The Month of May

I notice as I log on here that my last post was clear back at the beginning of May.  This actually does not surprise me one bit.  May is a crazy month for our family and this year was no exception!  Here are some words and photos to show off our month...

We started the month off with a trip to the zoo for Lily and Micah (with her class)...

Ready to head to the zoo

You can barely see it, but Lily is feeding the giraffe (in the gray shirt)

Then an adoption fundraiser jewelry party which had low attendance, but we still managed to make sales in oustide guests and were blessed with enough money to pay for another month of Nora's care--praise God!  A special thank you to my dear friend, Abbe, for her willingness to help in this way.

Next on the calendar was Mother's Day and then Toby's preschool spring program.  Toby was adamant he was not going to get up on the stage, but when it came down to it, he not only got on the stage, he even said a line all by himself in one of the songs!  Such a proud Mama moment!

Firefighter Toby!

Flower being rained on

Toby with his teacher, Miss Jane, whom we love!

We moved forward to Lily's school music program where she was a very cute explorer.  She had a lot of fun singing the songs and making some music with her classmates.

Explorer Lily

Our family getting eaten alive by mosquitoes after Lily's program

Throughout April and the beginning of this month, I worked on a watercolor painting for my brother-in-law, Jerry.  He was wanting it done for the camp they are directors of.

It was fun to get back to painting a bit...for some reason those days are few and far between right now.  I had to get the painting done by the middle of the month because...

The day after Lily's school program we surprised the kids with our trip to South Dakota for our oldest niece's high school graduation.  They literally had no idea we had planned the trip until we were heading out the door--it was great!  We loved our time out with family so much we debated half way across Iowa about just turning back around and calling the kids and Micah off work and school for several more days.  Getting away and being a family with no crazy schedules was so refreshing.

Kids outside on Swan Lake Christian Camp's infamous bell

Uncle Micah playing with Liam

Big smiles for all since Aunt Angie was able to hold Liam this trip

Lily's horse ride

Quinn's horse ride with Aunt Judi

Can you tell Quinn was having LOTS of fun outside?!?!

Getting ready for the graduation festivities

Little ornery cuties

Quinn with cousin Laura at graduation

Cousin Melissa swinging the kids on the hammocks

Our family at the lake

Dirt and boys always find each other

Even dirt and the older "boy"--awww....so sweet!

Our family with the Grad-Kayle!  Congrats!!!

Papa T with the grandkids

We did continue on home, however, because we had a garden to plant...

and our subdivision garage sales to get ready for.  We had great success at the sales so it made all the work worth it.  We were then able to collect a lot of the neighbor's "left-overs" from the sales and give them to another family who are adopting another sweet one from Rivers of Hope.  They are doing their own adoption garage sale fundraiser in just a few short weeks so we pray our extras will bless their efforts!  It was also nice to meet another fellow ROH family in person.  Many blessings to them!

Extras being gathered to send off to our other ROH friends

After the garage sales, I was finally able to box up lots of scrubs we've been collecting for several months. With the hospital Micah works at going to uniform scrubs this past year, we were able to ask many he knew to donate their old scrubs for clinics Project Medishare works in.  I'm so excited to be able to send these off to this great organization.  For more info on what all Project Medishare does in Haiti, click here!

We've also taken advantage of some nice warmer weather and had our first family campfire of the season.  We all enjoyed some pizza pudgy pies and s'mores over the flames.  Yummo!

Quinn guarding the s'mores supplies

Love

Yummy!

Nothing like a good ole roasted marshmallow

We are then rounding out the month with Lily's 7th birthday on her last day of school today.  Can't believe I'm writing I have a 7 year old 2nd grader in our household now!  Time flies for sure.  Still in blue at the end of the year-ha!

Lily on the first day of school as a 1st grader

Lily on the last day of school as a 1st grader (also her 7th birthday-today!)

This week, we were able to head to Lily's school to celebrate her birthday with her classmates.  On each child's birthday, her teacher has the classmates write a little letter to the birthday girl or boy and then she reads them all while that child sits in front of her class.  I stood there listening to the words of Lily's peers they had wrote about her with tears in my eyes.  As a parent you tend to see so many treasures within the personality and life of your children that you wonder if others notice.  I daily get to see so many ways that Lily cares for others, loves with a big open heart, and gives gifts and encouragement like it's going out of style.  As I heard the words being read off the pages of these letters, I realized that, yes, God is using those gifts not just in our home but to all she meets.  She is a gem!  Here are a few of the words her classmates spoke of her--I'm so thankful for having these for Lily to treasure.  They are truths spoken over her that will be needed when days come that unfortunately will carry unkind words.

-You are so nice. You are even fast at running and very sweet too.
-You are very special because God made you.
-You are nice and funny and you are a nice friend.
-You are a good artist and you do nice things.
-You are very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very nice.
-You have a good heart.
-You can run as fast as a car.
-You are nice and sweet. You are responsible and careful. You are full of love.
-You are a good friend. You have a good heart. You are full of love.
-You are so, so, so nice to me and the others and you are full of love.
-You are my BFF! You have a good heart. You are a good friend.
-You are nice and you get your work done in time. You are my first BFF!

 

So, all in all, this has been a very busy but highly rewarding month.  We still have Lily's home party yet this weekend and then I may have to collapse on the couch for a day to recover from it all.  When I look back, I'm amazed that this was a potential month (way back when) to have Nora coming home.  Obviously, we would have cancelled some things to make it work, but it still would have been pretty crazy.  Her homecoming still feels so far off, but the reality is she will be home sometime soon and I'm glad our super busy month is passed so we can relish her even more when she needs us to be more solely focused on her.  No new news from Haiti regarding our process, but we have enjoyed a few beautiful new pictures from two of our favorite young Canadian women who traveled back down to ROH to love on our kids again. Ashley and Ketsia have been such a huge blessing to our family and to Nora specifically.  We are always grateful for the love they give Nora.

Nora with Ketsia

Nora with Ashley

Chowing down on some mango

Sticky Mango Love

Tired girl

Pure Beauty

Process wise, we are still in MOI, but have not necessarily been there any longer than expected at this point.  More typical time frames for this stage are 4-6 weeks although so many from our orphanage have been stuck there for months and months.  We are beginning our 4th week there, so please be praying with us we will get out very soon and move on to passports.  Our hearts' desires is to see Nora come home by the end of July so our children will be able to have a few weeks all at home together before heading back to school.  God is Able!  If you remember, at the beginning of this journey we decided to help make these days a little bit more tangible for our children by starting a paper link chain around the top of Lily and Nora's room.  Every day we add a link.  We had high hopes of having her home before the chain encircled her room twice.  Well, we are getting very near the end of that second time around and it's not looking hopeful we will have her home before it reaches the starting point once again, but we have high hopes there will not be too many more chains left to be added.  As hard as it is to see link after link after link go up, it has at least created a beautiful scene around the top of their room...almost as if their room is being literally surrounded by love and care just as we pray for Nora each night as a family.  Here's a little video to show you the visual of just how many days our children have been waiting to see their sister in their very own home.  May God speed the remainder of the process and get these kiddos together!

Look Who's a Thieszen Now!!!

It is with much joy we report today we have received a message from Haiti today that our dossier is in MOI now.  For those of you who have no idea what that means, it means we have passed through legalizations and have our legalized adoption decree.  If you still don't know what that means, it means....

This little beauty is now officially a "Thieszen"!

YAYAYAYAYAYAYYAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Feel free to join in our celebrations today however you want to--we are praising God, dancing, jumping into each others' arms, kissing each other, hugging each other, crying, thanking God over and over and over...you get the picture.  We are HAPPY, HAPPY, HAPPY!

Now, what exactly does this mean as far as process?  Well, in layman's terms MOI is the last large step on the Haitian end of the process.  Our entire dossier and all paperwork gathered on the Haitian side needs one last stamp of approval in order for Nora to be granted a passport. This "stamp" sounds easy enough to get, but it is just the same as all other parts of this process...very unpredictable.  I have seen families miraculously get through this stage in 2 weeks time, more typically 4-6 weeks of time, and as long as months upon months upon months of time.  The families in our orphanage who are currently in MOI have unfortunately been held up there for too long.  We have no idea how long it will take for our paperwork to come through.  When it does, it will then head on over to passports, which hopefully will not take more than a few weeks to get.  After Nora has her passport, we will then enter USCIS (US Immigration).  The current time frame for USCIS has been running about 4-6 weeks as well from entering to take home date!  So, yes, we still have several more months to go, but IT IS COMING!!!!  Please continue praying for our process and paperwork to get through these last steps with no more major hold-ups.  Hopefully soon we will not just have an official "Thieszen" but a "Thieszen" who is HOME with the rest of us...Praise the Lord!