Mace: 24 months

    

Profile of a 24 month old Mace – 30lbs (70%), 37.7″ tall (off the chart!!), head 19.2″ in circumference.

• Interests: He still loves dinosaurs, but has recently become very interested in sharks and whales after falling in love with the movie “Nemo”! He also still loves Ninjas (Scripture Ninja in particular) but also asks to watch “Kung Fu Panda” daily!
• Enjoys: Swimming! This kid is a little fish and has been taking swimming lessons all summer. He swims great, is floating really well, and LOVES to dive down to the bottom of the pool for his “shark” dive toys!
• Turn offs: Like any 2 year old he doesn’t like when he doesn’t get his way. He also loves to be with his mommy and daddy and will still cry for a minute or two when we drop him off at church or leave the house without him 😦
• Vices: We are working really hard on first time obedience, and on obeying with a happy heart. Mace is still struggling with running from us, as well as hitting. We have lots of talks about using our hands to show God’s love and not to hurt.
• Strengths: Mace has learned a ton of new things over the last 6 months. He is SUPER smart and intuitive! He can now count to 5 and can identify the colors blue and red correctly almost every time.

Favorites of a 24 month old Mace:

• Foods: Pizza, yogurt, smoothies, chicken and yellow rice
• Songs: Mace loves music! We have lots of worship songs for him on our TV and some of his favorites are “Calculate” by Everyday Sunday and  “All that I Am” by Rend Collective. Every time we turn “All that I Am” on in the car he starts smiling 🙂
• Shows: Mace is really into movies. He loves Nemo, Walking with the Dinosaurs, Toy Story, and Kung Fu Panda
• Books: “How does a Dinosuar say Goodnight?” “Goodnight Gorilla”
• Toys: Mace loves toys! He always has a toy in his hand. Some of his favorites are.. Sharks, Nemo, & Dinosaurs.
• Activities: Swimming, playing outside, watching movies, spending time with mom and dad (I love the point on Monday mornings when Mace figures out that Luke and I are both staying home all day. You can physically see the joy on his face!) His love language is definitely quality time.

Words: 

Mace has had a giant leap in his vocabulary over the last few months. He is repeating tons of new words every day. Some of our favorites are… Sit, down, done, ball, blue, shark (this is hands down the most exaggerated word Mace says. It comes out more like “shaaauuk”), peepee, food, cup, more, please (pees), woah, hey, sorry (sor) one, two, three (free), four (fo), five (fii) (Five is always the most  exaggerated number he says! And is accompanied by 5 outstretched fingers!)

How 24 month old Mace is like his… 

Mama – Mace loves to play outside and asks to “sit” on the porch every morning. This is definitely something he and mommy love to do together.

Dada – Mace loves toys, just like his daddy!!! He also loves to wrestle with daddy, but will sit on his daddy’s lap and watch him work at the computer as well.

Treasuring 24 month old Mace, bits and details… 

• When watching the Scripture Videos that are shown in our nursery ministry Mace will do all the motions, and he is starting to try and say the words along with the videos.
• Mace tries to sing as well. He loves the “Oh oh oh” part on a lot of the worship songs that we do in ACME, as well as “All That I Am” by Rend Collective. A few nights ago I was singing “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus there’s just something about that name” to Mace as I was rocking him before bed and he tried to sing it with me. He would say “Jesus” and “name” at the right times! My heart almost exploded!
• Mace will tell you “sorry ” after he has done something wrong and has had a discipline. He will even tell Rage “sor” after he has been mean to Rage 🙂
• We are blown away by what a “water baby” Mace is! He has absolutely no fear of the water and he will go under water, jump in, dive down for toys, swim and float like a fish! It’s awesome, though he does scare us a bit by how fearless he is! He jumped into the deep end of the pool at swimming lessons a few weeks ago when no one was down there, and Mommy had to jump in (with my clothes on!) and get him. When he came up from under the water he was grinning ear to ear! He thought it was hysterical, mommy did not!

May 11, 2013 – GOTCHA DAY!!

The day our lives changed forever, as we looked our precious baby boy in the eye for the very first time. He is the answer to our prayers, our “immeasurably more”.

Mace’s Gotcha Day!!! from Luke and April Graham on Vimeo.

May 9, 2013 – The Day We Left for Uganda!!

May 9,2013. The day we boarded a Delta flight out of Tampa, Florida headed to Entebbe, Uganda to meet our baby!! The morning of May 9th we woke up around 8am (we aren’t early risers) and began getting ready and packing some last minute items as we waited for our friend Brandi to come pick us up and take us to the airport. We headed out around 10am with 5 checked bags, 2 backpacks, 1 rolling carry on, and of course 2 pillows. 

We stopped at Chick-fil-a for a last meal before arriving at the airport. 

Once we arrived at the airport we got all checked in and we were off to our gate!

“Where there’s stretching there is blessing” – Pastor Randy Bezet

The adoption process was definitely the biggest stretching God had ever done in our lives! And the blessing was equally as great!

After a quick layover at JFK we were on our way to Amsterdam!

 

  

Our flights and layover in Amsterdam were smooth and we arrived in Uganda around midnight on May 10th. As we drove through the city of Kampala in the middle of the night we tried to take in all the sites and smells we could. We arrived at the guest house, got settled in our room, and did a little unpacking before heading to bed for a few hours! It was so hard to sleep knowing that our baby was in that city less than 20 minutes from us! However, we were so exhausted from barely napping on the plane that we were able to get some good rest that night. And it’s a good thing we were able to rest because on the morning of May 11th our lives changed forever!

April 30, 2013 – Court Call Day

The Monday after our baby shower I was sitting on the floor of Mace’s room, as one of my BFF’s and I went through all of his gifts, and I remember telling her… “We are through ARC Conference, our 30th birthdays, Easter, and the Baby Shower, now it’s time to go get Mace!” You see those were all things that we knew we had to take care of before we left for Uganda. And starting in May we had planned to be in Uganda so we hadn’t made any other solid plans after the end of April. Well wouldn’t you know that God is such a good and humorous God that not 24 hours after making that statement we got the call saying we had a court date!

It was Tuesday April 30th and I was having breakfast at the beach with the lovely ladies below. We were celebrating that two of them were moving on to other awesome jobs that God had for them, and two of them were taking their place on our ACME staff. We had such an awesome morning at the beach enjoying the view and each other, and while this picture was being taken I missed a phone call from Sharon, our adoption agent. 🙂

As we walked to the parking lot I saw that I had a message from her. With the girls standing around and speaker phone on we listened to this message… “Hey April, it’s Sharon Bradshaw. It’s about 11:30 on Tuesday. Give me a call. I have some big news. Ok. Bye.”

So yeah, we kind of assumed we knew what that Big News was!! So I quickly called her back and one of the girls snapped the pic below while I was on the phone with Sharon. She was calling to tell us that we had a court date!! On May 16th!! And that we needed to be in Uganda by May 10th!! That meant we needed to leave in 9 short days! We were so excited and as I drove back to the office I called Luke to tell him the good news! That day started the 9 day countdown to flying to Uganda, and we had A LOT to do in 9 days! Flights to book, packing to finish, work to wrap up! The countdown had begun and we were going to get our baby!

April 27, 2013 – Baby Shower Day

I have always loved parties and baby showers, and have loved throwing baby showers for my friends throughout the years. On Saturday April 27, 2013 my incredible friends threw me the worlds best baby shower to celebrate our little Mace, complete with all of my favorite people and things!

 The girls chose a story book theme, because of my love for children’s books! And of course it was in the morning with lots of delicious breakfast food, my favorite meal of the day!

My incredible friend Nikki made this stunning cake, of 3 books stacked up, and also wrote me the most incredible poem that she read at the shower! This girl is multi talented and a true jewel!

Mace’s Poem: 

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away

Is not where our story begins today.

Instead it starts in the Sunshine State

With a girl and a boy who began to date.

They soon fell in love and then they got married

Even then at that time, in their hearts you were carried.

Daddy played music, Mommy made rooms pretty

They were apart a lot while he travelled city to city.

Then they both felt a call to be in kids’ ministry

And knew it was time to expand their family

They heard about people loving children in Africa

And they wanted to bring a baby back to America.

 

About the same time a little boy was found

Near a banana plantation by himself on the ground.

A wonderful lady named Robinah came by

And took him into her home so that he would not cry.

She could not keep him, and that is why

He went to the orphanage where he was not shy.

He was very happy and the nuns loved him there

They knew he was special, and the answer to prayer.

 

Early one morning, Mom and Dad got a call

That a baby boy so precious and small

Was waiting for them to come and take home.

But this is not the end of our poem

The most important part of this story is yet to be told

Because Mace, you are this boy and you break the mold.

Long before God made us or the earth

He planned you and your incredible birth.

He knew your family would be living here

Along with many friends that love you so dear.

Your mom and your dad are amazing and strong

Forever and always to them you belong.

 

We prayed for you before, we still pray now

God’s promise is sure and that is how

We know you’ll grow into a strong man some day,

And reflect God’s glory along the way.

     

  

   

 

 

Some of my favorite elements of the day where the Globe that everyone signed with messages to Luke, Mace, and I. As well as the fact that my sister Elizabeth, who lives in Prague, was able to Skype in for the shower! She was also very pregnant with there first baby Rebeka just as I was drawing to the end of our adoption process.

I loved sharing this special day with so many of my friends and family, especially my Mom and Gran! These two women have made me into the person and mother that I am today, and I don’t know what I would do without them! 

God truly blessed us with the most amazing village of people who loved us, supported us, prayed with us, laughed with us, and cried with us all throughout the adoption process. And now, I get to watch each and every one of these women love on my baby as if he was their very own!

March 26, 2013 – The Day we told the World!

The day we told “the world” about our precious little Mace was an incredible day for both Luke and I. We had already shared the news with our family and closest friends, but had waited until some paperwork formalities where completed before telling the world!

We told everyone via our Like Father, Like Son Post  on the Ours to Love blog! Our amazing friend, and family photographer, Krystle Sommers ,took a few TOMs Shoes images for us to make the announcement.

The day we told “the world” was a Tuesday and both Luke and I were at the office that day. My parents sent us blue flowers and balloons to celebrate our official referral and he was a boy!! Though Luke and I did not specify the gender of our child in our adoption paperwork I think we both secretly thought it was going to be a boy, so we were thrilled!

It’s so hard to believe that it has been over a year since we told everyone about our little Mace! In many ways it seems like he has been a part of all of our lives forever!

March 19, 2013 – Transfer Day!

On March 19, 2013 very little was happening in the US regarding our adoption journey, but A LOT was happening in Uganda and Mace was experiencing a lot of firsts and fun adventures.

This was the day that Mace said “good bye” to the precious nannies at the Ibanda Babies Home, who had cared for him for the first 8 months of his life. He then made the 4 hour journey from the only home he had ever known to the foster home in Kampala, Uganda. Mace got to experience this journey with his friend Ben (who is now home with his forever family and lives about 1 hour from us here in the Sunshine State) and Jane (an 8 year old little girl who when we left Uganda was still waiting for a forever family), along with Jeremy (an incredible employee of our Ugandan lawyer). They told us that Mace did great on the journey and did a lot of smiling and a lot of sleeping! Sounds about right to us, based on the Mace we know and love today!

   

Mace with the main nanny who cared for him throughout the first months of his life! Taken on the day he left the orphanage. 

And just for fun, Mace with that same precious nanny 2 months later when we all returned to visit the orphanage. 

They arrived at Ms Elizabeth’s house late at night, where he spent the next 8 weeks until we arrived in Uganda. It was such a comfort to us during the time that we waited for our court date to know that Mace was in the care of this incredible foster home and that he was loved and being well taken care of! Ms Elizabeth is truly one of the most incredible people we have ever met!

We loved receiving these blurry cell phone pictures from Uganda, as we were able to see our boys precious smile and some of the people who were caring for him in our absence! As an adoptive parent you live for pictures during the wait! Any glimpse (not matter how small or blurry) you can get of your child is something you hold on to like a priceless treasure.

   

 

March 1, 2013

“Weeping may endure for a night, But joy comes in the morning.” Psalm 30:5

The morning of March 1, 2013 brought more joy than Luke and I could ever contain! After a hard (and tearful) February 28th, where we knew we had missed the phone call that would change our lives forever, we were on high alert when my phone rang at 5:54am on Friday March 1, 2013 and the same 225 number appeared on the screen!

I grabbed the phone said “Luke, it’s her!” We both sat straight up in the bed, answered the phone and put it on speaker phone. It was indeed Sharon on the other end with the greatest news of our lives.  With hands trembling and voice shaking we sat together on our bed, as Sharon told us about a 7 month old little boy that she had met while visiting Ibanda Babies Home. He was perfectly healthy and according to her a happy and pretty well adjusted little guy. He was found as a newborn in a banana plantation and had lived at the Ibanda Babies home for the last 7 months. She and another adopting family had the opportunity to spend about an hour with him and had taken lots of pictures that she wanted to send over to us.

But before we got off the phone so she could email the pics she asked “Do you want to know what his name is? It’s a good one.” “His name is Emmanuel Manige.” Emmanuel… God with us. His name was a promise from God that He had been with Mace all of his life. From the banana plantation to the orphanage God had never once left him alone.

In all of this God had also fulfilled a desire of my heart, which was to get a younger baby. On our specifications for a child we had said male or female, 18 months and younger. But God always goes above and beyond to give us the desires of our heart and he fulfilled one of mine by giving us a baby under the age of one.

So as we said our goodbyes and hung up the phone we continued to cling to that iPhone waiting for the first picture to come thru. We quickly received an email from Sharon that was titled  “Here He Is” with the picture below attached.

Our baby!!!! Our son!!! It was the first time we laid eyes on our precious boy and we were in LOVE! Lots of tears of joy were shed as we studied every aspect of him. From his sweet smile to his squishy nose to his BIG hands and feet! We enlarged that picture and poured over it like every new parent does the first time they see their baby! Sharon had forewarned us that he would be in a dress (This Is Africa!) and even told us that for the first few minutes after she had met him she was unsure if he was a boy or a girl. The nannies at the orphanage called him Emma (short for Emmanuel), he had on a blue dress, and he was so darn pretty!

Sharon had to quickly leave for the airport, and being Africa with slow internet she wasn’t able to send more pics. However, the other adopting family who had gone to Ibanda with her was still at the guesthouse and so all throughout the morning they continued to send us precious pics of our little Mace! With each picture that rolled in when fell more and more in love with our son!

             

Of course one of the most fun aspects of this day was sharing our good news with our friends and family. Soon after we got off the phone with Sharon we called our parents and told them about their newest grand baby over the phone (good thing they are early risers because at this point it in time it was still well before 7am 🙂 And then we started texting our siblings and best friends!

 

Later that night we had a coaches meeting scheduled, so we got to tell all of our ACME coaches at one time, in one place! March 1, 2013 will go down forever as one of the greatest days in our lives! A day were we watched God fulfill a dream and a promise that he had planted in both of our hearts from the time we were kids, and the day we laid eyes on the boy who was destined to be our son from the foundation of the world!

February 28, 2013

Over the next 6 months I will be blogging about the details of our journey to adopt Mace. I will be chronicling the details of what happened in our world on that day, one year earlier.

February 28, 2013… “The day we missed the most important phone call of our lives… twice!!” Yes, the phone call we had been waiting for since November 7, 2013 (when our dossier left America via Fedex on it’s way to Uganda), the phone call every adopting parents dreams of getting… we missed it! Our adoption agent had been in Uganda to visit several of the orphanages that our agency works with, and to take care of business there. She was scheduled to return to the states several days later, and honestly we didn’t expect to hear anything from her (even if she did find out some good news while in Uganda) until she returned.

So we proceeded with our day just like any other Thursday morning. Luke and I were both up and getting ready for work in our bathroom, with the door shut, and music playing. All the while my phone was sitting on my nightstand in our bedroom… ringing.

We missed 2 calls and a voicemail, that said this:

“Hey April, this is Sharon Bradshaw from Florida Home Studies and Adoptions calling. Umm, I would love to speak to you and Luke as soon as possible. You might not have recognized this number so maybe you didn’t pick up. So I will try you back in about five minutes and hopefully you will be available to chat. Ok thanks. Bye.”

Aaaahhhh!!! We were pretty sure we knew what she was calling about 🙂 We tried calling her back and got no answer. We totally understood because she was in Uganda and there was an 8 hour time difference, as well as the fact that she had lots to accomplish on her trip, which was quickly coming to a close.

Luke and I were both pretty bummed, but went on to work and carried on like any other normal Thursday. Well, somewhat normal. We kept my phone on our body at all times with the ringer up LOUD!

When Luke and I pulled into the parking lot at work he handed me this beautifully wrapped box and said “I’ve been saving this for the day we got our referral call, and I guess technically we got the call today.” That boy! He hit this one out of the park!

Well needless to say we went to bed that night without ever hearing back from Sharon and we were both pretty bummed 😦 However, the story doesn’t end there, it’s only beginning! Stay tuned tomorrow for

March 1, 2013 “the day we got the greatest phone call of our lives!”

Mace: 18 months

Profile of an 18 Month Old Mace- 25lbs (41%) , 34 in. tall (88%), head 19″ in circumference (61%)

• Interests: Swords and ninjas are still 2 of his favorites, but he also has a new found love for dinosaurs!
• Enjoys: Playing in the water! We have been to both the pool and the beach this week and Mace LOVED both of them! We see  lots of swimming going on this summer and swimming lessons starting ASAP! He loves Rage (our dog) and enjoys talking about him and of course antagonizing Rage with a sword 🙂 
• Turn offs: When we have to take something away from him (like when it’s time for bed or he is being disobedient in regards to the item he is playing with). He really loves to play with our phones, though that has pretty much been a “no-no” since day one. So he is pretty unhappy when we take the phone from him. I (April) was home with Mace the entire month of January, so he is now pretty unhappy when we drop him off in his classroom at church, or when both Luke and I leave at the same time 😦 
• Vices: Running from mommy and daddy. This is a big “no go” in our world, so we are working hard on this one right now, and explaining how unsafe it is to run from mom and dad. 
• Strengths: He is a super smart kid and is picking up new things every day! He is learning our routines pretty well and is starting to do parts of them without us having to remind him. 

Favorites of a 15 month old Mace:

• Foods: Yogurt, blueberries, popcorn.
• Songs: This little light of mine, The wheels on the bus. 
• Shows: Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is still a favorite, and he has recently gotten into The Ninja Turtles!
• Books: The Little Blue Truck
• Toys: Swords and dinosaurs are the 2 things in looks for first in the morning.  
• Activities:  Playing with his dinosaurs (he makes them interact and fight), playing swords with daddy, playing at the park (his can climb up and down the steps by himself and loves to slide, both head first and feet first, but always laying down 🙂 taking a bath, and playing in the water (pool or beach)

Words:

This month he has added a few new words to his vocabulary and he has started saying a few 2 word phrases… 

Two (when we count he holds 1 finger up for 1, but says the word two 🙂 

Poor Rae Rae (hysterical!!)

Cup

Uganda (aka… Gogogo)

Africa (aka.. Ka)

Poppa

Night Night 

No No

Bye (said with the sweetest southern accent you have EVER heard!)

Hi – yah (while doing a ninja move 🙂 

Waahhh (Also, accompanied by a ninja move (this is something he picked up from the Scripture Ninja)

Stomp

“Ice” (which is really Yes. Mace was saying “ay” for yeah when we asked him questions. We began instructing him to say Yes, which came out as “Ay…ssss”)

 

How 18 month old Mace is like his…

Mama- Mace LOVES to be outside and loves the beach and pool. This is definitely like his mama, as daddy is not a huge fan of being hot/outside, or the beach.

Daddy-  He LOVES watching Ninja Turtles and lots of other cartoons. This is something he and Luke do together and is a dream come true for this toy loving/cartoon watching daddy!

 

Treasuring 18 month old Mace bits & details…

When you ask Mace to say Grammie he says “Poppa” instead. He won’t say Grammie yet but he knows Grammie and Poppa go together. 

Mace has really started mimicking the Scripture Ninja more. When watching the Scripture Ninja he will actually do the moves a step before the ninja does! He also does the moves to several of the Scripture Ninja Bible verses (Ephesians 3:20 & 21, Ephesians 5:1, John 3:30, Matthew 19:26)

When you say to Mace “let’s pray Mace” he immediately puts his little hands together in a praying position. 

Every night while I am rocking Mace to sleep I ask “Can I pray for you Mace?” and he always answers “Ice” (Yes). 

Mace babbles All.The.Time! And in all of his babbling you often hear “Rae Rae” A LOT!! : )