Today was a big day in the life of a Pellicer. We sent in our application to WACAP, the adoption agency we are choosing to use. We put our hands on our application and prayed that God would be open doors where they needed open, and shut them in our faces where they need closed. I tried really hard to pay attention to my hubby when he was praying, but I felt so giddy with excitement it was all I could do to keep my molecules from seperating! We walked to the mailbox and dropped in the app. Ahhhh...there goes the first of many hundreds of dollars :) Even bigger than that, Jeremy and I sat down with Madelyn and told her about her future baby sister. We are going to begin our home study shortly (the process by which a social worker determines if we are able to provide a home for the age/gender of the child we have applied for), and we wanted her to understand what it meant to adopt. I turned the reigns over to my hubby, who did great, minus teaching Madelyn the word "black" in reference to skin color, and not explaining what adoption actually is. Not bad for a first time convo, though! Her immediate response was elation, and then she made note of the fact that she would be able to teach Hazel how to be a big sis. Of course her first thought would be about someone else. I remember when Hazel was about six months old, Madelyn informed me she was ready to have two baby sisters. When I told her that was soooo not happening, her response was, "What about Hazel? Won't she get to be a big sister?" My FAVORITE thing about my eldest daughter is her soft heart for others. God really went out of His way to give me a daughter who would illuminate how I should be in my heart for those He's graciously placed in my life. We then explained to her that we would be waiting even longer than when I was pregnant with Hazel, and though she seemed to understand, we know that she has little comprehension of time.
In other news, we got rid of our Dish. Insert sad face....here. I am, excuse me, was a TV junkie, and though I've been working on it, I still sadly chose to sit my boot on the couch, rather than go play in my daughter's room (But seriously, who wouldn't rather watch the Food Network than get bossed around by a four year old playing teacher?!). Translation: 55 dollars more a month can go to fund our precious foreign investment, and I am going to be a better mom. Win-win? I'd say so. And all of this to the GLORY of the Holy Spirit, who very plainly told me to go cancel my TV, like, now. If the Lord is going to give me 30 grand towards our goal (which I KNOW He can do!), I figure the least we can do is chip in 55 bucks a month.
Monday, February 28, 2011
Friday, February 25, 2011
Questions...
I have a couple of questions that I was hoping other moms could help me with. First off, why doesn't it bother me more when I get peed on? As someone who DID NOT do bodily functions in my former life without kids, I am almost disappointed in myself that I allow small children to pee on me. Which leads me to my next question: What do I do about the crocodile death roll? If you don't know what I'm referring to, let me be a little less vague. "Death roll" is a term my older sister coined to describe what a one year old does when getting her diaper changed. My precious Hazel uses the leverage from me lifting her legs, arches her back further than should be humanly possible, and spins on her head like a bad nineties break dancer. But why stop there? She cries like I'm abusing her, tries to hit me, and of course, pees. Now I don't mind all of this, but it does bring me to my final question: Do you have to be patient to be a good parent? After spending all day chasing babies down hallways, defusing four year old drama, and simultaneously wearing my maid, cook, and concierge hats, I feel like I'm entitled to a meltdown of my own. In reality, this is where God in his sovereignty shows himself to me in such a powerful and convicting way. I can almost hear Him speak to me, "Andrea, just think how patient I've had to be with you." I love that in God we have the perfect parent modeled for us. Now I just have to make it a daily, scratch that, moment by moment priority to lay my imperfections at His holy and capable feet, and thank Him in advance that He has the power to change me.
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Our Application Letter
For those of you who would like to keep up with what's going on in the adoption process, here's the letter we'll be enclosing to our agency. It outlines why we are choosing the country of origin, sex, and age of the child we are looking for. The application asked for two paragraphs; that was a challenge! I have this strange desire for them to like me! I thought if they could see my heart for what we're doing and understand where we're coming from, they wouldn't think poorly of me for wanting the single most desired child in the adoption pool: a young baby girl. It was very hard to check the "female" box, and to say we want a baby between 4-8 months. It made me feel like I'm a heartless child hater. Every presentation I've ever watched on adoption stresses the need for older children, special needs children, and even boys to be adopted. I haven't met any of those criteria. Thankfully, I had a very wise woman tell me, "If you say yes to something you don't feel called to, you are stealing the blessing away from someone who does feel called to it." That philosophy has worked well in the past, but am I just trying to justify away my guilt for not having the fortitude to bring in a child that might be harder to raise? I hope not. What matters most is what God thinks of me, and I hope he's proud of us for saying yes to His call on our lives to adopt.
Anyway, here's the letter:
For all who are interested in following our adoption progress, here is a brief essay written to the adoption agency outlining why we are interested in the country or origin, age, and gender of child that we are choosing:
We feel very led to Ethiopia for several reasons. We are drawn to how family-orientated the culture is, and are excited about the possibility of meeting our future child’s birth family. We want her family to know that she will be given a loving home, and hope to have the opportunity to keep in touch with them as she grows. We can only guess at how important it will be for our adopted daughter to have a chance to connect with her roots. We feel very privileged to bring home a child into our family who is of a different race. The lessons we would be teaching all of our children about accepting people for who they are, not what they look like, are absolutely priceless.
We have two beautiful daughters, and would like a third because we both adore being “girl” parents. Bringing a child into our home who is a different ethnicity will present unique circumstances as it is, and we feel better equipped to raise a girl, because we have experience with them already. As far as the age, we would like to maintain birth order in our family. We would prefer a baby as young as possible, because our youngest daughter, Hazel, is just over one, and we want similar spacing to our biological daughters, which is around three years. We also believe it would be a much easier transition for both the baby and our family. We want our youngest daughter to be given the same chance to “care” for a baby sister that her big sister, Madelyn received. Additionally, we want to give our child as much opportunity to overcome the malnutrition that is so prevalent in Ethiopia.
Anyway, here's the letter:
For all who are interested in following our adoption progress, here is a brief essay written to the adoption agency outlining why we are interested in the country or origin, age, and gender of child that we are choosing:
We feel very led to Ethiopia for several reasons. We are drawn to how family-orientated the culture is, and are excited about the possibility of meeting our future child’s birth family. We want her family to know that she will be given a loving home, and hope to have the opportunity to keep in touch with them as she grows. We can only guess at how important it will be for our adopted daughter to have a chance to connect with her roots. We feel very privileged to bring home a child into our family who is of a different race. The lessons we would be teaching all of our children about accepting people for who they are, not what they look like, are absolutely priceless.
We have two beautiful daughters, and would like a third because we both adore being “girl” parents. Bringing a child into our home who is a different ethnicity will present unique circumstances as it is, and we feel better equipped to raise a girl, because we have experience with them already. As far as the age, we would like to maintain birth order in our family. We would prefer a baby as young as possible, because our youngest daughter, Hazel, is just over one, and we want similar spacing to our biological daughters, which is around three years. We also believe it would be a much easier transition for both the baby and our family. We want our youngest daughter to be given the same chance to “care” for a baby sister that her big sister, Madelyn received. Additionally, we want to give our child as much opportunity to overcome the malnutrition that is so prevalent in Ethiopia.
Welcome to Princesses and Ponytails
Welcome to Princesses and Ponytails! I was encouraged by a few of my friends to start a blog, mainly because I have the most hillarious kids on the planet. Well, that's my opinion, I'm sure after you hear what comes out of their mouths, you'll probably call it something other than "hillarious." LOL I never gave into the temption of blogging, because I thought it would make me egocentric somehow. Maybe it's because I'm totally digging the idea of having a captive audience, even if it's only in my mind. See, right now, I'm picturing 20,000 followers salivating at the idea of reading my next post. Again, only in my mind. My name is Andrea, and I am 27. My amazing husband is Jeremy, and he's 27, too. We have two daughters, Madelyn, who is 4, and Hazel, who is 1. As you can imagine, I am awash in a sea of pink, and wouldn't have it any other way. My eldest fully subscribes to the title princess, and baby sis is making her royal demands more and more these days. I'm a stay at home mama, who loves her kids, her husband, and most of all, JESUS!! I'm a little...ahem...boisterous, so I apologize ahead of time if you are totally offended by anything I write. We are in the process of saving/applying for an international adoption, so I thought a blog would be a great outlet for my excitement, and for people who are interested to stay up-to-date.
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