We're Ready for our Referral!

Sam loves his new ride!

Today I spent the entire day at a dealership in Fayetteville, trading in our van for a suburban. I have been on the hunt for a couple of weeks and last week, I found "the one". Whatever that means. It was hard work getting the best trade in for our van, getting the dealers to get to our numbers and do it on my own. Then, if that wasn't hard enough, trying to purchase the the Yukon XL with a Power of Attorney was an ENORMOUS pain-- almost as enormous as our new superburban!!!

I don't think this is a good idea...

Yeah. That's better!

Now, we can get our referral for our two new kids-- I can't wait. Think I should call our agency and tell them they can go ahead and give us our referral now???

Grace and Peace,
Shari

Room for 6 kids!!

And room for LOTS of stuff :))

You gotta give the boy credit :)

Wyatt had a math test yesterday-- first one in over a month, since we have been off and he has had his cast. There was a problem he didn't know regarding measuring liquids-- how many pints in a gallon... He couldn't remember and I wouldn't budge on giving him the answer, so he got creative. Next thing I know, he comes downstairs from where he is taking his test, he starts rummaging through the refrigerator, pulls out the almost empty milk carton, a one pint container of whipping cream and goes to work. He drank the rest of the milk so it would be empty, then he found a cup that looked the same size as the pint container of cream (thank goodness he didn't drink that, too!!), then he found a funnel with the science experiment stuff (I'm impressed he knew we even had that) and started pouring full cups of water into the now-empty gallon jug of milk... spilling and and sloshing as he went.



I was in the middle of teaching Isaac his Math, but I just had to stop and take a couple pics of my boy at work. I was proud of him for putting so much effort into this one problem! Unfortunately, he still got the problem wrong... but I think he deserves some credit for trying!!

In adoption news... two more families received referrals and several families are waiting to pass court in the next week, so they can go pick up their precious little ones!! I think it is so wonderful that there has been such a rush of activity this month... so many people are praying for children to be brought home to their forever families and Almighty God-- El Shadday-- is certainly working and answering the prayers of His faithful.

My love to you all! Stay warm and praise God for His sweet providing!
Grace and Peace,
Shari

What I should be doing...

What I should be doing is planning school for the next two weeks. What I should be doing is rotating, folding and putting away laundry which has piled up from our trip to the beach. What I should be doing is dusting, wiping or cleaning something. What I should be doing... is anything but blogging. But I am, so there you go.

Tony's parents and brother flew in last Thursday to spend some time with us before he leaves to go across the big pond. We rented a beach house on Ocean Isle and spend Friday - Monday at the beach. It was a really wonderful weekend, though I blinked and it was over. I ran my last really hard, long run before my race next month-- 22 miles up and down the island. The best part about running at the beach is laying in the water after the run!! I had my best recovery ever-- duh. I ran 22 miles, walked straight out to the ocean and sat down in the waves. Then after stretching and re-fueling, I spent the rest of the day sitting, laying and playing on the sand or in the water. No coming home and doing laundry, vacuuming, running kids to games, practices, etc. Just resting. It was good. :)

The other thing that was fun was having my middle child teach me how to "skin board". My brother-in-law rented a skin board from the local surf shop and taught Isaac what it is all about. He, in-turn taught me and we had fun. I'm NOT good at skin boarding, but that is okay. It was just fun to have Isaac teach me something new :). We also all had fun riding the waves on our boogie boards-- another new experience for me. Tony tried to teach me that one. I caught a couple good ones. Also very fun.

Wyatt enjoyed spending time talking all things military with Grandpa. On the way home we stopped by the USS North Carolina and took a tour. We have been on this great battleship before, but it was all new to Tony's parents. His dad is a HUGE military history guru, so there was much to discover together.

On the adoption front, there have been some big changes in our agency. The director of the ET program-- who also happens to be our family coordinator-- is moving with her family to Ethiopia to handle our adoptions from that end. So much has to happen once a family gets a referral, in order to make it possible for us to be united with our little ones. It is a complicated, slow process, often met with mess-ups and potholes along the way. Hopefully, by her moving to Addis and working for each family from that end, the entire process from referral to travel will go more smoothly, with less turmoil in between.

The other big news is that that AWAA increased its Ethiopia Program Fees. And here is my sad admission-- I haven't even taken the new fee schedule and compared it side by side to the old schedule. It's not that I don't care. Especially, because I believe that the reasons given were valid and ultimately, I believe that God will provide. Now, having made that "great statement of faith"... here is my confession. All I care about now, is the fact that we are getting closer to referral and now all the sudden, I am getting antsy. This really irritates me, because I was doing so well, for so long and not at all thinking about getting "the call". I assumed it was so far off and things were going so slow, that we wouldn't get the call for many more months. And, I think that is probably still true, but for some reason, after that last referral and the new "estimated" time frames for referral, I am rattled. I know there are lots of people in front of us, but I don't really know how many or what they are requesting. I don't want to spend lots of time on the chat group trying to figure it out, but still... I wonder. I especially wonder if all this will come down the line while Tony is gone. I put in an email to our coordinator asking these "wonderings" and, of course, she didn't respond. She is too busy, and we obviously aren't close enough to the top of the list to warrent a response.

So... I think I had better start finding something else I should be doing, instead of sitting on this computer blogging :)...

Grace and Peace,
Shari

More Referrals coming down the pipes!

This morning I woke up to a very happy Yahoo Group Post. More families are receiving referrals and the most recent referral came to a family not far in front of us-- for a sibling group!!! This is encouraging to me, since we would love nothing more than to bring home more than one child. I just don't know what the Lord has in store for Team Dragovich, but I trust Him and know that He is working in and through all things. He sees deeper than the surface and His wisdom is greater and higher than anything I can imagine.

In the meantime, we continue to be wrapped up in fall sports. It seems that on any given night, we are at a game, practice and sometimes both! Many nights Tony and I are in "divide and conquer" mode-- one at soccer, one at baseball. There is no way I could do this without him home, and I seem to keep reminding everyone that come Spring, Team D. will be choosing ONE sport and sticking with it. I can't say that I regret letting them choose this time, though. It is wonderful to see them excelling in their chosen sport and gaining confidence with each practice and game. Most importantly, Tony is enjoying every minute of getting his boys to their events and watching them intently as they learn to throw, catch, dribble, pass and make plays. So, who am I to drudge through this season like it is a chore and not a joy? Besides, after October, it is over, then we will all be scratching our heads and wondering what we should do with all our extra time :).

I think I am turning out to be somewhat of a "sub-par" blogger. There are many days that something happens and I think, "That was funny! I should blog about that!" And then, the day is over, I am exhausted and I decide that the three people who read don't care that much anyway :). I am probably wrong, because, if I have only three blog stalkers, then they are my most faithful following and they DO care-- so, sorry!!!

Okay, that was a random side-note, but oh well. At least I have a window of blog time now! Yeah! So, that is all I have. We are still pretty far out in the wait process, unless a LOT more sibling groups come AWAA's way and then who knows, maybe we will get a referral sooner than we think? Or, maybe the family that received the referral was just a perfect match for this sibling group and AWAA knew that and made the match. I may just look into this one. Hmmm...

My love to all of you who read, whether I know you personally, or not!
Grace and Peace,
Shari