How Big is your God?

This past month has been a weird month for my spirit. There are lots of things going on, not so much in my physical world as I have been working hard to clean out busyness, but in my spiritual world.

I have been reliving what this time last year looked like. Spending time with my father on and off in the hospital which resulted in his death one year ago today.

Preparing for our yard sale to raise funds for our adoption. That was an emotional drain because it involved going through and using a lot of my dad's stuff in my yard sale. Amazing how the smell of him and seeing his handwriting can wipe you out. The yard sale was not just an emotional drain but also a physical drain in being up late for nights and nights organizing and pricing.

Starting the school year and really questioning not only do I have the ability but the desire to homeschool my kids this year. I have had a lot of doubts here.

Struggling in my parenting as all these emotions have left me raw and exposed to my battle with lack of patience.

The, what feels like, never ending wait to bring our child home - and I have only just begun the waiting. I probably still have another year to go.

This and other things have left my heart and body feeling a bit raked over.

What do I do when faced with all this? I would like to say that I turn my eyes to my Lord and give it all into his capable hands. But, that would be a lie. What I normally do is turn on my super powers and "function". I know you know what I mean. I isolate. I take a posture of defiance and strength while crumbling inside. I hide. I start acting like God isn't big enough to handle me, and sometimes I believe it. Sure he can create the heavens and the earth, calm the seas, and raise people from the dead, but ME? Just not big enough.

The Lord knows that I get in these funks. He lets me wallow in it for a time. Until I realize, once again, how desperate I am. He has consistently brought me this song over and over these past 2 months. I do not own it as I never buy music. I do not listen to the radio as we are always listening to the kid's music. But he brings it to me however He can, and it has come a lot.

He is Mighty to Save - - Hillsong

Everyone needs compassion,
Love that's never failing;
Let mercy fall on me.

Everyone needs forgiveness,
The kindness of a Saviour;
The Hope of nations.

Saviour, He can move the mountains,
My God is Mighty to save,
He is Mighty to save.

Forever, Author of salvation,
He rose and conquered the grave,
Jesus conquered the grave.

So take me as You find me,
All my fears and failures,
Fill my life again.

I give my life to follow
Everything I believe in,
Now I surrender.

My Saviour, He can move the mountains,
My God is Mighty to save,
He is Mighty to save.
Forever, Author of salvation,
He rose and conquered the grave,
Jesus conquered the grave.

Shine your light and let the whole world see,
We're singing for the glory of the risen King...Jesus (x2)

God has made this my prayer. I can't tell you that he has answered all of my "dilemmas", but he has spoken into each one.

MY GOD is mighty! Mighty enough to rescue my father's soul. Mighty enough to get me through that crazy yard sale. Not only get through but be BLESSED by it. Blessed by the around $1800 we made peddling other peoples junk, but also blessed by the total strangers that came and poured out words of encouragement to us being in this journey of adoption, dropping an extra $5 or $10 bucks in support of us - strangers walking for a brief moment with us in our adoption.

Giving me peace about stepping down and slowing down my physical world so I don't feel like all I have to give to my family is left over energy. Not only giving me peace and showing me the ways to do it.

and the waiting...yes, the waiting for our child. When I was in the craziness of adoption paperwork, but longing to get it all done and approved so we could finally start waiting, someone said to me, "This paperwork is the easy part. You have something to do. Something to control. When you start just waiting, it is really out of your hands." I have to say that is partially true. The waiting is harder than I thought. Not like being pregnant where you know a due date. God just keeps reminding me that He already has her (or them) picked out for us and He is caring for them while we wait. HE IS MIGHTY TO SAVE.

To save not just me and you, but all of them. ALL OF THEM! Do you get that? ALL 147 million orphans in this world and he will pour out his compassion on every single one - like they are the only one. All the lost. All the hungry. All the forsaken. HE IS BIG ENOUGH. Praise Him!

Loving our T-Shirts

So excited to present our T-shirts to the world!

The Lord has been so gracious to give us a heart to adopt. It is so not of us. We want the message from this Hosea passage to tell the world that this adoption is not about us, or something we are doing. It is about the great love and compassion that HE has for the fatherless.

We want to raise funds for our adoption, yes! But we also want to spread the message that our great FATHER is present, and HE is mighty to save.

Hope you enjoy wearing our t-shirt!

Fingerprints, fingerprints

Not sure how many times at this point I have been fingerprinted :-) Surely by now they know who I am.

We travel this Friday to Nashville to get our final FBI fingerprinting done. The great thing about it is that we get to eat at one of the great Ethiopian restaurants that Nashville has and Knoxville is lacking in.

I will travel for food...

Chaos

Feels like life is out of control right now. My to do list goes on and on...

Trying to cram all my summer projects into the last 2 weeks of summer before school starts.

Trying to get school organized and realizing I have way too much stuff that I want to teach my kids and way too many resources to do it.

Trying to gather all the wonderful donations that people have given us so that we can have a yard sale to raise money for our adoption. I can't even park in my garage anymore. I, somehow, sometime, have to find time to price all this stuff in preparation of the yard sale.

Trying to get T-shirts designed and made to raise money for our adoption.

Trying to use up all the tomatoes I have so I am busy making and freezing spaghetti and pizza sauce (on the list again tomorrow).

My car is filthy - not a norm for me.

My house, while not messy, is NOT clean - not a norm for me.

My last two batches of bread have caved in in the middle while baking - what the heck is up with that? Makes me angry daily when I make lunch with my caved in bread.

I literally haven't sat down for any long period of time in days...weeks maybe.

So much on my plate, so much frustrating me.

"I can barely hear you whisper through the rain". That is my hearts cry right now. Just to hear the sweet, soft whisper of the Lord telling me that He is with me. I know he's got me. That he is all over every one of these details. That he is going to be the one that provides the funds to bring our baby home. That he could care less about my dirty floors and the never ending crumbs under my table. I am not praying for those things to go away, they are not bad things by themselves. I am just praying that I will take it a day at a time and be peaceful in the middle of it.

I have only a few days left of summer. I want to spend them with my kids not my to-do list.

In other areas...Our adoption keeps moving! We are #64 for a girl and #39 for siblings. We go next week to get our FBI fingerprints done in Nashville. Excited to get that next step over with.
Should have our T-shirts printed b y next week and will get that out and about so people can start buying them.

We start school next week and I am ready for the consistency that will bring. It is hard to believe that my little girl is starting Kindergarten and my oldest little boy going into 1st grade. Time is flying by.

Things in the Works

I thought that getting all our paperwork finished and entering the 2nd trimester of our adoption - the waiting stage - would be quiet. Not so true. We have all sorts of things in motion.

We had to file our I600A which is our immigration paperwork so they will let our child into the country. I got our FBI fingerprinting dates in the mail today. We have to be in Nashville on August 20th at 9am. I had hoped that the date would be before school started so we aren't having to work around school. That is the glory of home school though. School can go anywhere. I guess school that day will be in the immigration office in Nashville. Excited to be in Nashville and get to eat at some yummy Ethiopian restaurant - don't have that luxury here in Knoxville.

We are also starting to get into some fund raising activities. I am working on gathering donations for a yard sale, working with some artist to do a design for a fund raising t-shirt, and we will be starting a support raising letter soon which means compiling a list of addressed which will probably put my wedding list to shame!

In the midst of that, we are working on applying for grants in hopes of raising some funds that way.

It is a lot.

Am I complaining - NO WAY! I know the Lord will take care of all this, even if I don't take a single one of these steps to raise funds. He has chosen a child for us and he will get her home, no doubt in my mind. All these steps are just steps, just things on my list and they will get done, eventually.

For now, I have a 2 year old tugging on my arm saying, "More raisins please."

Keep on Moving!!

Wow, this journey is amazing! Our Dossier got approved on June 24th and we were able to get our official numbers on June 25th. Our initial numbers were #75 on the girl list and #45 for siblings. Which really almost blew my head off. When I went to mail our Dossier, I just had the number 75 stuck in my head. I just knew that we were going to be number 75. Crazy...

We will get a call or email every month letting us know our new numbers. I got the call yesterday for July and we have already moved :-) We are now officially #70 for girls and #40 for siblings. Crazy how those numbers can get you so excited but also anxious thinking about how long this wait is going to feel like before we are able to bring our little one/s home.

Yes, I am still, for some reason, really hoping that we get two. I know that the reality is that it will probably be just one as sibling groups that young are very rare. I suppose this just means that we are going to do this again. I just keep feeling like there are 5 kids in this family, so we shall see what the Lord does with that.

In "normal" family life, we are all doing really well. I have had mono and am trying to still recover and gain strength back from that. I am trying to keep our summer slow and relaxing, with not much success. The kids and I are hanging at the pool, playing with friends and eating lots of ice cream :-) I am super excited (especially since I whined on my blog about not getting to go on a 10 year anniversary trip) that next week M and I are going away for 5 days ALL BY OURSELVES! Thanks to some WONDERFUL family who are taking on our three, we are going to get a chance to get away and invest some time in us. I am so excited!

My heart has been in a bit of a funk as we have spent a couple of months now feeling overwhelmed by paperwork and the process of adoption so I am thankful that is past. The Lord has been really sweet to bring back around the real emotions of why we are doing what we are doing. The sweetness of the journey, the longing to bring our baby home, the excitement for my kids to have a new sibling, what it will mean to our family to be trans-racial. God has blessed me so much already and I am thankful. Anxious and impatient :-) but thankful!

A Huge Step!

We picked up our Home Study on Friday and submitted out Dossier today! So very excited to get past this big step! It has been an adventure so far and the Lord has been very gracious to us through it. Always guiding and directing...

I am sure, and I am preparing myself, that there will need to be changes, additions, corrections, etc. but just to take this step feels like I can take a big breath. Once it is all reviewed and finalized (which will probably happen next Friday and then we will have to make any changes that need to be made), our next step is to BE PUT ON THE WAITING LIST!! Doesn't sound all that exciting, but just the thought that we are on the LIST is awesome. One more step to bringing our baby home.