Introducing our SON!!!

Today at 12:00 noon, we welcomed the newest member of our family-

Olwam Daniel Mason

"Ollie"

Praise the Lord!!!

We could not have hoped for a better addition and are so thrilled to call Ollie our son. He entered this world on December 19, 2012, entered our hearts on March 8, 2017, and officially entered our family today, September 28, 2017.  We feel so incredibly blessed to have GOTCHA, sweet boy!!!

Court today consisted of a lot of waiting, and by the time we were seen by the Magistrate, I was very preoccupied with keeping the kiddos busy while Steve handled many of her questions: why choose South Africa? How's the communication going?  Will you teach him to braai and cheer for the Springboks? Lol.  It so happened that this same magistrate has presided over Ollie's various hearings since he joined his orphanage two years ago, so it was very special for her to get to sign off on the papers allowing him to finally have a family of his own.  Our time during the hearing itself was fairly quick but very joyous and she even let Maelee and Lilee stamp the final approval documents!

Waiting game!

 With the Magistrate- it's official!!!

 

 Our new family of five :)

 My handsome boy. :)

My special guys!

 Celebrating over lunch with our Wandisa team that made it all possible!

Brad, our lawyer, with Renate next to him (social worker that worked with Ollie to prepare him for us), and Rose next to Maelee, who has been our primary social worker through Wandisa.

 Celebrating over cupcakes at "home!"

Happy boy :)

More pictures from "Gotcha Day" here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/iHBQGb3SvmFtUGvI2

We decided to keep his birth name, "Olwam," as his legal name,  as he is not only old enough to already have a strong connection to it, but we also learned that his name means "our child" in the isiXhosa language.  We feel like between his birth parents and now us, his "forever" parents, this precious boy is now our child and we will always be linked, and we are so grateful that he was brought into this world!

The name, Ollie, was how he was introduced to us through our adoption agency when we first received his file in March.  We were immediately struck by his name. I mean, Maelee, Lilee, & Ollie- perfect! :) Haha. Not to mention we just think it's such a sweet name. We didn't even realize till a couple months later that it was only what the agency was nicknaming him as his real name wasn't allowed to be used until we received the official referral! But by then, to our family, this sweet boy was "Ollie" and so much emotion had already been tied into that name with this boy.  Given that he will grow up in the states, we thought (and thankfully all of the agencies involved agreed!) he might actually prefer a more Americanized nickname as he gets older, but only time will tell.  We will probably continue to call him both and he's welcome to decide for himself someday which he prefers! For now though, he adorably repeats Ollie when we point to him and say his name. :)

The middle name, Daniel, is meaningful for us on many levels.  My brother is named Daniel, and has a very special relationship with his nieces, and has been very involved and supportive with our adoption process from the beginning.  He has even traveled quite a bit through South Africa, tying him to our son's birth country even more.  Also special about this name, is that it contains my Too-daddy's name, Niel, in it!  My Too-daddy can do no wrong in my eyes and is incredibly dear to me, so having his name included is a way to honor his influence as well.  Finally, we love the biblical story of Daniel and his bravery.  Our verse for Ollie is: "Be strong and courageous, for the Lord your God is with you," from the book of Joshua, but the book of Daniel contains a very similar passage: And he said, “O man greatly loved, fear not, peace be with you; be strong and of good courage” (Daniel 10:19). It's hard to think of the story of Daniel without being inspired by his courage, and one of our prayers for our son is that he would have courage in all that lies ahead!

So, each part of our precious boy's name is rich with his past, present, and future experiences and we hope he will be proud of it someday.

Not only does today mark the day this precious boy legally became OUR precious boy, it also marks exactly one week since he has been with us full time!  And it has been quite a week.   

 

Snuggling in with daddy.

He loves repeating after us!

Trip to the Giraffe House this weekend!

Where we saw more of the other animals than the giraffes. :)

Ollie wasn't too sure about feeding the goats and llamas but eventually got up the nerve to throw the food at them!

Maelee, of course, loved every minute!

And Lilee was getting pretty brave, too!

Running to get a better look at the giraffes!

We brought a little stuffed giraffe for him and were so tickled that he already has quite a fondness for the amazing animals!

So much love for this sweet little guy!!!

My faves :)

One of their favorite car ride games- switching sunglasses!

Lunch/play stop!

We really started to see a new side to Ollie this past weekend as he quickly became a happy little boy just being a boy!!!  Lots of bounding and bouncing around, lots of giggles and smiles and quite a bit of mischief with Lilee- those two are quite a pair!  They love pushing one another around on our little "motorbike" and coming up with all sorts of goofy games.  Maelee is still the very doting big sister and loves pulling him up onto her lap and giving him lots of hugs and lots of English lessons! :)

The joy we've seen on his face is priceless!

Enjoying the playground across the street!

Last Sunday morning, we went to an indoor/outdoor play space that the kiddos loved!!! It was so fun seeing this playful side of our sweet boy.

 

At church later that day, we wanted to get some family photos we could put on our fridge to help him start seeing himself as part of our family, and he started with the most hilarious "CHEESE" expression!

He didn't quite get it :)

But now it's one of my favorite pics.

That's about it- keep that!

Take two.

(We're working on it, lol)

More pictures of the first weekend here:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/JqntT3TkOZvXopgs1

 

These girls love their brother something fierce!

Instant playmates!

On Tuesday, we went to Butterfly World!  A super cool place that not only housed an impressive collection of butterflies, but also various wild animals that have been donated/dropped-off etc, often as a result of people thinking they'd make good pets and realizing they don't...  We saw various reptiles, small mammals, and way too many tarantulas...

Last night we had to make a quick grocery run so I took the kids for some frozen yogurt while Steve started on the shopping.  Maelee soon pointed out that Christina Perri's "A Thousand Years" was playing over the loud speaker, which just about turned me into a puddle.  It's basically been my love song to Ollie and was the first piece performed on the recital I gave back in March, shortly after we we received his file.  It was a very "full circle" moment!

"All along I believed I would find you.  Time has brought your heart to me, I have loved you
for a thousand years. I'll love you for a thousand more."
HAPPY TEARS!

More pictures of our 2nd week here:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/Y0CAWQWLSXHn39UR2
 

It is all very surreal- we've been praying for this child for so many years... before we had two daughters.  Before we knew this child would be a boy.  Before we knew he'd be from South Africa.  Before we had any idea the adventure we were about to take.  But, God knew it all.  From the very beginning.  And His plans are so, so good!