Lots of "pennies" from heaven!!!

Wow! What an incredible day! First of all, I want to say "hey" to everyone reading this...I haven't been on to blog for awhile. I've been incredibly busy, but Wendy & I are making it through this process with God's incredible grace!
Anyway, back to the day we've had today.


As many of you might know...this adoption is not inexpensive...in fact the actual cost of $$ that we are still needing for the adoption is $16,700...until today that is!!!
That amount is only $14,200 after today...and what a crazy day this was!
The day started out with a phone call around 8am or so letting Wendy & I know that our church (New Covenant Presbyterian Church) was broken into and vandalized around 4:30am. Someone used fire extinguishers and sprayed them throughout the whole sanctuary. Needless to say, when we came into church (we had service in the gym) we didn't know what to expect to see. Well, we didn't see anything...the main sanctuary was closed off to the congregation, but there was an "air" of wondering by many.
Anyway, the Lord was glorified and worship was given...a tremendous message on Christ's full-sacrifice for us on the cross...His ultimate blessing to us!


The Lord had more blessings in store for us this day...Wendy & I were caught totally off-guard!
Unexpectedly, we were given $2500 during the course of the day!!!
I was/am being totally humbled in this whole process. Wendy always says that I am the one teaching her that God will supply all our needs and as He does (which I know He will) I continue to be "blown away" by His generosity to this "sparrow".


May the Lord be glorified as He is the "Giver and Supplier of all our needs"!!!

God bless,
shane

Papparazzi

Our dearest pals,

We need pictures! Shane and I have to design a scrapbook profile for the adoption agency. If you have any pictures of us together, or as individuals, could you please send them to us? We desperately need pix. My limited collection makes it appear as if we have no life before this year. I would be glad to make copies and return them if they are near and dear to you.

Thank you!
Wendy

Puddles

We finally finished our fourth training session (our third this week) at Bethany. It has been awesome! The room of quiet, serious people quickly erupted into a cacophony of conversation. It has really been an awesome experience. The nine couples in the room are truly diverse, not just racially but in experience and interest. I have truly enjoyed this experience. We have this very hip and cute trainer named Shayla. She is actually the birthmother counselor for Bethany. She has brought some reality and perspective to this process. I'm afraid that I still had my rose-colored glasses on when I started this process. I appreciate the agency's goal to inform us of all possibilities.


Last night we had an assignment. We had to imagine that we were birthparents that had to make a plan of adoption for our child. We had to write a letter to our child, explaining ourselves. This was one of the most difficult assignments I have ever had to do. We all brought our letters and then some of us read them aloud. There weren't many dry eyes in the room. Many of us have struggled with the concept of open adoption. Open adoption is when the birthparents may have visits (supervised) with the child and the adoptive parents. This assignment gave us a new perspective on the whole thing. Now I know that my happiest day will be someone's saddest. What a bittersweet time.


Please pray for wisdom for all of the future parents in this class. We all have tough decisions to make. Also pray for those birthmoms and dads. Pray that God would guide and direct them in their very important decision making. Praise God for Bethany and their incredible ministry.

On the run . . .

That's how our week has felt. I feel like I'm running on a treadmill without all of the awesome calorie burning. Tuesday was our first training meeting. We cruised through McD's for a fast bite. We smelled like quarter pounders when we arrived. We met 9 other couples who are in the process as well. It's funny how people interact with other strangers. We were all crammed into this little meeting room. As per my usual habit, I searched the room for a pair of eyes to connect with (Shane was in the bathroom). No one would look up. Everyone was so serious. I just wanted to make a little small talk. We opened with our name and something interesting about ourselves. As soon as I sat down, I realized that my socks didn't match. That was my interesting fact. Shane's was that he was adopted at 4 months. There were definitely interesting people there, but you can't help sizing them all up and comparing yourself. I had to confess this later. We watched a very moving video describing the process of adoption from a birthmother's perspective. I tried to cry quietly but I made little snorting sounds. How embarrassing!


Today we had our home inspections by the fire marshall and health department. Talk about under the microscope! I was neurotically finishing the all important wipe of the fridge seal when the fire marshall arrived. He was all business. I always find those kinds of people a challenge. I try to disarm them a bit and at get at least a smile or a laugh. I got one smile and a passing score. He looked behind our dryer. I won't tell you what he found. It was lint pergatory back there. The health dept. inspector arrived a half an hour early as I was finishing the basement. Just before he rang the bell, Maxi made her escape and proceeded to run around the neighborhood for 2 hours. What a day! We also passed this inspection and now I'm chasing the weekend. Training next week is Mon-Wed. Pray that we both don't collapse! I need some Gatorade!

The Juggler

Do you ever feel like a juggler with too many objects in the air and not enough hands to catch them all? That's me right now. I'm balancing being a teacher, wife, and secretary. I love teaching, but I can't help thinking about that new little person. I love my husband, but laundry just doesn't seem to be on the top of the priority list right now. You can pray that God would straighten out my priorities. Seems he's sending me the message to slow down. I have the cold that won't quit. I feel like a dish rag. It would be an underused dish rag if it came from my home!


A few things have happened since I last sat to blog (also low on the list right now, though tons of fun). We registered at Target on Saturday. I realized that adoption brings it's own set of obstacles. We had to enter a due date in order to register. I had to make one up:) Talk about overwhelming. There are even baby chotschkes. Just what we need. Tonight we finished the monster 40 essay questions called the self study. Whew! What a relief! Another ball goes rolling away!


Continue to pray that we would trust God to provide for us. Things are squeaky tight right now. Pray also that we would be shining lights at our training with the other parents. Pray that we would be prepared for all that is ahead (if that is even possible). Thank you for getting calloused knees on our behalf. Little Lankford will thank you too, one day!