1 week
So yesterday marked one weeks since our family grew from 4 to 7. I feel so blessed that God trusted us with these kids. The first couple days flew by...it felt like there was so much to do in such a small amount of time. Somebody always needed something. It is has only been a week and it feels like they have been here forever. They settled into a schedule pretty quickly. Today was the first day I went somewhere alone with all 5. Eli is on our church worship team so he had to be there at 6:30 am to play for all three services. Which meant I was left to get all the kids ready, out the door and to church on time by myself. I was successful!!!! I took a picture in the van on the way to church because I was so proud of myself {I was stopped at a light}. We make the mini van look pretty mini, don't we?
After church we went out to eat and it was a complete success. They all behaved and ate so well. It honestly didn't feel any harder then when we would go out with just the two. I am sure it won't always be that easy. We did get a lot of looks of curiosity of our very mixed family but we were so proud of our family we didn't care.
Our Thanksgiving break was perfect. The kids were all so well behaved and loving to their new extended family.
On Friday I took the four eldest each out on their own one on one date with me while Eli stayed with the rest. It was so fun to have each of them to myself and focus only on them. I think this is something we will do once a month. I think when you have so many kids it is important to give each kid there own time.
I am not trying to sugar coat anything. I am exhausted every night when I go to bed. There is no way I can make all the kids happy at the same time. The house will never be clean again and we will probably always be tight on money. The adoption is going to cost more then we thought. I have had some criticism and concern from people who just don't have the same heart for Orphans as I do. They just don't understand why we would want to take this on. That's OK. I will save that for another post. We have also been blessed by lots of love and support. We have had people buy diapers, formula, clothes. We have had alot of people praying for us, encouraging us and supporting us every step of the way. I will also write more about this in another post. I know that these children were meant for us and this is what God called our family to do. Everyone is not called to adopt. God has different plans for all of our lives. I do hope that our story will encourage many more families to adopt or to help people who are adopting. There are so so many children out there that need a loving family. I would make the same decision a million times over. Our lives are so blessed with them here. They had never had birthday parties, Christmas or church before and we are so lucky to see it for the first time through their eyes. It really has been easier then I expected. I think it is because of how natural it is to love them. It is the same as if I birthed them, they are ours and we are the lucky ones. Here are the best picture I could get of all of them. This was Sunday afternoon, we were all in the play room playing Wii while Eli {tried} to nap on the couch.
I never would have imagined that my life would be so full, so busy and so blessed!
