The Eight Year Old Man....

Aiden has always been............different. In a good way. He has always been part boy, part grown man, even when he was a baby. He has an old soul I guess you could say. I love that he has always had a sense of contentment. He has thrown 2 temper tantrums in his life and they lasted all of 2 seconds each. He's never out of control. He is very cautious. Won't ride his bike without a helmet, elbow pads, and knee pads. He is rarely wild. He talks with us on our level most of the time, so it was no surprise when we received his 2nd grade standardized test result and they showed he had a 7th grade vocabulary comprehension. This is just typical Aiden. I wanted to show these pictures because this will give you a true sense of Aiden and his "old man-ness".

Jeff walked out on to the front porch this morning and there Aiden was. Reading a story in the Fort Worth Star Telegram about some new developments at Hurrican Harbor. Make no mistake, his favorite are the comics but this morning he was focused on the Work & Money section! When I came back out with the camera he said to me "What? I'm just really into the paper, mom." Okay, what ever you say, grandpa.

Cooking Ethiopian.....................

I attempted Ethiopian cooking last night. I chose Ethiopian

Beef and Peppers because it didn't require any of the spices

I had to order on ethiopianspices.com. I have posted the recipe.

That picture of me is my "hey, at least I gave it a shot" pose. It actually turned out really good though. I hope Minte likes beef and peppers because he is gonna get some when he gets home!

Check out the recipe.

The Nursery....................

Here are pictures of the baby's nursery. I was inspired after going to Africa. I even picked up some things to decorate with in Niger. When my friend Lori and I saw the zebra bedding I fell in love! I also plan on painting the continent of Africa on one wall above the changing area with a heart in the corner, where Ethiopia is. I will add those pics once I have done it. If I am even able to do it. We will see. Here are the nursery pics:

And here is a picture of the boy's, Aiden and Minte's bedroom. Aiden loves it and can't wait until Minte comes home and they can share it. We are sending a picture of their room to Ethiopia so that Minte can see it and see how it has changed. We sent him a picture of it before we redecorated for him. I hope he loves it. Here is the pic:

Announcing..................

We would like to officially announce our newest family member!

Cooper Drake Teodros Wilkinson

Theo made it through court last week while I was in Niger. So we can post his picture now. Minte has not made it through court yet. We are sad about it but we are trying to be patient. Soon he will have made it through and the wait will be a distant memory. We covet your prayers for him. We were supposed to be in Ethiopia right now to pick them up. He is old enough to understand what is going on. Please pray that he can hang in there and that God would comfort our sweet boy. Thank you!

Finally................

I have been home Niger for a week and I am just now posting about it. We had a wonderful time. Karissa and Sally gave around 2,000 shots in 5 different villages along the Mehanna Road. It was a wonderful experience and I was so happy to be a part of it. Here are pictures from the vaccination clinic. Lawaly checking people in.

Karissa giving one little girl her shot.

Me giving out paracetamol to reduce pain and fever.

Sweet daughter and daddy leaving clinic.

Now you guys have to see something awesome. Karissa and I got to experience a real African sand storm. Like in The Mummy or Sahara movies. It was crazy. The first picture is of the storm coming in. The first video is the first minute of the sand storm and the second video is five minutes after the first video. Notice how dark it is. The video was taken at 6 or 6:30 pm in Niger. It is not dark at that time in Niger. The darkness is due to the sand storm. CRAZY!!!!

Good news, bad news, and a little more good news......

I will just start with the bad news, get it out of the way and move on from it. We didn't pass through court today. From my understanding our case didn't even go to court because MOWA did not turn in their recommendation for the adoptions. As of right now, we don't know when our case will be filed. That is the hard part. Not knowing when. Don't want to dwell on the bad though so on to the good.
I heard from Dallas Adoptions division of USCIS (immigration) and they told me that my case had been processed and I should be receiving my I171H any day now!!! This is great news because I can't travel with out it. I had been stressing about it.
The other good news is that I got to see several new pictures of Minte. He looks good and was wearing an Aggies shirt that we sent to him. That made me smile after a morning of pouting. I did not see the baby because he is back at his old orphanage until we get through court because they will represent him.
Now we are just praying for a quick court date so that we don't have to rearrange our travel dates. It could end up costing us several hundred dollars to do that. Thanks for your concern and prayers for us this week. Please keep it up.

What is new...........

It has been so long since I took a minute to sit down and post. There are several reasons for this. Here is what has been going on. We found out a little over a week ago that if we make it through court tomorrow in Ethiopia, our Embassy date could be as early as May 28th! Whaaaaaa? We were thinking that it would be late June! We obviously don't have to be in ET for court but do need to be present at the kids Embassy appointment so that meant getting air fair before having passed through court and hoping that we wouldn't have to change our travel dates later. I am leaving for Niger this coming Monday so that left me with a lot to do in two weeks.
I started out in a panic because I was still working. My boss at Frontera was nice enough to let me leave a week earlier so that I could get stuff done! This lowered my stress level. My mom came into town and helped us quite a bit and bought the baby and Minte some things. This decreased the stress even more. Thanks Mom, you are the best!
So as it stands, we are praying that we get through court tomorrow, will post the news here, and we are also praying that we get our I171H which is basically permission from US Immigration to bring orphans into the country. Lord please let it come!!
So I am packing for Ethiopia and Niger because I will be leaving for Niger on Monday May 12 and returning on May 21. If we make it through court tomorrow and don't have to change travel dates, we will leave for Ethiopia on May 24. Yes you read correctly, that is 3 days after flying home from Africa. I will get back on a plane and fly back to that very continent, this time with Jeff and Aiden at my side. I know it will be hard but it will be soooo worth it! We will be going to get our boys. I had thought about staying in Africa and flying from there to Ethiopia but it was going to cost about $1000 more to do that and as I have told many people, that will buy a LOT of Pampers and Enfamil! It just didn't make sense financially for us to do it that way. So yes I will be exhausted but I will also be soooo stinkin' happy.
Hopefully I will be posting again tomorrow with wonderful news that we are officially the parents of Minte and Theo and that we will be on this plane on May 24th,ready to go get them! Keep us in your prayers!
Thanks,
Jaclyn