The Last Days...

(Leah) So sorry for the lapse in time since our last post. We are furiously working to get as much done as we only have 3 days before we leave. When we booked our flights we saw that we flew out of Entebbe on Monday, February 22nd. It didn't hit us that the flight time was 12:30am meaning we have to head to the airport on SUNDAY around 5:00pm. In our minds we have lost a complete day to spend at Sonrise. We briefly thought about extending our trip by that day, but then thought that our parents would not be happy. And so, we have realized that it is hard to squeeze everything into our last days. We are trying.

Mark has spent the last few days at Musana Children's Home in Iganga. This is where Amy spent her first 5 weeks of her trip this past summer. He seems to be having a great time, although we have only heard from him once.
Amy is still not totally healed from her sickness although it is now just a bad cold. I, on the other hand, have been feeling really good (knock on wood). After my kidney stone, I think any sickness will be easy to handle. : )

This week has been CRAZY. We started out with a list of items that needed to be done, and it seems as though we haven't done much. Amy and Damali have been running around Jinja and Kampala all this week to meet with a lawyer about getting Sonrise registered for adoptons and trying to get all of the signatures on multiple forms (of which we have to track down these people for these signatures). It seems that everything takes three times as long here in Uganda as it would in the US. And I thought some of our government officials were bad...HA!!
Damali purchased a file cabinet and a large medicine cabinet in Kampala on Wednesday, so Amy and I have been working hard trying to get all of the meds organized and getting all of the information for each child into a folder, as well as receipts into respective folders according to month...such a hard job.
I think it really hit me last night that we are really about to leave Uganda. I don't know when I'll be back. I definitely plan on coming back, but it probably won't be for at least a year (unless the Lord has other plans). When I get back Catherine, Nulu, Ian, and possibly Miko will be going to school and all of my babies will be walking and starting to talk. It will be hard to miss all of the "firsts" in their lives. I finally got Brenda back for baby duty last night. Nanny Norah has been sleeping with her for awhile when we were sick and then had multiple babies to split up between the three of us. But, since it's my last few nights, I thought I would "give her a break" and take her back to her rightful place with me! I just held her last night and prayed for her and cried. It's going to be hard to leave her here. It did kind of hit me last night that having parents like mine, I have been prayed for often. These children don't have anyone to pray for them (or at least they didn't). So, I laid in bed praying for Brenda specifically and then praying for the children in general (I was too tired to pray for each by name). This is my new mission while I'm away - to pray for each of these precious children the Lord has brought into my life. I know I will cry my eyes out on Sunday when I have to say goodbye, but at least I can go knowing I am still able to touch their lives even from so far away. I will miss Miko yelling "Auntie Leah" everytime she sees me, little Fred who can't say my name so it ends up coming out "Eah" (no Auntie), hugs from Junior and Nulu, and all of the other small things that make Sonrise so special. I have seen how it changed Amy's life when she returned this past summer. Now, I got to experience it for myself. Let me tell you - the Lord has worked in my life tremendously and this trip has been amazing! I would be lying if I didn't tell you that this trip has also been really tough. I haven't been able to share everything on this blog, but it has really been a tough trip. Lots of great moments, but tough spiritually, emotionally, physically, mentally. God is at work at Sonrise Baby Home and I am so thankful that I have been able to be apart of it. We are hopefully going rafting tomorrow and then a quick visit to Musana on Sunday before we head to the airport that evening. I will try to do another post with pics before we head out of here, but if not - SEE YOU ALL ON AMERICAN SOIL. Love to everyone!