That's How Much You're Loved

So I have been working on crafting items to place in my online Etsy shop. I've been working in my free time (ha, right, "free time") on making items to sell. So far, I've got a couple of paintings I am trying to finish up and I've made some cell phone cases.

First off, BIG THANK YOU, for the overwhelming response to the cell phone cases!! I am amazed at the response I had from friends and family just on my Facebook page! Thank you all so, so, much. I have my work cut out for me this next week and I have a lot more cases on order. In case anyone is interested, I am selling them generally for $10 each (plus shipping for those who live out of state). Every bit is going towards the adoption.

Now, onto the real reason for my post today. 

I was reading some blogs online in the wee morning hours today (because my 15 month old still wakes at night, naturally). I found a really great family blog on their adoption from China. I love reading the stories of personal experiences! I saw on this blog something that really shook me. The following picture is not the one I saw personally, but is very nearly the same. 

Orphanage cribs 

Rows upon rows of cribs in an orphanage. So many cribs that they couldn't all fit in one camera angle shot. This wasn't the first time I'd seen this, but for some reason, it really shook me up. Though there were no children in the cribs, I knew that they were full of babies and children who do not have moms and dads, sisters or brothers, cousins or grandparents. They are alone. 

I felt very small. This road I am trying to walk has just begun, and I already see how much time, sacrifice, and expense will be involved.  And at the end of the journey, we will meet and welcome home our 6th child. But, she will be just one less. One in a sea of faces of SO many. So many still need homes. If it was physically possible to do, I would scoop them all up in my arms and love them and be their Mommy. Every child deserves a mom. A dad. A someone. 

I just shook my head and felt the tears burning my eyes and prayed, "God, I want them all." And then I felt him whisper back to my heart, "...so do I." Wow. Just one whisper from Abba broke me. I cried bitterly and deeply. As much compassion and love that my foolish, sinful heart feels for these little ones, oh how much God's heart feels it more. They are each so precious to Him. He doesn't want just one. He wants them all too. Each beautiful child that has ever breathed life either in their mother's womb or outside of it was crafted so beautifully and carefully by God. 

And He wants all of US. Orphan and widow. Mother and father. Slave and free. Haughty and reverent. There isn't one that He wants left behind. He wants to know each of us deeply and wants each of us to know Him in return. 

"Doesn't he leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders, and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.'" (Luke 15:4b-6)

This is God's love for us. So deep that it cannot be understood, explained, or described. So beautiful that it physically hurts. A love so reckless and wild, so consuming that it forsakes everything else to pursue. THAT's how much you're loved. What a privilege to hear His voice and to take part in extending that love to one of his precious little ones. 

Why China

Sorry it's taken me so long to get back to this post. With kids starting school this past week and finishing up some work here at home, time kind of slipped away from me again, as it seems to do so often these days. 

First off, I want to thank everyone for the positive response we've received regarding our choice to adopt. I have received so many encouraging messages and questions, and even got to share a little bit about what led us here privately. 

As I said before, I really wanted a separate post for the full explanation of what led us to adopt from China and how we made the decision to choose this country. 

For us, the story starts back on April 5, 2008. Phil and I were really blessed to be able to attend The Call (a prayer conference that's held all over the United States every year in different locations) in Montgomery, Alabama. We were only two of 12,000 people who got to attend this awesome time of prayer and fellowship that also happened to take place on the 40th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s death. It was an AMAZING experience to pray beside our brothers and sisters in Christ for Unity and healing in our nation. In light of all the news of racial divide lately in our country, I like to think back to that day where all races were gathered together and were ONE in the body of Christ. We can do this, guys. 

Since there were so many people at the event, I ended up getting separated from Phil during a break and we literally couldn't find each other. I remember standing in the back of the auditorium when one of the speakers took the stage and began talking about the importance and calling of adoption. My heart was stirred inside of me, as this had been a topic Phil and I had talked about briefly before we had even gotten married. As I shared before, my mom is an adoptee. They had a call for anyone interested in adopting to come forward. As I recall, they were discussing adoption from the US, and specifically Alabama state residents. 

I felt a little deflated because I remember thinking, "Well, I don't live here in AL." And besides that, I didn't even know where my husband was at the time. Come to find out, Phil had felt the same stirring in his own spirit. I have often wondered if we'd have just met each other in the smaller group if we'd both responded at the time. 

Regardless, on the way home we kept discussing adoption. And we were excited!! We both felt strongly God had called us to this, but we didn't know where to begin. When I got home, I contacted Bethany Christian Services (a large adoption agency) and asked to receive information on their adoption programs. The more we looked it over and thought about it, the more we felt called to International adoption. I circled several programs I was interested in. 

I began praying about it and God gave me a dream shortly after in which I saw myself painting a tree branch. On that branch I could see a ladybug crawling. I knew this dream was something God had given me for direction, because He's always spoken to me through this sort of thing. 

A bit later (I can't remember how long it was), I came across adoption blogs of people who'd adopted from China. And I saw ladybugs on some of these sites. I found out that ladybugs are a symbol of adoption in China! And during prayer, God revealed to me that the tree branch represented a new off-shoot on our family tree. Isn't God amazing? He's the ultimate artist, choosing that similarity between He and I to speak to me. God had given me direction and it just took me a little while to understand it. 

So China was on my heart after that. I shared all this with Phil at the time. Afterwards, we went to an informational meeting in Greenville with another adoption agency and learned more about the process. I remember looking in the eyes of several of the attendees there, who looked desperate to have the privilege to become parents and ready to adopt. I felt a little out of place, and a little guilty to be honest, when we introduced ourselves because we were blessed already with two biological children at that time. Despite this, we were welcomed warmly. In the end, we found out that we were too young to adopt from China, which made me really confused and sad to be honest! The minimum age requirements to even begin the process was 30. At the time, I was only 27. Meaning that, at minimum, we had to wait 3 years to even think about starting this process. 

So between 2008 and 2015, God brought to us new dreams and experiences. I gave birth to 3 more biological children. I had 2 miscarriages. We began a business/ministry and poured our hearts into it. We experienced hurt and rejection in the church. We experienced financial loss. We experienced joy at watching the ministry we birthed lead people to salvation, deliverance, and healing. We felt the pain and joy of closing the chapter in our lives that led us from our 20s into our 30s. And finally, we experienced supernatural restoration and entered into a time of rest. 

I like to think of those years as molding years. Years of tremendous growth and change. Years that we were on the potter's wheel. God took the time to withdraw from us what needed to be removed and shaped us more closely into who and what we needed to be. And the shaping never ends! We're just spinning now as he gently shapes us for the next stage of life that we're on. 

God gently reminded me of our plans to adopt. Plans that I had all but abandoned years ago. And I realized that the roadblocks that had been there before: age limitations, finances, and even family size, no longer existed.  In the years that had passed, China had removed or revised some of the other restrictions in place for couples to adopt from their country. Previously, even the current size of our family would've restricted us from adopting there. As it turns out, December of 2014 removed that road block as well. 

That's not to say that this journey will not be without its obstacles. Adoption, no matter if it is domestic or international, is time consuming and expensive. There are literally mountains of paperwork and red tape that we must wade through. Every aspect of our lives will be examined and scrutinized by others. I am sure it will be quite uncomfortable.

Some will not understand why we would choose to do this. Comments will be made concerning the choice to adopt a child with special needs (94-98% of children in orphanages in China have been classified as special needs...ranging from minor to severe). Some will question the desire to pursue a program in which money must be fundraised to make possible. 

My answer is this: God called us here. And if He called us, how can we not answer? I don't want to have any regrets in my life about responding to His voice. How will we do it? I don't have a clue! Isn't that great? Ha! Kind of like how God called Abraham to pack up all his stuff and start walking without telling him specifically how he was going to get there. I know I'm going where God called me to go, but I don't know the details just yet. And I don't have to. 

1 Thessalonians 5:24: "The one who called you is faithful, and He will do it." I'm so glad I don't have to know all the details right up front. We're not really in control of those details anyway. All we have to do is follow. And that is a comforting thought. 

Back to the Grind

This is the last weekend of summer break. Say it ain't so. As I said in one of my last posts, this summer was so busy and full and that only made it feel like it was coming to an end even more quickly. But enough complaining!

E starts K5 this year! I'm so excited for him. His books have been ordered and in the meantime, we will be working through some of the curriculum I already had saved from the older kids. And C is in 7th grade now. And N is in 4th. This just isn't right. Everyone's growing up too quickly!!!

Off to enjoy the last few days of summer with my kiddos. Hope everyone else has had a great summer too. Regardless, it will be nice to move back into the swing of things for the school year and get back to our old schedule.

Raising Awareness

So many articles and statistics are out there concerning the state of orphans around the world as well as adoption statistics. These can be overwhelming, to say the least.

In an effort to begin raising awareness for these precious ones, I am linking to an article here that has a lot of good starting information:

http://learn.showhope.org/hs-fs/hub/351176/file-577809165-pdf/Adoption+OrphanCrisis.pdf?t=1439495481029

New Beginnings

"Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba, Father."

(Galatians 4:6)

I've debated writing this post for a while now. In truth, a big motivating factor for me getting back into blogging was so I could document the journey we are about to undertake.

I'll try to make it succinct as possible. But if you know me, you know how verbose I am and how I can go on and on about things that really interest me. I'll do my best, honest, not to delve into it too deeply.

Phil and I have been married 15 years now. That's a long time, folks! I can remember back before we tied the knot, we would talk about future plans and dreams. I am really blessed to say that of all the big plans that we had and big dreams, we have done most of them! Now, all those plans and dreams didn't end with rainbows and leprechauns dancing in a meadow and singing folk songs on a guitar. (Don't ask me where the mental image came from. Just go with it.) But I consider myself pretty darned blessed to be able to say that I followed dreams I wanted to pursue and dreams God gave me to pursue with my whole heart. Fail or thrive, I have to say that as a couple, Phil and I have always sought to pursue God's plans for our lives.

There is one dream and plan we talked about for ages now that we have yet to pursue. Either due to circumstances, time, or ability. And that dream is adoption.

I myself am a testimony of the miracle of adoption. My mother was adopted in 1952 and I am the direct product of adoption. Along that line of thought, it's really humbling to think about your own personal life quite possibly even BEING simply because of a selfless decision made by birth parents and then a decision carried forward to completely alter the lives of the adoptive parents and adopted child.

So it had always been the topic of discussion between Phil and I that adoption would be something we were definitely interested in pursuing one day. Fast forward 15 years and 5 biological children later and adoption is not only on the table, but at the forefront. Why now?

I am a planner. I love making lists of goals and plans. Financially, I had our entire next 5 years planned out. Plans to buy a bigger house. Plans to become completely debt free. I'm not knocking plans at all. I feel God wants us all to use wisdom in our daily lives. But personally, my life had become something I viewed as entirely mine. It was about me. Without even meaning to, I had taken God completely out of the equation.

I was loading the dishwasher one morning and often times I will pray or talk to God as I'm doing those little menial tasks throughout the day. I can't even remember specifically what I had been praying about or thinking to be honest. All I know is that I felt the Holy Spirit just drop into my mind, randomly, "what about adoption?" The thought hit me, hard. To be honest, I hadn't thought of it seriously in years.

But God had been busy in my life and in Phil's life. For the last two years, He had been restoring things for us left and right. Finances, security, peace. You name it, God was busy doing it. Thank God...He even is in the business of restoring dreams. (Joel 2:25-26)

As much as my heart jumped to the thought of being able to pursue adoption, I also reminded myself to be wise. I had to stop and consider this whole thought process. I prayed for a few days and kept it to myself. I asked God a lot of questions. What about my plans? I realized that this isn't about me. It never has been about me. It's about Him. And do I want my life to be lived the way I want it to, or do I want to follow what He's got for me? I already knew the answer there. And the bigger question I had to ask was...God, can I trust you again? Because last time I trusted...everything wasn't perfect. There were times I hurt. Times I failed. Times I cried. Times I lost. But then I remembered Romans 8:28. "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." 

Hadn't God taken every bad circumstance and turned it around for my good? Absolutely. Hadn't God restored every single thing that I had lost? Yep. Could I trust God with the unknowns involved in following after Him again? Of course I could. So I let this dream begin to grow in my heart. I asked friends and mentors to pray with me. And when I decided to approach Phil, God had already been working in his heart on the topic as well. You see, God was already working behind the scenes. Isn't it just like God to upend our plans and give us something even better?

So again, it seems we will be pursuing what God has placed in our hearts. As I said before, I am big on researching and thinking things through. So the last couple of months have been fraught with number crunching, praying, reading articles, and finding out what requirements there will be involved.

The adoption process tends to be long and from what I understand, there is enough red tape to choke a bull. Despite all of that, we are excited! Our hearts have been turned specifically to international adoption. And even more specifically, China. I won't delve into those topics in this post but I promise to be more specific as to what led us in this direction in a new post soon.

We are hoping to be in full swing with the paperwork requirements no later than December of 2015. Please pray for us as we move forward in this process. Pray for guidance and direction from God, patience, and breakthrough to any obstacles we might come across. And if you have read this far into the post, you have my thanks! I will try to keep things updated here for those interested. Love and appreciate everyone who shares a part in our family's lives. We are blessed!

Summer Fun!

Much belated posts regarding our vacations this summer. We had a blast and our kids had what we think is easily the best summer ever. First off, our awesome and amazing French exchange student that became part of our family in 2012-2013 came back for a visit. It was such a blessing to see him again and catch up. I wondered when we first got to the airport if it would feel different having him back again, but I can honestly say...it was like he had never ever left. So many good times were had and I sadly didn't take enough pictures. I blame my broken iPhone.

Phil and Greg jamming...J joined in too. 

Now...on to our Washington trip in July. One word: HOT. It was entirely TOO HOT FOR HUMANITY. Seriously ya'll. It was so hot (how hot was it?) that I saw two hobbits throw a ring into a pit of fire. It was so hot (how hot was it) that I couldn't muster up the energy to take my picture beside JFK's memorial tomb because I was just too tired. I was like, "I'm good." So sad.

Anyway, besides how hot it was, we had a FANTASTIC time. I can tick off some items off the bucket list now. I've been to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History!! How cool is that? We could have spent easily a day in just this museum but we were short on time. The exhibits were not only educational but truly beautiful. I will definitely go back because we only got to see a very small percentage of the museum.

I think the kid's favorite thing was the Air & Space Museum. It was pretty mind-boggling. So much history that covered early flight into space travel and there were really a lot of interesting displays that were interactive for the kids, so I really enjoyed watching them learn about flight dynamics, space travel, and there was even an interactive display where the kids could take a personality quiz that showed them which part of the NASA program that would be best suited for them, should they want to become an engineer one day! Very cool.

Here are C and L standing in front of the replica of Neil Armstrong in his spacesuit. There was an exhibit right around the corner from here which showed NASA in the process of preserving the historic "Man on the Moon" space exhibition space suit.

Now to the monuments in D.C. We actually got to walk up to the White House this time (last trip we couldn't find any parking and it was sooo cold) and were surprised to see a church group leading worship just steps away from the gate. It was a humbling and beautiful experience. We spoke to the members of the group who told us that they are from the local Korean church in D.C. and have been coming out to minister to people through music each Sunday evening. Great people with awesome hearts for people and for God.

Random alert: right in front of the White House there is a statue of President Jackson and when we walked up, we saw a cute little squirrel sitting on his arm. I thought this was kind of fitting because Jackson was a pretty crazy dude. I could totally picture him with a rabid pet squirrel. Wish we had gotten a picture of that!

 President Jackson...I salute you.

We also visited the usual sites: Washington Memorial, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Jefferson Memorial. Phil and I got into a debate over which Memorial was best. I say Lincoln and he says Jefferson. I think the kids ended up siding with Jefferson other than C, because she and I kind of LOVE President Lincoln. Nice to have someone on my side. We also stopped by Arlington Cemetery to view the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. I have never witnessed a more distinguished and revered site. And appropriately so.

Either way, this trip was super educational not just for the kids, but for us as well. There is almost no cost involved at all, but there is a lot of walking to do. I would go back and hope to do so in the next couple of years. If you have ever debated going to D.C., please consider making the trip if you can.  There's something to be said about the history and solemnity of the city there.

From D.C. we drove a little farther to visit family in PA. The visits always seem to short because there are so many family members and friends to see and try to catch up with in such a short time. The kids have so many cousins there and I am pretty sure each night that they went to bed that they were completely exhausted (but in a good way) from all the playing and visiting.

Lastly, we were able to make the short drive to Niagara Falls. This was the first time we had been back in over 10 years! Crazy. The kids had never gone and they were pretty impressed with the site, as far as I could tell! I think Phil was on the verge of a panic attack because he was worried someone was going to squeeze through the bars and fall in.

Niagara Falls!!! 

If we are able to go back in the future, I would love for the kids to get to travel over to the Canadian side, because there is a quaint little town directly on the border there that I remember visiting with Phil years ago that I think they would enjoy. 

So basically, that was our summer in a nutshell. Of course we had the usual cookouts and BBQ's but, we got to do so many extra things (that ended up not costing us very much at all, so bonus!) that I think it was easily the busiest summer we have ever had. And it's over far too quickly!! Now we are back to the grind and gearing up for school to start for the kids next week. Until next year, summer!