Invested

As I have had time off for Christmas break I have had a lot of time to think. This is good and bad. Maybe "bad" isn't the right word. Maybe the better word is "hard". Even though we have just started on this process to adopt I feel a mixture of emotions. I am so excited and yet the wait and the unknown is so hard. I already love this child so much and I have no idea how long it will be before I can see their sweet face or hold them. I do not know if I will have a boy or a girl. I just know how much I have prayed for this baby and for God's help in making decisions to lead us to our baby. I have been trying to do all of the work I can on my end. I'm praying for His wisdom as we make decisions about our agency we will use.

Merry Christmas from Marty

I do not yet have a child to take Christmas photos of....but I do have my puppy :). Marty is kinda rare. He really enjoys wearing "clothes". If we take his collar off of him he is so upset until he can get it back. He really enjoys wearing little sweaters or vests. He is such a ham.

So tonight I found this Christmas sweater my grandmother bought for him last year. I was like 2 sizes to small. So I just put it around his neck like a scarf. He didn't want me to take it off of him!

So...I decided to have him pose by the tree. What cute shots we got! The scary part is that I truly believe Marty wanted and enjoyed having his picture taken.

Winter Break

With an unexpected snow/ice storm I began Christmas break a couple of days early. For now I won't complain. However I may feel a little differently in May/June when I am still in school.

Ice covered everything. Poor Marty had to slip and slide outside in the back yard.

While I do not enjoy driving in such icy conditions there are a few things I enjoy about the cold weather like drinking hot chocolate and wearing scarves. I love listening to Christmas music, spending time crafting while watching Christmas movies, and baking yummy confections. Yummm. I love watching snow fall.

The next snow looks like it might be on December 24th and 25th. White Christmas this year???

Our Adoption

Adopting a child was somewhere in the back of my mind when I was younger. I thought I would like to do that someday, but I wonder now if at the time if I really believed I would do that one day. Or would I would marry a man who longed for the same thing? Again, this was just a thought I had once that was tucked away while I pursued life as I wanted to. Little did I know a seed had been planted that God had plans for.

God led Derek and I to one another. We lived in the same small town our whole lives and even attended similar events and yet we never knew one another. Our families even knew one another and we knew many of the same people. I always felt like we met at the perfect time, God's timing. I knew not long after we met that I wouldn't be looking any further. I had found my best friend.

As it would happen, he too, was interested in adopting. It is funny how God works in our lives. As we began to research adoption we started to look more closely into Ethiopia, which I'll be honest, I had never thought of before when I pictured adoption. Yet again, God had other plans. As we looked into requirements and learned about the countries and the need we knew where we would adopt. We may have still talked about other places, but our hearts always came back to Ethiopia.

I have tried to read everything possible. I've looked all through the Bible for answers when I asked myself so many questions about whether this was His plan for us for sure. I saw it again and again as I read things about Jesus being the defender of the fatherless(Psalm 68:5) and that He would place the lonely in families(68:6), and that religion He accepts as pure and faultless is to look after the orphans and widows (James 1:27). Once the call had been placed on my heart I began to look at how very blessed we are. At the same time, we are so very undeserving of all that we have. He has provided for our every need. Jesus gave it all. He just wants us to care for those less fortunate and those who can not defend themselves. I knew I could not say no to Him.

Derek and I have prayed about this for a long time and we are so excited to have officially started on our journey to adopt from Ethiopia! It will be months of paperwork, fundraising, waiting, and praying. We are willing to work hard to raise the money we need and to prepare for this. We believe that God will show us this generosity and support through others. We know it will be absolutely worth it.

As we got to the end of our homestudy application we got the the part that required our signatures. As we looked down and saw the words "Adoptive Father" and "Adoptive Mother" we both got a little choked up. It was a really special moment. We were so overjoyed to begin on this path that we have prayed about for so long now. I know that we will face many joys and challenges, yet we are very happy that this is the journey we are meant to be on. Please follow our journey!

New Wreaths

After making several wreaths for the Christmas season I decided to make a couple that were a little different. I made this heart shaped fabric wreath! This will be so cute in January and February.

I had black fabric and wanted to make something a little different. So I made this! I love it and I made the flowers out of felt. I think this is super cute.

I love making these and knowing that it is going to help raise money for our adoption makes the time spent even better. :)

Tis the Season!

I'm loving this time of year right now. There is still something so magical to me about a Christmas tree. This is my first "grown up tree". This is our first Christmas in our house so we always had a small 4 foot tree before which I still have upstairs in our loft. The first thing I do when I get home from work is plug in the tree so I can enjoy the lights.

I enjoy the glittery ornaments.

Our mini tree upstairs.

My wreath that I made last year before Christmas.

A super cute cookie jar that I got for Christmas last year. It currently houses my candy canes and hot chocolate mix. Yummmmmm

I bought these last year after Christmas for like a dollar. I LOVE shopping for Christmas decor after Christmas so that it is super cheap. So I plan on going out the day or two after Christmas to hunt for decorations to add to my collection.