Unbelieveable Experience

Well, I've been a slacker about keeping the blog updated...but in between moving to our new house, baseball season, football season, summer vacations, maintaining two houses and yards there just hasn't seemed to be enough hours in the day.  So, I recommit myself to be a better blogger.  So many great experiences have happened over the last couple months I just don't know where to start.

Let's do this one first - This is going to be the Cliff's Notes version because I don't want this post to be a book...but if you're really interested in the minute details of how this all played out - email me and we'll talk - it really is just another piece of proof of just how involved our Father in Heaven is involved in our seemingly insignificant lives.  On May 26th our good friend Emily who was staying at the orphanage on a service mission called to visit with Brandie.  She said there was something that had been on her mind she had to visit with her about.  Emily had fallen in love with a little girl in the orphanage named "D" and really wanted to bring "D" home with her....but she knew that wasn't the Lord's plan for this little girl.  For whatever reason Emily felt she needed to talk with Brandie about D and her little brother C.

Brandie stewed over this for the next day or so, but she couldn't get our dear friends, the Seables out of her mind.  She was resistant to the promptings since John had told Brandie back in May of last year (in response to her question if they'd ever want to adopt) "Not only NO, but H@LL NO!"  I'm pretty sure he was only 25% kidding!  :-)  

The days went on and Brandie finally worked up the courage to ask John and Jenny out on a date.  After dinner Brandie blurted out what she'd been feeling.  To her amazement J & J were more than open...in fact, they both said they've felt they have been being prepared for this.  What an amazing night! 

Over the next few weeks J & J worked VERY diligently to get all of their paperwork, classes, applications, finances, and family prepared for this life changing experience...the whole time not knowing if these two kids would still be available after all their documentation was submitted.  Luckily for them (and D & C) the Lord had long since planned this whole thing out.

I'm still absolutely astounded that now how blessed we are to have Mighty and Agbesi come to our home, but how blessed they (and we) are all going to be by having two of their very close friends coming home to their forever family and live literally less than 5 blocks away.  I can only imagine what a strength and comfort it will be for these little guys to be able to draw on something familiar while going through a TON of changes.  Just another testimony of how God is in control.  Can we really ever say again, "Wow, that's a coincidence!"  I promise you'll never hear me use those words again.

Part 2 - Fast forward now to the last week of July/first week of August.  We'd decided to take the family on a business/play vacation to Seattle.  We took the kids to see all the cool things of a great Northwest city during the day and I'd work durning the early evening.

Tuesday afternoon we'd received an unnerving email from our good friend Anita, the director of our international adoption agency, AAI.  She shared with us how the director of our kid's orphanage had come to the knowledge that we were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and didn't know if 'he was comfortable releasing these kids' to us.

Now, before I go on, I want to be clear that Brandie and I think the WORLD of the director.  He truly is a man of God who has been blessed with the love of Christ to care for, love, and protect all of his children in his orphanage.  I can completely relate and understand with his feelings of doubt and desire to protect his kids.  It is obvious now (it was anything from obvious Tuesday night) that he was given some mis-information from someone as to the true nature of our faith.  He was basing his thoughts and feelings off those bits of information.

OK, back to Tuesday night.  Brandie and I were SICK!  I was angry, frustrated, and scared all at the same time.  The thought of waiting for over 18 months for these kids and growing to love them and now being faced with the possibility of not being allowed to bring them home because of a misunderstanding weighed heavily on our hearts and mind that night.  Needless to say, we didn't get much sleep that night.

Wednesday came with a million thoughts going through our minds.  Finally, we decided that I should write the director and tell him our true feelings of Jesus Christ and what we believe.  Brandie took the kids to the water park while I stayed back to ponder on what I could possibly tell this man I don't even know that would convince him that 'we're good people'.  Then the thought hit me like a ton of rocks, "I can't convince anyone!  But I know Someone who can!"

I immediately went into the bathroom (the only quite room in the house), knelt and asked Father to help me draft a letter with my true feelings and then allow his Spirit to travel with that letter so that John could feel in his heart what we were feeling.  I knew, through our faith - and God's power - this could absolutely happen.

Long story, short - and not to be too dramatic.  That's exactly what happened.  Anita talked with the director that following week.  He said he'd read the letter and felt in his heart that these were good people and that God was involved with bringing these four children to the same part of the world.

Miracles have not ceased....

Court Update

Don't have time for a long update as I'm sitting in rainy Portland getting ready for a meeting, but we just got a good email from Anita!

Hi all,
The meeting with the official in Kpando went very well! Joha said it went much better than he anticipated and that "the director is welcoming and expressed his readiness to handle the cases." Yea! He took copies of all of your homestudy reports and will be discussing the cases with the remaining "team members" and will be informing the regional director about the cases. The official said he would call Joha within the next week or so to give feedback and discuss the outcome of his talks with the other officials.

So many steps that we don't really understand but the main message here is PROGRESS!!!! Things are moving along nicely for your cases. =-)

Love,
Anita

Great news!  Sounds like we're back on track for making some progress!

Thanks for all the prayers.

Court Update and a Scary Call

Anita is awesome about keeping us in the loop with what's going on now that we're in the delay mode.

She shot us over a quick email last night telling us that Joha had found someone he trusts in Ho (the regional city - no smart comments here Derek!) and that he'd reached out to the person. He's traveling to Ho next week to meet with the Social Welfare worker and will hopefully be able to put us back on track with a reasonable time frame. We're anxiously waiting for an update!

Last night I'd just gotten home when I saw a message from our friend Kristie O'leary from Feeding the Orphans. She said she'd spoken with Emily (our kid's surrogate mommy in Ghana) and that Mighty had an accident and to call her ASAP. I immediately picked up the phone and called Kristie.

Kristie started with "if my phone dies I'll call you right back" and then started in with "The kids were running around the courtyard - Emily had told them 'you'd better quit running or someone will get hurt' when just then Mighty took a nosedive on the concrete and busted her chin wide open......" Then her phone died! Talk about the all-time worst times for a dead phone.

I waited impatiently for a call back and within a few long minutes Kristie called back and filled me in with the rest of the details. Emily lovingly scooped Mighty up and took her to the ER. Emily said the Mighty's chin was split wide open and was bleeding pretty bad. When they arrived at the hospital they spent 4 hours before they were treated. Mighty of course was terrified and in pain. Emily said they were not gentle at all and poked and prodded her with their fingers and a gigantic needle before giving her three stitches. What a traumatic and awful experience for the poor little doll.



The kids were all nervous for Mighty last night when we told them. Before we tucked the kids in to bed it was Brinley's turn for family prayer. It was tender to hear her pray for Mighty and Agbesi that they would be safe, that Mighty would heal quickly and not be in pain, and thank Heavenly Father that Emily was there to comfort and console Mighty.

These kids are already a part of our family and it's hard in times like this to not be there with them... All in God's time and all for a purpose.

Not a Good Email

After three weeks of excitement - finally knowing we were going to be headed to Ghana in the next short weeks - we received a very disappointing email from Anita today. The title was "Court Delays"...which made me not want to open the email.

Anita explained that the new Social Welfare worker (who replaced the other gentleman who'd had a stroke) was a little edgy about messing up since he's new on the job. This means Joha (our Power of Attorney in Ghana) now has to go to the Regional office and work through the Magistrate Court - rather than the district court. For a frame of reference - this is like having to go to Idaho's Supreme Court instead of Nampa's municipal court.

I'll be honest, I was more than a little irritated with the news - not with any one person - just that now we were back on the indefinite wait-n-see game that I so despise. It's SOOOOO frustrating not knowing a timeline.

After I was able to calm down a little I chatted with Anita and she assured me she was not at all nervous about the unexpected changes and helped restore complete confidence in Joha and his abilities there. We were both comforted to get the additional information from Anita.

But still....for now....we're waiting, and as Gage would say "that's LAAAAMMME!"

Ghana in June!!

This week we made some definite progress - much more than we'd had in the last couple months!  I'm a person who is generally very patient as long as I know what timeline we're dealing with and up until now we haven't had that timeline.  Here's an email we received from Anita on Monday.

"Hi Oswalds,

 

I had a planning session with Joha this morning and now have a better view of when you may go to court.  Unfortunately, the Social Welfare Officer in the area your children are from has died from a stroke.  This will not cause a huge delay, but the new officer has never done an adoption case before.  Joha says there is nothing to worry about but this will take a bit more time than we originally anticipated.  He expects that your cases will go to court sometime in the first half of June!  Remember, he can only guesstimate at this time, but Joha is usually fairly accurate.

 

June in Ghana!  Perfect!

Anita"

I had to read the email a couple times to make sure if I was supposed to be happy, sad, or nervous!  We were horrified about the news of the Social Welfare Officer - although, it doesn't surprise me it happened during our case!  I nervous this would really set our process back further than we felt we are already! However, neither one of those two emotions could come close to the excitement and peace (FINALLY) we had by just knowing there was at least a rumor of a date in June.  We're anxiously waiting for the actual call when we find out when the date of court is, but until now - the first part of June is just fine with us!!

Additionally - on Wednesday we got our visas back from the Ghanaian Embassy in New York!  That was the last piece of documentation we needed in order be able to travel!  We're officially ready to go when we do get the call!  Can't wait to squeeze those cheeks and kiss those beautiful faces!!

Here's one of my favorite pictures of Agbesi and his buds at the beach!

Here's Mighty's pretty eyes.

8 Missed Calls in 5 Minutes From Home - Never a Good Sign!

Some people frequently question if there's really a Supreme Being, others suppose there's a god of some sort - know him as Father, Allah, Buddha, or Jehovah.  I've been blessed in my life to have several experiences which have strengthened my knowledge that there is a Father in heaven, that he loves us, and this week I was shown, once again that He has a sense of humor...

About a week ago we were all talking about how hard it is to play this waiting game.  It's one of the hardest things we've ever had to do...just sit here waiting for a call from Ghana so we can jump on a plane and fly over to meet our two new little rugrats.  We (well, really I) confided my frustration with our Yahoo support group by posting the following:

"So, our good friend Melina hand delivered our dossier to Ghana on March 21st...that's 42 days for those who don't have a calendar - and still no call for the court date. Brandie and I have been trying to figure out for the last couple of weeks if we'd rather rub rock salt under our eyelids, jab and icepick into my bellybutton, or cannon ball off a 20' diving board into a pool of broken glass instead of this waiting game! This is NOT fun!

Other families waiting for court dates - what are you doing to occupy your minds while you wait? Please don't tell me yoga or meditation...I'm much too shallow for those things! :-)
Anyway, the message board has been quiet for the last few days so I figured I'd liven it up a little bit. This waiting thing SUCKS!!
Lots of love,
Jason"

Several of our friends on the message board replied with things like - super clean the house, do garage sales, clean out closets, home repairs, etc.  Anything to keep you busy and your mind at work.  We'd already done the yard sale, Brandie does a good job of keeping the house cleaned, and I really have no interest in creating a list of 'things' to do just so I can work more.  So what to do?

We've prayed as a family to ask Father to grant us the patients to see this adoption on His time and not our time.  I know we'd be comforted if we were able to do so.  We also asked Him to help us focus on the more important things rather than just the wait.  I think that was our problem...

On Thursday I was out of cell phone range and Brandie's phone had died while she was at school helping with Gage's pre-school class.  After my business meetings I was on my way back into town when my cell phone lit up like a Christmas tree - 8 new voice mails from our home number?   Uh oh...that's never a good thing.  My first reaction was that someone was hurt or had been in an accident.  I called home quickly. Brandie told me we'd had a fire in the garage which was started by a heating lamp that the kids had messed with and it had fallen into some wood.

Brody had gotten home from school at 2:30 and done what he does every day after school.  Put his bag down on the porch and grab the basketball.  He was shooting hoops when he said he 'felt like he needed to go into the house'.  (I asked him later why he thinks he felt that way at that moment.  He said, "I don't know".  It was a great teaching moment to let him know that the feeling he had was the Holy Spirit talking to him.  I told him how grateful I was for him that he was worthy to receive promptings and that he was obedient enough to follow the prompting).  When he got into the house he immediately smelled smoke and when he walked into the kitchen could see smoke coming from the garage.  That's when he frantically called his mom's phone and my phone - but no one answered.

He grabbed the dog - fearful the house would burst into flames - and ran over to Gage's pre-school to get Brandie.  When Brandie got home she immediately opened the garage doors to find the whole garage FILLED with stinky black smoke.  She ran over to the heating lamp, unplugged it from the wall, and quickly extinguished the fire.  We were VERY lucky the wood had smoldered a long time, creating all that oxygen killing smoke - otherwise the little fire would have been a big fire and taken our house with it.

The damage had been done.  The house had been filled with the smoke, everything in the garage (including my boat and 1969 Firebird) were now a hazy grey color and smelled like we just tried to make jerky out of them.  When I arrived home three of Brandie's close friends and Brandie were tearing the house apart - putting all of the bedding, clothing, rugs, etc. into bags and totes for washing.  The disaster cleanup people were there within the hour from Brandie calling our insurance agent.  They began the restoration of taking our 'camp site' back to smelling like a home.  They started wiping down the walls, door jams, moldings, counter tops, and anything where the dust or smoke could settle.  They told us we had to stay out of the house that night because they were going to bomb the house with ozone and hepafilters.  They would then clean the carpets, clean out all of the duct work and then we'd see how things went from there.

So, here we are - Sunday night.  The walls, moldings, door jams, plant shelves, and carpets have all been cleaned.  We spent a few hours yesterday in the laundromat doing 8 jumbo loads of laundry.  We've had bombs go off in our house and garage.  Large fans blowing air around in both the garage and house all the while a huge hepafilter runs in our living room.  The smoke smell in the house is drastically better (but not gone according to Brandie) but the garage still smells like a case of s'mores gone wrong. I'm pretty sure we'll have to paint all the walls and ceiling to get it to smell better.

The moral of the story - be careful what you wish for - because what you had in mind as an answer may not be the exact same as what will happen.  The Master is definitely the controller of the universe and he DEFINITELY has a sense of humor.  I was shown that again this weekend.  No one was hurt, our house still stands, we have a lovely camping scent throughout, and I'll probably get a new paint job in the garage out of it...but at least for a few days - I wasn't thinking about being in Ghana!

Day 46 and Counting

Today is day 46 and counting...not that we're in a hurry or anything.  *smile*  For those that don't know what I'm talking about it's been 46 days since our dossier was hand delivered to our Power of Attorney in Ghana.  From that time we've been told that our court date will be anywhere from 30 to 90 days.  We've really been hoping (and praying) our court date would be closer to the 30 end...and not the 90 end.