the first "I love you, Mom"

We have decided that, if we don't document each of the days' highlights at the rate the kids are learning/adjusting, we might forget how far they have come. Truly, their vocabulary and willingness to speak in English is improving by the hour. They can read full sentences with a mix of two dozen words...like, "Nate and Pierre love to play ball. Mom can eat pizza. Bailey loves to play with the cats." They also learned to tell time to the half hour, how to answer questions about pictures of communities and schools, and how to play hide-n-seek in the dark with their little brother! Dad's grilled chicken at supper was the biggest hit so far. They exclaimed: "Me love chicken! Me want two chickens!" (The pronoun "I" will be our first lesson tomorrow. :)

A trip to the visitation of a dear friend and co-worker tonight reminded me again of this. Life can be short. We know that, yet we live day to day as if that is not so. Each of us has so much to offer...so much power to change lives...and actually the time and energy to devote, if we desire. We look at these two Haitian children and how they came into our lives. The overall miracle of it was not our own doing, but there were things we had to decide to set aside and sacrifice to make it happen. In the end though, those sacrifices and heartaches and trials were NOTHING compared to the gift I received tonight: Pierre said nonchalantly as he ran off to play, "I love you, Mom." Goose bumps!