First few days...

We brought our soon-to-be son home with us to start the mandatory 30 day custody period yesterday afternoon. We came home and made dinner together, ate, and then sat together on the couch and watched "The Love Bug". Marci had never seen it, but really loved watching Herbie. He was mesmerized throughout the entire movie. He liked it so much, in fact, that he's sitting downstairs right now watching it again!

The picture, above, is of our sleeping boy on his first night staying with us in our apartment in Budapest. Sorry there's not more to show than the top of his head, but the room was dark and I opened the door just wide enough to point in his general direction and shoot the camera. : )

Today we spent the day traveling up and down the Danube River by boat and bus. We took the subway and stopped at the grocery store. We walked back to our apartment and Marci changed his clothes so he and his dad could go play soccer in the City Park near our apartment. They played there for over an hour and by the time they got home I had dinner ready for us. After dinner Marci took his first shower here and now is all ready for bed and is watching the movie. 

It doesn't sound like we should be tired, but we are! Having one 7 1/2 year old child (one who is full of energy and lacks a bit of discipline), and having a language barrier (he speaks a lot of Hungarian....we found out that he only has a 40% hearing loss after all), can be a bit taxing. BUT...we love having him with us (finally!) and are willing to work through anything that we might have to do in order to bridge the language barrier. 

Marci is already picking up some American Sign Language. He constantly wants us to look for dogs, and uses the sign over and over. He also likes the sign for "amen", and loves to use it at the end of our prayers with him (we pray before each meal and before he goes to sleep at night). He is beginning to call us Mom and Dad...although it's hard for him since he was introduced to us as Bruce and Karen. But I think he'll catch on to the Mom and Dad thing very soon.

Please continue to pray for us. We need God's strength and wisdom for every moment (as we ALWAYS have, but seem to notice it even more now).  I'll try to post more pictures of the area next time. It's really beautiful here, and we've learned a lot about Hungarian history. It's fascinating! : )