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| Nolan with his Aunties at the home. We are so thankful for their love for him. |
Every day I waited for an update. I set up our baby’s room numerous times to
just go in and tear it down. I sat in his room almost every night and prayed
for wisdom and strength to be able to continue in this journey. I know that 3 ½ months isn’t that long to
wait for a child but when you are told almost every day to expect a phone call
that you will be going to get your child it feels like forever. Then, one day you are told you need to stop
the process all together because you will never be able to bring a baby home
and then the next day given hope that it will work out and very soon. AAAHHHHH!!
I tried to focus on something else but every day I came home feeling
something was not right in my home. I cannot tell you how many times I sat down
and started a blog post about how I was feeling, how the process of bringing
the baby home was going and then I just would break down in the middle and cry.
I didn’t want to post a blog because I didn’t know what the next day would
hold. But today is different. Today Nolan
is home. Now I feel the freedom to share
what has been happening in our lives.
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| Our family of FIVE |
On Wednesday, May 8th we were given the documents
to take to the orphanage to go pick up our son; a 10 month old who had been
abandoned on the side of the road when he was 3 months old. These documents do not give us full custody
but approve us to be foster parents for Nolan.
The whole morning we were running back and forth from the social welfare
office to stationary shops and internet cafes trying to make sure all our
documents were in order. Finally at 2
p.m. everything was ready. I sat in the
car with the girls, still not having told them what we were doing there at the social
welfare office in case something fell through…again. Then Nick came out holding
a packet of papers. He jumped into the
car and rushed to our lawyers to make sure the documents were accurate and
sufficient. They gave us the go ahead of
we went. Finally we told the girls. We
were in the car and they had been so good all day long. They were tired and they both had asked to
please go home. They were tired of being
in the car and waiting and waiting. So,
when we told them that it was time to get baby brother they just sat there and
stared. Hannah said “no way! no way!”
then just started screaming! Hailey
started dancing and singing about going to get baby brother. As we drove out to the orphanage my stomach
was in knots. All day it had been in knots but this was even worse. Forget butterflies, try komodo dragons! I was finally able to think that our baby was
coming home. We realized all of a sudden
we better start thinking about names. We knew his name that was given to him by
the staff of the orphanage was William but we didn’t feel that was the name we
wanted to give him. The whole way out we
talked about his name with the girls. We
couldn’t agree on any name. When we
arrived at the orphanage we sat outside with the girls and talked with them
about what we were going to do. They broke away from us and ran towards the
home where they knew he would be. When I
got there they were already inside holding his hands and talking with him. His sweet Dada’s (aunties) had him all
dressed and ready for us to take him home. They were so proud of him and just
kept asking to hold him one last time.
He was a little terrified of us and kept reaching back for them. There was one specifically that we could tell
had grown attached to him. She kissed
him goodbye and told us she was so thankful he was coming to a new home where
he would be forever and for us to know that she really loved him. We are planning on a day that we can go back
and visit her to show her how happy and healthy her boy is. As we got in the car to drive away they gave
us a bottle to calm him down. He had never been in a car so he was scared to
death. Of course he was, we were all
white faced English-speaking strangers.
We stopped on the way home at a friends house to get his car seat and
all of his clothes. He fell asleep so
overwhelmed as I sat and rocked him. At
that moment I realized there weren’t just four of us anymore, there were
five! My girls were running around with
their friends as I sat holding my son. I
was in shock. As we packed back up to
head home the girls were so excited about bringing their baby brother
home. I was at that point
terrified. Nick held him in the back
seat as we drove back home. As we got
home he continued to cry and be overwhelmed but the girls were so anxious to
show him everything! I didn’t know what to feed him and started looking for food.
He devoured everything in sight. We
played a bit with him and read him some stories. The first real responsiveness we saw was with
Hannah. He would dance with Hannah when
she would sing a song. We put him to bed
that night and he fell fast asleep. All
night I kept wondering if I would be able to hear him when he woke up. In our little house his room is right next
door. It’s not like the walls are thick
at all but I was terrified that I wouldn’t recognize his cry. I laid awake almost all night waiting to hear
him cry out. In the morning there still
hadn’t been a peep. The girls were up at 630 (normal wake up time is 730) but
they were just waiting for baby brother to wake up. As they sat outside his room we waited and
waited. Eight thirty came around and he
still wasn’t up. We finally went in at 9
and there he was lying silently. It was
baby brothers first day at home and honestly, I was terrified. We had talked about
how bringing any Tanzanian guests over would be hard because he would probably
recognize them and want to go to them.
About an hour after he woke up, a friend stopped by and I just held my
breath. They came and tried to take him from my arms and he screamed and put
his head on my shoulder. We could not
believe he had already bonded himself to us.
It was such a relief. From then
on he has been a mommy and daddy’s boy (more so daddy’s). He has attached himself at our hip and never
wants to be by himself. The next couple
of days Nolan was known as “baby brother”.
We kept trying to figure out a name that fit him. We had a long list and
couldn’t match him with any of the names.
We wanted to share the news with everyone but we needed to have a name
before we could share him with the world.
All night long Nick and I would look up names on the internet. We
started writing down lists and calling him by different names! Finally on Friday we settled on Nolan. All of us were in agreement that it fit
him. The Maasai had already told us that
no matter what name we gave him they had already named him. His name was Laanyuni which means “the one we
were waiting for”. This name fits him
perfectly! We had been waiting and the wait was over. He was home.  |
| He learned to clap after a couple of days watching the girls. |
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| Thumb and blanket:) |
So that you can get to know Nolan a bit I will describe his
personality. He is a pretty happy baby
all together but has some lungs on him!! He can scream and it is not just when
he is crying.. That boy can scream any time of the day. When Nolan is awake, everyone is awake. He
screams when he is happy, he screams when he wants more food, he screams when
he can’t see you, he screams when he wants his bottle, he screams when he is
done with his bottle, he screams when he is playing with his toys, he screams
when he wakes up (not cause he is mad, just cause). Nolan screams! We are trying to teach him to tone it down a
bit. One thing we didn’t think about was
that naming him Nolan is a nickname.
Somehow saying “No” has lost some of its gusto as we find ourselves
often calling him “no”. It is so close
to his name that we have resorted to saying “no” in new languages. If you walk by our house, you might hear
Hailey yelling, “tabala” (maasai) or or Hannah prefers “Hapana” (Swahili). This is sadly often while we are
transitioning and trying to get the noise level down a bit. Nolan loves his sisters. When they are home he sits and plays with
them and is so content. He loves Hannah
giving him his bottle and sometimes will only eat when she is feeding him. If I
try and come to take over he refuses to eat and she runs back and finishes
feeding him. Hannah walks him around holding his hands and he is constantly
smiling when she does that. He loves
Hailey giving him a bath and follows her all around the house. He LOVES music and will dance and sing every
time he hears music. He is terrified of
big lifelike dolls (like the girls big-girl dolls). He hates zhu zhu pets. He starts screaming if he sees them moving
around. At first it was funny but now I
know he is genuinely afraid. He eats
ANYTHING you put in front of him as long as it is blended well. He does not
like solid food but we have started to try chunkier things. He loves to sleep and sleeps through the
night at least 12 hours. He sleeps about
3 hours in the day for naps. When he sleeps he is a thumb sucker but also needs to grab onto some sort of clothing or blanket with the same hand he sucks his thumb with. He loves his daddy
and smiles every time Nick comes into the room.
He loves to snuggle and will let you hug him as long as you want. Overall Nolan is a happy kid that loves to
eat and sleep!
It has been 2 ½ weeks since he has come home and our family
is still adjusting to having an extra little person! People have said that
going from 2 to 3 children is a huge jump.
I wasn’t sure and thought it couldn’t be that big of a difference but oh
my goodness they were right! Getting out
of the house becomes an insane mess!
Nowadays, going out is a rare occasion.
Even here in Arusha we are a family that likes to get out and do
something. Now, the thought frightens
me! This post is coming so late because to
try and get anything done with 3 kids around is INSANE!! And I am too tired at
night to sit and think. So, we are sorry
our update of our little guy is a little delayed.
Thank you so much for all of your support and love! We have
such a long road ahead but we are really trying to be thankful for every day we
have him. We are fostering for the next
6 months and then we start the grueling process of application and court for
adoption as a Tanzanian. After that, we
start to seek immigration to the states.
We are trying to be realistic in saying we won’t be heading back to the
states for another 2-3 years. This is so
hard for us to imagine and honestly it is making me extremely homesick. Things
could go a lot quicker but we are preparing for a long journey. Please be praying for us and this transition
as well as for the paperwork and the government here in Tanzania. Even if it takes forever, we feel like we are
ready. Maybe if you ask us in 12 months
things will be different, but as for today, we are just so grateful to Jesus’
faithfulness to give us the desires of our hearts.
