In the Meantime...

Before I go any further, here are two blogs of families that are in Ethiopia right now:

The Foote Family
The Cole Family

I think there are others, but these are two that I found are updating their blogs well.

Okay...

I bet you have been wondering what Team Dragovich is up to in the meantime... you know, the MEAN time between our two court dates :)! That is what I think it is anyway. Well, we've stayed pretty busy. My dear friends threw me a beautiful adoption shower, and we were certainly showered with wonderful gifts and lots of PINK!!!!! I do not ever get tired of looking at pink girlie clothes, that's for sure!

We've also took a day trip to the beach-- we live two hours from some very nice, family friendly, quiet beaches along the southern border of NC-- right above South Myrtle Beach. That was tons of fun and other than coming back looking like lobsters, it was a huge success.

Tony dove back into work. He came home to some pretty big things happening for Womack's pain department, and pain medicine in the Army overall. I am so proud of the work he does for soldiers and their famlies. He would be embarrassed that I am bragging about him, but oh well. And I am sorry if it is offensive that I am bragging about my husband's skills. Sometimes I just can't help myself-- God has so gifted him in this area. I think God's gifts are so creative and funny sometimes. Or maybe it is just funny to be married to someone who is so gifted and talented in treating pain in people. Not that I don't think that it is important-- I think it is VERY important!! It is just not what I ever expected-- do I know what I did expect?? No. But, I never even knew there was such a thing as a "pain medicine specialist"... let alone that I would marry one. Of course, he wasn't a pain medicine specialist when I married him. :) Anyway, that was sorta a rabbit-trail. Tony is busy and has a lot of different things going on in the world of pain, and I'm proud of him.

But, really, he went back to work a little early so that he would be more free to take off when we travel to pick up the kids. This week has been hard. I won't lie. Every day I have to fight this battle of being done waiting. Every morning my natural instinct is start worrying about whether we will pass this time. On Saturday we got new pictures of them-- our May update. It was hard. We both cried. I'm so happy that they look so happy and well-adjusted and growing. When we first had pictures of them our little girl wouldn't smile a lick and our boy smiled so politely. Now, our pictures are filled with them playing, laughing and just having a good 'ole time together. I love it and hate it all at once.

So, I guess that is the sum total. Not really. I am in the middle of painting our little girl's room. I think it will be really pretty when it is done... and yes, I will post pictures. It just has taken so long to get both the rooms ready, and I admit, I never think a room is really quite ever "done"-- at least not to my level of done. But, who can meet that standard??? So, once it is painted, bedding on, curtains hung and at least a COUPLE decorations hung on the wall... I will post pictures.

Thanks for stopping by :) Go read the other families' blogs. You will be blessed.

Grace and Peace,
Shari

Yea!!!! We're HOME!

We made it through all our travel adventures-- I feel so brave and all grown up :). The boys and I had a great time on the farm in IL... boy, it is COLD there! I am spoiled in sweet NC! And, of course, we were welcomed just perfectly to a cold arctic blast as we pulled into the driveway of my parent's farm-- negative temps and 30mph winds for the first 3 days we were there. I opted for being a yogi instead of a runner for those days :). But, it warmed up to tolerable, and even veered into mild for a couple of days! We all managed to catch the flu bug in between Christmas and New Years-- I have become good friends with Clorox and Lysol.

Boys with their favorite new toy--funny, where's the Wii?
Oh wait, that's Mommy's favorite new toy!

Santa brought a Wii this year-- they must have been making an overload supply this year at the North Pole. It seemed to be the gift of choice. Funny, the boys didn't even really recognize that they got the Wii when they were frantically looking at all their treasures! They noticed all sorts of other things and even a couple things they DIDN'T get, but the Wii elluded their attention for quite some time. It was Aunt Emily and Mommy who went wild about it, and then they recognized its existence. BTW, Aunt Emily and I LOVE Guitar Hero :) I'm really bad at it, but it is still fun. I think I can still hear "Slow Ride" in my sleep and sadly, "Baracudda" still has the best of me... but not for long-- I SHALL prevail!!

My gladiator and God-warrior... forces to be reckoned with!

Tony is doing well on the other side of the globe. He is in a good routine, getting to do some pain medicine stuff and seems to have plenty of time to eat healthy, workout a lot and read a lot. He begins every conversation with, "I'm so huge, you should see my _______ (arms, shoulders, traps, abs, etc)!" I'm happy for him. And once I can run more than 2-3 sporatic days a week, finish any one of the books I started three months ago and lose my new and ever so lovely hive rash all over my torso, neck and arms, I'll be even THRILLED for him. Until then, happy is good enough :)

Creation Museum in OH with the Harbaughs on the way back to NC-- VERY FUN!!

Last, but not least... adoption news. There is none. But this is not to be un-expected. We have been waiting 7 1/2 months now and are in a line that is a bit sporatic. The sibling group line. Right now, I am starting the process to have our USCIS approval broadened a bit to include any sibling group or two children ages 0-6 years with one or both of them being a girl. We have always been happy to be this broad, but somehow during the paper chase process, we let the wording be too narrow-- I don't know why-- it is all so confusing when your going through it. Anyway, our fingerprints expire in April and there is not a chance that we will get a referral, go to ET and get back with our kids before then. So, I have to do this whole hoop jumping thing again anyway-- might as well get the age range right this time :).

Even though there is no DIRECT news for us, there has been a lot happening in our agency's program. Ten referrals for the month of January have already been given and this is unheard of for so early in the month. That is very exciting! There is fear on the YG that this is it for the month. I don't think so. I won't believe it. I believe that more children are going to be referred to their forever families this month and I even believe that the wait times for court and travel are going to start to shrink. Why do I believe that? Why NOT? :)

Well, Happy New Year to you all!!! Thank you so much for praying for our family during this deployment and adoption time!! Thank you for leaving posts and comments on our blog and thanks for faithfully checking in, even though I am the sporatic blogger :) My love to you all!

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

Hanna and other Happenings

We survived Hanna but not completely unscathed... can you believe that??? At about 7:30 this morning, Isaac pointed to the ceiling from the second story and said, "Hey Dad, what's that? Water just dripped on me." That was all it took to make Tony move faster than lightening. The next hour was a a flurry of, "GET ME FLASHLIGHT!!! I NEED A BUCKET!!!!! WHERE IS THAT FLASHLIGHT!!!!" Note to self, make a list of supplies that we MAY need in a hurricane and put them ALL together in ONE PLACE! I had all that stuff, but it was scattered all over the place. Not helpful. And my brain wasn't firing on all pistons at that moment either. Also not helpful.
Turns out, a venting pipe which goes out the roof of the house wasn't sealed properly, allowing water to seep down the sides of the pipe and down onto the ceiling. Fortunately we caught it early and it was a minor drip. It will also not take much to fix. No problem. I like high pressure situations in the morning-- wakes me up. You know I am not serious. The sad truth is, I have been secretly looking forward to Hanna's arrival for a couple days now. I knew she wasn't going to be strong enough to inflict real harm, but definitely mighty enough to cancel all our Saturday responsibilities.
The drippy ceiling was not our only injury. Our power never did go out, but did surge a few times-- again, early in the morning. Apparently, it got the best of our home computer. Tony can't get it to do anything but flash a blinking question mark at him. Hmmm... I don't think it is supposed to do that. We are going to take it to the Apple store tonight to have a diagnostic done on it. Fortunately, we have our computers covered as part of our USAA home owners policy and I am pretty sure we will get at least part of a new computer covered through them.

So, that is it for Hanna. It is gone. Quick mover, that Hanna is. Except now, I have no excuse for not doing a run this afternoon-- oh wait, yes I do. I have to have my computer "diagnosed". Besides, it's hot and sticky and still windy. And I'm on a low-mileage week, so I don't feel bad not running. Guess I'll have get back to business tomorrow.

In other Team Dragovich news, yesterday the boys and I were up at the crack of dawn driving to Spencer, NC. There is a pretty awesome Transportation Museum there and though it took us two hours to get there, it did NOT disappoint!! The boys had a FABULOUS time, learned a lot of fun NC Railroad history, and had LOTS of hands-on experiences-- of course, culminating in a REAL train ride on an old-fashioned passenger train. That wasn't their favorite part, however. Their favorite thing was playing Star Wars in the factory-turned-museum. They apparently turned the entire building into a Star Wars spaceship and ran from station to station turning knobs, pressing buttons, flipping switches and rooting out evil in-between the railroad cars. And in case your wondering what kind of mother lets her boys run wild in a train museum playing Star Wars... well, I could go to great lengths describing how the museum was really designed for such freedom of investigation- whether you are playing train conductor OR Star Wars... but, instead I'll simply say...I am that kind of mother :D

Enjoy the photos!
Grace and Peace,
Shari

Before the train, came the canoe


Can you imagine racing in this???

Wyatt and Isaac on the turntable... they aren't so sure yet.


Climbin' on the caboose

Getting on the Train


PS. BTW, we have been officially waiting over 3 months for our referral. Only 4-6 more to go ;)!!

OUCH!!!

Yesterday was rough. It didn't start that way, but by mid-afternoon, I was emotionally, mentally and physically exhausted! I woke up to every bed in the house (except for mine, of course) peed in and wet sleepwear scattered all across the boys' carpets in their rooms. This is not so crazy or unusual, so I rolled with it. We started school and were pluggin' away, when I hear Sam scream from Wyatt's room. This is DEFINITELY not unusual, so I don't even look up from Isaac's Math book. Next thing I know Wyatt is ushering a screaming and bloody Sam into the homeschool room, looking as white as a ghost! For good reason, too-- when I DID finally decide to look up, there was blood everywhere; all over his shirt, drops trailing him on the floor and most importantly-- pouring out of his mouth like an open faucet! My exact words were... "Oh!" and that was it. I guess he and Wyatt were playing "sleeping bag wrestling" and Sam crashed against the ONLY piece of "furniture" in Wyatt's room. Of course, I rushed him to the bathroom and for the next several minutes worked only to stop the bleeding and determine its source. Isaac was crying (I later found out that he thought Sam was going to die), and Wyatt was talking non-stop (this is what he does when in distress). Sam was just slobbering and bleeding all over the place and I sort of checked out-- emotionally, anyway. Once the drama was over and all was well with Team Dragovich, Sam fell asleep, the boys and I finished school, worked on chores, and I slowly checked back in. Only when I did, it came to me in exhaustion, mixed with thanksgiving AND irritation-- weird, huh? Some days are filled with just too much body fluid!!!

Other than Sam drama, we have been enjoying a more laid back schedule. Soccer is over, and school will be over in a few weeks. I am already painting, re-arranging, and decorating rooms in my mind and sometimes looking too much at furniture on-line. The garden is up and growing pretty well--yea!! Adoption news is none, really... I have been following closely the families ahead of us-- those waiting, waiting, waiting for different things-- referrals, court dates, travel dates, etc. It looks like the wait times may be increasing again-- anything could happen, but the pattern is definitely moving in the "increase of wait times" direction. This is so hard to watch happen... yet, I have to always go back to God and His divine timing. There have been a couple comments made by families in our adoption Yahoo Group which have grabbed my attention and heart... one was about adoption being God's idea and design and when we enter into this eternal plan with Him, we have to expect that the enemy is going to be hard at work to oppose it-- YES!! I can see that-- and must be prepared to battle against schemes of Satan, who is trying hard to destroy this most beautiful relfection of God's love.
The other comment was made by a husband in the group, who so wisely comforted his wife as to why their court date didn't go through a second time... he said to remember that this would be the only time in their new daughter's life in which she would live in her native culture, surrounded by her native language, customs, nannies who love her, etc... this is not to say that their daughter would be better off staying in Ethiopia without a mother or father!! NOT AT ALL!!! But it is to say-- let God do His work in His perfect timing-- knowing that He IS at work, and EVERY day in EVERY way, He is molding and forming us and our children into unique and beautiful individuals created for His Glory; He will use ALL things to bring this about... and we can trust Him :)

Grace and Peace,
Shari

YES!!!!...... but; no.

Well..... IT CAME! The highly sought after I-171H came today!! AND.... they screwed it up. The government messed it up. Can you believe that???? I mean, I didn't think our government COULD mess up!! Okay. That is enough sarcasm. They got the approval wrong. They only approved us for one infant girl, 0-24 months. You know, after all the prayer and discussion and thought that went into making our final request in the first place.... Well, I just sort of had to laugh. So I wouldn't cry :) It really isn't a big deal. At least I don't think it will be. We'll see how long it takes Immigration to get us a new corrected form. They said 3 business days. They also said in the reply email that they rarely make mistakes and not to email back a "thank you". I kind of think that is funny. They DID rewrite the correct approval back to me in the reply email AND they got back to me in the SAME business day, instead of the two they said they were allowed to take up to-- don't ask me what I would get to do if they didn't get back to me in two days... call the "now your not even following your own rules" police??? Okay-- no more sarcasm, I promise.

For all my "non-savvy" adoption friends, let me explain what the I-171H does. I know I've said before that it is our "pass" to bring our kids into the country. It is NOT my ticket to now go to Ethiopia to pick up kids!!! I WISH! All this form does is complete a packet of about 15 or so other documents called a "Dossier" (maybe one day I'll actually count them all up) which is then shipped off to Ethiopia so that we can "get in line" so to speak. Pardon the pun-- that is not how I mean it, but that sort of how it is. At least that is how it feels, right now. But the cool thing is, you know how when your in a really long line-- I mean a REALLY, REALLY long line-- you start to chat with the people around you in the same line and by the end of the wait you have created all these new friendships and have a date to get together next week for coffee at B & N? Well, that is the wonderful thing about waiting in the adoption line. We have the honor of meeting amazing people, making new, lifelong friendships and sharing in all the ups and downs of this unique journey called "adoption". So, when the I-171H came today but it was all messed up... it was okay. Because God is in control and I'm not alone ;)

Grace and Peace,
Shari

Living with Gracious Uncertainty

No... before you have to get any further, the I-171H has not come yet. But that is okay, because I am living in "Gracious Uncertainty". It is the life filled with "breathless expectation" at what God is doing behind the scenes and causing to work for our family's good, even though we do not see it with our eyes. "Wow!" You say... "Why, Shari, that is so profound!!"... well, Friends, it is; but I did not say it or think of it on my own. It was in today's Oswald Chambers devotion. Click on his name to read it yourself. It's good stuff and just what my little pattering heart needed to remember and tuck away as we continue this wait. (Man... and all this paper does is get our stuff to ET-- so we can REALLY start waiting!)

Adoption paperwork isn't the only thing we are waiting to understand. Over the weekend, my middle son was riding in one of those caged-in, go-cart, dune buggy things (that sounds awfully accurate, doesn't it?) and the boy who was driving the go-cart, dune-buggy thing accidentally flipped it over with my almost 7 year old in it (Yes, he was wearing a helmet and buckled in). Yikes!!! Besides the shock factor which took the rest of the day to overcome, he kept his right arm dreadfully close to him at all times and cried continually about it being in pain. He refused to keep ice on it, and when Tony mentioned "hospital" and "x-ray" he about went into shock again-- AAAAAHHHHH!!! So... we opted to wrap it, splint it and wait for the morning. Tony did manage to get him to the ER on post the next morning and the x-rays revealed nothing. No break. But... I'm not so sure. It was VERY sensitive last night still, and swollen in one particular spot on the top of his hand, and puffy all around his wrist. He still can't squeeze anything with that hand. Breaks are so tough in little kiddos-- especially in those parts of the body with tons of bones and lots of space in between them, naturally. It probably isn't broken. All we can do is wait and see. Poor baby. :(

Thank you to everyone who is keeping up with us and praying for us!! Somedays it is hard to remember that we ARE indeed adopting! But, I am confident that in just the right timing, all things will come together and happen. Not just with paperwork, but throughout this roller coaster ride :D

Grace and Peace,
Shari

Nothing to blog about

So why even blog? Maybe if I blog, it will SEEM like something is happening, even though it's not. Not that life isn't happening here at Team Dragovich headquarters-- plenty of life is happening here every day!! Even more life than I care for, some times-- and that's saying a lot! In fact, because we have had so much "life" lately, I decided to skip soccer practices and stay home for one whole day without going ANYWHERE!!! Now that felt weird-- but not for long. I was happy to not suck the money out of my pocketbook and into my van and I think my van was happy, too!

But, what doesn't seem to be happening is movement forward with adoption. We are still stuck on those two pieces of paper. The homestudy report and our I-171H form (immigration)-- which is waiting for the homestudy report. We have seen the draft and it has been sent to our coordinator, but I haven't seen a copy in my mailbox or gotten any confirmation that it has been sent to USCIS so they can finish their piece and get us our form. I read on another family's blog that our coordinator is getting ready to go to Ethiopia for a month beginning on Friday-- YIKES!! That is great, but I hope she finishes reviewing our report before then! And I guess if I need anything, I can contact the other coordinator at our agency??? I was REALLY hoping to have our Dossier to Ethiopia by the end of April. Okay... let me be frank here, I thought we would have it done before now. But that is not how it is working and based on watching the many families who have gone before us... I better just count this as practice :D!!

I have to say, that when I start to get anxious about how long this paperchase is taking and whether or not we have been forgotten (that sounds silly, doesn't it?), I hear the whisper of the One who knows all, sees all and directs all things... He quietly speaks, "Keep your eyes fixed on Me, Shari. Delight in Me and I will give you the desires of your heart". My head is up, Lord!! Don't let me trip!

Grace and Peace,
Shari

I LOVE North Cackilaka!!!

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE living in North Carolina... or North Cackilaka as I love to affectionately call it-- I have no idea where I got that; I know I heard it somewhere, and I used to say it to the boys all last year before we moved-- they would to get so irritated with me. The conversation always went something like this: "Boys, aren't you SO EXCITED to be going to North Cackilaka (in my Yankee accent)??" Boys' reply, "Mom, STOP calling it Nawth Cack-i-LAKA!!!" Then I would just say it again :) Now that we have lived here for almost 10 months and I still say it, they have given up...

This is why I love NC-- all week long, Tony and I have been taking time in the evening and doin' some front porch sittin'-- watching our children play with all the neighbor kids, laughing at their crazy antics: club joining, club un-joining, scooter/bike races, light saber fights, etc. In MARCH!! Yesterday it hit almost 80 degrees and all week it has been getting warmer and warmer. Our front porch has a perfect view of the whole cul-de-sac and all the other neighbors' yards where the kiddos play. They just bee-bop from yard to yard, living in their own little world, so oblivious to our observations and spying on them :). Tony says living this way reminds him of growing up and it just fills him up. I feel like I am getting a special opportunity to look into his childhood and watch how his days were filled. I did not have such a childhood-- I grew up on a farm, and we certainly weren't galloping through the cornfields to get to the neighbor's house!! I treasure my childhood for different reasons, and would never trade it for the world, but I feel doubly blessed to be able to live now in a neighborhood full of families and kids and experience this side of life as well. I think the only thing missing is two more little dark-skinned bodies, running helter skelter with the rest of the gang!!

Speaking of our dark-skinned beauties, I am beginning to allow myself more and more to "feel" their coming into our family. Does that sound crazy? Let me clarify... when we first started this adoption adventure (not that long ago), it was so hard for me to imagine them without getting anxious, uptight and frustrated with the whole adoption process-- I mean, there are MILLIONS of orphans in Africa alone, but I can't get to any of them because of all this mound of rules, paperwork, meetings and red tape!! Besides all this, there is the lack of physical evidence (being pregnant)-- other than the crazy emotions-- to prove that they are really coming. Don't misunderstand what I am saying. From before we sent our application to America World, I clearly had the vision in my head and heart of Team Dragovich in "techni-color"-- it is beautiful, I wish you could all see what I see!! But that is part of the problem-- seeing it so clearly, yet being helpless in many ways to bring it to fruition. We do our part, but SOOOO many other entities must do their part to bring the vision to fruition. Isn't that the point, though? Isn't that where God's grace, mercy and peace come to the fore-front and not only does the vision come to pass, but so does the "fruit" in the life of Team Dragovich? I think so; and I am willing to go through it all-- because I see our "Techni-color" family and KNOW it is God's design.

Two more families are traveling this week to pick up their babes... We're praying for them and cannot WAIT to follow them in Ethiopia. Meanwhile, we are at at stall with paper-chasing. That's okay, soon enough we will be sending off that Dossier and entering the ranks with SOOO many other families in the "WFR" (waiting for referral) phase. Right now, that is my great desire... to be able to "tag" myself in our Yahoo Group as "WFR"!! So now you know how obsessed I am :)-- ha!!

Grace and Peace,
Shari