Preparing Their Room

We are painting the twins' room with the great help of their sister, Kelsey, and Auntie Jana. We are amazed by their creativity and talent.  With the theme of the African Savannah, Kelsey has sketched an Acacia tree, a giraffe, and an elephant so far.  We projected the images of her sketches on the walls using an overhead projector.  Jana and Kelsey traced her sketches, and Jana is making them come to life through her painting.

Once the supervisors showed up, we began to work.

Representing the dog's point of view:  Tuffy Huff

From the cat world:  Fada and Pabu

We started first with the Acacia tree.  Here is a picture of a real Acacia tree.

Here is Kelsey's sketch.

An amazing sketch...very scientific and detailed.

So far, Jana has painted the trunk of the tree...leaves are coming.  Remarkable!

We love the balance of the tree!  It's hard for you to see the scale of it...it's very large.

Then, along came a giraffe.

Kelsey's sketch.

Amazing!!

Jana and Tuffy started painting the giraffe...

You can see how large the paintings are in this photo.

Jana hasn't finished her yet, but after many hours, she (the giraffe) has come to life!

Our giraffe from head to hoof.

What a sweet face!

The elephant is next...

Here is Kelsey's sketch.  We can't wait to see it come to life, too.

Again, what an amazing piece of art!

Why Brave Frog?

On our first trip to Caddo Lake we were sitting on the dock at Moonglow lodge. It was Jena's first trip, we were well over the bump to realizing we were not just falling in love with each other, but that we were already in love. We sat on the dock with a glass of wine and watched the sun go down with Jena taking some amazing pictures. As we talked night fell around us leaving us with the sounds of the wetlands. The frogs were chirping all around us in a chorus of noises, high, low, short, and long. Suddenly in the distance we hear a boat and it pulls tight into the dock to our right. All the frogs stopped and we sat in silence as the man docked his boat, got out, and left the area to go home. A few minutes after he left we were still waiting in silence. I leaned over to her and whispered, "We need one brave frog" because we knew as soon as one started they all would. Of course, soon one little frog let out one little peep, then another,  then one more, and soon we were surrounded by the harmony of hundreds of frog noises.

"Brave Frog" is our way of saying, "It takes just one brave individual to start something that can make a difference." It's a concept of appealing more on your sense of adventure then your sense of fear regarding the unknown. Don't let thoughts of failure hold you back, but instead realize that in the grand scheme of things everything will work out okay if you are willing to work hard and keep an open mind when achieving your goals.

So we're brave frogs. We invite you to join in the chorus.

Referral

Two weeks ago we received our referral. We had several surprises. We were thinking originally it would be for a girl from 2 to 4 years of age. Our first surprise was, it was two. Then we were told it was a boy and a girl. Then  that they were 15 months old. Whew! That is a lot of surprises, but there was one more. They are twins!

Shortly afterwards we received one picture of each of them. Here are the first two pictures of the newest members of the Stute family.

On the left is our little boy Noah. He's chillin' in a chair eating something sweet or maybe sour from the look on his face. On the right is our little girl, Nala. They are absolutely adorable. They are currently staying in the orphanage they were assigned to, The Royal Seed Needy Orphanage  which is in Odipong Ofakour, a very small village outside of Accra. It cares for about one hundred children. Here's a little video about the orphanage
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_dgaO9f_5U

After a few weeks of paperwork and reviewing medical information, we accepted the referral and are now on the road to finally getting to meet them and bring them home. We received four new pictures in which they are a bit older, and even cuter.

Cracker time! Real men wear Pooh bear socks.

These eyes can probably make even Mommy "bend" the rules just a bit.

Standing up in her yellow dress.

"Hey, I'm cute too and these are my mommy melting eyes."

It is now simply time to wait, prepare our home and our lives to accept them into our family. The days between then and now can't go by fast enough. Soon they will be moved to the Kwahu foster home where they will receive more individual care. Right now they are under weight and little Nala is under height but these problems will go away with our loving care.