Here and now vs. there and then

"Never commit your virtue or your happiness to the future. Happy work is best done by the man/woman who takes his/her long-term plans somewhat lightly and works from moment to moment “as to the Lord.” It is only our Daily Bread that we are encouraged to ask for. The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received." Lewis (The Weight of Glory)

This was recently posted on our friends' blogsite and... shoo! I needed to hear this again. Pastor Elie told me this, our Bible study friend told me this, and now here it is again. I do accept this to be true, but it's difficult to keep my mind in check. I am a dreamer. I have big plans.

Our child is not here right now and I need to be. My mind should not be in the future in Ethiopia. I need to be here right now. This is not easy.

Not a pack'n'play, but a playpen

So stubborn. For me, there is no Adventure Outpost. It's Teepee Village. There are no In-pursuiters. They are Interns. And there are no pack'n'plays, but there are playpens. And now, Rob and I have one... a playpen. Our cousin forwarded on the information about a lightly used playpen from a woman in her Twins Club, and we jumped. It took us (Who am I kidding? It took Rob...) a bit (Which he wants me to quantify as two minutes.) to figure it out, but now it's set up in the living room. Now what? We have no kid yet. Are we going to pack this plastic and nylon beast up or leave it in the middle of our highest traffic area just to stare at for a couple of dreaming days? Probably the latter.

We are waiting, which means that we think of each little step as a huge one. A playpen! We are well on our way to becoming parents now, right?

Comrades

Yesterday, Rob and I spent the day with some comrades, a family of four that is also adopting from Ethiopia. It was nice to be around people that are in a similar boat as us. (Ours is an old rowboat, with faded and chipped light blue paint. I think that there's a red stripe on it somewhere as well. Anyways... ) We are able to talk about a lot of the same ideas, fears, dreams that Rob and I have regarding our child. Our time was a blessing and we are thankful for these people.

News

We have none.

Link

Our agency just posted this link, which I'll also put in the links' section off to the right. Have fun exploring a part of the world that Rob and I are about to enter!

At 2 months: tapas

So, as of today, we've waited two months for our child from Ethiopia. Depending on how you consider it, two months has been a short and a long time. Sigh. A family, that was matched recently with its son, waited just over two months: This sounds good. But when you consider when we submitted our first dossier to Albania, we've now waited a year. God knows.

In other news, my very thoughtful cousin recently sent me a surprise package which included a book... my new favorite, which is perfect for our situation. It's called A Mother for Choco, by Keiko Kasza. Read it!

And yesterday, some friends of ours gave me a list of Bible verses having to do with children and our hopes for them as Christians. I have been wanting a relatively short list, all put together in one place. (Yes, the Bible itself is one such place, I know! Just not so 'relatively short.') Now we have one.

And, ay! I almost forgot: Yesterday was New Year's Day in Ethiopia. 10 September. It's now the year 2001 over there. Hm... is there anything that I'd like to redo from the year 2001 that I can take care of while I'm over there? I'll be thinking about that!

So, a little bit of everything for today.

Please pray. Please pray that our child and his/her birthparents have food and a place to stay and someone to love them. Please pray that the birthparents have peace about the decisions that they're making. Please pray for the birthparents' and our child's salvation. Please pray that the adoption is all said and done by the end of December of this year, so that we don't have to redo all of our immigration work, which expires in January. Gracias.

Referrals!

No, not ours, but still very exciting! Four baby boys were matched with their families today. (The families waited 3, 4, and 5 months. I know nothing about the fourth family.) Another family got its call to travel (next week) to pick up their 3-month old daughter and two families will return home with their children tomorrow. God willing, we will be matched with our child soon. And, thank God for those families already being united.