Brent and Jessica Naslund knew their lives would change after they looked into little Chloe's crib at an orphanage in Ghana.

They just didn't now how much.

"She just put her little arms out and her eyes just sparkled," Jessica said. "We picked her up and there was an instant connection - we just melted.

"We knew when we walked out that day, we were going to move forward with this adoption," she said.

The Bismarck couple, however, didn't know that Chloe, now 2, has a brother Cameron, 4, who also had been abandoned in the West African country.

"In Ghana, they won't break up siblings, which I think is a good thing," Brent said. "We thought: 'How hard can this be' - it's not like we haven't done it before."

The Naslunds have two biological children, Zachary, 15, and Abigail, 13. The couple officially adopted the Ghanian children earlier this year, a move a state adoption official says could be a first for North Dakotans.

The number of children adopted in North Dakota from other countries has averaged about 20 a year over the last few years, with most coming from China and Russia, said Julie Hoffman, the adoption services administrator for the North Dakota Department of Human Services.

Hoffman said four children were adopted from Ethiopia last year, the first time she knew of North Dakota families adopting children from Africa in the dozen years she has worked for the agency. She called the Naslunds "trailblazers" for adopting children from Ghana.

"We don't see many adoptions from Africa, as a whole," Hoffman said.

Doubling their brood has been rewarding but it hasn't been without challenges, say the Naslunds, who returned home from Ghana this summer. Zachary and Abigail are involved in school activities and sports, and Cameron attends preschool.

Jessica, a stay-at-home mom, is constantly shuttling the children around town in her minivan.

"Being the mother of four is definitely quite challenging, especially when your family basically grows overnight," Jessica said. "We're still trying to figure out how to juggle what they need and when the need it.

"My older children still need to have a fair amount of attention, so we focus on quality time with them," she said. "With the little ones, the focus is on quantity, because with them it's just always, always, always."

Zachary and Abigail said their parents consulted with them before adopting Cameron and Chloe. The teens said they were supportive.

Things are much different in the Naslund household now. Zachary relishes that he's dodged changing a diaper, and has been known to pay his sister to do the deed.

"It used to be much easier, but the good times overtake the hard times," he said.

Cameron likes football, just like his big brother. He's also the class-clown at his preschool, his mother said.

Chloe likes to read. "Wewwow" she says for yellow in a book about colors.

Said Abigail: "It's much more noisy than it used to be."

Brent Naslund, 40, a major in the North Dakota National Guard, said adopting Chloe and Cameron "just felt right."

He had worked out of the U.S. Embassy in Ghana's capital city, Accra, and headed the Guard's participation in the State Partnership Program, which pairs Guard units around the country with military and civilian governments in developing countries.

Jessica, 38, volunteered at an orphanage in Accra, while Zachary and Abigail attended school.

"There was always a child who needed to be rocked, fed and played with," Jessica said.

Impoverished parents are allowed to leave their children at orphanages without losing parental rights.

"That's why they're so full," Jessica said. "It's an open-door policy."

Ghanaian adoptions to the United States totaled 67 between 2001 and 2005, U.S. Embassy statistics show.

The country has no "set-in-stone" adoption policy, Jessica said.

"Living in the country gave us a huge advantage because we did the footwork ourselves," she said. "Each adoption is handled just a little bit differently."

Brent Naslund said the military was very supportive of the adoptions.

The number of North Dakota adoptions has slid over the years, from 535 in 1982 to 273 last year, Hoffman said.

"It has to do with the declining population and declining children," she said.

Some countries, like those in Africa, can be challenging for parents wanting to adopt.

"It's very expensive to travel, and it takes people with a lot of patience and those with the ability to make their way through mounds of paperwork," Hoffman said. She also said some countries are very opposed to having children adopted to Westerners.

The Naslunds said they will keep their two younger children tied to their culture in Ghana, and intend to go back someday. Of the children's past, they know only that Chloe and Cameron had been left with a pastor by their mother, and had been in the orphanage for about six months before they were adopted.

Jessica said the children's biological mother likely did her best.

"They had to have had a loving mother because their core is so beautiful," she said.