I know how she feels.....

So...I may have written this before, but I can't remember.
Sometimes it seems like we are not really adopting. Almost as if one day we will jump out from the behind the curtain and shout "surprise! Just kidding!" Especially during this time of waiting. We are waiting on an email or a phone call for our referrel(s).

But mostly I feel unequipped for this task. We have several friends who are adopting or have completed their adoption, but they all live in different states. So sometimes I feel alone on this journey. Brent and I will be first time parents, most of our friends who have adopted were already parents, so Brent and I are going brand-spankin' new to this whole new world of parenting. Granted, sometimes I feel like we have 40 kids with our youth at the church. But we send these kids home!
We are not able to talk much with our out-of-state friends, so I don't know how they feel or their emotions.

So, it leaves me wondering - isn't this adoption thing for real adults who have their ducks in a row and don't have to wonder if they can make it on one salary? Do they have to fund-raise and then run out of ideas and people or does the money just appear on their doorstep? Do they have an adoption support group and resources available all over their city or not?

I don't know. I just have to believe. Even if I don't feel it.

My friend Kelly sent me this link to a new blog. I laughed when I read a post from her Big Adoption Series, here is the excerpt:

"I noticed right away that most of the other couples
seemed infinitely more knowledgeable about adoption.
They all looked like real adults - capable, earnest,
not especially given to the whims of fashion or style.
They were sensible and generous in the exact way that
parents, in my mind, should be. I tugged at my cute cardigan,
probably found in the Junior's department, and wished
I hadn't even bothered with make-up. I did my very best
to appear mature and motherly and all the while, I felt
like an impostor. We nodded our way through muddy terminology
dossier, referral, home study. We sat up straight and drank
Sprite from paper cups as we swatted imperceptibly at
nagging thoughts - we are too young, we don't know how
to be parents, who would ever give us a baby? The swinging
seat lurched ever-so-slightly, for the very first time
as we came to understand all that would be required of us,
when all I wanted was to sign a paper and order up my baby."

I know how she feels!

- you can check her blog out: www.flowerpatchfarmgirl.blotspot.com

Here's the Deal......

So here's the deal....we almost adopted 4 kids...again. The same 4 as before. We had a to have our medicals updated. They added a few tests and and x-ray. When we sent in our medicals, it was necessary to have our dossier reviewed again. This time we were told if we wanted the 4 siblings we could have them. What? Shock.

So okay, we thought and prayed about it for weeks. I mean sincerely prayed. Sometimes I say I pray about things and then I really don't. This decision affects too many lives to count, mainly 4 or 6 if you count us, and I have learned my lesson about not praying about things in my/our life. I am perfect at messing up my own life, so I didn't want to mess up four other lives. Especially since thier lives have been such a mess already! I was even doing Pricilla Shirer's study "Discerning the Voice of God" during this time. Everything Brent and I were reading and talking about seemed to lead to make the decision to adopt the 4 kids.

This brings us to December 1. We drove down to our agency to talk with them and tell them we had decided to move forward. This meeting set all kinds of things in order. Write a letter of intent, get a psychology update, print off a few forms to fill out, find a organziation in which to send tax deductable donations, etc. Even that night we had a man call wanting to know where to send their donation - we hadn't told him that we had decided to go ahead in the process. A few other events were happening that we thought was confirmation from the Lord. Everything is going smoothly, except, my spirit is twisted. That's the only thing was so weird. It was not the feeling I expected after saying yes to them. I literally felt as though my spirit was being twisted around inside me. I couldn't figure it out.

Fast forward to December 15, we are meeting with our psychologist. The 15th just happened to be the last appointment she had open for the year.
It was a cold, snowy, rainy day. I love days like that! The meeting went so well. I actually thought she would say we were out of our minds! haha!
Our agency is right across from her office, so we stepped over to say hello. Pat saw us through the door and motioned for us to come in. It was the kind of motioning where you instantly know something is wrong. We walked to the office and Anne told us that our letter of intent had been rejected. At first, I wasn't sure what she meant. I just thought, okay, so we write another one? No. That was not the meaning. There were some changes in Peru. Without disclosing all the details, there seem to be some political moves when our letter of intent was submitted and it was rejected. We had been told this was a done deal. But now there was no deal at all! We weren't really sure what to think about the news. What do we do now? We didn't know, we still don't really know.
Confusion was the main feeling of the day. Had we "heard" wrong? What about all the things we thought were confirmations along the way? What does this mean? It is still confusing and sad that children's lives seem to be in the hands of political parties. However, I know the secret: children's lives, all lives, are really in the hands of the Creator. He holds this world. Nothing happens unless He says yes. Charles H. Spurgeon has great quote:"Wherever God in His providence guides you, let it be your joy to know that He is too wise to err - too good to be unkind." ---
You, we, must believe God. So what did we decide?
We decided to keep our home study update the same - adopt 1- 4 children (siblings) and change the ages to 0 - 11. Who knows what will happen next? We just keep going and waiting and sincerely praying.

We still have the organization set up in which to give tax deductable donations. If you would like to give, please leave me a comment and I'll send you the info.

I know this is long! Just wanted to let you know what was going on with the adoption.

Reading

The past few months I have heard about or come across several books that I want to read. I try to hurry to read a book, just so I can finish it and get to the next one. This is not good for me, esp. if I want to retain what I read! However my friend Amber mentioned in her blog recently a quote by John Piper about reading. Basically if you read for 15 minutes a day, you can average 10 books a year! How fantastic! Here is the full quote below. To see Amber's full blog - click "Amber's Blog" on the left side of the screen.

"He recommends setting a goal to read for 15 minutes a day:
“Suppose you read slowly like I do--maybe about the same speed that you speak--200 words a minute. If you read fifteen minutes a day for one year (say just before supper, or just before bed), you will read 5,475 minutes in the year. Multiply that by 200 words a minute, and you get 1,095,000 words that you would read in a year. Now an average serious book might have about 360 words per page. So you would have read 3,041 pages in one year. That’s ten very substantial books. All in fifteen minutes a day.”(When I Don't Desire God, p. 129)"