love > fear

brothers

2011-11-30T16:52:00.002-06:00

I know I haven't posted in MONTHS and I really really do have so much to share, but for now...

I LOVE THESE TWO!!!!!

eye glasses...again

2011-08-09T15:28:00.001-05:00

Well, I seem to have a nice little trend going here!

A new friend sent me this fantasmic link...it's like TOMS for eyeglasses!! I'm in love...and now you'll know why I (and the rest of my family) will soon be sporting multiple pairs of glasses.

glasses

2011-07-15T13:23:00.002-05:00

All 4 kids had eye appointments this week. Noah got an updated prescription, new glasses coming in a couple weeks. Hannah is getting glasses, picking them up this afternoon. Molly is getting glasses, picking them up in a couple weeks.

Nahom will probably need them in a couple years.

Once again, Nahom is our healthiest and strongest kid...God is good.

Forever Family Day

2011-07-10T13:43:00.005-05:00

July 10, 2009

Two years ago today Nahom and I flew home from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

On that day I posted this.

Today at Red Robin :-)

It's been an amazing journey, full of ups and downs, tears of joy and sorrow, bonds and attachments, heartache and pain...and God has been faithful and true through every step! It's fun to see how our kids have grown and changed. I've been thinking a lot lately about our adoption process and those first days home. I got to sit down with a new friend the other day who is just a few weeks home with her kiddos from Ethiopia and as we talked through our experiences, the memories just came flooding back. One question she had was, do we feel like a family? And it felt so good to say, Yes. We do. We are a family.

And I wouldn't trade this family for anything in the world.

sharing a post

2011-07-04T11:31:00.002-05:00

I loved this post this morning. I have followed this blog since the very beginning of our adoption process and I continually appreciate what Lisa has to share.

One thing we are always reminding ourselves of is the fact that we are so dependent on God, yet we live as if this is not the case. There is something in us that fights against that, demanding or maybe claiming, our independence.

So while I LOVE and am so thankful to live in an independent country...I'm equally thankful that I'm invited to live dependent on my Heavenly Father.

life these days

2011-06-15T23:41:00.003-05:00

Well, another long break from blogging! To say we've been busy is a MAJOR understatement.

Gary graduated - WAHOO!! Then he had to finish student teaching. Now school is done for Gary and the kids and we are embracing summer with much anticipation!

Last week my stepdad Tom had a stroke, followed by several smaller ones. After a week in the hospital and tests, tests, and more tests we've discovered he has a hole in his heart, which was probably the cause of the stroke. He's home now and doing good.

I have a bunch of other stuff I want to blog about, but it's late and I don't want to rush through. I will say, in reference to my last post -- finally got somewhere with insurance company and got some good reports today! I'll leave you with a pic from one of the most joyous days our fam has enjoyed together...and we've enjoyed a lot!!

In retrospect, we shouldn't have had Nahom standing in front of the graduation robe...he's too cute to get lost in the robe!!!

health insurance

2011-05-20T10:58:00.001-05:00

Sometimes when I'm dealing with the insurance company, I feel like I want to start gnawing on my own arm.
is that normal?

repeat

2011-05-12T06:51:00.000-05:00

last semester I posted THIS.

I'm going to repeat it now.

love>fear
and
schoolwork>blogging

sigh.

I'm almost done for the semester and then I have the whole summer off. One class period, two papers & two exams and then I'm all done until September!

hugs

2011-04-12T08:45:00.006-05:00

In our house I often hear one of my children say "EVERYBODY thinks..." and I know that this child has one specific concern with one specific person. Somebody hurt them, or didn't see them and then they see that hurt in almost every interaction that follows...with the one who hurt them and everyone else. Sunday it was Hannah. "Everybody likes Molly more than me!" I asked who? and her answer was EVERYBODY!! As we sat and talked I asked for examples of people who like Molly better than her. She had lots of examples of people, but couldn't come up with ways these people had demonstrated their clear preference for Molly. Until we got to Nahom, the flood gates opened. "Nahom thinks Molly is a better sister than me. He loves her more than me."

so sad. I was reminded that while we have come so very far, we are still growing and learning. We are still testing ground and protecting our hearts. We are still in need of God's healing touch in our lives.

We had a nice brother sister meeting. We talked about hurt feelings. Then we talked about what we love about each other, what we are good at, what games and activities we enjoy doing together. Then we took a picture...

I love the picture...at first glance. At first glance you see two beautiful children who love each other. But when I really look, I see leftover pain. I see Hannah's eyes swollen from crying and I see Nahom protecting his heart. See how Hannah's head is resting on his shoulder? See how his head is far away from hers ~ as far away as he could get within the confines of her hugging arms. And it's not because he doesn't want to hug her without reserve. It's because there's a part of his heart that can't.
not yet.
but we're getting there.

He will if I ask him to. Sometimes when he hugs me ~ a halfway, protect yourself, don't give too much hug ~ I say "That's not a hug! THIS is a hug!" and then I hug him so tight and he hugs me so tight and then I say "THAT was a GREAT hug!" And I hope when he walks away a little bit more hurt got chipped away.

So this picture IS beautiful. It shows progress and it shows hope and it shows growth. And it does show a brother and sister that love each other, even if they are still learning what that means.

Great Info

2011-03-23T09:49:00.002-05:00

So, I know I just said I never update here, and now twice in 12 hours, BUT there is some great info HERE that I want to be able to spread! Project Hopeful does amazing work advocating for HIV+ children and their families.

what up, facebook?

2011-03-22T21:11:00.005-05:00

see the cute facebook box right over there ----->

So, a few things I've noticed:

~ I update facebook about a ga-gillion times a day and I struggle to update the blog

~ a few blogs I follow have facebook pages for apparently the same reason

~ I know how to make a facebook page

~ I am not being "too big for my britches" (a frequent lie I get hit with!) by creating a facebook page to go along with this blog

~ I will probably be able to update the love>fear family and friends much better by incorporating the facebook aspect

so here goes!

what's up in our world

2011-02-05T11:42:00.006-06:00

Geez, I haven't blogged in a while!

Everything is good - I spent some time this morning reading back through the blog posts from this fall and realized that when I blogged HERE about weight loss and not fitting the dress by Spring, I really committed myself to something ;-)
I'm sensing some serious calorie counting in my immediate future!

Gary has been student teaching for two weeks and loves it!

Noah is still rocking the 5th grade.
Nahom is still a madman on the basketball court - if he could just remember to keep his hands out of his pockets when he gets bored.
Hannah is planning her career as a pet groomer/walker/doctor/stylist.
Molly has progressed from a cutie pie line-talker to a "seriously, it's time to be quiet in line at school"-er! The girl has found her voice!!

I started my third semester back at school a couple of weeks ago - I LOVE my new classes and couldn't be more excited about what this Spring holds.

I have a fun blog post brewing around inside - even photos to go with it - but my computer has been getting fixed at Best Buy for about 3 1/2 weeks now and I need it back to upload the pics, my loaner computer isn't as user friendly as my real computer. (Matthew - not your lovely computer I'm using at work - I'm talking about the yucky one I'm using at home!!)

I think the only other thing I have to share is that I am so completely and totally over winter. I'm done. I want it to be at least 50 degrees. I want to be able to leave the house without grabbing hats, mittens, boots, and scarves. I'm remembering times when my parents would say "I'm getting too old for this" and I would scoff at them. yeah - I'm totally there!!

oh yeah....the Packers are going to the Super Bowl!! Now I'm not a big sports person at all - but even I am pretty excited about this! Our kids are thrilled too and seriously, they've never even watched a game all the way through.

Go Pack Go!!

Happy Birthday Hannah!

2011-01-05T21:41:00.014-06:00

7 years ago today our beautiful Hannah came into the world! I can't believe she's 7 ~ for some reason in my mind there is a big difference between 6 and 7...she's turning into a big kid! Here's a little tiny glimpse into the fun we've had over the past 7 years.

{and yes, that is Hannah at just about 3 years old, with a bottle!}

This morning ~ showing off her birthday jewelry and new boots!

Happy New Year!

2010-12-31T22:53:00.005-06:00

Three attempts at a family picture using the timer - I LOVE the first one, Nahom is so hilarious, but Gary's face is completely hid by Hannah's hat! To my friend Doris...here's your picture of my Christmas slippers that I did not want to take off for church last week! While I realize they are not the star of the photos {although they should be!} hopefully you can still appreciate their beauty!

Happy New Year Friends! We pray you see God's hand at work in your life in 2011 as we did over and over again in 2010.

ok. copy and paste content of Christmas letter.

2010-12-30T20:59:00.005-06:00

After several attempts at linking to a pdf, inserting a jpeg, blah, blah, blah, I've decided to copy and paste the words from our beautiful Christmas letter :-) Trust me, it was adorable, what with the cute snowflake background and all! But it's impossible to send one to everyone we know and love ~ there are simply too many of you!

Well, it is December 23rd {IT IS NO LONGER DEC 23!} a

nd I’m finally sitting down to write our Christmas letter, which is long overdue, especially since I did not get one out last year! Life is good and we are so blessed! Nahom and Molly have been home with us for a year and a half...I really don’t know where the time went! Adoption was, and continues to be, an amazing journey for our family, all six of us! God has used this adventure to teach us so many things about who He is and how He loves us.

The other big news is that we moved ~ finally! Our cute little Altoona house is now inhabited by my sis Naomi and her husband Eric. We live in a big old house in downtown…we LOVE it! The house is 130 yrs old and 1000 sq ft larger than where we came from. Decorating for Christmas was amazing! Of course old houses have their drawbacks, but the advantages have so far outweighed the downfalls. I did an extremely poor job of updating our friends and family with our new address ~ I didn’t realize how many people I missed until our Christmas cards starting arriving with that tell-tale yellow forwarding sticker on all the envelopes!

Our house during the blizzard!

So, on to the really fun stuff...what we’re all up to!

Molly is 6 years old and in 1st grade. She has grown and changed so much since coming home. Last year in kindergarten it took her several months to be comfortable enough to talk to her teacher and classmates. This year, she consistently needs to be reminded to be quiet in line and not to talk to her neighbor. Her teacher is also an adoptive parent and is so understanding and insightful. We giggle together with joy at her constant chattering! She takes dance lessons and absolutely loves it. Her other great passion is coloring...she just doesn’t stop and our house is full of her creations!

Hannah is also 6, but would be very annoyed if I did not inform you that she will be turning 7 in about two weeks! She is also in 1st grade and is doing great ~ such a good reader. Hannah also takes dance and loves to color and draw, but her biggest joy this year has been the addition of a pet to our family. Hannah used to cry when we would visit friends or family with dogs because she wanted one so badly. She honestly spent months praying for a dog. As many of you know, Noah is very allergic to dogs and cats and we’ve only found one breed that he has no problems with...Bischons. In June a friend of a friend was looking for a good home for her Bischon. We couldn’t believe it! So after we moved in July, Milo came home to the Clark house. He is such a great fit and Hannah honestly adores him, as we all do! He fits just perfectly into our family and it’s hard to remember what it was like before he was there to greet us at the door when we return from our adventures each day!

Milo finds the craziest places to take a nap ~

he has two very comfy dog beds, but this is what he chooses!

Nahom is 8 yrs old, in 2nd grade, and is crazy athletic! He played soccer this fall and did great. He best buddies from school were on his team and every morning he would ask how many days until practice or a game!! His coach for soccer coaches basketball for the YMCA and asked if Nahom would be interested in playing...which of course he was! So now we’ve moved on to basketball ~ we weren’t sure how he’d do, but he is rockin’ the court just as hard as he rocked the soccer field! He has a real competitive streak and we’re happy to have a place for it to escape. He’s amazing at defense and really does not like when the other team has the ball. We are so proud of him and how hard he works at both school and sports!

Noah has reached the ripe old age of 11. A few weeks ago he made a comment about being 5 years away from his driver’s license, I started to correct him...and then realized he was RIGHT!! Where does the time go? seriously!! Noah is our smarty pants. He reads everything he can get his hands on. At teacher conferences this fall I was shown is reading scores. The goal was 10 points. Noah had 184.5. That’s not a typo...184.5. The kid reads and absorbs like crazy. He is an amazing big brother and works hard to be a good example to his siblings. He’s started enjoying some of the benefits of being a big kid. In our school district 5th grade is middle school. Yes, my friends...it’s true. I am a parent of a middle schooler. How did this happen?? He is playing the French Horn and just had his first band concert last week.

Gary just finished his last semester of classes and will start student teaching in January. In was 4 years ago last week that he quit his job at the post office to start back at school. It really has gone by fast...I guess throwing an international adoption of 2 kids in there helped! He’s so excited to get in the classroom and start teaching. We’ve been asked so many times if we are planning on moving for a teaching position and the answer is no. We know there are not an abundance of teaching jobs here, but really feel like this is where God’s planted us and this is where we’ll stay until He calls us elsewhere! If there isn’t a position available, he’ll sub until God opens the right door for him. I think the highlight of Gary’s year was his trip to Ethiopia in May. Noah and I traveled in 2009 to bring the kids home and Gary really felt like it was time for him to go. He got to spend time with some of Molly and Nahom’s birth family, he visited a school for children living with HIV and in extreme poverty, and he toured historical churches and sites. It was an amazing trip that had a great impact on him as a father, a teacher and a man of God. We are praying about when we will be able to travel again to Ethiopia, hopefully together, and how God wants to use us in this beautiful country.

Well, that leaves me! With the small amount of space left I’ll tell you that I am busy ~ I am still working as the Executive Pastor at our church and loving it, I’ve returned to school and am studying Religious Studies, and loving it. I am the proudest mama and wife in the world! I am incredibly blessed by this beautiful family, not too mention our extended family and friends that are such an amazing support to us. We love you all so much! ~Mary and the gang

Christmas with the Clarks

2010-12-25T21:02:00.011-06:00

Decorating cookies

Christmas Eve at church, our girls with their friend Maddie. Are they cute or what??

The Fam!

Christmas morning, Milo snuggling with a doll bottle!

Santa brought Snuggies...even for Milo :-)

Nahom rocking the camo hat.

Christmas joy in the form of a spongebob snuggie. This girl's waited a long time for one of these!

Kiddos with their super dooper babysitter Kyrie!

World AIDS Day

2010-12-01T12:08:00.000-06:00

It's today! I'm in a rush, but really wanted to share this video with you! Project Hopeful was really helpful to us during our adoption process and I LOVE this video they made to raise awareness!

Eyes that See

2010-11-30T22:19:00.003-06:00

Most of you, I'm assuming, already know this tid-bit of wonderful information...which is why I've taken my time in posting it. But then I took a look at the email I get sent once a week telling me how many people have viewed the blog, for how long, blah, blah, blah.

There are a lot more people reading this blog then I knew -- and I'm not sure who you all are -- but whoever you are I want you to know about this....

EYES THAT SEE

It's a beautiful organization that is run by people we love, doing work that we love, for people that we love. Suffice to say...we LOVE Eyes that See!! Please check them out - their hearts are amazing and their website does a wonderful job at telling you everything you need to know!

boot camp

2010-11-16T09:23:00.002-06:00

This morning I was checking email on my phone and I saw the subject line of one email that read "65% off women's boot camp".

Is there something wrong with me that I immediately assumed it was a coupon for a great boot sale???

needless to say, it wasn't.

outing myself

2010-11-01T20:26:00.006-05:00

So there are a lot of things I blog about, and I try to be very open and honest about my feelings, frustrations, joys, fears, etc...but dear readers, there is something I've been hiding from you. Now, if you actually know me in real life and live close enough to see me on a regular basis, then this will be no big surprise for you...in May I started eating healthy and working out...and I've lost 47 lbs so far! One thing about totally putting yourself and your weight loss journey out there is that it makes you a whole heck of a lot more accountable. So PLEASE, don't tell me how many calories are in that "whatever I'm about to put in my mouth" because I guarantee you I already know. And this is my journey and only my journey. Ok, threats are done!

Now, you might be surprised that I would "out myself" at 47 lbs lost. Why not wait for 50? Well, today is our 13th wedding anniversary, and the last time I fit in my wedding dress was 13 years ago TODAY! To celebrate this amazing accomplishment a beautiful friend of mine took me out and got to work documenting the glorious event. I'm not quite to my actual weight from our wedding day, but close enough!! It's cool that I got back into it right at our anniversary, and I was happy happy happy to have the pics done, because I DO NOT PLAN ON FITTING IT BY SPRING...I plan on the dress being TOO BIG by then :-)

So to Jacqui (photographer extraordinaire) I say THANK YOU! for sharing your time, your gift and your beautiful fun-loving spirit of adventure with me!

To my kids: mama's back! (actually, a new mama, none of my kids have known me at this weight!)

and to Gary, I love you so much! I'm so proud to be your wife and I can.not.be.lieve. what the last 13 years has held for us ~ to say I never imagined we'd be here is the biggest understatement in the world! I am so excited for what God has planned for the next 13 years and beyond and there is no one I would rather journey with!

SOOOO.....bring on the pics! Let's start with a before...this was taken Thanksgiving Day, last year.

and October 25th, 2010...

I look kind of ticked...I'm not. That's my artsy look. My "look out world, here I come! {and there's a lot less of me to see, so you might not notice me coming your way, but seriously, look out, here I come, ready or not, for real, I'm not messing around here}" kind of look.

ugh.

2010-10-22T22:33:00.001-05:00

love > fear

AND

school work > blogging

I need to get through the next couple of

weeks and then I'm sure I'll have lots

of things to blog about!

playin' it safe

2010-10-01T17:03:00.000-05:00

Noah informed me that there is a homecoming dance at his middle school tomorrow night. I asked him if he wanted to go. He said "I will not tarnish my good reputation, which is based on my smarts and my kindness, I will not tarnish this reputation by going to a dance." When I asked him why he thought his reputation would be tarnished, he replied, "I don't know, I just have a feeling."

absent blogger

2010-09-18T09:21:00.004-05:00

It's been a crazy month, lots of ups and downs. Honestly, it's been a hard month for one of our kids, some behavior issues. And it's been a hard month for me as I dig even deeper into my soul and find more yuck {yuck being fear...fear that I'm not enough, fear that our kids won't know how deeply they are loved and wanted}. But in the middle of all of this, God's goodness and complete joy have been all over our family. His faithfulness surrounds us and we are always seeing His hand at work.

On a much lighter note, we have also been busy with regular life stuff! School started for the kids on September 1st, for Gary on the 2nd, and my first class was on the 7th. Here's a run down of how we're each doing:

*we decided to keep our kids in the school district we were in before the move and are so happy we did.

Noah started MIDDLE SCHOOL!! In our district, 5th grade is middle school. He is doing great - he loves the added responsibility and freedom and seems to be adjusting wonderfully. He was nervous over the summer, but is really truly excelling. He's in band and brought home is rented instrument today...the french horn...and I gotta tell you ~ he's off to a great start! He is also taking tennis at the Y and if you are my facebook friend, you may have read about him starting a "Kid Council" here at home with his siblings. I think he's a natural born leader and I'm so excited for what this year holds for him!

Nahom is in 2nd grade and in normal Nahom fashion - jumped right in and isn't looking back. He is in soccer this fall and two other boys from his team are not only at his school, but in his class! So that is great fun for him and, of course, he rocks the soccer field. At last week's game when it was his turn to sit on the sideline {one kid is always out of the game} he was pacing up and down the field, hands on the back of his head, and I'm pretty sure, ready to take over for the coach if need be. He is always asking "how many days til my game?" He loves loves loves soccer and I think his biggest fan is Grandpa B!

Hannah started 1st grade and has one of our FAVORITE teachers! We were so excited. She is doing great, a little nervous about 1st grade because the math goes into the 20's and 30's! Man, the things kids worry about :-( So we've had some good talks about that. The girls are in dance this fall and had their first class a couple days ago. Hannah was SO overjoyed when it was time for tap and a Hannah Montana song came on.

Molly started 1st grade with an absolute bang! Such a contrast to last year. She has one of our other FAVORITE teachers {a mom who has also adopted internationally!!} Last year it took Molly 4 months to talk to her teacher and probably most of the year to talk to the other kids. This year, her teacher told us she is quite the chatterbox - always talking and interacting ~ she actually had to be told to be quiet in line {I know I'm not supposed to be overjoyed by this news, but I SO AM!} We are SO proud of her!! She is also L.O.V.I.N.G. dance and wants to go every night!

Gary is in his last semester of classes, will student teach in the Spring and then graduate in May!! I can't believe it - it's crazy to think this is his last semester on campus. I'm so incredibly proud of him & can't wait to see what this fall holds for him....besides the obvious writing of a 30 page paper required for graduation! Gary is not taking tennis, soccer or dance, but is very involved in the running of children to said activities!!

And that leaves me :-)

I am taking two classes this semester and loving it again. I'm only on campus 2 days a week, once in the afternoon and once in the evening, so I'm only absent from work for an afternoon each week. It works out great and I really do love being in class.

Milo has adjusted so wonderfully into our family and the kids love having a dog! I'm honestly not sure how he feels about fall coming and us all leaving him ~ I assumed he would be very sad, but I think he might be enjoying the time to himself!

The new house continues to be an amazing blessing with lots of room for company and lots of room for us! We love being here.

I'm going to try and get some pictures up soon, it might be another slide show - I love how easy that is and how many pics I can post at once!

Ethiopia

2010-08-15T22:00:00.004-05:00

I've been meaning to post pics from my trips to Ethiopia {over a YEAR ago!!} I was inspired today when I made the montage of some summer pics. The song is my favorite from the CD's I brought back from Addis Ababa. The only bad part about working on this today is that IT MAKES ME MISS ETHIOPIA SO MUCH! I love the people and pray constantly for God to use that in whatever way He has planned...enjoy the photos.

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

sweet summertime

2010-08-14T12:13:00.002-05:00

WOW! What a summer!

We have moved - you're all aware of that.

We made a VERY impromptu trip to Racine, WI to visit my family there.

We have said good-bye to two (and tomorrow a THIRD) amazing VB families that God has called other places.

Those are the big things. We've also....

visited the farmer's market

swam at the Y

played in our backyard

planned a camping trip (for next weekend)

settled into our house

welcomed a wonderful dog to our family (he's absolutely vicious...you can tell in our video below!)

celebrated Nahom's 8th birthday

hung out on our amazing porch...we seriously LOVE LOVE LOVE it!

Here are some pics soon - although I'm a little short. My battery died a few weeks ago and I could not remember where I unpacked the charger!

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

definitely NOT a slacker un-packer!

2010-07-07T21:55:00.002-05:00

I AM TIRED!!!

We moved on Friday...went so well and we have a great team helping us! We have been working and working to settle in and return to a life of normality. I will write some more soon and post some pics. We are loving the new house and all the space!

random thoughts from a slacker packer

2010-06-28T22:24:00.003-05:00

I have some stuff I want to post - some cute pictures on my camera - but I'm too dang busy packing up our house and getting ready to move! We're almost there - moving day is Friday and then I'll post a great update {Let's be honest, it's gonna be after the 4th!}

We have some great stuff happening in the next few days. Thursday we'll move a few things in and hang out at the house waiting for the Dish network guy to come hook us up. Friday we have the move. Saturday some of my family from Racine is coming up {YAY!!! can't wait to see you!!!} and then Sunday we have church, church picnic, family picnic and of course FIREWORKS! I missed last years because I was in Ethiopia over the 4th of July.

So we are trying to figure out where to watch the fireworks from - we need some help neighbors...where's the best place to watch from that doesn't involve massive amounts of traffic? We've always watched the Altoonia works and walked to the park...but this year we are embracing our new neighborhood!

The other day I noticed on facebook that it was the one year anniversary of Michael Jackson's death - which reminded me that one year ago I left for Ethiopia to pick up Nahom. When we were traveling we heard the news. WOW - it really snuck up on me! A year ago I was in Addis Ababa! We are super close to our 1 year celebration as a family of 6. It's strange because it seems like it happened so fast, but at the same time seems like this has always been our family. crazy.

Ok - I'm going to go pack something. Have a great 4th of July everyone!

10.01

2010-06-23T20:01:00.002-05:00

my checkbook is off by $10.01...to the good, but still. I'm thinking I added in my head instead of using the calculator and now I'm off by 10.01. I really don't feel like finding the error...but I really love a checkbook that is balanced to the penny.

what to do, what to do....

making connections

2010-06-18T08:20:00.003-05:00

Yesterday we had an appt with Nahom's specialist - everything looking good and his numbers were great! We actually looked at his CD4 count from last visit in Feb and he's up to 494! {he was 289 when he came home} and that was 4 months ago!! SO, we'll be excited to see what they are at now. He also had a bone scan done - FINALLY - and we anxiously awaited their highly educated opinion on how old Nahom really is. He came home with a birth date that would make him 10 years old right now. {If you are unfamiliar with the process, in Ethiopia many people do not know their exact birth date and when children are given birth certificates for the purpose of adoption, the orphanage or the government - not sure which - has to make a guess. SOMETHING has to be written down} Nahom and Molly came home with the same birthday, different years; and we could tell Nahom wasn't as old as his paperwork said he was. So we talked with our local pediatrician and decided on a new birthdate. Yesterday we had a moment when I just about freaked out. Dr said "He appears to be sweating, could be a sign of puberty" YIKES - he's not even 8 yet {according to us}. Our second appt was with the Endocrinologist {for thyroid issues} and he ordered the bone scan and called us at the end of the day. He said after reviewing the x-ray he would put Nahom's age between 7 1/2 and 8 1/2!! The birth date we chose for Nahom makes him 8 years old in August!! YAY!

The second BIG HUGE WONDERFUL part of yesterday was before we even left the waiting room. Dr. H came out and asked if we were interested in meeting another family that had adopted an HIV+ child from Ethiopia. ummm, YES! PLEASE! YESSSS!! We feel incredibly blessed to live in a community where so many people have adopted, have adopted from Ethiopia, have adopted older children from Ethiopia. I feel incredibly blessed to be a part of this blogging, web-board, yahoo group time of history where I can connect with people like us who live miles and miles away. But we don't know anyone in person, in real life, that has adopted a child who is HIV+. And here we are, a few rooms away from another family, who at least lives kind of close to us, and we are about to meet them!!

So they were a wonderful couple with a BEAUTIFUL daughter! It was so great to connect with them, even for a few minutes. We, of course, exchanged emails and then it was time to start our appt...you know, the reason we came here! So that was a great gift and we SO enjoyed meeting H and her mom & dad!

WE ARE MOVING!! {got any boxes?}

2010-06-12T09:25:00.005-05:00

Yes, it's true ~ the long awaited move.

If you know me at all in real life you know that I've been ready to move out of our little house for quite some time :) and that God has not provided a way for that to happen. Well, as usual, things happened in a most unsuspected way!

So here's the run down:
~ My little sis & her husband are renting our house.

~ We found a house down by campus, close to church that is much bigger and WAY older {I have a thing for old houses!} I will post some pics when we get keys, in about 3 weeks.

~ The whole thing happened very quickly & I can hardly believe it's true!

I will admit, some of my excitement lessens as I look around our house. I'm not exactly loving the idea of packing up all the stuff we've accumulated in life through our 10 1/2 years in this house, 12 1/2 years of marriage and 4 kids!

We are also taking a lot of time to walk through this with our kids. We know for Nahom & Molly this home stands for a lot. We know they've been through so many transitions already. For Noah & Hannah, this is the only house they've ever known. We moved in here when Noah was 4 months old. This house has witnessed a lot of firsts for our kids. Noah & Hannah's first words, steps, birthdays...the list goes on and on. For Nahom & Molly, this was the place they first said "I love you, Mom!" and meant it. The first place they hugged us without reserve. In this house we became a family. We've grown here.

So it's nice for me that my sister and her husband are moving in. I have no idea what the future holds, but I will admit, I have pictures in my head of them starting a family, bringing a baby home from the hospital here, and the whole darn thing starting all over again.

...got any boxes???

HOPE for HIV

2010-06-05T17:37:00.001-05:00

This is amazing to me - what does it mean? WOW. I can't even begin to imagine...

Check THIS out!!

This morning I was thinking about if there was a cure for HIV. What would that look like? I can easily imagine what that would look like for us - for Americans. And OF COURSE my next thought was...What would it look like for Africa? How long would it take to get there? How many people would get the treatment? How much would it cost? Would we work to eliminate HIV in Africa? How long would it take? How many people would die in between the time a cure was discovered and the time it was made available to them?

So, yeah, lots o' questions and thoughts in this brain today. ANYWAY - VERY amazing news!!!

super funny :)

2010-05-24T10:08:00.000-05:00

I've watched this video 3 times this morning and my kids think it's hilarious. Add a couple Ethiopians and you've got our family - people who think they are way cooler than they actually are!!

A long, thought out, not hastily posted post

2010-05-21T13:54:00.000-05:00

Some of you may have heard about the Pat Robertson adoption fiasco from yesterday. I've been trying and trying to decide how to respond. On facebook, adoption blogs and adoption websites people are encouraging each other to leave a comment for Mr. Robertson on the CBN website. I was hoping things would not get ugly and so far they haven't - people seem to be responding in love and truth...and complete frustration and disbelief.

I have also been trying to decide if I should include a link to this fiasco. I don't want to because, honestly, I don't want any more people to hear this than what already have. It's so very disturbing. And I do want to link to it because I guess I want you to be able to know that this is not me or anyone else blowing things out of proportion. And I guess I know after all of this, you'll just google it anyway.

so here's the link. It's an hour long program. There is a story on adoption that starts around 14 and 1/2 minutes in and his comments follow it. The woman with him SAVES THE DAY and is an adoptive mom.

And here's my response...a stolen video :)

I saw this a couple of weeks ago on a blog I follow and LOVED it! I would like to figure out how to email this to Mr. Robertson. It's such a reminder for all of us, adoptive family or not, a reminder that we are all adopted. enjoy...

May 20, 2009

2010-05-20T16:08:00.004-05:00

A year ago Maelet Gary Clark {insert giggle at the middle name} became Molly Maelet Clark!!Here's a link to the post celebrating the day and here's little miss Molly today!!

cutie pies :)

2010-05-16T13:52:00.001-05:00

New Clothes

2010-04-16T11:56:00.004-05:00

Our dear friend Doris has a beautiful Great-Granddaughter named Gabi. Gabi has sent some clothes in the past that my girls have loved!

This week Doris brought us another box of clothes for the girls to enjoy. When I called the girls to the living room and told them Gabi sent them some new things here's how our conversation went:

Hannah: Who's Gabi again?

Me: Remember she sent you those clothes & swimsuits?

Hannah: OOOHH! Yay!!! I love her style - she's SO stylish!

They then started going through the box and holding up each item and then had to change into some of the clothes :)

Thank you Gabi (& Gabi's MOM!!) we appreciate your beautiful giving spirit! Here are some pictures of the fun Molly and Hannah had.

A year ago...

2010-04-08T11:43:00.003-05:00

I met my kids!

Here's the post from that week.

I cried reading it. Remembering the joy of that day and remembering the pain and uncertainty of that day knowing we would not yet be all together. What a difference a year makes...

Easter

2010-04-05T15:50:00.007-05:00

We had a super fun weekend with a few bumps in the road :) We have been needing a new faucet for a while, so on Saturday Gary installed our new one. During sink fixing time I was cooking and baking for company we were expecting on Sunday. In the middle of the project, Gary realizes he needs a tool from Menards and leaves to get it. I am still baking in a kitchen with no running water. I'm starting to get stressed out because dishes are piling up and I can't even rinse them out. (I had gotten some water before he shut everything off, but wanted to keep that for boiling eggs and whatnot!!) So I decide to start straightening up a bit and go to put some baking supplies away in the cabinet next to the sink and guess what happened...

YEP! I knocked over a box of toothpicks!! They fell ALL over the place - primarily over the pile of dirty, un-rinsed dishes I had been accumulating.

The girls in their Easter dresses - they wanted matching ones so they wouldn't fight over who got which one. (their idea, not mine!)

All 4 kids...

We had a great day celebrating Jesus and what He's done for us!! And we hope and pray you all did too!

We made the paper.

2010-03-27T19:18:00.001-05:00

A local paper, Volume 1, did an article on International adoption and KVI.

Click HERE to read it :)

ss# joy

2010-03-23T19:56:00.002-05:00

NAHOM HAS A SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER!!

We can file our taxes :)

We are seriously close to being done with adoption related paperwork. I'm just a little excited right now!

brotherhood ;)

2010-03-19T22:23:00.004-05:00

So this clip was taken by Nahom and started in the middle of a conversation about Daddy going to Ethiopia. If you listen carefully you can hear Molly (right at the beginning) asking if Daddy is going to bring a baby home!!!

We were starting to clean up and I'm not exactly sure how this got started, but I thought it was so cute I had to grab the camera.

Dang.

2010-03-13T20:09:00.000-06:00

I read this quote tonight on a blog. Dang.

"The place God calls you is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." (Buechner)

Continued Cuteness

2010-03-11T12:51:00.004-06:00

Earlier this week I worked a shift at the Warming Center and didn't get home until 2am. The next morning Gary let me sleep in and got the kids ready for school & out the door. I slept very peacefully and when I woke up to get ready for my day, this is what I found on our couch...Hannah's puppies waiting for her to come home!!!! Poor Hannah ~ she wants a dog in the worst way, but we have too many allergy ridden people in our household. So, she tries her best...

Welcome to "I'm done with winter!"

2010-03-05T16:24:00.006-06:00

So I am seriously done with winter this year. I don't know if it's because I'm getting older or if it's because winter came early this year or if it's because we were cooped up in our cute little house with 4 wild children all winter. But whatever the reason, I can tell you - I am seriously D.O.N.E.

Even our kids are feeling the longing for the joys of warmer weather. The last couple of days have been nice and warm (Yep, I'm a WI girl! Cheering for 42 degrees!!) and the kids have been wanting to get out bikes and skateboards and all things spring. Today the girls decided to play beach. I know I say this a lot, but I LOVE MY KIDS!!

"Warming Up" in their towel

Swimming :)

Catching some rays!

How cute are these girls!?!

A new member of the family...

2010-02-20T20:45:00.008-06:00

No, we are not adopting or pregnant :)

Two weeks ago we headed out of town to visit our new Great-Niece (that's right, Great-Niece, unbelievable I know because of how young Gary & I are!!). Her name is Ashlyn and she is BEAUTIFUL!! Hannah was thrilled beyond thrilled to get to hold her and just had a great time lovin' on this gorgeous new baby!

updates

2010-01-30T09:14:00.003-06:00

I've struggling to blog lately because life has been that uneventful :) It was so easy to blog when there were adoption process updates, exciting new pictures and a world full of firsts. So I've spent the last month or two really thinking about the blog and what I want it to be. Should I just make it a place to post pictures of the kids and give a nice summary of the week's events or should I pour out my heart in random (and perhaps babbling) writings of what is going on inside my house, my head and my heart?

I haven't come up with an answer.

The other thing is, while life has seemed uneventful, it is also VERY VERY full!! I cannot tell you how full life is. I didn't even send Christmas cards this year...maybe we'll go all out for Valentine's Day :)

Our kids are doing really good.

Noah is really enjoying 4th grade. He got glasses in January and they just fit him perfectly! He is very intelligent and is becoming more involved in school activities. He is really stepping into his role as big brother to 3. I see a strength and maturity in him that is definitely new this year. He is more patient with Nahom and Molly and seems to get them.

Nahom. Nahom is finally feeling the effects of a life left behind. We have had some good talks in the last few weeks about how he misses Ethiopia, his friends and family there. We encourage him to feel these things. We let him know that we love Ethiopia, and everything it represents and that we don't ever want him to forget. We talk about the day that we all get to go back to Ethiopia and visit and he gets happy and excited. So, it's good. He knows he is a part of our family. He stresses that he wants to be in our family and only visit Ethiopia. He is feeling what is so important for him to feel - loss.

On a completely different note, we have school. He is doing AMAZING in school. I was talking to his teacher this week and she told me we will see a big increase in his grades since 1st quarter. Let me stress here how HUGE this is. We really expected him to be behind, far behind, for a couple of years. So the fact that at the end of 1st quarter he was near the bottom of the class and at the end of the 2nd quarter he has a big increase in his grades and scores?!?!? Dang, our boy is smart!! He is reading and is really good at math.

We have a dr appt with his specialist next week, but everything we know is that he's doing GREAT! I was talking with a fellow adoptive mom and good friend of mine a few weeks ago and she asked me how much Nahom's HIV impacted our daily lives. It was cool to sit in for a minute. It's hard to put into words. It's not like we forget he is HIV+, but yet, it's not like we are always thinking about the fact that he's HIV+. Meds have become a part of our daily routine. There really are so many other things that are a "big" deal in our world. So, I'm not trying to minimize the disease, but it just really doesn't have an effect on our daily lives.

That brings us to Hannah. She turned 6 in this month and it really hit me. I mean, she's my baby, and now she's 6!! She just LOVES LOVES LOVES school and is doing so good! She is excited that she's learned to read and lives for her turn to bring snack. She is very involved in school yard dramas (already!) and will tell me all about who didn't talk to who today and why these two kids are never going to be friends again (until tomorrow's update!)

Speaking of drama, she is full of it! I've spent the last few weeks wondering if this is a normal phase for a little girl to go through or if this is adoption related. (My good friend I spoke of earlier told me that after you adopt you will put everything through the "adoption filter" wondering if every issue is normal or because we adopted. She was SO right!) We spend time talking about what is in her heart and encourage her to feel everything and talk to mommy about all that lives inside of her.

And little Miss Molly...she's ALIVE!! She is talking more than ever and not just to us!! She is finally talking to her teacher at school and even to some other kids. She has always talked to us, of course, but very quiet outside the house. She is coming out of that shell. She is more confident with her English. The other day she came up from the basement and said "Oh my gosh! I have to go to the bathroom so bad. I can't believe it!" Just like that. All the little words and in the right order!! She is also learning to read and is so proud of her accomplishments. She seems to be relaxing into the truth that she is a part of our family, now and for forever, and that she isn't going to be sent on to anywhere else. The word I've started using to describe her is whimsical!

Gary started school this week and so did I! That's right ladies and gentlemen, I'm back in school after a nice 17 year break! I'm taking two classes in Religious Studies. After the first week I'm really excited for what this semester holds and not at all thinking "What the heck did I get myself into?!?!" which is what I imagined thinking at this point.

I'll try and get some pictures up soon. Have a great Saturday!

Amharic Tee Giveaway

2010-01-21T20:11:00.002-06:00

Check out this blog for a chance to win some Amharic wear. I discovered Maya's Mercato today and am engrossed in reading, reading, reading!!

found my camera...

2010-01-20T14:01:00.000-06:00

at Action City!

has anyone seen my camera?

2010-01-14T23:26:00.002-06:00

So the last time I remember for sure having my camera was at Action City when we celebrated Hannah's birthday - that was over a week ago. Have I called them? no. Why? because I really don't want to believe that I would leave my camera at Action City. I didn't realize it was gone until Monday of this week.

Really would like to find it...I have some great pictures to share :)

Super cool art

2010-01-12T23:24:00.003-06:00

So I just discovered this amazing artist on facebook and visited her new blog where I discovered she is having an art giveaway!! So I encourage you all to jump over and check out her work - I love it!!

I will post some pics soon and I also have some updates to share :)

super fun facebook app

2010-01-02T19:37:00.001-06:00

a selection of status updates from 2009

Click to make it bigger :)

December happenings...

2009-12-17T08:32:00.003-06:00

We have been super busy these past few weeks! Here's a snippet of what's been happening in our lives ~ and let me point out there is no particular order here, just as they pop into my head and also it is a list of the amazing and wonderful, dull and mundane, icky and cruddy!

~ the kids are getting along GREAT, oops, no wait, they are fighting constantly; no, no, hold on...YES they are getting along great! Nope, back to fighting...hold on...wait for it...and we're back to loving each other and standing for each other and playing beautifully. (see the fun pattern!)

~ Gary has been working extremely hard finishing up the semester, teacher assisting at Altoona High, preparing for finals

~ Mary has been busy with regular work stuff, and her small group, and the most amazing God calling, leading the charge as our church opens an overnight Warming Center for the homeless in our city

~ Molly is coughing constantly

~ Hannah is coughing constantly

~ Mommy is coughing constantly

~ the boys are healthy!

~ blizzard...NO SCHOOL!

~ Christmas lights, trees, music

~ COLD COLD COLD weather

~ It's really really hard to find places in our little house to hide presents for our four kids

~ Our friend Kristy made us the most beautiful scrapbook documenting our adoption process! It's gorgeous!! An amazing, heartfelt gift!

~ family picture taken (This was one of the worst nights we have had a as family of 6 - utter chaos!)

~ Nahom's viral load has dropped to the "undetectable" range! Praise God for ARVs!!!

~ Mary has 4 sewing projects to finish for Christmas presents :(

~ borrowed vehicle from Mary's parents...YAY! we have two vehicles for a few weeks!

~ Gary's Mom leaves for Arizona, lends us the PT Cruiser...YAY! we have three vehicles for a few weeks (and two drivers!!)

~ Our van breaks down!! YAY! We still have two vehicles!!

~ UGH! Mary locks keys is running van. Her Dad has to drive 40 minutes to bring her an extra set.

~ Nahom's adoption finalization is set for December 23rd!

~ The girls are learning to read!

~ Noah is making his way through all of the Harry Potter books. Reads the first one in 3 days!!

Here's what has NOT been happening:

dishes, laundry, floors, bathrooms, windows :) Gary has his last final today and Mary is off Friday and Saturday...guess what we'll be doing!!

Our house is filled with indescribable joy! Don't get me wrong, we have moments and days that our kids are filled with sorrow, pain, confusion and a longing for a life left behind, but in the midst of that we see God at work. He is healing hearts, teaching love and acceptance. He is showing Nahom and Molly that they are safe here; they are staying here; they have found a forever family here. God is teaching Noah and Hannah that they are loved, loved, loved ~ not as much as before ~ MORE than before! That our love for them grows with each day! He is showing them that they are loved by their new brother and sister, even if they don't always show it. In the middle of the craziness and the hard days, God is here. He is bringing us joy which cannot be described in human words!

A great calling...

2009-11-28T11:49:00.002-06:00

Let me start by saying this ~ man, am I making up for my lack of blogging or what???

ANYWAY, I wanted to share a link with you. My friend Hannah is starting a ministry in Ethiopia and I really want you to read all about it! Hannah traveled with me to bring Nahom home, and I had the amazing honor of dedicating her daughter (see the post below!). She is an amazing woman, full of God's love, His heart for people and a true compassion. It was very humbling for me to be in Ethiopia with her and watch as God was birthing a new dream within her heart.

She has been working very hard since returning home and is going back to Ethiopia in February to continue the work God has called her to. (I have to mention here how extremely jealous I am and how I might have to sneak into one of her suitcases and go along!)

You can read about what God's doing on her blog.

Child Dedication

2009-11-28T11:33:00.006-06:00

About 2 weeks ago we had Child Dedication at church. I love Child Dedication day - such a special opportunity for families to set aside a time to gather with family and friends and stand before God and say "This child is Yours, we will raise this child to know You and Your love for them." Well this one was especially special for a couple reasons - first, I got to pray for and dedicate the child of one of my closest friends. I love her so much and she traveled with me to Ethiopia when I brought Nahom home. Secondly, we had Nahom & Molly dedicated! We asked Nikki to dedicate our kids. Nikki is our dear friend, the founder of KVI , and one of the reasons we have two new beautiful children in our family! I've blogged before about watching our friends adopt, then watching them adopt again, then watching them walk in trust and obedience as they opened an orphanage in Ethiopia. Well Nikki is this friend! We thought it was very appropriate and would be very meaningful for Nikki to dedicate our kids. She prayed an amazing prayer of thankfulness and blessing over Nahom & Molly, as well as our entire family.

Thanks Nikki! We love you!!

Nikki praying for us.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T23:18:00.005-06:00

What a wonderful day!

It actually started last night - Gary and I had a fun movie night after the kids went to bed. We spent a relaxing morning at home and then met Papa & Grandma, Auntie Carrie & Uncle Kelly and Cassie out for Thanksgiving lunch. Then we stopped by VB's Thanksgiving dinner where we saw some great friends. After that we went to visit Grandma Marilyn and Grandpa Ken and the rest of Gary's family. The kids had fun at Grandma's house and drew some great pictures.

Last year we were at Valleybrook's Thanksgiving and there was a big sheet of paper on the wall where we could right what we were thankful for. I remember I wrote "Noah, Nahom, Hannah & Maelet". I remember I was thankful that God had led us into the adoption process and that we had a complete home study and that our dossier had been sent off to Ethiopia. I was thankful that our kids would be coming home soon (or so I thought!!)

So here we are a year later and I'm sure it seems very obvious to say we have so much to be thankful for, but truthfully, we do. Gary and I have an amazing marriage and feel so blessed to have each other. We have the most amazing kids and literally do not have enough words to describe how much we love them and how wonderful they all are.

This picture doesn't have anything to do with Thanksgiving - but it's a super cute pic of our girls mix-matching their pj's!

So in our house it is now officially the Christmas season! Tomorrow morning I will hit the stores for a little Black Friday shopping and we will probably have our tree up by the end of the weekend! Tonight on the way home from Grandma's house we drove around and looked at Christmas lights - I have NEVER heard so much gleeful screaming and shouting! Nahom and Molly LOVED, LOVED, LOVED the lights and were begging for us to have lights on our house.

Which brings me to one final update...Maelet has decided she wants to be called Molly, the name we gave her when she came home. Maelet is her middle name and we still use it here and there, but she is using Molly more and more. Nahom is NOT following suit and is sticking with his beautiful Ethiopian name :)

Halloween

2009-11-13T14:25:00.003-06:00

I know I haven't posted in SOOOO long! Life has been crazy busy, but crazy good! I'll post more later ~ here are some pictures from Halloween (compliments of Leah!)

ARV's

2009-10-05T12:17:00.004-05:00

So we had a great appt with Nahom's specialist. She is amazing and so kind and they even had an interpreter there for us so we could be sure he understood everything that was going on - that was a HUGE gift. There were really no surprises. I knew from our previous visit with her (before he came home) that she would want to start him on meds if his CD4 was below 350 and we knew from our local pediatrician he is at 298.

While it is so exciting to have him home and finally on the medication his little body needs, it is sad too. The drugs are hard on kids' bodies. They have a lot of side effects and will need to be changed to avoid resistance. Our little boy has a daily pill sorter that beats any 90 year olds!

I read some really exciting stuff on this amazing blog - please check it out!

busy

2009-09-24T22:04:00.006-05:00

We've had some fun firsts...

Noah's first week on Safety Patrol - he did great! He was very professional and stayed super focused, even when his best friend came through :)

Hannah, Nahom & Maelet's first week of soccer. They are all doing very good, but I have to be honest, Nahom rocks the field!

We have been so busy and I'm going to be out of town for our church's Fall Women's Retreat. I am so excited, but really want to blog about some fun stuff that's been going on. I've also been missing Ethiopia SO much lately and really wanting to post some pictures from my trips. We have Nahom's first appointment with his Pediatric Infectious Disease Specialist in Minneapolis (FINALLY!). More coming soon - I promise!!

10 questions

2009-09-12T13:19:00.003-05:00

Click here to go to one of my new favorite websites Ethiopia Kids. It's for families that have or will be adopting from Ethiopia - we have the great pleasure of being the topic of the "10 questions" section.

There are some cute pictures of our kids too :)

missing blogger found alive, but over-scheduled

2009-09-05T09:31:00.004-05:00

Wow, I haven't blogged in awhile! We have been so busy with a trip to visit family, doctor and dentist appointments, getting ready for school to start and finally, starting school!

We had a great time on our vacation. We visited with Great-Grandmas, Aunts. Uncles & Cousins, took a trip to a Children's Museum, the zoo and did a bunch a swimming. We also got to surprise Grandma GG with a 90th birthday party!

Enjoy the pictures - there's a few from the start of school at the end.

ok - it's not fitting on the page - sorry. If you click the little picture it will open it all the way. Weird. Who knows how to fix this?

vaca and the start of school

Hannah the cook

2009-08-18T23:35:00.004-05:00

Hannah has a new found fascination with cooking. Today we made a cake and she declared she would frost it all by herself. Enjoy the video and please ignore the messy kitchen! There's a little of everything on the counter!!

And here's the finished cake! She was very proud.

wii fit

2009-08-17T10:49:00.002-05:00

Grandma & Papa are on vacation and we are borrowing their wii fit, and having a blast! Gary & I have been "having fun" sweating our little (let's be honest, our big) behinds off! And the kids are having SO MUCH FUN with all the different activities. I was laughing so hard watching their expressions this morning as they were hula hooping, skiing & striking some serious yoga poses!

I'll try and get some video and/or pictures later!

dinner at the Clarks

2009-08-15T15:27:00.009-05:00

This is our friend Oscar who came to have
dinner with us on Tuesday night...
This is Oscar helping our kids while I am
cooking and Gary is refilling drinks...

Now you all know what a dinner invitation to the
Clarks actually means...reinforcements.

In other news, Nahom is adjusting really well to life here. One thing that has been hard is trying to understand how things work and what belongs to him, what doesn't, etc...The other day we had a tough time when the girls went into his room to retrieve some toys they had left a couple days earlier. Nahom was not happy and in fact, cried for quite a while, claiming "this Nahom's!" We spend a lot of time reassuring him that he has everything he needs, he is loved and he has things that are for him.

On Thursday night we went shoe shopping for school. Nahom got to pick out his own shoes (not the ones Mom wanted!) and was so proud of his choice and eager to show them off the Dad when we got home! At bedtime he took his shoes to bed with him and I couldn't resist this picture. It's cute and sad and beautiful all at once.

friends coming home!!

2009-08-11T16:53:00.014-05:00

We are so excited that 3 more friends have come home from KVI! These are kids that are really good friends of Nahom and Maelet's, friends Noah and I met and played with when we traveled in April and friends I got to go back and see when Nahom came home in July. Their families are from church and great friends of ours!!

This beautiful girl we got to greet at the airport! Another amazing friend is pictured...LEAH! She traveled to Ethiopia in Feb of this year and got to know a bunch of kids, including ours!!

Noah was so excited to see her come home!

Leah drove to the airport with us.

Then these two cuties (that would be the cutie in the orange shirt and the bigger of the two striped polo shirt cuties) came home the very next day! We got a chance to hang out with them after they had some time to settle into their new home with two other brothers and a sister!

This is a picture of our kids hangin' with our bff's at the beach...no new kids here YET!! That's right, these two lucky boys have the most beautiful baby sister waiting for them at KVI. On my second trip I got to love and hug and kiss and snuggle and adore her. They are one anxious family and we cannot wait for that beautiful girl to get home!!!

Positive Protest Post

2009-07-27T21:48:00.006-05:00

So I often get invited to protest or boycott a company, television station, brand name, etc. and I have to say, I usually ignore these invitations. But this one is a little different. I've read about this movie and have been bothered by the trailer and can't imagine the actual movie. There are so many misconceptions about adoption and there is a lot of fear surrounding adopting older children, not to mention some people's thoughts on adopting a child who is HIV+. I was reading on this blog that Tom is challenging readers to write 500 blog posts about how their lives have been impacted positively by an orphan. Well my life has been big time impacted positively by 2 orphans!! and that's just a start. So here's my contribution:

Warner Bros. new horror movie Orphan proclaims that it must be hard to love an adopted child as much as your own. Let me tell you about how orphans changed my life. I'll start with the orphans that AREN'T my kids. During our adoption process I took two trips to Ethiopia and met more orphans than I can count. I held babies, tickled toddlers, cuddled with some adorable 4 yr olds. I've sang and held hands with some energetic little 7 yr old boys and girls and sat while strong and beautiful 12 yr old young women braided my hair. The quote from the trailer that is especially dark and frustrating is "It must be hard to love an adopted child as much as your own." While this is not only untrue when you adopt, it is untrue about children in general. I can honestly say, I love the kids God has let me spend time with. I pray for them and I can't wait for God to bring them families, especially the older ones. They are gifted, loving, beautiful, full of life and just want to be loved and deserve to be loved.

So now for the really fun stuff...MY KIDS! They are unbelieveably easy to love. They are cute, funny, smart and loving. They love to laugh and play, they love to swim and run and ride their bikes. They love to go to the park and go for ice cream. They love to snuggle and hug. They fight with each other, they sneak an extra 5 minutes of video game time and they beg to watch a movie instead of going to bed. THEY ARE KIDS!! Just like my bio kids, my children who were adopted track mud on the just mopped kitchen floor; they hit each other over a piece of candy; they push my buttons! And just like my bio kids, my kids who were adopted melt my heart everyday. They are unbelieveably EASY to love!!

I'm not going to attack the writers/producers of the movie Orphan. I'm not even going to ask you to boycott the movie or show up at the theartre with picket signs! I am going to make sure you know...Adopted children, orphaned children waiting to find families, are very easy to love.

church...as a fam of 6

2009-07-27T08:13:00.003-05:00

Last night we headed to the 6pm service at church ~ all 6 of us, which I know by next week will be very mundane, but it was our first time and for many people, their first time seeing/meeting Nahom. We chose the evening service because it is a lot smaller, so less overwhelming. Also, in the summer, there is a cookout before the service. Our great friend Doris took this family picture of us. Maelet fell asleep in the car on the way to church so that's whats going on with her!

The kids had a great time in Flight Zone, Nahom stayed with Mom & Dad in "big church". It was a long hour of meet and greet before church actually even started, so we thought we would start Nahom in Flight Zone next week.

Today we have a "Post-placement" appointment with our Case Worker from our home study agency. We will have 3 of these over the next year as they walk through the transition with us and send a report on to Ethiopia. After the first year WE will be responsible to send a report to Ethiopia, once a year, until the kids turn 18.

We are so excited that in less than a week 3 more friends from KVI will be coming home to their forever families here in Eau Claire! Nahom can't wait to play with his friends :)

our house...a bad place for birds

2009-07-23T20:30:00.004-05:00

A couple of days ago Nahom and Hannah were playing in the backyard and Nahom started calling Gary, "Dad! Dad! Look!" Gary glanced over and saw Nahom had a little baby bird cradled in his hands. Apparently it had fallen from the nest attached to our house. After we freaked out, had Nahom put it on the ground and scrubbed his hands like crazy with every kind of anti-bacterial soap, we checked on the bird. It was still alive, so we left it. In the morning, it was still alive, so Gary called the DNR to get their recommendation.

They said leave it. The mother will still care for it. So, of course, Gary named it. Norbert. Norbert lived for another day and did manage to crawl under the kids picnic table for shade. Gary had blocked off the area so the kids would leave Norbert to heal, but it was not to be. Tonight after dinner Hannah broke the news to me, she was very sad.

Then a little while ago I was sitting in our living room and heard a big thunk on the front window. I go to investigate and find feathers stuck to the outside of the glass and a bird sitting on our front walkway. It was alive, but seriously shaken. It just sat there. Gary tapped on the window and I opened a window to see if it would scare away. Nope. Just sat there. We went about our bedtime duties, I checked back and it had moved to the middle of the front yard. Good grief, please don't tell me we have killed another bird.

Well, I just checked and there is no sign of the bird (dead or alive) so I think this one made it. Hopefully it will tell all it's birdy friends to steer clear of our house - it is obviously a bad place for birds.

ps - we really like birds and are very sad they are having such bad luck here!

a visit to OCB

2009-07-22T20:59:00.002-05:00

So tonight we decided to go out to dinner at Old Country Buffet (Gary's choice!) and it seriously didn't occur to me until we got to our table that the two of us would have to do buffet style dining with 4 kids. It was a super fun night! The kids did great, even though we had to remind them a bunch of times not to touch or grab the food they were interested in, but wait for mom or dad to help them.

The other part of the night that was intriguing was the looks we got. I have to say, I thought we got a lot of looks at Menards, but OCB wins! I was just sitting there thinking that the Menonite family was excited we were there, because tonight they weren't "most stared at family", and then the people sitting next to us leaned over and said "Your kids are sooo cute ~ all 4 of them!" and then about 15 minutes later the family sitting behind us said "Your children are so well behaved. What a great family" So even though we got some unhappy stares, God sent some great people to love on us!

finally an update!

2009-07-22T16:04:00.005-05:00

Wow - I'm long overdue for a blog post! So this is going to be a completely random collection of thoughts, but I've got to get something down here, as I'm now being stopped on the street by wondering friends asking "WHY? Why haven't you updated the blog?"

So things are going great! This homecoming has been very different than Maelet's and there is a definite feeling of completion running through our house these days!

I'm going to try and answer the questions I've been asked repeatedly, as I'm assuming those are of the greatest interest to you :)

1. How did Nahom and Maelet react to seeing one another?
It was very anti-climatic. At the airport they were very shy and looked at one another only out of the corners of their eyes, if at all...until we got in the car. Then they would say each other's names, but not much else. By Saturday morning (the day after we arrived home) they were running and playing and our house has been filled with the sweet sound of the beautiful language that is Amharic. We LOVE it! By Sunday they were fighting like they'd never been apart!

2. How is Nahom adjusting to the family?
Amazingly well! He seems to really know that this is where he belongs and that we are his family. We love how confident he is in who he is...a Clark.

3. How is life with 4 kids?
Last year some friends of ours (who have 4 children) told us the hardest transition was going from 2 to 3 because now you're outnumbered. They were right. Life doesn't really seem that different than it did before Nahom ~ except, you know, a ton more joy! So really, I'm not trying to paint an unrealistic or super rosey picture, but life is amazing right now. And we know that could and probably will change. But for now, we are really having a great time.

Here's a fun story that my friend Catherine labeled "blogilicious":
After a couple of days of having Nahom home Hannah told me that she likes Nahom a lot more than Maelet because Nahom isn't as snotty as Maelet. I said, "Well, you know Hannah, sometimes you can act kind of snotty too." She said, "No, I mean, he has a lot less boogers than Maelet!"

On day 4 home we had our first sign of blood ~ wow had I spent a lot of time thinking about and imaging that day in my mind. So it was also, very anti-climatic, which I guess is a good thing :) Nahom came upstairs and pointed to his foot where he must have scratched a little bug bite or scab. There was the tiniest amount of blood ~ about the size of a pin head. So I had him sit on the toilet, I "gloved up", cleaned the blood away, put on a bandage (that was about 15 times the size of the owie!!), bagged up the tissue I used to clean off the blood and the disposable gloves and threw them away. The whole thing took about 60 seconds and really, other than the gloves and the bagging of garbage, wasn't that different than on other owie I've encountered in the last 10 years of parenting. It was nice that our first sign of blood was so little. I worried, before he came home, about that first time. Would I be nervous? Would I clean it up appropriately? Would I faint at the sight of infected blood? ...so I was pretty sure I wouldn't ;) but it's really nice to have that first time out of the way!

finally a family of six

2009-07-10T20:38:00.002-05:00

Nahom and I made it home this afternoon. There is so much to tell and so much to praise God for, and I can't wait to tell you all about it ~ but it will have to wait at least a day or two. I'm SO TIRED!

Thank you so much for your prayers!
Mary & Gary, Noah, Nahom, Hannah & Maelet

Double Cause for Celebration

2009-07-10T08:35:00.002-05:00

What a day! Not only are Mary and Nahom coming home today, but mere moments ago Hannah lost her first tooth. Pretty darn cool when you consider that Maelet lost her first tooth a few days before Mary left. Whoa, that's amazing.

Woo-hoo!

2009-07-10T08:12:00.001-05:00

3 hours 45 minutes and counting, y'all!

Party at the Airport

2009-07-09T06:07:00.003-05:00

I got a call from Mary at 5:28am this morning. She and Nahom are getting on a plane in about 8 hours to come home! I am crying as I write these words. My family is going to be together, all together , for the first time ever in approximately 30 hours! Praise God! Our wait is over. God is good.

No New Tale to Tell

2009-07-07T14:25:00.003-05:00

First of all, my apologies to Love and Rockets (formerly Bauhaus) for ripping off their song title for my blog title. Having said that, nothing to report from Ethiopia. We're still waiting to hear something from the embassy. We thought that if we heard something today it would be a minor miracle. We had no real expectations that we would, it just would have been nice. There's still time this week for them to come home. We are confidant that Mary and Nahom will come home at just the perfect time. We live on God's timetable, not our own.

Hannah and Maelet started Altoona's summer program yesterday. They went for 2 hours yesterday. Hannah was disappointed that she didn't get to stay all day the first day and Maelet did really well at "school" so today I signed them up for the whole day. That means 8:30am-1pm is "dude time" at the Clark ranch. It's pretty sweet. It's all about video games and eating tacos and Chinese food so far. That's also a time that Mary and I can IM uninterrupted as well. This is pretty special time for Noah and me. I've had to split my time with the kids since Mary has been gone and Noah always seems to get the short end of the stick. The girls need more attention and more help with stuff than Noah does. That is entirely unfair to Noah and I feel bad about it. That is why the summer program for the girls is perfect for us. Dude time rocks!

I love that Noah is still excited to hang out with me. He even held my hand the other day when we were leaving school-and there were other kids around-and today as we walked up to the mall! I love my kids so much. They really rock my world!

hello from Ethiopia

2009-07-05T13:08:00.002-05:00

So internet in Ethiopia is crazy, either I can't log on at all or I can get to my blog with all the pictures and graphics loaded. I just tried sending some pics to some waiting Moms & Dads and had no luck (actually tried about 4 or 5 times!!) And now I'm blogging! Who would've guessed?

So Nahom is wonderful!! It's been amazing hanging out with him and really being Mom and Son. He is so cute and has an incredible sense of humor ~ he'll fit in just fine :)

We have visited with the doctor who has been caring for him for the last year, visited AHOPE and the KVI orphanage in Nazareth.

I just read Gary's post below and could not have said it better myself - that really just sums up the paperwork/visa/prayer request part of life :)

I'll blog again if I'm able ~ love you all and miss you so much!

love Mary & Nahom

Waiting and Praying

2009-07-04T12:16:00.003-05:00

No news yet. We're still waiting to hear from the embassy. Mary was told that it would take 7-10 working days to get Nahom's visa. We've been praying that it would come sooner than that and that everything would go smoothly. Basically we are praying that there aren't any more surprises. We are ready for our family to be all together.

I talk or instant message with Mary just about every day. She is fine but is ready to come home. She was a little sick the other day but she is feeling better now. Hannah H. is starting her journey home in a couple of hours and will be back tomorrow at noon. Her family will be happy to see her I'm sure! Soon Mary and Nahom will be making the same journey and we definitely are anxious for their homecoming!

It would be great if you all could keep us in your prayers and pray that Nahom's visa comes soon. We know that we have lots of people praying for us and words just cannot express how much we appreciate all of your prayers and support we have received through our journey. Thank you so much.

Embassy Appointment

2009-07-01T13:07:00.005-05:00

Mary and Nahom went the embassy to apply for Nahom's visa today. At first is seemed like a closed door. Mary was told that some of our paperwork was missing and that she would have to leave and come back next week. But following God's prompting, she went back in and spoke boldly to one of the people processing visa applications. After refusing to see her today and being told that she would have to wait until next week to seen, they processed Nahom's paperwork and started processing his HIV waiver.

God is moving. God is good.

News from Addis

2009-06-30T07:59:00.006-05:00

Hi folks. Here's what's been going on in Ethiopia. I wasn't able to communicate with Mary at all on Sunday. I thought this was because they had to move but that wasn't the case. The internet in their guesthouse was out all day Sunday and in the morning on Monday. It's back up now and I was able to talk to Mary twice yesterday. I was also able to talk to Nahom. He's with Mary and Hannah in the guesthouse now. The coolest thing was watching Maelet. She ran from the other room, I mean she really booked it, when I said, "Maelet, it's Nahom." She didn't really talk to him that much, she mostly giggled and said his name over and over with her hand over her mouth.

She's been having an amazing time with Nahom. He really likes video games, just like his big brother and let's be honest here, his dad. I got an email from Mary yesterday and here's what she had to say in part about their day together.:

"Everything is going great - did paperwork today at Hope, visited kids there. I brought a HUGE bag of dum dums suckers to hand out. When we got to Hope, Nahom grabbed the bag and went to work. He was so busy handing out candy to all of the kids and I was struck by the fact that 48 hours ago, he would have been on the other side of that - grabbing for a sucker that was being held out to him. He was so beautiful. He also LOVES babies and it is amazing to watch him play with them - he works hard to get them to laugh."

Today they're going to KVI and going to Nahom's doctor to get medical records and such. They're also planning on doing some shopping today. Full day. We have a Skyping appointment set for sometime between 10 and 11am our time so I'm looking forward to that.

That is all I know right now. Our embassy appointment is on Wednesday and I think we should have a better idea of how long it's going to take to get Nahom's visa then. I'll update as I learn things.

They Made It

2009-06-28T07:42:00.004-05:00

Mary and Hannah H. made to Addis safe and sound. There was an "unfortunate" mix up with their guesthouse reservations. The place that they thought they were going to be staying (the place with the irregular internet access) did not have a reservation for them and additionally had no room for them. Bummer. However, the place that Mary and Noah stayed in April, the place with in room internet, had room for them. Boo-ya! So now we can stay in touch and talk everyday! What's more, soon Nahom will be at the guesthouse as well and we will be able to talk to him. How awesome for Maelet! She understands where Mary is and what is going on but I think being able to talk to Nahom will really cement what she thinks is going on in reality. God is amazing. We were settled into the idea of not having much communication between us but God had other plans for our family. So now I'm sleeping with my laptop next to me with the web cam and microphone hooked up to it.Technology is a wonder.

Cute kid story ahead. This morning the girls were selecting their cereal bowls and cups for breakfast as they do every morning. There are no real surprises in this department. Maelet doesn't care what bowl she gets as long as she has a blue spoon. Lately, Hannah has been using a "grown-up" bowl. Since she's a big sister now, character bowls just don't cut it. I gave Maelet her usual blue cup (the girl just loves blue!) and Hannah took her Hello Kitty cup. I poured Maelet's cereal into her bowl and started to pour Hannah's into her usual "grown up" bowl when she said, "No Dad! I want a Hello Kitty bowl to match my cup!" This threw me off a bit.
"Are you sure?" I asked. "You usually want a grown up bowl."
"I like my stuff to match, Dad. You know that's how I roll!"

Yup. She's my daughter alright! But the best was the time Noah was trying for the millionth time to explain Pokemon to me and he was trying to clarify something and he said,"Are you pickin' up what I'm layin' down?" Ahh, my kids: my pride and my joy.

Leaving on a Jet Plane, part 3

2009-06-26T20:12:00.004-05:00

Mary is now well on her way to Ethiopia. The drop off was smooth and uneventful. We here at the Clark hacienda are going to miss her but we are so excited for her to finally be on this trip to bring Nahom to his family! We remarked how this trip to the Cities was much different than the last time she got dropped off at the airport. We were both giddy with excitement and anxious to get to the airport so the last leg of the journey could get underway. The last trip was very heavy emotionally. We knew that Mary ans Noah were still supposed to go but it was a bittersweet revelation. At that point we didn't know that Maelet was coming home at the end of the trip. God's will was apparent to us, we just didn't know exactly what He was going to do. God does amazing things in the most unusual ways.

Mary is going to pretty much be out of touch while she's gone. The last guest house she stayed at had wireless internet and we were able to talk just about every day. This time, however, the guest house only has dial-up internet(or as I call it- Amish internet) on the one computer they have. And from what we have heard it only works about 40% of the time. We will be able to text some though. We bought a T-Mobile pay-as-you-go phone with which Mary will be able to text me. It's not much but we'll be able to stay in touch somewhat.

As information and communication from Mary will be somewhat limited, the stuff I post will be about what is going on at the "Home Front." Keep in mind that when I get updates y'all will be among the first to know. We love you guys and cherish all the support and prayers we have gotten from you.

This is a story to make you say "Aww! Cute!" Yesterday morning before the house was fully awake, Mary was watching the Today show with Hannah. Hannah was telling Mary how much she was going miss her and how she wished she could come with. Hannah said that she was going to be praying for Mary and then Mary asked her if she wanted to pray right then. So she did. I love my kids.

Here is a funny and typically Mary story. For weeks when people have asked Mary about the flight or have been commiserating with her about having to make the long flight again, Mary has always responded with her usual practicality and pluck, "It's not bad. It's 23 hours of reading, napping, and watching movies. I don't mind it at all." Her outlook was somewhat different yesterday. On the way to the airport she kept saying, "Uugh! I just want to be there!" To which I said, "You might be in for a rough ride. We're not even past Elk Mound yet." Later on, when we we just about to Hudson, she sighed and said, "I'm already not looking forward to unpacking." "At the guesthouse?" I asked. "No. When I get home." I laughed so hard I was crying. After I regained my composure I said, "I am so blogging this!"

The kids are watching "The Tigger Movie" downstairs so I'll sign-off Tigger style-TTFN-Gary.

getting ready to go

2009-06-25T07:51:00.002-05:00

Well, I've been busy busy busy getting ready to go! So I leave tomorrow, arrive in Ethiopia Saturday, 2pm our time, 10pm their time. I'm so excited and can't wait to be there again! I miss the people, the culture, the food and even the smells of Ethiopia!

I had plans of writing a long in-depth post this morning, but honestly, my mind is going in 100 different directions and I'm so anxious to get going on my to-do list.

I appreciate your prayers while I am gone and specifically for:
~ safe travels
~ health
~ smooth embassy date and processing of the waiver
~ eyes that see and ears that hear as I visit some other orphanages and possibly a clinic or two
~ for Gary, Noah, Hannah & Maelet - that they will have an amazing time together and not miss mom too much

Last time I was in Ethiopia we stayed at a Guest House with wireless internet, so I was emailing home all the time and Gary and I were able to Skype at least once a day. This time I'm staying at a Guest House with ONE computer that everyone shares and it's dial-up internet. I've heard from friends that have traveled before me, it works about 40% of the time. SO, I won't be able to communicate home as much, I DOUBT I will be able to get on facebook, and I'm sure I won't be able to Skype. But just like the last trip, Gary will update here on the blog.

I'm scheduled to be home July 15th, 12 noon, but that could change to an earlier OR later date, so Gary will know that too.

Now you're up to date!

embassy date!!

2009-06-19T11:25:00.001-05:00

Our appointment at the embassy is July 1st and I leave June 26th!

where are we at

2009-06-18T07:48:00.005-05:00

Hold onto your seats ladies and gentlemen, I know this part is going to be shocking for some of you...

WE ARE WAITING!!!!!

Yes, folks, we are waiting again for news from Ethiopia :) We need to know when I have an appointment at the US Embassy so we know when to throw the already packed suitcases in the back of the van and make the drive up to the airport.

It is such a gift to know that Nahom does not have TB, that we are not waiting 6 more months to bring him home and yet the longing to go and get him is stronger than ever.

So, here's a picture to tide you over...ok, it's really for me :)

meeting Nahom

Test Results

2009-06-15T07:07:00.003-05:00

HE'S NEGATIVE!!!!!

We are excited beyond words! We got a call about 1/2 an hour ago from our friend Dan who is in Ethiopia, at KVI right now. He was with Eyob when the news came in and called us right away!

No word on a travel date yet, but we are just so excited. I feel like I can breathe; I didn't realize I was holding my breath :)

Thanks for praying with us and standing with us!

keeping my eyes fixed

2009-06-10T08:02:00.004-05:00

Adoption has a lot of waiting, and the waiting gets really really old. Yesterday afternoon I was getting really frustrated. By afternoon here, it's evening there, the day is done and the time for information to come has passed. So then you settle into, "ok, it's not going to happen today". When I got home from work yesterday Gary and I sat on our bed and prayed. Prayed for peace and for patience and for God's will. We told God we trust Him.

This morning I was out walking and this song came on the ipod. I've heard this song before, many times, but man it's never messed me up like today.

So walking through our neighborhood this morning I lifted my head, fixed my eyes on Jesus, and walked back into hope. I will not live in despair, water swirling around me. I will walk on water and He will catch me when I fall. I will get lost in His eyes and everything will be alright. When I keep my eyes on Jesus, everything IS alright. That doesn't mean everything works out exactly like I planned and hoped. It means when I keep my eyes on Him I live in the truth that He works all things together for my good, the truth that His plan is always better than my plan. And the truth that I am ok, that I am taken care of and that I am loved beyond where my wildest dreams and imagination can take me.

no news yet

2009-06-05T12:59:00.003-05:00

We haven't heard anything yet, but I've been told that phone calls are happening and emails are being sent. It feels really good to know we are cared about and while I am SO anxious to hear, I know and trust we'll hear news exactly when we are supposed to!

thanks for praying with us today :)

full of anticipation

2009-06-02T08:36:00.007-05:00

The countdown has really begun.
So on Friday it will be 8 weeks since Nahom has finished his saliva test for TB. I've been watching the calendar, have the google countdown set to June 5th, and waiting and waiting for the day. I was told that sometimes the results come in sooner, apparently we are not going to be finding out sooner. And I've been realizing that we might not find out on Friday either. Maybe the test didn't go right to the lab, maybe it went the following Monday. Maybe the communication from the lab that has his test (unknown location) to the Adoption Agency in Ethiopia, and then from there to the Adoption Agency people in the US, and then to us...maybe that isn't going to happen by Friday.

We are back where we've been so often in this process. Waiting. Waiting on God. Waiting for his perfect time and perfect will. Trusting. Trusting that His plan is good and right and perfect, even if we don't see what that is. So I've been seeing so much recently how these words have come to live in me. I've thought these things before, I've typed them here on this blog before. And I meant it. And then I'd walk away and start with a little tiny worry. The icky thing about fear is that it never ever stays little or tiny. It always grows into something big and then into something monsterous. So there is no room for even a little worry.

That doesn't mean there is no longing, no anticipation, even some impatience. But we will stand in the middle of God's promise and hold onto the truth of who He is and who we are in Him. And we will hear news of Nahom. And we will trust God with all the details after that. If we hear that he is positive for TB, that we are waiting six more months, we will grieve. We will cry and ache and our hearts will hurt with a physical pain that feels like a great weight laid upon our chests. And we will know that God is good, that He is taking care of Nahom so far away and that he is taking care of us.

He's taking care of Gary who hasn't had the unexplainable joy of holding Nahom in his arms. Gary, who just wants to meet and hug and kiss his son, touch him and hold him and tell him, face to face, I LOVE YOU!

God is taking care of Mary ~ who has had the unexplainable joy of holding and hugging and kissing Nahom, of telling him I LOVE YOU! And has heard those words said back to her, I love YOU Mommy! Mary, who just wants to sit again with her boy on her lap, stroke his head and feel his soft little boy breaths as he falls asleep, cuddled and secure in a mother's embrace.

God is taking care of Noah, a boy who went to Ethiopia to become a brother to Nahom and did. Noah who says, I just wish my brother was here. Noah, who asks, when will Nahom come home? How much longer?

He is taking care of Hannah, who just doesn't understand or comprehend everything that's going on and knows there is more change coming and doesn't know what to expect with that change. Little Hannah who looks at pictures of a brother she's never met and wonders who he is and what he's like.

And we KNOW that God is taking care of Maelet. Sweet, beautiful, joyful Maelet who also KNOWS that her brother is coming and is starting to talk more aobut him, kiss his things and tells mommy, Nahom come.

I got an email yesterday from Eyob at KVI. Nahom is good, he is asking when he gets to come home. When I am coming back for him. And Eyob tells him, when it is God's time, we must wait for God's time.

So we are all waiting. And I know this isn't the last time the Clark family will wait, but to date, it's the hardest. When we passed court I posted a slideshow of pictures of Nahom & Maelet with a song "Waiting". I think I'm going to watch it today.

So we would love for you all to be praying with us and for us. We aren't praying for a negative test result, we are praying for God's perfect will to come through. We are praying that if the test is negative, that God will be in all the details involved in another trip to Ethiopia ~ for me it means getting work things done and ready for another absence, packing and some paperwork. For the family it means mommy being away from Maelet for the first time, being away from Hannah again so soon after the other trip, and the additional hit to our finances. And if the test is positive, well, that means some serious heartbreak. It also means Nahom has 6 more months away from the doctors and medications he was waiting for him here and 6 more months for HIV to have it's way in his little body. So really, it means 6 more months of trusting God to do what he does best, caring for his kids. April 16th ~ saying good bye to Nahom

great weekend

2009-05-31T21:44:00.009-05:00

the fun started Thursday night...Noah had a field trip to Beaver Creek Reserve and it was a sleepover! So we took the girls to Sonic for corndogs, fries and ice cream. They loved eating in the car, we folded their seats down and let them sit in the "way back".

Then on Friday night we had Maelet's birthday party. I was really proud of her, we ended up with more people than I originally planned and she was a trooper! She had Dora cupcakes, picked the green frosting as you can see. She didn't really know what to make of the presents, but finally caught on by today!!! When my parents showed up with a present she smiled, squealed and took the gift!

Here's a picture of my bff Jen. She and her family gave Maelet this sweet dress up set!

Then on Saturday morning our neighbors brought us all this stuff!! Some friends of theirs (who we don't even know) were getting rid of some clothes and toys and knew we had just adopted. They actually sent BAGS of stuff while I was in Ethiopia too! What a blessing, tons of super cute clothes - mostly stuff that is too big right now, which I love!! We are super stocked on clothes for now, so these will come in handy in the near future.

Then on Saturday afternoon we attended a wedding. Noah, Hannah & Maelet looked SO cute all dressed up and unfortuantely, I did not get any pictures there :(
Then we headed to a graduation party. Gary won 1st prize in a watermelon eating contest and the kids played with friends.

tri-lingual?

2009-05-26T19:03:00.002-05:00

So Maelet LOVES Dora ~ and we have tons of Dora stuff, toys and movies because we have another daughter who used to love Dora. Since she has discovered the DVDs we are now getting a sweet taste of Spanish with an Amharic accent. Today in the car she was drinking out of her water bottle and then saying "Yum yum yum...delisioso!" (I'm sure I spelled that wrong!) This morning she sat down at the breakfast table and greeted her siblings with "Olah Amigos!"

She cracks me up.

budding photographer

2009-05-25T22:55:00.002-05:00

a couple weeks ago I was transferring photos from the camera to the computer and realized someone got a hold of my camera :)

she took 76 (yes, seventy-six!) pictures in the wee hours of the morning, here's a few

fun website

2009-05-25T22:14:00.002-05:00

I love this kind of stuff! Too fun!

Adoption Finalized!

2009-05-22T10:54:00.008-05:00

On Wednesday we had Maelet's adoption finalized, which really means a trip to the court house, a chance to get dressed up, meet a judge, and go for ice cream. Legally, it means she is our daughter for real, even in the eyes of the state of Wisconsin, but we didn't need a trip to the court house to know that :)

The kids horsing around while we waited to go in.
The girls wore their traditional Ethiopian dresses and Noah wore his vest!

It's official! Paperwork signed!

A trip to Dairy Queen ~ she loves ice cream!

All worn out!

the good, the bad & the ugly...& the unknown

2009-05-18T18:33:00.004-05:00

I have been thinking so much about what to post here, how much to share. I have been so blessed by the blogs I've read over the last 9 months ~ I feel like they've really helped prepare me for the realities of adoption (and all the complex aspects ~ adopting older children, adopting a child who is HIV+, adopting internationally). So I am going to share...not everything, but a lot of things, and hope that our experiences will benefit someone else's journey. Thus the title of today's post...

let's start with the good :)
Maelet is beautiful! She is funny and goofy and has started breaking into spontaneous song and dance that is very animated and very Ethiopian ~ it's wonderful! She is expressing herself verbally, and non-verbally. For the first few weeks we were home whenever something happened that Maelet didn't like she would just freeze and stare into space. It was difficult to re-engage her and so sad to watch. That tide has turned my friends. It's funny, because we kept hearing from people who had traveled to the KVI house she lived in that she was, now I'm using their words here, kind of a Drama Queen! And at first, I didn't really see it. Yeah, it's here, in full force. This girl could win an Oscar...and we love it. She isn't shoving down the emotion anymore. She isn't trying to impress us. She is testing boundaries and when things don't go her way, watch out! The really great news is that Hannah is EXACTLY the same way. We have two energetic, stubborn, melodramtic 5 year old girls...yeah, can't wait for age 13!

She is talking more and more, both in Amharic and in English. She loves to run, LOVES to play outside, and loves to play with the dollhouse and with babies. She's started coloring and really really really likes Elmer's glue. She is eating well, she is sleeping well, and she is BRUSHING HER TEETH! We battled that one for awhile.

Her hair is getting so healthy! We've had it down the last few days and it's sooooo cute ~ love the curls! The girls love to wear matching outfits ~ and thanks to Grandma GG, they have a couple. Here's a cute picture from today that shows off the great hair and outfits!

ok, the bad :(
Let me first say that really, none of this is actually bad. It might be difficult, challenging and sometimes unpleasant, but it isn't actually bad...but come on...great title.

So sometimes things get really hard. It's important for Maelet to know that we are her parents. She needs to obey us. She can trust us. And consistancy is super important right now. And that's what I keep repeating to myself over and over again when she is refusing to sit at the table because she wants to play outside right now, even though it's supper time. I so badly want to say, "It's ok, you've had a rough life, you go play until you fall over from exhaustion, you deserve it." But that doesn't help her see what life in a family is all about, that doesn't teach her that she needs to obey Mom & Dad. And tonight it's about supper, but tomorrow it could be about something much more important. So we carry her back to the table over and over again. We ask her not to pause the tv 100 times during Spongebob, you may think this is hilarious, Hannah and Noah do not agree. All the while reassuring her that we love her, she belongs here, she is our daughter, and for good measure - another 10 or 15 times...we love you.

Hannah is adjusting. She was so excited to have a new sister, someone to play with and sing with, to draw with and talk with. The only problem is someone to play with means someone to share toys with. Someone to draw with means someone who wants to use the pink marker too. Someone to talk and sing ~ difficult when she doesn't speak the same language. Sometimes Hannah wants to boss Maelet around, sometimes she screams when Maelet touches a toy she had her eye on, sometimes she counts how many kisses Maelet gets and then adds 5 and cries because she didn't get the same number of kisses. And my very favorite, sometimes Hannah yells "Stop mocking me!!" when Maelet mimics her words ~ something we're excited to see, not so fun, apparantly, when you're the sister. And sometimes, Hannah is so excited and full of love that she bursts forward with a hug or kiss for Maelet and is swiftly pushed away...and then Hannah is hurt. So in these times, we hold her and hug her, we tell her she's loved so much, that she's an important part of this family, that no one could ever replace her.

time for the ugly...
sometimes we don't. Sometimes we say, "Hannah, that's enough! Hannah, you have to share! Hannah, for the hundreth time, she's NOT mocking you!" And then we take a deep breath, tell her we're sorry things are hard right now. We're sorry it's frustrating. We love you so much, you're doing a great job as a big sister, you're an important part of this family and no one could ever replace you.

the rest of the ugly...
our house. My back went out about 9 days ago ~ no bending or lifting. Gary just finished off the end of the semester, which means papers, projects and finals. I think this weekend is going to be clean the house weekend. It will have to happen in steps. 1)pick stuff up 2)actually put that stuff away 3)vacuum or scrub where that stuff was laying 4)take the several baskets of clean laundry and not only fold, but put away this laundry 5)organize and file away Maelet's adoption paperwork 6)re-pack Nahom's adoption paperwork

another ugly...
my hair. It needs to be cut, thinned, something. I ran into the guy who cuts my hair at McDonalds. He offered to grab a spork and a plastic knife and meet me in the parking lot...he works again on Thursday. I'll be there.

& finally, the unknown
the results of Nahom's TB test. I have gotten two emails from Eyob, the KVI Director, and he tells me Nahom is good. He knows he is coming home soon. He knows I am coming back for him. We sent a package with a family that traveled a couple of weeks ago and one of the things I sent was a little calculator. Eyob says he carries it around and uses it to figure out how many days until he gets to come home. Go ahead and cry, I did.

We are reaching the point where news could come any day. While we were in Ethiopia I was told that the results don't always take the full 8 weeks, sometimes it is a week or two sooner. This Friday it will be 6 weeks since he finished the saliva test. It is crazy waiting for a phone call that will either be hurry up and pack, get on a plane, we are ready for you OR we'll see you in 6 months. We are hoping for a negative test result and are prepared for a positive test result. We know that whatever happens we are in God's hands, and so is Nahom. We would love for you to be praying for him, that he feels God's presence and peace and that he knows, deep down and for real, that we love him and are coming for him as soon as we can.

come and listen...

2009-05-12T16:32:00.004-05:00

I haven't posted very much, or maybe anything, about our trip to Ethiopia and there's so much I want to share and I promise I'll get on that. I have so much to tell you about the country, the people, KVI and our kids!! So, here's a step in the right direction...pictures of our first day with Nahom & Maelet. I LOVE LOVE LOVE to talk about adoption, HIV, our trip and of course, our beautiful kids ~ all 4 of them. Mostly, I love to talk about what amazing things God has done...so come and listen

must see news...

2009-05-11T10:47:00.004-05:00

There's a woman I've worked with throughout our adoption process from an organization called Project Hopeful ~ she was interviewed for a Mother's Day news story. I would love to tell you all about her, but the video does such a better job! Click here to view!

She does a great job advocating for HIV+ children and their new families and her heart is just beautiful :)

she's got a sense of humor...

2009-04-27T22:39:00.004-05:00

Here's a picture of our friend Grant at the airport on the day we came home. He's holding his wife's purse so she can take the sweet pics shown below. We were looking through the photos tonight and when she saw this one of Grant she just laughed and laughed and then made her version of the face! It was so cute...enjoy!

arriving home

2009-04-27T22:26:00.004-05:00

Here are some amazing pictures from our arrival at the airport. As you can see, Maelet was a little overwhelmed ~ she did warm up eventually :) Thanks Jen for the awesome pictures (super bff plug ~ she's an amazing photographer, you should check out her website and blog, and see what she's really capable of, you know, with alert and happy children and women who didn't just get off a plane after 24 hours of travel!)

long overdue blog post

2009-04-25T15:46:00.003-05:00

Hello Friends and Family ~
I've sat down to blog several times over the last week and either been interrupted or I've fallen asleep :)

Things are going good at the Clark house - Maelet is doing really well and adjusting to us. We read a lot and talked with friends on what to expect during this time of transition and it's crazy to watch it unfold right here in our own house.

Hannah and Maelet are either glued together at the hip or completely ignoring each other...kind of like Hannah and Noah.

After Valentine's Day I found these shirts on clearance and grabbed two (less fighting that way!) the girls found them and wanted to wear them, they were so excited and had a great time showing them off.

Ok - a little girl is calling my name, so more to come!

we're home

2009-04-18T16:45:00.002-05:00

What a trip!

So we are back in the US and so far so good!

We had an amazing group of friends and family waiting for us at the airport when we landed ~ had a fun lunch at McDonald's (fulfillment of a promise I made to Noah on the plane) and then a really good ride home. Maelet is doing great! This morning I was upstairs and I heard her calling "Hannah, Hannah! Naa!" (Naa means come in Amharic) and then a bunch of words that I don't understand :) It was so good to hear her interacting with Hannah ~ they had a great time playing together this morning.

Unfortunately, I have not been able to take any pictures because my camera battery died while I was still in Ethiopia and as crazy as this might seem - I just didn't have the energy last night and this morning to find both the camera AND the charger. So no pictures yet. But don't worry, it's charging now and we'll post some soon.

love you all so much!
Mary

Woo-hoo!

2009-04-17T08:36:00.002-05:00

For those of you who are keeping track- 4 hours to go!!