Possibly getting to adopt again!

Well, the beautiful girl in the last post is our little Susie! We adore her ! She likes us pretty good too! We have also been able to get to know her parents through phone calls. Things are difficult for them and they are making some very hard decisions. They called and asked if we would adopt her. I have never had anyone ask me that on the phone or actually in person either. It was a very surreal moment. Here is this child who I love and adore. She has transitioned into my home so effortlessly. She is not only darling but a really easy baby and she even kinda looks like Patrick.

Anyway, back to the phone call, so here is the other side of this , I care deeply for her mama. She is very sweet!
We talk all the time, sometimes several times a day, we text each other funny things! So my heart was both excited and deeply saddened to hear the question. I am a mom and I love my kids too. I cannot imagine making that selfless sacrifice for my kids, I hope I would do the same if I needed too.
We said yes! Things could move quickly from here on out. I am going to my first meeting with them on Wednesday, 2 days! I have never met any of my kids birth moms. I of course would love to sit and have a conversation with them and learn about their personalities. Me being the curious person that I am, I would like to just watch their mannerisms . Do my kids have any funny trait's that come from their birthmom? Do they look like her? Did she have dreams for her child? Are there things she wanted them to do in life or things she wished they could see?

How amazing to get to know my baby girls parents, I already know so much about them and I cannot wait to continue to have a relationship with them. I will hopefully get pictures from her birth until now. I will get to know all the details of her birth. I have already talked with her mama about her dreams for her daughter. It is a strange position to be in, it is a strange conversation to have. I feel blessed that the Lord has worked these things out for baby Susie for her future and her life.

This will not be an easy road for anyone, yet, everyone involved believes this is the best thing for baby Susie!
I know the people who read this are my family and some of my closest friends, please continue to pray for this situation and lift up her birth parents and the details of this adoption.

First and second placement with safe families!

Well, we had a precious child here for about a week. She was a beautiful baby girl!We feel so blessed to be involved with such an amazing organization!

Here is what I have decided, even if a child does not get to stay in our home for a long period of time, we have to believe that the Lord had them here for a reason. Now that we know their name, we can continue to pray for the Lord to work in their heart.

On the day the baby left , we had another little one yr old girl come to our home. Here is the thing, there are so many needs right now!!!Our group has days when they need to place 9 kids sometimes more.

We still have the one year old little sweetie here! We have loved having a little girl in our home. She is a joy and a blessing and we will care for her for as long as we need to.

The kids adore her and my little boys are so cute and careful with her. John Matthew is always trying to make her laugh and they have become big buddies.

We have decided for the dynamic of our family a girl works best with our two boys so close in age. They are just different with a girl.

It is so fun to have pink hair bows and little girl shoes, I forgot how cute they make all little girl clothes! I cannot resist buying cute things for her!

HAPPY NEW YEAR

I love Christmas time , I love decorating, I love the traditions we have , I love the parties,I love baking,I love giving, cause I am a present girl .Overall , I just love celebrating who Jesus is and what He did and does for us! It is one of my favorite times of the year.
I am always sad to take the Christmas decor down!

I love to spend this time to reflect back on our year and pray about the coming year.
I would never of guessed this time last year I would have moved to another state.
I would have thought I would have adopted a little girl by now.
I spent most of the year on a strict diet and I would never have thought I would be the size I am now!
I love being a follower of the Lord , life is an exciting ride, full of adventure!

Looking ahead to 2011, we will be involved with an organization called safe families. Hopefully, get to help some families out.
Would love to have another daughter this year.
Get direction from Matts company as to where the next stop for us will be.
Basically, sit back and see what He has planned for us. Fun to wait and see.

Safe Families!

Now I do not get out much and so the Lord has to bring people to me at the grocery store. Seriously, this is getting comical!
Here I am at walmart , stocking up as usual and I notice a beautiful blond lady holding a dark infant. Because of how my family looks I am always interested when families look like mine. I strike up a conversation and my passion for children is ignited when we start talking about the organization she works with. It is called Safe Families, based in Chicago.Such an amazing ministry! Through my years in teaching parenting classes and fostering I have noticed it seemed the State workers were completely overwhelmed with their load and even the ability to turn some things around.This is the organization that is the solution. Christians and churches come along side families who are not in the system yet, but, they soon could be. They are facing job loss, homelessness or drug or alcohol rehab or a few of these at the same time. Basically, they are at the end of their rope! Who better to step in with hope for them than believers who can say, "We are going to help you ".
I could cry just writing this. It is precious to see moms like you and me say, hey , I can take one more kid in my home for a while. Many of these children are under the age of 5. I was able to meet some of these little ones last week and they are darling.
Please pray for this organization! For these families, who are looking for hope. Especially with the winter coming, and with the economic crisis so many people are out of work, no money and no place to live. The homeless shelters are filling up.
Please pray for wisdom for the staff of this organization! Amazing believers who selflessly give their life, basically to make things right for others.

I have so much to be thankful this season!

Our house is sold!

We just moved from Texas to Illinois. Our house in Texas had been on the market for a few months. We had updated the house more than I thought we would need to before we left. Then while we were gone our realtor had a few more suggestions. Now of course all of these "suggestions" cost us even more money. We felt we needed to make these changes,especially, when my very well known realtor called and told me this was the worst season she had seen in 30 years for our area!
We prayed and we had people from all over praying for us and this house. I tell ya, prayer works! God is faithful, all the time!!!

Observations!

While we have loved living here , there are some interesting things we have noticed;

We have loved the summer!This has probably been one of our best summers as a family ! What is great about the weather here is when the kids do not have school in the summer, they can actually go outside and play. Where in Texas if you are out past 10:00a.m it is not gonna feel good. It is actually beautiful here with many ponds and lakes and even the beach 15 minutes away.
Now, we realize the weather is about to get ugly. However, we homeschool and I will try to only leave my house when it is necessary.

We have loved the amount of touristy things to do here.Many things are even free ! My personal favorite has been the Forest preserves, we like to take the kids and the dog and walk/hike around, these places are beautiful ! We have tried to partake in all the outdoor activities, so we will head to the city more when the weather gets a bit colder. It is already in the 40's here.

We love the people. Now here is the thing, I really think we pride ourselves on being friendly in Texas. I have to tell you the people here are sooo nice and helpful.The weird thing is they think I have an accent, I do not know what they are talking about!I am however very aware that I say ya'll a lot.

We found a church already, which has been such a blessing !

The weird things we have noticed are , you have to drive a long way to get a sonic beverage ( which is on my list of favorite things) and there is not a Hobby lobby on ever corner. Chick-fil-A is sadly a day trip, my kids are having withdrawal. Speaking of restaurants there is mostly chain in the village where we live. We have however , found a scary hole in the wall place that makes a mean Mexican chicken. Matt and I mostly eat veggies and protein so we love this place.

They love their siding here. You have to hunt out brick homes here, it is really strange!

Random grocery store chains here, my favorite is Dominick's(owned by Safeway) and this mom and pop shop in Wisconsin that carries the best stuff and has great prices.

Do you know what a Kringle is? It is an amazing pastry that is made in Wisconsin. I have bought one of these for my family and it was gone 5 min. after we got home.Sadly, because of my lack of willpower with baked goods these will need to be a rare occasion treat.

No roaches here, but spiders of all shape and sizes are very common,eeewww!

Overall, we love it here and if the Lord allows us to stay here a while we will be excited to do that!

Still waiting for our baby girl !

For those of you who have asked and wondered we still desire to adopt more children. We were done with all the paperwork before we moved and just needed to actually have the homestudy "updated". Here we are in a new state with new laws and new requirements. We have just had 2 homestudy visits here and more paperwork to finish and we are almost in the "waiting " stage. Which means our agency will submit our scrapbook to the birthmom they feel we are a good match with and she will say yes or no to us. We then proceed according to her wishes. Sometimes, the birthmom wants to meet you and sometimes she does not. We are very open to what she wants , yet we are cautious still , depending on her situation.
It is our deepest desire to get to be at the our baby's birth.However , we are trusting the Lord with all the details.
Our crib is up and we just bought a new baby girl car seat(because we had to have it inspected by the police). We have found they are more particular about some things here and not so uptight about others.

We feel ready in our home and in our hearts. We will see what the Lord does.

We will post when we know something. Thank you for praying for us through our journey!