Too Little for Tricks or Treats…

But not too little for costumes!

Front Porch Pumpkins

Double The Fun

There is something captivating about similar-looking twins. I think, what can be cuter than two curly-headed girls? 

4 curly-headed girls.  :)

Through the wonderful adoption social circle, we have been blessed by a friendship of another adoptive family who have twin girls from Colombia.  Though we have never met the family we don’t feel like strangers.  They have sent us a box of twin clothes and I have received so much support from the mother. 

Last week they brought us more twin clothes, toys and books.  So fun to finally meet!

Their mother said they save things for “the other twins”.

  

Thanks for coming girls! 

We so enjoyed our time with you!

We’ve Got Ourselves Some Sneaky Babies…

I have never raised a baby boy. My mom, who has raised two girls and three boys said, “They are like little boys in beautiful, little girls’ bodies!”.

They are busy girls and sneaky (which I attribute to their intelligence).  A mama always has to think they have the smartest kids, right?  :)

Little J’s response to my attempt at child-proofing.  Yes, that is an outlet plug that she has managed to pull out and put in her mouth. 

I also need your advice and expertise.  The littles have learned what the “no-no’s” are in our house.  Which is great.  As long as Mom or Dad is in the room, they don’t go near them.  Here is where the sneaky part comes in, as soon as we are not in eyeshot, they head directly for what is off-limits.  We have put up lots of things but could probably move some more.  There are a number of things we can’t move (cords, etc). 

I would like for them to learn no means no, regardless if Dad or Mom are watching.  Is this an impossible goal?  Do all babies get into the “no-no’s” as soon as their parents backs are turned? 

How did you combat this?  Short of rubber-matting our 1st floor, I am not sure what to do!  :)

 

If you live in the Fort Wayne area, Check this out!

My friend Wendy had a great idea.  She and four other families are combining:

Pizza

Helping orphans

Family night

November 7th is Orphan Sunday. In honor of orphans everywhere we are sharing a deep dish pizza with any of you in the Fort Wayne area. In return, we'd love for you to make a donation to help feed orphans.
You place your order.
We deliver it to you along with a free copy of Answer the Cry video.
You give us a donation made payable to Show Hope.
You have a fun family night at home enjoying pizza and a movie that will get your family talking.
Your donation goes on to make a huge difference in the life of an orphan.

Check out the details on her blog!

Click here to learn more

6 Months Ago

Little J and Little A arrived in the USA. 

And it has been an incredible six months.  Like, 6 months of wonderful and hard and blessing and challenge.

How can six months go so slowly?  How can six months go so fast?

Kind of ironically, the girls received their permanent residence cards today from Homeland Security and a letter saying “Welcome to the United States of America”. 

Little A was delighted.

Little J didn’t know what to think. :)

Babies, we are so glad you are in our home and in our arms!  We can’t imagine how empty our lives would be without you.

Sometimes I Like to Curl Up In A Ball

The girls have a book called “Sometimes I Like to Curl Up In A Ball.”  It is about a cute, little wombat at bedtime.

But that is how I have been feeling.  Apparently my response to feeling behind and watching my to-do list grow longer is to want to curl up in the fetal position on the couch but I am not a cute, baby wombat. 

Go away mountains of laundry.

Go away stacks of dishes.

Go away broken dishwasher.

Go away stack of bills.

Oh, but wait, I remind myself as I wade through a dirty kitchen, billions of women have washed dishes by hand their whole lives.  In fact, millions don’t even know what a dishwasher is.

I start trying to focus on others.  It’s not about me. Another thought.  They estimate there are nearly 27 million slaves worldwide.  More than there have ever been.  According to best guesses, at least half of them are children.  13.5 million child slaves. 

I start to sing “Count Your Many Blessings” as I fill up the sink.  I have to sing loud because there are two crying babies at the safety gate. I look over and smile.  More blessings, currently loud and whiny ones.

Many times kids that become child slaves are the vulnerable children, with no one to advocate for them.  Other times, parents put their children in slavery because they think it is better than the child starving with them.

And I almost throw in the towel over a messy house. 

Three of my favorite blessings:

A Change of Pace

Jon has been on business, so the girls and I have been hanging out at Grandma and Grandpa’s…because, I am a wuss like that.  I don’t like staying by myself especially now with two babies!  It makes for long days.  It was amazing though because all that time was just what the J&A needed to warm up to the men on my side of the family! Woohoo!  We made lots of progress!

Helping make applesauce.

The girls’ personalities are so funny, both full or personality, but really different.  Adia is a goof and loves to make everyone laugh.  She would leave these glasses on and make sure everyone could in the room saw her. She smiled and talked behind the glasses.

Grandpa reads their favorite book, over and over and over and over.

They both were a little bummed about the cold and the heavy coats!

The girls love dogs.  They both have their own word to identify the dogs.

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa! 

We are so glad that Daddy is coming home tonight!

Katelyn Pfister Update

It seems that Katelyn is slowly recovering. The doctors want to keep her a few more days in the PICU to wean her off of IV sodium and to make sure that she can maintain her sodium on her own, but God has shown His faithfulness time and time again.

I believe she has to stay in the states for four months now.  Please continue to lift her family up in prayer. As they are missionaries in Haiti and have 5 children, this is a lot to deal with. 

Challenged

I am challenged by many books I read.  Challenged in a good way, the way that brings me closer to God, love Jesus more and leaves me scratching my head in prayer, “What do you want me to do with this God?”

Three books I recommend:

The Hole in Our Gospel by Richard Stearns

Crazy Love by Francis Chan

 

Family Driven Faith by Voddie Baucham

Also,this isn’t related to the material in his book, but if you have never listened to the sermon, Table of Nations by Voddie Baucham, The American church has such a skewed perspective on this topic. Click here and listen. So good.

What books would you recommend that have challenged you?

 

J&A want you to know they are big stuff. :)

Have a happy weekend!

*All book cover images taken off of Amazon

A Slice of Perfect

That is what a Fall afternoon with babies to enjoy feels like.  Perfect.

Happy 11 months, babies!

 

 

But all things perfect have to come to an end, a riddle for you.

What is worse than one baby with a high fever during the night?

Two babies with high fevers in the middle of the night!

We know this is such a small problem in the light of what others deal with.  Please keep Katelyn in your prayers.

We got our vaccines yesterday and the girls also got flu shots. Has anyone had a similar experience of your kids getting really sick after vaccines? We have some very persistent, high fevers and I assume it relates to this?

Fall, Where Are You Going?

Adia starts the funniest little facial expressions.  One day she started tilting her head, her next phase was scrunching her nose.  She now thinks it is so funny to stick out her tongue, her LONG tongue.

We went to a nearby state park to hike this past weekend and the girls were full of energy.

Adia could hardly keep her tongue in because she was so happy.

She kept us laughing with her antics.

 

She would rather stick out her tongue instead of smile. :)

 

Let me zoom in on that for you.

Jada cheered her on.  Jada applauds life about 1,000 times a day.

A few more pictures from our hike:

  We’ll take 365 days like this!

It seems like we often miss the leaves turning, so we were glad to catch them.

Oh, how is it the middle of October already???

 

Please continue praying for Katelyn.  It looks really serious.  She is in the ICU in St. Petersburg, FL. Her parents are with her and a grandma is staying with the other 4 children in Haiti.

It’s a Win, Win, Win!

Yes, that is right, we have three winners! 

But let me tell you why else this is a win, win, win.

Win #1: Ya’ll rock.  Your participation was amazing.  Many of you passed this on to your friends. I believe their were over TEN events scheduled because of your help in raising awareness for orphans and your planning! 

If you have tried to enter an event and are having problem at www.orphansunday.org please, TRY AGAIN! You may have to create a login, exit and then re-enter the site!  Please don’t give up!

Win #2: You know how I said that I hadn’t done giveaways before because I was a tightwad?  Well, I have decided that I LOVE giveaways for a good cause!  When one of you would comment, I would think “Ooh, I hope they win!” If I didn’t know you, I went to your blog and read your stories and I wanted you to win! Seriously, I want you all to win a shirt. So, stay tuned, I have more giveaways planned.  A win for you, huh?

Win #3: Last but not lease, three of you are going to win a really cool shirt!

Jada and Adia helped me pick the winners.  The first three to go in their mouths won.

 

Can I get a drum roll please?

Congratulations to:

Carissa Schlipf

Susie Tonner

Wendy Walz

Congratulations winners!  E-mail me asap with your selection of color, size and style of your 147 Million shirt from the “Feed One” line. If you didn’t win, you can still order your own!  http://147millionorphans.com/147-gear

 

On a very serious note:

We have some missionary friends in Haiti.  Their oldest daughter, Katelyn has been very sick and is now in a Florida hospital, but she is still in very serious condition.  Please pray for Katelyn and her family!

Goodbye Old Friend

We will see you in April.  **Sniff** The zoo is closed for the season. Due to the GORGEOUS weather and wanting to enjoy those animals one last time, Jon came with us for our last zoo visit of the year.

On the way out we had the following conversation:

Me: Hey Babe, did you want to grab the camera?

Jon: No, you know, you already have so many of the girls at the zoo and in those clothes.

Me: It’s their zoo outfits!  Come on, let’s take it.

Jon: Maybe just the little one. 

Oh my dear husband.  He was glad we brought the good camera.  He took 31 pictures of just the lions! hehehe. Love it! We have this fun big camera that we both need classes to learn how to use, but it is oh-so-fun!

Once more for the season, Jada and Adia at the zoo. :)

It was so fun to watch the girls find the animals.  They have come a long way in their zoo appreciation this year. Probably because they can finally find the animals!

 

They both locked in on the giraffes, Adia tried to pull out herself out of the stroller.

“But I want to keep watching the giraffes!”

 

And Jon did it.  He captured the essence of Jada in a photograph.

 

We ran into lots of friends!  So much fun!

 

Waiting for the train

 

We weren’t sure how the girls felt about the dark tunnel while on the train ride so we took a picture to see. Apparently very scary.

 

Adia loved looking at the chicks, so much in fact, she never wanted to leave. :) 

  

This is when Mommy took Jada away from Daddy.

 

Just kidding. 

 

And probably one of my favorite shots of all day.  The goat eating Jon’s hand and Jon trying to hold still so Adia can pet it…

Yay for the zoo!  We will see you in April.

Oh, I can’t forget the at least ONE Bill the Lion shot.

Last day to sign up for the giveaway.  Tuesday morning we will post a winner!

Also, participate in the new poll in the side bar, help me solve my blog caption debate!