It’s hard to believe it’s been one year since we first met Zinabu and Abatu. That day will forever be burned in my mind, and I remember it like yesterday.  I remember getting on the bus, knowing we were heading to the orphanage and knowing that in just a few short minutes, our lives would forever change.  I remember the surreal feeling of that big bus turning down that small dirt alley and slowly pulling up to the gate of the orphanage.  I remember Rob saying “Hey, dude, I think I see your kid”. I remember looking out the window seeing Abatu scurrying around cleaning up toys with the nannies and some other children to make the orphanage look its’ best prior to our arrival. I remember so vividly the thoughts and feelings that were going through my head at that very moment. It’s just not possible to entirely verbalize them, but I’ll do my best.  Seeing him and knowing that he really does exist – that he’s not just a picture and a story written on a referral report. Knowing that in just a few minutes, we would walk through that gate.  We would meet our children – the children which we had anticipated joining our family for so long. Knowing from that point on, our life and our family would never be the same.  I remember being filled with nervous excitement, clutching Lora’s hand tight and doing my best to fight back tears.

I remember walking through that gate and being led into a small room with all the other families - all of us waiting with anticipation for them to bring out our children.  Zinabu and Abatu were first, so the rest of the kids coming in was just a blur. I remember the scared look on their faces as they came walking into the door - the nanny saying ‘Zinabu and Abatu’, pushing them toward us as we raised our hand.  Pulling them on our laps and giving them each a squishy ball with lights in it.  We’ve since asked the boys about that moment, and they remember it well too.  It was a scary experience for them.  The scariest part for them was our ‘light eyes’.  The boys had likely never seen blue eyes before.

I remember the fun of playing with our boys for the first time – Zinabu’s crazy energy and playing with anything electronic he could swipe from someone’s hand.  I remember Abatu’s remarkable prowess in kicking and throwing a ball and his quiet, nervous smile.  I also remember the sheer exhaustion that came from days with little to no sleep and being weary from travel.  As awesome as it was to be there I remember just wanting to go back to our guest house and crash.

Today, we celebrate one year from the day our lives changed forever.  The last year has been filled with many ups and many downs.  We have had a lot of days filled with joy and laughter, and we have also had a lot of days filled with yelling, fighting, and tears.   Although he considered himself an atheist, Bruce Lee once said “Do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one”.  Our life isn’t necessarily easy right now, but that’s OK. We pray for wisdom to meet the unique needs of our children, and the patience to endure challenges that come our way.  Having that patience is a challenge in and of itself, and we still have a long ways to go…but we’re trying!  Although it’s challenging, we wouldn’t trade it for the world.  We’ve been so blessed through the additions to our family and through all the friends that took this journey with us – you know who you are.

On top of all the memories from a year ago, we also celebrate Abatu’s fifth birthday today.  What a day!  We look forward to celebrating many more October 25ths. I will leave you with this precious clip from one year ago of Zinabu asking a blessing over a snack.  Enjoy!

It's been a while since we've had an update.  That's not due to a lack of things to write about...it's due to a summer with too much to do and too little time to document it all.  Truth be told, this update has been partially written for a long time, but I haven’t made the time to finish it up.

Unless you are living under a rock, you probably know that it’s Father’s Day this weekend.  If you’re living under a rock, consider this your warning.
Around our house, we aren’t big on gifts.  It’s rare for Lora and I to present each other with a big expensive gift for Mother’s day or Father’s day – or even birthdays, anniversaries, or Christmas for that matter.  It’s happens once in a while…but it’s few and far between.  We’re both OK with this…at least I think we are.  I hope we are!  Usually gifts just get thrown in a drawer after a while anyways.  Unfortunately, our moms and dads also usually suffer the consequences of our lame gift-giving this time of the year.  Sorry about that, guys.

First…let me say that I have been very blessed.  I have an amazing dad and a fabulous dad-in-law.  They’re two of the best guys I know.  Love you guys!  We have very close families, which is such a blessing!  I can’t imagine anything that would break our family apart.  But it happens to families every day.

Yezelalem Minch is a ministry in Ethiopia that exists to keep families together.  They provide sponsorships for vulnerable children – often those whose parents are sick or have died.  By sponsoring a child through YM, you help that child stay in the home with parents or other family by helping to meet their basic needs.  In addition to child sponsorships, they also provide community development projects including educational programs, health care, vocational training, and much more.  By meeting these needs, they are preventing the primary reason that children are given up for adoption.  And you keep families together.  We are proud to sponsor Rediet through Yezelalem Minch.  You can read our blog 75 bucks for more information on our sponsorship of Rediet.

YM is an amazing ministry – but they need our help.  Rent costs in Addis Ababa are skyrocketing, and there is so much need for their programs that they are running out of room.  The Future Hope Campaign has been launched to raise the funds necessary to purchase and develop property for the program’s operations as well as a new vocational center.

A Walk for Hope has been scheduled for this weekend in Grand Rapids to raise money and awareness for this project.  We as a family will be walking 3 miles on Saturday.  Yes – this includes all four kids!  This is where you come in.

I don’t generally care too much for Father’s Day gifts…but this year I'd really like one.  And I need your help to get it.  All I want for Father’s Day this year is for families to be able to stay together.  We care enough for this ministry that we are going to step out in faith and personally match all donations up to $500.  To this point, we aren’t anywhere close to that.  One more thing - If you choose to sponsor a child through Yezelalem Minch for $30 a month, we will donate $100 to the Future Hope Campaign.

Please consider supporting this amazing ministry.  We’re very blessed to be a part of it, and you can also be blessed!   If you would like to donate or sponsor a child, please follow this link to the Contact page and just shoot us a quick note letting us know.

For more information on YM and the Future Hope Campaign, you can visit http://www.yezelalemminch.org and http://futurehopecampaign.org. 

Thanks for tuning in, and welcome to the Dykstra Family Blog reunion post.   We’ve been home just about 6 months now, and thing sure look different than they used to!  I thought this might be a good opportunity to look back on past blogs and reflect on them to show a little progress.

In Questions and Answers (click to view in a new window), we covered many of the frequently asked questions that we had within the first month or two of being home.

Are the boys adjusted yet?

The new answer:  We’re still working on a few things (and we always will be) but the boys have made a lot of progress in 6 months.  We’re still learning how to share, and learning how to deal with life and possessions not always being fair 100% of the time (Less Is More).  Zinabu specifically is very inquisitive (read: naughty) and is quite a challenge for us.  For anyone who happened to be at East Saugatuck Church on Sunday morning at 9am, yes – it was my child who pulled the fire alarm in the middle of the service.  Doh!

We have settled into normal life routines for bedtimes and mealtimes and overall, we are doing very well.  Both boys are now done with preschool for the summer and will be in kindergarten/young fives 5 days a week next year.  They look forward to riding the bus!

Do they speak English yet?

The new answer:  Yes – very much so.  The boys can communicate now very well and the language barrier is almost entirely gone.  The boys are almost exclusively talking to each other in English.  We still talk in Kambaata/Amharic whenever possible with the few words we know to keep the boys sharp, asking them what things are to make sure they’re going back to that place.  “e su en Etopia minden no?”  It seems like they are still able to pull quite a few things out – most of what we believe to be Kambaata.  It seems like Amharic is mostly disappearing.  If I point to a fish, they can no longer come up with the Amharic word “asa”.  We’ll see if we can get them to hang on to some of it.

We have a ton of “story time” moments over the past few weeks.  Now that English has come as far as it has, the boys are free to tell stories.  We’ve heard lots of stories about Ethiopia – some of which are believable and some which don’t seem so true.  Both boys have been able to recall the plane flights home and explain to us what they were going through.  We’ve learned Abatu’s ears hurt on the flights, and Zinabu and I were able to hash out the “seatbelt incident” (Home Sweet Home) and we found out that he was scared of the “opening windows” – the overhead bins being opened and closed.  

We talk frequently about their family in Ethiopia and their experiences.  They like to talk about it now, and Zinabu is mostly over his anti-Ethiopia sentiments, which is a really good thing.  We’re very glad that we have an open relationship about their past and let them know it’s OK to talk about it and to miss it.

What do they think of the snow(sun/rain/etc)?

The new answer:  They’re over the snow!  They liked it while it lasted, but they have told us they do prefer the nice warmer weather we’ve been afforded lately.  It really doesn’t depend on the weather - they just want to be outside.  We’ve had several issues – even tantrums – over them not having their own umbrellas.  Lora finally loaded them up in the car and drove them to town to buy them umbrellas to silence the madness.

So how are you doing?

The new answer:  We’re doing pretty good.  Our life admittedly is crazy.  It’s a different level of crazy than most families face – but crazy nonetheless.  We’re very fortunate to have family supporting us and helping us out on a regular basis.  It makes the madness we face at times bearable.  We still try to not leave too many “1 parent days” wherever possible – specifically at bedtime.  It does happen on occasion though, and it is way easier than it used to be.  That is a big blessing.  Abatu has also in the past month finally decided that he loves mommy.  That was great news – he was mostly indifferent towards her before.

All four kids now can ride two-wheel bikes and they do so all over the place.  It’s nice to be able to turn them out and let them play.  They got their first boat ride on the pond last weekend, which they loved.  All have fishing poles, but we haven’t dared open that “can of worms” yet.  Fishing with four little ones will be a challenge, even for 2 adults!  As nice as it is to turn them out and “let them run”,  it still requires a certain level of interaction and supervision to keep them from seriously injuring each other, but thus is life as the parents of four similarly aged siblings.  Speaking of “let them run” – we’ve signed all four kids up for the Rural Rush 1 mile fun run on June 3.  We expect them to finish very high in the 0-6 age bracket.

Thanks for stopping by – you stay classy.

We traveled somewhere sunny and warm for spring break!  You may be thinking we went to Florida or (insert Southern state here).  We did contemplate a Florida trip, but quickly reconsidered.  20 hours in the car sounded less than ideal for our first road trip as a family of six, and we sure didn't want to pay for six plane tickets!

After talking to our friends the Cayleys from Wisconsin and the Meyers from Holland, we decided on a road trip to visit the Cayleys in sunny Eau Claire, WI!  There may still be ice on the lakes and snow in the shadows...but at least while we were there, it was sunny and warm - even when it was cold and rainy back home.  Who knew you could go north for nicer weather.

The main purpose of our trip was to have an "Ethiopian Reunion".  On our first trip to Ethiopia we traveled with both the Meyers and the Cayleys.  We were scheduled to do the second trip with them as well, but the Cayleys unfortunately got delayed due to their case being investigated by the US Embassy in Ethiopia.  I won't go into the confusing details, but our five adopted children are all related in one way or another or at the very least lived in the same village and were good friends.  They were all very close and we wanted to give them an opportunity to spend some time together.  In addition to the Meyers and the Cayleys, the Scott family from Minnesota came down for two days as well.  They adopted another cousin and friend of the kids.

We did some planning and hit the road with the Meyers.  We decided on an overnight stop in Madison, WI to break up the ~8 hour trip.  To date, our longest trip with the boys had been Grand Rapids.  After an evening of swimming and a morning trip to the Madison zoo, we were back on the road and headed to Eau Claire.  We visited with the Cayleys for 3 days.  Lots of fun was had by all - multiple parks with play structures, an indoor water park complete with big slides, and most importantly lots of time for the kids to play together.  Every day was packed with exhaustive fun-filled excitement.  I'm not sure how they did it, but they were up late every night and awake by 6:00 or 6:30 every morning.  It made for a tired mommy and daddy by the end of the weekend.

During much of the trip, we had 8 adults and 11 children running around!  We were so thankful for the great weather. All the children, whether biological or adopted, had a great time playing together. With the kids playing outside, that left the adults to spend time talking, telling stories, and comparing experiences.  It really helps to talk to other families so we all know that we aren't alone in our experiences!

It's hard for the boys (specifically Zinabu) to deal with the emotion of spending so much time playing with friends from Ethiopia and then returning to real life.  They don't really understand the concept of vacation and consider it a fun new thing to do.  They have asked angrily and insistently over the past couple days to stay in a hotel and go on another trip.  We've had quite a few ups and downs over the past week and had some very hard days...some of our hardest days in a while.  We also had a few moments that were really good.  The last few days we have kept very busy (and the boys have been busy, which helps redirect them).  Things seem to be leveling out a little which is most welcome!

On our way home, we stopped at an Ethiopian market in Chicago to pick up some Ethiopian spices.  We've been meaning to make Ethiopian food for a while but didn't come home from Ethiopia with all the supplies we needed to do so.  This weekend was the time for us to do that!  We made injera (the Ethiopian signature flatbread), Doro Wat (Ethiopia's national dish - a spicy chicken), Mesir Wat or "Wuti" according to the boys (red lentils - made at the boys' request), and Gomen (collard greens).  It all turned out great!  It is nice to finally be able to make injera.  It's quite a process to make it and many Ethiopians who move to the US even buy it because as I understand it's much harder to make here in the US.  I finally found a recipe online that is pretty complex compared to many other recipes I've seen, but it actually works.  The Frost family came over and the food was received to rave reviews!

This week, we have kindergarten testing for Z & A.  It will be interesting to see how that goes, since the boys are still working on their English, letters, numbers, etc.(though it gets better every day).  Our preference right now is to put Zinabu in Kindergarten and Abatu in young fives.  Ben will be in Pre-School.  That means we'll have a pre-schooler, a young fiver, a kindergartener, and a first grader.  The school years will never be boring around our house!