False Labor - Adoption style!

I went today for what I thought would be a typical visit with the girls. I wanted to meet with the director (just back from maternity leave) and have her look over my documents to make sure we would not run into any problems. The social worker there (who communicates VERY poorly) said that I could take my documents to the court and take the girls home today! I was a little shocked! I wasn't quite ready for them to come home but I wasn't going to say no! :)
So, off to the courts I went and the day kept getting longer and longer. Thankfully, my dear friend, Mary, was with me to keep me calm. We realized our sons would come home to empty houses so we even called the school to have them let the boys go home with a friend. Finally a little after 3pm (which is basically quitting tim on Fridays b/c it's the Sabbath) they said we could come back Monday to finish. So we didn't get to take the girls but I'm ok with it! Monday is going to be sooooooooo busy that if I would not have gotten a jump start today we would have come home Monday empty handed!
Monday we have to leave at 7am and arrive at 9am at the orphanage. We will go to the courts and a judge will sign a paper and then we have to drive BACK to Rabat (2 hours) to have a local police check done. Then we have to drive BACK to the orphanage (another 2 hours) to finish through the court system and take the girls home.
I predict that we will not get home until 8pm. We'll see how close I am with that guess on Monday! :)
--Rachel

I made babyfood!

First of all, I know there are mothers out there who make their own baby food even when they have a choice. Hats off to them! I'm a fan of the lazy route where the most energy exerted is putting the little jars in the grocery cart. :)
However, in Morocco if you can actually find baby food, it's not of the typical things you find in American baby food (like bananas, peas, etc). I did have some shipped in that I ordered on the internet but it was quite expensive to do that.
So, after reading a wonderful book (which I'll talk about more further down) about raising twins and where the author made her baby food with twin infants and a 3 year old, I decided I should try it. The author swore it was very easy.
First, I ordered a baby food making kit. You can order these things separately if you want. This is the one I got:

This is the Kidco BabySteps Complete Natural Feeding System (Model F5000). You can go to www.froogle.com and type in that description and then have it sort the findings by lowest price to highest price to find the cheapest deal.
So, I did peaches and carrots and it was a success! Here are some pictures of the carrots:

This was right before I steamed them.
After steaming them, I put them in the food mill.

This is what it looks like after you turn on the mill.

Then you put them in an ice tray, cover with plastic wrap and freeze. The kit came with two trays with lids but I put my peaches in those so I had to use some of my extra ice trays.

Tomorrow I'll pop the cubes out and put them in freezer bags. Then when I am ready to use them I'll take a couple of cubes and microwave them.
I was quite surprised at how simple it really was. If I wanted to do a small portion then I'd use the hand grinder because the food mill runs on 110V and my house is a 220V so I have to use a transformer and it's a pain. :)
So, the book about raising twins is called Ready or Not, Here We Come!: The Real Experts' Guide to the First Year with Twins and it is by Elizabeth Lyons. If you or someone you know has twins, get this book! It is written by a mom of twins in a style like your girlfriend is talking to you. Here is a picture of the book:

Now I'm off to make a skirt out of corn husks. LOL
--Rachel

Mixture of nervousness and excitement

I can't believe my girls will be home in 4 days! Part of me is soooooooo excited. I just want them home! I want them to be held as much as they want, to sleep in a big crib (so their little legs won't be scrunched to fit in the little crib at the orphanage), to eat as much as they want (Leila eats too slow and they take her bottle away before she's done), and more!
On the other hand, I have TWIN GIRLS coming into my home! ACK!!!!!! It will be a chore just to get in the car, diaper changes galore and lots of dirty bottles!!!
I'm also a little worried that they'll ask for some paper that I don't have and we'll have to wait to get the girls. I have an appointment with the director of the orphanage tomorrow. She just came back today off of maternity leave with twins! She is going to look over my papers and make sure I have everything. It was so nice working with an agency with Andrew. We pretty much just had to show up and they did the rest. Sometimes we'd have to sign something or bring something but it was easy compared to this.
I ordered some cute little outfits a while back from Macys.com (they had a HUGE sale) but they haven't come yet! I was all ready to dress them in their little jumpers with tights and pink mary janes. If they don't come tomorrow they'll have to wear some jeans and pink tennis shoes. I mostly just purchased sleepers and onesies so I don't have many outfits yet. Their Easter outfits came in the mail yesterday. They are SOOOOOOOOOOO cute! I'll have to post a picture soon.
--Rachel

Here's a pic of Leila!

Enjoy!



--Rachel

Gee Thanks, Oreo! You REALLY shouldn't have!

Oreo brought me a present. A LIVE mouse!


He did FINALLY let it go. Thankfully he didn't make it into the house with the mouse!


--Rachel

I'm really NOT playing favorites! :)

It seems that after uploading pictures from each visit with the girls I always have way more pictures of one girl than the other! Fortunately I notice this in between visits and try to make it up the next visit with the one with less pictures but I never seem to get it even. Of course, if this is the only thing I have to complain about with twins I guess I am doing ok. Wait until I get them home, then I'm sure I'll have a list! :)
That being said, I just really liked this picture of Leah. Hopefully I'll get a good one of Leila next time. Of course, we have way more than you could ever want to see on our website, but this is just one of my favorites:


--Rachel

Monkeys in Morocco

Went to see the girls with some friends yesterday and they asked if Andrew and I would like to go an hour further to see and feed some monkeys. We went and it was fun! Enjoy the pictures!






If you didn't feed them fast enough, they would tug on your pant leg!




This one almost pulled my pants off!


It actually snows in parts of Morocco.

We have a date!

Our girls will be home March 3rd!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

A couple of odd pictures from the house

This first one is a picture of the "orange room." Basically the previous tennant painted it in this high gloss orange with the fushia border. It has been promised that it would be painted since we moved in. FINALLY it's getting painted because this is going to be the girls' room and it will clash with all of the pink, etc.
So, here is the orange room:


This next one is from our master bedroom. We have a wonderful housekeeper who spoils us by changing our sheets (including the comforters) every other day. However, with the Americana quilt she ALWAYS puts the pillows upside down which drives Andrew crazy so he feels he has to fix it.

In honor of Marie

Marie is a good friend of mine here in Morocco. She has been such a great support to me since we arrived. She just found out that she has breast cancer and she leaves tomorrow to start Chemo in the states. Please keep Marie and her beautiful family in your prayers.

The girls have something to say! :)

I love the baby coos. Today Leah and Leila were going non stop!!! So I set the camera on record and captured each of them "talking." Enjoy!
Here is Leila:


and here is Leah:


--Rachel