We are CLEARED!!!

   We are cleared!  Well that's what the email said from the US Embassy.  It's the email we've been waiting for for over a year now.  Right now it seems so surreal, like I can't really believe it's FINALLY here.  We have our flights booked, our guest house reserved and all our travel arrangements made. We leave Wed., May 30 from Atlanta and will be back Fri., June 8.  Please pray that the girls will warm right back up to us. There are going to be so many changes for their little hearts and minds to adjust to. Imagine what it would be like to leave everything you know...to lose all sense of familiarity, and to have to acclimate to a whole new way of life. Think about what it would be like to have to embrace a culture so different from what you are used to.....and I mean COMPLETELY different ... now imagine that you cannot understand what anyone is saying or ask questions because you do not even speak the same language as everyone around you. That is what our little love bugs will be facing. Please pray specifically for our flight home. They've only ridden in a car twice (to our knowledge) and that was a challenge for them, so a plane is definitely going to be a new experience for sure, and twenty-seven hours in flight is a long time for anybody!!!
     Please join us in praying that their transition will be the best that it can be. We are not being unrealistic... we know there will be obstacles to face... but we would be foolish not to "make our requests known to God." We know full well the power of prayer, as we watch Him work miracles in our lives over and over and over again. We are reminded time and time again about the importance of prayer through out scripture. If that was not enough it is, but if it wasn't we know that Jesus Himself.. the blameless, spotless lamb of God wrapped in human flesh, chose to spend His time just prior to His crucifixion talking to His heavenly Father. I can't think of a more ringing endorsement this side of heaven!!!
    Now all there is left to do is a few final touches to the girl's room, to pack our bags of donations, and load up all we'll need for the trip. If I can ask one more request of you, please pray for Alex and Avery while we are gone. This is by far the longest we have ever been away from them, and I can tell that they are both feeling a little anxious already. For all of you guys here in Muscle Shoals, love on our babies good for us please!

For everyone that has been a part of bringing our girls home... we are so thankful for you....and....it's finally happened... it's finally here... they're coming home!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love to you all,
Millie & Nick

                             

and we're almost there...almost there.

   So we started this journey officially last April. There were Home Study interrogations  interviews. There were mounds and mounds of forms. There were federal police clearances. There were classes to take, papers to be notarized, books to be read, and on and on and on. Then on a Wednesday night there was a "transition plan" call that rocked our world, and set us clearly on the path to the twin baby girls He had chosen to be a part of our family. It didn't seem to matter that they were just brought up casually in that conversation. It didn't deter us one bit that we were told there would more than likely be NO WAY that their paper work would be done in time for our referral. Then on that blessed day in December we receive the call we had been waiting on for so long.... "Mr. Wiginton... you know those twin girls that I mentioned back on your conference call? They are ready for referral, and we need to know if you guys are open to adopting twins." ARE WE OPEN TO ADOPTING TWINS??? Ummm, let us pray about that ;)

And then came these.....

Be still my heart....

and then today after months of waiting, and waiting, and waiting some more.... We get the email we have been waiting on. The girls birth parent interview is scheduled for this coming Monday at 1:00pm (that would be around 5 a.m. here)! This is the last step for us in getting cleared by the Embassy and getting our appointment to go get our girls! We are sooo excited and so covet your prayers that the interview will go well for their birth mom, and that the Embassy gets all the information they need to clear us to come get them. We will update as soon as we hear something from the interview!

Half of my heart...

A few of the things I miss about Ethiopia:

  The weather: If ever there was perfection in weather this would be it. Every day was warm and sunny with a nice crisp breeze. Everywhere we went people would say, "I'm sure you are burning up!" We were quick to say that we love, love, love, the beautiful weather and the high temps with ZERO humidity. Folks in Alabama can hardly imagine sunshine without the stickiness of high humidity. It was wonderful!

    

  The Buna a.k.a. coffee: Everywhere you go in Ethiopia they offer you coffee. It is the birthplace of coffee, and dates back to at least the ninth century, so it is a very big deal. They drink it so strong that it is straight up black (not a chance you will see the bottom of the cup until it is completely empty:). It is so, so, so good. I'm not sure that its goodness is as much about the coffee itself as it is about the hospitality it represents. These people embody the words gracious host. They are the very definition of it. 

The Food: As soon as this girl can make it to Birmingham she WILL be adding Berbere to her spice cabinet. If you know me well you know that when it comes to food, "the spicier the better", and oh my, do they do it up right in Ethiopia. The meal pictured below is quite possibly the most delectable meal I have ever eaten. If you order fried chicken dry style in ET, this is what you get.




As you can imagine, in a climate like this, the fruit is absolutely out of this world. We had fresh mangos and bananas every single day for breakfast.

The People:  Nick and I fell in love with Ethiopia. 

We fell in love with it's people: People who understand how to love their neighbor as themselves, People who jump at the chance to serve you, People who greet you not just with a Selam (hello) but quickly follow it with Dehna Neh? (how are you?... and then slow down to listen because they really do want to make sure all is well with you), People who greet each other with a hug and kisses and often stand holding hands as they speak.

Of all the things that moved me about the people of Ethiopia, the thing that stood out to me the most were their eyes. When conversing it was like I was looking into their souls. It was as if they were giving me a gift... no false pretenses, no self protective barriers, no illusions, just honesty, warmth, vulnerability. To speak with them would be as if you were having two conversations at once. One with your words, and one with your heart. I wish that I could better convey it, but some things are just too holy, too sacred for words.

Abdissa & Biniam of Children's House International:)

Markos- Cab driver extraordinaire ,and one of the friendliest people you will ever meet.

Zerihun- He was our guide to Adama, and what a blessing he was! We felt an instant connection to him. He was the first evangelical believer in his village , and endured much persecution for years. Now he is pastor of a church in that very same village ,and is praying that the Lord would bless them with more full time ministers and the funding and opportunity to buy land there to build a church. It is extremely hard for an evangelical to obtain land from the government to build a church. He has seen many victories there in his village, and asked us to partner with him in prayer. Will you join us in praying for Zerihun, his church Tede Kale Hiwot Church, and the people in his village Tede?

This guy was the guard at our guest house, and he would absolutely break his neck to try to help you.
 I don't think he stopped smiling the entire time we were there. I loved being outside during our stay because the weather was so beautiful. I eventually had to limit how often I went out, because if he saw me come outside he would jump up out of his guard shack, and come running with his chair. He couldn't bear to sit if I was having to stand.
Bless his heart, he's dressed in polyester from head to toe, in the heat, grinning from ear to ear because he had the opportunity to honor me in that way.

...and then there's Nigatu. A guy we met on the street who works locally at a school for sponsored children. He thanked us for coming to Ethiopia, and told us that he had much to learn from us. We had so much more to learn from him. We were able to talk, and share with him, and I really can't explain our exchange as anything other than holy. I thank God for Nigatu ,and what He did in my heart as a result of our conversation.

Tezera- Just typing her name causes my heart to well up. Thank you Jesus for Tezera. I have never known someone to serve so selflessly, love so deeply, or sacrifice so greatly for those the Lord has entrusted to her care. She puts her heart and soul into her work in Adama, and it is easy to see why she is so beloved to those who have the privilege of knowing her. I would greatly appreciate it if you would join us in praying Psalm 41:1-3 over her as she is recovering from a recent surgery. She actually sent me this scripture to bless me, but the Holy Spirit led me to pray it over her.

Psalm 41:1-3

 ¹ How blessed is he who considers the helpless;
The LORD will deliver him in a day of trouble.
² The LORD will protect him and keep him alive,
And he shall be called blessed upon the earth;
And do not give him over to the desire of his enemies.
³ The LORD will sustain him upon his sickbed; 

In his illness, You restore him to health.

Oh yeah.... and then there are these two ;) 

I most definitely miss them the most. Quite actually, not a moment goes by that I am not missing those little faces, longing to hold them in my arms, and kiss their sweet little noggins. Hold on little angels, we're coming soon!!!!!!

Introducing the lovely....

    I will keep this blog post short.  I know that the only reason you are visiting it is to read my lovely musings and enjoy my pitiful perfect grammar ;)
    On Friday morning we were scheduled to appear in court. Abdissa was supposed to pick us up at a specified time, but because traffic was terrible he was about an hour late to get us. So when he was able to get there we hopped in the car and headed out to court. We got there, walked swiftly up six flights of stairs, booked it down the hall, and just as soon as we turned left into the court waiting room our names were called! Absolutely perfect timing! 
    We walked in and sat before the judge. She asked us several questions such as: Do you intend to adopt Meryn and Saryn, have you met them yet, do you understand that this is a binding contract...etc. She reviewed our file, and found that there was an additional document that she wanted added before she would sign off on it. She dismissed us. As soon as we left the room Abdissa started making calls to get the extra document delivered to us a.s.a.p. Within an hour the document arrived, it was submitted to the judge, and we were called back in. The judge said, "It looks as though I have everything I need to proceed on this case." "The girls, they are all yours." "Congratulations." There are absolutely NO WORDS to describe the joy we felt in that moment.... no words. Thank you Jesus!
   So... I'll delay you no longer... Introducing the most precious set of twins you will ever lay your eyes on... Meryn Grace Wiginton and Saryn Faith Wiginton!!!!!

Meryn Grace Wiginton

Saryn Faith Wiginton

* it was very important to us to keep their given names since they are 2 years old. The original spellings were Meron and Saron. Since we live in the south and there is no telling what people would come up with when they tried to pronounce it (we have heard all kinds of crazy pronunciations when we show people their picture with their name on it), we decided to simplify the spelling.

The first time ever I saw your face...

Written yesterday March 15th:
Our visit to the Widows and Orphans home in Adama today was amazing... Absolutely Holy in every way. Still trying to wrap my brain around it all. The girls did GREAT meeting us. Meron did not cry one bit!!! Saron was another story ... but she only cried for a few minutes.... once Tezera put a sucker in her hand she was good to go:) They wanted us to hold them all morning...did not want to be put down at all!!! We had the joy of feeding them their bottles, introducing them to Alex and Avery via a photo album (that Saron rarely put down for the rest of the day. We played in the floor with them for a long while. They LOVED the new toys that our friends sent with us as donations to the orphanage. Eventually we were able to rock them to sleep. I could have stayed like that forever...sitting side by side with Nick all cuddled up with Meron and sweet Saron's little head on my shoulder and her arm wrapped around my neck. They slept in our arms for a while until Zerihun (our guide and a local pastor) practically forced us into leaving the home for lunch. Zerihun was such a blessing to us. We so enjoyed getting to know him, and hearing his story of what it was like to become a Christian and be the only Evangelical Christian in his village for 5 years. All I can say about that is WOW. He shared many prayer requests and we are honored to be able to pray for him and his ministry. We have come to love him very much. When we returned after lunch we walked in and were able to pick up right where we left off. The girls were already becoming used to us:) There were a few short tears ,but they warmed up quickly:) We sat in the floor and played with them for a long time. Tezera the director of the home came out and sat and shared her heart with us. It was absolutely unbelievable. She shared about  the girls mom, and her dealings with her. This is too much to type here but when you lay your head down tonight thank the Lord for Tezera... it is her love and effort along with the prayers of MANY of our faithful friends and loving family... that has kept their mom in this country. God bless Tezera!!!!! I love her... such eyes of compassion... such sacrifice..such devotion..oh me, I'm going to cry all over again just thinking about it. She already had to wipe my tears while we were there. If listening to her share her heart doesn't move you, you might want to make sure you still have a heart. She opened the suitcases with all the donations while we were gone for lunch. She said that the Lord sent us to bring her exactly what she needed right that very moment. She just kept saying, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you!!!! We explained about all the family and friends in our hometown who had donated and it blessed her so much. The w&oh at Adama was absolutely beautiful... to see how they are caring for.the widows and the orphans there in that same space was just the most unreal,holy, natural thing i've ever seen in my whole life... it worked so beautifully... His very heartbeat being played out there.... when we were getting ready to leave Tezera could not stop saying what a miracle it was that the girls responded to us so well.  I shared the story of how Avery knew that she would have twin sisters long before.we did... she grabbed me by the hand and led me in to her office asking me to please write it down so she could keep the story and share it with others. As we were saying goodbye, she blessed us and gave us hugs and kisses on the cheek. When we walked out the door Meron ran to the glass door and knocked on the glass to try to get our attention .... Tezera just turned and said, "This is a miracle! This is a miracle!!" 
What some of you may not know is that we were warned before we left that this first trip was just for "observation", and not to expect to have a whole lot of interaction with the girls. You see, our sweet agency director was here in Ethiopia for the entire month of February, and when she visited the orphanage the girls were terrified of her and her traveling companion. She said that they began to cry the moment they walked through the door and were inconsolable. She was never able to get very close to them or interact with them because their fear of strangers was absolutely crippling. They were supposed to be transferring them to an orphanage closer to the city when they left that day, but the girls became so hysterical { and would NOT calm down} when they tried to place them in the car that they had to leave them where they were for fear that the police would think they were kidnapping them. So they prepared us for this type of reaction. Instead our heavenly Father saw fit to go before us and prepare their  hearts for the day they would meet their Momma and Daddy. We give Him every ounce of the Glory for the miracles we are experiencing here! Thank you Jesus, You are so good!!!! Thank you so much for your love and prayers. We are literally wrapped in them.

Love millie

First Day in Addis

Hey everyone, just a quick update from our first day here in Addis.  After 25 hours of travel from one airport or another we finally got here and it was relatively as smooth as it could have been.  We got to our guest house around 11:00 pm last night and fell straight asleep.

This morning we were carried to the Thomas Center to see the children there and what sweet babies and children are there right now.  The nannies were all so sweet to show us around and allow us to play with the children for a little while.  After that we left and spent time at the CHI office with Abdissa.  We were able to spend several hours there with him, what an awesome man he is, just a genuine sweet soul he has.  After we left the office our driver brought us back to the guest house where we spent most of the afternoon napping, trying to catch up on some lost sleep and jet lag. The weather here is beautiful, around 75 deg and a constant breeze blowing.  I'm pretty sure I could take that year round!

Tomorrow morning Abebe, YWAM's Ethiopian director, is carrying us to Adama to meet our girls!!! To say we are excited is the under statement of the century.  I'm sure that I will be restless all night wondering if the morning is here yet.  We will also get to carry all the donations from everyone with us to the Widows and Orphans home.  I cannot tell you what a blessing you are for giving, thank you from the bottom of our hearts.  The difference you have made cannot be explained.  The lives you will have touched will last lifetimes.  That's really about all for now, we'll try to keep everyone updated more later in the week.

Much love for everyone from Ethiopia,
Nick and Millie

I theck we will get twiss.

So, in February 2011 we had this absolutely beautiful, un-seasonably warm day. After a long, cold winter I was pumped about the opportunity to bring the kids to the park for the afternoon to play. We got there and the park was packed! I guess everyone else was eager to enjoy this gorgeous day too. So I sat on a bench, soaking up the sunshine, and watching my kids as they ran, and giggled, and played with all the other little cuties that had come out to celebrate the day He had made. 

As I'm taking it all in, Ave comes running up and asks if we can have some "girl time". I'm like, "sure sweetheart" this sure is a strange time and place for that but okay. She pointed to a big rock, and said, "let's climb up on that one and do some girl talk." I told Alex that we would be watching him from the big rock then we strolled over to it hand in hand to "do some girl talk". I climbed up, sat down, then helped my little love up to join me. She laid her sweet little head in my lap, and as I played with her hair the dialogue began:

"Hey Momma, I've been thinking".... "What about?".... "well, I've been thinking that God sure has blessed our family..." "He sure has sweetheart"... "and I think that He wants us to adopt babies..." "Really?" (At this point we are on YWAM's waiting list. We agreed not to tell the kids until we were off of the waiting list and were official prospective adoptive parents. She knew NOTHING about it, and we had never discussed adoption with them at all.)... "Yes Momma, and I think we are supposed to adopt them from Africa"... (I did not think she even knew what Africa was.)... "Well sweetheart, if that is something you feel like the Lord wants us to do you need to pray about it, and we will be too."

All time and space stood still for those few moments. I will never forget the way I felt when I heard her say those sweet words of confirmation to me. I will treasure it forever.

Fast forward to April... It's the day before Easter and we have planned a scavenger hunt to surprise the kids with the adoption news. They find the last clue and discover that we are adopting from Africa! They were ecstatic! After jumping up and down and celebrating, Ave looks at us, and says, "I need a bag." We were like, "what?" She said, "I need a bag, like a great big garbage bag to put all the things that are too little for me in for my baby sisters. My room is full of stuff I can give them." We went through the whole speech of, "Baby, Momma and Daddy do feel like the Lord is leading us to adopt two children, but we will have to see what exactly He has planned for us. It could be that we only end up with one, but even if it is His will for us to adopt two He will give us exactly what is best whether that be two boys, a boy and a girl, or two girls. We do not know, so don't get your heart set on baby sisters." Through out the day she would refer to her twin baby sisters, and we would remind her that we did not know yet what He had planned for us. She would just kinda brush us off and go on about whatever she was doing. This went on for months! The pics below are drawings she did on June 1, 2011:

....and so, on November 16th we have our transition plan meeting over the phone with Becky @ YWAM. During the course of the conversation we ask if there are any siblings available to adopt right now. Becky said that there were not, and that it didn't look as though there would be any any time soon. Then she mentioned kinda nonchalantly that there was a set of twin girls that were having their paper work processed right now, but that they were probably too far away from being ready for it to be an option for us to adopt them. I wish to goodness there had been a video camera here to record the looks on our faces when we heard those words. There was so much feedback on our three way call that Nick was across the house from me. Our eyes met... he mouthed to me "Did you feel that?"I nodded my head yes, and we continued on with the call without skipping a beat. We finished up the call and cried like babies (Sorry Nick, but we did:). We prayed our hearts out as we waited for our referral. We asked Him to make it absolutely clear that these girls were our little Wigintons. We asked Him, the Author of time, to speed up the clock on their paperwork if it was to be. We had been praying ,from the time that we realized that we would have to select which child/children was/were to be ours, that our little ones would be impossible to miss... and that if it wasn't contrary to His will, that we wouldn't have to make the decision at all.

.... and then, just a few days before Christmas we receive a call... "Nick, you know those twin girls that I mentioned during the transition planning call? They're ready for referral, and we would like to know if you guys would be open to adopting twins." All I hear is, "Yes, Ma'am, we would. Let me talk to Millie. We will pray about it and call you back. Do you have a picture you can send us so we can see their little faces? You do? Okay great, we'll call you back." With eyes as big as saucers he shares the news and we rush to the computer to wait for the first glimpse of our little angels. Within minutes, there they were... Be still my heart... The most beautiful little twin baby girls I had ever laid eyes on... our girls...the little Wigintons we had been praying for for so very long. Talk about love at first sight... and the sense of knowing... just absolutely knowing that they were ours and we were theirs and that was just the way it was:)

After some time in prayer... then some time of celebration... we called Becky and shared our hearts with her. We told her that we would hop on a plane TODAY and go pick them up if we could. That we were that sure that they were ours. Then I told her that just because I wanted to know, I had some questions for her. I asked her if there were any other sibling sets available at this time. She said, "No, they are the only ones." Confirmation #1! I asked if anyone else could swoop in and adopt them out from under us. "No, you guys are the only family currently approved to adopt more than one child." Confirmation #2! Are twins very common in Africa? "well, they are fairly common in Africa, but oddly enough, they are the only set YWAM has EVER had." Confirmation #3! Wow, He couldn't have made it any clearer for us:)

We waited until Christmas Day to tell the kids the good news.

Avery's christmas list. The first two items requested were for her "baby sisters":)

So, what better way to tell them than to put pink bibs and pink baby "balldolls" under the tree?

They ran down the stairs to see what was under the tree. When they saw the gifts that were left for their sisters, Ave picked them up and said "For our baby sisters of course!" There was never a doubt in her mind:)