Russian Adoption Diary: Good, but Busy Weekend

Monday, November 12, 2007

Good, but Busy Weekend

This weekend was a whirlwind. Friday night, D and the boys drove to stay overnight at their wrestling venue. The girls and I got up Saturday morning and left for Dallas by 6:30 a.m. We had a meeting to attend regarding our China adventures.

The guys had an exciting weekend with the bwins winning their first ever medals! L took 3rd and El took 4th. They don't know which one is which. They just know that they both got a medal. They actually had to wrestle each other for the first time. D told the ref that he wasn't coaching or saying anything to either one of them. He just let them wrestle and stood back to see how it went. When I called to see how they had done, El answered the phone telling me he got a medal. When he handed the phone to L, he said, "Did you know we stay at motel. We sleep there." The medal was nothing in comparison to the utter joy of staying in a cheap motel! :-)

As for the girls and me, our day was long, but good. We enjoyed learning more about our organization and about the process. We also enjoyed meeting other prospective teachers. We made it back home on Saturday by 8:30 p.m.

Sunday was another big day. Of course, we had church and Sunday School in the morning. Then, in all afternoon and evening, was the Hope Symposium.

Again, we had Becky Wright, singer of "Child of My Heart", in concert. Then we had testimonies from an adult who grew up in a foster home, an eleven year old girl who spent 4 years in DHS custody and was adopted along with her 2 sisters a year ago, and then our family covered the international side of things. We had 2 breakout sessions where people had the choice to attend sessions covering DHS, 2 domestic adoption agencies, 2 international adoption agencies, homestudies, legal issues in the DHS system (taught by my hubby), financing an adoption, Big Brothers Big Sisters, and another mentoring group. After two sessions it was dinner time (3 kinds of chicken, tons of veggies, rolls, cookies), more music from Becky Wright, and a testimony from a birthmother. Then it was off to another session and we wrapped it up with an agency information fair. It went from 2:30-8 p.m.

All in all it went very well and I think it helped many people. Hopefully it will result in changed lives for children and families everywhere.

I think all of the adrenaline of keeping moving kept me going all weekend, but this morning I'm moving a little more slowly. We've kind of picked up from the tornado of a weekend and have done math. I think we'll do our phonics and sit around and relax a little this afternoon.

posted by 6blessings @ 8:01 AM

4 Comments:

At 3:10 PM, jessy said…

Yes,girl! For heaven's sake sit down and rest yo' self. You're making the rest of us tired!
At 7:33 PM, Melissa said…

congrats on the medals.

Sounds like a great weekend.
At 1:14 PM, Sig said…

Sounds great and fun, but very tiring.
At 7:16 PM, Jane said…

your work with Child of My Heart will change lives beyond your knowledge. God has been so gracious to many through your efforts! Generations will change because of a 6 hour seminar! And from there, His kingdom will be forever changed....praise God!

And I love the hotel excitement! reminds me of when I took Nikita and Stas to my parents in Ohio...a long drive for just me, so we did the trip there in two days....they were OVER THE TOP about the hotel. And then the breakfast spread the next morning was great too! not just juice and beagles. The newness and excitement can't be beet!