Todays Blessings

Yesterday and Today were exciting and amazing. We spent all day Saturday baking a bunch of goodies: cupcakes, cakes with gummy worms, caramel sauce, and cream cheese frosting to name a few. Today when we got to church we were greeted by our amazing church family who poured out their love to us by bringing in more yummies for our bake sale!!! All morning we were selling stuff including some bracelets and one wonderful person who threw a $10 into our random donation jar. We made a nice little chunk of change to bring our baby home.

When we got home I had to run out to catch a part of my cousins sons graduation party. He doesn't remember me but I remember those adorable squishy cheeks when he was a baby. It was truly a blessing to watch his video and see the amazing young man he is now. I got to chat with my Aunt Susan for a little while over some sammiches. It was nice to be able to talk to you, but too short, Aunt Susan. And as usual, spending time with my cousin and her oldest daughter was a huge blessing. I love you Lynda and Amy. We WILL do that date soon!!!!

Back at home, while Jeremy ran to take Mariah to work and to wander around Lowes getting some stuff, the kids and I got to give big hugs to "funny man" Rob and his GORGEOUS and AMAZING wife Sherrie. Yet another blessing!!! And the kids got to watch both of the big kids try out their electric scooters.

Then it began to sprinkle so we booked it inside, put on our pajamas and we watched The Wizard of Oz....a classic that my youngest children have not seen and one of my very favorites of all time. I got to snuggle with the baby boys, itch Josiah's elbow bug bite for him and watch Christian hide his face whenever the wicked witch came on. The girls, as always, were enchanted with the singing and magic.

Reflecting on what an amazingly blessed life I lead. I have a husband I love and "get to kiss whenever I want". I have 6 kids and I get to stay home, home school and raise them....and most of all I get to goof off with them.

And on top of all that I have another child out there, somewhere, I can pray for. Although I don't know who he or she is, God does and I can pray for them, their health, that they are safe and being well cared for and loved while we both wait to be united. I can't wait to hug him or her. I can't wait to teach them things and have them teach me who they are and what they know. And I especially can't wait to tell them about an amazing Savior who loves them more than I or anyone ever could. 

Dear Jesus,

Thank you, Lord, for You and for giving me my family. 

In Your Holy Name,

Amen

Go Fund Me

Hi everyone!
We are trying to make it super easy for anyone who has prayed about it and chosen to help fund our adoption. We found probably the simplest way online is through Go Fund Me. Here is our link below. Please remember that every single penny will go towards bringing our baby or child home. If you can give a dollar, $20, or $1,000, you have helped to bring our child home.
Thank you for your prayers and please check out our fundraising page!

http://ourroadgoeseveron.blogspot.com/2015/06/listening-to-god.html

Listening to God

When we first began this adoption adventure, and really, we are still in just the beginning, we knew what we wanted. We wanted a cute little girl with some repairable medical problem: a cleft palate, even a heart defect that was operable. And if you read some blogs from people who adopted from the list of waiting children, many say the same thing, they went into this knowing that they would get a child with as minimal problems as possible only to have God place a child with them that was completely not what they "knew". But how could we?

I mean, we have 6 kids, right? How could we add a child with severe problems?  Like brain cancer that could come back or a heart condition that could end their life in a couple years? Or how about a child who has been blind from birth?

The more I look through the available children, the more I'm drawn, not to the perfect little baby girls who need a couple minor surgeries....but to a baby boy who is blind. Another boy who is a little older and blind in one eye. An eight year old boy who has been blind since birth but who, his caregivers say, never complains and is very bright.

Now I'm not sure what God has in store for us. We are only beginning, we still have our homestudy to do, we still have months of paperwork and visits. So we will just wait and see. Waiting on the Lord. We will know in His time and we will know who.

Until then, could you please pray for M, the boy who is 8, A, who is the very young baby who is blind, and J, who is a little older and blind in one eye. Thank you for praying for them and thank you for praying for us.

Dear Jesus,
Thank you for these precious boys. We don't know your plans for them but we know that we can love them even from here and pray for their families. We don't know if one of these boys is our son, we will wait until you place that clearly in front of us. We are scared, Lord, of what it will mean to have a child with significant medical or emotional needs in our home. We don't know how this will change our family. But we do know that, once that child whom You have chosen is here, our lives will be richer because You gave him or her to us.
Thank you for taking us on this journey that has made us more compassionate. While first we were gushing over the sweet little baby girls, we are now praying with tears in our eyes for those children who may graduate out of the orphanage without ever knowing a real home. We again, Jesus, promise Your Name will be the first thing our baby or child hears from our lips. You are all who matters.
Thank you Jesus for every thing You give these children and we thank You for All Gods Children and all they are doing to try to help this orphan crisis. We especially, God, pray and thank you for those selfless, compassionate and amazing parents who have taken in a child with a significant medical issue. We pray you bless them and watch over them and guard their hearts. We pray for all the children in the orphanages in China and around the world who can not see, or have to endure painful surgeries or procedures, the ones that don't have a mom and dad to hold their hands and tell them they will be ok. We can only be one, we pray more families come forward to take these children into their homes.
In Your Precious Name, Jesus, Amen.

The excitement

Lots of things about this adoption are nerve wracking. The waiting. The thought of the home study that I hear from people is "long and invasive". The fundraising.

But under all the paperwork and waiting we are so excited!!!! I just love going onto the All Gods Children website and seeing all the adorable babies and precious children waiting for their new homes! I get such a thrill when I see the word "matched" under a name! Matched means that some amazing, awesome, loving person or couple or family has decided to make that baby or child a part of their family! Even if it is a child that I was daydreaming could be ours, there is not one thought of that once I see that child has finally got a family- no more waiting for them!!! I get such a thrill knowing that, one day, that "matched" will mean that that baby or child is OURS and that we will be bringing her(or him) home soon to meet her sisters and brothers!!!

When all my kids were born those first few months were magical. While other moms may dread those nights up I treasured every second of it, even more so for each birth. Every night away meant that I got to spend a few precious hours with my baby alone. I know that our new baby may not have many awake nights, she will be a little older, but I know that I will set aside time, perhaps in the evenings when the others have gone to bed, for just us. It won't be those middle of the night nursing sessions with my biological children, but I'm determined to make it a special time for us. It doesn't have to be the same, it just has to be ours.

I know that the time leading up to getting matched, the time leading up to traveling to China, the first few days and nights(and possibly even years, we just don't know!) with our precious one will have their challenges. I am not dreaming that this is all a walk in the park. All the paperwork and fundraising has proven to be one mountain of challenges after another. But knowing that this is Gods will for us, that one day our baby will have her own family, that she will be loved unconditionally and so so much, that she will have siblings that would die for her.....the challenges are nothing. She is everything.

I love her already.

A Mothers Strength

There are so many different parenting styles. Some parent based on belief, like our family. Some do what their parents did. Some go with their gut. Some research and see what methods have worked for others in the past. There are so many parents out there that are doing what they feel is the best thing for their children. Every parent who loves their child is going to do what they believe is best. I will never know the strength of someone who decides that their best is to give their child away.

I have a friend who does foster care. She is a believer and she and her husband prayerfully made the decision not to outright adopt like our family has chosen, but to foster until they find their little boy baby to add to their family. They have taken children into their home and they have a little boy there now that has become part of their family. He is deeply loved by his momma, his daddy and his sisters. They are all he has ever known. They have rocked him to sleep, stayed up nights, fed him his first mouthful of cereal, prayed over him. His biological parents have not yet made the choice to sign the papers to allow my friend to adopt. I will never know the strength it takes to live every day, loving unconditionally a baby that is not mine, not knowing if the baby I love just as much as a child I gave birth to will be taken from the only home he knows.

In order to be a mother you have to be strong. I know mothers who have waited through many many miscarriages, finally having a healthy pregnancy, a healthy baby. I know a mother who raised her son all the way to adulthood, only to have him pass away in a motorcycle accident, in the arms of his twin. I have seen a mother squint at her food stamps to make sure she is getting what it says, not what she wants, and then turn to her baby boys in her shopping cart and give them a huge smile and a tickle.

I don't know how strong I am. I don't know if I would have the strength to give up my child, smile when there wasn't enough food on the table. I try to be strong every day just going through the usual routine that is a house with 6 kids. I pray to yell less and cuddle more. I pray to have enough energy to get up at 6:00 after being up for 3 hours at night with a sick child, play and work all day, and then still have enough energy to make my husband his dinner before I relax for the night. I pray for peace. I pray for their futures. I pray that they will be strong moms and dads, like all the moms and dads I see around me every day.

Be-Attitudes for Mothers

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love God, for their children shall
not be ignorant of their Creator and His plans concerning them.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love the word of God, for their
children shall know of the way, the truth and the life.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love the house of God, for their
children shall enter there and sit with them in the presence of God.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love to pray, for their children
shall feel the power of prayer and many shall find salvation.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love to give to the cause of Christ,
for their children shall become supporters of the Kingdom of God.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love the family altar, for they
shall have their reward in this world and in the world to come.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love to speak kind words to their
neighbor's children, for thereby they shall win
other boys and girls besides their own to Jesus Christ.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love to be companions to their
children, for they shall be called understanding Mothers.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who love to fight life's battles
bravely with a strong and steadfast faith in God, for their
children shall know where to find strength in time of need.

 

Blessed are the Mothers who, when they are old and gray,
can look back upon memory's wall with no regret and can say,
"I brought my children up in the fear of the Lord."
Theirs are the mansions in glory.

Author uknown, http://www.crossroad.to/Victory/poems/mother-prayer.htm