Christmas highlights

Grace's Giggle

What a gift we received today! A volunteer at GLA made this precious video. She reminds us of "Tickle Me Elmo". Remember him? Noah had one when he was little. You pressed his foot and he giggled. She sounds a lot like Elmo!  Ohhhhh if we could just have her in our arms!

Our Christmas Gift

We are so thankful for many many reasons that Grace is at GLA. They are teaching her how to love because they truly do love their babies and give them the best care. Receiving these updates and pictures each month fills our hearts with joy.

Here's what she's been up to:

This month we took hand and foot prints of all the kids at the Main House. I do my best to have this done about every three months so you have an extra treasure to take home with you when you come and pick up Malozie. Each child reacts a differently to having their hands and feet painted and then pressed against the paper. Most of them are intrigued by the different feel and will closely examine it while others will want to eat it. Malozie was quite content to allow her hands to be painted but she was one of the little ones who though just maybe it would taste good. She tried to put her hands in her mouth after her hands were painted but she was stopped before she could get it there. 

 Developmentally Malozie is advancing well. She is getting stronger in her ability to stand on her own and walk along furniture. She is does not yet have the confidence or stability to step out on her own but she is so very close. We think she will be walking independently in the next few months. She has seemed a little more temperamental in the evening then she had in the past. During the day she is happy and content for the most part but in the evening she will become a little irritable when she is tired. She will whine and cry and act like she is unsure if she wants to be held, lay in her crib, or what. Her nannies do a great job of calming her and getting her to go to sleep when she starts to act like this. Overall Malozie is doing really well and has one of the most precious smiles I have ever seen, especially with her teeth peeking out now! 

Height: 69 cm Weight 17 lbs. 15 oz. 

Humbled

Humbled. That's me. Once again, God has completely knocked my socks off. After finding this blog entry about when Malozie first came to GLA, I left a comment for the lady who wrote it. Susan, the blog author, was the NICU nurse who cared for our baby.

Yesterday, Susan friended me on Facebook. Today, she sent me a message and included another blog entry that I remember reading back in January when she wrote it (I had been following her blog for a while). I remember the baby who died. I remember weeping as I read the story. I remember reading about the "after baby", but never knew she would be ours.

We knew our Grace came to GLA in fragile condition. We knew she was starving. But, today, God allowed me to see the actual state of her little body. She was truly on the brink of death. Her tiny five pound body was eating itself. Reading these words about your child will bring you to your knees:

"her chances of survival are extremely poor"

That was our girl. Our bright, smiley, chubby girl---by all medical standards, she should not have survived her rough beginning. Today God revealed to me through her story that she truly is a MIRACLE child and that it is only by His GRACE that she lives today. Grace. A perfect name for her. God gave us her name years ago. We just never imagined how fitting it would be.

When Grace came to GLA, she was 6 weeks old and had a protein-energy deficiency. The medical term is Kwashiorkor. Even though she looked chubby, it was just swelling---very dangerous swelling. I have no doubt that God used the previous baby's death---Wideline was her name---to give Susan the wisdom she needed to save our girl. 

Grace had been spoon-fed porridge for the first 6 weeks of her life. Our sweet girl was starving, to say the least. If you would like to read the whole story of God revealing Grace's trouble to Susan, you can click here---grab some Kleenex first.

I have thought a lot about Mary today. When the angel Gabriel visited her and told her she would be the mother of Jesus, I believe Mary was as surprised as I feel right now. This is part of her song:

And Mary said:

“My soul glorifies the Lord     

and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has been mindful
    of the humble state of his servant.

"The humble state of his servant". Mary. I get that. Mary was worthy to be Jesus' mother. God looked down from Heaven and chose her. But, ME? Why has He looked down from Heaven in all of His gracious wisdom and chosen me to be the mother of this sweet miracle we call Grace? I am not worthy. These thoughts have consumed me and brought me to tears all day long. Grace's life was on the line less than a year ago. God could have easily taken her into His perfect Heaven. He could've chosen to heal her that way. But he didn't. He saw her fragile state, he knew she'd be a McCraw, and He gave Susan the wisdom she needed to bring Grace back from the brink of death. 

I will continue to praise Him and I will continue to stand humbled. Humbled at a Mighty God who chose me--chose US to parent His miracle child. Also beyond thankful for his servant, Susan.

And I can't wait to tell Grace of God's amazing grace in her life! 

Such a gift!

It was such a gift to receive these 5 pictures from a GLA volunteer today. Our baby girl truly is so happy---there are many other babies who don't always smile so much in their pictures!

The "Haiti" spelled out in ABC blocks is so beautiful to me. I'm thinking of enlarging it to hang in Grace's nursery.

The lady in the 2 pictures with her is Grace's volunteer. She stays at GLA for long periods of time (4-5 months), goes home for a few weeks, and comes back. I am so thankful that Grace is being so well cared for and so loved on! Doesn't Marguerite just look like the sweetest Grandma? : ) (Oh, about the volunteers: each volunteer at GLA is assigned 6-7 babies to be "their babies". They feed them, change them, give them all of their daily care. So, they are very familiar faces to these kiddos.)

This picture was taken on Oct. 22, so it is her most recent picture. Look at how her hair is growing! It doesn't look so splotchy anymore. Those little rolls on her arms just beg to be kissed and don't get me started on those sweet lips!!! Mmmmmm....so ready to be kissed by Mama!

Another nugget

We keep finding these nuggets of joy. I've been in contact with a volunteer at GLA, now that she's home. We cannot contact them while they're at the orphanage. She is the one who posted lots of pics/video and notes about our baby.

Today, she told me about another blog that was kept by a nurse who worked at GLA.
It is such a blessing to read about our baby and the amazing way that God rescued her. It sounds like she didn't have much time left!
Read this entry (it's the 2nd part of the entry...scroll down til you see the name Malozie).

Wordless Wednesday

October Update

These are the precious words we received for our October update (after pictures):

The main house has 4 nurseries and the children are split up into them depending upon their development. Malozie currently lives in what we call our “URG B” nursery.  There are about 8 kids who live in this nursery and it is the tikes who are getting up on their feet and learning to walk.  Most of them are professional crawlers and can get where they would like to go but they are working on that stability and confidence they need to take steps on their own.  It is an active nursery and the kids from this nursery will join the Toddlers, who walk, on the nursery balcony for their playtime.

Malozie’s day starts between 6:30 and 7 am when the majority of the kids in URG B start to rise.  From 7:30-8am is breakfast time.  The kids will have anything from cereal or scrambled eggs to spaghetti, depending on the day.  After breakfast they get changed and bathed for the day.  The rest of the morning is filled with playtime on the balcony either in the nursery with their nannies or on the third floor balcony for one on one time with their volunteer. They get a snack with juice around 9 am and then they will have a naptime.  Lunch is served at noon and after that they are changed and around 1 pm starts the main naptime for everyone.  If they are not napping they will go to the volunteer balcony for an hour in the afternoon. By 3pm most of them are awake and they get a snack and juice.  More play time on the nursery balcony before supper is served at 5pm.  After supper they are bathed and dressed for bed.  This process will often last until 7:30 pm and after that they will wind down and visit with each other from their cribs until the nannies tell them they must lie down and be silent at 8:30 pm. 

Malozie is one of the most adorable and most cherished babies in the nursery.  She has the sweetest disposition and loves to smile and cuddle with anyone who spends time with her.   She is starting to take steps on her own and her nannies are always cheering her on in this.  Her face lights up when she knows she has done a good job.  She is interested in anything that is around her and will watch intently for a little while before going to check it out.  She is very bright and will take time to learn how a toy works before she moves onto something else.  She is definitely becoming more and more independent with her improved walking skills.  She really enjoyed the gifts you sent her this month.  She smiled and giggled the whole time she was examining the gifts you sent and looked at the photos of your family with a lot of interest.  These gifts will be kept in a special bin for Malozie that her current volunteer will bring out for her to play with when she is on the balcony for playtime.  Thank you for sending these precious gifts for her to have and become familiar with.  You will find a few photos of Malozie opening her gifts attached as well.

I am looking forward to the day you get to come and meet this precious little angel in person!

Malozie is healthy and growing:
Height: 68 cm
Weight: 16 lb 4 oz

September Update

Soooo excited to get these today. Our baby girl is growing! 16 pounds already! Her smile just lights up our hearts. ; )

What's next?

I love "showing off" our baby girl! We have had so much fun showing her pictures to our friends and family. The boys even have their own brag books and take them everywhere they go.
Immediately after the "AWWWWW......she is sooooo cute! What a precious smile!" comments, the next question is always,
"So, when will you get to bring her home?"

It's frustrating to try to answer that because the real answer is:

we don't know. 

The answer I try to always give is, "Well, only the Lord knows that." It's the truth. I can tell you the time span of what adoptions have typically taken in the past (very discouraging). But, what's the point of that? God has never worked on an "it's always been this way" plan.
The Haitian government is undergoing a lot of changes right now. They are for the better. The orphans of Haiti will greatly benefit from these changes. However, that means we are treading on unknown waters. What we hope and pray is that the "new" will mean "speedier". But, the truth is, we just don't know.

I thought it might help to lay out the map our dossier must take before we can bring Grace home. Right now, it is still at the orphanage being prepared to enter IBESR (Haitian Social Services). This is from GLA's website: (* where we are now)

Steps of an adoption in the order they happen:

*Pre-IBESR = We are preparing your dossier to go into Haitian Social Services.  There are some legal documents that must be made after you accept your proposal and some of them must be legalized at the Ministry of Justice.  If we have problems getting a document, this can delay this step.

IBESR = Haitian Social Services

Parquet = Pre-Courts, they interview the birth parents and give permission for the dossier to go through the Haitian court system.

Courts = The dossier is in the Haitian Courts having the actual adoption declared and legalized.

Attest or Attestation= After court papers are finished, the Act of Adoption must be sent to the National Archives and they declare that the signature on the Act of Adoption is legal.

Legal or Legalization = All court papers must be sent to the Ministry of Justice to be legalized.  They declare that the signature on all of the paperwork actually is the signature of the Judge who signed it.

MAE = Ministry of Foreign Affairs must legalize the signature of the person in the Ministry of Justice who signed your paperwork in the step above.

MOI = All Adoption passports must go through the Ministry of the Interior for approval before Immigration will print the passport.

Printing= Your dossier is in Immigration waiting for the passport to be printed.

Visa=Your dossier is in your country's Embassy waiting for a visa to be issued!

New Pictures!!!

GLA is great in so many ways, but one of the great things they do is send monthly updates to the adoptive families. We will get new pictures and an update of what Grace has been up to every month. Since we received our referral this month, there wasn't much to update, but these are her August pictures. The bath time pics were from June and the one with the Haitian flag (from our referral) is from July, so you can see how quickly she's changing. They do change so much at this age. We think she just keeps getting prettier! : )

It looks like they're playing music and she's dancing in this picture!

Mmmm....those eyes, those eyes!!!!

I just want to reach through the screen and kiss those sweet cheeks all over!!!

But wait! There's more!

I am in a wonderful Facebook group of families all waiting to adopt from GLA. We are all in different stages and one of the great things is that some families have already made their first trip down there. Lisa, one of the adoptive moms, took these pictures of Malozie (Grace? Not sure when we'll officially start calling her that!). That's Lisa's husband holding her. Doesn't she look so petite in his arms? This was in May, so you can tell she's grown since then (the bathtime/ducky pictures were from June). Mmmmm....look at those sweet toes! I just want to eat them up! (Yes, I've always had a thing for baby toes.)

Lisa said she's just the happiest baby and always smiling---the same description in her profile from our agency. Yea for happy babies!

August 22, 2012

We have waited for this day for so very long. When I think back to the TLC "A Baby Story" episode that made me ask, "Haiti?", this has been a very long road. The road ahead to get her home seems really short now, even though it may not be.

I want to get this down before I forget any of it. Here's how the day played out:

We spent the morning in Mt. Pleasant at the dentist. Luke and Jonah both got good reports. Afterwards, they begged to eat out for lunch, but it was only 10:45 and I really just wanted to come home. Boy, am I glad I did! We got home and I did my usual routine of walking the dogs. Right when I came in the house, the phone rang. It was a 218 area code and I usually don't answer weird numbers. The only number I knew for our agency was an 800 number, but something inside of me just whispered "what if" as I stared at the Caller ID screen. So, I answered. Amy, the owner of God's Children Adoption Agency, identified herself and my heart just stopped. After it stopped, it started racing. When she said, "I have good news!" I felt like I couldn't catch my breath. It was a quick phone call and she just wanted to make sure I was near a computer so she could send our referral. I do remember her saying, "I will let you make your own judgments, but let me just say she's precious!"
When I hung up the phone, I was pretty hysterical. I was crying and Luke was the only one in the room. I told him the email was here! Jonah heard my hysterics and came running. They were both excited, but we had to wait.
Robby and I had agreed from the start that we would not open the email without both of us being here. The only problem was, he had a CUSTOMER. Grrrrrrr! They had pulled into the driveway at the same time I had come home from the dentist. So, they had been there a while. This usually indicates a "buyer" which also indicates a long stay---decisions to be made, money, etc.
I could hardly stand it! I was just pacing in front of the window willing that customer to leave. (They weren't getting my message!) So, I started making preemptive phone calls to say "we have a baby, but I can't see her!" At least that passed some time. I put everyone on email alert and waited some more. Finally, the customer left and I called Robby. He RAN home.

We opened the email and found that GLA had used a site to upload all of the pictures. So, we clicked "download" on all of them, but still couldn't see her at this point. After they had all downloaded, we clicked on the first one, and this popped onto our screen:

After the AWWWWWWWWWs, we were all cheering and hugging and crying and talking about how absolutely adorable she is! You Moms know that feeling when you're pregnant and you start to worry if your baby will be cute. I mean, what if he's not really cute, but everyone is just polite and says he is. It's a worry I had with all 3 of mine and then of course, I thought all 3 of them were the prettiest babies I'd ever seen. Well, that was the same worry I had this whole time of waiting. "What if we get matched to an un-cute one?" Just all the what ifs.

As you can see, God has given us the cutest baby in all of Haiti!!!! Seriously!!! There aren't any cuter ones. I promise. And.....she is all ours. All of her. Those sweet kissable lips. That belly just begging to be blown on. Those cute pigtails for Mama to have fun with. All. Of. Her.

As we clicked through each picture, we just oooed and awwwed. Then.....the video. Oh, how precious is that video! Just hearing her giggle and seeing her move around. It was a priceless moment!

Poor Robby...the phone started ringing and he had to go back to the shop. He told me he would put a closed sign on the door and come right back home, but that didn't happen. He ended up having the BUSIEST day he has had in a very long time. He sold 5 stoves! God is taking care of us each and every day.

When he finally got home, we watched the video over and over again and then I left for our doctor's office. All of her medical forms were still in French and instead of waiting on the English translation (2-3 days), I took them to our doctor to translate. We are so blessed to have Dr. Latortue. He is Haitian! Yes, in little ol' Mt. Vernon, we have a Haitian doctor. Just one of the many details God has taken care of in our lives. I love seeing the fingerprints of God! Dr. Latortue has helped us with all of our medical forms for the dossier and knows all about our adoption. He has a precious wife and daughter who are excited for us, too. He was happy to read them and told me that everything, "looks great". We knew Grace's bio father is deaf, so we wanted to make sure her hearing test was good. No problems at all. Dr. Latortue even made the remark that he KNOWS the pediatrician that examined our baby. Amazing! Only God could orchestrate these details!

(Funny side note: when I got to the doctor, the receptionist, who has also walked this journey with us of notarized medical forms, etc., took the medical forms back to the nurse's station for the doctor to go over them. I had printed out the picture above and put it with the forms. From the waiting room, I could hear all of the nurses exclaiming, "Awwwwww! She is so cute! She's precious! Look at those eyes!" I just sat in the waiting room and thought, "Yep, that's MY baby!")

After visiting with Dr. Latortue, I came back home and gave Robby and the boys the "she's perfect" report. Then, we went to Mt. Pleasant for a celebration dinner and to pick up the photo prints at Walgreen's. I had uploaded all of her pictures so I could make "brag books" for the boys and for us. In the car, it was just non-stop talk about her and how cute she is. How did we get so blessed? She's perfect! At dinner, we watched the Ranger game on TV and just flipped through our Gracie book over and over. Every time we'd look at it, one of us would notice another precious detail about her. So fun!

We stayed up VERY late that night just watching the video over and over and staring into her sweet eyes. We also had fun Googling her name and finding the blog posts that had been written about her. The nurses and staff at the orphanage have blogs and they write about children as they come in. We found out that she had been in the NICU when she first got there because she was starving. I just love to see the "before" and "after" pictures and thank God for saving her and giving her a healthy start. One of the things we are most thankful for is that she came to GLA at 6 weeks old. So, for the last 6 1/2 months, she has received wonderful care, love, and nutrition. You can see it in her sweet disposition.

I'll close with this "coincidence" for my Grandpa. When Robby went to the mailbox this afternoon, this issue of "Texas Monthly" was there. Yes, God is in every detail of our lives.

Words cannot describe how excited we are to "raise our Texan".

God is good and everything He does is good. Psalm 119:68

From the mouths of babes....

I've said from the beginning that I blog for our family to have a journal of our lives together. These are the things I have to put down so I don't forget!

The boys have been so precious about our baby girl and saying the sweetest things.

Luke: "You know what Mama? Wednesday was not the best day EVER (the day we got our referral). Do you know what the best day EVER will be? When we bring Gracie home from Haiti!"
Then, he continued....
"...and I asked the Lord to make it one trip so you can just bring her home when you go."

Oh, the faith of a child. We have talked to them about the fact that as the law stands now, we will have to travel 2-3 times to Haiti for paperwork before we can actually bring her home. We also know that God can change this very easily. There is a new judge and each judge makes his/her own rules about this. So, we are all praying fervently and asking God to change that rule. Personally, it's for very selfish reasons. The idea of spending 2-3 days with Grace and then leaving her just terrifies me. It would NOT be pretty! However, I know that if I have to do it, the Lord will be faithful to give me strength. Many adoptive parents have done it before me.

*************************************

Jonah: "When Gracie gets here, I am never going to play video games again! You know why? Because I want to help you with her...you know, play games with her, play toys with her, that kind of stuff."
This is LOVE, ladies and gentlemen!

Another Jonah quote I love:
"I'm going to go read my Gracie book."
We made "brag books" for each of the boys with the photos we got from the orphanage. They love to "read" them and just look at her over and over---well, we ALL do!

*************************************

At 11 years old, most of Noah's quotes are questions and aren't as cute and innocent. Mostly, he wants to know WHY he can't go to Haiti with us and WHEN we will get to bring her home. Patience is not really something he likes to practice.
He is very excited, though, and loves to watch her video over and over.

Our boys have waited a lonnnng time (extra long in kid-years) for a baby sister and they are over-the-moon in love with her already. : )

1 minute, 47 seconds of pure JOY!

We were so surprised and so blessed by this video! We can see the sweet disposition and happy joy in the heart of our baby girl. I can't say enough about the staff at our orphanage. They truly love these babies and take the BEST care of them.
Blessed beyond words....
(Turn up your volume so you can hear these sweet giggles!)

Referral Day is finally here!!!! God is good and everything He does is good. Psalm 119:68
Here's what we know so far:

Her birthday is December 11, 2011. So, she's 8 months old now. Her given name is Malozie, but we will call her Grace. We just think she's perfect in every way!

FIFTEEN years!

Happy Anniversary to us! 15 years!!! Wowzers! : ) That's a long time. Well, in some ways, it feels like the blink of an eye.

Thanks to the grandparents and their willingness to Monkey-Wrangle, we had a wonderful weekend away in Dallas. We saw the Rangers play, complete with fireworks, on Friday night and stayed til Sunday. We had a GREAT hotel that was connected to a mall, so we pretty much just stayed there. Ate lots of yummy food and caught up on our sleep, mostly. We relived our days "pre-kids" when we'd sleep late, have a late breakfast, which also meant a late lunch, took a nap, and had dinner at 8:00. Funny how your life changes.

I am so thankful I married my best friend and I love him more and more every day.