Shelton Shenanigans

Puzzle 3.0      Yes, that's right, Puzzle 3.0!      A week ago yesterday I posted a tell-all piece about lessons we've learned during the first two weeks of our puzzle fundraiser.  If you missed it, the main take away is that we launched a puzzle fundraiser a few weeks ago.  We have a 1,000-piece puzzle.  For every five dollars donated to our adoption fund, through Pay Pal or by cash or check, we add one piece to the puzzle, with the donor's name on the back.  In the end, our daughter will have a super cool keepsake to hang in her room with a picture on the front, and the names of all the people who helped bring her home on the back.  We'll frame it with glass on both sides so we can enjoy either side.      Someone asked me if we were going to suspend it in the middle of her room so that both sides would be visible at once.  I replied that I was fairly certain our middle son would find a way to turn ...

                        Lessons Learned In the First Two Weeks of Puzzle Fundraising      In case you haven't heard, the Shelton family is adopting a little girl from Haiti!  If you've been following this blog for any length of time, you know this is a long, long story, but most importantly, you know that we're in line for a referral, and thus we are back in the fundraising game again.  A couple of weeks ago, we launched our puzzle fundraiser.  We purchased a 1,000 piece puzzle to put together and hang in our daughter's room.  We'll be framing it in a double-sided frame that will display the puzzle picture on the front.  On the back will be the names of the people who helped to bring her home by sponsoring a piece of the puzzle.  Every five dollar donation equates to one piece of the puzzle.  So when it's...

It is safe to say that the Shelton family is now basketball crazed - especially the twelve and under crew!  If the big boys aren't practicing or playing an actual game, they're getting their virtual fix with NBA 2k, watching a game on TV, or keeping up with the stats on my phone.  We are now just over halfway through the basketball season and any given weekend you'll find Steve and I warming the bleachers somewhere, cheering for someone, and keeping the concession stand in business.    Don't ask me how it happened, but I somehow have turned into a basketball mom - purely by accident, I assure you!  As much as I would like to deny this, I did show up to work on a Monday morning a couple weeks ago with a Gatorade and a kid's jersey in my purse - and no make-up.  Oh the humanity! This is the first time we have had all three boys playing a sport at the same time - and in two different leagues at that.  Two are very competi...

     Four and a half years ago, I began this blog, announcing that the Sheltons were adopting, which was a surprise to most of our readers.  I wrote pretty regularly for a while there about our decision-making progress, life events, working through a home study, fundraisers, and the like.  And then....well, there just wasn't anything to say.  We had done all we could do and were waiting for the paperwork to move from one place to another.  Today, however, I am very pleased to tell you that the dossier has completed its journey and has at last been formally submitted to  the IBESR - meaning we have moved officially into the line of families waiting for a referral!  We are no longer waiting to wait in line, we are actually in the line!      Enjoy that bit of good news.  Savor it and chew on it a while, because there won't be any other big news for a long time.  Currently, it takes eighteen to twenty ...

     Several people have asked me recently how things are going with our adoption, which says to me two things: 1) some sweet people actually read this crazy thing; and 2) I really should get around to updating it!      Truth be told, not a lot of movement has happened in the Shelton adoption saga – at least not insofar as the official paperwork and referral process are concerned.   Due to a long and complicated legal reason (which I’ll be happy to tell you sometime if you actually want to know) there is a rather large log jam in the Haiti adoption world.   Wait times are seemingly ever increasing and families are waiting a long, long time to meet and ultimately bring home their children.   In all seriousness, I expect our daughter to come home in 2020, or later.   We are still waiting for our dossier to be officially submitted to the Haitian government, having now completed two home studies, and a ton of other paperwo...

Mersi Jesus      We did it!   We went to Haiti; we took cold showers; we didn't drink the water; we ate new foods; we played with kids; we toured villages; we experienced traffic like you'll never find in the US!   We shopped at Papillon Enterprises; we learned about sublimation at Life SA; we saw the sewing centers and walked through Pathways Academy. We worshiped with the local church, played with a lot of kids, made some life-long friends, and we made it home safe and sound!   Now we are grappling with all kinds of questions, observations, ideas, and perspectives on reality that we will never fully comprehend.   I'm warning you now that this may be a very long post, or series of posts, as my mind is racing and my fingertips can't begin to keep up.   So grab your favorite hot beverage and find an easy chair, and I'll do my best to describe our first encounter with Haiti to you.           From the moment our...