Thorburn Family

We all have our resolutions in place. Here’s New Year ala Jubilee :^)…………… 

One of Rich’s brothers, Chuck, was with us for Christmas dinner and is pictured below.  It was so good to see him! 

Our Christmas letter/picture has turned into a  New Year’s letter, maybe picture?….. things have just been gloriously crazy, but we’ll get them out soon.  Here are a few pictures from our fun Christmas morning.  

I started writing to the children when Lydia was born, and I’m sharing it as an idea to consider for other parents out there who may find it to be a good practice in your families as well.   Our family’s collection includes everything from “cherishing you” type of letters from me, instructional advice-types of letters, and cute or special memories for the children of Rich’s and my growing up life as well as our life together with the children.  I also have recently started including recipes everyone likes in the family and notes on organization and household management.   Finally, there is a big collection of articles from long dead, and not yet dead, wise counselors on every type of subject.

Of course, we are all growing along the way, so if you do this, date your entries so that the children can keep them in perspective :-).  There are things I wrote as a new mom that I wouldn’t necessarily find as worthy to write at this point in the game, and I’m sure the same will be true 20 years from now.   However, there are enough letters to them that I would repeat exactly over again too, and I could not have written them now as well as I did then. If I hadn’t written to the children at the time we had a newborn and a two year old, or when financial times were particularly lean for us, I wouldn’t remember as well now what it was like then, both the great wonder of it and the difficulties, so it is helpful for them to see how God worked in our life and the blessings and lessons we learned then that we could not transmit in the same way now.

The children don’t always read these regularly.   Some of them are more interested than others.  But, they have their whole lives ahead of them and I don’t know if Rich and I will be around a year or ten years from now.  Our memories fade, too.  I don’t know hardly anything about my grandparents and what they think or how they have lived, and that doesn’t mean that my parents didn’t tell me; maybe they did and maybe they didn’t. The point is, it’s nice to refer to something written and tangible, something we can pass along despite the busy seasons of life in which we constantly find ourselves, something that our children can see through new, maturing eyes as they reread the entries during their various stages of life.

Some years my entries have been many and sometimes I go too long without adding to it.  Lately, I am adding lots and lots of things!   I also started a private blog for the children and this has helped me to keep it up, and also helps the kids read it more often.  During this school break, I have been busy copying everything previously written into the blog, and now I will keep only one master copy printed out in a binder, kept with the family albums (previously, each child had a big binder).  When the kids leave the house, we can make them a copy of the master binder and they’ll be good to go.  

My ultimate goal is to equip the children through these entries.   The days are “short and evil,” and anything we can do to give them tools or direction, as well as a sense of the rich heritage they have been given by God’s grace and the love with which we have loved them, seems worth the few minutes it takes to jot something down, or copy over an article.  So there’s my little idea and I hope it will be of use to someone else too.

Valerie turned thirteen this week and had a great time.  I wanted to put some baby pics on (she was sooooooooo cute!!!!) but our scanners don’t work so I am posting these for now.   She has been waiting patiently for her Ipod shuffle and finally got it (first pic), and she also got a cake decorating set and nifty cupcake thing, as well as a special Girls Of Many Lands doll which she’s wanted and Grandpa found for her!   For her bday dinner she chose cornish game hens w/apple-cranberry stuffing, mother’s dinner rolls, mashed potatoes, etc   We had lots of fun and are so happy that we have this sweet, loving daughter!

December 3, 2005, three years ago today, we first laid eyes on Jesse.   Can it even be only three years?   He was 6 1/2 then .. small for his age, blond, cute. We didn’t know at the airport that night that we were meeting the boy who would, within mere days, be known to us as our next child.  Our family life continues to be a vivid illustration of Proverbs 16:9  ”In his heart a man plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps.”  Our adventure was about to continue and we didn’t even know it.

A few months earlier, with absolutely no plans to ever adopt again, we had felt a compulsion to make ourselves available for free respite care for adoptive parents in difficult situations.  As we were in the process of figuring how to actually DO this respite care thing, we met a precious couple from Texas who had rescued three children w/needs from a Russian orphanage one year earlier, including this blond-haired bundle of energy and mischief.  Jesse would visit for a month, we figured, and that was the plan,  But, within a few days of Jesse’s arrival to our home, we knew we were adopting him. The legalities started and we finalized in court six months from his arrival into our home. Proverbs 16:9 all over again!

Jesse has been a real joy — he is a precious, delightful, and strong-hearted son.   We have been greatly blessed by his sense of family identity and loyalty, his infectious sense of humor (see picture :-)), his ability to make any number of unique sounds and noises :), his what-you-see-is-what-you-get personality, his developing strength and skill, and his sheer brightness and passion as a kid.  We love the type of sibling he is, as well.  Jesse deeply desired a brother since arriving here, and he missed his brother from the Texas family immensely. We told Jesse to start praying about a little brother. We are so thankful God gave Jesse his new little brother this year! He cares so well for him, teaches him things, plays well with him, and is a (mostly :)) good example to Ben.

Rich is the perfect father for Jesse.  They “clicked” right away and Rich shared with us later that he’d started praying about Jesse joining our family before we even actually met him, though there were no plans to adopt then. He just couldn’t get him off his mind and believed this was going to be bigger than we planned. Rich has a knack for bringing out the best in Jesse, and for knowing what will be good for him in any area.  I frequently tell Jesse that if he grows up to be anything like his Dad, he will be a great man!   As a mom, having this little boy has given me a different angle on boys and on raising them.   Though Jesse has been through a great deal in his short life, especially during his time in Russia, “winning” him as my son and ministering to his brokenness and difficulty, has come through very different means than “winning” a child in our other adoptions.  I quickly learned that Jesse is blessed most by food :), baking for him, keeping a fairly consistent schedule for him, reading to him, giving simple praise for accomplishments, forgiving/forgetting his “mis-steps,” and simple things like rubbing his back. He’s not too complicated, and he internalizes those simple things as acts of love, which is a blessing to see — we take this resilience & attachment as a gift from God.  

Since joining our family, Jesse has made a working potato cannon, and an enormous plane in our backyard (complete with an old ceiling fan for the propellor), and other cool things. Let’s just say that the day he learned his plane would not actually be able to fly.. was not a good day at our house :). Jesse’s also getting really good at Karate. Every time he tests, he is “promoted,” and it will be fun to see how far he gets with martial arts in years to come. He’s doing well in his school work, too. Jesse’s got a penchant for absorbing history, and he’s just about memorized, word for word, the first volume of Story Of The World, The Ancients, by Susan Wise Bauer, and he’s working on her second volume, Middle Ages. He listens to them over and over again and retells the stories to us frequently.

We praise God for our little man :^), for his amazing life & story, and pray that God will be His help, strength, and salvation for the rest of his days. Thanks for letting me “love on him” a little here.

Lydia just graduated from her training at a local hospital in the Dare To Care program, and now she can work w/patients on “the floor.”   We were especially blessed that Nana (Cheryl Saunders) was able to join us.