We have been exceedingly blessed to meet and get to know most of Titus' precious caregivers from when he was in Taiwan. They have touched our lives more than they will ever know. We love and pray for them often and enjoy getting together with them whenever we can. I cannot even put into words the blessings they have been in our little family's life. Their hands and hearts loved and cared for our little man before we ever could.
Adrian and Kalyn, like us, live in the great state of Kansas and about once a year they have had a reason to travel to travel to KC and drop in for a visit. We are always blessed by their time and are so thankful that they care so much about our little boy. They are an amazing couple. Truth be known, they even celebrated their first year of marriage serving in Taiwan. Their hearts and life amaze me! Thank you Adrian and Kalyn for your love and care for our family!
Kelsey is another young lady who was also one of Titus caregivers and is a friend and alumni of Adrian and Kalyn's. In March 2011, during their spring break from college the three of them took a
road trip around the Midwest and visited many of the families of the
babies they took care of. We missed seeing Kelsey this year but she
has a great excuse; currently she is a very busy lady, serving for a
year at THOGL caring for 23 babies. You can follow her adventure at: http://goservelove.blogspot.com
In October of 2010, soon after we brought Titus home this sweet trio also came for a visit to see our little guy. Titus has grown and changed so much since that first year.
Natalie, was also a caregiver of Titus'. She currently resides in the St. Louis, and has an amazing heart for the orphan. So much so, that within less than of year of she and her husband marrying they decided to adopt. They are currently in the process of adopting twin baby boys from Africa. I have loved following Dan and Natalie's journey and can't wait to see their precious boys finally in their arms.
While serving in Taiwan, Natalie wrote a sweet letter to the babies. I remember reading her letter while we were waiting to bring our baby home and bawling but also feeling once again reassured that our Titus was loved and cared for. I even printed her letter and saved it for Titus to read someday. http://littlethingsbigstuff.com/2010/07/27/a-letter/
And if I'm not mistaken Titus is the baby pictured at the bottom of her post. :)
In 2011, Natalie traveled to KC where we met up for brunch to catch up and for her to once again see and hold Titus.
"Christ
has no body on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which Christ's compassion for the world is to
look out; yours are the feet with which He is to go about doing good;
and yours are the hands with which He is to bless us now." Author Unknown
Thank you to each of Titus' caregivers for blessing our family so much through volunteering your time, your energy and your wants and desires all to be the hands and feet of Jesus. You have blessed us so!
An amazing dragon cake made by another HOGL family.
Once again this year we drove a couple of hours to celebrate the new year with other HOGL families. It is truly a blessing to get together with these families every year to celebrate our chlidrens' heritage, what God has done in our individual families, and pray for Ted and Bev. For without their servant hearts' none of this would be. We are blessed!
Since the celebration is in the same town that Uncle Braden, Aunt Clarissa, and Cousins Hadley and Braxton live, we spent the weekend enjoying some time together. They too attended CNY. We are thrilled that once again they have chosen to help us celebrate Titus' heritage. Braxton and Hadley always seem to have a great time playing with all the other children, making crafts and trying new food. I was so busy talking and catching up that I failed to take a lot of pictures. Oops! :(
Exactly one year ago today, Kevin and I were on our way to finally meet our Titus Andrew. Taking in everything that his birth country is. Loving every second. I never thought it would take me this long to blog our trip. There are several factors as to why. One, we had very limited internet access as well as time while in Taiwan. Two, I was emotionally and physically overwrought and the very idea of processing and trying to put all we were experiencing into words was just too much. We were just living and taking in the moments as they presented themselves. I honestly remember the details vividly that it's like it was yesterday...and I'm thankful for the time I've spent reliving and praising God for that special week.
Of course, Titus is the most important reason behind writing these Taiwan Rewind posts. He won't remember his six months of life and time in Taiwan and so it is my privilege and responsibility to share with him what his daddy and I experienced and saw while we were there. Because of him, I never want to forget a single detail. It's his precious story and the journey of a lifetime for our little family.
On August 17th at 2:34 am we received a phone call from Ted Skiles that he would like us to be in Taiwan in two days or in two weeks. We chose the two days; nothing was going to post-pone me from waiting to hold my little boy another two weeks. After all my prayer through this entire adoption journey was that I would be able to hold my son, on or before his 6th month birthday.
The funny part of this story is my niece and nephew were staying with us for the week because my sister and brother-in-law had to go back to school as they both work for their town's school district. When my sister asked if we would be willing I said sure it will be great parenting practice for us. She then hesitantly asked, "You don't think you'll get a travel call, do you?" My reply was that at best it would be weeks away. And God laughed.
On Friday, August 19th Uncle Eric and Aunt Kate came to pick us up and take us to the airport at 6:30 am. When we pulled away from our home, it was surreal to know that we were leaving as two and coming back as a family of three. Oh, what a glorious day!
We arrived at the airport with plenty of time to check in, pray together, promised to post lots of pictures, gave hugs, talked about the journey that awaited us, and said our good byes.
Kevin and I then sat and waited by ourselves in great anticipation for the journey that awaited us. Our emotions were high. We had no idea what awaited us on the other side of the world, but it didn't matter, we were ready. We had several flights before we would actually be on our way to Taiwan. Honestly, we would spend most of the day traveling or sitting in airports. And somehow due to the International Dateline we would lose an entire day. Our trip consisted of traveling from KC to Dallas, Dallas to LA, and finally LA to Taipei.
Just after 8:30pm we were finally leaving LA and on our way to Taipei. The 14 hour flight was long, but went well. EVA Air did an excellent job of taking care of our every need. We ate some yummy Chinese food, Kevin watched 3 or 4 movies, and I tried to relax.
Every 20 minutes or so I would click my individual flight monitor to see how many miles we had traveled, how many more miles of the 6823 miles we still had to travel, and to watch the progression of our plane over the wide Pacific Ocean. It helped relieve some of the anxiety in my mama's heart to know how much longer it would be until I was FINALLY in my child's birth country.
I'll never forget the rush of emotions that I had as our plane descended and I got my first peek of Taiwan at 10pm on August 20th (Taiwan time). It was hard to see much, but this was it. We meandered our way through customs, thermo scanning, finding our luggage and even stopping to snap a picture or two.
Finally in the crowd we spotted Ted's smiling face. What a welcome sight! We then began our two hour car trip to The Home. It was midnight when we arrived and we were given what we considered our preview of our precious boy. It was sooo hard not to reach out and touch and hold him.
With much restraint we headed to bed. I attempted to sleep, but knowing that my son was close by, I couldn't. Finally, I woke Kevin up at 6:15 am and told him it was time to finally go hold our son. We stayed in the apartment that was about a mile from The Home but that morning that one mile walk seemed to to be ten miles. Finally we arrived at The Home to find out that Titus was still asleep. Thankfully though, Bev allowed us to wake him up. Maybe, my restraint and good behavior the night before helped my case. :) I felt bad waking Titus up from his peaceful slumber, but my aching arms couldn't take it much longer. We tiptoed into the nursery and I slowly lifted him from his bed. He studied us and stared intently at Kevin and me but his overall demeanor was peaceful. We jumped right in caring for his needs: diaper changing, feeding him breakfast, burping, and rocking him.
Our hearts were overflowing with love and joy. We were finally complete. We had waited so long for this day to come and it had been worth every single struggle. Titus has always been meant to be our child and we are blessed to be his parents. Our Father's hand brought us together...only He could of made this happen. To HIM be the glory!!!!
The #1 reason we went to STL was to see old friends and meet new ones from The Home of God's Love. We had a wonderful time picnicking together, watching our children play together, reminiscing about Taiwan, and marveling at God's amazing design of creating our individual families.
This past weekend we drove a couple of hours to meet other Home of God's Love families to celebrate Chinese New Year. We are blessed to have so many opportunities to celebrate Titus' heritage with so many people!
Since the celebration was in the same town that Uncle Braden, Aunt Clarissa and Cousins Hadley and Braxton live; we decided to make a weekend of it and spend some time together.
Hadley & Braxton love their "Baby Titus"
We had the special treat of watching Braxton and Coach Braden in action during a basketball game on Saturday morning. We often wish we lived closer so we could enjoy more of these fun aunt and uncle moments.
I think B was having a great time.
Love that smile!
Because it's preschool basketball the coaches are on the floor at all times. It's great that the little ones can have one-on-one help. We had a great time and it's really hysterical watching this age play!
We were also ecstatic when they in turn, decided to attend the CNY party with us. Hadley was overjoyed as she loves reading about other cultures. She has been reading lots of books from the library about CNY, China, and adoption. I love to watch her learn and explore.
Thanks Hadley for helping me make egg rolls!
We spent a lovely evening eating, talking and meeting with other families. It never ceases to amaze me how God uses adoption to build families. We saw several classmates from our alma mater, Ozark Christian College, that have also adopted from THOGL. So exciting to watch how God intertwines our lives yet once again.
I knew very little about it or what life would be like there.
Our son's birth country
90 miles from mainland China
Mandarin Chinese is the national language
A whole different culture
And those were the main things that I knew.
But now, when I think of Taiwan literally thousands of pictures come to mind...
Memories
Faces
Stories
People
The Home that has facilitated in creating many forever families.
The majesty and beauty of God's creation found in the
marble at Taroko Gorge.
Singing Amazing Grace together with Ted and The Crowdus
in a cave were a secret church met almost 100 years ago.
The largest Taoist temple in Taiwan that overlooks
The Home of God's Love.
Sometimes during the evening and late night hours
we would hear chanting and worshiping.
The streets of Taipei filled with incense, food, and
paper prayer cards
all to be given to false gods and deceased ancestors
because it was ghost month.
Oh how my heart now breaks for the lost people of Taiwan.
Will they ever know the Truth?
70% Chinese religions (Buddhism/Taoism/Confucianism)
28% nonreligious
2% Evangelical Christians
I also picture the beautiful children at The Home
that have childhoods so different from my own.
Despite the cultural divide and language barriers we found alternative means to communicate
through hugs, tickles, teasing, and playing games.
My life will forever be changed by these beautiful faces.
The love for two people who have taken James 1:27 to heart;
ministering for 42 years in the country of Taiwan
Thank you Ted and Bev!!!
Remembering Bev's prayer over Titus
before we began our long journey home
still makes me weep.
We remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
I Thessalonians 1:3
Of course, one of the best moments is when
my aching arms finally held my baby boy for the first time.
