Well it's a good thing we all know how to swim. As many of you know the Missouri River is raging a war against us, and unfortunately it is winning. Our house is safely out of harms way, but my parent's house is going to need some prayers. Thanks to the most wonderful friends and family their house still has a fighting chance. A week before last Thursday it was reported how bad things were going to get and my Dad had been trying so hard to save Misty Waters for the season and then realized that his own house was in jeopardy. That night we started building a berm and sand bagging. Previous to that time we had been helping a friend's parents to sand bag their house. I was also able to help a co-worker move his things out of his house. I am so glad I did those favors because we had to call in all those favors plus when working on my parents house. We had to rebuild their berm on Thursday just in time because this morning Karl and my Dad went out to my parent's house and water is in their yard and 8 inches up their berm in the backyard. It really is a sad sight. The good to come out of it is all the acts of kindness from friends and family. Shout outs to: Todd Ternes (love him like a brother), Lori, Randy, Jace, Seth, Randi Jo, Mitch, and Tanner Lura (who all drove two hours one way to help us), Brock Frederickson (who is married to my cousin Kassie), Mark VanRay (both him and Brock are barely related to us and they drove hours to help), Karen and Lenny (again drove miles!), Kelli, Chris, and Ella Gabel, Carol and Greg O'Shea, Sharon and Dwayne Ternes, Katie and Casey Rogstad (Casey had barely landed back from being gone for a week and didn't even go home before coming to help!), Jeff and Bri MacQueen, and many many more, some even strangers. Also those who didn't help us directly but my cousins who organized a wrestling group to come up to Bismarck for the day to fill sand bags, I am so proud of you and so thankful. Words are just never enough but I hope you all know we could not have done this physically or emotionally without your help and support. I just hope you all know that we would return the favor in an instant and will always be here for you.
On to happier subjects our homestudy is done, I know I said it was done last time, but last time our portion was complete and now the WHOLE thing is complete. It was very interesting to read what another person who barely knows you perceives your family. Thank you to our references who said such kind things about Karl and myself. We will pay you later :)
If you have time, please say a quick prayer for all of those affected by flooding in the state this year.
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
What a post so soon?!
I know everyone will be shocked that I posted again so soon but another hurdle was tackled. We just sent in ALL of our homestudy material, yes ALL of it! As long as we didn't forget anything or screw anything up that means we are DONE with the homestudy! Yippee! Not that we didn't enjoy spending time with our fabulous social worker, Lindsey, but it just means we are even closer to getting on that waiting list! We are also done with the I-600A form and will be mailing that tomorrow! Those of you not down with the adoption lingo it is just a form that needs to be sent to the Department of Homeland Security. The more official name is the application for advance processing of orphan petition.
In addition to the hopeful things in my life, my uncle Pud is doing really well! I am so proud of him because his life has had to change dramatically in the course of one week and he is taking the bull by the horns and working to make his life healthier! I know there is going to be many ups and downs but he and we can do it! I even saw him reading the nutrition labels off a box of oatmeal (that for the record had a huge red heart on the front of it that read "Heart Healthy") and he told me "I can't eat that stuff, did you know it has 11% sodium!" False advertising if I ever saw it!
Yesterday we also had Pastor Renee to our home to visit about the adoption. I really can't say enough about what a amazing woman she is and how she has helped guide us back to our faith. She wrote me an email the other day that read, "I am so happy to be able to support you both through this journey, and I am excited for Heart River (our church) as well!" What a wonderful faith community to belong to!
Well I just read the post again and I seem way more giddy than I ever realized, perhaps it is because I just got done working out and my blood flow to my brain hasn't returned, but that is okay, it is a good feeling to just relax and be happy in this moment.
In addition to the hopeful things in my life, my uncle Pud is doing really well! I am so proud of him because his life has had to change dramatically in the course of one week and he is taking the bull by the horns and working to make his life healthier! I know there is going to be many ups and downs but he and we can do it! I even saw him reading the nutrition labels off a box of oatmeal (that for the record had a huge red heart on the front of it that read "Heart Healthy") and he told me "I can't eat that stuff, did you know it has 11% sodium!" False advertising if I ever saw it!
Yesterday we also had Pastor Renee to our home to visit about the adoption. I really can't say enough about what a amazing woman she is and how she has helped guide us back to our faith. She wrote me an email the other day that read, "I am so happy to be able to support you both through this journey, and I am excited for Heart River (our church) as well!" What a wonderful faith community to belong to!
Well I just read the post again and I seem way more giddy than I ever realized, perhaps it is because I just got done working out and my blood flow to my brain hasn't returned, but that is okay, it is a good feeling to just relax and be happy in this moment.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
A Difficult Week but Happy Mother's Day to all!
Many of you have heard but my Uncle Pud had a heart attack last Thursday and ended up with a quadruple bypass on Tuesday. This has led to a lot of long days this week. We are both pretty tired out and trying to rest up. Thankfully Pud gets to leave the hospital today! It will be a long road to recovery but he is well on his way.
We celebrated my 28th birthday last week as well! My family made it very special with dinner made at my house with my favorite meal, FAJITAS! Yum!
We were invited to our homestudy agency, God's Children, to participate in an adoption get together yesterday. Honestly, we were both a little nervous to go but it ended up being alot of fun getting to know other families who are adopting as well as see all those adorable children that have been brought to their forever homes. We didn't realize how much adoption has made on impact on the Bismarck/Mandan and surrounding communities! We have quite the support network. Very exciting news!
As far as where we are in our paper chase, Karl has to finish his education and we have to meet with Pastor Renee to have an adoption meeting with her. Then all our homestudy things can be sent in and hopefully we will be done with all things homestudy for now. Once the homestudy is completed all of our dossier paperwork is completed but just has to be notarized so that will be quick. I am hoping in a month we will be on the waiting list!!!!! So excited!
Happy Mother's Day to all!
We celebrated my 28th birthday last week as well! My family made it very special with dinner made at my house with my favorite meal, FAJITAS! Yum!
We were invited to our homestudy agency, God's Children, to participate in an adoption get together yesterday. Honestly, we were both a little nervous to go but it ended up being alot of fun getting to know other families who are adopting as well as see all those adorable children that have been brought to their forever homes. We didn't realize how much adoption has made on impact on the Bismarck/Mandan and surrounding communities! We have quite the support network. Very exciting news!
As far as where we are in our paper chase, Karl has to finish his education and we have to meet with Pastor Renee to have an adoption meeting with her. Then all our homestudy things can be sent in and hopefully we will be done with all things homestudy for now. Once the homestudy is completed all of our dossier paperwork is completed but just has to be notarized so that will be quick. I am hoping in a month we will be on the waiting list!!!!! So excited!
Happy Mother's Day to all!
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Happy Easter!
Happy Easter everyone! Unfortunately I have been fighting a miserable cold for the past week and this was my first day out of the house for awhile. I am so sorry to have to miss my Uncle Randy's 50th birthday party as well as celebrating Easter with the Lura side of the family! We miss you all!
My first trip out of the house was to church this morning with Karlos. In the sermon today our pastor, Pastor Renee, was telling a story about her husband Ben (those of you who don't know, her husband died in the Haiti earthquake) and a mission trip he took to Ethiopia when he was 15. According to some of my Ethiopia reading Easter in some areas is a bigger holiday than even Christmas, and Pastor Renee told the story of how Ben and his dad where staying in a small village in Ethiopia and in the middle of the night while it was still pitch black they woke up to singing. They put on their clothes, rubbed the sleep from their eyes and took to the street with the people following the singing. The people of the village sang while they climbed a mountain and held Easter service on the top of the mountain. It was a great story and the great beginning to a wonderfully uplifting sermon. I feel Ethiopia everywhere I go these days. . .
We had our second homestudy visit on Tuesday and it went so well. Lindsey is just a wealth of information and although she technically is here to somewhat "judge" us, we feel so open to be able to discuss some of our more embarrassing parenting questions to her without worrying about her reporting us even before we have children! I had to laugh because I have been spring cleaning like a nutcase lately and it was very important for me to move all the cleaning chemicals up to higher cupboards. So when Lindsey didn't ask to look in the cabinets I was kinda sad! She quickly said, "well if you really want me to I can look in the cabinets." In other words we probably overdid it. We are also probably the only people in Bismarck who have child safety doorknobs on our utility room door with no kids living in the home. I also had my friend Laura's daughter Sydney color me a picture to hang on the fridge. See we are a child friendly home! We were well prepared and turns out it probably would have been ok without the over the top effort. Now we wait for Lindsey to finish all her paperwork and we have a bit ourselves to finish and then we can send the dossier once we get her report back from the government.
Special thanks to Kelli for becoming a notary for us! You are the best!
My first trip out of the house was to church this morning with Karlos. In the sermon today our pastor, Pastor Renee, was telling a story about her husband Ben (those of you who don't know, her husband died in the Haiti earthquake) and a mission trip he took to Ethiopia when he was 15. According to some of my Ethiopia reading Easter in some areas is a bigger holiday than even Christmas, and Pastor Renee told the story of how Ben and his dad where staying in a small village in Ethiopia and in the middle of the night while it was still pitch black they woke up to singing. They put on their clothes, rubbed the sleep from their eyes and took to the street with the people following the singing. The people of the village sang while they climbed a mountain and held Easter service on the top of the mountain. It was a great story and the great beginning to a wonderfully uplifting sermon. I feel Ethiopia everywhere I go these days. . .
We had our second homestudy visit on Tuesday and it went so well. Lindsey is just a wealth of information and although she technically is here to somewhat "judge" us, we feel so open to be able to discuss some of our more embarrassing parenting questions to her without worrying about her reporting us even before we have children! I had to laugh because I have been spring cleaning like a nutcase lately and it was very important for me to move all the cleaning chemicals up to higher cupboards. So when Lindsey didn't ask to look in the cabinets I was kinda sad! She quickly said, "well if you really want me to I can look in the cabinets." In other words we probably overdid it. We are also probably the only people in Bismarck who have child safety doorknobs on our utility room door with no kids living in the home. I also had my friend Laura's daughter Sydney color me a picture to hang on the fridge. See we are a child friendly home! We were well prepared and turns out it probably would have been ok without the over the top effort. Now we wait for Lindsey to finish all her paperwork and we have a bit ourselves to finish and then we can send the dossier once we get her report back from the government.
Special thanks to Kelli for becoming a notary for us! You are the best!
Sunday, April 3, 2011
1st Homestudy Meeting Completed!
Karl and I were able to meet Lindsey, our homestudy social worker, for the first time on Thursday! We drove to Jamestown to meet with her. It was a bit scary because you really want this person to like you and think you will be good parents. Lindsey was very supportive and professional. Another small world story though! We were talking about where Karl grew up and he mentioned that his parents used to own the Wigwam resort in Baudette and Lindsey stated she had been there before! This made us excited and then she said, "The last time I was there a wedding party was taking pictures on the boat dock and the entire wedding party fell into the lake!" Before she had finished the sentence, Karl and I looked at each other in amazement and I shouted (literally, in a coffee shop, it was embarrassing!) "That was Jenny's wedding!" (for those of you who don't know Jenny is Karl's sister). What a tiny little world we live in! We all had a good laugh about that one.
Also exciting was last weekend we were out eating with my family and my good friend's sister (who adopted two children from Ethiopia 8 months ago and has been my mentor through the paperwork process) and her family came in to eat. Karl and I hadn't met their Ethiopian boys yet and was able to spend a bit of time talking with them. What an inspiration seeing how well they are doing and how bonded they are to their parents. Such cute boys!
So what's next you ask. . . well still compiling paperwork and then off to get everything notarized and certified. We have to wait until the homestudy is completed and filed before we can turn in our dossier so our first priority right now is finishing up the homestudy documents and doing our adoptive parent training requirements. I have found that some organizations are kinda stinkers about helping us with paperwork!
Also exciting was last weekend we were out eating with my family and my good friend's sister (who adopted two children from Ethiopia 8 months ago and has been my mentor through the paperwork process) and her family came in to eat. Karl and I hadn't met their Ethiopian boys yet and was able to spend a bit of time talking with them. What an inspiration seeing how well they are doing and how bonded they are to their parents. Such cute boys!
So what's next you ask. . . well still compiling paperwork and then off to get everything notarized and certified. We have to wait until the homestudy is completed and filed before we can turn in our dossier so our first priority right now is finishing up the homestudy documents and doing our adoptive parent training requirements. I have found that some organizations are kinda stinkers about helping us with paperwork!
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Notarize, Certification, and Authentication. . . Oh brother
Well I am sitting here trying to stay warm with the blizzard going on outside! I am truly uncertain as to how I am going to get in to work tomorrow. Oh well, worry about that at that time. We luckily beat the blizzard by coming home yesterday from Montana. We had such a great time! It was so fun to spend time with the family and get to snowboard at the same time! It was crazy to run around running into Luras left and right!
We sent off our policy paperwork as you know last Monday and I received the dossier (dah see ay) guide by email today. At least this involves far less creative writing skills but every piece of paperwork needs to be notarized, most need to be certified, and some need to be authenticated. I forsee many a trip to the state capital for me. Thankfully my friend Kelli has decided (due to my begging and pleading) to become a notary public so she can travel from appointment to appointment with me instead of having to hire a notary to come with me to the doctor's office. Sounds like fun, huh! Now that we have this paperwork I am really getting excited and I feel like this is GOING to happen!!!
We are meeting our homestudy agent, Lindsey, in Jamestown next Thursday for our first visit. Excited but nervous. My next struggle is to get Karl to start our education requirements. Wish us luck!
We sent off our policy paperwork as you know last Monday and I received the dossier (dah see ay) guide by email today. At least this involves far less creative writing skills but every piece of paperwork needs to be notarized, most need to be certified, and some need to be authenticated. I forsee many a trip to the state capital for me. Thankfully my friend Kelli has decided (due to my begging and pleading) to become a notary public so she can travel from appointment to appointment with me instead of having to hire a notary to come with me to the doctor's office. Sounds like fun, huh! Now that we have this paperwork I am really getting excited and I feel like this is GOING to happen!!!
We are meeting our homestudy agent, Lindsey, in Jamestown next Thursday for our first visit. Excited but nervous. My next struggle is to get Karl to start our education requirements. Wish us luck!
Monday, March 14, 2011
Step Two: Done
Phew! We finally sent both our policy papers and our homestudy application! What that means is we now wait for a time when our homestudy agent, Lindsey, can come to Bismarck to do our homestudy and we wait for more paperwork so we can start our dossier for the adoption agency. Basically we wait for more paperwork. Thankfully I believe all creative writing projects are done so we can complete the next set of paperwork in a more timely manner. Karl is very happy to be sending that autobiography on its merry way.
We are so excited to leave for Big Sky on Thursday to spend some time on the slopes and enjoying my extended family. It is a Lura cousin reunion of sorts. Should be a good time, especially since we have cabin fever following the blizzard we got on Karl's birthday. I will post pictures when we get back.
Please keep the people of Japan in your thoughts and prayers as they continue to struggle with the effects of the tragic earthquake and tsunami.
We are so excited to leave for Big Sky on Thursday to spend some time on the slopes and enjoying my extended family. It is a Lura cousin reunion of sorts. Should be a good time, especially since we have cabin fever following the blizzard we got on Karl's birthday. I will post pictures when we get back.
Please keep the people of Japan in your thoughts and prayers as they continue to struggle with the effects of the tragic earthquake and tsunami.
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