It's Funny Where a Beard Can Take You

How do you de-stress at the end of the day? A piece (or two...) of chocolate, glass of wine, exercise, facebook, reality tv, reading a good book or a bad magazine, blogging, talking with your significant other or a good friend? Well these are all valid choices (except maybe the exercise one), but the past two nights I've been having fun wasting my nightly down time on this site: www.jonathanspies.com Yes! That IS my husband's website. He just made it a couple days ago and put it up mostly for professional purposes. HOWEVER, he put up an interactive app that lets you upload any picture and put his beard on your it (have I mentioned he is bearded fellow?). His beard is fully stretchable and re-sizable, so you can put any size face up there. There is also a beard gallery of other people's creations that is fun to browse through. So I know I should probably be doing more important things... but sometimes we all need some time off.

Eagle Christians

Yesterday we went to our friends' church to hear and meet some pretty amazing people from Rwanda. Pastor Charles preached; Pastor Charles along with his wife is the founder and director of Africa New Life Ministries, which does just amazing work in the communities of Rwanda. We also had the privilege of hearing the testimony of Enric Sifa. Enric was just a kid when the 1994 genocide hit, and he and his little brother survived by living in the jungle in a pit. His father was murdered but his mother somehow survived, and they were reunited with her in an aid camp after the genocide had subsided. After they moved back into their neighborhood however, Enric's mother was beaten for advocating to get her land and house back (a more powerful man now wanted it), and she eventually died from that attack. Enric became a "street kid" to survive. He described his life and more importantly his mental attitude as a street kid. He told us how when he would get sick he would just sit on a curb and wait to die, because he knew it didn't matter to anyone whether he lived or died.
Eventually Enric's love of music led him to discover a church, which led him to Pastor Charles and Africa New Life Ministry. Now Enric has sponsors here in America, goes to school, and guess what? He tried out and WON Rwanda Idol! (Rwanda's version of American Idol). This kid is incredible. He taught himself how to play the guitar, and has some serious skills. He spoke of how becoming a Christian and having faith has changed his life, and knowing that people KNOW him and care about him has given him confidence. What a cool guy, in every sense of the word. Get his cd's!!
After the service I wanted to talk to Pastor Charles and his wife, Florence. I didn't really know what to say to them. Hi, We're adopting! just sounded so hollow after hearing everything that was going on in their country. What I really wanted to say to Florence was, I want to be you. Working to take care of all these kids, making a real and lasting difference. Working on the ground. But that sounded flippant as well. So we chatted about our daughters and she wished us luck on our adoption.
But I left the service with a heavy heart. The work being done in Rwanda is yielding amazing results; children love going to school there, the community is thirsty for faith, the government is willing to partner with programs that are seeing results, like Africa New Life. I was just sad that I was stuck a half a world away. I told Jonathan that my secret plan is to get him to live in Rwanda one day (sooner than later), which is why I obsessively ask everyone who goes to Kigali how the internet speed and connections are (Jonathan is a web developer). My secret (which I don't think I was keeping very well before) is out of the bag. Who knows where it will take us one of these days, but I hope it takes us somewhere where I can hold babies and play with kids who need love and work in a community like Kageyo or one of the many other communities in Rwanda that is rebuilding.

a Reblog

from Heather's blog at Sit a Spell, something so great I wanted to to retweet it, only I don't twitter, I only blog, so here I am, reblogging it:

We may have issues. Can we in the least admit that? Maybe the issue is our hard hearts. Maybe the issue is that the church as a whole is not talking about adoption enough. Let's not get defensive. Let's just admit that there are a whole lot of orphans out there being neglected and a whole lot of us doing nothing to care for them in their distress. Let's quit defending ourselves and simply admit...crap. There's a lot of orphans. There are a lot of Christian families. This discrepancy is a problem.

And now for a can of worms: You guys out there adopting from Rwanda, with or without an agency, who HAS or IS planning on sending their dossier without CIS approval and who HAS NOT. What has anyone heard about this? We thought this was totally fine to do, and had heard from multiple places that we DID NOT have to wait on CIS approval to send the dossier, that we could send the approval along when we got it to our POA and he could put it in.Now we are hearing the opposite - that we need to wait for approval to send our dossier. We were planning on sending our dossier off in a matter of weeks, so this would be a major time delay if we have to wait on CIS; however we don't want anything to go wrong over there. I know what the Migeprof website says (to have approval in your dossier) but we were under the impression that as long as you had it by the time you went to court you were fine - anyone know anything???

And so it began

On April 6, 1994 the plane carrying Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana and Burundi's Hutu president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down as it attempted to land in Kigali. Like us, the small quiet country had just celebrated Easter; families had gathered, congregations had worshiped, neighbors had shared meals. In a flash, the world turned evil. The radios spewed only lies, evil, and hate. Power hungry and evil men took over the government and wanted nothing but the total annihilation of the 15% of the population that was of Tutsi descent. In a country of 7.3 million, that means 1 million people. More land for the Hutus. More jobs, resources, educational opportunities, cattle, food, more everything for the Hutus. For 100 days the world went on while Rwandans killed each other. Hacked each other to death. Hunted one another down. Trapped groups of people - women, children, babies - in schools and churches where they sought sanctuary and set them on fire.
The Rwandan genocide is one of the greatest manifestations of evil in recorded history. I hate thinking about it. I've read some books, done my research on it; I feel I owe it to my children to know as much as I can about their birth country. I do not dwell on it, and I would not even bring it up, but for this one reason: for you to know how much greater the good work that has been accomplished there is.
It has now been sixteen years since somewhere between 750,000 and 1,000,000 people were brutally murdered by their own neighbors, by people they knew and who knew them personally in a country the size of the state of Maryland. In sixteen short years, Rwanda is now once again safe to travel to; in fact I would feel safer traveling to Rwanda than I would traveling to most of the countries in the western hemisphere!
How is reconciliation like this possible?
For one, once the veil of evil was lifted off the eyes of the Hutus - once the genocide leaders were stopped, once the drug and alcohol induced fogs fueled constantly by the genocide leaders, once the killing squads were not called to assemble, once the propaganda stopped on the radio, once the fear-mongering ceased - truth could once again burst forth and be heard. The truth took a long time to take hold. Some were stubborn and didn't want to believe it, for certain, but truth has a way of winning out in the end.
The world finally took notice and came. And then they stayed for while. Peacekeeping forces from France and Belgium were the first to arrive, and later the UN took over and set up refugee camps (where many more died from poor conditions, malaria, and water born illnesses) across the borders in the Congo, and Uganda. When the world is watching, evil men revert back to the cowards that they are.
Restoration. Deep heart changing forgiveness. Rebuilding of trust and of a whole country. Building by building and house by house. The kind of restoration only possible when God intervenes. He alone can change ashes into gardens, mourning into gladness, death into new life.
Money, aid, sponsorship programs, educational programs, counseling programs, programs, programs, programs! Investment is the bottom line. Not only others investing in Rwanda, but Rwandans investing back into themselves.
Obviously the work is not done there. Some estimates put the number of orphans at 750,000, some even higher. Clean water is desperately needed across the countryside. Infrastructure still needs to be rebuilt. There is more work to do. But it has begun.

Orphan Villages

This is from 4-more's website. They are a non-profit that works in Rwanda on behalf of the orphans of Rwanda. They are currently in Rwanda now, working on installing their first water purification system in two orphanages, and while they are there they are traveling the country and making other contacts as well. This is from their travel blog today. Counting my blessings and holding and hugging them a little closer as I kiss them goodnight tonight after reading this. People ask us why adoption. We point to the great need. This is that great need.


"We were able to visit one of the 45 orphan villages throughout Rwanda. The homes in the orphan villages generally consist of an average of 4 children and do not usually exceed 9 people.

Sadly, only 3 of the 45 orphan villages have water, which means they have a place to go (sometimes average of 5 kilometers away) and have to pay for their jerry cans to be filled (these cans are 20L and cost up to 100 Rwandan francs, which is about $ .25).

At times they are able to afford this water, and other times they are not. The other 42 orphan villages have no access to water of any kind. Their only recourse is to capture rainwater in buckets (as pictured).

Despite the many struggles and inherent disadvantages, the orphan villages are focused on improving the lives of children through such things as educational opportunities. In fact, 100 orphans have been sent to university and 54 have graduated!

In Gabo’s words, “our homes currently are just a drop in the ocean” according to the great need in Rwanda. The current number of homes within the orphan villages is 447. The estimated need is for 20,000.

Right now, the most desperate need in the existing orphan villages is for what seems the simplest thing – clean water."


Clean water to drink, a dry and warm place to live, a school to go to, food to eat and shoes on your feet. These are the bare basics of life. 447 homes in 45 orphan villages are not getting these. What is to become of the kids who need to live in the non-existing 19,500 orphan homes? Its enough to break your heart. Go to www.4-more.org to find out how you can get involved to help the orphan crisis in Rwanda.

Totally Stealing Christina's Post

I'm feeling too tired to say much today, but I read a great post by Christina and I wanted to share it with all of you. Actually, Christina and Jeremy have been doing a great series on the misconceptions of adoption. Her latest entry is on the myth that adoption is only for couples who struggle with infertility. Okay, go read it - she says it better than I do. (Oh, it's the Jeremy, Christina and Nate blog on the blog roll).

If only I knew then what I know now....

I turned another year older yesterday. Yes, the sands of time are catching up with me. I am in the process of investigating wrinkle creams (though that is a conversation for a different blog I'm sure; still suggestions are appreciated), and am considering getting serious about pilates. I need things to stay in place. I've got some years to go and I just can't get away from this gravity stuff! Its all around me all the time!
Okay, the point is, looking back, you always wish you would have done things differently. I wish I wouldn't have done that perm on Christmas day of 2000. My sister Abby's turned out amazing. Mine, turned out disastrous. We washed it right away (skipping the 3 day no wash policy) to try to get it out FAST, and it still stayed in my hair until I finally cut the last bit out two years later. Looking back, that was a mistake.
The adoption process is the same way. Mostly, we're all new at this. We try to gain wisdom from those who have gone before us, or from our agency, or from people in the field, but really it is one of those unique journeys in life that can be commonly shared yet be vastly different for so many of us. I find that so strange yet so fascinating at the same time. Here we are, all gathering roughly the same documents and putting together roughly the same paperwork, give or take a document here or there, picture pages here or there, family presentations here or there, and sending them to countries around the world or to just across town, and the quest that these documents take us on are so different. That is why I love reading your stories. Your love stories between you and your children. No two are the same and that is so beautiful.
Now, back to what I wish I would have known. I wish I would have known I needed TWO certified copies of my marriage certificate - one for my dossier and one for my CIS application - because I thought I only needed one and now I have to go back across town and get another one.
I wish I would have done the homestudy FIRST so that I could be getting the rest of my dossier done while waiting on my homestudy report to be written, but instead we did it last and now just get to.... wait.....
I wish I would have known I would have turned into a slightly hyperactive and stressed out not pregnant but sort of acting like I'm pregnant minus all the cravings and sickness (so really just moody) person. I don't know what I could have done about it, but at least I wouldn't have been in denial about it for so long. As they say, "Denial is not a river in Egypt." Acceptance is good.
I wish I would have gotten my doctor to sign me up to a clean bill of health when I saw her in September so I wouldn't have to scramble my way into an emergency physical. Of course, we hadn't settled on Rwanda in September, and I definitely didn't have the medical form needed then, but still, this is hypothetical, and that is what I wish.

So there are a few things for you newbies just starting out on the journey of independent adoption from Rwanda. Turns out I had my items slightly out of order for getting the dossier completed in the most time effective manner. If efficiency is your game, you may want to take these notes under advisement. Disclaimer: I can not be held responsible if you go mental in the process.