Baby in my tummy news

Ok- we will call the baby in my tummy "bio baby" since we don't know if it is a boy or girl and we don't have a name - this will help keep our babies straight :). The great news is that last week I took Julia and Jacklyn with me to the doctor to spend some special time together, and we heard the heartbeat for the first time. That was a big praise! My first trimester is over and the excitement begins. I feel 95% better.

So now for questions and answers:

Q - Will you find out what you are having?

A - Javi does not want to find out, but he says I can. I don't like that option, but am trying to decide what I should do. I would REALLY like to prepare and get some good baby finds at garage sales especially since when I bring this baby home I will already have our other babies home and life will be crazy enough - HMMMM- what to do.

Q - Are you showing?

A - Not really. I always lose weight when I am sick and now I am back to my starting weight. I just can't suck it in and look/feel more like I just ate at a buffet (you know the feeling :)) Here is a pic from Friday just at 13 weeks.

So much excitement!

Do you remember that we said we wanted to wait 1 month to celebrate our birthdays(until I was over my sickness)? Well, last week I bought an amazing chocolate mouse cake to celebrate our b-days this weekend. It just happens that we had 3 extra reasons to celebrate, so we put in 3 b-day candles for the 3 new babes that will be joining our family in the next several months (that was a better option than 65 combined candles).

Then, a gal with our agency just found out she will travel to go get her babies this week and she was willing to take 2 ziploc bags of small gifts from us to our boys! She will also take pics of them for us - what a blessing! We sent 2 small little fuzzy blankies that Janae made a long time ago for our boys, a couple of baby toys, an outfit and a baby photo album for the older one with his and his baby brother's photos on the cover and our family photos inside. The kids loved helping me wash everything and get it ready. Janae and I had some special time last night shopping for a couple of things for the bags and we bought some cute shoes and sunglasses on clearance for when they come home.

We sent off our final payment and we think we have found a big van from a friend that we will hopefully buy this week. Things are starting to seem real once again.

OH HAPPY DAY!!!

Proverbs 25:25 "As cold water to a weary soul, So is good news from a far country."

Psalm 144:15b "Happy are the people whose God is the Lord."

Oh Praise the Lord! He has heaped His blessings on us and our sadness has turned to rejoicing! Yesterday the Lord blessed us with 2 sons. Yes, we got it- we finally got our referral for 2 precious boys ages 4 months and 15 months. They are not biological siblings, but as precious as can be. We are overjoyed and humbled at the Lord's gift to us.

Here are some interesting and cool facts concerning these boys and how they were "set apart" for our family. The baby, who I think we will call Jeremiah, was born in March on my niece's b-day. Janae and Julia have b-days at the end of March, so we will now have 3 b-days within 10 days of each other (4 if you count my niece too). The older boy, who I think we will call Josiah, is 11 months older than Jeremiah and 14 months younger than Joanna who is currently our youngest. Then Jeremiah and our baby in my womb will be about 10 months apart. I can not believe the spacing. We were prepared that we might get 2 close in age or basically have 2 little babies once this baby was born or 2 - 2 year olds or 2 -4 year olds, but it is almost a natural spacing as if they fall right in place with the ages of our other children. Jeremiah, the baby is about 1 month older than the baby that I miscarried would have been. I am thrilled that the boys are so close in age because they will be little buddies like Joanna and Jacklyn.

We will likely have to wait 4 more months before we can go pick them up because of court closures for rainy season. We hope to travel in November. My biggest concern is that I would be allowed (by my doctor, airlines? and husband :)) to travel to Ethiopia in my last trimester. After waiting and working on this for over 1 year, I can not imagine missing this. To me it would be like missing the birth of my babies.

PS - sorry I can not post pictures until we pass through court in October, but here is a sneak peak. I can not wait to get my hands on them!

Charina to the Rescue

The hardest part of getting 4 little girls ready each day is doing all their hair. Sadly, they often get quick pony tails from me if we have to go somewhere, but Charina has been experimenting. I showed her this website, http://www.shedoeshair.blogspot.com , that my friend Susanne sent me (Thanks Susanne) and it inspired Charina. She did these hair dos below on Joanna and Jacklyn and the updo on Jacklyn's b-day.

Jacklyn's 4th B-day

Jacklyn saw this boy doll that wets its diaper at Target and really wanted it. She named it Josiah - The Hope of the Nations - Brick Diaz (Brick is from the show Gladiators that they watch with their Daddy :) - Javier grew up going to WWF type wrestling matches with his dad in the DR - so I guess this is what he is passing down from his dad :))

Cousin Love

More Cousin Love

We have a birthday tradition we learned from our years of going to Spanish church. It is "La Mordida" (The bite) - It is where everyone chants La Mordida over and over and then we push the birthday girl/boy's face in a piece of cake - the kids love it, but my dad hates it :).

Here I am with my Beauty on our way to her birthday date. What you can't see are her hot pink boots and her fancy updo. I Love that girl!

Saturday we celebrated Jacklyn's 4th b-day. We all woke up early and met my mom and their 3 cousins at the zoo for a snow and watersplash day around 7 am. The kids played in the snow and then played on water slides. They were giving out free promotional stuff and there was a fire truck etc. We all rode the train around the zoo and it was getting too hot around 10:00 am (that's Arizona for you), but Jackie really wanted to see Kashi, the little orangutan, so we sprayed off with some more water and went to see the Orangutans. Jacklyn kept telling us that her party was sooo fun. The best part is that it was completely free with my mom's super duper zoo pass.

We went to my mom's house and made baby pizzas (the kids made their own with 1/2 an english muffin, sauce cheese, etc). They were so good, fun and easy for the kids to make.

Jacklyn chose to go out with me on her birthday date that night, so once I got over my sickness, we headed out to Denny's. She said she either wanted PF Changs or Denny's. Luckily PF Changs is much further from our house (and way too expensive), so we went to Denny's. Javi's boss once took our whole family out to PF Changs and now they all beg to go there :(.

New do and Jo Jo

Look at those chubby little legs. I thought she was too cute lounging on my bed with her legs crossed, pretending to talk on the phone.


Joanna is just so sweet and silly these days and she talks a lot. She was really the sweetest, most caring kid during my sickness. Every time she could hear me sick in the bathroom she would come and say, "Mommy, you sick? You need medicine?" She would often leave and come running back with Gatorade or water for me. The other kids are used to it and just ignore me, but Joanna was truly concerned and didn't know what to do.



Well, since my roots were bad and I have lived in a pony tail the last 2 -3 months, I decided I needed some help. Now that I am functioning again, I found this reasonable place out by our new house. Well, I feel a little bit better about my hair, but now I need to get rid of all of this acne (gotta love these hormones) and finish up the sickness. This is weird but I think the worst of it is over. I had 4 brutal weeks and now the sickness is only sporadic - this is so unusual for me. Could this mean it is a boy??? I am not sure we will find out. We never found out the gender of any of our kids until the last baby. Javier said it ruined the excitement of the actual birth for him, but I liked being able to plan and prepare.