YEP! 365 days ago last Thursday we were in Accra, Ghana receiving our adoption decree. April 8th, 2009 Brian, Josephine and Comfort officially became PEARSONS!!!! April 8th 2010 we were together as a family on the beach of the Pacific Ocean. It's funny to think that last year at this time we were playing in the Atlantic Ocean!
I know it's been a while since I have updated, so I thought I would take this opportunity to fill you in on the last six months. Here are some of the great things that have happened:
-We have bonded as a family really well. Brian is doing extremely well homeschooling, he is very smart and has really good logical thinking. We have worked through some of his past traumas and he seems to be happy although he does miss his grandma. Brian is growing a lot! He's gained 15 pounds and is on his 3rd set of clothes. Josephine is also doing really well homeschooling. She is just starting to read and loves it! She is a very motivated learner. Her past trauma has been a little harder to deal with because hers comes out as sadness, especially at night when she has time to think. She also has had some nightmares, but all in all she is doing great. She is also growing really tall. Every time I turn around her pants are too short. Comfort is more delayed in school, but also did not have much schooling in Ghana. Our dentist told us that she is not 8 (which I suspected because her father told me she was 9 not 7) but more like 10 1/2. Which of course means she is more delayed than we thought, but she is showing great improvement the more I work with her. She is such a great kid and dances and sings all around the house. Sometimes she'll stop and say 'Isn't this a wonderful day?'. To think that she was holding on by a thread in Ghana and now she is so full of life. Her health has been great and she is also growing but not as fast as Brian or Josephine.
-We got a new 15 passenger van!! Thanks to an amazing friend who had a fundraiser without our knowledge and bought us our van! We can't thank everyone enough, we LOVE it. We had been praying for months that we would get a van and not have to drive 2 cars everywhere and our prayers were answered.
-Brian and Comfort both had their first American birthdays in November and Josephine had her birthday in January.
-Our beautiful granddaughter number 2 was born in December. Kylah is such a sweetie and it was really a great experience for Brian, Josephine and Comfort.
-Our first Christmas together as the 'New and improved' Pearsons.
Then the first of the year...........
-New Years Day our daughter's car was stolen out of our driveway. Did you know that you are responsible for all towing and recovery costs even if someone steals your car?? Thankfully they pulled the guy over for speeding and arrested him, which happened to be at the same time that we were all praying for him to change his ways and that he would know Jesus as his Lord.
-My friend Lori and her son Alex made a surprise visit for 6 weeks from Papua New Guinea!! What an awesome time we had staying up late, watching movies, eating chocolate......
-Our homeschool Co-op moved once again to a new building. Everytime we move to a new facility we quickly outgrow it. One day I was watching Josephine and Comfort dance around the room in ballet class and I started to cry. To think how far those girls have come and then to see them all decked out in frilly ballet outfits dancing and twirling around the room like little princesses. It was just too much. All the boys want Brian on their team in the gym class because he is so great at all sports, its been fun to watch him make so many friends.
-We were at the doctors 14 times in a 3 week period with 3 ear infections, Maggies first ever visit to the E.R. to get 9 stitches, Brian and Josephine were both having migraines, all of the kids came down with a nasty bug with coughing and fever, Nathan had to go to the E.R. because he had a piece of peanut M&M stuck in his throat (we found out that his tonsils and adenoids were so enlarged that he couldn't swallow, he was on a liquid diet and lost 15 pounds and is having surgery to remove them this Friday) then I went to the E.R twice in one day. Hopefully after Friday we'll stay away from doctors and E.R.s for awhile.
I know there's lots more that has happened and I'll continue to blog about things as they pop into my head.
One more thing:
In October Daniel arrived safe and sound from Ghana. We had so much fun with him. We took him to some of our favorite cool places and fed him some great food. He ended up extending his Visa and just left last week. We sent him back to Ghana with pictures and letters for the kids relatives and he called from Brian and Josephine's grandmother's home so the kids could talk to her. It was really nice and she had called all the aunts and uncles to her house so they could also say hi.
2 miles and1,100 feet elevation gain then you're blessed with an awesome view!! Mark, Kelcey, Maggie (yes that's her with her new short, stylin' hair) Brian and I started out the year with a leg burner to the top of Rattlesnake Ledge. Last week the kids and I hiked all the way around Rattlesnake Lake (see it at the bottom) while Mark was at work, so it was fun to see the lake from a different perspective. I was not loving looking over the edge, but the rest of my family seemed quite content to lean over.
