Protection & Fruit Leather

Earlier this morning there was a terrorist attack in Moscow in the Metro train system. It is not a religious terrorist attack, but a political attack. It came from a group of Chechens from the North Caucasus area. There is a lot of violence in the North Caucasus, but it usually does not extend out of that region. There was a train bombing back in November of 2009 on a luxury train going from Moscow to St. Petersburg. This same Chechen group was identitifed as being responsible and it is believed that this is in retaliation to a FSB(Russia's Federal Security Service) operation that killed 8, including their leader known as the Russian 'Bin Laden,' insurgents and capture another 10 from earlier this month. The FSB operation was carried out, because of the training bombing.

The first attack happened at the Metro stop for the FSB, and another attack happened 45 minutes later. The death toll is right now at 37 and more than 60 are wounded.

Why am I telling you all of this? We travel this weekend to Russia. It does not sound like they will not cancel our trip.

We NEED everyone to pray that we will be protected during our week there and that Sam will be safe too. Maybe an extra special covering over our son. He is such a special guy and we haven't even met him yet. I am already so proud of him.

You maybe asking yourself what does fruit leather have to do with Russia and attacks. Don't worry it doesn't, but if I was a pastor I am sure I could weave a good connection between the two. Maybe something about without God's living water we are all spiritually dehydrated. Anyways,Grandma and Ol'Bud (my grandpa) recently gave me their food dehydrator. A week ago I discovered that fruit leather was just dehydrated apple sauce with favoring or coloring. So I have been busy making lots of fruit leather for our trip. I hope Sam likes it. I colored some of them green and red and they are really cool looking. Plus I dried some pineapple, and I have some pears that I am going to dry too. Anyone have anything else have suggestions for what I should dehydrate?

15 days and counting...

I feel like we should be posting everyday because we are so close to leaving, but in reality nothing that exciting is happening. We spend the last two weekends doing mostly nothing and this weekend and next weekend I have class. In between all that there is just work and homework and getting our fingerprints done for the FBI. I read these other blogs where people have these long lists of things to do and then I worry that I'm missing something.

The visas will get here when they get here.

We still don't know how much money we need to take so we can't go to the bank.

We can't pack because that would be silly.

If we buy Sam anything else we'll have to buy an extra suitcase, so that's out.

Honestly, the best thing to do at the moment seems almost not to think about it. I don't know how Tim is coping but for me work has been a little crazy and I am also trying my hardest to get as much of my school work done before we leave as possible which means 2 bulletin boards, some presentations, and probably a good 2 more hours at the resource center at the library cutting things out using the die cuts.

One more thing, about his name. I think we're going with the two middle names. If he doesn't like it when he's older he can change it but we still call him Sam. He looks like Sam. So Sam he'll stay. For awhile he'll probably be Sam Alexey or Alexey Sam but eventually he'll just be my Sam.

Okay, I'm stopping now. I could probably ramble for a little while more but this post is already pointless.

What's in a name?

The blog has been made private because you never know when big brother Russia is watching you, but it being private means I can share the details with you all.

Today we got what may be the closest thing to a referral that we're going to get. Sam's birthday is in November (most likely the 2nd like I thought). It says he's outgoing with gray eyes (I say they're blue) and light brown hair. We knew all of this. We also found out some info on his parents that I don't want to share here but will be good for him to know when he's older.

Here is where the debate comes in. We knew Sam wasn't his real name but were going to change it because I love the name Samuel. I love that God gave him that "code name" for a purpose because it is what Hannah named her son after praying for him for a long time. The Bible says she named him Samuel because "I asked God for him". In my head his name is Sam.

We had always agreed that his middle name would be Stanley. It's a Tweten family name and it seemed like a good fit.

Today we got his Russian name and are now in a tizzy over whether to keep it. I think before we knew it we were okay with changing it. Now we aren't sure. His Russian name is Alexey, which I don't like. I also don't like Alex.

But neither of us is ever going to back down on our chosen names. So what do we do? 2 middle names? Samuel Alexey Stanley Tweten is a little bit of a mouthful. What do you guys think? Too much?

Leave us a message and let us know, maybe one of us can be swayed.

Time is ticking away...

So, we leave in less than 4 weeks.

That is crazy.

I feel like we should be rushing around like mad and instead it was a weekend almost like any other. I've had a cold all week and didn't feel up to much anyways but I can't even think of things we should be doing.

So we're excited and scared and nervous and not at all prepared.

That's all I can think of now. It seems really far away. I'm sure I will be regretting those words in two weeks.

Show Hope Fundraising Opportunity

I thought I would post this for all other adoptive families that need a little help fundraising. It was shared with us today, and while we really do not have the time or energy to start something new I think it is a great way to raise money, and from talking with the spouse of the director of this program it is really easy to do. And will save a bunch of time and effort if you were already thinking about selling t-shirts as a fundraising mechanism. Show Hope

Go Belmont

It is getting that time of year when the madness starts, and all I have to say is, "Go Belmont." This really has nothing to do with our adoption except that very soon we will have a little guy to take to games and yell, "Go Belmont." And that makes me very happy. I cannot wait to teach him the grrrr at the end of one our cheers, but I also know that there is a very good possibility he will not be ready to attend a basketball game next year. I know that we have a long road ahead of us once our family has expanded. In learning Russian news, I have learned that the word for fish sounds like the spanish word "¡Arriba!" I have a new excitement about learning Russian and I going to start using ¡Arriba! for fish from now on.