My baby went to Homecoming tonight!!!!

Me and my baby girl.

Manning and Daddy

What Morgan does to Cole after he falls asleep.

Me and my only baby girl of the house sleeping together

Cole and Manning after his fourth grade graduatio

Picture of Pastor Keith, Boyden, and Cole at Camp Global Missions Camp from this summer. Man, what a great time we had!!!! (and Ms. Deb is back there too!)

More Pictures Of The Prayer Box

Prayer Box

I decided to make a prayer box this week so that the kid's could write down people we needed to pray for and then every night the kid's could take one out of the box and pray for whoever is on their card. I also wrote a bible verse on the back of each card. The box is divided into two sections. One section is for the cards that need prayer and they put them in the other side that says "believe" after they have prayed. I found a box at the store and used all my scrap booking supplies to do it up. It came out really well. Manning and our preacher's daughter, Bailey, helped with the box decorating and tag decorating. I am so excited about this. The kid's seemed really excited too. Morgan and Cole were already rattling off names to put in the box. And here it is.........

Book Review

The book I mentioned below, "Reckless Faith", arrived today. Amazing, I ordered it Tuesday around 5PM. They said it would be here today, and although I doubted that reality, it made it here TODAY! I was on the back porch and heard the familiar diesal engine of the UPS Truck, ran through the house and there it was! I have already read 3/4 of the book and IT IS AWESOME!!!

Also, Aimee, read your comment and thanks so much for the link. Pretty sad we work on the same campus and yet have never met. We are literally two minutes from each other on a daily basis and we talk to each other through a blog. Kinda odd, don't you think? Maybe we can do lunch some day as long as you have the baby with you so I can kiss on her:)

Movie Review

Not what I expected and I must say I enjoyed the old cartoons much much more. There was a lot of cursing in the movie and that was very disappointing and it was just way to futuristic for me. The boys didn't like it either. So wishing I would have rented it first :(

Broscious' Book Club

Wow! That sounds so much cooler than "Oprah's Book Club" doesn't it? Well, I just ordered a book yesterday off of Amazon that I have been waiting for month's to come out. It is called "Reckless Faith" by Beth Guckenberger. If you go back to my older posts I have a video with Beth talking about adoption. She and her husband have lived in Mexico for, I think, 13 years working with orphans. I absolutely love her. The book is supposed to arrive tomorrow. Can't wait. I will be sure to write reviews. Anyone interested in joining?

Bloggin Fool!!!

Wow, I know I have broke some kind of record today and deserve a reward. Including this post, that makes six posts in one day, Whew!!! I had a lot to say.

Update on HIV Adoption

OK, so I have been doing a lot of thinking about disclosure issues lately when we finally bring our little girl home. My husband and I have been talking about who we should disclose to or not. Well, Grace from our agency told us there was a possibility for a one year old little girl that was HIV Positive. Nothing definite, but maybe a possibility. We have talked to the boys about it all, and they could care less whether they have a sister that is HIV positive or not. It's so funny how different children raised with parent's in the medical field are compared to the more medically sheltered children. My kid's know so much about disease and the body that I don't even think about it until I see how much other kid's are sheltered from the human body. So Cole, the eleven year old, has said about 10 times in the past few days " So mom, we might be getting a one year old sister from Ethiopia that is HIV Positive". He is so non chalant about it. It didn't hit me until last night, when I looked at my husband and said " Maybe we should tell him not to announce the HIV status to the world"

Then, the more I thought about it, I am not going to tell him not to say anything. Why should we think we have to hide her status. I don't want her to grow up and be ashamed of a disease she was born with. I don't want her to be ashamed of any part of her. She is God's Perfect Child. Period!!!

If someone has an issue with her HIV Status, I will gladly educate them on it, however if they choose not to know the facts, they can carry on about in their own ignorance. My girlfriend, a wonderful Christian woman, said "I think it's great, time to start weeding them all out" And it's so true, why should we care what the rest of the world thinks? If they don't like it, they can stay away from us.

As I have talked to many people over the past couple of month's about our decision to adopt a HIV Positive child, it has been a wonderful chance to educate on the advances in the field. I am amazed how many medical professional's are not up to date on HIV treatment and research. It is such a fast-changing field that unless you are constantly digging your nose into the subject, you can't keep up. I specialize in HIV and teach that section to our nursing students. I feel so fortunate to be in a position to help stop the stigma at least somewhat. My long term goal is to start my PhD this year in Public Health and Epidemiology with an emphasis on HIV. I would love to work for UNAIDS one day. Please pray for our family as we wait to hear news about this possible little one that we want so badly to be ours.

How could anyone not give this cutie a stamp?

Poor little thing! He has gotten a stamp on his hand every day so far at school, that is until today. The first thing he said when I picked him up was " I was a bad boy today and didn't get a stamp" He was practically in tears. I asked him what he did and he said " I didn't do anything right today". That just breaks my heart. I told him I was sure he did lot's of things right today and just because he made a mistake, that he is still loved sooooo much. I asked him if he learned from his mistake, and he said "yes". Now what did he do? He poked a little boy in the back while they were watching Blue's Clue's. OK, so first of all why were they watching Blue's clue's at school and second of all, it's not like he bit the kid or pinched him, he poked him to get his attention for goodness sake. He said he would never poke another pre-schooler again and we went to Wal-Mart and bought Speed Racer The Movie. I am so hard on him:)

Last night he was talking to me while we were laying in bed (yes, he still sleeps in bed with Mommy and Daddy) the conversation went something like this:

Manning-I alway's good in school mommy
Me- good I am proud of you, I know you are a good boy
Manning- I never get in twouble
Me- I am so glad
Manning- OK, so I got in trouble once de other day.
Me- what did you get in trouble for?
Manning- I frew mables in de air and one went into de fis tank ( this is his lingo)
Me- Oh my! Were there any fish in the tank?
Manning- Yeah, but they still live!

And he still got a stamp that day, guess the poking thing really did it!!! God love him.

And finally, the much anticipated movie is out!!!

We have been waiting for this movie to come out FOREVER!!!!! This was my favorite cartoon when I was little. We didn't make it to the theatre, or actually I should say we have tried the indoor theatre three times with Manning and I swore I wouldn't take him again until he is at least six. So for his birthday, I bought him the DVD collection of the old cartoons. He loves them. Mike hates them! He never watched the cartoon when he was little and swears it is the stupidest cartoon he has ever seen. We have been collecting all the cars, you name it we have them. And now finally, I picked Manning up from Pre-school today and we drove straight to Wal-Mart. We are watching it right now. Excitement is at an all time high at the Broscious house right now. I know, we need a life:)

2nd job interview and meeting "The DOC"

Last Friday, I went through the most extensive interview I have ever had in my life. I had already decided not to take the job with the best pediatric heart surgeon on the east coast that would have pretty much sealed my career as a nurse practitioner for OH! Say the rest of my life!! Not to mention that I would have a lot more money left over. Well the PA that works with him now, said just come in see what we have to say and then decide. So that is what I did. Now the 14 year old was all like "So will you make more money there?" and I said "yeah, a lot more" He said he was willing to sacrifice time with me so that I could make more money for the family,(when in essence, what he was really saying was, hey, you make more money which means a little more is going to trickle down to me and I'm a teenager who really doesn't need quality time with his mother anymore because she doesn't know anything anyway)

I met with seven different people for this interview that lasted over six hours. I met with the anesthesiologist, the perfusionist, the PICU Cardiologist, the Peds Cardiologist, Dr. Gus, administrative people. I was dizzy by the end of the day. So I come home and start discussing it with my lovey. He say's something that actually made sense (I know, WOW that's what I was thinking too for those of you that know my husband). He says I would rather you regret taking this job then regret missing out on something with the boy's. And he is soooo right. I prayed and prayed about it and I know the right thing to do is stay in my state of poverty as a nursing teacher. With us adopting, it is even more important for me to be in a job that I can just take off if my kid's are sick. I have so much flexibility with this job and I maybe work 25-30 hours a week and only eight month's out of the year. So the hard part is going to be calling them and turning this position down. I told Dr. gus to give me two weeks.

The really cool news is that same day, I had a very early appointment with our Pediatric Infectious Disease Specialist in Morgantown. She is a wonderful woman. She is also a Christian. She was soooooo encouraging about us adopting an HIV positive child. I told her I was worried about being able to handle it all and she said " You will not have any trouble handling this, you can do it". The Lord had prepared the way for this day. She answered a ton of question's for me and was very kind. I was leaving and she said " I see you when you come back with your baby girl". She also told me that she had just had a consultation with another WV family the week before. This family is adopting a sibling set of three. One has HIV and the other two do not. The sibling's have been separated and have only been able to see and talk to each other through a fence. Now these three are going to be raised together where they can hug and kiss each other, beat the crap out of each other, and all the other fun thing's sibling's are supposed to do. God is good!!!!

Nightmare school day this week

OK, yesterday, not such a good day!! Thank goodness God alway's gives us a new one. So yesterday I wake up at 715am to the alarm going off. I had to leave the house at 730 after getting myself, Cole, and Manning ready for school, because Morgan was already gone (or so I thought). I was so mad that Mike set the alarm clock wrong, called him to find out why he didn't listen to me when I told him I needed up at 610. He promptly let me know that he set the alarm for 605, thinking to himself that I would be mad that he was waking me five minute's early. Mike said you know what, I bet Manning was hitting the snooze. Manning sleeps with us in the middle and the clock is on Mike's side. Mike said he know's how to hit the snooze and does it all the time. That little turd hit the snooze button for an hour.

Morgan turned his alarm clock off in his sleep. Morgan called his dad, who agreed to stop working, come pick him up, and take him to school. We made it out of the house by 730. Dropped the kid's off at my aunt's where they were to catch the bus. Find out later that middle school was closed due to electrical problem and there was no way my aunt was going to put Manning on the bus by himself without his brother with him, so she decides to put him in her car (she has no car seat) and take him to school herself. The school is very close and at this point in the morning I didn't care (and for those of you who know me, I know usually I would be throwing a fit over vehicle safety). Now around noon I receive another call, stating that High School is letting out early due to a water problem and Morgan is on his way home.

And just when it looks like all is clear, I go to pick up my four-year old after his first full day of pre-school. I stand with all the other parent's, watching the kid's leave the parking lot on a bus. A teenage girl is standing beside me from our neighborhood. She looks at me and proceeds to tell me that she saw my four year old getting off the bus at the church pre-school. She heard one of the worker's say "who is this kid?" Then she said they proceeded to take him into the building. Now mind you had this been Morgan or Cole at this age they would have been hysterical and I probably would have been also. But not Manning the four year old that believes he is 25. No Manning would have just walked home by himself had the daycare people not insisted he go inside. And knowing this independant child, he probably would have made the walk home with no problem. I could see him sitting on the front porch with his chin in his hand's when I would pull up and say "where have you been, I'm hot, I been waiting here all day".

Well, the school thought he was to ride the bus to the daycare (that he has never been to in his life) while I specifically stated he would be a walker and be picked up my myself, my husband, or his brother every day. Thank goodness I have known the daycare owner all my life. I walked in and she said "does this one belong to you?" He told them his name and she knew he was mine. He just turned around while he was playing and said "Hi Mom" And finally the day ended with me sticking my foot in my mouth at church last night. I came home to my family and had to laugh, becuase Morgan said "Dad's going to buy me a smart alarm clock" Mike and I unanimously said I don't think it's the alarm clock that needs to be smart, just the user:)