God is in control

this past week I have been looking back over the past almost year at just God's perfect timing. this time last year Brian and I were very much ready to start a family. we started praying that God would open up the doors. He started tugging on our heart strings. We thought we were ready for a family but as I look back I see that God was just preparing us for what was to come. here is a short list of what God has been doing to get us ready for this family that we thought we were ready for a year ago:

- in May of last year we joined an AMAZING small group at church
- in July we joined the Orphan Ministry at our church which is what God used to lead us to begin our family through adoption
- throughout the summer 3 of our friends found out they were pregnant (we now have 5 friends that are expecting and 1 just had their sweet baby girl about two weeks ago)
- in September we started the process of international adoption. met with out adoption agency and switched to Domestic Adoption so we could have a newborn for our first child
- in October because of God's favor we were able to get in the training class (we were supposed to be in the February one)
- Fall last year our jobs proved to be very supportive of our adopting and very flexible with our schedules to go to all our adoption meetings
- ever since October God has proved faithful to bring incredible friends and family along side of us to provide financially for this adoption.
- February we ordered baby furniture that should be in sometime in May
- March of this year waiting for our adoption approval with ONLY $4000 left to go!

God is just so good about his timing. it amazes me that he waited till we were surround by an amazing group of friends to walk with us on this journey. right now i am so emotionally torn about how to prepare for the arrival of our sweet baby boy. i so badly want to prepare for him to come really soon but I emotionally need to prepare for him to come sometime in December. God is certainly in the details. i feel completely confident that it's ok that i might not be completely prepared because i have an incredible group of friends who will be prepared for me. God has blessed us with friends that are also growing their families right now and we can just soak in all that information from them. we have an amazing church body that is filled with people joining in on our journey from a distance. people enjoy hearing our story and we love sharing it. God is even surprising us with how is providing for this adoption financially. i BELIEVE he will provide the last $4000 in the next two months.

we ask that you please pray that this approval process will go quickly and that we will be paired with a birthmom sooner rather than later. most of all please be in prayer for our baby boy as he is waiting in his mommy's womb. pray he stays healthy and that God will send his angels to surround him and him mommy during this time.

international or domestic?

Audra and I had our first meeting with Bethany Christian Services this morning. What a sweet time it was. Our questions were answered and questions were asked of us. The most important question was asked of us: When you envision your new family following the adoption process, what do you see? That is a question we had not asked ourselves. So that is where we stand. How do we answer that question? Well, here are our thoughts. We see ourselves with a newborn or as young as possible. We want to be a part of the firsts in this child's life. We want to instill our values and beliefs from the beginning. So how does that play into our initial thoughts of international adoption. Newborns are not an option, if only because of time constraints and waiting periods. 2 years or younger is the closest we would get. So that opens another door and another option. Domestic adoption, which has also been a desire of ours. We would continue to seek a child of race. It is unfortunate, but African American children are an option of last resort to adopting parents. They choose one of own race or bi-racial before they even think of a child of a different race. That saddens both Audra and I. So, is God leading us to adopt domestically? We ask for your prayers with this issue. We also ask for a quick conformation more than answer. The next cycle for the domestic process begins October 10th, just around the corner. Wow, how quick could this take place! We thank you again for your thoughts and prayers through this process. Keep an eye open for our decision and next step. We love you all.

- brian

our first meeting

You can see that I have posted the answers to the pre-clearance questions. I guess they did not see anything too wrong with them, because they have asked to meet us. Audra and I will be meeting with our case worker, Chris Troutt (female), on Wednesday morning. We pray that this will be the first of many. I believe this will be more informational than anything else. 8 am CST is when we will meet with Chris at the Nashville Bethany offices. Please pray that all that is discussed is to the glory of God. We thank you again for your prayers. I will let you know all about the meeting Wednesday afternoon.

- brian

Pre-Clearance Questions

As I said in the last post, we made it past the pre-preliminary application. Now we have to make it past the pre-clearance questions. I have added the questions that you might see them. I will also post our answers after I run it by Audra for an ok. The answers were e-mailed in moments ago, so we wait in anticipation for a response. This will be the first of many waiting periods. Patience is the request for the day. Thank you again for your prayers and words of encouragement. God bless you for your participation in this journey.

- brian

The Journey Begins

On Friday, September 12th Audra and I filled out the pre-preliminary application with Bethany Christian Services for international adoption. This is the application they require to see if you are worthy of moving forward with. Well, Audra said it would take about 2 weeks to hear back. You throw a weekend in there and it make take a bit longer. God is up to something, because we got our response on Monday that we were moving onto the next step. More on that in the next post. Our desire is a male infant from the country of Ethiopia. We will try to keep you up to date on all that is taking place within this process. Each post will be a new step, application, home visit, etc. All we ask of you are your prayers. For that we thank you in advance.

- brian