Need to Post

I feel like I need to post. It's been over a week. But I'm in a pretty bad mood today about our adoption. I really want to have a temper tantrum. I want to cry and stomp my feet. I want what I want and I want it now!

There. Shew. I hate feeling like a brat.

Now, let me resume being a responsible, faith-filled adult. When we went through infertility, I feel like I 'failed' in the way that I handled things. I operated in a constant attitude with God like the paragraph above. I was in my twenties. Ten years have passed since then. I'd like to think I learned something about God's faithfulness. His Grace. His Mercy. So, at the risk of giving platitudes - I'm going to post things I know to be true. It's all I've got today.
TRUTHS
* God is in control.
* God knows everything.
* God's timing is always best.
* I never want anything that hasn't been sifted through the hands of God first.
* God put us on this path of adoption.
* God loves me and my family.
* God is a good God.
* God sees things in an eternal perspective.

So...I know God is not in a hurry for His best. We will continue to wait. We covet your prayers. To all my sisters who are in the same 'waiting' room, I keep you in my prayers, too!
Love to all - a

Help with a Quick Click!

Hey Everybody!

My friend, Jennine, is getting ready to bring home her son from Ghana soon. They have entered a pet contest to help raise some of the travel costs! (ingenious!)

Will you take a minute and vote for 'Batman' the Guinea Pig?

I can't get my link to work on my post so.....click on the 'Going Ghana Gone' link in my sidebar. The link in her post will take you to vote. Click and enter your email. You can enter once a day per computer/email.

Raising funds for the ginormous cost of adoption is one of the biggest things that keeps people from doing so! Please help them out! Vote as many times as you think about it!

Thanks y'all!!

50 Years...A Rare Breed

A Beautiful Weekend, A Beautiful Couple, A Beautiful Marriage

Frank and Dixie renewed their vows on the exact day of their 50th wedding anniversary last Sunday! We had all of Mark's family down to the island last weekend for a 4-day celebration. (It's taken me a week to recover to blog about it!)

They are a rare breed in this day and age! 50 years of love. 50 years of laughter. 50 years of tears. 50 years of decisions. 50 years of building a life together. 50 years of challenges. 50 years of joy. 50 years of family. 50 years of mistakes. 50 years of learning. 50 years of prayer. 50 years of smiles. 50 years of LIFE. 50 years of COMMITMENT. 50 years. 50 YEARS.

God is so good. What an example. I love my in-laws. They are amazing. Enjoy the pics below!




All 5 grandsons stood as witnesses to the renewal.



I love this picture where they are praying and the stain glass of Jesus is in between them, high above.

Speaking the words.

Sealing the Deal!

We're looking forward to the next 25!! We love you, Frank & Dixie!

Life

I usually like to laugh my butt off. But sometimes I have a week where I ponder deeply. I don't think I articulate those musings very well. Which is a little bit funny considering that I teach people how to communicate for a living!!

My first child is a 4-legged Bassett/Beagle hound mix. Many years ago, a co-worker rescued her from the dumpster at a hospital. She is completely beautiful to me. She has the shape of a basset with the head and tail of a beagle. She is super smart. Almost human. She has deep, dark tattoo-looking eyeliner around her eyes. She looks at you in a way that says, "I completely understand but what can you do?" She's the first 'real' pet I've ever had. (These pictures don't do her expressions any justice but since we went digital I find myself really just taking pictures of my human children.)

Jantzen is the best dog ever. When we got her in our 2nd year of marriage, my husband said, "Does 12 years sound like a long time to you?" 12 years was the time our vet had just told us was the average age for a dog her size. At the time it seemed forever. We were in a new home, new marriage, new jobs, new town, new dog. I couldn't even see into next week much less next year.
Jantzen is 12 years old this year. She is beginning to show serious signs of arthritis and old age. Her front paw is beginning to 'fuse' due to arthritis which is making her hobble as if she has a hurt front leg. It makes me sad. It also makes me realize once again how precious life is. 12 years has flown by.

Have you ever been in a time in your life where you thought, "I can't wait until.....!!" We are in a place where we 'can't wait' to see who God has planned for our family through this adoption. My gut reaction as I think about this is sadness that it takes so long to find that out. But then I remember how long it took to have my biological children. I remember my first thought in the first moment that I held Asa was that I would do it all over again just to have Asa. Not any child. Asa. I would endure all that waiting, crying, and speculating just to have Asa. If you've heard my testimony with my child-bearing years, you know that E came along just as easily as possible. Asa was only 8 months old when we learned we were pregnant with Eli. Mercy, I always say.

For this next phase of adding to our family, God is writing a different story. I could spend it crying and speculating. God knows we've done enough of all that. Yet, we have so much faithfulness to point to. We KNOW He is in control. We KNOW He is the One who will shape and mold our family. I trust Him. I trust His timing. I will wait for the children that God has for our family. I'm sure I'm going to have my moments (may have already but I'm not telling!! :) but I'm going to trust and I'm going to wait.

In the meantime, I hope and pray that I will make everything of the time I have as a family of 4. I have very few regrets in life. But I regret that I was unable to love life with just me and Mark in the couple of years prior to our children. I was very busy wrestling with God. And what huge blessing and sanctification for both us He has done in that process. But I would hope that I've learned my lesson!

So, how's that for deep. Somewhere in there, my 12-year old dog's arthritis is related to God's faithfulness. At least in my mind, it is.

This has been SOOOOOO random. If you made it this far, thanks for doing so. This adoption thing is really so unique to anything we've ever done so far. (doh!?) Thanks for letting me process outloud during your blog reading time.

So, here's a few family pics of how we are enjoying our time!!

July 4th on the Boat
My true first born

Mark thinking he is going to stand up and surf on the tube behind the

boat like his 6 y.o. phenom son.

Our 6 y.o. phenom son 'surfing' the tube while the boat is pulling them.

This pictures cracks me up.

Eli and Grant (friend) laying on the tube waiting for us to go.

We are totally anchored eating lunch.

Not having any intentions of moving yet and every 5 minutes,

they shout 'Are y'all ready to go yet???"

My Fritch Men!

Just cruising along

Summer has been fabulous - The Gathering Place is rocking and rolling. I told a friend once that 3 years seems to be a magic number for a new job. The first year, you have no idea what you are doing. You are just trying to get through it and learn all the ins and outs. The 2nd year you try to adjust to what you learned during the 2nd year. You can anticipate some of what will happen but still aren't in a 'groove'. The 3rd year, everything 'settles'. You've worked out the kinks. You can concetrate on actually doing your job well - improving the little things, enjoying the ride. We just completed our 3rd year at The Gathering Place. This is our 4th summer. We are enjoying the ride. Thank you, Lord for your grace and goodness. For knowing our family, better than we know ourselves. Our lives are dependent on you.

We've put our emotional selves on an adoption break. I'm trying not to read blogs and material quite as much. I threw myself into the adoption with all that I am - for those of you who know me well, I know that's not hard to imagine!! With our busy summer, we've decided to try and not think about it until we have some more concrete information. We continue to trust that the Lord has called us to this and that His timing is perfect. And moreoever, He knows exactly who will become part of our family - forever. I am with great anticipation to unwrap that package. We welcome your prayers for our family.

Lastly - for those of you who know Frank & Dixie - my in-laws - they are celebrating their 50th Anniversary this July! Unbelievable! The whole family is coming down during the middle of July for a week for a big celebration. They will be renewing their vows. Mark will perform the ceremony and all 5 grandsons will 'stand-up' as groomsmen for them. How precious! My mother-in-law recently told me that in her prayers, she has always prayed for her GrandSONS - but now she has started praying for all her grandCHILDREN - especially the ones in Africa who've yet to join us. She is so precious in her love for us. What great heritage of great long-lasting marriages, Mark and I have to pass on to our children. My parents have been married for over 40 years as well! A dying breed in our generation. We are grateful for their dedication to each other and their obedience for decades to the Lord. What a legacy. It will ECHO for generations to come!

Not much to report. Just a taste of SSI for those of you who've berated me to update. :) Love to all!
a

Pick a Number

The boys and I drove to Marietta this past week. In our 5 hour drive that lasted 8 hours, we played games. Pick a Number is one of our favorites. One person picks a number, tells everyone what it is between and everybody gets a guess - closest is winner and gets to "Pick a number" next.

Heard on the way:

Eli: I'm thinking of a number it's between 1 and 20hundred.

Asa: That's 2000, Eli.

Mom: 82!!

Asa: 10,000!! ( Mom's thinking 'between 1 & 20 hundred, Asa!')

Eli: It was 3.

All die laughing. The kids have no idea why.

Here's another game. The ABC Animal game. 1 person starts with A. says animal that starts with A, next person B, so on....

We get to "P" - it's Eli's turn. Can't think of one. Taking FOREVER.
So Asa chimes in with, 'I'll give you a hint! It starts with 'PUUUUUU' (thinking of Puma)
Eli: 'You said POO!!!!"

Both boys die laughing.

Too funny.

I-171 Received!!!

Hey Everybody! We received our I-171 from Dept. of Homeland Security today! Woohoo! This is our pre-approval to bring an orphan into the US. We will have to file our actual I-600 once we know names of children to put on the forms.

I was SO excited. Our new phrase in our house is forward motion. We may still not know very much about the end result of this process....but as long as we are moving forward.

We still have our 'eyes' on a set of siblings. Would you pray for them with us? One of them may be very sick and we are waiting to hear a final word on this - hopefully within the next month or so. We are feeling more and more drawn to these children. We just want it to all be the Lord's idea!! His are always the best ones, right?

Our hope and prayer all along (from the very start in January) was to have our children home by this Christmas. A local magazine called yesterday who heard our story back in March from a friend of mine - she had considered putting our family in the May issue about Mothers but decided against it and never called us. So, I thought it was just a passing thought for the owner of the mag. No biggie. But she called yesterday and wants to feature us in either Nov. or Dec's issue. She wants to have pictures of our new children with our family in the issue. November's issue is about families. But Decembers!! December's issue is about a Season of Miracles!!! Of course, it is!

We are believing the Lord for a season of miracles. He has orchestrated so much already that Mark and I couldn't have tried to write this many details into a story if we tried. I was thinking the other day about 'our adoption' story. A friend recently said to me, 'This isn't really your story. It belongs to your children." I LOVE that. I love that God is allowing me to walk this side of a journey of how a child is 'born' into a family.

He knows who will belong to us for their time on earth - I can't wait to squeeze them!!

Thanks for your prayers!!
Love!!!
a for the Fritchmans