La Multi Ani Cristian!

Today is Cristian's birthday.
Here is a picture of him with his "Happy Birthday Breakfast." He is 6 years old today. Nicolae and Cristian are both 6 years old now.


Cristian's birthday makes me think of my mom. (Not that I don't think about her EVERYDAY! Mom forgot many things, but one thing that she always remembered about the boys is that they were 5 and 6. Now she would just have to remember that they are both 6. God how I miss her!

Happy Birthday Cristian! I love you so much!

Lessons with Nicolae and Cristian

Yesterday Nicolae and Crisitian worked on becoming more fluent and flexible with their numbers, both in English and Romanian. I noticed a huge improvement after the lesson...especially with Cristian. Knowing the numbers fast and fluent was not easy for him. However, once he figure out what the numbers were, he was very good at writing them.

Nicolae already knew his numbers, however, he had a bit of trouble when it came to writing them down. Writing the number 2 was the most difficult for him. You could hear him groan every time he rolled a 2. In the video you can even see his attempt to avoid having to write the number 2.

Later on last night we played the board game "Trouble". It is the game that has the dice in the middle of the board. You click on the bubble to roll the dice. There was an amazing difference in the boys' confidence level. Cristian actually knew some numbers immediately. Before he always had to count each individual dot. Sometimes he would say the numbers in Romanian and some times he said them in English. It was so wonderful to watch learning in action.

Great times with the boys!

Today was another wonderful day with the boys. Nicolae was so adorable at the store this afternoon. He loves going to get the fruit weighed. It is his goal to get the lady who weighs the fruit to smile. It is so adorable. He looks at me and then heads off on his mission. He always starts by saying " Buna ziua" to the lady. "Good day". Then after she is done weighing whatever it is he has handed her, he quickly replies, "multumesc". "Thank you". If the person does smile, he smiles and is so happy. If they don't smile, it is as if he has failed and wants so badly to try again. He so reminds me of Tomas when he was Nicolae's age.
At the park, the boys spent some time jumping rope and of course climbing up the climbing wall. Nicolae can not only climb up by himself, but he can get down by himself as well. It is such a huge thing for him. He has had to overcome a lot of fears to accomplish this. I am so proud of him. He is pretty darn proud of himself as well.
Cristian is almost ready to go solo, but not quite there. Hopefully, he will be able to add this accomplishment to his list...soon. He still needs a tad bit of help get up and some help getting down too. It isn't because "he can't do it", it is because he doesn't trust himself. Fear takes over.


Here is a video for all of you to enjoy. It is a video to "showcase" Nicoale's and Cristian's "jump roping abilities". Enjoy.

Nicolae and Cristian's First Easter Egg Hunt!

Some American families planned an Easter Egg hunt and we were fortunate enough to get invited. I believe that they have been doing this for a couple of years now. There must have been about 300-500 eggs. I don't know exactly, but there were a lot.

You can not get plastic eggs here, so they get recycled every year. I was actually able to contribute 12 eggs ...wooohooo. When the hunt is over, the eggs get separated out and given back to the people who brought them. Teri and I are planning to have the boys hunt again tomorrow.


While we were there, we met up with Eric and Heather Kooiman again and their two children Hannah and Samuel. Eric is from Modesto. His parents, Rie and Clares attend Big Valley Grace. Small world.

Nicolae and Cristian were so excited. Every picture I took of Nicolae today has this same smile. He was so genuinely happy! Cristian too. They have never hunted for eggs before. It was so adorable. Well and of course they loved the getting the candy part too.

Teri was a good Auntie and helped out when the searching became more difficult. There were about 25 kids altogether. It was a great day.
Happy Easter ....again...
Tomorrow is Easter in Romania
Love,
Debbie

Baking cookies with Auntie Teri

Hey,
I left Teri's picture out. Oops! So here it is.
Thanks Auntie Teri!

Today is our One Month Anniversary

Today is our one month Anniversary.
March 19th was the day the court said yes, but the 21st was our actually first day together as a family.I can hardly believe a month has already gone by.

Things have continued to get better everyday. Yesterday and today were actually both really great days for both of the boys. Even Teri remarked how well behaved the boys have been. It is so nice to see the progress they have made. They are learning how to read, write and speak in English. They are learning how to play appropriately, how to get along with each other and how to be respectful. It is pretty amazing how much difference a month makes.

I would appreciate your continued prayers as we all continue to figure things out and learn what it means to be a family.

Today Teri baked cookies with Nicolae and Cristian. We decided to take some of the cookies to the DPC today . It was a great reason to go and visit and just another way to remind the DPC we are still here! The boys behaved nicely at the DPC office today too. Yay!




Afterwards, Teri, the boys and I, all went to the park. Nicolae and Cristian spent some time "entertaining us" with their jump roping "skills". They were so diligent and so cute. They were both very proud of themselves. Oh how I wish I had taken my video camera with me.












Thanks again for all of you who have taken time to pray, to write and to care. God willing we will be able to come home soon.



Love,
Debbie

Please pray- Another Potential Road Block

Of course...Romania has thrown up another road block. Now, the law has changed ...yet again...and supposedly, the natural parents have to come to court when the boys have their court date to be adopted. The parents will then be asked, for the third time now, if they really want to give up their rights. We just learned of this about 4 days ago. It is so frustrating. I have no idea what happens if the parents don't come. Do they come while I am there? What happens if the parents say no? Then what? So many unanswered questions. I have asked Mr. Mocanu and he said he will check into it. He has no idea. The law just changed. Grrrr!

Tomorrow I am planning to go to the DPC just to keep connected and get some paperwork from them. On Wednesday, I will be meeting with Carmelita, the social worker from ROCK. She is going to do my home study that is required from the U.S. to leave Romania. Praise God for this blessing.
I still need to find out more about what all I need to get done for both Romania and the U.S. There is so much that needs to be done.
Please pray.
Love,
Debbie