Cousins

This weekend I had the gift of some goooooood cousin time.

They are one of my dearest treasures in life.

They live far away and we only get to see each other about once a year.

When we do see each other its easy, relaxing, fun, refreshing, and deeply enjoyable.

Thank you, God, for the gift of my cousins.

School Time

This week my babies went back to school. Jorie to the second grade and Luke to the first grade. Although they are tired, they have had a great first week.

ahhh, feeling the love.

seriously mom, no more pictures.

my big girl.

I said, "say good-bye to your brother" and they hugged him from both sides. This was the only moment of the morning that I almost lost it. They all love each other so much. I know that may be too sappy for some of you....but for me, ahhh so precious.

One of the many blessings of going to a small private school is the size of the classes. Jorie has 12 in her class and Luke only has 6 kids in his class.

Jorie begged me for this Hannah Montana folder. I reluctantly gave in hoping that no one except me and her would ever know about it. First thing when she sat down she pulled out that folder and showed all of her girlfriends in the class ...as well as ALL of their parents. Ugh. Choose your battles, I guess. Our family's current favorite thing to do in the evenings is Uno. A game we can all play and we have so much fun. I especially enjoy trying to beat my husband. :)
Caleb seriously wins a lot. It is hilarious.So, having Caleb home alone with me and/or Marc everyday has been a surprise delight. Ya know, he is kinda my wild one and I really thought he would be gloomy walking around the house for 8 hours wondering when his favorite playmates would come home from school. Well, as it turns out, he's not wild at all when Jor and Luke aren't around and he is wonderful to be alone with. He has been playing pretty good by himself and he likes to be a part of and help me with whatever I am doing. I have loved my time alone with him! It is bringing back so many memories of when I used to be home alone with just Jorie. I know it's just the first week....but so far so good. I may never let him go to school.

Esther

It has been a GREAT summer.

One of my favorite things this summer was studying the book of Esther with Beth Moore's materials. Last night we concluded the 10 week study and I just want to tell you that I loved it! Not only did I love digging into God's word, studying a WOMAN, discovering so much deeper richness in this well known book, but what I really loved (and will really miss) was hanging out with Sarah, Em, and Kelsey every Monday night. It always amazes me to see how God speaks to each of us so differently from the same passage. What a special group of girls that God brought together for such a time as this. This study was the icing on my cake of a fabulous summer! Thank you, God!

Did you know that Esther is the only book of the Bible that never mentions God?

Gabriella

When people ask me why we are adopting, Gabriella is the first thing that comes to my mind. In 1995 I spent 3 weeks in an orphanage in China. The leaders that were with us told us on day one that they were praying for our hearts to be broken for the things that breaks God's heart. At the time, a very strong and seemingly invincible 19 year old, I had no idea what they meant. Today, after 14 years of crying over having to leave Gabriella behind, I have a better understanding of what breaks God's heart. His heart breaks for the millions upon millions of orphans in our small world. I have heard it said that God doesn't see statistics, he sees children. He created them and He knows everything about each of them. If my heart hurts this much over Gabriella then I can't even fathom how much His hurts over all the others. As my heart prepares to meet Mei, I seem to be going through some increased grief over Gabriella and all of the others that I can't take home. I wanted to show you Gabriella's pictures so that you can see a piece of my heart and also so you can see her beautiful face. A face that probably never lived outside of an orphanage or ever experienced the love of a family.

Will you ask God to break your heart for the things that break His?

August in Pictures

Thank you, Lord, for my August.

August was definitely an amazing month.

August adoption news included receiving our LOA from China and our I-800PA from US immigration. The next step is to sit back and wait for our travel approval to arrive in around 6 weeks. Once that arrives we should travel to China in another 2-3 weeks. Best estimates put us holding sweet Mei in our arms the beginning of November. Needless to say, I am ready for that moment. We also received updated pictures of Mei last month. What a gift.

This week marks the one year point since we sent in our first adoption application to HOLT. I can't believe we have been on this journey for a year now. What a wild year. The Lord has been so faithful to carry us through it and is continually reminding us to keep our eyes on Him. The journey is not yet over... the emotional and circumstantial rollercoaster continues...my love for Mei and my God continues to deepen.

Another cool thing that happened last month was "Worship Defined". (worshipdefined.blogspot.com) For months now I have felt the Lord working on my heart and giving me a deep desire to serve the poor in the world. Once I recognized that desire I went to Him repeatedly asking Him what to do with that. Seriously, the poor are everywhere. I became overwhelmed with the depth of poverty in our world and my mind was spinning with ideas of what I wanted to do about it. I wondered how I would ever know which direction God wanted me to go first. The beginning of July I felt the Lord telling me to take the month of August to chill about it, let it go, not even give a thought as to what "I" could do and just spend the month totally focusing on Him and who He is. So anyway, one day during August during my sweet time with the Lord I had a new idea to develop worship nights where the community at large could come together and we could provide awareness about the poverty in the world and issues related to it. After a few moments enjoying that new idea that seemed from the Lord I realized that my friend Malia had shared that exact idea (one that she had had for quite a while) with me several weeks prior. It's like God was saying to me, "Yes, I know you heard it from Malia first, but that actually was My idea and I wanted you to know that it was from Me. Now, go and join her." In the meantime my dear friend Melissa was also receiving confirmation that she should also join Malia in this venture. God is soooooooooooo amazing how He works. Anyway, you can check out our blog at worshipdefined.blogspot.com to find out more about it.

It's amazing what happens when you decide to let it all go and let God be God. At the beginning of the month I told the Lord that I wanted to be radical for Him. Throughout the month I learned that being radical for Him has nothing to do with what I do. To me, right now being radical for Him means to be sold out to Him in every way. To pursue him radically. To seek Him continually and earnestly and passionately. Being radical for Him is a matter of the heart and the focus of my thoughts. When I seek Him with all that I am, when I seek Him radically, He alone does radical things. The real reason my August was so amazing is because of the depth of intimacy that occurred between me and my Lord. Oh, I praise you Jesus!