Five months

We have been home with Yabby for 5 months now! Just about every medical problem is gone! For the first four months I think we were at one of the four doctor's office at least twice a week!
We are all amazed at Yabby's English! Her preschool teacher reported to us a couple of weeks ago that she loves to talk. Considering her big sister loves to talk too...our house is never quiet! Add in a loud big brother and a Dad with a big voice and well, you get the picture. Can you imagine dinner time at our house?
I think we are starting to get into the groove of the new normal. Everyone one has adjusted pretty well. Considering Yabby was pretty much an only child and Isabelle was the baby. We have had to help them find their new places. We are still working on it but things have seemed to calm down. So the adventure continues...

New Life

My mother-in-law looked over at Yabby sitting on her Daddy's lap at church and she looked like a princess. The drastic contrast from the first picture we have of her has not been forgotten. Her sad little face and receding hair line. It is amazing how a lot of love and good nutrition can change things.
On Good Friday as I was putting her to bed she started with a long list of "Why" questions.(We are in the "why" stage right now) "Mommy, Why Adam and Eve eat apple? It yucky and dirty?" "Mommy, Why Jesus die on cross? I die instead of Jesus!" That was just the beginning! Just then God spoke to my heart. This is part of why you are her Mommy-You are to help her with these questions. This is why she is in your family. I often struggle with why our family and not another. I'm not sure if I have the insight or knowledge to be her mother. God gives me those moments and reassures me that it WILL be OK and that HE will give me what I need to be her Mommy. She is a very complicated little girl with a complicated past.But I have learned so much from her. If only we could have the compassion of Christ that we would feel so passionately like Yabsira that it would make us so sad that we would want to take His place because we love Him so much. Of course I explained to her why Jesus had to die in her place- But I love the way she loves Him.




This last picture is Yabby sitting with her Grandma and Papa at church. It is such a blessing that after many years of being away that Rob can serve in the church he grew up in. The kids go running when they see grandma and papa at church!

Our first family trip

We went on our first little family trip since Yabsira has been home. We went to a friends wedding in Virginia that Rob was preforming and we stopped at some old friends home on the way.
We had a great time visiting our old friends. Our children are around the same age and Joel and their oldest daughter were each others first friends. The kids got along great and it was fun to catch up on each others lives.
Even though we had a long trip in the car the kids got along crammed in the back seat. The only thing we didn't expect is that Yabby gets car sick! It is only by God's grace that I had a couple of Ziploc bags that were easy to get to. Poor little girl didn't understand why she didn't feel well...she kept blaming the granola bar she ate.
Our friends wedding was beautiful. The bride was gorgeous and the groom was beaming. The girls loved getting all dressed up. Yabby now refers to her dress as the married dress. It was also good to visit with more old friends at the wedding. Isabelle and her "first friend" won a dance contest and got a giant lollipop as a prize.
We started to get used to the warm weather of the south so it was shock to our system when it stared snowing when we got home!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

It is getting warmer here so we decided to break open the fire pit for the season. As you can see Yabsira had her first smores! She tried one the traditional way and then she decided "no chocolate!" So,I had to eat her chocolate...I can never let chocolate go to waste!

WE ARE PRAISING GOD!!!

Today we found out that Yabby's best friend from Ethiopia passed court! She will be living in the U.S.A. and I have been in touch with her sweet Mom and we plan for the girls to keep in touch. Yabby is beside herself with joy and can't wait to talk with her BFF on the phone.

We are still alive!

Another month has almost past and I really didn't think life could get any busier that it already was! Was I ever wrong! I have been to the doctors office at least twice a week since Yabby has been home. Mainly the visits have been for her with one of the rest of us sprinkled in every once in a while. From giardia to ear infections and everything in between. We are praising God that nothing has been serious.
Yabby is very, very, very loving her family(as she would put it:). She has a new favorite song. It is a Toby Mac song and I'm not sure the name of it. But it melts my heart when I hear her sing it. The chorus goes like this...sort of..."I love my family. God bless my family." It is in the cd player in my car and to her brother and sisters dismay she sings it loudly even after the song has ended.

My girls

One Month in America!

Did one month really go by?! It is fun to reflect on a little girl who had never used a straw before that is now playing the Wii with her brother and sister.
Rob and I have often used this analogy to gain perspective. It is like we started reading a novel a third of the way through. We aren't sure how it started. We are figuring out the plot as we go along. As we keep reading the plot becomes a little clearer.
I know we will not completely figure her out. That is kind of a joke in our house...When Joel was one week old I said to Rob, quite confidently,"Go to work! I need to figure him out!" Every year on his birthday Rob asks me laughing,"So, have you figured him out yet?"(sorry,I think I have told this story before:)) The same goes with Isabelle and Yabsira. God is the only one who knows them completely. So, we need to constantly be seeking Him on how to raise them. After all, He knows the whole story!
THEN

AND

NOW