Sunday, March 30, 2014

A Morris Family Update

One of our favorite things to do is to fellowship with others and have true community through honesty and openness. Since we can't do that with all of you in person, we decided a blog update is our next best opportunity.  We have a lot of new things going on in our family right now and we wanted to share them with you.

Childcare:  As many of you know Abram struggled greatly with going to child care on Sunday mornings while we were in Sunday School and worship.  He wouldn't be just sad-- it was an uncontrollable cry and panic.  We strongly believe that he felt like we were leaving him.  Because Chris teaches an adult Sunday school class at church, he needed to go each Sunday, but I would stay home with Abe.  This was hard as I was missing fellowship with our church family, but we believed it was what Abe needed in order to attach to us and trust us.  However, in January we decided to try again... after many mornings of dropping him off with lots of tears, he slowly began to feel more comfortable.  Our church's child care workers are amazing and they had so much patience with Abe. He now goes in with smiles and he blows us kisses.  It has been an amazing transformation to watch and one of our biggest answers to prayer!  This isn't huge just so that we can go to church, it means he knows we are coming back for him whenever we have to leave!

Speech:  Abram also started going to speech therapy once a week.  We are so blessed by our wonderful speech teacher, Miss Katherine.  She is perfect for Abe and couldn't be sweeter.  She adores Abram and enjoys working with him each week.  At our last visit she said each week she is amazed at his progress and couldn't be happier.  While Abe isn't speaking in words we can understand completely, he is definitely trying and interested in talking.

Sleep:  When Abram came home in August his crib was in our room.  He would wake up periodically and make sure we are there and then it would take about thirty minutes to get him back to sleep.  This would happen several times a night.  Then after his surgery and hospitalisation he struggled with severe night terrors.  He started taking melatonin to develop a natural sleep pattern but his sleeping was inconsistent for a few more months.  In February we made the big move and put Abe in his room.  After a few rough nights, he is doing great and only wakes up once a night if he looses his panda :)  We are all sleeping much better!

Palate:  Abram has his yearly cleft team meeting at the Children's hospital in August.  At that time the plastic surgeon will look at his palate and we will discuss a possible lip revision surgery.  I recently took him to his first dental appointment and his dentist found that the back of his front two teeth are covered with decay.  He said it is vital that we save these teeth so when it's time for surgery there is bone to work with.  This will be an outpatient procedure that will require complete anesthesia.  Hopefully they can combine this procedure with another surgery.

Volunteer Work:  I am greatly enjoying this season in my life of not working-- but now that Abram and I have developed a routine I have been feeling like I should be doing something.  We traveled with a family to China who volunteers with an amazing organization called "Love Without Boundries."  It is an organization that offers "hope and healing to orphaned children" in China.  When we came home I joined their Facebook page and a few months ago they posted that they have a need for educational volunteers.  I submitted my application and a couple of weeks ago I had a phone interview.  I was offered and accepted the position as a co-coordinator for a secondary school in China.  I will be responsible for compiling student reports for their sponsors; I am excited to get started with this!  I encourage you to check out their website: Love Without Boundaries Foundation

Hawaii:  It looks like this is where we will be moving in April 2015.  Of course, with the military nothing is for sure and it can definitely change but as of now our we are planning on moving back to Oahu and we couldn't be happier.  We absolutely loved it there and we are excited to experience it with Abram!  We'll be expecting lots of visitors...

And our biggest news of all...

We have started the paperwork for our second adoption!!  Hopefully before we leave Monterey we will travel back to China to bring home a sibling for Abram.  We are in the middle of ALL the paperwork (again) but it is definitely worth it!  Hopefully because we are back in the states and because Chris isn't deployed the process won't be nearly as long!  We are using the same agency and adopting through the "Waiting Child" program (older child with special needs). We put in the same requests as we did for Abram: no specific gender, 0-24 months in age, cleft lip and palate.  We have already started praying for the child that God wants to place us with and we can't wait!!

Okay, I think that's it for us!  Sorry I did so much talking :)  Now we want to know what's going on with you and your family and how can we be lifting you up in prayer?  Our word for this year is "intentional" and one way we want to be intentional is through our prayers.  We greatly desire to know how we can pray for you.  We love you and thank you for all your love, support and encouragement you continue to show us! We are blessed to know you!

Maybe I'll start doing quarterly blogs to let you know what has been going on ... or maybe not and I'll just do one of these blogs whenever the mood strikes :)