May Was Celebration Month

Eliana Turned 3!

Daddy/Hubby's Birthday

Silly Faces!

Abigael's 10th Birthday!

Katie's 13th!

Happy June everyone! We had a busy but great May. With Mother's Day, four birthdays, and our 20th wedding anniversary, there was a celebration in our home all month long! What a month! :-)

Life is good. My high school freshman has his last day of school today, and the other children only have a couple more weeks of school. Looking forward to summer break. Yay!

Blessings, Kristy

Mean Blog Comments

Dear Mean Blog Commenter,

I will no longer give you a platform to spew your hateful, opinionated comments. Feel free to start up your own blog. I have deleted your comments and will now moderate comments. It is not fair for my blog family to stop for for a visit to be met by your comments. My blog is about faith, family, and love. I am truly sorry that you are hurting from your past experience. It is not fair for you to be in pain, but it is also not fair for you to take out your anger on other adoptive families.

Blessings, Kristy

Home 3 Months!

Wow! Three months home just snuck up on me. We are doing very well and staying very busy with 5 in soccer and 2 in lacrosse (one is on JV and Varsity so I am sure that counts as three lacrosse sports!) The new kiddos are enjoying playing soccer and Yadel and Betel have already scored their first goals! Abigael is quite the goalie. It is so fun being able to watch them play soccer and enjoy being kids with no worries!

I had such an amazing Mother's Day...the best ever. I had all nine children with me all day and it just warmed this Mama's heart as we ran around to lacrosse fields and finally made it home to an amazing home cooked meal made by my family. I also received the most beautiful necklace ever that has the names of all of the children on it. The back of it says "My nine blessings from God." Awwwww!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I so love my family.
On the adjustment front, things are going well. We are all still adjusting, but we are also finding our new normal. I know that by our 6 month mark, we will have officially found our "new normal" and I am excited about that.
We had our first post placement visit yesterday and the kids were so funny. The social worker asked them if there is anything that they don't like and Abigael said "those little round green things" (peas) and Yadel said "snakes." They crack me up!

If you are considering adoption, please allow your heart and mind to consider older children. They are so amazing and are longing so much for forever families. They KNOW what they have lost and KNOW what they long for. And they are usually the ones left behind. I can't imagine a better investment than to invest in the life of a child.

Blessings, Kristy

Adjustment

Well, we know that it was coming, and thank the Lord the adjustment issues are small, but they are here. The honeymoon is over folks. I told this to my husband last night then laughed imagining that the new kids feel the same way. I am assuming that they are saying something like "But Mom WAS so nice........." :-)

I praise the Lord for this time though. It isn't easy but I know that our new kids feel safe and comfortable enough to come out of their shell. With adjustment comes breakthroughs. Today was a major breakthrough day for one child. A hurt happened and that child chose to run and come to Mommy crying. This from our very "self-sufficient, I don't need any help" child. Oh it warmed my heart to know that I am now the safe place and place of comfort.

Our job as parents is to invest in our children, raise them in the Lord, and mold them into responsible, giving, and loving adults. It is our honor. It is not easy, but this isn't about me. If this was about me, my life would oh be so different, and shallow....oh so shallow.

Kechene T-Shirt Fundraiser

My blogger friend and fellow adoptive parent, Lori, is helping to organize a 5K run in Kansas to help the older girls at Kechene, a government orphanage in Ethiopia, further their education. The money raised will specifically go to help the girls that have aged out of adoption to obtain an education in Ethiopia. If you are a Gladney family, chances are that you toured this orphanage while in country. Even if you are not local to Lori (I'm not either) you can support this GREAT cause by buying one of these most awesome t-shirts for only $15! I just love this design. Go on over to Lori's blog HERE and get your cool t-shirt today. I can't think of a better way to spend $15!

Two Months Home!

A Day At The Beach
Betel, Samuel, & Eliana
Stephan & Eliana
Betel, Yadel, Grace, & Abigael

Betel, Grace, & Yadel

Yadel, Stephan, Katie, Cousin Britney, Grace, & Betel
Abigael & Papa Bob with her catch

Yadel & Papa Bob with his HUGE catch

Fishing....can it get any better than this?
Roasting marshmallows at the Grandparents

Easter egg hunt thanks to Grandma

I logged on to my blog today and was surprised to see that we have been home for two months already! Where does the time go? It is just amazing. It seems like we just came home yesterday but it also seems that we have been a family of 11 forever. We are truly blessed by our great big family. My life is so crazy busy and exhausting, but so amazing and rewarding! I am truly thankful that the Lord chose me to be worthy enough to mother these wonderful children.
The new kids are adjusting beautifully and are just blossoming and blooming. They are all happy, energetic, and are enjoying school. Five children (including our newest three) all started soccer this week. Mom and Dad are just exhausted but the kids are ecstatic and having a blast! Eliana who is almost three and not in a sport yet wakes up every morning saying "I have practice today?" since all of the other kids ask on a daily basis. On top of the five playing soccer, Katie, our 12yo is on a travel lacrosse league and Stephan, our 15yo plays both Varsity and JV lacrosse for his high school so we are an official sports family.
We just enjoyed a wonderful spring break in South Carolina with Grandma Alice, Papa Bob, Aunt Tammy, and cousins Brighton and Britney. The newbies enjoyed meeting their extended family! They especially loved swimming in the ocean all week even though the water was a frigid 59-60 degrees all week! Brrrrrr!

That is our life in a nutshell. Thanks for following along on this journey with us. If you have specific questions regarding us or our kids, older kid adoption, Ethiopia adoption, etc, please e-mail us at growinginfaithandfamily at gmail.com. We'd love to support you in any way that we can!

Blessings, Kristy

AdoptionFathers.com

Our good friend Pete, who has also adopted from Ethiopia, recognized that in the world of adoption, there is a gap of support for adoptive fathers. And he created AdoptionFathers.com as the ultimate resource for adoptive fathers. There are video interviews of fellow men that have adopted. A new video interview debuts today, featuring the most amazing man that I have ever met: my husband. Go on over to the video interview here, take a peek at this great website here. Please spread the word about this wonderful new adoption resource for men!