We are home!

   Sorry to have neglected the blog but I was updating our secret group on facebook and just forgot:) We have been home for a little over a week and are adjusting as best we can. It is indescribable how amazing it feels to have everyone under one roof!
   Nehemiah seemed to be a total mess the first few days we brought him home. He cried constantly and wouldn't sleep unless being held. We were shocked because in the orphanage we never heard him cry. On day four two little teeth popped through and he settled down. I think with all the new things and the teeth he was just done. He is now sleeping much better and not crying all the time. He does love to be held and if he falls asleep while being held you cannot lay him down!:) Stinker, he is loving having so many brothers and two little mommies that talk to him all day. We can already see him growing in his strength. His head control is much better and he will sit with assistance for short periods. We are working on building his core strength and lots of bonding time. He has not had any bottles since leaving the orphanage he is only nursing. This is great but also a huge task with six children. Thankfully Joey has been home to be an extra pair of hands.
   Jeremiah seems to love having a family he hugs and kisses everyone and is loving exploring more of the house each day. We have been shocked how strong he has gotten in just the week we have been home. At the orphanage he needed two adults assistance to go up and down stairs. Now the goober is running up and down a few times a day to check out what is going on. He walked over a mile yesterday to the neighborhood playground and even went up the steps and down the slide a few times. He eats like a champ and has not turned down any of my cooking. The only thing he said no to was chocolate!! Silly boy. He is sleeping well at night and still takes a good nap during the afternoon. He supposedly was potty trained in the orphanage and the first few days in Ukraine he used the toilet but since being home he has not but we are rolling with diapers for now. (side note, wow five kids in diapers at night and three kids during the day is a endless job!!)
    Adjusting to a family of eight is not all sweetness and roses it is crazy hard work. Just having six kids under 7 years old is tough add in special needs and institutional behaviors and it is impossible. We turn to God minute by minute requesting patience and guidance. The support we have received from family and friends in the form of meals, gift cards, gifts for the kids and prayers have been so uplifting. To God be the glory great things He has done!

Little update:)

   Sorry to be away for so long we have had a very eventful trip:) We are back for now due to a glitch in the computer system in our boys region. But if you have not been following along on our secret facebook group, we received both referrals for the boys (about a week and a half apart) and have meet and started bonding with both of them. Nehemiah is 10 months old and the biggest little boy I have ever seem. He is so yummy and precious! He has started "talking" and is very smiley and happy. His orphanage is bright and cheerful with caring nannies and director. Jeremiah is a stinker! He is 4 (will be five at the beginning of the year) and is smart as can be. He has fooled his nannies into thinking he is not big or smart enough to accomplish the tasks that they ask him to do:) He is very ticklish and love love loves bubbles. He is going to really enjoy having 5 brothers and sisters. He really lights up in his groupa (like aged children grouped together in the orphanage) He is still not to sure about adults trying to play with him  ie. Joey and I :) To him adults tell him what to do and feed him. His orphanage is very clean and prides itself on order and healthy food. The children are well cared for, but affection and physical touch are not common from our experience. We will be returning on Friday evening and have our court date scheduled for November 26th at 2:30pm!! So excited to finally say we have a date. We will stay for the ten day wait after court and then start the process of getting birth certificates, passports and visas at the US embassy. Please please join us in praying that we will make it home as a family for Christmas! My children in the US would be devastated if we missed it.
   It has been a LONG difficult road for the past few weeks and we are so ready to have our whole family in one country under one roof. God has been good and met our needs as they have come along. Thank you for your support and prayers. After court is done and we are home we will be sharing lots and lots of pictures!!:)

And we are off.....

Mommy and Daddy are coming:)

Tomorrow Tomorrow we are leaving Tomorrow!!

  I don't know where to start this post? I am so overwhelmed we received more donations and are now $588 from being fully funded. It seems so inconceivable I remember sitting in my living room with a group of my friends crying because I was scared about what God had laid on my heart to do. And now we are one day from leaving the US to meet our new children for the first time and we are basically fully funded. We are not going to haggle over $500 when you look at $30,000! Plus we feel that our "total" is a guesstimate anyway based on past adoptions. We are pretty good at living cheaply and plan to continue that in country. So we feel that we can say with a degree of confidence that we are fully funded! Wow so amazing and all the glory needs to go to GOD. Thank you Thank you Thank you for all you have done we have felt so supported and loved.

Friday Fun Facts

 We leave in 4 DAYS!!
 We only need $2853 to be fully funded
 We will have kids give or take a month ages 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 (turned 7 today)
 We are so very blessed!!

Meet our boy:)

 Here is an adorable picture of the little boy I spoke of in my last post, we officially committed to him this morning and hope to meet him a week or so after we arrive in his country. I can't wait to put a smile on that sweet serious face! I knew he was mine this morning when I read on the adoption group facebook site that someone else might be interested. I had a panicked moment and thought, "No, they can't have him!" :) We praise God that He is always with us and has guided us in this crazy process. You have a mommy and daddy coming for you!!!
                                                 

We have not decided who will get which name but we plan on keeping Nehemiah and Jeremiah we will make a decision after we meet the boys. Thank you for your continued prayers and support!

Praying Praying Praying

  The title sums up what we have been doing since my last post. We have been praying hard for direction and clarity in so many different areas of our lives. One major prayer is clarity on which child we should bring home. Our hearts are pulled to a little one that is soon to turn 5, in his region he will be transferred to a mental institution as 5 is the "age out" date for the orphanage. I cannot imagine my 5 year old going to a place like that and she doesn't have special needs! Other then picking up our clean unmarked bills from the bank I believe we are ready for our trip, which will make for a long 6 days:) I dread saying goodbye to my children and in a way I want to get it over with.
 
 

We know Who is in control!

  Well it has been a long few days, we have been on our knees praying. God has been speaking to our hearts and although we feel broken and disheartened by the loss of Dane (Nehemiah) God's will and plan is our ultimate goal. We thought about just bringing Alaric (Nehemiah) home and taking it "easy" :) I think the devil was working on us in that moment. We thought about how we would not need to raise any more funding if we only got one child, we would not have to buy another vehicle and so many things that would be so simple. God doesn't call us to simple or easy but to serve. He says take up our cross and follow. We have peace that He has called us to TWO children. We may not know who exactly the second child will be but we remain committed to working our hearts out to bring two new children into the Breakfield family.
    We came to this conclusion throughout yesterday and last night. We knew that it would be another leap of faith because we were still short $9,500. We said yes to God and He is so gracious and loving to affirm us in our decision. This morning (Sunday) we received a very generous donation that brings us to needing only $7,500. God is so good! We have enough to make our first trip where we will meet the children for the first time and have court. This trip will hopefully take around 3 weeks. We will then come home (without the children) for about 10 days. When we return we will need the additional funds to pay for passports, medical exams, visas for the children to be allowed to enter the US, and our plane tickets to fly home ~$9,000 for two children.
   Thank you so much for praying, sending messages, and sharing our news. Please continue to pray, share and if you feel led you can donate through clicking on the button with Nehemiah's picture on the right side bar of this blog.

9 MORE DAYS!!!

Happy Day/ Sad Day

  Today has been a huge flood of emotions, we have been running around town trying to get last minute things done for our trip, then we got a call no one wants to get. Nancy informed us that Dane's (Nehemiah) paperwork is not done. To make a long story short he is not available for adoption at this point in time. There is a very slim chance that it will be squeaked by, which is what we are praying.. But we need to proceed, we are just not sure what that means. There is another little boy who is perfectly adorable and available right now but it is so hard to think with a broken heart. We also lost $4,200 when we lost Dane (he had a grant that was gifted to him before we committed to adopting him) Which puts us $9,600 short and we leave in 11 days. Lots to think about and pray about. Please lift us up as we make HUGE decisions in the next few days. God has a plan He is not surprised but we are knocked off our feet!:(

WE ARE LEAVING!!!!

AHHH We got our dates!! We have our appointment October 10th so we will be leaving around the 8th of October. Yes a little over a week!!! I can't stop shaking so excited and nervous and in shock!! God is sooo good!! Thank you all who have prayed for us in the journey we could not have done it without you!!  We leave in 11 days!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Room is ready!

  We finished the boys room today, thank you ebay for the cute used bedding:) Soon to be big brother moved out of the nursery and in with big, big brother the two couldn't be happier. I am a little worried a 6 year old with tons of legos mixed with a naughty 22 month old spells disaster to me! We will have to make it work though, we thank God we have a four bedroom house and can put kids in rooms by two. Today marks our paperwork being submitted for 6 weeks! I consider us FULL TERM! We are ready to pop! Come on travel dates so we can meet our babies.

  Thank you to whoever bumped our Family Sponsorship Page up $100, we are chipping away at our mountain....only $5,400 left:)

Moving right along!!

  Today was an exciting day and nothing really even happened for us!:) The families submitted ONE week before us got their appointment dates...and they are for NEXT week! Yes only one week away. If the current trend follows for special needs children we will be traveling in two weeks. That fact got my heart going. On one hand I am so ready to go see my boys and hold them, but it gets a little scary when we try to figure out how we are going to get there. As of today we are only $5,500 from being fully funded! Just typing that gives me goose bumps we are so very blessed to be at this point. But I am not about begging:) We are so close but we need to push through to the end and finish this fundraising thing for good! The giveway seems to be a bust right now not one ticket sold, we have sold a few things on ebay but are really out of ideas on how to raise anymore money on our own. If you feel led please consider helping us reach the finish line and go to Eastern Europe with the peace of mind that the bill is paid in full! Thank you!

Give away

Help the Breakfield's bring home two precious baby boys from Eastern Europe, born with Down Syndrome and abandoned at birth because of their diagnosis.

Give Away! Each donation is a opportunity to win one of three amazing prizes!

1. A Mens Movado Watch (Victoria gave this watch to Joey on their wedding day, it has only been worn a handful of times for special occasions) valued at ~$600
2. An American Girl Doll of your choice, valued at ~$110
3. A Squier Acoustic Guitar with cloth case, valued at ~$130

Donation $10 each

only 600 Donation will be entered!

To purchase tickets call (540) 207-2230

or online at

http://reecesrainbow.org/58774/sponsordane

please leave name and number of tickets purchased on receipt

Sharing this post will also enter your name in drawing!:)

Matching Grant MET!

  Scratch my previous post, we are now fully matched with our Lifesong Grant which means we raised $12,000 whaoooo that is a big number. We are only $6,000 from being fully funded. If anyone has any great ideas please feel free to pass them along:)

Check out the thermometer!!!!

   Wow can you see that number!! We are $300 short of meeting our matching grant with Lifesong for Orphans!!! Only $300, so close. That puts our grant total at only $4,600 from being FULLY FUNDED!! I really can't believe it. When we started this adoption we were looking at the $30,000 thinking "God had to do something big." And the circumstances in our lives the past two months have definitely cemented that fact in our heart and minds. One of the fun quotes that goes around in the adoption circles is "It's God's will, it's God's bill." Our boys ransom has almost been paid and we are so ready to go get them. Today marks 5 weeks since we were officially submitted. It might have gone by fast for you, but time seems to be standing still for me! Please prayerfully consider giving to our Lifesong account (Family name Breakfield and number 3911) or to our Reece's Rainbow account just click on our cutie's face to the right of this post!:) If you can't give then please share and pray!!

Big weeks coming up!

   We are back from Florida and had a nice time away, mom and dad are still recovering!:) This week coming up is like a holding week then next week lots of things "could" happen! We should be hearing back about our Lifesong grant and where we stand with fundraising. We hear from the JSC foundation about the grant with them, Joey has a follow up interview with a potential employer, and we should be getting very close to finding out our travel dates!! Lots of exciting things. God has really been teaching us patience BUT if I were Him....:) We would find out our travel dates so Joey would have lots of information to take to his interview, he would get the job, we would be fully funded by our Lifesong grant and JSC foundation grant, and be traveling in October!:) I know God's timing is perfect and we are trusting Him, but please join us in praying for the patience and faith to continue walking in the path that He has given us. Pray we have joy and peace no matter our circumstances.

Moving on up!!

  Wow things seem to be moving along. We checked our Lifesong account this morning and we have received $700!!! so that money doubles to $1,400! So exciting to see God's people give, thank you! We also heard that three more families received their appointment dates today. That moves us up to 6th in line! Plus those who received appointments were only submitted three weeks before us! Those numbers really don't mean much in the way Eastern Europe does its appointments but it is fun to see us moving up and getting close to "our turn" My arms are itching to hold my boys and to have our family together under one roof! We do need to start doing some major pushing on the fundraising front. We should be traveling in 5-8 weeks and need about $7,000 (after the Lifesong grant) to be fully funded. So close:)

The colossal car wash!!

   Words cannot describe how Joey and I felt on Saturday during our car wash, if we had not made a single dime we would have left feeling rich beyond our wildest dreams. Our amazing friends and family showed up and blessed us with hard work and lots of laughs. We enjoyed 4 hours of sunshine, soap, water and fellowship (a few cars were washed as well) I was able to share pictures of our sweet boys and explain our adoption journey. My hot hubby stood on the side of the road and waved signs for hours. It was also so very fun to watch all the little ones washing and serving, they didn't even know that they were storing up treasures in heaven! My only regret of the day was not bringing my camera and taking pictures to show our new sons how much they are loved! In my defense I worked the night before and was going on no sleep for over 24 hours:) Our grand total at the end of the wash was $1,278!! A nice step closer to our final goal. A HUGE thank you to everyone who showed up to wash, most with kids in tow, and to the others who stayed at home to watch children. The adoption journey is hard but at a time in our lives when we truly have the least amount of money we have never felt so rich and full of joy! God is so good and He is using His children to bless us so much. Thank you everyone!!

Don't forget!

  The big car wash is Saturday!! 10-2pm We have been so blessed with volunteers to wash or make signs and borrow buckets. We are praying for great weather and to spread the word about adoption in general. If we can show God's love to a stranger we have had a successful car wash!
  No real big news otherwise just waiting for the phone call. On a side note and in an effort to be truly transparent. We will be leaving next week to go on vacation. We planned and paid for this vacation in January before we even dreamed we would be adopting. This summer we looked into cancelling or being able to transfer the reservation to another family (so we could do an adoption give away) but we were not allowed. It is a use it or lose it deal. In late June, Joey's company told him he could not go on our vacation due to the travel that would be involved with the adoption. I was so very upset. I look at this trip as the last family vacation before life gets very hard. Our four wonderful biological children have been amazing through this journey but they deserve our time and attention as well. We will be traveling out of the country for a LONG time and afterwards much of our attention and time will be spent with the new little boys. Anyway....I prayed and prayed that God would allow a way for Joey to go on this trip. Well....He did:) In His own mysterious way! So we will be leaving for a week to Florida spending a few days at Disney and a few days just relaxing.
   As I stated before this trip was pre-planned and payed for no money we receive goes to any of our "family" expenses. We have a separate account set aside for donations that are given directly to us, our FSP is controlled by Reece's Rainbow and our Lifesong Grant is controlled by Lifesong. Just wanted to be clear!:)

God is the great Provider!!!

 Huge Thank you to Ryan Merryman for claiming us as friends!!:) We have been approved for a matching grant with Lifesong for Orphans through Family Christian Bookstore for $6,000!!! Ahh, this grant is a matching grant so for us to receive any of the money it needs to be matched. Which makes giving so much more fun!:) If you give $50 we get $100! If you give $500 we get $1,000! If we receive the full matching grant we will have raised $12,000. Thank you so much for all who have prayed regarding our funding this is a huge step in reaching our goal of being fully funded. If you would like to give to our adoption in this way see below! 

Please make checks payable to Lifesong for Orphans
In the memo please note your gift preference with 
Family Number #3911 and Family Name: Breakfield. Please mail checks to:
Lifesong for Orphans
PO Box 40
Gridley, IL 61744

SUBMITTED SUBMITTED SUBMITTED!!!!

 We have made it to this point and honestly I don't know how we did! (Well I do God, Who sent the awesome support of family, friends and strangers) We were officially submitted today in our boy's country. We are now only waiting on travel dates, one amazing phone call that will tell us what day to be in Eastern Europe. We still have not heard anything back on the two grants but we have our car wash coming up on the 31st. I feel like our adoption has reached full term, I went to 42 weeks with my fourth baby so I know there is a wait ahead of me but we are still so close!!:) Praise God we are submitted!!

Car Wash!!

  We have been busy this past week planning a car wash! We are so excited that Terry Hawley has graciously offered to let us use his Dairy Queen location. We are joining with the Middle School Pastor Kyle Kelley and his wife Becca who are also in an international adoption. If you are local and around on Saturday August 31 come over and enjoy a blizzard while we wash your car!:) It feels so good to have our paperwork done and we can now focus our attention of preparing our home for the boys and raising money for travel costs. Continued prayer request are timing of our submission and DAP appointments, fundraising, health and safety of the boys, and childcare arrangements while we are out of the country.

The Home Stretch:)

   Can't believe we are here! We received our I171H (our immigration approval) in the mail yesterday evening. It is now notarized and ready to head to Richmond on Monday for apostille. Then off it goes to Eastern Europe and we are done. There is a possibility of our whole dossier being submitted on Thursday!! Eeekkk! Your submittal date is one of the big ones. It means paperwork for the time being is done and in country. After that we just wait for our travel date known as our DAP appointment. As I might have mentioned before we will be one of the first families submitted with a new form requesting expedited DAP appointments for special needs children. We are hopeful that it will decrease our wait from submission to DAP. The current wait without the expedited form is 9-12 weeks. So I guess now our current prayer request are safe and speedy travel of our documents and quick submittal and DAP.
     Also as we are so close to the end I am staring to feel panicky about raising the $18-20,000 we still need before we travel. When we knew we still had time it didn't feel so big but now that time is running short we are really feeling the pressure. God knows and sent an angel today straight to our door with a handful of cash. He only said God told me to give this to you! Asking for money is such a humbling thing but what has been so amazing about this process is for the most part the people that have given are not the ones we have asked! Which just further shows us that God is working and He definitely works in mysterious ways:) Last prayer request is I have started my pumping schedule to induce lactation and so far have no results but I am determined to work hard at this and give it a full effort. I am slightly thankful for something to "do" every 2-3 hours while I patiently wait for our DAP!:)

Waiting and more waiting...

   So we still haven't received our official on paper approval which we will need to notarize, apostille and then send over to Eastern Europe. I called and spoke with our officer this morning and she said that her supervisor needs to okay the approval first. Ugg more waiting. I was so hoping to get it out with a group of families leaving Saturaday for EE. So excited for them! We are stuck in a waiting pattern with so many things in our life right now that sometimes I could just scream. Oh well while I wait I will paint:) two new little cribs that Lord willing will soon have little boys to sleep in them!

Amazon link

   Devoted followers:) I have uploaded an Amazon link to the side of my blog. If you should need to shop please use the little linky and we will earn a percentage toward our adoption:) It's the little things!

AHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

WE HAVE USCIS APPROVAL!!!! MOMMY AND DADDY ARE COMING BOYS!!!:)

When will I learn?

   Last week we left Tuesday morning to attempt to have our fingerprints taken. Our whole family had prayed and prayed about this situation (and many of you sent sweet comments that you were praying as well) As you know we were able to get our fingerprints with no problem. God answered our prayers with a yes. You would think that I would take that experience and go forward with faith that there is awesome power in prayer. Sadly no, I jump right back into trying to "do" God's work myself. I have been calling USCIS daily (sometimes more then once a day) to check with our officer on the status of our application. We were told by our agency to "grease the wheels." Well all the phone calls have gone right to voice mail, not once have we been able to reach our officer. We tried at different times in the day. Over the weekend we thought maybe she was on vacation so we would reach her Monday. Nope:( right to voice mail this morning. I know this sounds like such a little thing but at the end of this adoption paper chaos being this close to being done makes us crazy people. I was so discouraged and thinking about how I could get in touch with this person all week. It finally hit me that I had not prayed about it! I was working so hard on my own strength to get this done that I forgot about my super power:) I could call all I wanted for the next three years but unless God wants us approved nothing is going to happen. SO.....would you please join us in praying for our USCIS officer to process our file and approve us to bring two sweet blessings into the US. As hard as it is, it is so exciting to be in positions where the only way things are going to work out are if God works miracles! We are in so many situations right now that the world would look at us and say give up, stop trying. But we know we serve a living God. We are honored to be able to give God all the glory for carrying us through and pray we learn the lessons He is trying to teach us (the first time:).

Beauty from Ashes

  It has been 5ish months since we began our adoption journey. I feel like our lives have been turned upside down, but in a good way:) Before we began this journey I knew very little about international orphans and the conditions they live in. I knew next to nothing about down syndrome, and I took so much in my life for granted. God has been slowing taking away all our hindrances to faith, our health insurance, his job (financial security) our control over the timing of our adoption. But I can honestly say I have never been more happy and full of joy then I have been in the last few weeks. My marriage is stronger and Joey and I are truly loving spending so much time together. In a weird way it is a dream come true. Who wouldn't want to not work and have 24/7 family time? We have hit obstacles with the adoption that make the little things we accomplish all the more sweet. We cannot scrimp and save for the adoption and try to pay for it ourselves, so we have to trust that God will provide the money. We were so blessed to be able to walk in and have our fingerprints done yesterday at USCIS department. I called yesterday to update our status with their office and we were told we have an officer assigned to our case. That is a great sign!! We could possibly be looking at approval soon, that means we could be submitted in the next few weeks. The timeline is getting shorter and shorter but our funds have not moved above the $1,700 range. My Bible reading this morning was from Luke 5. Jesus was calling his disciples and he told Simon to let down his nets to catch some fish. Simon told Jesus that they had been fishing all night long and hadn't caught ANYTHING. That is how we feel right now.  BUT...Simon said in vs 5 "because you say so, I will let down the nets." If you don't know the story Simon's crew caught such a large amount of fish they had to call another boat over to help them and even still both boats were so full they began to sink. I know without a shadow of a doubt that God has called us to this adoption, and we are trusting that in His timing our nets will overflow with all we need to accomplish what He has called us to do.
PS. Please don't think we are just sitting around waiting for donations for our adoption either:) We have applied for grants as soon as our homestudy was finished however most grants take months to be approved. We could easily be done with our adoption before we hear if we were approved. We have also done two yard sales, I have been selling Mary Kay and a few other home sales friends have donated their commission to our adoption.

Calling all Prayer Warriors!:)

   Well tomorrow we try again! We will be headed up to Alexandria to try to have our fingerprints taken for immigration. Being turned away last time was a very emotional experience and I probably won't sleep tonight but we would love for you to join us in praying for this situation. After we are printed we can pray for a speedy approval!:)
   Joey has been working hard on his resume and small projects around the house. I told him this afternoon that he needs to find a work-from-home job because we are going to miss having him around. It has been about two weeks since we sent out our support letter. If you received one please prayerfully consider how you could join us in our crusade to ransom two precious little boys! If you didn't receive one just click on the link to the right with cutie Nehemiah's face:)

Where do you turn when life is impossible?

   I am happy to announce I am out of my funk and ready to fight again! Unfortunately Joey is really feeling the weight of our situation today. He is looking into the impossible place we find ourselves and it is overwhelming. How do you interview for a job knowing you need off for a 3-4 week trip to Eastern Europe and you still don't even know when that trip will be? How do you apply for benefits when you are bringing in two special needs children? How do you not become consumed with anger at the people/company that picked this exact time to lay you off? I know the answer but it is so much easier to type then live. GOD is the answer. He is the God of the impossible. Only God will get us through this situation and I want everyone reading this blog to have front row seats. We may cry and whine through this process but I want you to watch God work miracles in our lives and the lives of these children. We have no idea how this can possibly work out and we need your prayers. Joey especially today and tonight as I head off to work and leave him alone with the children. Please lift him up, he is such a selfless, sacrificial husband, father, and friend. I hate seeing him hurting, but I also can't wait to see what God is going to do! If you are reading this and are in an impossible situation and you don't have the hope that I talked about. We would love to talk with you about how we are able to have hope and joy in our lives no matter the circumstances! Message me!:)

Surrounded by rejection

   We drove up 2 hours to my parents house last night to be closer to the Alexandria office for federal fingerprinting last night. After putting the kids to bed we drove to my brother's apartment and slept on the smallest hardest futon I have ever seen (thanks Zach:) so we could be up at 6 to be first in line to have our fingerprints taken this morning. We after all of that, they rejected us. Even though we were told by numerous family that have gone before us to this specific office that you can go early they said no and to come back on our appointment date which is August 6th. This is the straw that broke the camels back. I feel so done, I have no fight left in me. Joey is remaining positive and maybe tomorrow I will be able to too. I don't really know what else to say, so I will let Matthew West say how I feel.
You mustYou must think I'm strongTo give me what I'm going through
Well, forgive meForgive me if I'm wrongBut this looks like more than I can doOn my own
I know I'm not strong enough to beeverything that I'm supposed to beI give upI'm not strong enoughHands of mercy won't you cover meLord right now I'm asking you to beStrong enoughStrong enoughFor the both of us
Well, maybeMaybe that's the pointTo reach the point of giving up
Cause when I'm finallyFinally at rock bottomWell, that's when I start looking upAnd reaching out
I know I'm not strong enough to beEverything that I'm supposed to beI give upI'm not stong enoughHands of mercy won't you cover me[ From: http://www.metrolyrics.com/strong-enough-lyrics-matthew-west.html ]Lord right now I'm asking you to beStrong enoughStrong enough
Cause I'm brokenDown to nothingBut I'm still holding on to the one thingYou are Godand you are strongWhen I am weak
I can do all thingsThrough Christ who gives me strengthAnd I don't have to beStrong enoughStrong enough
I can do all thingsThrough Christ who gives me strengthAnd I don't have to beStrong enoughStrong enough
Oh, yeah
I know I'm not strong enough to beEverything that I'm supposed to beI give upI'm not stong enoughHands of mercy won't you cover meLord right now I'm asking you to beStrong enoughStrong enoughStrong enough

Read more: MATTHEW WEST - STRONG ENOUGH LYRICS 

We are pressing on!

   Thank you for all your kind words of encouragement and prayers, we are so blessed to have such supportive family and friends. I can't really speak about how we feel and are doing it is all still so new and raw but I do know God called us to adopt. This surprise does not change that at all. We will be moving forward in the adoption process and giving everything we have to bring those boys home. I will not let Satan win this fight. We had been putting aside money for the past few months for the adoption and had planned on continuing that tread until we travels to pay for as much of the cost as we could. God is just letting us know that He will provide everything for the adoption from this point forward. We have to totally trust Him to provide. Our mini safety net we had set up was taken away but that is okay we are trusting and growing our faith. We were so encouraged to receive our federal fingerprint appointment from US immigration yesterday in the mail. We will be traveling to Alexandria in the morning to try and have our fingerprints done early to speed up the process. This is the final step on our part for the adoption. I can't believe we have made it this far!! It is so surreal. Please pray that we are allowed to do this tomorrow and that approval is given quickly after our prints are done. Also please pray for me as I start working more hours at the hospital to cover our bills and Joey stays at home. I have to give up control of my "job" at home and I am not liking it:) Joey has been gracious and is willing to have me explain how I like to have things done but it will be a huge adjustment for our family. We are so very blessed and have so much to be thankful for, we are looking forward to spending more time with Joey/daddy. We plan to be very intentional with our extra time and make memories.
I will leave you with the lyrics to one of the songs we sang at church this morning. It touched my heart, God is so good!
                                                                      "Always"

My foes are many, they rise against me
But I will hold my ground
I will not fear the war, I will not fear the storm
My help is on the way, my help is on the way

Oh, my God, He will not delay
My refuge and strength always
I will not fear, His promise is true
My God will come through always, always

Troubles surround me, chaos abounding
My soul will rest in You
I will not fear the war, I will not fear the storm
My help is on the way, my help is on the way

Oh, my God, He will not delay
My refuge and strength always
I will not fear, His promise is true
My God will come through always, always

I lift my eyes up, my help comes from the Lord
I lift my eyes up, my help comes from the Lord
I lift my eyes up, my help comes from the Lord
I lift my eyes up, my help comes from the Lord
From You Lord, from You Lord

Oh, my God, He will not delay
My refuge and strength always
I will not fear, His promise is true
My God will come through always, always

Oh, my God, He will not delay
My refuge and strength always, always

Doors slamming shut, God open a window!

  We were blindsided this morning. Joey was let go from his job of 11 years. Nothing negative was said about him or his job performance just cut backs were made and he was part of it. With only a month severance pay we are scrambling to figure out health insurance and how this affects the adoption. We know that God is in control and this does not surprise Him. Please pray for peace and for God to show us the next step. We feel very lost and numb at this point.

Sweet friends lift your spirits!

   What a week, after being sick this past week I was looking forward to a holiday weekend to relax and enjoy my family. WRONG! as I prepared for work on Thursday evening of the 4th I started sweating. I remember thinking why am I so hot?! but I had had chills and fever off and on this week after being sick so I shrugged it off and went to work. My hubby texts me an hour or so later and tells me the AC is broken. The outside coil was frozen solid and it was 85 in the house. Poo, a little guilty I was at work all night in the freezing hospital while my family was cooking in our home. Well the service company said it was a holiday weekend and would be out on Monday. Okay three days to kill, we can do this! Friday I got off work around 8 am and when I got home we headed right out to Richmond to apostille the last big chunk of our paperwork. I fell asleep for what felt like 1 second on the way there:) Apostilles took about 2 hours and we headed back home. At home around 1pm I went to lay down I didn't care how hot it was I was tired! Joey woke me up at 3:30 because he was leaving for a Nationals Game. So cranky mommy got up. It was hot and the kids were crazy so I said lets go to the pool. I thought I would let them cool off and get nice and tired and then we could go to bed early:) If you have 4 kids or more you know prepping for the pool is no small task so after that hurdle was crossed off we went. As I pull into the pool I notice lots of people leaving and I get a sinking feeling. I pull up to one and ask what happened. A child peed in the pool and it is closed for the rest of the day. Now I am already frazzled, tired and grumpy. I have lubed up 4 kids and wrestled them into their swimsuits and packed a dinner and pool bag. I started crying and drove away. The kids all asking a million questions at once "why aren't we at the pool, why are you crying, where are we going, what is for dinner, can we have gum, can we go to chuckecheese?" I kid you not those were the questions!:) I didn't know where I was going but I wasn't going home. Joey called to "check in" and at that moment I hated him! It wasn't his fault but I was tired and he was off having a good ole time while I was stuck in this mess. I ended up driving to a park that has a small creek and the kids and I had a great time throwing rocks and splashing away. We ate the meal I packed and I treated them to slushies on the way home. I think God was showing me the even when things don't go as planned they can still be amazing and wonderful. I really did have a great time with the kids at the park. After we got home and everyone was in bed I tried to relax and fall asleep. If you have never worked night shift you wouldn't understand that even though you are so tired you want to sleep, your body won't let you. I was also getting hotter and hotter I check the thermostat and noticed it was 89 downstairs. It was 11 and I thought I should check on the kids. Poor Meah had a ring of sweat around her in the bed and Hannah was thrashing like she was having the worst dream of her life. Jedidiah was awake staring at me as if to question "why?" I decided to get them all up and take them to my inlaws house (just a few blocks away) to sleep there. They were out of town and I knew the kids and I would rest better there. So by midnight I had the kids set up and settling down, I text Joey to let him know I was not at home and tried to fall asleep. Just as I was dosing off Joey walks in:) We were finally asleep after 1am (Ironically Joey's moms alarm woke us up at 4:20 that morning)
   So we got up the next morning ready to go to my parents house. We had planned on spending Saturday with them for our 4th of July plans. We rounded up the kids trying to minimize the disaster made on the house and headed to the van. I was so looking forward to spending the day at my parents house. Just relaxing I was still tired and we were trying to to think about how we were going to pay for the AC repair on top of the adoption. After all the kids were in the van we tried to leave, but the van wouldn't start. I was in shock, this was not happening. I was so thankful Joey was there so he could keep me from throwing an adult temper tantrum in front of the kids. We unpacked the kids and went back into my inlaws house. I believe with all my heart that there was a problem with our van that did not involve the battery. We prayed together as a family and I put on FB what was happening. I received immediate responses from friends saying they were praying. I also got text with offers of vehicles, homes and car repair. We are so blessed with our support system! After about 1/2 and hour Joey decided to try and jump the van with his truck, why not it couldn't hurt. It worked! We decided to go up to my parents, praying the van would make it.
   Today is now Monday at 3pm, we bought a new car battery for $100 and I just put $600 on my credit card for the AC fan motor to be replaced. But, we have a running van and a house that is on its way to being cool. We got to spend the weekend with my family and we have so many other blessings. We were also able to overnight the paperwork we got apostilled on Friday and it is now in Eastern Europe already being translated! (we sent it with another family going to get their little one so it was hand delivered yesterday) We now only have one more piece of paper to receive and we are done!!! It is the approval from US immigration. Please join with us in praying that this approval arrives quickly. The wait could be 75+ days! We constantly remind ourselves that this is in God's hands and in His perfect timing!

WARNING! this post contains talk about breastfeeding!!!

  I LOVE breastfeeding!:) I have enjoyed being able to provide for my children in that way so very much. There are very few things sweeter then snuggling with your little one and having that intimate moment just the two of you in the middle of the night. God made such a perfect way for mommies to bond with their babies and provide them with easily digestible nutrition and antibodies to fight infection. All around it is a great experience. After giving birth with my last baby we decided not to have anymore children. Joey really felt God saying that our family was complete and had a vasectomy. I was so very sad and cried a lot that month.  The next few months my husband would wake up to me sobbing (and I mean pillow soaked, sobbing) about not ever breastfeeding again. I know it sounds crazy but God had given me such a strong desire for more children and of all things to breastfeed again. I cried and asked Him why did I have this desire when I knew we would not have more children? (Joey doesn't know but I also prayed that we would miraculously get pregnant) Well as always God does have a plan and He knows best. A few months after my last sobbing fit, He called us to adopt. We now know that He has two little ones we hope to bring home soon. I also learned an amazing thing while in our adoption group FB page. You can induce lactation!!! What?! How amazing is that. I won't go into the details of how exactly you do this but it is possible, and I am going to try my hardest to do it! I would love your prayers as I start the process soon, as it takes a few months as it would if you were pregnant and preparing for a baby. It is quite a commitment in the preparing months and there is no guarantee that I will be able to produce milk, but I would love to be able to provide this for our boys. It would be awesome for them in terms of bonding, nutrition, and immunity. I am not going to lie, 50% of my  desire to do this is for myself:) I really do love breastfeeding my children and I so look forward to having that time again. The "fair" side of my mommy brain says that I nursed the others I should nurse these too. If you would like to support us in this, thank you! I have no time to hear about how this won't work and isn't possible I am just too busy!:) Found these on clearance yesterday, I am ready to go!!

The stress is killing me!

  I have worked in the healthcare field for over 12 years, I have a great immune system unless I get stressed. I have been sick more times in the last 6 months then I have been in the last 6 years. When we started this adoption journey I read so many blogs about other families that had adopted or were in the process. I read about how these families felt "attacked" by the devil. He hates adoption it is too perfect a picture of the redemption that we have in Christ. It is what God has called our family to do and the devil wants to stop us. I can not explain how "attacked" I have felt since we started this process. From job stresses for both Joey and I, to financial strain and even just plan physically we have been sick so much. Joey and I both have gotten the same GI bug three times in the last few months (and I do clean my home!) This past Friday we got some more discouraging news that just about broke me. I then managed to get a sore throat/head cold, worked my shift Saturday night in the ICU and then woke up Monday morning throwing up. I felt like Anne from Green Gables," in the depths of dispair!" I keep telling myself that in 6 months all this will be funny, this too shall pass but it is still hard to be in it right now.  I am so blessed and have so much to be thankful for. I will not let the devil win in this battle. When I look at the big picture and gain some perspective my life is so easy and I have more then I could ever need. I have awesome friends and family that lift me up in prayer (and I do feel your prayers) Not to mention my wonderful husband who has been such a support during this process. Yesterday as he was caring for the 4 kids and checking on me, he was putting together our package for USCIS and mailing it off, prepping for two different grant applications we are applying for and finalizing our checklist to finish the paperwork for Eastern Europe. So today I am choosing to rejoice, His mercies are new every morning!

Money Math

  Now that we are starting the home stretch of the adoption I have started thinking about then upcoming cost. At this point we have used our tax refund this year and personal savings to pay for all the cost regarding the adoption. Our friends have donated items and/or bought from our fundraising campaigns such as Mary Kay and 31. We have raised $1,500 through those efforts, we have put in a little over $6,490 in fees (HS, vital records, apostille, mailing cost) Our little Nehemiah (Dane) had a grant for $4,000 donated to him prior to us committing to him. So that all totals to...$11,900. We need $18,100 to reach our goal of $30,000. We are hoping that our final cost will be under that total but that will depend on time in country and travel fees. Our known big cost coming up is facilitation fees we need $12,500 our Eastern Europe team when we get there. The rest of the cost are flights ~$3,000 (hopefully) $430 for childrens' embassy medicals, $460 for childrens' visas, $720 for immigration fees, and ~$2,000 for expedited passports. Total= $19,110 which doesn't include our logging and food for the time we are in country so I don't think that $30,000 is far off our total need. From what we have figured we need about $20,000 at this point to finish the adoption. Now some fun math!! that is only 200 people giving $100!! 40 people giving $500 (which two of our donors have given this amount!:) 20 people giving $1,000!! 100 people giving $200. When I think about it that way it seems so simple and doable. I know 100 people.
   I do want to also add that I have read in many places about how adoption will tell you who your true friends are. I am so very happy to say all our friends have come around us and supported us in so many ways. The two families that have donated monetarily are families that are "like us" young families with their own children to care for. These dear friends felt their donation, and knowing their sacrifice just shines God's love. We hopefully will be travelling in 3-4 months. Please pray for us to be placed with an USCIS officer so our application can be processed and for our fundraising efforts to be fruitful!

Our God is AWESOME!

  Our HS agency just called and our clearances were done today! God did send His angel armies to Richmond today!! I am an emotional disaster! We can now officially finalize our HS and send it off to immigration and finish this paperwork! Thank you for praying and to God be the glory!

The God of angel armies is on my side!

   This clearance thing has been so very hard for me, I pray and try to give it over to God but I still am so impatient. As of today it has been three weeks and they haven't charged our card the fee for the clearance which means it hasn't been started yet! Yesterday at church I felt like every word was directed at me. Every song was so special! I prayed for God's angel army to storm into the Richmond police station and supernaturally finish our clearances. That mental image really helped me!:) But I also heard what God was saying to me in the sermon. Our pastor, Drew Landry spoke of sleepless nights. I have had so many of those lately. Worrying about my sweet boys so far away from their mommy, possibly hungry and very possibly very very hot! I worry about getting to them in time, decreasing the amount of "damage" being done by neglect, and so many other things. My sweet sister-in-law told my husband this week that she was praying for someone/anyone that will be our boys advocate for them as they wait. Someone to hold and love on them as they wait for Mommy and Daddy to come. That touched my heart so much! As I wait and have these sleepless nights, God is using them to teach and mold me. I woke up this morning promising myself and God that I would focus my attention on something other then myself. This week is VBS at our church and Joey and I have the privileged to teach the entering K5 class. I have an amazing opportunity to impact these sweet little ones and tell them that they are special, God loves them, and that they are a blessing! So for this week, I have 18 adoptive children God has given me to love on. I intend to do it with all of my heart. If you all could pray for the clearance situation for us though that would be great!

The Pillow is gone!:)

 Ruth Einfeld is the winner of the quilted pillow! She really wanted that gift:) So we start anew with the quilted tote! After I receive 10 donations of at least $5 I will pick a winner!

Moving along as fast as a snail!

  We are still waiting for those stinkn clearances and yesterday I called to check on them because it should have taken 2 weeks and it has been 3! Sometimes I would just rather not know things! Apparently we signed an extra box on the form and they were sent back AHHHHHHHHHHHHH. I was pretty much in a funk all afternoon after hearing this news. But! Last week we applied to USCIS (immigration) to get the ball rolling with a nice $890 check, even though we don't have a finalized home study to send them. They emailed us saying our case has been started! so exciting the last step of this paper nightmare has begun! Our first set of papers is now transferring from TX to MO, which should take two weeks. In those two weeks we hope to get our finalized home study sent to MO to meet it and really get going with annoying phone calls to try and speed up the 2 month process to be approved:) Once we receive our official approval letter we sent that to Eastern Europe and that's it!!!!! We wait for our date to go. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Come on clearances come on!
   Oh and we just need a few thousand dollars too:)

try again auction pics!

Pillow is gone!:) 6/20/2013

Okay here is another try to have the auction pictures show up!

Wedgie!

   Well in my last post two days ago I said I was putting on my big girl panties the devil decided to give me a wedgie! Thursday afternoon we sent off our first wave of immigration paperwork to start the process, and we felt good to begin the final paper process. Joey headed off to play softball for a team that was down a player at 7 and I put the kids to bed. Earlier that afternoon I had mowed the lawn for Joey as his fathers day gift, and by now my back was killing me! I had been dreaming of my Epsom salt bath for hours. I no sooner climbed in the tub and Isaiah and Meah came running in to tell me Hannah was throwing up! NICE I get out clean her up and get all the kids tucked back into bed thinking it was just having too much candy before bed.  I climb back in the tub and...you guessed it! Repeat. We spend the next few hours cleaning and tucking until about 10:30 when she settles down. I crawl into bed and crash at 11. At 11:30 Joey comes home and I am going to be honest I was not happy with him. He was banging and booming all around! He is usually very careful to be quiet and I couldn't understand what his deal was! He came upstairs and went in the bathroom to shower, continuing to make such a ruckus that he woke the baby up. Now I was ready to let him have it! He crawls into bed at midnight moaning and groaning and wiggling so much I finally ask what is his deal! He hurt his knee and can't get comfortable. I am not too sympathetic at midnight  I shove a pillow under his knee and give him some aleve.
   Morning comes and Joey is feeling worse. He asks me to look at his knee and as I get out of bed I feel a wave of nausea come over me. I run to the bathroom and start my own journey of throwing up. When I finally make it back to bed 30 minutes later Joey is emotional realizing something is seriously wrong with his leg and what that means for our family.  So many things run through our heads but mainly we just try to make it through the day with lots of little kiddos running around. I survive until naptime and at 1:30 go and lie down. Joey heads off to the doctor to have his knee looked at. Thankfully it is his left leg so he can drive. The doctor thinks it is a torn meniscus and orders an MRI. A sweet friend brings dinner over and we let the kids watch tv for the rest of the day:) I may not understand why or what God's plan is but I do know that He loves us more then we can ever know. Each day I am learning to lean on Him more and more.

Discouragement:(

  To be honest this past week has been rough for me, I am discouraged! We have gotten no response to our auctions or sponsor letters we sent out. Actually we are in the negative for our photo cards because a few of them came back undelivered so we are out the postage! (I would like to add that after my pouting at the beginning of the week a few friends did order some of the totes that I have been selling as a fundraiser that really raised my spirits! thank you!) We are waiting waiting waiting on that second redo clearance and the third reference for our finalized home study draft. Joey has said from the beginning the money never bothered  him, weird because in matters other then adoption money matters usually stress him and not me! But the money part really stresses me out. I look at it from a different angle though. I am currently working night shift at a local hospital, my goal and dream would be to quit or at least minimize my hours after our kiddos come home. So when I look at having to finance $20,000 we have left to pay and then another vehicle to me it looks like more time at my job then time at home with my precious children. I should have given a disclaimer at the beginning that this is a whine post:) I just feel stalled with everything then we got more lovely news about our immigration paperwork. What used to be a relatively quick and painless process now will probably take at least 75 days! AHH
   I have prayed and prayed this week for God to guide our adoption and then like a light bulb in my slow dense head He spoke to me. I am working, I am drawing you close to Me. I always think about and look to the end of our adoption journey as the good part, the happy ending. I need to realize that this is a good too, this is a blessing! All these things are teaching and molding me into the woman that God desires me to be. I cherish my biological children more, I respect and honor all the work my husband has done. I have been on my knees more in the last few months then would have been if we were not adopting. I need to pull my big girl panties on and realize if I keep being discouraged then the evil one is winning. I refuse to let that happen! God is going to do great things in these little ones lives. I am so blessed to one day, hopefully soon, be their mother. I know He will open the doors in His perfect time and when He has finished teaching me what I need to learn. Please pray for grace because I can be a little stubborn:)!

More Auction Items!!!

•    The next great item we have to auction off is this beautiful pillow and tote, made with love by one of the children's advocates through Reece's Rainbow. Just $5 an entry!

  Perfect for 4th of July coming up! 

  Red, White & Blue raggedy 9-patch pillow. Measures 17"x17". Would look great in any room.... on sofa, chair or bed. Soft and cuddly. Made from 100% cotton fabrics and stuffed with 100% premium polyester fiberfill. Machine washable on cold/gentle cycle. Line dry or low heat. (Pillow is gone!:)
• 
  
   Quilted tote is great to carry those little extras that don't fit in your purse..... Kindle or Nook, magazines, kids toys and books, lunch and snacks.
  

  Tote measures 11 3/4" x 13". Straps are 9 1/2" long and reinforced for strength. Pleated bottom is 4". Has a loop and button closure and is fully lined in white.

  A patch work design in peachy pink, yellow, purple, greens and yellows. Back has two fabric loops for decoration or to use to clip something onto.

  
  

Auction!

   I am having a mini auction for an adorable Noah's Ark bedding set! Only $5 donation gets your name in the drawing to win it! Just go to the button on the side of this blog and donate then message, email, or text me your amount and you will be entered! $5=1 entry, $10=2, $20=4. The set includes quilt, bumper, bed skirt, diaper stacker, 2 valences, 5 wall hangings, night light, and cute lamp!

Home Study Draft

  Our wonderful social worker Clair sent us the rough draft to our home study yesterday afternoon. We read through it for spelling and information errors. After having those checked we get it checked by our facilitation team so that it all looks good for the country requirements and translation issues. We now wait for our new clearances and our last reference. It feels so good to have that semi-done! I started to feel like shopping and found these cute little sweatshirts on clearance and thought they were perfect! I laid awake last night imagining how cute my boys will be wearing these!:)

The first wave

  So excited to say our first wave of paperwork is off on it's way to Eastern Europe via another Reece's Rainbow family in CA. It contained a majority of our dossier that we had apostilled yesterday in Richmond. I  called our home study agency yesterday and everything is in except one of our references, which when we then emailed him said he did not receive it.:( We also learned that the state police clearances that we finished will not be good enough for our dossier, they are on Department of Social Services letterhead and they need to be on State Police letterhead. I told you this paperwork is annoying! So off we sent new forms with $50 yesterday hoping this doesn't add another 6 weeks to our timeline. We should be seeing our first draft to our home study any day now. We finished everything two weeks ago and Claire said give her about two weeks to write it up. Once we receive the draft we can start our immigration paperwork. Sorry if I have stated all this boring information already. I run what needs to be done multiple times a day in my head, and Joey calls and we do our checklist together at least once a day. I love how involved and invested he is in this process. Sometimes he annoys me with how much he wants to check and recheck that we have everything.
   Yesterday after coming home from Richmond and feeling like we had finished a big adoption milestone, I felt like shopping! I wanted to find one thing for the boys room. Joey took the two big kids to a nearby baseball diamond to play some ball and I took the two littles out shopping. Well 5 stores later I couldn't find anything that I liked:( I even went to JoAnns to try and find fabric to make something but didn't see anything that said buy me. I need to keep the room semi neutral so it is not too much of a shock to the boys. They are coming from an almost sterile white environment and too much color and business will be stressful for them. I  would like to do an airplane theme because that is how they are coming into our family, flying across the world. Oh well I have time, it just figures when I do have an evening to shop I don't find anything:)

Starting Freezer Meals

   At the end of my pregnancy with Jedidiah I had to do something, especially for the 12 days that I went overdue! I made lots of freezer meals which were wonderful. He was born November 12 and I did not cook a meal until after Christmas. So this week as I thought about what I could do while I wait on our home study paperwork and for the next few months of waiting I thought I would start again at the freezer meal stock up. I know with almost twin boys joining the family in addition to being away from home for over a month I will not feel like cooking. I plan on tripling one of the meals I make during the week and freezing the two extras. I found this is the easiest way for me to work it into our schedule. It really isn't too much extra work. I will have to hide the meals from my husband though, he already commented last night that he thought I was cooking them for him while I was in country. I told him I would rather he made macaroni and cheese the whole time I was gone because it is going to be chaos when I get back!:) I will probably leave some meals prepared for when he will be home alone with the kids. At this time our plan is to both go for the first trip. We should be gone 2 1/2-3 weeks in which we meet the kids, go to court and are approved to adopt. We will then come home for the 10 day mandatory wait. Then I will go back with my mother to pick up the boys and apply for visas and passports. Once we receive those it is homeward bound. We should be headed out sometime this fall I am hoping for September but Joey keeps reminding me to not put a time in my head. Anyway I am planning on wintery meals, chili, soups and such plus those seem to freeze better:) If you have any favorite freezer meals and would like to pass them along, I might give them a try I have time!

Car shopping stinks!

   My husband and I are not car people. We don't get excited about the newest and greatest vehicle out there. We do get excited about a car that works for us and is paid off. I will me painfully honest, I hesitated to commit to a second child because I knew that meant we would need a bigger vehicle. I hate car shopping and car salesmen and the whole deal. Plus I love my van. Anyway we went and looked for a brief moment at the Toyota Seinna 8 passenger van. That was my top pick, not a massive crazy thing but it was a no go:( the back latch covers the side seatbelt and the front middle doesn't look like it could safely hold a car seat. So now we have pretty much decided on the Nissan NV. I will admit it is a very cool van. It is convenient for all the kids to get in and out. But it just came out so the odds of us finding a used one are slim to none. We are hoping to wait until after the boys come home and then maybe find a 2012 NV when they are trying to get the new 2014's out and maybe get a deal. We will see, until then I get to wrap my mind around driving a Nissan Titan truck engine with a 12 passenger bus on the end of it:)
    In a separate car note, I was involved in a hit and run accident on my way to work Sunday evening. As I was going down Rt3 east a man in a white sports car hits me and the car next to me from behind. He then accelerated into the second car again. I was in shock not quite realizing everything that was happening. As we all pulled over to the side, the man that hit us gets out makes some rude comments to the second car then gets back in his mangled vehicle and speeds off. We all stood in shock not sure what if anything we could do. After about 20 minutes the police show up and take about two hours to take statements and pictures. The poor other driver was hit harder then me and had a terrible headache and it was quite hot outside. After finishing up I headed off to work arriving around 8 pm. After about an hour my neck and back were starting to bother me, nothing terrible just annoying aches. Work was busy and just grabbed a some Motrin. Around 2 am work slowed down and I really struggled to stay awake. I think the adrenaline kick from the accident and then the motrin relaxing me made my body want to crash. I made it through the shift and headed home at 8am were I did crash. So very thankful my children were not in the car and no one was seriously injured. The police call this morning and said they caught the man that hit us and he is in jail being charged with two counts of felony hit and run.