CHIFF

"God sets the solitary in families;
He brings out those who are bound into prosperity . . ."
Psalm 68:6a (NKJV)

I'm going to ask you to take just a minute of your time today and read about a piece of legislation that needs to pass. Children In Families First (CHIFF) will be of great benefit to the children currently stuck in orphanages around the world. It is a bipartisan bill that will allow for the development of a bureau within the Department of State. This bureau will handle international child welfare, streamline intercountry (international) adoption, and protect the children and the families adopting them.* If you've ever adopted internationally or known someone who has, you know that at times it can seem like a bit of a tug a war as paperwork bounces from agency to agency, and it's not always clear who is in charge of what. While I feel like most parties involved are doing the best they can with what they have, things need to change within our government to help orphans find homes and families. You can read more about it here. And please take the time to sign the petition here. It takes less than five minutes, but for the children this affects it could mean a lifetime of change.

For those that have already signed the petition, I can't thank you enough!

* Information taken from childreninfamiliesfirst.org

A Birthday and An Update

Yesterday was my 33rd birthday. When I woke up yesterday morning, I didn't remember that it was my birthday. I'm so hyper focused on this home study update and getting everything done, that it completed slipped my mind until Patrick told me Happy Birthday.


Despite my forgetfulness, it turned out to be a great birthday. Patrick got me Rascal Flatts tickets, and the concert is the night before our 11th anniversary so he killed two birds with one stone. We don't typically do anniversary gifts so that will more than cover it.



We finally had our appointments with our new doctor to update our medicals yesterday morning. Everything went smoothly, and I really liked him. We went and did our blood work this morning, and once that all comes back we'll be rocking and rolling and well on the way to completing another home study update.



We've now been officially registered and waiting for two years and nine months. I think, based on the trend that I've seen, that we should receive a referral sometime between September 2014 and April 2015. Could it be sooner? I'm not ruling out the possibility, but I'm basing my math on what has happened to most families in the past couple of months. Most families are receiving referrals around the three and a half year mark.



Once we receive a referral, we will travel to Bulgaria for one week to meet and bond with our daughter. Then we come home for four to six months, and while we're back here in the states court takes place, and she becomes ours officially. Then we go back for 10-14 days for our Gotcha trip and bring her home with us.



So if we receive a referral at three and a half years (nine months from now), travel a month (give or take) later, and then travel around six months after that to bring her home, we could conceivably have our daughter home in approximately 16 months. Obviously, that's all speculation, but I like putting some sort of quantitative measurement on this whole process. It helps me function better.


Sixteen months sounds like an eternity to most people, but for us, at this point, it seems like a drop in the bucket.


Still we pray that, by some miracle, it's sooner . . . much, much sooner . . .

Sometimes Life's Hard

This adoption journey is hard.

That's not a ploy for sympathy.

It's just a statement of fact.

Three years and (almost) four months ago we sent in our application to AGCI. That is a long time y'all. I look back at my naive, excited self and laugh. Wouldn't I like to share some stuff with that girl. But here's the thing, even if I knew it all, how unbelievably hard and stressful this whole process would be, I have no doubt we would do it all again. Because let's face it? Come heck or high water we're going to get our girl home. Giving up is not an option.

"rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer" (Romans 12:12 NKJV)

On Exercise and Eating Right

One of my biggest pet peeves is when people ask me, "Why do you work out? You're already skinny."

I usually just laugh it off. First of all, I'm not extremely comfortable with being called "skinny". Comments about anyone's weight, mine included, make me cringe. I know some people feel like they're complimenting me, but in all seriousness, it makes me insanely uncomfortable.

Here's the deal. I don't work out to be skinny.

Do I want to maintain a healthy weight? Yes.

But that's not (the only reason) I work out.

About two and a half years ago I came to a point where I was super stressed. Work was draining me emotionally and physically. I was feeding myself a steady diet of highly processed, high sugar, low in nutritional value junk. I had gained quite a bit of weight, and while I didn't like that, I liked the way I felt physically and mentally even less.

I knew something had to change. This wasn't who I was. This wasn't who God created me to be. And I wasn't honoring the temple He had given me.

So I started to change things. I started running (actually walking/jogging again) for the first time since before Andrew was born. Was it hard? Yes. I was working a lot. I had a four year and a full time job where I showed up at 7:15 every morning and didn't leave until close to five (and then I took A LOT of work home). Plus I was wading through the stresses of adoption paperwork and waiting. Some days it was all I could do not to say "forget it". Sometimes it meant making myself work out at nine at night (or later), but I made myself push through the exhaustion and do the work. And you know what? I almost immediately started feeling better. The constant exhaustion I felt began to lift. The stress began to have less of an effect on me mentally and physically. It's always going to be hard. There will always be excuses. And there are days where I feel like I would rather walk across a bed of nails than work out. But the benefits, I reap from going for a run and listening to praise music far outweigh those few moments of "I don't want to".

I also started changing the way we, as a family, ate. I didn't want Andrew growing up thinking junk was the norm. So I started really paying attention to what we were eating. I started cutting back on the processed foods, and cooking and baking from scratch. I changed the way I prepared the foods we were eating. In college I took quite a few exercise and nutrition classes. I learned things from these classes, and from one professor in particular, that have stuck with me for well over 10 years. These were the classes where I learned about the chemicals that we put in our bodies and the damage they do. These were the classes where I first heard about hydrogenated oils and how crazy bad they are for you. This is also where I learned that whole foods are best. So I became a label reading fool.

Do we ever have junk food? Yes, we do. I'm not going to lie. I polished off about half a bag of Doritos yesterday afternoon. And I do have t.v. dinners on hand for those times when I just don't want to cook. Do we every eat out? Yes, probably too much. But my goal is to make most of our meals healthy on most days.

Some examples of this are: Baking from scratch and making sauces, etc. from scratch. If we have dessert, I want to know what's in it. I don't have issues with sugar in moderation (although I am not a fan of High Fructose Corn Syrup and try to avoid it for the most part). I do have issues with sugar in my spaghetti sauce which is why I make my own. I also try to buy organic when I can. Although, it is more expensive, and it doesn't always happen.

We eat butter.

We eat cheese.

We eat meat.

We eat eggs.

We eat vegetables.

We eat fruit.

We eat ice cream.

No foods are off limits. I want my kids to have a healthy view of food. I want them to understand that food is fuel for the body. I want them to see the importance of eating right and exercising, not to be skinny, but to be healthy. But I also want them to enjoy food. And so yes, sometimes we pile in the car and head to DQ for ice cream.

This isn't about a diet. It's not about "looking good". If the only reason you want to lose weight or get in shape is to look good in a swimsuit, it's not likely to have staying power. There has to be more to it than that. It's about taking care of the body God gave you. It's about being the best you can be. No amount of vitamins or supplements or crazy crash diets can take the place of taking care of yourself. It's about being physically and mentally healthy so that you can lead the full life God intends for you to live.

And that is my rant for the day.

Kindergarten Graduate

This guy finished kindergarten yesterday.

Clearly he's listening well.

It's hard to believe he's going into first grade in just a few months. It's hard to believe that in less than six months he'll be seven. (It's hard to believe that he won the Spanish award. He clearly didn't inherit my linguistic skills . . . or lack thereof. Haha!) It amazes me how quickly the years pass. How quickly one year turns to two and three to four, and before you know it kindergarten is over. While I'm sometimes sad that my baby is growing up, more than anything I just want to enjoy each age and stage knowing that it will pass, and Andrew will be on to something new and exciting. There is no greater privilege than watching your child grow into the person God created him to be. I couldn't be prouder!