossiers were sent in October and November though. Argh. It could be 5, it could be 20. Who knows!  I also got no answer about what they thought our chances of getting through court before the rainy season was. I was bummed about that. But hopefully with the news of another judge supposedly taking seat within a month, maybe we have a good chance! They said I could call again next week to talk with the director and see if they have anymore info for us.

Until then, please keep praying!

• For our son: that he will stay healthy (there are many sick babies at the orphanage and several in the hospital).
• For a quick referral
• That another judge will take seat this month
• That we will get a quick court date and pass before the rainy season

Peach, Coffee, & Hot Chocolate

I'm so sorry for the sparse postings lately. It has been a very crazy last couple weeks and I wasn't feeling any good posts. ;) Nothing specifically new on the adoption referral end... just waiting (and trying to not think that maybe the waiting will be less than we anticipated). This Wednesday starts our 3rd month of waiting! I will call AAI Wednesday for our update and to see how things are moving along. Who knows. Maybe we'll be pleasantly surprised.

This has been a fun year of teaching in regards to our adoption. I teach 1st and 2nd grade at a classical school. All of my students are caucasian, except for one beautiful biracial little girl. It's been really neat to watch my students start to open their eyes up to a world that is way bigger than our school and their neighborhood. It all started back in the fall, even before we announced our adoption. I like to read a lot of multicultural books to my students and we started coming across things that were "different" than the way they see things and hear things. And, one day, we came across a Chinese name on a math paper. One of my students said, "That's weird!" That of course spurred a continuing conversation (still going on to this day), that it's not weird, it's different. We talked about how if they went to school in China they would be the ones with names that stood out. We've had these conversations about many different cultural things on many different days, and I must say it's fun to see them starting to "get it." I even hear them saying it to each other, "it's not weird, just different!"

Here's another thing that happened frequently. Every time the kids were coloring a picture and coloring in someone's skin color, they would say things like, "Hey, can you pass the skin color? (i.e. peach)." After hearing this several times, I finally talked through the skin color thing. I had everyone take out all their colored pencils (which come in many shades of every color) and roll up their sleeves. I said, "We're going to see which colored pencil matches our skin color." At the end of this activity, we found that every person in our class (even all of those who were caucasian), had a different skin color, and to their surprise, no one actually matched the peach! I concluded this little activity by explaining that we shouldn't call the peach crayon "skin color" because not everyone in the world has that color skin. With much excitement they quickly went to their desks and made up all new names for their crayons including things like, coffee, hot chocolate, and cookie dough!

It has been so sweet to see their growing understanding of how people are different. Without my prompting or encouragement, when the kids are coloring, they are now including pictures with kids of all different skin colors, especially brown. ;) However, they don't quite understand that Abraham in the Bible, a jewish patriarch, is not African American. They have been doing things like this, without looking for recognition from me or others. They do it as if it's always been a natural inclination. Even the pictures they draw me tend to have people with brown skin. Here's one of the pictures my girls colored for me. An African ballerina. So sweet. 

New Family Traditions

It has been a week of really, really wishing our sweet baby boy was home in our arms. These last several months have been so great for us! We have had so many awesome conversations about the upcoming start of our family! One of our all-time favorite Pastors, Mark Driscoll, just started a new sermon series on 1st and 2nd Peter. We tune in every week for his sermons and are also going through the 200 page study guide he wrote for the series. One tradition that he mentioned back during his Song of Solomon series had to do with his dinner table. This is one tradition we do as a couple now and are excited to continue it, and further develop it as we add children around our table! Check out this introduction to the Family Resources section of his study guide. (He provides questions from his sermon for use during the week as parents train their children).

Dinner is one of the great highlights of my day. Why? Because I get to sit in my
home with the woman I love, laughing, chatting, and eating with our five children
whom we deeply love and enjoy. Every time I sit at the table with my family I am reminded of the words of Psalm 128:3–4, which says, “Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the LORD.” As Scripture says, I am blessed. Some months ago we started a new tradition at the Driscoll dining table that
has also been a blessing. Whoever is taking their turn setting the table ensures that
our “dinner Bible,” as the kids call it, is sitting in front of “Poppa Daddy,” as the kids
call me. Throughout the course of our dinner together, we chat about how the day
went, how everyone is doing, and whom we can pray for, and we discuss a section
of Scripture. Over the years we have always made it a point to read Scripture to
the children when they were little (especially at bed time), and help them develop
personal daily Bible reading habits once they learned to read for themselves.
However, we struggled to find a way to do regular family devotions with five children
of different ages and attention spans. Still, the dinner Bible discussions led by Grace and me have been a huge hit. Every time we sit down for dinner the dinner Bible is in its place on the table, opened to the section of Scripture we will discuss that evening by one of the enthusiastic kids. We often have some really insightful conversations around the dinner Bible as the younger kids, especially the boys, seem to be able to handle longer and more reflective discussions when their hands are busy as they eat. Also, with the casual conversation over dinner I have noticed that everyone gets an opportunity to speak as we take turns chewing our food, and our dinners last longer than they had before because everyone is engaged. The following steps are offered based upon my experience with our children over dinner. These steps are intended to help direct theological discussions between parents and their children while also building the children’s theological vocabularies so that they are increasingly familiar with biblical concepts.
Step 1. Eat dinner with your entire family regularly.
Step 2. Mom and Dad sit next to one another to lead the family discussion.
Step 3. Open the meal by asking if there is anyone or anything to pray for.
Step 4. Someone opens in prayer and covers any requests. This task should be rotated among family members so that different people take turns learning to
pray aloud.
Step 5. Start eating and discuss how everyone’s day went.
Step 6. Have a Bible in front of the parents in a translation that is age
appropriate for the kids’ reading level. Have someone (parent or child) open the
Bible to the assigned text and read it aloud while everyone is eating
and listening.
Step 7. A parent then announces the lesson’s “Word of the Day,” reading
the corresponding definition and/or paraphrasing the meaning at an age-
appropriate level.
Step 8. Ask the discussion questions written for each day’s lesson. If your kids
are older (i.e., junior high and up), you might consider using the community
group questions (beginning on p. 21) if they are better suited for your children.
Step 9. Let the conversation happen naturally, listen carefully to the kids, let
them answer the questions, and fill in whatever they miss or lovingly and gently
correct whatever they get wrong so as to help them.
Step 10. If the Scriptures convict you of sin, repent as you need to your family,
and share appropriately honest parts of your life story so the kids can see Jesus’
work in your life and your need for him too, which demonstrates
gospel humility.
Step 11. At the end of dinner, ask the kids if they have any questions for you.

The following discussion questions are offered in hopes of helping you and
your children grow in relationship with each another and Jesus. They are meant to
be supportive and not constraining. Therefore, do not feel bound by any questions
or pressured to follow the steps too rigidly. Follow the Spirit’s leading and don’t be a
religious parent who is rigidly inflexible, thereby making this sort of thing something
they must be do in duty rather than something they get to do in delight. If you miss a night, or if conversation gets off track, or if your family occasionally just wants to talk about something else, don’t stress—it’s inevitable. For your children, the point is to learn what they are thinking about God, to help them know and love Jesus as God and Savior, and to teach them how to articulate and explain their Christian faith. For parents, the point is to lovingly instruct children and each other, thereby creating a family culture in which every member freely and naturally talks about God and prays to him together. In short, the goal is simply that your family would open the Bible and grow in love for Jesus, one another, your church, and the world. Finally, remember that family Bible study requires a sense of humor. Be sure to have some fun, enjoy some laughs, and build some memories.

So there it is! I guess one way to pass all this waiting time is to start making new traditions and revamping old ones! We'd love to hear if you have any special ways that your family teaches your children about God.