Home Study Packet Complete!!

Time to start blogging again! We are so excited today, we finally sent our home study packet in to our agency!! This is a big step, as the packet was quite large. For those of you who are not familiar with the process, the home study packet consists of medical examinations, fingerprinting (for the FBI and Missouri), lots of signing and initialing, self studies for both Luke and I (about 12 pages of intense questions about our childhood, families, marriage, children, and views on adoption), consent to release forms, etc...As I said, it was a lot of work but so worth it as it gets us closer to bringing our little one or ones home. The next step will be to set up our home study visit/ interview. From what I understand, a social worker will come to our home and evaluate our home life, as well as talk to Luke and I together and separately. After that report is complete, we will begin to compile our dossier....more details to come....

So this post may be the hardest I will ever have to write...Sadly, Luke and I lost the baby this weekend. It has been to date the longest, most difficult weekend of my life.
I have gone through a wide range of emotions over the past 4 days. I have found myself angry, confused, depressed, and hurt. I can not understand why the Lord would allow this into our lives after trying to conceive for so long. However, there are some things that He has made clear to me in the midst of my hurt. They are very simple: God is still in control, and He is still good! I may be angry and I may not understand, but He holds a purpose in all things. My sweet husband keeps on reminding me of the story of Job. Job was a righteous man, and yet the Lord allowed immense hurt into his life for ultimately one purpose...He knew that despite the circumstances of life, Job was going to praise the Lord through it all. In Job 2:9, Job says, "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised." Oh, how this applies to our family right now. The Lord has blessed us with the ability to conceive. He gave us a few short days of life within me to realize that. For whatever reason now, He has taken away, but we will still praise His name! After Jobs' wife tells him to curse God and die, Job replies in 2:10, "You are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God and not trouble?" Just less than one week ago, I wrote about the Lords goodness to our family because He had given to us. Now I am writing about the Lords goodness even though He has taken away. I know that we live in an imperfect world where imperfect things happen and until we are in His presence at home in Heaven, we have to expect and accept "trouble" just as we would "good".
Praise the Lord with me for He is good!

The Lord is Gracious and Full of Compassion

The Lord shows us in many ways His love for us. He has shown His love for our family in a big way just recently. As I mentioned above, we have just begun the process to adopt from Ethiopia. It has been a long road to get us to this point of obedience, and has taken a lot of prayer, tears, and disappointment along the way. For two and a half years, we have been trying to have a baby and although it has been painful and hard, we discovered this week the reason for all of it. It has become quite evident to us that adoption was the Lords' specific plan for our family. He has taken us on this journey of infertility for that very reason.... perhaps He knows we are stubborn and that was the only way to get our attention! He has made it clear to us that His plans are perfect, they are always on time, and never waver in our questioning them.

So, maybe you have figured it out by now....or maybe you are wondering why I am rambling on about this...but here it is: Luke and I just found out that we are expecting baby number two, who will be coming in about nine months! Thats right, Maddie was correct....She will be having one "dark skin" brother or sister, and one "light skin" brother or sister! Praise God for His faithfulness to us!!!