Saturday, December 29, 2012

Telling our older two kids

As you probably know, 3 of our children live with us and 2 of them live with their moms.  The 3 girls that live with us have known for a while about our desire to adopt in the future.  They were excited when we told them we were going to pursue Z.  They have prayed for Z for all these months so it didn't really come as a surprise.

Today on the way home from up north we called Katlynn (the 18 year old) to see if she wanted to come spend the night and celebrate christmas with Dave's mom tomorrow.  We picked her up and headed home.  When we got home we told her our news about the adoption.  She just smiled and said that is so awesome to be able to help a child like that.  We showed him his picture and she seemed very happy and excited to welcome in a new brother.  She has many younger siblings (4 at her mom's and the 4 here) so she is used to having little ones around. 

Then our son called us to see if we wanted to go rollerskating with them tonight.  Rollerskating and my kids go hand and hand.  They LOVE to skate and it really brings them together.  So, off we went to the rink to enjoy 3 hours of skating.

I had a chance to talk to David tonight and I wanted to tell him about the adoption before he heard it from someone else.  The last time we were tossing around the idea of adoption, we didn't keep him in the loop and I think it made him a little sad and he felt disconnected.  I didn't want him to feel left out.  Plus, I was very excited to tell him because really if it wasn't for him having a major change in attitude and doing so well, we wouldn't even consider it right now.  But, he is doing amazing and I wanted to make sure that he knew that.

I pulled him aside and looked him in the eye and said, "guess what?"  He thought nothing of it and was like what?  I told him that his dad and I are going to adopt a little boy for real this time!  The look on his face was PRICELESS.  He got the biggest grin and before he said anything else he gave me the biggest hug that I have ever gotten from him.  He said that he has known for a long time that this was my dream and he knew that if he changed his attitude and did well, then that dream would come true.  Then I showed him a picture of little Z and he hugged me again.  He smiled and said he is going to be the best big brother that Z could ever ask for.  He asked if he could have a little picture of him.  He wants to put it in his wallet so that whenever he looks at it he can pray for Z.  Plus he wants to tell his teachers at school ;-).

This few minutes with David comfirmed to me that we are making the right decision to adopt.  He was the one that I was most worried about, the one who may have the hardest time accepting our plans.  I know deep in my heart that our family is making the right decision and are 100% ready to welcome Z into our home!  I am so very blessed to have such amazing kids who are excited about helping a child know what having a family is all about.

What a great feeling!



Friday, December 28, 2012

Welcome!

After spending 3 hours getting the perfect background for this blog, I suppose it's time to welcome you to our journey to bringing our son home! 

Our journey officially started months ago (in July) when Hannah (our 13 year old) and I were looking at adoption blogs.  We ran acrossed the most beautiful boy we have ever seen.  I knew right then and there that this was my son!  At that time, Dave was not ready to make a commitment to adopt so I decided to pray for him to find a family.  If my husband was not ready to adopt, there was not point in getting our hopes up.

Hannah was already in love with little Z.  She started a mission years ago called Hannah Hopes and through this mission she sends stuffed animals to children around the world.  I will explain more about this later. 

She wanted to send little Z a very special bear so she decided to spend her birthday money on it.  She found this bear from Hallmark and has been waiting patiently since September for God to show us a way to get the bear to Z.



So, here we were waiting, praying, and hoping to find a way to bring comfort to this special little boy!

Yesterday, my husband Dave told us that he is ready to proceed with the adoption for Z!

We are over the top excited knowing that God played a huge part in changing Dave's heart!  An answer to our prayers :-)!

So, let this blog serve as a place for you to be able to keep track of our progress to bring this boy home.  Unfortunately I cannot post pictures of his face, but I can tell you that he is from Eastern Europe. 



 I will post as often as I can.  Thanks for reading!

Courtney