Just to try to keep up my desire to blog for real, I am going to post about my decision and feelings about our flu shots.

I have had several people ask me if we were getting the shots and why. So, I thought I’d write them down. But I want people to know I think this is a personal decision and I completely respect everyone’s direction they go with for themselves and their families.

The kids and I all got our H1N1 shots last week. I couldn’t drive fast enough, in sleet, to get to the place I heard was offering them in KC. I decided to get them for the following reasons:

1. For the selfish reason that I don’t want to freak out every time I forget to wash the kids hands before they eat or play with a friend who has a fever an hour after our play date. I can drive myself crazy before the holidays or during an outbreak with stuff like that.

2. As a pregnant person with other health concerns I didn’t want to put myself and the baby at an unneeded risk, plus I’ve heard that it can help the baby’s immune system too and since I probably can’t breastfeed, I want to give it the best immune system that I can. Although people have been fearful that this shot was manufactured fast, I haven’t heard any reason this flu shot is any more dangerous than the yearly shot. But most importantly, I learned while trying to get pregnant and then going through my pregnancy with Eliza while on arthritis medication, that you have to weigh the risks vs. benefits sometimes and then just go with the decision and not feel guilty about the “what ifs.”

3. I think we have the most effective vaccination system the world has ever known and our generation has never lived through a “plague” or dealt with anything close to polio or wide spread measles so we’ve lost touch with how devastating that could be. Our kids don’t even have to get the chicken pox any more. It’s easy with all of our conveniences and up to date medicine to get out of touch with the reality that for every shot my child takes, thousands, if not millions of children have died from that disease before.

Now, this is NOT to get into the debate about autism or vacinations related to that argument. I have strong emotions for many people involved in that debate and I do not want to touch on that on our blog.

I just have had several people ask me if we were getting the shots and why. So, I thought I’d write them down.

**For the record, that is the LAST time I am going to be able to fool Jadon into getting a shot by simply not saying the word “shot” until his pants start coming down. My boy WILL NOT be fooled again. But a sucker bribe, that may still at least soothe the wounds.**

What have you decided?

2 years ago yesterday JADON was given to us for FOREVER! It is an amazing, mind blowing day.

But, at the same time, it was a rough, heartbreaking day. 2 years ago, he also left the arms of his foster mother, Rosalyn, who had cared for him since birth. I knew it was heartbreaking and tragic at the time when he watched her walk out the door with unbelievable strength and when he cried 3 hours in mourning. This year my heart is again sad for Rosalyn and Jadon, but in a deeper way this year.

This year, I have a 6 month old biological daughter who’s been in my arms since birth. She is only 2 weeks younger than Jadon was when his family changed for the 2nd time in his small life. My daughter knows us, wants us, needs us. We are all her heart has ever known. I realize in a new way this year, how my son’s heart was broken 2 years ago. I realize in a new way the heartbreak of a mother who left the child she had bonded to for 6 months.

Adoption IS beautiful, wonderful, glorious, magnificent and special. But it is also tough, heart-wrenching, hard, difficult and traumatizing.

Please pray with me that we can reconnect with Rosalyn. We had email contact with her at first, but have not heard from her since Jadon’s first birthday, when she mailed Jadon a sweet love letter. I want to be able to tell her and show her how INCREDIBLE this little man is!

Please also pray for Jadon’s heart. While I believe he has healed as much as possible in the past 2 years, he has a lifetime of healing to do. Last night we read a book about Guatemala. He’s gained an interest in the word whenever we talk about his first country.  He also smiles when he says “Guatemayah!” in a way that I know his heart is making a connection. When we were praying just before he went to sleep I asked him if he wanted to pray for Rosalyn, who is one of his mamas in Guatemala. The look in his eyes brings tears to mine today. It was a look of complete confusion. I didn’t really expect it at this age, but he definitely knows I am his mama and for me to connect the word to someone else was baffling to him. I caught a glimpse of how difficult the road is before us. To explain to a child the realities and beauties of his adoption is a huge job. A job that I am honored to have but one I do not take lightly.

For those of you that are concerned that I am looking at this “negatively,” I promise the next few days will be FULL of JOY!!! Many families choose to make a celebration of the day their adopted child was put in their arms. Since that day was so difficult for us, we choose to celebrate the day we traveled as a family to the United States together. That day for us is the 22nd of August. All throughout this week we are talking about and celebrating Guatemala, then on Saturday we are going to have a BIG Guatemalan Fiesta! So, stay tuned and I’ll share the celebration with you!

I apologize my blog has been so drab lately! We moved our pictures to an external hard drive which has not been connected since the move. If you stick with me, our blog will once return to the glory days of full color pictures, and maybe I’ll even learn how to download video!!!!

Thanks for walking with us.

This is a long post. So I’ve put in a couple pictures to liven it up. There’s a reward at the bottom for those of you who make it there.

Here’s a pic to start you off. If you don’t know already, “Jadon Rocks!” It’s gone to his head. He walks around sometimes saying, “I rock!”

Thank you so much for everyone who has sent a caring message in the past few days. I am going to try to attempt to explain a little more.

Hallmark announced Tuesday that they will be laying off 6-8% of it’s workers. It was a surprise in the way that Hallmark takes laying off it’s employees very seriously, but not a surprise because of the way the economy is going. They may have already started to lay people off, but we won’t know for sure who is laid off until several weeks, maybe even months have passed.

When we were leaving Atlanta and Josh’s job at Lockheed Martin, I said a couple times that it felt a little crazy that we were leaving a job with solid government contracts for airplanes to work for a retail company that relies on Americans’ holiday spending. But, we decided it was worth it to move closer to family and get Josh into a job that was fulfilling, challenging and exciting to him. We have not regretted the decision. It is incredibly wonderful to be near family and Josh has found his job to be every thing and more than what he dreamed it would be.

When we left Atlanta in October we left with only what we could fit into our pretty small Honda CRV. Our home was left with all of it’s furnishings and most of our comforts with the hope that it would sell better. In October and November the economy made it’s sharpest declines and it became increasingly obvious that we were going to have to take an extreme loss on our home in order to sell it. We said several times in those months that if it wasn’t for Josh’s love of his job, we would move back to Atlanta in a heartbeat. We got a contract, but we did loose a significant amount of money on our sale in December. Side note, we absolutely loved our home. If we had stayed in Atlanta we would have been happy in it for many, many years. But instead we were living in my parents basement and were looking forward to getting our furnishings from our home before our baby was born. At that time our brother-in-law began working on my sister’s unfinished basement in order for us to move into it.

In December, we closed on our home with a loan we had to take out because of our transfer. We moved our stuff to two places. Half went to my parents’ basement and the other half to my sister’s where we’ve been living ever since (see previous post). Our plan was to allow our finances to recover somewhat for 6 months, then move around Hallmark downtown to start our lives here. We’ve been planning on finding a church and a community to serve and live in this summer. We’ve been on two house hunting trips, researched schools, found doctors, applied to preschool programs all in the area we were planning to move.

So, on Tuesday it came as a blow (as I am sure it did to all Hallmark employees) that Josh may loose his job. We feel pretty unsecure because Josh is definitely the last 6-8% to be hired, which we are sure puts him at the top of the list of who to consider to lay off. There are reasons to be hopeful, but certainly reasons to be worried too.

On Wednesday I was pretty down. I think the first year after a move across country always is. When you move you loose all of your “normals” and nothing is comforting. The grocery store is different, the weather is surprising, you get lost all the time, everything is just different. Suddenly friends you only saw once a month or got go on walks with are the only people you want to see in moments of homesickness. When we heard of Hallmark’s layoffs, all I could think of was the home, friends, church and the beauty of Georgia that we left behind.

I do know that if we were still there, I would be incredibly sad that my family wouldn’t have been there for Eliza’s birth, I would miss dearly the deep talks I have with my sister after the kids go to bed, I would miss the way my son anticipates time with his grandparents and cousins he now knows.  But in either decision there are pluses and minuses, ups and downs, things to rejoice in and things to mourn.

Thank you for your prayers. In many, many ways our situation is not that bad. We are blessed with family, health, a roof over our heads, safety, many things that America has recently found we all take for granted. More than prayers that Josh would keep his job, I ask for prayers that we would continue to find contentment. Realizing peace in a situation we don’t want to be in while God being glorified in our hearts is actually the only thing we truly want. Knowing our God in moments of crisis is the only thing we actually need. The world could continue to fall apart, but as long as God continues to reveal himself to us, we will be fulfilled.

Josh would like to keep his job in order for his family to be provided for and in order to continue to do a job he has found that he absolutely LOVES. I would like him to keep his job so my husband continues to be fulfilled and challenged during the day and so that my family can have a space to live and thrive in.

If you are still reading this incredibly long post I thank you for loving us. Thank you for walking beside us by listening, commenting and praying. We are so thankful for everyone we’ve been blessed to live life with. We’ll keep you updated.

Here are the pictures I promised:

About 2 months ago we had our friends over for dinner. If you don’t remember them, check out the end of this post. We met Tony and Sarah in birthing class and discovered we both had sons, 3 months apart from Guatemala. The girls ended up being born 4 days apart (and the day we left the hospital they were randomly put in the same room that we were!) When we got the girls together outside of mine and Sarah’s stomachs, here’s what happened:

We placed our new cuties next to each other on the couch.

We snapped a decent picture.

Then, things quickly made a turn for the worst.

And in the time it took for me to snap 4 pictures while laughing at 2 poor 3 week olds, disaster struck.

Will they ever trust us again?

I’ve wanted to post pictures of our cute Nemo from Halloween. But, I can’t find where my mom downloads the pictures on her computer. Hopefully she won’t have to stand too long in line to vote after work and she can show me so I can post tonight.

I just have to say about the elections (totally apart from party affiliations or personal opinions) that it is pretty exciting to be a part of history today. As a woman myself and a parent of a minority, I love that either a woman or a minority will be elected today. I think that’s pretty cool.

I am also pretty glad that Josh and I voted via absentee ballot and don’t have to stand in line.

I value learning from different people’s perspectives. Sometimes I’ve been weighed down by people out to prove that adoption isn’t the answer to the evil of poverty.

I don’t think it’s the only answer. But, God fills me up with the truth that it is one incredible, amazing answer that he has established.

Here’s how He’s done that recently.

Click here to follow the Alexanders journey to pick up Abe.

Absolutely beautiful, on so many levels.

As Emily Alexander’s sister said on, “A Long Way from the Theta House,”

In the country of Ethiopia, there are an estimated 4.5 million orphans.

Today, there is one less.

Soli Deo Gloria.

Indeed, Soli Deo Gloria, “For the Glory of God Alone” Sometimes we have to take this one kid at a time.

If you are just now joining us, please check out our entire trip on these posts:

AHHHHH. . . . Guatemala!!!

Rainbows, Panajachel and volcanoes?

Bye Lake Atitlan, Hello Antigua and on to Guatemala City

J A D O N ! ! ! !

The Weekend Together

Embassy Appointment Day

We had to wait another day after our Embassy appointment for our paperwork (from the US Embassy) to arrive. We also couldn’t take a flight out that day just incase our paperwork didn’t make it.

We made good use of our time, getting better aquanted with our friends and spending more quality time together. The 5 days we spent as a family of 3 in Guatemala City will forever be treasured in our hearts as a very special time together as a family.

We walked to the mission house that Josh and I spent a couple days in before getting Jadon. As I mentioned before, the ministry is an incredible mission to the gang members and men in prison in Guatemala City. It is connected with “Center for Transforming Mission” under “Things We Care About” on the right side of the blog. While staying at this house we also met a couple who were there to establish an orphanage at Lake Atitlan. We plan on going back to Guatemala for on a mission trip in the future to possibly serve these ministries. Let us know if you are interested in knowing more or would consider going on a trip with us.

We spent some time measuring Jadon. . . .

We went to lunch with our new friends at an incredible steak house in GC.

THEN, the paperwork we were waiting on arrived!!!

Isn’t this the cutest darn VISA picture you ever could see!!!!!

We had dinner with our new friends,

and took some family photos.

Tomorrow. . . . we go HOME!!!!!

Monday was our Embassy appointment day. That’s the day you go to the US Embassy where they put their final stamp of approval on everything. It really seems bigger than it is, but it is the only thing us adoptive parents can actually watch happen, so it is a pretty big day.

We were the first appointment at 7am on Monday morning, so we were the first to go into the little closet room and face the guy on the other side of the window. When he stamped our paperwork, I started to cry, but I decided I had to clear up really quickly because I didn’t want everyone outside of the room, who were still waiting for their time to go, to think it was a scary “closet.” Sure enough, everyone was looking at us when we left. I expected cheers from everyone when it was time for us to go, but maybe that was just in my head.

There are no cameras allowed near the Embassy so we have no official pictures of it happening. But here are some from the rest of the day.

Dada Love!

These are still some of my favorite pictures of my boys!

With dada in the pool.

We met Jami, Clint and Hudson over the weekend who turned out to be great friends of ours. Here’s the first picture of Jadon and Hudson. We hope the boys have a lifelong friendship with each other. They ended up flying on the same plane to the U.S.

At bed time Jadon said, “Does anyone else think it is windy in here?”

For some reason those camo-dino pjs still fit him. Weird. Well, at least mama still puts them on him. Maybe I am a little attached.

This was a very happy, good day.

Since our appointment at the US Embassy was at 7am on Monday morning, we received Jadon from Rosalyn on Friday. Which was unfortunate for our wallet, but much more fortunate for family bonding.

Here are pictures of us bonding with our sweet, sweet, special baby J during our first weekend together.

Trip in a taxi to the market. RIDING GUATEMALAN STYLE!!!

After bath snack.

Here’s the volcano we missed outside our hotel window on our visit trip. It was beautiful!!

Nap time.

Getting ready for the pool.

Just a quick picture to compare how much he’s grown this past year!!!! Here’s a picture from July 2008.

Back to August 2007, Here’s Jadon’s first swim.

Learning to trust mama.

One of my favorite pictures.

I think he is dreaming and thinking, “hum. . . I think I’ll be a braves fan.” He loves to watch them on TV now and he can throw a ball like a major leaguer already, as well as knock some mean ones out of the park with a cardboard wrapping paper roll.

But seriously, wasn’t he sweet??

Finally the day came when WE GOT HIM!!!

At around 1pm on August 17th, Jadon’s foster mother Rosalyn, with her boyfriend Yoni, pulled up in a taxi as I was anxiously standing on our balcony hoping I would see them drive up. I started tearing up and told Josh, “I think I just saw them pull up!! Let’s get to the lobby RIGHT NOW!”

As I look back on it, I think when we came to the lobby a little early I think Rosalyn was a little disappointed that she didn’t get a few last minutes with Jadon to herself. The next few hours were filled with a mix of joy and heartbreak. It was such a joyous time, being united with our baby forever, but also so hard because sweet Rosalyn had poured her heart and soul into loving a little boy that she now had to hand over to us. I will always be saddened by our language barrier but pray often that we were able to express our thankfulness and love for her.

The moment of being united with our baby was an amazing, treasured moment we will never forget! There are no words to express the feelings.

We firmly believe that babies do experience losses in adoption, that they experience what is happening to them and need as much help in walking through it as much as possible. Jadon watched Rosalyn walk away, hand in hand with her boyfriend, then once we got to the room he cried for about 3 hours. All we could do was hold him and love him as much as would allow us to try to comfort him. After a while, we found a “magic” Gatorade bottle that brought out the smiling baby we remembered from our visit trip. It was a feeling I cannot express seeing his little face light up again. Now, I still can’t believe that I get to see it everyday!

We then settled in for a sweet evening and night time with our special, wonderful baby Jadon.

If you missed the previous post about our trip to Guatemala last year, to get the full experience you have to read in chronological order. Start HERE.

Then go HERE.

Okay now, THIS is what a VOLCANO looks like!!!! When we woke up on the third day in Guatemala the clouds had cleared and we got SPECTACULAR views of the volcanoes around the lake!

So this is how we spent our morning. Reading and relaxing on this porch overlooking the lake and volcanoes while talking to people who were visiting and who lived in Guatemala.

When it was time to leave we caught the taxi boat for the last time to Pana, then took a shuttle to Antigua.

Getting off the boat, we took one of my favorite pictures of a native Mayan family. There are 5 villiages surrounding the lake. In each one of those villages the native people speak a different Mayan language.

On the drive Josh took this picture of a “Chicken Bus” similar to the one Jadon would be taking with Rosalyn to meet us in Guatemala City the NEXT DAY!!

This is the famous shot from Antigua. Unfortunately it was cloudy by the time we got there so you can’t see the volcano behind the clock tower very well.

THIS is THE chicken restaurant to eat at!!! If you ever see one in America, GO! In Houston last month Josh and I spotted one on the way to the airport and we had a serious debate of whether or not to be late for our flight in order to stop and eat!

Here is Pepian. It’s our favorite Guatemalan dish made of a slow roasted vegetable stew over chicken. Trust us, it tastes much better than it looks in this picture.

Here is a woman doing traditional Guatemalan weaving. We bought a lot of woven material for gifts and to make things for our home. All of the material you’ve seen in these pictures (like the tablecloth above) are woven by women on looms just like in this picture.

One of the many beautiful sights in Antigua. Antigua is a great place to soak up the Spanish influenced culture.

After our time in Antigua the American man who allowed us to stay with him in Guatemala (who has a ministry for gang members and men in prison) sent a taxi for us. The driver was an ex-gang member who’s arm was blown off by a grenade during his gang years. Never had we been so frustrated at the language barrier as on that ride to Guatemala City. We would have loved have spoken with the young man about his story and his testimony.

Our time in Guatemala before we got Jadon was invaluable. We are so very thankful we had the oportunity (and the confidence) to travel his country and soak in all of the culture and beauty of the land as we could. We definitely plan on traveling there again with Jadon. We are anxious to share with him what we saw and to serve in the many ministries we were able to experience and learn about.

Next up. . . . . . J A D O N ! ! ! !