Heading in a new direction !

As many of you know we have had such an interesting journey with fostering. So many precious kids !

We have grown and the Lord has changed us in so many ways. We are so thankful for his awesome blessings ! All 5 of them ! We have said from the beginning we wanted to Glorify God in this and we wanted to be open to however many kids He had for us. We have loved our journey so far and yet we feel we are in a different place with our 5 today.
So we decided to look into other adoption avenues. We looked at international adoption through Edna Gladney (Ethiopia) or Dillon (Korea). We have people we know who have kids from these programs and at least the people we know had great experiences. As we were about to send in the paperwork to one of these programs we were able to share about our foster journey at our church with a panel of friends who have all adopted children through various routes. One of our friends had been through a local agency that needs families to adopt African American or bi-racial babies.It is the whole birth-mom chooses you thing. We were interested and decided to call. We found out there are a few babies being born in the next few months and the agency does not have families for these babies. We are in ! We are having our homestudy transferred over to the new , christian agency and we could not be more excited. Knowing we could have a newborn in a few months is amazing. This agency takes the birth mom in shares the Lord with her , loves her and counsels her and then supports her in her decision. We have heard there have been so many miraculous stories of God working in the lives of these ladies. We are so excited to get to be a part of a place like this.

Please pray for us as we embark on this new adventure. We are getting paperwork finished and our scrapbook looking cute ! It is times like this that I am so thankful that we believe in a sovereign God ! Please join us in praying for the precious birth mom . Please pray for the health of the baby and mom now and during delivery.

We are so excited to see what our Lord will do !

I GET BY WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS !

I wanted to share about the goodness of the Lord in our journey to foster.

First of all, if you do not think you are having any more kids , you get rid of everything related to babies. We started the foster process when our youngest was 5 yrs old. ALL the baby stuff was long gone!

So, I started talking to my friends and I shared about what we felt the Lord had called us to do in fostering to adopt some kids. We had friends bring us carloads, yes , one time it was a suburban in fact , filled with items we would need ;swing, bassinet, crib, toys clothes, you name it.

I will never forget one night before our agency wanted to come out and inspect our home we were rushing to get the children's room all set up. We still needed a mattress for our crib. Very few people knew this fact. My kids and I walked out to go to church that night and sitting against my garage was a brand new with tags baby mattress. No note , just the mattress. I started to cry and my kids were worried about me and I got to share with them the beauty of the body of Christ. I told them we had a need and God placed our need on someones heart and they listened and obeyed. They spent their time and money to bless our family because God loves these children. By this time we were all crying and I know none of us will ever forget that day. A beautiful lesson on giving !

One day we received a call telling us that we would have a little girl arrive at our house in 2 hours. It was Yeah ! and Yikes all at once. I had no car seat for her ! I sent an email to my sweet friends asking if anyone had a car seat we could borrow .Within the hour one of my sweet friends arrived with a new precious pink car seat. We still use this seat today, with a blue cover, it works great !

We were also blessed by several friends with a pampers and Pj shower. My boys were given 30 pairs of pj's thankfully all sizes and I did not need to buy diapers for months. Such an amazing blessing !

There have been so many friends and family members that have blessed us with things we needed at just the right time.

There are so many orphans and children who need a home and a family. God does promise that He will supply all our needs according to His riches and Glory.

If you have considered fostering or even adoption. Know that God is faithful and He will provide for everything !

Also, if you are not a member of a Church, it is so helpful to have people who love and support you like a family.

I know we are truly blessed to have the support we do and I appreciate that so many of the people in our life have really been a huge part of our journey , with their prayers and support ! We know it would not have been this easy without these amazing people in our life.

If some of you are reading this, We love you and we cannot express how thankful we are and how much we love you!!!

Buckey and Bup !

John Matthews new words are Buckey for Blankie and Bup for cup !

I love this stage, when they are learning to talk. I love when they repeat everything you say to them.

Adopted for life

In case you are interested in adopting or you know someone who is , there is a great book out there called ," Adopted for life " by Russell D Moore. Matt and I picked this book up the week it came out and I could not put it down. It was so exciting to read a book that discussed everything I felt inside.

This man and his wife struggled with infertility issues and they adopted internationally. He is a very intellectual man and yet he allows the reader to see into his daddy's heart.

He covers a variety of issues that face the person who is considering adoption.

He also paints a beautiful picture of our adoption as our Father has chosen us and how he lovingly brings us into His family.

He discusses how adoption is the gospel ! Of course , I am a fan of adoption. I truly get the picture of what has happened in my home and what GOD has done in my life. It humbles me greatly !!

He also covers the role of the church and this got me thinking. Thinking about all the famous people who have gone to other countries to adopt kids. I was thinking about the guy who started the campaign to send computers to third world countries. TOMS shoes , so cool ! Are any of these people believers? WHAT ARE WE DOING ? I can tell you what some of my friends are doing; I have friends who support a local crisis pregnancy center, I have friends who serves at a homeless shelter regularly, I know believers who are trying to get licensed to be foster to adopt parents, I have friends who have now adopted their second biracial baby. We (people who know Jesus ) need to take His word to heart when He says true religion is to care for the orphans and the widows.

I also believe with the Haiti crisis, there will be many opportunities for believers to show their faith to the world . There were 380,000 orphans in Haiti , there is no telling when the dust settles how many more there will be.

I do see God moving in the hearts of His people and they are moving to action and it is amazing! I love hearing stories of people opening their hearts and checkbooks to the people of Haiti.

Anyway, pick up this book for yourself, or for anyone you know who is interested in adopting. It is good stuff !!

Snow Fun !

It was so fun to have a couple of crazy snow days here ! The kids had a great time playing and having snowball fights. It actually snowed on Ethan's birthday and that was a special day for him !


For a few days it did not seem like we lived in Texas. Now the snow has melted and we have a mud pit in our back yard and that seems more like it .

3 BIRTHDAYS IN 4 WEEKS !

If it seems like all I blog about is birthdays, your right ! I have this span from January to February where more than half of my kids birthdays land.

Ethan just turned 7 years old ! I cannot believe it ! He is such a precious sensitive kid. He is so passionate for the Lord , I cannot imagine what God has for him one day. He is one of the most creative kids I have. He is a builder and artist and an inventor. He love to serve others and is very patient with his siblings, especially the younger ones !

We are so blessed to have him as a son ! We love you Ethan !

Where did my little girl go ?

Grace just turned 12 years old ! Wow ! She has grown up so fast! I cannot believe she is 12 and almost a teenager.

Because I know she reads this , I wanted to tell her how blessed we are to have her as our daughter.

Grace Elizabeth,

I could never have realized 12 years ago that I would have a child like you ! Your heart is amazing ! I love your passion for God's children and especially Africa. I love your passion for serving your family. You are an amazing blessing! One day you will be an outstanding mama. I am excited to see where the Lord takes you in this life.

Your devotion to our Lord is amazing. You spend most of your free time seeking Him and getting to know Him better. I am so proud of your knowledge of the Bible, I pray you will always have that fervor for His word. I pray that you will always want to obey Him and serve Him. I pray He will always be first in your life.

I love you precious girl, I would not make it through most days without having you with me !

All my love,

Mom