Today was a mix of information and events.
The Good
1. We had a great time at a new mall called The Fondeloras. There was a place called Happy City on the top floor that the girls (and adults) enjoyed. No one was there so we did fun carpet slides, bumper cars and games over and over. We also found Lanie some size 9 shoes that Velcro for her tiny feet. Thank you God for the invention of Velcro! She can put her own shoes on.
2. We ate out for the first time other than the empanadas snack. The mall even had Tex-Mex! They got their first McDonald’s last year. Scott ate at McDonald’s!
3. The attorney came over to discuss somethings this afternoon. She gave some great information about Lanie and said the lady at ICBF ( you know the one that insists on us speaking lots of Spanish)… Anyways this lady felt good about our connection with Lanie based on when she dropped her off Friday and the detail reports I have given them over the past few days. Reality is I really like this lady and have great respect for her. She takes her job very seriously. Anyways, maybe our integration meeting will go well. Lanie seems to be attached to us very well. They also gave some good insights into Lanie. Her speech delays make it hard to understand her Spanish. We have a hard time understanding good Spanish much less Spanish with poor pronunciation! The agency people and other Spanish friends here have a hard time understanding her as well. I might start teaching her English end of the week.
The Bad
She still struggles going to sleep. Bedtime seems to get harder each night.
The Ugly
The bad news of the day was that our attorney told us there have been some changes in the adoption system here in Manizales. What that means to us is that we came here thinking Lanie and I would be home in about three more weeks. Scott leaves June 14. Alli and my sister leave June 21. The attorney said to plan on being here about 4.5-5 weeks from Friday. We went for ice cream after hearing that news although I did request a Margarita instead. We are already a bit homesick and the idea of being here with my sweet but high energy Spanish speaking nina in a country I don’t speak the language well with not a lot to do and a lot of extra expense does not bring smiles to my face. I don’t want to be away from Scott and Alli that long. However, as Alli said, God has this in his plans as well and we can walk in it with peace. God has answered many other prayers so I’m now praying the court proceedings go very quickly. Maybe I should just pray for contentment in whatever He has in store for us. I’ll pray both! Thankfully there is another single girl adopting here that is on our same timeline so maybe we’ll hang out. I know there are many good things that could come from being here longer as well.
I’ll try to post more pictures tomorrow.
Trusting Him for the future.
Buenas Noches!