Tired and Thankful for it!

We stayed out way to late last night... not one of us was in bed before 10:00 pm. On a normal school night we are hunkered down in bed well before 8:00 pm. This morning my eyes are tired, the kids were dragging, we were late for school... and it was all worth every moment of it!

Having my eyes tired this morning reminds me of the sweet laughter of all my favorite little boys playing together. Dragging the kids out of bed this morning made me laugh at the "Pirate Show" performed by those same group of silly boys. As we got to school and Noah said "Mommy, I am so sleepy!" I had to smile... I told him remember how blessed we are to have friends that we love and that make us laugh each time you feel tired today. He smiled at me, Noah gets it... he knew I was talking about the awesome 3 hours of giggles and screaming that happened last night. Before I left him in class his little arms hugged around my neck and he said "I love this kind of tired."

Me too buddy, me too.

My heart is so thankful this morning to have women in my life who love me unconditionally, who pray for my family, who hold me accountable. These friendships have been void in my life for the 15 years.... but the ones that are here are oooh so sweet.

Thankful for feeling sleepy this morning, because every moment of being my friend last night was worth it.

One of my other dear friends, Wendi, took some photo's of our family in the middle of a more chaotic photo shoot. When my sisters were here for Christmas with their families we decided to take a family photo... so Wendi came, even through it was like 3 degrees outside..and took some pictures of our whole family. While we hanging out she snapped these awesome photo's of our family. Gedion was not super happy to be taking photo's.... so we will try again soon when he is feeling more comfortable and is up for smiling in some of just him! Here is the family photo and one of my girl and me... the rest are on her blog...  Thanks my sweet friend for these... they are precious!

We are just alike..

This morning as I was writing to Grace in her journal I was working through a topic we covered in church yesterday. We are working through the Bible again this year, but with the topic of family as the focus of the year. This week one of our dearest friends and fellow adoptive Dad's spoke about God as the "Daddy" and us as the children. Galatians 4:3 In the same way we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying "Abba! Father!" So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God."

Tim did an amazing job of helping us to understand why we would even need to be adopted in the first place... you know the saying "We are all children of God"... anyway, that is another blog post. To cut it short, I loved how he worked through the concept of being adopted into God's family and why we/others needs to be adopted.

Now let me back track... in church yesterday morning Grace was with us. We have not put her into child care yet... only because we are still working on bonding and attachment, etc. Anyway, she was sitting with Ricky in the back, because she loves to chatter, and we didn't want to be a disruption to everyone else sitting near us. When they came back to sit with Johnny and I at the end of the service, Grace was trying her hardest to put a little pencil behind her ear. I happen to sneak a photo....

Daddy ALWAYS puts his pencil behind his ear. Always. Such a sweet moment watching her be like her Daddy. 

I love/hate these moments with all our kids. The moment they do something, anything, that is an exact duplicate of me or Ricky. I say love/hate because there have been things that I have not been proud of that the kids have done and I think... hmmmm... I think that is my fault.

Since we have been home, we have been working through what Gedion's age is really going to be. We don't know for sure how old he is, but we do know for sure.. he is not 4. The last few times at the doctor, someone has asked his date of birth and then looked up and said "Wow, he is big for his age!" I am quipped more than once, "Look at how tall his Daddy is!"... Ricky being over 6'6"... I feel like its a perfect answer for something that might make Gedion feel uncomfortable (as soon as he can understand what they are saying). 

In my own private struggles, I often wonder and fear that our kids will have identity issues. I won't go into specifics, but it is not just the G's that I worry about. So I often trying to find things to point out... showing them that they are "like" us.. that they are "like" the rest of the family. Even though we are all different, and God made us that way, that there are little things that tie us together. Funny how I am probably more worried about it than the kids are or ever will be. God is working on me in this area.

Today I wrote to Grace in her journal that no matter how we are the same or different over the years, how we look or act the same or different, or the things we say or don't say that are the same... We are exactly the same on a major issue in our lives... we are both adopted, and if my earnest prayers are heard.. all of our kids will be adopted. 

Here are the things I know for sure:

1. God made us all in his perfect image

2. Sin separated us from God

3. We are all adopted  into His family when we choose to receive the gift that He sent of his Son

What a special bond to have as a family, the one thing that would/could make a child feel separated or different from the his/her earthly family.. is actually something that we all have in common, something that binds us together, something that makes us the same. 

Praising Jesus this morning for revealing through teaching and his Word the concept of adoption and becoming an heir to His throne, and how we are all the same in having that available to us. 

A small funny from this morning..

On the way to school this morning Noah saw a rainbow... we have not had rain here in a week or so, but it just so happen that there was an amazing rainbow this morning across the sun. All the boys were excited about it! Noah started talking about the gold at the end of the rainbow.... Jake was excited even more! Jake was saying that if he could just find the gold then he could help all the kids in Africa.... melt my heart... Noah seemed confused and asked how chocolate is going to help the kids in Africa? To which Jake said "oh Noah, the chocolate part is just on the Blue's Clues, not in real life."

I just had to smile to myself, I love that Jake corrected Noah that the chocolate part was not real, but the gold at the end of the rainbow still made perfect sense to him. I love their little brains!

Not a resolution...

For Christmas my amazing hubby bought me a devotional. You see we buy Christmas gifts with some sort of a guide. The kids all get 4 things: Something they want, something they need, something to help them grow spiritually, and some fun from Mommy and Daddy. So, in keeping with that same theme, my hubs bought me One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp which is inspired by the Authors blog and own journey into a life of thanksgiving. I am super excited about my new found mornings and time to read my Bible, study a devotion and have a cup of coffee while my sweet pie princess sits next to me eating her oatmeal.

This morning I decided to start including Gracie girl in my devotional time, I know it will only be a few short years before she is gone at school with the rest of the crazies during this sweet time of the day, so we sat and I read and she ate. It was lovely. I am also writing letters to her, in a journal of sorts, so that someday she will see me for who I am. When she is teenager and we don't see eye to eye on everything or when she thinks she is alone in her thoughts or feelings, I hope she will read this and know that even her Mom struggled at times, that I felt alone at times, that I was scared and unsure at times. I hope she seems that my path has continued to bring me back to a loving, forgiving, GRACE giving God and that she runs to Him each moment her heart is troubled or feels alone.

This morning Grace is wearing this awesome footsie jammies.. don't you love footsie jams? I do! But my girl has S.T.Y.L.E.! She is wearing her sneakers over the stop of her footsie jams... 

Are the rest of the Daddy's like ours??

I don't know what other houses across the country look like today, but ours was a funny mixture of people not feeling well (Mommy, Daddy & Grace) and rowdy "Last Day of Vacation" crazies (the test of the house).

I woke up with a yucky throat, and I think Ricky followed me pretty quickly. Grace was feeling yuck by this afternoon and was so lovely to be around ;) after an unsuccessful nap time and an attempt to play outside.... It might snow tonight... The Daddy of the house, who gave up his furniture finishing planning session, played the board game of choice with the little people in the house.

Surely God has blessed our home in abundance with a Daddy who who loves his kids, who stops what he is doing to play (even if it's not by the rules) a game. Thankful for my amazing hubby and his dedication to our family.

In addition...

I have also decided I am going to be using my blog as a way to "remember" all these moments, thoughts and craziness! I want to remember all the sweet moments with J, all the funny moments with C, all the ZANIE moments with N, all the "firsts" with Big G, and all my very own mother/daughter moments with Princess G.

Grace is obsessed with shoes! She was wearing her Zebra stripped footsie jammies and pink converse to breakfast. Speaking of breakfast, the love of my life LOVES to make the kids breakfast.. something he loves or they love or the dreaded something new! Two days ago we had one of these breakfast moments, which means my love told the kids they could not have cereal and instead he was making them their own Apple or Banana homemade oatmeal. This proceeded to change the always lovely (laced with sarcasm) morning mood, into what I will call the DARKNESS. 

Jake is having a moment here on the couch, irritated at Dad (or EVIL WAR LORD) as he was being treated. ;) Gedion would not even look at Dad and Cater was just in tears. I can't say that Dad  handled the rejection very well, which in all honesty was a little amusing for me. 

I made the Banana part and Dad made the Apples... every picked Banana, which really made Dad happy ;) 

So after a ever so important battle over what was for breakfast, we finally made our way to putting the oatmeal into the bowls and serving the kids. EVERYONE ATE IT ALL and 4 of the 5 asked for more! I made another batch and saved the leftovers for the next day. Which were REQUESTED the following morning. All of this brings me to today, which consisted of yet another exciting world ending new breakfast for just the little Ethiopian's in the house. Gedion was less than excited, but he tried it and ended up asking for the coveted "last one."

 As I look back on the last three days home with the Evil War Lord and his desire to show our kids new foods, I have decided I  need to not be so predictable! I LIKE to feed the kids the same thing EVERY. SINGLE. DAY! Because I know that it will not bring on a full on riot, because it is easy and I don't have to worry about the tears or trantrums that might follow, but I am really doing them an injustice. They ARE AFRAID of new things, it gives them anxiety which I am sure is the same anxiety I feel when Daddy says, "No cereal, I am making something for you guys." 

This brings on a new era of my life, the seeking ways to make breakfast healthy and fast (I am not so wonderful in them mornings before school) so it is necessary to have something that I don't have to stress about. 

Anywho, that is that. Something our family went through, something I learned about myself and something I am going to try to change. 

I promise, not everything will have a life lesson involved, this just so happen to have a "I need to change that" attached to the story.