March and April

It has been a crazy two months, and I have not sat long enough to write my monthly blog update. March and April have been very busy months for us as we started a new adventure as homeowners!

We started looking at houses when Scott got a new job in January. I know a lot of families deal with a commute but it was NOT working for Brielle. She was used to having her daddy 24/7, so him getting home at 7 was really hard for her. We closed on our house in the beginning of March, and moved the last weekend in March. It was a whirlwind month of packing, driving back and forth, therapy, and Brielle's birthday!

Her birthday was March 27th and we moved March 28th. As much as I wanted to throw her a big party I knew it was not in the books this year. So I thought about her favorite things, and that became her party: balloons, Chick-Fil-A, friends and cupcakes. It was low key, and just right for our sweet 4 year old. She had a blast and was asleep 5 minutes into the drive home.

Scott's parents came to visit right after we moved, and were a huge help painting. We painted our dining room ceiling, and whole master bathroom. We had the rest of the house painted before we moved in, so it was nice to check our final painting projects off. Then my parents came the next weekend, and helped us wallpaper the dining room. All we have left is to hang pictures!

Brielle has been making great progress lately. She is using her signs pretty consistently, even though she does mix up which ones to use from time to time. Now the struggle has been having her understand that she doesn't always get what she wants just because she is signing. Brielle has done pretty well with the move, and loves her big girl room. She has started standing independently for a few seconds at a time, and cruises along all the furniture to get around.

In OT she has mastered her first puzzle and a stacker toy, which are both developmental milestones. She loves the ball pit and the swing the most. PT is not her favorite, but we are seeing the results at home.

Last Friday we had her IEP test with the Paulding county schools. She will be starting their special needs Pre-K in the fall. She does really well in Sunday School, so we know  she will be ready for school. She will also receive PT, OT and speech at school.

Yesterday we got her AFOs (ankle-foot orthodics), and she really likes them! She likes things that squeeze, so she doesn't mind wearing them. She already is standing much better, and is working up the courage to take those first independent steps!

We still enjoy our sweet girl every day, but she is certainly a stubborn toddler. We have to be consistent in discipline, and the temper tantrums are fierce when she is told no. But she has become so much more aware of her surroundings and wants to help with everything from vacuuming the house to putting away laundry to feeding the dogs. She has come such a long way in just 8 months. Praise the Lord for all the healing He has done in her life!

Thank you for all your continued prayer and support!

The waiting...

The time that every adoptive family dreads...the time when all you can do is wait. Your baby is waiting for you, and you would literally leave tomorrow to go get her, but government approval stands in your way. Ugh. There is nothing fun or easy about it, but it is part of the journey. I like to keep the blog positive, but I want to keep it real too. And the waiting is very real, and I am really over it.

We are hoping that the process should begin moving again next week, but I'll save that update for then. For now I want to document what the past few months have been like. There are times when it has been very hard. Mother's day. Every time someone asks for an update and I say nothing. When I realize a month has gone by since I got the last picture of her.

But there are times that are good. Scott and I have been cherishing our moments together as a couple before we are a family. Dinners with friends. Walks in the evenings. Weekends at the lake. Most days go by without me compulsively checking my email every 20 minutes for an update.

What it really comes down to is that God is faithful through it all. He is the same today as he was yesterday, and He will be the same when we finally get to meet our girl. And He has to be enough for me. I cannot be a good wife or mother until I bury that truth deep in my heart. God is the only one who can fulfill me, not motherhood. In order to be the best mother I can be I have to be a servant of Christ. That is what He has been teaching me. And most days I still fail pretty bad, but I trust that God is working in me everyday.

So as our waiting season is (hopefully) coming to a close I want to put this lesson into writing. I must be filled with Christ to serve my husband and my daughter. That must be the priority.

One year ago...

It is hard to believe that is has been a year since we officially started the adoption process. We applied on March 23rd, the day Scott turned 25. It is possible that I had our application complete by January, even though I couldn't apply until March. I thought it was a good time to look back over the past year and commemorate all of God's faithfulness. There has been so many small things I don't know if I can list them all, but here are a few big ones.

1. Our goal for 2013 was to have our dossier finished. Then the government shut down and the FBI stopped processing fingerprints. We thought for sure this would keep us from meeting our goal, but we received FBI clearance in the middle of December, and finished getting everything certified by December 31st!

2. Finding Brielle. There are so many God moments in our choosing to adopt Brielle, but I will share one story. When we were first married with both liked the band Sky Sailing, and one of their songs was titled Brielle. We both decided we liked that name, and tucked away for potential children. In April we found a little girl on the waiting list names Juanita Gabrielle. We knew she had medical complications, so we wanted to consult a doctor. We took several months praying over the decision before applying to adopt her specifically. Her name just confirmed our decision because my great-grandmother's name was Juanita. Then one day Scott spoke up and asked if I remembered the name we liked Brielle. I remembered, but didn't recognize the connection. He said that Brielle is from the name Gabrielle. I knew then that this little girl was supposed to be my daughter.

3. Fundraising. We knew we would have to raise around $36,000, and our prayer when we first began was to finish debt free. After a few months of fundraising I didn't believe that would be possible, so we began looking at our options for adoption loans. I set the resources aside to look at later, but I am now happy to say we will not need those! As of yesterday we have completed our fundraising goal! That is a testimony to God's faithfulness because there is no way we did that on our own. Thank you to all of you who personally gave; you have played an important part of our story. We cannot wait to tell Brielle about all of you! We may still have some unseen medical costs, but our travel and agency fees are now fully funded!!!

Praise God for all that He has done in the past year! We cannot wait to see what the future holds, and hopefully we will be in Colombia this summer. Please keep praying that our paperwork will be processed quickly, so we can go get our daughter!

Beginning the dossier...

So we begin Phase 2 of the paperwork...the famous dossier packet. Except if you are not involved in the adoption world then it's not really famous to you. The reason that it is famous is because it is a lot of work, and the work has to be done very carefully. Once our home-study is officially approved we can really get going, but today we officially began our dossier preparation with a conference call. We love that our agency has someone to guide us through all the steps, and answer even my most detailed questions. 

We have to get our fingerprints done again, which we had a good laugh about because to do that we have to go to our local tobacco shop. Always a fun time. Especially because there is a sign that says tobacco customers always get priority over customers getting fingerprints done. My original goal to finish the dossier was six months, but I am hoping I can get it done even more quickly. The agency told us that there was a family who got it done in two weeks! But a lot of the process depends on how long the FBI takes to process your fingerprints. I am just excited that we are finally moving into this phase. Just one step closer to our child! 

It is a weird reality to know that (most likely) our child is already living somewhere in Colombia. I just pray that he or she is receiving good care, and the rest I leave in God's hands. I can't wait to actually find out who our child is, and start decorating his or her room. We have some furniture in there, but I have held off on actually decorating. Just one more thing to look forward to!

We appreciate your prayers for an expedient dossier process without any major road blocks or governmental changes in Colombia. I will try to keep everyone updated as we complete each step. (I think there is almost 30!)

Ask, Seek, Knock

We are in a series at church called Jesus Said. It is a really great series that concentrates on the words of our Savior. This week our message was given by Brad Sinclair and he talked about the Ask, Seek, Knock passage. I have always thought this passage was pretty simple, but Brad really challenged my mind set. He said that we often ask of the Lord, then we sometimes seek Him, but do we really even knock. We need to be persistent in bringing our requests to the Lord; we need to knock on His door.

I ask many things for our adoption, and we often seek out the Lord's guidance. I am not sure if I have ever truly 'knocked' though. I think I'm a little scared to knock. I'm afraid I will be persistent with what I want, but it is not what the Lord wants. So I sit back and wait for a 'sign'. I do not actively knock on the door to see what the Lord has for me. I think it has something to do with a lack of faith. I'm afraid to ask for specifics, and then trust that the Lord will make it happen. I want to control the situation (how surprising to those who know me).

So I've been challenged to knock on the door of the Lord for what we want in our adoption. I'm telling to all of you, so I have someone to hold me to it.

1. Debt-free adoption. This is kinda a big deal because adoption costs more than both of our cars combined. We have been debt-free our whole marriage, and I believe, with the Lord's help, we can continue to be debt-free. It means we will have to trust on the Lord to provide, and apply for as many grants as we can get. I'm not very good at accepting help from other people, so this will truly stretch me.

2. Our specific child. I've been very nervous to put any type of limitation on the child that we want because I feel like we have the resources to meet needs of a variety of children. We are open to medical needs, siblings or a school age child (up to 6). From there I have a hard time narrowing down any specifics. I still struggle with saying we "can't/won't" take a certain disability, age, etc. I don't want to limit what the Lord can do through us. But I feel like we need to start making decisions about what we can truly handle. We need to start knocking on the door for the specific child. Please pray wisdom for us as we make these decisions because it is heart-breaking.

I know this isn't just my typical info post, but this is a little glimpse of what goes on in my head daily as we continue this journey. I have been so encouraged by everyone who says they read our blog. It is very humbling to know that so many people are praying on our behalf. Please feel free to comment on the blog, or the Facebook link. It is super encouraging, and I love answering any questions.

If you are at all interested in information about how to begin adoption please let me know. We feel very passionately that more people could adopt if they knew how to begin.

God Bless,
Allyson

Overwhelmed

I knew in following the Lord's call to adoption we would be blessed in ways that we could not anticipate. Last night I was overwhelmed with blessings from the Lord. I have coached a  team of wonderful cheerleaders for the last 3 years, and last night was my time to say goodbye to them. It was bittersweet because I hate to leave my girls, but I look forward to the next step in our lives. We had a wonderful banquet of chinese food, and a time for the girls to be awarded for their accomplishments this year. Then it was time for me to thank those who have done so much for me over the years. And then the awards ceremony was supposed to be over, hopefully with only a little crying because once I get going its hard to stop.

But I didn't know the wonderful surprise the girls had prepared for me...they raised a gift of $550 towards our adoption. I was completely overwhelmed. This gift touched me so deeply. Not only was it nice to be recognized for the last 3 years, but it was like the team was giving me their blessing to move into our next stage of life with adoption. I will always have the sweet memory of my precious team helping me raise money to bring our first child home. Thank you girls (and parents) for all that you have done for me. I love dearly and will miss seeing you daily next year. I know the Lord will continue to bestow his blessings on you as a team.

In other news we can start our home study process as early as next week! We just have to set up a time to start our first interview. I'm super excited!

The beginning of a journey...

Well this is an entirely new direction for our blog. We are going to share our journey through the process of adoption. Here is how our story began...

When Scott and I were thinking about getting married we discussed what we wanted our family to look like someday. We both have been on overseas missions trips, and loved the experience. We were both open to the idea of adoption...after we had a few kids of our own.

Fast forward two years later...our church is offering a missions trip to Haiti. I don't really want to go to Haiti because they don't speak Spanish, and I don't like the idea of not being able to communicate at all. But we didn't have any other opportunities to serve over seas in 2012, and we felt like the Lord was really calling us to go. We joined a team from our church that was going to do evangelism and medical work. Neither of us have any medical training, but we were willing to help wherever we were needed.

While we were in Haiti Scott was great with the medical team. He did triage for all the patients, and was really good at it. I, on the other hand, felt kind of useless. I couldn't help with medical procedures, I couldn't talk to or understand the people speaking Creole. What I did do though was hold babies. The Haitians love for Americans to hold their babies, and I was more than happy to do it. I knew that it was my opportunity to show a little of God's love to these precious children, and just pray over them. The more babies I held the more it just felt 'right'.

Scott and I knew we wanted to wait several years before trying to have children, but I felt like the Lord was creating in me the heart of a mother. At the same time I did not want to bring another child into the world after seeing what those children had to live through every day. God was really working in my heart, but I did not know where He was leading me. I just kept praying that God would do something 'big' in me after returning from Haiti. I even felt like He might call Scott and I to go overseas. I would love to go overseas and work with orphans someday, if the Lord calls us to that.

So that is where I was at when we returned to Haiti. The next Sunday at church (Scott was already in Dubai on business) our pastor preached a sermon called "If you can't do it for all, just do it for one." And I thought so if I can't take care of all the orphans does that mean I should just take care of one? And then our pastor said, "For some of you that might mean adoption", and it just hit me. I felt like that statement was spoken just to me. But I wanted to make sure Scott was feeling the same because I wanted him to lead in a big decision like this. When he returned to Dubai we talked about Haiti, and what it had done for us. We talked about adoption, and it felt like we were right in the center of God's will. What an awesome feeling that is.

In December we went to an informational meeting with Bethany Christian Services, and were super excited to get all the information. The only disappointment is that one of us had to be 25.

Fast forward to March 23rd...Scott turns 25! So we have finally submitted our formal application for adoption. I have done some reading, and I know it's not always an easy road to travel. We know the Lord is guiding us, and has some awesome things to teach us along the way. I hope you enjoy sharing this journey with us! We appreciate your prayers, and we begin the process.