It started out as a pretty good day. We got to sleep until 7:30 or so, we ate breakfast, my father-in-law took all the big kids to this little convenient store and all the kids got kites. These kites are so ghetto! They only cost .30 each and the string is less than a dollar. The kids love them. They are litterally made out of tissue paper... the exact kind that you use in gift bags! They only last a little while but it's one of those activities that keeps the kids busy for a few hours so it's worth it. Then we ate lunch and then we started getting the kids ready for our last appearance at the courthouse. We had to time everything perfectly so that we could keep the kids clean until our adoption liason arrived to pick us up at 1:30. He arrived about 5 minutes late and as he was pulling the car around... that's when it happened. Mary Jane prophesied... "I have a feeling that what we're about to do is going to give you plenty of material to blog about tonight." I didn't pay much attention to her because I'm a guy and that's my job. But as the afternoon started to unfold I could see that what she said was all coming to pass.
Before I go on, let me give you some background info. In Brazil you aren't allowed to spank children. Not even in the privacy of your own home. They say that it is abuse. So, to spank a child in public is definitely a no no. Secondly, keeping our kids clean for any time past 30 minutes is virtually impossible. If there is a puddle they will find it. If there is a small patch of dirt they will walk through it. We have to keep a bib on Robert if we want to keep the front of his shirt dry for more than 10minutes because he is a world class slobberer! So, just the stress of trying to keep them looking good for court was enough to have most parents reaching for the prozac much less what we were in for. When we got to court we had to climb 8 flights of stairs because the line for the elevators was almost out the door! I know that I look like I'm in shape (round is a shape!) but that's a lot of stairs when you've got a 2 year old on your shoulders and you're holding the hand of your 4 year old. To make matters worse, Diogo (our family prankster) thought it would be funny to turn the lights off as he he reached the top of each flight and make monster noises to scare the rest of his siblings. Normally this would be encouraged (because it is funny) but when your parents are out of breath and feeling dizzy because of all the stairs, you just don't want to deal with that. When we finally made it to the top, we had to wait in this narrow hallway... with no air conditioner... and only 3 chairs. There were 7 of us! What's up with the chair shortage??? It wasn't because other people were in the other chairs either... there were only 3 chairs! As our liason told us to wait we all scrambled to try and be the first to plop down in one of the chairs. Then whoever made it first had to have someone on their lap... and if you were lucky you could have 2 kids on your lap. Wow, this is awesome. As we sat there each minute seemed like hours. After about 20 minutes of sitting in this tiny, hot hallway with kids trying to escape and whining and touching the lights and teasing each other and touching each other and complaining about the heat and asking for water and moving from one lap to another and... I think you get the picture... we were about to lose it. Remember what I said about not being allowed to spank your kids? Well, I think all Brazilian kids are given this information in school or something because our kids would not obey at all! They were acting like I've never seen them act. I'm convinced that they knew we couldn't discipline them in public and that is why they were acting this way. So, being the guy that I am (now remember we're not only in public, we're in a courthouse) I wasn't going to let some little kid get the best of me. I looked down the hall and didn't see anyone coming and swatted one of them on the butt because they wouldn't sit down. His eyes got real big... he couldn't believe Dad spanked in public! Then someone walked by and went into a room right next to us and another kid tried to turn off the lights for the 15th time so I looked around and the coast was clear so I coughed real loud and swatted at the same time ( I was in stealth mode now! ). This basically lasted and hour and 10 minutes! This may not seem like a long time to you but for us it was an eternity! Finally, the judge called us in... not into his courtroom but into his office. Now, his office had real nice leather chairs, all kinds of decorations from different countries, a lot of glass stuff everywhere... this was not a childproof environment! We all sat down and the kids were real calm at first as the judge and the D.A. spoke with them, then once the kids were comfortable they all started acting out again... touching stuff, jumping up and down on the furniture, getting up and taking things off his desk! Was this really happening? What was this judge thinking for bringing us into his office for this long of a time period? Was it a test? I don't know but I wanted out. Robert was all over the place touching everything even though I was saying, "NO!" He walked over to this small glass table that had this very expensive looking African statue on it and hit it just enough for the statue to rock back and forth and... whew! Mary Jane caught it just in time! It was crazy. The kids knew that even though I was brave, there was no way that Dad was going to spank them in front of the judge! There was no stealth mode spanking gonna happen in this office... you can believe that! The judge just kept talking and talking and talking. Was this really happening? Was this just a bad dream? Was Allen Funt going to jump out from around the corner and say, "smile, you're on candid camera?" Finally after about 30 minutes we were free to go. We then went next door to the courthouse and all the kids got there picture taken for their passports. This went fairly smooth except when it came time to pay... it cost us 120 reas!
Now, we were off to the doctor for their shots. By this time we were so frustrated with all the kids for not obeying us at the courthouse that we were glad that they were going to get stuck with a needle! And we hoped that the doctor used the biggest needle in his arsenal too! Just kidding... well, maybe not. When we got to the clinic, we were the only ones there. Everything was nice and neat... it was very quiet... then, BAM! Within 2 minutes of our arrival, all the toys were all over the place and it was so noisey, because of our kids, that you couldn't think! I looked at Mary Jane and told her I didn't care because maybe this will motivate the staff to get us out of there quicker. To make a very long story short... our children received a total of 17 shots between them! Robert had 5, Gabriel 4, Marlon 4, and Diogo and Ana had 2 each. You can imagine all the crying that went on as each child received their shots. We had to go in with them and hold them while they got each one. Mary Jane went in with Ana and I went back with all the boys. The way they made me hold them was like something you would see in a UFC cage match. They were not happy! To say that this was a stress filled day would be an undertatement! Then it came time to pay the bill... are you ready? 1,670 reas! That's over $1,000 American! What! You've got to be kidding me! OK Lord. Did we really sign-up for this!
When we got back to Betania all of the kids had meltdowns. just put it this way... it wasn't pretty. I even had to discipline Marlon, which was hard because I hadn't had to really do that yet. He was so mad with me that he said, "he wanted to go back to the orphanage!" I was so ticked off. My flesh wanted to say, "OK, there's the door!" "How dare you not be appreciative of all the things we've sacrificed for you!" But I wasn't going there. I had my father-in-law come in the room (to translate) with just the 2 of us and I told Marlon that he was my son. I wasn't going to let him go back to the orphanage. We were a family, period. By the time it was all over, we were able to hug and kiss each other. I think he realizes that MJ and I are serious about them and we are committed to them, regardless of how they act. We then brought all our new kids into the Sala (living room) and we had our first family meeting. My father-in-law translated for us and we explained that we were very disappointed in the way that they acted today. We told them that we loved them but we weren't going to tolerate that kind of behavior. They all said they understood then one of the kids said, "I think this would be a good time to hug now." So, we did. Man, what a day. This was probably the hardest day yet. Today's blog couldn't begin to explain the stress that we all experienced. But one thing... there was no quit in us. I even explained to our liason today that even though times may get tough, just knowing that this was a God idea and not a Mary Jane and Jim idea... it makes all the difference in the world. We know that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us and that He will complete the work that He has started in us. No matter what.
Well that's it for now. Michael will be flying from ATL to Miami standby tomorrow, so pray for favor. He just needs to be in Miami by 6:30pm for his flight to Brazil. We can hardly wait to see him. Oh yeah, we were told by our liason today that net week we have to take all of the kids to the passport office. He told us that it will probably take 2-3 hours inside the office! I can hardly wait! Hopefully Mary Jane will prophesy something positive this time... I guess we'll have to wait and see?
Love ya,
Stressed Out in Brazil
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