From the floor....

I come to you tonight, live from my bedroom floor! ha ha Seriously, we are making memories sitting on this floor! I've even got my favorite place to sit. ha What will I do when our bed gets placed here, covering the precious spot I've sat down on for the past week?! lol

Our bed and dresser will be delivered tomorrow! Praise the Lord! The inflatable mattress hasn't been too bad, but it's now going to Cala until her bed arrives on Tuesday (shopped at two different furniture stores.)

We still eat Japanese style until Tuesday when the dining room table and chairs arrive, and I will be so excited to see my house with furniture!!

In other news... we attended Cala's open house last night. She seemed a bit overwhelmed in the big school building, and was excited to see she has a locker! Glenn and I were excited to see she has the seat that we were wishing she would get- front row, dead center! The teacher said, "Cala, you have the expensive seat!" We also learned her teacher loves art and Cala will be spending time in art classes. That's great, because it's right down Cala's alley.

Cala met yet some more kids today, from the neighborhood. It's really been an education for her. She came to me a few days ago asking what a step-mother was. She also came in telling me that one little girls' Papa (daddy) was spending the night in a motel. :o/ Oh brother. I had some 'splaining to do about life to her.

Pray for Cala and for me as Tuesday approaches. I feel good about this decision- her going to school, as they will have programs available to help her where she needs it, but I still will miss her terribly during the day. Her 3 year old brother said in a Spanish accent, "Cala, I going to miss you". Try saying "miss" like "meece" and you got it! :o)

Never Fear, I'm Here!

:o) Yes, it's true! We are able to get a temporary (at least) connection to the internet! Come September 7th, we will have cable and dsl set up, so no problem whatsoever.

We have been staying busy doing all the things you do when you move! We went today and got our final load of stuff that Glenn had put in storage (on one of his trips here).

Best news right now is our living room set that we bought last week will be delivered tomorrow! Praise the Lord for that as we have been sitting on the floor! I'm coming to you live right now from my bedroom floor!

Really, this is the stuff memories are made of. I mean, when else will we be sitting on the dining room floor eating our supper?

Tomorrow: I hope to get Cala enrolled in school. Yes, she's going to try regular school this year. I will lose my homeschooling job, but I am excited to see how she does. She's excited! She asked if since we are in the states, if she could try it, so we are going to see how it goes.
She's already made friends with 3 neighborhood girls. I am thrilled! AND, she's already asked them if they know Jesus :o)

That's it for now... check back tomorrow for another exciting edition of my life in a Mini-Apples suburb.

And Finally....

We got the call to close on the house at 3:00 p.m. (central) TODAY!!!!!!!!!

Glenn is (as I type this) on the phone here at the motel trying to get our phone and internet/cable set up!

Since that could be a few days getting on, then I don't know when I'll be posting again... but never fear, I'll be back! :o)

Don't forget me! Pray :)

Good News/Bad News

We checked out of the motel today at 1:00 p.m. We then went to a neighboring city and ate lunch, trying to kill some time until we got word about the closing and when we should be there.

I want to stop right here and say that yesterday, we were discouraged about the delays and were out and about. I said, "Let's go by the house and pray." That's what we did too. We pulled next to the house (out on the road), and led by Glenn, each one of us (yes, even the baby at 20 months prays!), said a prayer for the house and our situation. We truly just wanted God's will. Our daughter is 7, and can be a real prayer warrior when she decides to be. She prayed a similar prayer to what Glenn and I did, praying that God would let His will be clear... if for some reason not for this house, then for another one. Ethan (he's 3) prayed, "deh Lord, hand sanitiz-a-yoh, chemo, house, Papa say this house my house, my room, Jesus' name, Amen." (Let me translate- we use a LOT of hand sanitizer and Ethan sometime started praying for it!, and chemo- my Dad, Ethan's biggest fan-"Gampa" is taking chemo for prostate cancer. Ethan ALWAYS prays for chemo, as he has been told Grandpa is sick from the chemo).

Then there was Seth.... he's 20 months and in his simplistic child like manner, folded his hands, bowed his head and said, "Houuuussssseeeee, Mama, Papa, Amen." I am blessed to know he will always pray for me :o) , but just thinking about how he simply said, "house". You see, in his little world, all is o.k. I am sure he thinks, "Who cares I'm only eating fast food or at restaurants? Who cares I'm staying at a motel? My Mama and Papa are with me, all is right in the world."

AND, what am I getting at? Within about 30 minutes from those prayers, we got word that things were going well.... they simply needed 2 papers (very easily obtainable papers) and things would proceed with a new lender.

THEN, to the good news/bad news part.... Today, when we ate lunch, I prayed that we would hear word concerning the house, and within minutes... we did! It was good news- everything is settled, completely settled, the house is ours.... Bad news- we can't close until tomorrow, because of a matter of time... no time at that point for the mortgage company to make the transfer to the previous owner's bank.... so that has to happen tomorrow.

I can live with that sort of bad news. :o) We had already checked out of the motel, so we called them back, and got the SAME room for the same discounted price. Thank you Lord! :o)

Do pray for us... as I type this, it's almost midnight and a storm is really here.... a bad one with hail and lots of rain and wind. This Florida girl is used to it, just would rather be in my home when it happens. :o/

Waiting is the Game

Closing once again passed us by today. However, our mortgage broker has another lender setting on go, ready to close tomorrow. We have two documents to take care of for them (their paperwork is somewhat different than the first people, but they seem much more reasonable!). We have one done, and the other one is from the company that did our taxes. The accountant will get that done in the morning, and then we should be ready to close!

I just continue to ask you to pray! Thankfully, we are all together, we're happy to be here, just frustrated.

**** ****

On a lighter note, we are enjoying listening to the differences in accents here. We commonly hear "yah" and "you betcha!" Can't wait to use "Ya'll" :o)

Still in the motel, dreaming of home.....

Our new home that is! Paperwork got taken care of, but closing was re-scheduled for 4:30 p.m. Central tomorrow! (Wednesday!) So, we had to reserve this room again for tonight. What are we going to do from 11 a.m. tomorrow (at check-out) until time for closing, with 3 kids in tow?!

Can I scream now?! Today I was just really tired feeling (kidney infection) and so the baby and I stayed in today. Actually, Glenn went and got Subway for lunch, and then at supper, he took the two oldest kids out to another town for Chinese. (something I don't share their love of!) The baby had left overs from lunch and Glenn brought me something back from Culver's (a chain of restaurants here in the mid-west).

The baby and I really enjoyed our time together. So nice how a child can bring a smile to your face no matter how you're feeling! He truly lives in his own little world, happy as can be, full of joy and blissfully unaware of the cares of the adult world. Oh that we could all be so carefree!

A hiccup on the way to our house

So, today I went inside our house for the first time! I love it! I really do, and I can definitely see us enjoying life there, away from the hustle and bustle of church planting life.

If only the mortgage company could share in my enthusiasm! It seems they want two extra proofs of Glenn's being self-employed, and that we had a place to live before now. I feel like I'm in the adoption world again with all this paperwork. You know, it lies in not being a "9 to 5'er", and the average person in the world doesn't understand the way Glenn receives his pay.

So pray when you see this... we are scheduled to close at 2:30 central tomorrow, but that's depending upon this paperwork getting settled. So, pray that it does and all goes according to God's will. That's after all, what we truly desire.

Something We're Doing Right!

I actually fell asleep last night before signing on to this blog! That in itself is amazing because anyone who knows me well knows I am the classic night owl! I feel the most awake, the most alive late at night!

I said all that to say this (wow! that just sounded like a line out of my Dad's preaching, "I said all that to say this" ....) ha .....

I wanted to share with ya'll how a compliment can sure be encouraging! Yesterday evening we were ready to go eat supper and debated as always , "where do you want to go?" "I don't care. It doesn't matter, where do you want to go?" (to which I always wonder why can't one of us just make a decision!?! ha ha). We ended up at Baker's Square. For those with no frame of reference to what Baker's Square is, think Perkins or better still, it's a lot like the old Village Inn Restaurants. (I think a few of those still exist, but none around our home area, anyway, hence why I said, "old").

I must first say here that Seth, our 20 month old is going through this very clingy stage where Mama MUST be in sight or nothing is right! He's really been quite the bear lately too. SO, that doesn't make dining out the best experience, although we're really trying to change that. I must also say that usually when we walk in a restaurant I get this feeling that most people (withOUT kids) are thinking, "oh no! here come three kids! Yikes!" That may just be me feeling that way, but because I do, I really try to keep the kids calm. I certainly don't prefer to eat out while hearing kids yelling, so why should anyone else!?

About half way through our supper, an older couple got up to leave (yes, they had already eaten!). They stopped at our table and the lady said, "Excuse me for interrupting you, but I just HAD to tell you how wonderful your children are. You certainly are doing something right, so keep it up! It will really pay off later."

I just wanted to cry right there, but managed to say "thank you." You see, just yesterday morning, I was feeling like my kids were not obeying a thing I said. Oh, they'll obey Papa, but what is up with not wanting to obey Mama? So, this was just such an encouragement to me (and to Papa too!) :o) Compliments do go a long way... I think I'll try to compliment someone soon.

We Made It!

We decided to go ahead and make another long day of it, and just get on to our new city! We made it to Minnesota at 9 p.m. or so, went to the Park 'N Fly to pick up our truck (Glenn left it here last time he came here), and then we were off.... I had the boys with me in the van, following Glenn and Cala in the truck. We drove through the cities and into our new city. We were all very, very excited to get here. I laughed because Ethan (age 3), upon us entering Minnesota, said, "Yay! Good job, Papa! You found Shota" (Shota is his way of saying Minnesota!). ha ha

Then, as if the Lord smiled on us, we pulled into the motel. Glenn went in and stated we had made online reservations for the next 5 nights. Without us asking a bit, the man upgraded our room , free of charge! This room is HUGE! It's actually a 2 room suite! So we have a separate living room area with plenty of room for the kids to run around (which they did tonight!), and then the bedroom WITH a JACUZZI!!!!!!! We couldn't get over it. We told the kids that right there, we should thank God for all this! So, right there, we prayed, praising the Lord for this smile. :o)

Tomorrow, we are all excited to see our new town. Tonight, we are all excited for the bed!

Farther than Expected

We drove and we drove and we drove.... we told the kids this morning we would stop a lot sooner than we got to last night. After all, that was the reason we left earlier this morning. HA! You have to remember, we have a lot of stuff with us!!! When we travel, we prefer to find an "interior corridor" motel. Not this time! With all this stuff, we much prefer an exterior corridor (meaning you pull right to your door, and can just unload everything right there).

So, we started looking for a room around 5 p.m., which is the time we prefer to stop (since having kids). It wasn't happening! Everything was interior corridors, so we just kept driving. Same old story down the road, and then we found a place with one room left on the bottom floor (oh yes, of course we have to have a bottom floor with all this stuff!). It was too expensive for what they offered and so we went on.

We found another place, but we have always said if one of us felt bad about a place we wouldn't stay. I don't know how to explain it other than I just felt no peace about this place.... and something "told me" to drive around back. There in back were three "undesirables" drinking "yucky drink" as my daughter calls it. I just knew then I didn't want to stay there.

And so we drove..... we ended up in the middle of corn fields in Illinois, with nothing else in sight! At long last around 8:30, we were all so hungry and decided we were getting food no matter what. (there had been no possibility of food for a looooonng time!). There we saw it... a Super 8, which looked to have outside doors on the bottom floor. Glenn went, got the room, we pulled around only to find the doors have been changed, and no longer are really there. (hard to explain). Ha Ha! It's funny almost... Thankfully we have the last room close to the door in the hallway, so it's not as bad as it could be.

We did just decide on which place to stay in our new home town.... it's actually an indoor place, but by then, we will have picked up our truck, and can leave things in the covered bed. (which is locked).

More than exhausted, but getting excited the farther we go....

On the Way to Mini Apples :o)

We got a later start than we planned, but the important thing is we had a good day of traveling. We made it to a city in Georgia that's an hour south of Chattanooga, TN. (we had hope to get to Chattanooga, but with our late start, we didn't do bad at all).

It was an emotional day (Tuesday) as we set out... saying bye to my Mama and Daddy... well, it felt like it did the first time we left for Russia- well, maybe not that bad... I do think though it gets harder to leave them as they are getting older, and my Daddy has prostate cancer, taking chemo.. that makes it a bit harder.

We talked to our parents before the kids went to bed. My Mama said she would have given anything this afternoon to hear a kid say something, as it was just too quiet (Dad had taken a nap).

Better run to bed... it's late.

My precious sons....

Ok, so while I'm writing this, it's very late (or early depending on how you look at it) in the morning (uh, 4:05 a.m. to be exact!, but hey! it's only 3:05 in my new time zone!) ha ha

Our oldest son (age 3) came home to us one year ago, on August 13th, 2005. On Sunday, our church here in Florida had dinner on the grounds as a farewell to us. We also had our boys' dedication service. It was very, very nice!

On Saturday night, I wrote a poem for the boys, and I read it during the service...I will post it here, and catch up on the blog while on the road... stay tuned...

THROUGH A WHOLE LOT A LOVE
- Amy Barker McCarver (aka Mama)

We dreamed of a son to call our very own.
By the miracle of adoption, he would come into our home.
Where he would come from, only God knew
Then suddenly we felt Him saying, “not one son, but two.”

Once we were sure Guatemala was the place,
Much had to be done, so we began the paper chase.
Home study to be done, our life stories to be told.
Our sons were now a small baby, and one 2 year old.

We got to meet you both in your birth land,
Got to hold you, look deep in your dark brown eyes, and walk hand in hand.
The day we had to leave, it seemed our hearts would break.
To not have you with us, seemed more than we could take.

Then months passed and finally the time came
Papa got to bring Ethan home, our lives would never be the same!
Just three weeks more, and Seth came at last
The heartache of waiting was all in the past.

Genetics? No, but he’s simply your father, I’m your mother.
Cala’s your sister, and you each are the other’s brother.
And today as we dedicate you to the Lord above
May you remember you got here through a whole lot of love.

Countdown Begins- so why don't I get busy?

Here it is Five sleeps as my kids would say, until we leave our home area and hit the road, moving ourselves, along with our earthly possessions to Minnesota!!!!

I truly do need to get "a move on" and pack some more, but just have no energy after last week. It's like I planned so long and so much for the party, that now that it's over- I'm sooo exhausted I can't recover. I know that's not true, but it feels that way right now. I do have fibromyalgia (http://www.fibrohugs.com for the best info out there on it), and so, I truly am exhausted still.

Oh well... this too shall pass....

Let the packing resume!

Anniversary Party was Great, and HOUSE news!

What a nice time my parents had at their 50th anniversary vow renewal ceremony and reception! I am thrilled that it turned out so well, and blessed to have them as my parents!

In other news: I'm exhausted!!! :o)

House news: After a roller coaster ride of emotions, with the house we liked best having an offer made on it before we had made up our minds about it.... being told we could still have a chance at it if Glenn could get the offer to them by 1 p.m. that day (it was like 10 a.m. at that point)..... well, we HAVE A HOUSE! We are officially first time home owners and I am soooo very excited about it!

I really would like to post more, but I really am exhausted! :o)

So busy!

Staying super busy getting my parents' 50th anniversary renewal ceremony/party taken care of... it will be this Saturday. I am excited to see how it all turns out really.

Just so much to get done. I talked to my sisters-in-law today, and I so wish they could be here, but that's the life of a foreign missionary. I know... been there, done that.

My husband and our oldest son are in the Mini Apples area now. They will come back on Friday in time to be at the party on Saturday. We will then all finally be together in Minnesota in a couple of weeks.

I am excited about that!