Your Custom Text Here
Photo by: Marchele Johnson, Marchele J Photo
December 1st, we marked six years since we submitted our application to Lifeline Children’s Services to become part of their Ethiopia international adoption program. We had prayed, researched, prayed some more, and as a still newlywed couple, we embarked on a journey that we could have never imagined.
Read moreIn honor of National Adoption Month, I wanted to share the top 5 questions that I’m asked about our adoption journey(s).
Read moreI used to think it was kind of weird when people said they were “paper pregnant.” But here we are four years into this thing, one babe home after three adoptions started, one at the beginning stages (Haiti), and this is what it looks like.
Read moreIt's been one year since we arrived home with our little Brighten. I vividly remember walking through the door, into our playroom, holding Brighten and introducing her to her home. Obviously, she didn't understand what I was saying or showing her, but I was so proud to bring her into the place that we'd prepared for her.
Read moreI'm not good at keeping secrets. Well, let me rephrase that; I'm not good at keeping my own secrets. I've always been a verbal processor, so I think that telling my own secrets is some sort of coping mechanism. But with adoption, sometimes telling too much too soon can hurt the people who love you, and can break your own heart as well.
Read moreWhen Jason and I began our Ethiopia adoption process in December of 2013, we had no clue what the next several years would bring. We were, admittedly, blindly optimistic. We thought it'd only take a few months to do our home study (try 7.5), be on the waiting list by summer (it was the end of September), and be booking flights to Ethiopia by Christmas 2015. Thankfully, even basking in our optimism, we'd heard that adoption is not for the faint of heart, so we had the foresight to set some "guidelines" - rules for ourselves if the going got tough.
Read moreI remember the seat I was in. I remember who was sitting near us that day. I was so embarrassed. But I was so broken and I couldn't stop. The tears came in full force. Loud. Breathless. Shaking, I held onto the seat in front of me as I wept.
Read moreMy great-grandfather, Storie, who Brighten is named after, marked timber for a living. All day, every day for years and years we walked the woods, marking timber. Everyday at lunch he'd eat a giant meal that my great-grandmother packed for him, drink a thermos of piping hot coffee, and laid on the toolbox of his truck to take a 20 minute nap in the sun. From everything I've heard about him, he loved his job, and he was good at it. Storie passed away just a few months before I was born, so I never got to meet him in person, however the stories I've heard certainly tell the tale of a man I would have loved to have met.
Read moreThis post has been a long time coming. When we moved into our house in 2013, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with the small, back room. Originally we used it as an office for Jason, but I assured him that as soon as we had a child, he'd get kicked out.
Read moreAround this time last year, things looked a lot different in our lives. We experienced a pretty big setback in our adoption process. Our hearts were broken as we had been rejoicing and dreaming of days that we thought were soon to come, but in the matter of an instant, everything changed. You can read the post I wrote about that here.
Read more
This is a blog post I've dreamed about writing for the better part of three years. It's the dream half fulfilled, yet my heart feels so entirely full. It hasn't quite sunk in yet, but it is getting more real with every passing moment.
Read moreWhen I was a teenager, I heard a story about children in a developing country who heard about Jesus for the first time. Their biggest takeaway from the gospel is that Jesus is coming back. They were so excited about Jesus's return that they began waiting at the doors and windows of their homes so they didn't miss the opportunity to witness Jesus returning for His Church. I remember longing to wait like that, and feeling a sense of guilt that I didn't.
Read moreOne of the biggest differences with our domestic adoption and international adoption is the preparation period. With our #journeytojudah in Ethiopia, we know that we'll have anywhere from 6 months to 16 months to prepare for his arrival, even after we're matched. With our #searchingforsunshine domestic process, we could get a call that a birth mother is in her second trimester, or that a baby has already been born, or anything in between. It's been exciting and crazy to think that our lives could completely change (for the better, of course) from one day to the next, or even one hour to the next. That is a new concept for us!
Read moreJason and I periodically have a conversation about my adoption blog and how my blogging frequency has declined a lot over the last year. I always tell Jason that I just don't know what to write. Most of the time we have no new information, and it seems redundant and negative to just say "Waiting is hard" one-thousand different ways.
Read moreIt's been a lifelong joke - I'm not a camper. I camped once in 8th grade and a frog kept me up all night and I ended up asking the youth group leaders if I could go to the house on the other side of the lake. They said no, I was mad, and I wrote off camping forever.
Read moreDear Judah,
Sometimes I dream about opening my email. This is task that I do literally 500 times a day and typically doesn't seem like that big of a deal. There will be a day, though, that it's the biggest deal of all. I dream of getting a call, being instructed to open my email, and then I dream of seeing your sweet face.
Read more
Source
Six summers ago I traveled to a camp in Alabama as a 'leader' for youth group camp. I was in college and thought I was going to be teaching middle schoolers and high schoolers about the bible. I don't know what kind of impact I had on them, but God surly used that week to grow me and prepare me for the life that lay ahead of me.
Read moreI realize that's an unconventional title, but if I had to describe my mood for the last three months, this would be it: I HATE WAITING. I've had a bad attitude, I'll admit, but I haven't been able to kick it. Ever since we got the news about the new waiting list and the delay, I've had a bad attitude. My heart hurts, and my heart is tired of waiting.
Read moreYesterday I was listening to my favorite podcast and the host was interviewing a mom who is waiting for a referral from the Philippines and who has been in the process for four years. Sometimes it's hard to listen to people talk about their experiences because every adoption experience is different and it's difficult to not compare our experience to someone else's.
Read moreHappy New Year! We probably shouldn't say this, but we;re not too sad to see 2015 behind us! It was a good year for the most part, but God really stretched us as He worked in our hearts through new mercies that were completely unforeseen to us. We look forward to 2016, hoping and praying that maybe this is the year. We doubt we'll be able to travel to Ethiopia twice and bring home Judah in the next 361 days, but we are hopeful that we will have a referral by 2017. Of course, that's definitely a hope, and as we have learned over the past few years, nothing is guaranteed or set in stone in the world of adoption.
Read more