What did you mean?

Today is March 6th. The day those of use in the special needs community call 'Spread the Word to End the Word Day'.

A day dedicated to raising awareness to end the R-word - retard or retarded.

It's offensive. It's hate speech. It's derogatory.

It used to be a medical term, but is no longer. Now it's turned into something people use as a word like dumb, stupid, bad, useless, not-worth-much, etc. Many use it from business professionals down to elementary school kids.

And that needs to stop. Because

I want you to read a blog post for me. Please. Just this once. It's written by the mama of the kids I spent a lot of time taking care of the past few months. And you will see some familiar faces in there, like Ralph's, Zhen's, and Theo's, but you might not recognize them, because they are little! ♥ They're still way too cute!

Anyways, go read it.

Ralph and the Crew: When you say ret*rd...: I heard what you said. Yeah, you.

I just want to know what you meant by it. I heard you say ret*rd. Yes, I did.
I was just wondering... When you said ret*rd did you mean?? Read more..

Ok, have you read it now? No, well go back and read it silly! Read it? Ok, good.

Now, I ask you to stop using the R-word, and go sign the petition saying you won't say it.

Just do it. You never know who you are hurting by using it, and hurtful words are better left unsaid, right?

This adventure is over.

I'll admit, I went to check on Maxim several times before I went to bed Friday night... just because I still could not believe he was there sleeping in his crib! 

After a few hours sleep, I was up again with a heavy heart knowing that in a couple hours, I would have to say my goodbyes.

Good morning, Mr. Max!

Good morning Ralphie and Ruby Jean!

Last snuggles with Maxim... minutes before goodbyes. :(

Then I had to say goodbye. I knew it would be tough. I did held it together until I got to Chipper and Stephanie, and again with James later at the airport. I blame them for getting emotional on me. ;) Then I cried most of the first flight. At least I wasn't sitting next to anyone!

You can't spend 7 weeks pouring yourself into a family, living with them, getting to know them, laughing with them, crying with them, caring for them, loving on them... and then leave without leaving a huge piece of your heart there.

I have been gone a day and a half. And they are constantly on my mind. I miss them so much it hurts. It just plain old stinks having your heart where you can't be!

But I'm back with my family, and it feels soo good to be home. My chunky monkey, Jonathan, wasn't scared of me like he was the last two times I've come home!

He was slightly wound up and wouldn't stop smiling at me. :) Melted my heart. Rachel, my 3 yo sister said "Sarah, I soo happy you are home!!" and tonight during devotions when we were going around praying she said "Please help Sarah feel better!". Love that sweet girl!

After sleeping a solid 10-11 hours last night, I came home from church and took a 3.5 hr nap this afternoon. ;) Still dealing with sickness, mainly severe headaches, but it's much easier to rest and get better without having to worry about anything or anyone. Stephanie did say that if I needed counseling or something for PTSD, they would take care of it. LOL


It's over. I'm home. Stephanie and Maxim are home. The Nance family is all together again. There is one less orphan, and one little boy whose not all alone in an institution tonight. Mission complete.

This adventure is over. Signing off on the chapter about this journey, and going to go sleep and miss my Kansas family some more. Goodnight!

Maxim is HOME!

Maxim is home. Thank you Jesus!!!

On the way to the airport!

Is that her plane?

Soo excited!

Waiting for them... Thomas, Rose, Jordan, Leroy, and Grandma with Ruby in front.

Is that them??

There they are!!

Daddy meeting Max!

Safe in Daddy's arms.

Ruby meeting Max! She was soo excited!

Meeting Grandma!

Max and Rose

Meeting Chipper! (he stayed home with the other 3 boys)

Love this picture!

Ralph and Max!

Love this picture!! Ralph and Ruby are in love with their new brother! Theo and Zhen were like ya whatever... :)

Max and Leroy

Kisses with Grandma - he already knows how to turn and give his other cheek for a kiss. :)

Max and Zhenya! I told Zhen to smile...

Max and I :) 

The 7 long weeks (total) I've spent here caring for his siblings so his mama could bring him home... it all melted away tonight holding him in my arms. He was soo worth it.

He wasn't digging the pictures... sweet boy was soo tired and ready for bed.

As my dear friend so wisely put it, I survived, and now I get the best reward ever.

I still can't even believe he is home. Maxim is home. After 8 long years. He is sleeping in the other room, in the Nance home. Max is home. Welcome home, sweet boy.

Mission Bring Maxim Home: Complete.

Things that make me smile.

♥ A little boy with too high of a fever to go to school, so his older sister dressed him up (yes, after I told her not too).

♥ I was tempted to send Ralph so I could say goodbye to his bus driver (no school tomorrow or Friday - parent teacher conferences)... she surprised me by stopping by today after she had dropped everyone else off. And gave me this. :)

It says "Something to remind you of your great time here in KANSAS - Bus 220 - Francine & Oba"
I plan on getting her a cheesehead or snowman or something and sending it back. :)

♥ Snuggles and kisses with a sick little guy who gets my camera and tells me he wants to take pictures with me. :)

♥ Playing "In-a-Pickle" with the older kids. Basically you have cards and you have to put a card with something on it, on top of something else that it goes in/with. So 'Partridge' would go in "Pear Tree". It got a little weird when these two got put together, and after that, it got a little crazy. ;)

This is the way we eat our cake.

When it feels so early in the morning.

Ok, so it was after lunch. They are still cute.

Speaking of treats, go check out this awesome Russian chocolate, and help bring an orphan home. My mom blogged about them here...

And yes, my dad just got home from Russia. He was there for work. He left the same day I did, 3 weeks ago. I wasn't kidding in this post when I said it wasn't the best time for me to be gone. My poor mama.

She survived, thanks to some awesome friends we have who helped her out!! You know who you are... thank you for being there when I couldn't be! :)

Sometimes I wonder...

...what I am thinking.

I gave Ralph, Ruby, and Zhen root beer and cookies.

Luckily they went to bed fine so the morning shouldn't be too ugly.

Speaking of getting the kids up for school... Leroy asked me yesterday if they could have the alarm clock in my room and put it in their room. Umm, no. If I don't have it, I don't get up on time. Which means that if Thomas and Chipper failed to wake up with their alarms (not unusual), they wouldn't make it to school on time. Actually, not just them, everyone would miss their buses. Sorry dude, not happening. lol

Thank you to the sweet lady who brought us pizza, soda*, and cookies for dinner tonight!!!

Won't get on my soapbox about the Superbowl, if you wanted to know, I'm sure you could probably guess what my opinion is about it! I did opt outta going with Chipper to the Superbowl youth group thing at church tonight. It would have been my last few hours outta the house for the week, but I felt ready to pass out**, and feeling stupid sitting there for 3 hrs with a bunch of teenage boys when I barely know a thing about football... it just wasn't worth it. hehe

On another note, I have less than a week left here. I'm leaving Saturday. Thursday and Friday are parent teacher conferences, so no school for anyone. Not really looking forward to that, but it is what it is.

Mama and Maxim should be coming home Friday, PLEASE pray this works out. Not only do I want to meet Mr. Max after all this, but I don't feel right about leaving when Mama isn't home or on her way home for sure.

Wow, I made a whole post with a face.... smiley, stick-out-my-tongue, or sad! So proud of myself. You may notice that doesn't happen often blogging about my time here!

Thank you for your prayers. G'night peoples.

*err pop as they call it here
**side effect of those stupid antibiotics I'm still on, at least it's helping for what it's supposed to be helping for. Not sure it's worth it with the headache, nausea/upset stomach, and dizziness/shortness of breath/faintness.

This 'n' That

Everyone is on the mend, with just a few of us still stay-home-from-school-sick. Thank you for praying!

Tonight, in the course of a half hour, I gave 12 pills/shots/droppers of meds. TWELVE. Craziness. And my total from today is going to be 17 (have to take mine yet tonight). Hey, gotta get a head start on this nursing degree, right?

The other day, Stephanie had a birthday! Not fun to spend it away from her family, but we still did something special for her.

Ruby painted pictures!

Rose did too!

And we made a cake!

Today neither Ralph or Ruby had school, so I got to spend some extra time with them.. and I got my camera out. :)

Gosh, they are soo dang cute! And good thing they are too! ;)

Best buddies!

They were going to the "foo-lah store"??? Thomas (home sick) and I were asking them what they were riding in... they wouldn't tell us. lol

And tonight we were (ok, still are) watching some TV before bed...

Leroy got up to get a blanket, Thomas laid down to steal his spot, and Rose stretched out too. After a bit of a pushing and squeezing, they ended up like this. :)

We tried to keep the little ones up for awhile so they wouldn't be up too early tomorrow. Zhenya didn't last too long, but I didn't mind. :) It was amazing, he was sitting STILL on my lap! hehe

Friday Funnies:

Ok, so you northerners and/or Wisconsinites want a chuckle?? The following are my conversations with Ralph's bus driver. She cracks me up. These people don't know much about cold weather!

Before I left in Dec, I told her I wouldn't be seeing her again. When I came out to get Ralph when I got back, she just laughed and laughed. There I go making a liar outta myself again (not unusual... Chip was teasing me the other night about not being in bed yet and hour after I said I was going too!). Anyways.

Driver: "So where are you from? Minnesota? Wisconsin?"

Me: "Wisconsin."

Driver: "There a lot of dairy farms up there?"

Me: "Yes, my mom actually grew up on one!"

On that note, tonight the food channel was on. They were talking about these beer battered fried cheese curls from Madison, WI. Beer and cheese, why I am not surprised it's from Wisconsin? :P

Another day, it was slightly cold, I went out to get Ralph in a tshirt. I was a little chilly, but I have to walk 20 ft out to the road. The bus driver is wearing a sweater, and says aren't you freezing? Umm no!!

Yesterday, it was snowing, but nothing really sticking the the ground, maybe in the upper 20's, but windy. I was wearing my winter coat.

Driver: Now this is your kinda weather!

Me: Bah, this is nothing. They have off school at home today because they have so much snow!

Bus aide: Oh that would be nice!

Driver: Well, the weather didn't want you to be homesick when you were here!

I can go without the snow and cold just fine without being homesick, thank you very much. :P

G'night y'all! (I'm "down south" now, but I'm told by my FL friends I'm not very good at southern slang! LOL)