Nesting!!!

Here are two pictures I found for the girls at Marshalls! The butterflies and flower actually are three dimensional...so cute!

I've been trying to very frugally start getting the girls room ready!It's a fun challenge! My friend Lisa gave the girls this wooden kitchen set! Isn't it cute!!! Thanks Lisa!

Now on to the challenge of finding THREE twin mattresses sets for a good price! I keep checking Craigs List, so I may find them through there. It is hard using Craigs List though because you kind of have to commit to buying something before you see it! I know God will provide...

Be praying for our agency directors who are in Liberia now to adopt and bring home their son Toben. You can check out their blog at www.petreeepatch.blogspot.com...

Update....

The lawyer who processed Addy's Hopes adoptions died about a week ago. We are very sad for his family. Addy's Hope will now be looking for a new lawyer. Pray for them to find one quickly! Our agency director will be heading to Liberia very soon! Pray for her while she is there! She will be going with several families to pick up her own adopted child as well as go through our cases and hopefully make some headway.

She will have an assistant there to help her measure the children, etc. I will be very glad to find out what size they are approximately! It is hard to buy for them guessing what size they will wear.

I am experiencing much peace through this process, continually praying that God's will be done. This is such a huge undertaking that I need to know that God's will WILL be done!

We still have a lot of money to raise, approximately 8,000-12,000 more. We will have more garage sales once the weather gets warmer. So if you have any goodwill donations let me know! I will gladly pick them up! Thanks again to everyone who has donated so far!

For fundraising we are also selling shea butter and if anyone wants to get some it is 5.50 for a 1 oz, 10.00 for a 2 oz and 16.50 for a 4 oz. Email me if your interested! acwalsman@yahoo.com

I've got another fundraising idea up my sleeve but still in process! Basically it will be bracelets with different fabric choices and in the middle it would be black with a short bible verse in white text (or vice versa). Our oldest son has one that says "December 30, 2007" and underneath that it says "God's Soldier". That is the date he committed his life to Jesus Christ! The fabric on the sides of the text is camouflage. My younger son has one with the same fabric but it says "Love your neighbor as yourself." The lady who is helping me make them is working on being able to make them in bigger sizes so that I can get one that says something like, "A gentle answer turns away wrath". I need to be reminded of this every day, often! If you have any thoughts about these email me!

Timeline

Our director told us to be ready for bringing home our kids by mid-February, but plan on March-May. It is so nice to have a time frame. I can get ready for our kids and then if we don't bring them home until May at least I can relax and know we are ready when it's time. I ordered a few books to start reading on trans-racial adoption and adopting older children. I'm also planning to take some courses given by the state for foster parents that will equip me to parent children with special needs. I know I will have a lot to manage so I'm excited to start getting equipped!

Answered PRAYER!

Court decree has been signed by the father!!!! This morning I prayed specifically that the father would come in today and sign. In some strange way I new that step was going to be completed today. So now we need to be praying that the minister of health in Liberia would complete the case histories with the parents. And the court decree would be officialized in the courts making Serena, Gidstina and Gideon officially Walsman children! AAAAAGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!! :) :) :)

Really Struggling!

We haven't been given any updates, things are going slower than expected, and I feel like my heart is laid open bear on the alter, ready to be smashed to pieces any minute! I never imagined this process to be so painful! I have pictures of our children now printed and taped to a shelf just above my computer monitor. I have this urge to take them down and put them away and not think about the adoption, other than praying for the children each day, until we get the call to bring them home. It is so painful to live in this not knowing stage. It isn't that I'm desperate to adopt them. If it isn't God's plan than I would willingly lay them down. But we are in the stage of not knowing, which is so hard for a control freak like me! :)

Having gone through three miscarriages I know how it feels to have God give and expect a birth and then have him take away. I just don't want to go through that again! I wish he would just tell me now, if they aren't for us, than close the door. But I realize that may not be his plan, we could go along another year or more and not bring them home. I know that I just need to trust and be surrendered, it is just so difficult!

I look at the children and I wonder should I attach to them as my children? I love them so much, without even trying. I am actually trying not to attach but when I look into the reality of my heart I'm already attached to them! I need to be praying that God would give me his love for these kids, not my own. My own love is so conditional and unstable and selfish and self-centered. God's love for them is, I imagine, free without any strings, free to love them where they are and continue to love them even if they don't come home. Free to pray for them and think about them and free to let every bit of my heart one hundred percent agape love them. Doesn't agape love mean to love at the sacrifice of oneself? So loving them would mean, letting them in, at the risk of them never becoming my children. Would I have loved in vein? No, I would have been a reservoir and hopefully conduit of God's love for them and that would be a gift.

I'm not sure if I've posted this already but the children's biological mother did come and sign the papers for the court decree, now we are just waiting on the father to come. Pray for God's will to be done please!

Thank you to all who have donated towards the children's adoptions! We appreciate it from the bottom of our hearts! We are up to 3,000 dollars! 13,000 more to go!

New Pictures of our kids!

Gideon,

Serena

and Gidstina!

Update...

Right now we are waiting for the necessary documents to be signed so that Serena, Gidstina, and Gideon will be legally our children in Liberia! This is so exciting! We hopefully will have that completed within the next 4-6 weeks.

We have the opportunity to send some things over to the children with a family that is going to pick up their children. I decided to sew them blankets even though it is hot over there right now. I figured they could lay on them or hold them. I just wanted them to have something special and I love making things by hand for my babies! I embroidered their names on them. We also will send a picture album for each of the children and letters from each of us.

I've been reading a book called "A black man's tribute to his white mom". It is definitely a good insight into how a dark-skinned child feels with a white mother. I know we will have challenges but I will continue to remind my children that we are all made in God's image, we have the same color blood, and if we all looked the same wouldn't that be boring!!!!!!! God is much more creative than that!

I just finished reading "Tears of the Rain". It was about a missionary couples experience in Liberia from 2001-2003. They were there during the civil war. What a scary time! It gave me tremendous insight into the Liberian culture and the extreme poverty in which they live. It helped me to understand how they can give up their children for adoption. It is the most selfless act they could do for their children. Children literally die of starvation on a daily basis there. Malaria is horrible and a common killer of young children. Measles generates such high fevers that children lose their sight. It is so so sad. Witchcraft and devil worship is VERY common. Child sacrifice is not unusual. I read things that I thought weren't humanly possible. Our living conditions here are absolutely royal compared to Liberian living conditions. I feel so spoiled and I just don't know how to change it.

I want to figure out how to spend less on everything, groceries, clothes, gifts. It just doesn't feel right at all to live the way I do while those in Liberia are living the way they are. So if you have any good beans/rice recipes or other money saving ideas email them to me at acwalsman@yahoo.com. Thanks!