Lew Lew – bo – bew, Banana fana fo few, fee – fi – mo mew-ew, Lew! This post is dedicated to my awesome husband who has driven to Atlanta TWICE this week to get Arthur’s papers state-certified. The first trip was expected, the second trip was because of a clerical error in the spelling of Arthur’s name. So the second trip was a surprise and it was, needless to say, undertaken much less enthusiastically. But it got done! So here’s to Lew, a great husband to me and a wonderful father already to our sweet babies! *APPLAUSE* Leave him a comment and tell him how awesome he is, he deserves it!

This small name fiasco has gotten me thinking that I need to write a blog to let you internet people know what we’re thinking as far as names go. As I mentioned before, we will be keeping their first names as they are and giving them second names from us. But we will be changing the spelling of their first names simply because the current French spellings don’t translate easily to our American pronunciation. So, the names! Our son will be Arthur and our daughter will be Ginine! I know, I know I’ve been spelling Ginine with a “J” but we have decided to use the “G” instead for a few reasons. The first and least significant is that I hate writing “J”s. I know that sounds silly but I imagine I will be writing many, many in the years to come and I just can’t sentence myself to a lifetime of “J”s. For some reason, my hand just rebels when they come up. I apologize to all the wonderful “J”s in my life, I swear I still love you all, I just hate writing your names. The second reason is because around our house and with our families, Ginine has already developed a little nickname, Gigi. So the “G” spelling just works much better. And, the final reason is because we like it. So, do not be alarmed when I start posting about a little girl name Ginine or Gigi. We’re still holding tight at just 2! We haven’t decided definitively on middle names yet but we have a few ideas. I will, of course, keep you updated. In the meantime, go buy a t-shirt!

Well, we learned tonight that our children are learning and speaking Swahili at their orphanage! Knowing that the official language of the DRC is French, we have been boning up on our French hoping that would be enough. Not quite! We now get to try and learn a whole new language! I’m feeling a little overwhelmed by this news but also really excited! I love learning new things and I’m ready to dive into Swahili head-first. We definitely want to keep their African heritage a part of their lives and helping them maintain their native language is one big way to do that, so here we go! Hakuna matata!

The sky is gray and the ground is wet but there is sunshine in my heart and joy in my soul! God is GOOD! ALL the time! Overnight God has used his angels on earth to make a huge leap in our fundraising fund. People, God is faithful. Can I get an “Amen?” And people, we have some amazing friends in our lives with super, crazy, extra-large hearts. Can I get a “Yee-haw?” Check out our thermometer – it says we raised over $2700 hundred dollars since yesterday! This is amazing! We are so thrilled! And, AND!!! There’s more good, better, best ever news – we also had an offer from a friend to BUY our plane tickets using their sky-miles! I was in the bed when I heard this news and I literally almost fell out of it. Happy Saturday morning to me! We are so thankful and so humbled by all y’alls support and help as we continue this journey to bring home this sweet brother and sister. Words seriously can not express the thankfulness and joy we are feeling today. We are getting so close to making this happen! Keep it coming!

“He who calls you is faithful, He will surely do it.” 1 Thessalonians 5:24

P.S. I included this image for my sweet nephew Levi. When he first heard that a little boy named Arthur was coming to live with us, he cried, “Arthur Read???” I love that kid.

Well, last week we got some amazingly terrifyingly wonderful news! Our family of 2 will soon be a family of 4! Last Wednesday when we received our new pictures of our beautiful daughter which I shared on this blog, there was also a picture included that I did not share, a picture that has not left my mind or heart since I opened it. This picture was of Janine with her older brother, Arthur. When we received our referral information back in December on Janine, we were told of Arthur’s existence but that he was not legally available for adoption and they did not expect him to become so. It bothered us to know that Janine would leave a sibling in Africa if we adopted her but since there was nothing we could do about it we tried to make peace with it, move on, and prepare to bring our sweet girl home. We thought at the time that the best we could do was keep his name and information so that, maybe one day, she would have the option to contact him. Well, last Wednesday our adoption worker informed us that Arthur has now legally been made available for adoption. I opened the picture and my first thought was, “Hello son, so nice to meet you!”

 So, basically, IT’S A BOY! After much prayer and discussion, we are excited to announce that we are pursing the adoption of this handsome young man named Arthur! We are thrilled for the opportunity to keep Janine and Arthur together and so excited to bring home a son as well as a daughter! BUT we have a short amount of time to come up with a LARGE amount of money. Our totally awesome agency, A Love Beyond Borders, does not charge a fee at all for a sibling adoption but his DRC country fees are $7500. Add that whopping figure to the amount to travel we were already saving for and you will understand why, in the midst of our excitement, we are also scared to death. But we are fully confident that God has given us these children as our own and we will do whatever it takes to bring them home together. We completely believe that this is God’s plan for our family and that He will work this out. And you can help too! We’ve got t-shirts, we’ve got wristbands, we’ve got puzzle pieces, we’ve got donation options! But most importantly, we’ve got an adorable three year old boy who needs to come with his sister to his forever home! Please help us keep these sweethearts together!

Whew! What a long day! And it’s only 5:00. My day started earrrrly this morning at 4 A.M. when I cursed my alarm clock rolled out of bed to get ready to head to Atlanta. Our biometrics appointment was at 8 A.M. downtown and, even leaving our house at 5:30, we were still cutting it close to be on time. If you are reading this and you drive to work in ATL on a daily basis, please message me and explain either a) what your mental defect is or b) you know what, I can’t even think of a “b” because you have to be crazy to do that on a regular basis. Please, get help. So after almost three hours of listening to every Atlanta radio personality discuss the “Paula Deen Diabetic Dilemma” to death, we finally arrived at our appointment. And it was full of all the excitement you would expect from government workers who spend their entire day taking fingerprints from the masses. My session was a little tense because apparently I am incapable of “relaxing my fingers” and my print-lady was convinced I was tightening up just to tick her off. Everyone please try right now and relax your fingers. It is not an easy task, particularly when you are getting the evil eye from Print-Lady-Patty. Plus, (oh, there’s a plus, this was not my fault) she kept telling me to drop my wrist but I am short and the counter where my hands were placed was way above my waist, so how am I supposed to drop my wrist when I’m standing on my tip-toes to even reach the counter? After my session, I had to fill out a customer comment card on the service and I wanted to be honest but I chickened out because, hey she has my fingerprints, and in my mind at that moment she also had the power to totally ruin my adoption and possibly my face. So she got an “excellent” and I just got away from her.

After our appointment, we had a nice morning down at Atlantic Station where we had a yummy breakfast at Cafe Nineteen and then spent some time just walking and browsing some shops before we headed home.  It was nice to have a little time together out of the house and away from some stress. But it was even nicer when we got back home and both climbed in bed for a serious nap. And it’s great to be done with that appointment and we are praying that our prints are good and we won’t have to do that again!

P.S. buy a shirt…

We have new pictures of our beautiful little girl! This little peanut needs to come home ASAP!

A bead party! Whoo-hoo! And you are invited!

On Thursday January 26th, my awesome sister Susan and I will be hosting a bead party in Dublin, GA to raise money with the non-profit organization Outreach Uganda. We will be selling handmade jewelry, purses, scarves, etc. and ALL of the profits will go back to the African women responsible for the beautiful products. This is a fundraiser solely for the women of Uganda and is not connected to our adoption expenses. But it is a GREAT cause and a wonderful opportunity for us to help out some hard-working women and purchase some beautiful handmade products. The women that Outreach Uganda work with live in small communities in the impoverished African country of Uganda. Through this program, these women have access to sustainable income-generating work that allows them to feed their families and send their children to school. You can read about the communities where these women live and the difference that these sales make in their daily lives here.

If you are in the area, you are invited to attend! If you’re not in the Dublin area, but you are in my neck of the woods, you can buy personally through me! If you are further away but would still like to participate, message me about placing an order. I’ll be posting pictures of the products closer to the date so you can just let me know what you’d like to buy! And I do encourage you to buy, buy, buy!

And, of course, don’t forget about our fundraisers for our daughter and the orphans in the DRC! Thanks for all your support so far and keep it coming!