New Car

Well... new to us that is. It is a 1977 Plymouth Volare station wagon, which we bought from the original owner. He needed to reduce his number of cars so he has time to restore his Model A and 1957 Chevy.

The car has manual steering, manual transmission, manual windows & locks. But is does have power brakes. The air conditioner doesn't work, but the windows do. :)
The engine is a slant 6, like found in the Dodge Aspen. It has just under 164,000 miles. It has been well maintained so we hope the kids will get lots of use from it.


front of car (JonPaul)

upholstery- love the plaid

kids showing it off

Adoption Update

I got a call from our case worker today. Actually several calls, verifying details in the home study report.

The report from Children's Services has been received from North Carolina, now we are waiting on the one from Washington. The case worker's supervisor told her only those two were needed, not one from every state like we were originally told. That's a big help in getting the study finished and approved.

I have learned that 2 of the personal references letters have been mailed. So they should be arriving soon. We will need a 3rd one, but that may already also be on it's way- I couldn't reach my friend by phone today to ask her.

We have narrowed our list of potentials down to 5 or 6. The first on the list is a brother & sister. The others are singles (although I have information that #6 has a brother somewhere.) Of course, once we are approved, we will have case workers suggesting kids from their files to us that they think will be a match for us. And once we get approved, we can start getting more and detailed info about the kids we are interested in.

So now we just pray that the last of the paperwork arrives here quickly and the study is quickly approved. However, this is a government agency and it has to go through two different offices for approval. And because of all of our moves and our already having three kids, there is a LOT of paperwork to be read through, even more than the average family. But I know the local case worker realizes we are serious about the process since we are working hard to get her the info as quickly as possible. She has said she will do what she can to expedite things.

The other day, I was thinking if the kids are placed with us around the first of September, that would be really ironic. We started the process early in January, so then 9 months later we would have an addition to our family.

Drill Competition

Jon Paul and Naomi attended a JROTC drill competition on Saturday (after driving back and forth to Birmingham on Friday to help friends move). There were about 9 schools competing. Here are the awards the team received.

1st- exhibition (routines with spinning rifles and drill moves)
2nd- color guard (Jon Paul was the commander)
2nd- unarmed regulation (set routine of drill movements)
3rd- inspection (of uniforms & knowledge questions)
3rd- armed regulation (set routine of drill movements with a rifle)

Adoption process update

We have now finished all of the interviews and the two home visits. I finished getting the case worker the list of all of the places we have lived and all of the places we have been employed. A background check will need to be ordered from all of those states. Unfortuately, this will mean a delay in getting our approval by approximately 2-3 months (because there are some many different places to get reports from).

I also prepared a photo album which included all of the required photos, and then some. We needed to submit photos of each of the rooms in the house, front & rear view of house, and any place where we have food. I also included photos of the pets, and included captions for the photos to explain what they are showing. A short description of each family member too. Something for other case workers who have not met us to learn something about us and our interests. In all, the report was 27 pages- with 2-3 photos on most pages.

The average time in takes to get a family matched with a child is about 3-4 months. So now instead of getting a placement in late summer, it will probably be in Nov/Dec. Which might work out better as then the children will not switch schools until the beginning of a new semester.

The school calendar here starts the new semester right after the Christmas break. And school will start on Aug 7th this fall. Which is only a short time after we plan to return from our trip to Oregon. The kids and I are going to drive there and back, pulling the camping trailer. That way we can bring the animals with us as Jonathan will be on temporary duty (TDY for those who understand military acronyms) part of the time we are gone and won't be able to care for the cats and birds (we were already planning on taking the dogs.)

We do have a short list of potential children to ask about once we get approval. However, I will not post links at this point because many things could happen between now and when we get approval and can ask about them. If you would like to see the children that are currently available for adoption, you can go to these websites.

http://www.adoptuskids.org/ (national site, just go to "meet the children" tab on the upper part of the page. Fill in the search form and be sure to check which state to search on- Georgia for us.)

http://www.myturnnow.com/ (this is specific to Georgia)

You will find many of the same children on both websites, but some are only on one.

It's happened again-

It's happened again, another one of our children has entered the arena as a driver. That means we now have 3 teenager drivers in the household as Naomi received her driver's permit today.

And she has already had her first driving lessons. I think Jonathan and I will survive- but that remains to be seen.