Sisters reunited!

Today was an amazing day. Exhausting in every way and I missed most of the potluck/Bible study at my parent's place (the last one to be held there) and I just NOW have a minute to THINK at 10-something-pm, but.........very, very amazing.

In a nutshell, here's what happened:

After two weeks of begging at an increasingly louder volume for the government to figure out which siblings belong together from the raid two weeks ago, finally today was the day. After several time changes, finally at almost midday, we had our three little girls in SEDEGES so that a 4 year old girl could show us which was her sister (their sister--she has a brother, too). My Mom and sister got there in time to see what looked like a "police line up" as my Mom put it. Three of us were holding our three babies and the sister, crying from confusion in the arms of a government social worker, finally pointed to the one in the middle and told us her name. Finally, we knew the poor baby's real name!! She has had two others in the past two weeks.

Now, we needed to reunite the family of three children. The question was, bring the two to our homes, or let Little Sister D go to them (the stance we'd had since finding out a sibling group was separated)?

So the fun began. Several of us (me, my family, volunteer Katrina) had been feeling pretty reluctant to hand over one of the girls we'd been caring so hard for the past two weeks. (The main reason I kept the pressure on SEDEGES to do this sooner rather than later!) I was waiting to see the age of the siblings, and if they could be integrated into the Baby Home, we could "make" space (and several are leaving even this week). Also to see if they were totally wild as some are, or on the calmer side.

Now seeing the sister and how sweet and quiet she was, and learning her name, and watching her love on her baby sister, my Mom and I were like oh yeah, gotta have her!! Meanwhile SEDEGES is begging for us to just take her with us and them to bring her brother to us next. Here the decision seems easy but when we're already so very overloaded and out of beds and donations barely keeping up.....it's not so clear cut.

I also had to imagine telling the caregivers, as hardworking as they already are, that two more were coming, making 6 new arrivals within 6 weeks (our normal preferred pace is one a month, if that many)! We're also in the thick of some other changes with kids, as well as a new staff member who started today and new volunteers. AND I wanted to be with my family more this week before they leave.

But life doesn't wait. So we took sister S back with us.

Then three of us spent 4 hours out with the 4 at the doctor (see pictures below for the more enjoyable part of the outing) to get orders for TB testing and other necessary labwork.

On the way back, SEDEGES called my cell phone (extremely rare) to say that the brother needed to come ASAP because he was crying for his sister. Okay, that makes 20 in the house tonight, but what else to do... [He hasn't arrived yet, but I assume will come sooner rather than later.]

Then I made some harried preparations for tomorrow (huge day: team of 18 coming, painting, outing with the kids, Rudy's adoption hearing, etc., etc.) and left to give new marching orders to the volunteers and go to the pharmacy.

By now I was really tired but pressing on because the day was far from over. Then I had a phone call that gave me renewed strength and encouragement, that God was leading in all of this and would make a way for everything!

In SEDEGES this morning as we tried to see which girl went to which name, approximate ages, etc., I recognized the names of several parents from street visits I've made. In particular, I noticed the dad's name of the three siblings and remembered which ministry had worked extensively with him. I met him and their family in 2007 when I visited the tents/shelters and piles of trash they call home.

So as soon as I had a minute without holding two babies at once, I called the fellow directors of a home for boys just outside Cochabamba. We talked for nearly 20 minutes as we marveled at God's plan. They have prayed for over a year now that these three siblings would come to our home when/if taken away from their parents. I thought they might be very disappointed or insist that we work to put the children back with their parents (although practically never happens in "street cases").

To my surprise, I could practically hear them jumping up and down for joy through the phone, first the husband then the wife. They were incredibly grateful that we would take in the three and also gave me much needed information (for example, knowing actual birth dates is a treat in these situations!).

Tomorrow afternoon they'll come over to see the kids and tell us more. God is at work!! What a "coincidence" that I would see that name on SEDEGES's papers, that I would remember their dad's name, that I would have met him nearly two years ago, and that someone happened to mention that he had been involved with the ministry that I know the directors of! (And right now they have Scottish visitors staying in their house who are a huge support to our ministry.) What a small world...


And switching gears, here are a couple of pictures from the l-o-n-g doctor outing this afternoon. Glad I took my camera to entertain ourselves! (The first two pictures above are also from the outing. Are they not cute or what?!)

What to do when waiting 3 hours for a doctor with 4 little girls...eat!

Waiting for our freshly squeezed orange juice

Katrina and the 4 little girls having their snack of crackers and juice outside