Safely Home

Our family took 10 days to have a time to be together and reconnect, but also to see a bit more of this huge continent we live in. We traveled to Mozambique and spent 5 days by the ocean and wow, it was so beautiful. We were in a bay so there were not many waves and our kids swam in the pool and in the ocean non-stop. As I watched them splashing and playing, I just smiled seeing their pure joy. This vacation gave us a few days of no interruption and we had so much fun together. Amazingly, we managed the whole trip with no sunburns, so good job African sunscreen!

We did go snorkeling for one day but the ocean was not cooperative and we swallowed a lot of salt water as we tried to swim with big waves going over us and into our snorkels. Elijah and Faith braved it for a little while but Mercy was not going to get her face wet. Then they dropped us off on an island for a few hours and it was beautiful and it had a huge sand dune we could climb and more snorkeling with no waves. The kids were in heaven and ran all over the island.

Our last few days were spent in Swaziland and there was more to do there than we could squeeze in, but we did get to watch a man making candles and he spoiled my kids by asking them their favorite animal and then making it while they watched him and then he gave it to them for no charge. We also went to a glass blowing factory and saw some really beautiful things made from recycled glass. The kids read posters all about blowing glass and the process of making different glass items but did not get to see anyone blow glass because it was a Sunday.

We LOVED our time away and it was good for each one of us to have that time together, but we were all very happy to be back in Lesotho on Sunday night. It was nice to greet everyone at the border in the language we are now familiar with and it was just good to be back at Beautiful Gate and see our friends here. Beautiful Gate is such a great place to be and while the ocean and palm trees were beautiful, the weather was warm and inviting, and we had no worries for a few days, we are happy to be back home!

Our first house in Mozambique - 1 night only.

A pic in front of the glass blowing factory in Swaziland.

The view from our house in Mozambique where we stayed 5 days.

Apparently our house came with a cook so we had him cook one meal, crab curry and prawns. It was very nice.

This man made each of my kids their own candle animal. He is an amazing artist.

I tried to post this 2 days ago but we were having internet issues.

Vacation Time

Tomorrow is our 15th anniversary and we will be celebrating by taking the kids on a trip to Mozambique and Swaziland. We will spend 10 days away seeing some sights and also relaxing on a beach for 5 days. Faith has been counting down the days for the last 44 days and just now came and said that she can't sleep :) We are all looking forward to some down time and I am thankful that God has provided us with the amazing opportunity (our friend helped us get a really good deal).


We have to leave a day early so we can try to get our visas in order so please pray with us that all will work out and there will be no complications or delays. Prayers for our safety as well would be greatly appreciated and I hope to have some nice pictures to post upon our return. We will be missing an adoption and possible child reunification while we are away as well as a chance to get to know some short term volunteers who just arrived, so please pray also for Beautiful Gate while we are away as it is a very busy place!

My rambling thoughts

It is a cool, rainy Saturday here in Lesotho. After a winter of mostly sunny days, it is a great relief to have a cloudy rainy day. You see, August is WINDY season and the winter sun has dried out the land and grass so that when the wind blows, the top soil, dry grass and litter go flying through the air. I took the kids to the river yesterday for a little play time and we all had to cover our nose, mouth and sometimes eyes to walk there. Sometimes the dirt in the air is so thick that we cannot even see across campus and the sky looks cloudy even though we know there are no clouds. It is amazing to see and hard on those of us with allergies, but with the wind comes warmth and occasional rain.


The past month has been a time of many children coming and going. We have had 6 children who have been adopted and 2 who have been reunified and we have had about 5 newborn babies admitted. With the 6 children who were adopted, one family had waited 8 years for their set of siblings and the other families waited 6 years!! Wow, what a long wait for these families and yet they persevered and waited for their children. What blessed my heart is that every single one of them, after meeting their child, said it was worth the wait as the child/children were a perfect fit. It is amazing that God can orchestrate such perfect matches.


When I returned from furlough, our youngest child was 3 months old and we had very few newborn babies brought in for the 5 months after and now our houses are full of newborn baby cries again. One house is so full of little babies that they no longer have room for more. All their older children have been adopted or reunited so it is a really young house and a lot of work for the house mothers. Yet, when I go in there to visit, the house mothers are smiling and singing and playing peek-a-boo with their little children.


Hearing the cries of the newborn babies is a bittersweet sound. On one hand, I am extremely thankful that the babies have been brought to a safe place and have the hope of adoption. However, the fact that they have been abandoned, thrown away as trash or have been the victims of attempted murder, breaks my heart. I look forward to a day when there will be no more abandonment even if that means I will be without a job! I am also praying for the adoption process and that there would be a breakthrough that would quicken the waiting time for families who are trying to fill the call in their lives to love on the precious children not only here at BG, but around the world.

"Think of Me"

For the past 2 days, I have been going into a house and looking at and holding a little boy. He is less than a week old and he is just an amazingly cute little guy. He is quite lucky to be alive considering his mother did not choose to get pregnant. This choice was forced upon her and yet she choose to go through with her pregnancy and give up her first son for adoption. She is only a teenager and knew she could not care for him nor did she have the resources to even try, so she did the loving thing, and is giving him a hope and a future.
Culturally, she could have ended his life without guilt or shame. Yet, she gave him life. Many girls around the world choose to have "fun" and are careless, get pregnant and abort their babies. They had choices and ways to prevent it and yet choose the easy and immoral way out by choosing death for their child. But this young girl, she chose life for her son. She gave him a chance and can sleep easier without the added trauma of murder to her conscience. May God pour His blessings over this young woman. When forced into this situation, she chose love.
So he arrived the other day, after hours, and I got to meet him on his second day of life. We had a social worker fill out an admission form and that is when I noticed that this little guy did not even have a name. So sad, and yet I know that he does have a name to God. He was knit together and God has a family for him. God knew that his mother would not be able to care for him, but God has a mother who is waiting and aching for a baby to hold in her arms. My heart aches for the girls of Lesotho who are being forced into these situations. My heart breaks for the tiny babies who come through our gates without the love and care of a mother. But my heart also hopes because I will get to see some of these babies in the arms of their chosen mothers. Mothers who will wait years and years until they can bring their child home.
In my reflective state of mind, I listened to the song, "Think of Me" by Lisa Chan a few times today. Here are just a few of the lines in the song that are moving...


"I have a name you can know it, it's been awhile since anybody asked..."
"Think of me, let me live in your mind..."
"Keep loving me, while others play blind..."
"Show true religion, cause words don't relieve, your actions they heal me, show that you believe..."
"Think of me..."


To mothers who chose life and mother's who bring those lives into their homes through adoption!

7/11

Eleven years ago, I embarked upon an epic adventure...
I became a mother!
This event changed the course of my life forever. Nothing would ever be the same again...and that is completely fine with me.
You see, I am not one of those mothers who is going to complain about needing time away from my kids because I LOVE being with my kids.
I am not going to tell you all the things I miss from before I was a mother because my life is richer and fuller because of having my kids.
I enjoy who they are, laughing with them, playing with them, cuddling with them, crying with them and most of all loving them through every stage of their life. I do not regret the past and I do not worry about the future hardships to come, I enjoy them right now in the moment.
I say these things not to brag, but in hopes of encouraging others.
Children are a blessing from the Lord whether biological or adopted and I encourage you all to take every minute and live in it so you won't regret missed time once they are gone and out of the house.


Eleven years ago, God gave me a son who was so cute, sweet and easy to love. He has changed a ton over the last 11 years and has become a young man who loves God with all his heart, seeks justice for those who are mistreated, has the most creative and imaginative mind, enjoys being the big brother to over 60 sweet little Basotho kids and who will stop at NOTHING to get a laugh out of everyone he meets. God knew what He was doing when He created this guy because he is a joy to be around :)


Seven years ago, God gave me a daughter who was also cute, sweet and easy to love. She embraces her place as the youngest in our family by being our little clown. Her laugh is so hilarious that it makes all of us laugh with her. She loves like no one I have ever known and enjoys serving others. She spends most of her free time pretending to be an animal and loves to dress up and be a girly girl. But most of all she loves to bring a smile to our face and to cheer up the kids around Beautiful Gate when they are sad. She loves God and wants to please Him and prays more faithfully for people than I ever remember to. I am so glad God knit her together into such a great mixture of fun and love.


I praise God for another year with my precious kids and that I can celebrate the birthdays of 2 of them tomorrow. I did not do anything to deserve such precious gifts, yet God saw fit to give me 3 of the most amazing blessings in all the world. I will do my best to honor Him by investing my whole heart into them so that they in turn can pour their hearts out for others when it is time for them to serve God on their own.


HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELIJAH AND MERCY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bryan and I surprised them with a flight with MAF. They loved it except that Mercy gets a little airsick, bummer. They were celebrities at the village they visited too as I do not think too many white kids have flown there :)

Good Reasons to Come to Africa

The other  night, Faith and her 2 cousins, Paige and Kelly, spent about 2 1/2 hours Skyping with each other. They did their usual things like playing with American girl dolls and having a dance party, but then they did something new which made my heart extremely sad. The three of them decided to convince their mom/Faith's aunt of all the good reasons they should come to Africa. My kids and their cousins are like siblings in that they are so close and they really love each other and miss each other so much while we are here in Africa. It is so hard to have them separated, but I have to trust God's timing and plan.
Sorry Kristin but I made a promise to the little sweeties that I would write out their list and make sure you saw it. They spent a lot of time and had some great discussions (more than one which made me want to cry because they love each other so much) and here is the list of all the good reasons why you should bring your two girls to Lesotho/ South Africa:


1. Good way to spend time together
2. It's educational
3. Once in a lifetime opportunity
4. African kids
5. Fun
6. Warm
7. New foods
8. Amazing views
9. Pet and see cool animals
10. Help kids
11. New culture
12. Exciting
13. Amazing sunsets
14. Swimming
15. Hunting
16. Fishing
17. You will see what life is like for us
18. We don't have to Skype
19. New smells
20. Stars
21. We can climb the big tree
22. Pretty flowers
23. Amazing trip
24. New language
25. Adoptions
26. See each other in person


With each list of good reasons, you need a few bad reasons too so the girls had:


1. Expensive
2. Long travel time
3. Mosquitos
4. Need shots
5. Passports needed
6. Poverty (seeing it I guess)
7. Boring trip in airplane
8. Water is not clean


As you all can see the good far out ways the bad, so it is a pretty convincing argument :) I praise God for a family that really loves one another and really wants to be together. We are lucky that our kids and nieces get along so well. I just need to remember to be thankful when I hear them talking and plotting together and not feel sad or bad that they are not able to be together as much as they would like. This is one of the unfortunate costs of obedience, but we have eternity to spend together making up for the time we do not get to be close to each other on Earth. And Kristin, I do not know if their argument will help you come here, but here is their well thought out list. If only the cost was not so high, then it would be so much easier.

Quarterly Update

This is an article that I posted in our most recent newsletter so if you received our newsletter, you can ignore this post.

The last 4 months have been very full of visitors from around the world. We have hosted several teams, even a few from our own hometown which was great. During our furlough, we felt like we were too busy to really connect with a few people that we wanted to connect with and having a team from our church as well as a team from Bryan’s old high school, offered a great opportunity for us to make stronger connections.

Seeing those we love and respect coming through the gates here and falling in love with the same kids and staff we love is heartwarming. Seeing their tears, hearing their stories, and listening to their hearts about how God has met them while they served Him here is always so encouraging to us and inspiring also.

We have had 3 volunteers join our team this year and spending time with them has also been such an encouragement to us. Living in community day by day and seeing Jesus come alive through the actions and attitudes of those serving alongside us has kept us going through the hard times and helped us stop and give God the glory in the good times too. 

Beautiful Gate is not a perfect place because we have not reached our destination in heaven yet, but it is great to see how God is using people from around the world to come alongside our staff and He has helped our staff come alongside those who are hurting. There are many issues that arise both through our staff and through our volunteers and it has given us many opportunities to grow and also to display the fruit of the spirit which God is pruning us to produce. All that being said, we feel God moving and shaping us and we love the way He is using His people to encourage each other in the amazing journey of life.