What blog? :)

February hasn't been the best blogging month I suppose...but we are still alive and kicking. It's been a wild month. Max's real birth father showed up at our house on the 7th, so we have been getting to know him. He just found out about Max in January, and thank God, he has no desire to parent him, or as he said, "to break up a family." He says Max is a lucky little guy and that he wants to be a part of Max's life. That is fine by us. I know what it is like to wonder about a biological father, and I think genetics are important, and I am glad that Max will not have to wonder about where he came from. I was like a little sponge, soaking up all of the information from this guy that I possibly could. I wrote it all down in a journal that I keep for Max. Well, to be honest....I wrote it all down in Levi's journal on accident :) It was titled, "The day we met your birth father." Ha! I scratched it out and wrote, "Sorry buddy, it was dark and I grabbed the wrong journal." So that was less than 3 weeks ago, and this week we are taking this new dude out for dinner on his birthday. Open adoption is crazy, but it is good and beautiful too. We are so thankful for the peace we've had throughout the process of meeting Max's birth father and that everything is going well.

And then this week, we found out that we have been accepted into the 10 week program with Iris Ministries, to learn and serve in Africa. We will leave 3 months from today. So, now we have to think about fund-raising, a word that causes a panic attack each time I see it, say it, think about it...you know. I am just so incredibly American. And I have that typical first-born "I can do it by myself" mentality to boot. Ugh. I want to do everything by myself and never, ever want to ask for anything. It's awful. I hope we don't have to do this on a long-term basis. Seriously. Please God, no. I don't think it's wrong to raise support, or necessarily that people will say no...it's just something I hoped I'd never need to do. I've also hoped I would never have to be a butcher or work in the meat-packing industry. It's just one of those things. I've never wanted to be that family on your refrigerator. I don't know why the idea of raising support makes me squirmy, but I suppose it has to do with my pride and distinctly western sense of independence. I'd much rather be the one giving. Flying a family of 4 to Mozambique and back costs just a little over 10 thousand dollars...and yes, that's just for the flights. But we do feel that God is telling us to go and we are obeying, and since that is the case, we know that everything will work out fine.

The kids keep saying things like, "Can we go to Africa for a little bit?" and "Are we going to eat rice when we are in Africa?" and "Are we going today? Please, let's not go to church, let's go to Africa and play with those kids."

So, we are boxing up our stuff, giving away or selling the non-essentials and putting everything else in a little storage unit, so we can rent out or sell our house soon. We'll come back in August, and at that point we'll probably know more of the story. If we feel like we are supposed to stay in Africa, we'll make plans to do that. If not, we won't. So, please pray for us. We have a lot to do in the next 3 months, to get ready, and at times it gets a little stressful :)

Love,
Kate