Holy Week

I love Holy Week!  I love the closeness with Christ, the closeness to His story, the story of our redemption.  I am taken in at the last supper, I grieve the suffering on the cross, I anticipate with great joy the resurrection and I celebrate new life on Easter.  A week full of emotion, meaning, deeper spiritual growth, love and gratitude.  Holy week has it all and not only to I get to benefit by taking part I get to give back to God by being apart of it and letting it change me.  Here are a few images to stir His spirit within you.

 

Maundy Thursday

 

 

 

 

Good Friday

 

 

 

 

Holy Saturday

This is a writing I found, author is unknown.

“Something strange is happening — there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.

 

He has gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the Cross, the weapon that had won him the victory. At the sight of him Adam, the first man he had created, struck his breast in terror and cried out to everyone: ‘My Lord be with you all.’ Christ answered him: ‘And with your spirit.’ He took him by the hand and raised him up, saying: ‘Awake, o sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.’

 

I am your God, who for your sake have become your son. Out of love for you and your descendants I now by my own authority command all who are held in bondage to come forth, all who are in darkness to be enlightened, all who are sleeping to arise. I order you, O sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be held a prisoner in Hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead. Rise up, work of my hands, you who were created in my image. Rise, let us leave this place, for you are in Me and I in you; together we form one person and cannot be separated.

 

For your sake I, your God, became your son; I, the Lord, took the form of a slave; I, Whose home is above the heavens, descended to the earth and beneath the earth. For your sake, for the sake of man, I became like a man without help, free among the dead. For the sake of you, who left a garden, I was betrayed to the Jews in a garden, and I was crucified in a garden.

 

See on My Face the spittle I received in order to restore to you the life I once breathed into you. See there the marks of the blows I received in order to refashion your warped nature in my image. On My back see the marks of the scourging I endured to remove the burden of sin that weighs upon your back. See My hands, nailed firmly to a tree, for you who once wickedly stretched out your hand to a tree.

 

I slept on the cross and a sword pierced My side for you who slept in paradise and brought forth Eve from your side. My side has healed the pain in yours. My sleep will rouse you from your sleep in Hell. The sword that pierced Me has sheathed the sword that was turned against you.

 

Rise. Let us leave this place. The enemy led you out of the earthly paradise. I will not restore you to that paradise, but will enthrone you in heaven. I forbade you the tree that was only a symbol of life, but see, I who am life itself am now one with you. I appointed cherubim to guard you as slaves are guarded, but now I make them worship you as God. The throne formed by cherubim awaits you, its bearers swift and eager. The bridal chamber is adorned, the banquet is ready, the eternal dwelling places are prepared, the treasure houses of all good things lie open. The kingdom of heaven has been prepared for you from all eternity. “

 

Easter Sunday

 

 

 

 

Have a blessed Holy Week!

 

 

 

Welcome to my Esty shop!!

Check it out!!! Adorable handmade hair clips and barrettes for the fashionable little and not so little girls in your life.   I also have Ethiopian inspired handmade cards.  Some of my hair clips are made with vintage fabric and many are vintage inspired, all of them are cute.

Anwen and her little sister (who is in our hearts but not yet in our arms) were my inspiration.   Anwen always looks so cute when she wears clips in her hair, and I can only imagine her sister will rock the clips just as well!

The handmade cards were inspired by Esuyawkal, I wanted to make something to celebrate Ethiopia, something that I would have looked for as I waited for him to come home.  Here is a sample of one of my cards:

This is part of the series of cards that depict Tukuls, the traditional homes in Ethiopia.

The vintage aspect of my shop is in process.  As many of you know I am a great lover of vintage goods and my goal is to offer up some of my excellent finds in my shop.  I’ll be sure to let you know once I have a few things posted.

While I have been searching for a way to sell some of my handmade goods, this shop came into existence in part to help fund our adoption.  At this time all proceeds from Prolifika will go towards our adoption, which I hope will cause you to feel even better about recommending my shop or purchasing for yourself.

Here we go again!

The Grant family is adopting again!!! We are very please to announce that God has lead us to another adoption and we are pleased to be in the early stages of the process.  We are returning to Ethiopia as this is where Esuyawkal is from and If one of us is Ethiopian than all of us are Ethiopian!

Our hearts will forever be in love with this amazing country, it’s beautiful people and it’s rich, vibrant culture.

We will be rounding out our family with a little girl between 3-4 years of age.  Ewan, Anwen and Esu are very excited about having a little sister, their understanding of why we are adopting is not always sound but it is always cute!  The children though are not the only ones that are giddy about adding a member to the family, Brian and I are also quite thrilled!

We were so impressed with our agencies Adoption Advocates International and Adoption Link (for the homestudy) when we adopted Esu that we are using them again.  It has been nice to be back in touch with people that helped us along the way when we were in process with Esu.  It’s like talking to an old friend, or that labor and delivery nurse that was awesome and you will never forget, it just makes you feel good to see them or talk with them again!

So, there you have it, our big news!  Three cheers for adoption!!!!

Important health warning for children of Ethiopian/Abyssinian/Eritrean decent!

Our agency had a little blurb about this in their newsletter and I was pretty alarmed, alarmed in that dodged a bullet kind of way.  Here is a condensed version of the article from the FDA with a link to the larger, more in-depth article.

An article by the FDA exploring the link between children of certain ethnic groups and an increased risk of experiencing life-threatening or even fatal side effects from taking codeine for pain relief was recently brought to my attention, as children of Ethiopian descent may be the most at risk. From the FDA’s website:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is reviewing reports of children who developed serious adverse effects or died after taking codeine for pain relief after tonsillectomy and/or adenoidectomy for obstructive sleep apnea syndrome. Recently, three pediatric deaths and one non-fatal but life-threatening case of respiratory depression were documented in the medical literature. These children (ages two to five) had evidence of an inherited (genetic) ability to convert codeine into life-threatening or fatal amounts of morphine in the body. All children had received doses of codeine that were within the typical dose range.

Parents and caregivers

who observe unusual sleepiness, confusion, or difficult or noisy breathing in their child should stop giving their child codeine and seek medical attention immediately, as these are signs of overdose.

FDA will update the public with more information once it has completed its review. 

 

Additional Information for Parents and Caregivers

Certain children may be at risk for life-threatening side effects, such as breathing difficulty, or death when taking codeine for pain relief after tonsillectomy or adenoidectomy. This can occur even with use of codeine at recommended doses.

Codeine is usually prescribed on an “AS NEEDED” basis. Do not administer codeine to the child on a regular basis UNLESS the child requires the drug. Do not administer more than six (6) doses per day.

Signs of serious side effects of codeine in children can include unusual sleepiness, confusion, and difficult or noisy breathing. If your child shows these signs, stop giving your child codeine and seek medical attention immediately by taking your child to the emergency room or calling 911.

 

 

 

To see the full article please visit

http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/ucm313631.htm

 

Catching you up

A lot has happened since my last post which was on Thanksgiving, so this post is to catch you up on what has been going on in the Grant Clan.

-Brian and I got away for a night and visited the New Glarus Brewery, and stayed in a super cute B&B.  Brian had a ton of fun sampling the beers at the brewery, I was prohibited from drinking due to all of the gluten in beer but I really enjoyed watching Brian have fun.

-We saw Santa:

 

Ewan really wanted to visit Santa so we met a friend at the local mall and the kids sat on Santa’s lap.  Shortly after our Santa visit, in fact we were still at the mall, Ewan started to ask questions as to the legitimacy of the mall santa.  He came to the conclusion that the mall santa was a man dressed up, and personally I also thought he was kind of creepy too.  Later that afternoon we were at our home school group Christmas party and the kids started debating over whether santa was real or not.  A mom came to me to warn me of the conversation in case I was a die-hard santa person, which I am not.  I figure my kids will find naturally and I am a-ok with that.  Later that night as we moved furniture around to make room for our Christmas tree Ewan started to ask the direct questions as to whether santa was real, in fact he asked me straight up if Santa was real.  I stop sweeping, and since I was not facing him at time allowed myself to panic quietly for a moment before turning to answer his question.  I have always been of the mind that if my child asks me something directly I will not lie to them.  So, I told him that santa was not real and we talked about St. Nicholas, the conversation went really well, until he started asking about the Easter Bunny, at that point I told him to talk to Daddy.

 

We ACCEPTED an OFFER on our CONDO!!!!!!:

 

This has been by far the biggest and best thing that has happen to us since my last post.  It has also been an answer to prayer and completely guided by God, and amazing we can see that happening in the midst of it all.  We accepted the offer a few weeks before Christmas and are slated to close in the next few weeks.  For me the most amazing thing about this whole experience is how God has answered our prayers and given beyond what we have even been praying for.  We have seen his provision and experienced his leading and been able to see his plan for our family unfolding.  I am learning patience in this process and to trust in Gods timing, I am learning that even when it feels like things are not moving, God is.

This Saturday we are looking at a house in our neighborhood (which we really love) for the second time.  At the showing we are meeting woman who owns the house, who was also raised in the house and then purchased the house from her parents and raised her children in the house.  We are praying that she likes us and feels good about possibly selling to us.  We are also praying that God would perfectly orchestrate this for us, which we know he can.  So feel free to talk to God on our behalf if you feel lead.  🙂

 

– I started a group at my church:

This fall I started an adoption support group called Odyssey at my church.  The group was started to meet the needs of the adoptive families in our church and outside of the church as well.  A safe place we can come to talk about things related to adoption, a place to feel supported.  Each month we have had a topic, this months topic is “How do we keep our children connected to their culture”?  I am happy every month when we come together and share our experiences, I am always learning new things from the other parents.  I am also elated that my church is so supportive of adoptive families and of orphan advocacy.

 

-Looking to Ethiopia:

 

With the sale of our condo and the purchase of a house on the horizon we have started teh conversation about possibly adopting again.  We are currently discussing when we might want to start the process again.  I am eager to get to a place in which we are earnestly praying about the next adoption, I can’t wait to see where God leads us.

 

Well I have just about used up my time at the computer, the children are getting restless.  Esu is actually standing on my chair behind me and pulling at my hair, I better wrap up before he pulls too much out. 😉

 

-My last picture is a current one of the kiddos, they are growing so fast I can hardly keep up.

 

 

Photo Friday- Kilted Ethiopian

Eusyawkal is represent'n for the McLeod Clan!! So Proud!

Photo Friday- Big hair

My baby just after I took braids out of his hair- I am glad that I am not the only one in the family that has big hair. 🙂

Remembering on Mothers Day

Today I am thinking about each of my precious children that made me a Mother.

This picture was taken just after I became a Mother for the first time!

Baby Ewan!!

This next picture was taken literally seconds after Anwen was born, I had a VBAC which is why I was able to have her on my chest right after she was born.

Baby Anwen!

This is a picture of the first time I held Esuaywkal, the little man that made me a Mommy for the third time!

Me crying all over my boy and holding is tight, he is not getting away from me:)

I wish all of you a Happy Mother’s Day and fond remembering!!

More on Summit VI

So as I said in a previous post Summit is a yearly conference and this year it was in Minnesota which living in Chicago makes it practically in my backyard or an 8 hour drive away.  I was blessed to be in great company for the drive so the 8 hours flew by,  the time flew faster on the way to MN but the drive home was more effected by my sheer exhaustion and the exhaustion of my car mates.  I wish I had a picture of our car trip up to MN and back because we had some good times but alas I did not have my camera with me.  Although if you go to There’s glitter in my coffee you will meet my good friend Elizabeth who was one of the lovely people I went to the conference with.  Actually it was a facebook post that Elizabeth made that alerted me to Summit, Thanks Elizabeth, you’re hilarious and awesome even if you can’t read a map!  Hehe!

Ok, so on to the conference stuff.  This conference is over two days and is absolutely packed with sessions to educate you on all aspects orphan care from the U.S. foster system to Global orphan care and the stuff in between. I can only tell you about my journey through the conference but I think that you will get a pretty good idea of what a typical experience would be from what I did.

Each morning from 8:30-10:30 was the general session in which corporate worship began in the large sanctuary of the church, there were also a few speakers during this time.  Each evening there was also a corporate session in which we heard a speaker and participated in worship of some kind.  Thursday night Steven Curtis Chapman preformed and Friday the worship band from Bethlehem Baptist Church led worship.

Breakout sessions:

I attended 6 breakout sessions and 1 lunch time session over the two-day conference, here are the breakout sessions that I attended:

• Church based orphan ministry 101- Overview- This is the session you take if you want to start an orphan ministry in your church, it was really good and if you purchase the book Launching an orphan ministry in your church you will basically have all of the information and more that was presented in this session.
• Church-based orphan ministry 201- Global orphan care- This session was great the guy who lead is the president of Orphan Outreach.  There was so much information presented and a lot of it was really practical information for starting a ministry in a foreign country.  There were a lot of things about this presentation that Americans need to hear about having relationships with the people we are trying to help.  I am not quite at a point that I would be starting an orphanage or ministry abroad but it really opened my eyes to wanting to work with organizations that have people already on the ground and that really know the organizations they are working with.
• Engaging Church Leadership- This was an essential session if you are desiring to start your own orphan care ministry.  I learned a lot about how to approach the leadership in our church, things to do and NOT to do.  Loved this session and Daniel Bennett who presented it is a pastor so his perspective was really valuable.
• Implementing a Balanced Orphan Care and Adoption Ministry in our Church- This was another session that was packed with information.  Bethany Christian Services were the ones that did this session and the videos that you can see on the link I gave are given by the same man who did the session.  The site is packed with information and links to help get a ministry started.
• How Does it Work? Models of Global Orphan Ministry Based in US Churches- In this session we got to hear from a panel of pastors and ministry leaders that apart of churches or ministries that are doing global orphan care.  It was really informative and really a treat to hear from Pastor Sudaker from India.  I really appreciated hearing his view on short-term missions to India and whether they are helpful or not he told us they are!
• The Truth About Orphan Care: Are We Doing More Harm than Good? This session was given by Vision Trust, and was really informative and eye-opening.  I walked away from this session which happened to be my last session feeling like I had a much better understanding of the pitfalls of not fully understanding the culture that you are working within.  The goal is to help these countries and to equip them to help themselves and often times that is just not happening.  I really loved this session and how thought-provoking it was.

In one area of the host church there was an area set up for ministries to have informational tables.  I collected a huge amount of information and took home a lot of business cards to build up my contact list.  Some of the ministries that were there were:

Sweet Sleep

Show Hope

147 Million Orphans

Lifesong for Orphans

Hope for Orphans

Of these featured speakers I would say that Stephanie Fast was really awesome as was Mary Beth Chapman.  John Piper was really great too and gave a thought-provoking sermon.  All of the people who spoke during Summit were wonderful and on fire for orphans which was really inspiring.

I can’t wait to go to Summit 8 next year, I have already started saving for Brian and I to make the trip together to where every it is going to be.  The conference was awesome and it was a huge blessing to be able to share two days with people who are advocating for orphans locally and globally and are really, really passionate about Gods call to …care for the fatherless…

Catching you up

So the last post I made was in the middle of March, I know it has been a long time.  Here is what we have been up to since March:

Brian was laid off from his job at the end of March which was quite a surprise at the time, although looking back there were red flags within the company.  The good thing was that Brian had not been laid off for any other reason other than restructuring and that they were giving him a severance package- Praise God!! Brian continued to work for three more weeks and so his final day at work was sometime in early April.  Three days after he was no longer working he was offered a job programming for Sears, again- Praise God!

At the same time that Brian was laid off we very unexpectedly received an offer on our condo.  It was a great offer and we wanted to take it so we signed a contact to sell our place!!  I scrambled to get all of the paper work together and before we knew it the inspection was over and we were in attorney review.  We had not looked at any homes yet as I was scared to look and get my hopes up, but things looked good with the deal so since Brian was off of work we scheduled a morning to look at houses with our realtor.  About 10 minutes away from the first house our realtor got an email telling us that the contract was being canceled-  BOOOOO!  Apparently the buyer could not get financing, we were really bummed out!  It took me a few days to get over the loss of the contract but in the end I believe that God had a reason for keeping us in our condo for now, I am not sure what it is but I trust that it is for the best.  We have not had anyone look at our condo for awhile, and so we are just waiting.

We got to spend a lot of time together as a family while Brian was waiting to start at Sears and that was great!  I also got to take the opportunity to go to this amazing conference on Adoption, Foster care and Global orphan care, the conference is called Summit and it is put on by The Christian Alliance for Orphans.  The conference was two days long and it was in Minneapolis, MN this year, each year a different church hosts the event.  It was amazing and I feel so blessed that I was able to attend.  I came away feeling even more equipped to start and Orphan ministry in our church, I also came away more on fire to make a difference in the lives of orphans locally and globally.  I highly recommend this conference for anyone that has a heart of orphans, is in a ministry involving orphans or is thinking about adopting.

As you can see the past 6 weeks have been packed with life changing events which have pulled me away from my blog and most everything else.  I am hoping to be able to write more regulary now that things are settling down a little.  I have really missed blogging and the other day was gently urged by my sister to start posting again- she said- “Shonah your blog has dropped to my 4th most read site, it used to be #2”.  I asked her what her #1 was and she told me it was her e-mail.  So this post is for you Meghan.