One Story of Sonship

My lovely wife has asked me to write an entry in the blog for nearly a year now. But, between being swept away by the joy of playing with J and being consumed with all the tasks of work and life, I haven’t had the energy to form a coherent string of words. I don't know if these will be coherent either, but I do know they are filled with delight and gratitude.

My lovely wife is napping, as is our son J (along with our scruffy puppy). Our home is very still and I’m listening to some new music by an old favorite through my iPod. We just attended a fantastic superhero-themed birthday party for one of J’s little amigos. Last Saturday, we walked the beach with our son for the first time; where he watched the sunset and attempted over and over again to dive into the waves. This life seems incredible and impossible to me. After years of longing for our son, we have been given this gift.

Just after its release, I listened to the audiobook of LOVE WINS by Rob Bell. My favorite quote had nothing to do with beliefs about heaven or hell. It had to do with parenthood. Rob Bell wrote “the Father’s love cannot be earned and it can’t be taken away. It just is.” The love we have for our son comes from the Father. His love transforms our hearts. His love widens our vision. God’s love is the only reason our hands can open up to receive any gift, especially the gift of adoption.

We were welcomed into the shared-parenting of J by his birth-mommy. God's love was the source of her ability to welcome us. Our parenthood was not earned, much like our adoption into the family of God is not earned. It just is. It’s a gift.

My lovely wife and I spend a lot of thought on how we will raise J and his brothers and sisters to come. The words Laughter, Joy, Encouragement and Forgiveness keep coming up in these conversations. We don’t want to squash or squander this gift.

I know I do not want to teach J things he will need to un-learn later on in life, especially about God and His grace. I want to show him by example that he can trust the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob…the God of his father, grandfather and great-grandfather. Our hope is that J will open himself up to the incredible Love that never leaves you abandoned. Our desire is that J encounters Jesus and His winsome love. Our dream is that he will walk with the Spirit of Truth and not live in fear.

But, these hopes, desires and dreams aren’t fulfilled in “pre-packaged” programs and spoon-fed dogma. The Grace of God will seek and find J, through whatever wilderness has been set before him. The Good Shepherd will care for our son when he is questioning, doubting, grieving and even cursing the faith we will share with him. We are able to rest, knowing that our prayers are heard by the Father who adopts us out of a joyful, selfless love that we can barely conceive.

When J was a few weeks old, we would get up for his 3 a.m. feedings and read the Old Testament in order to stay awake. J and I read the life of Joseph together during those early mornings. We read about the dreams God gave Joseph and of his alienation from his brothers. We read of the love Jacob had for Joseph. We read everything: the dreadful losses, the dizzying successes. We read of years of plenty and years of famine. We read of deceit and struggle. We read of forgiveness and reunion. We read of God's Grace and how simply un-fair that Grace must be. Thank God.

My son will not grow up to be perfect. He will have weaknesses and he will face the enemy. But the lullaby medley that J falls asleep to is completely true. J can rest in its truth.

Jesus loves you.
Jesus loves the little children.
He’s got the whole world in his hands.
Don’t worry about a thing, ‘cause everything’s going to be alright.

Gracias,
Jeremy

Finalization pics

Blogger Fail.

I have written this blog like 3 times along with posting a bunch of amazing photos and each time, once I clicked "publish", it would all disappear. This has been very frustrating as I seem to have less time or energy to blog as of late.

Anyway, I don't even know where to begin. So much as has happened since my last post. Do I recap our finalization? Christmas? His first birthday celebration?

Well, between the Finalization and Christmas, December was a crazy month. I need to send out another HUGE thank you to all who helped make our finalization happen. The money came in....every cent. And we couldn't be more grateful or feel more blessed. We have the most amazing friends anyone can ask for and even strangers sent in money. We have to give praise to God for reminding us how we are never alone.

My adoption world seems to grow daily as I continue to meet more beautiful families. I am so happy my son will get to grow up knowing so many other kids with families that look like his.

I know I need to post a ton of updated pics, but I am going to try publishing this small note to test if blogger has decided to like me again.

Hugs to all!

It IS a Wonderful Life.

About 9 years ago, I saw the Jimmy Stewart film, "It's a Wonderful Life" for the first time. It is a favorite of my husband's. We had been married a couple years and were having dinner and a movie at a friend's house. For most of the film, I was trying to suppress a massive anxiety attack as I had realized, I was indeed married to George Bailey. My husband constantly put others' dreams and needs before his own and struggled with fear that no matter how hard he worked at at it, he just wasn't enough to make my world and the world around us a better place. He was (and still is) George Bailey.

Now please remember, I hadn't seen the film before, so I didn't know the happy ending that was coming, so I was terrified. But the ending came and I had to try to hold back the sobs. There have been multiple occasions where we were in need and our community of friends came forward with unbelievable support. And we have felt like the Bailey's do in the end: massively rich, because we have amazing friends.

Right now, I am living in that moment at the end of the film when people come to the Baileys with money in their hands cause they heard George needed it.

Last December when we submitted our adoption application to our agency, we thought we might get matched with a birthmother by summer at the earliest. I mean, we had funds to raise and I was teaching full-time; we thought summer was taking an optimistic view of how long it would take to be matched. On our application, we said we were open to any race, but we were praying for a Haitian-American child because my younger brother is Haitian. The agency would tell us later that they laughed when they read that detail because they never served a Haitian birthmother before and they thought it was oddly specific. A few weeks later, a Haitian-American woman at 33 weeks pregnant walked in the door!

Our agency called us and asked if we would like to expedite our adoption and get a profile ready immediately to show this birthmother. We expressed our concerns about how we were not financially ready to pay for an adoption and they said they would work out a payment plan. So we rushed and got our profile ready and the agency began our home-study. They showed the birthmother our profile along with a few other couples and she picked us not knowing we were praying for a Haitian child. Talk about meant to be!

Usually in most domestic adoptions, you finalize 90 days after the child is placed. He was placed in our home March 12th. Well, after long delays, we finally received our finalization date for early December...right before our son turns 9 months old. About a week and a half ago, our agency informed us that they had just learned from our lawyer that the agreed-upon payment plan that we're due to complete in April will not be approved by the judge and if we want the judge to finalize our adoption, then we have to have to pay-off the remaining $5,000 by November 23rd. Our budget is tight as it is with our payment plan. So, we began to pray. God has brought us this far, this quickly, right?

Then a wonderful thing happened. Our friends began to spread the news and money began to come in. This was not expected or requested, but their generosity has humbled us greatly. As of this moment, we still have $3,916 to raise. We continue placing things up on eBay and I am finishing a new collection of handmade Christmas ornaments this week on Etsy. I know, we don't have much time. But, we are keeping faith that God will provide all our needs.

I want to say a big thank you to all of you who have supported us and to all who have been praying for us!

with much gratitude and love,

--Libby

Please Help

On Tuesday, October 26th, tragedy struck our church family and the world lost an amazing person. Larsen Hunt, was brutally murdered by her exboyfriend. Its hard to talk about with turning into a crying mess, so I am going to post a link.

Larson leaves behind a 5 yr old son named Aidric--who has autism. We are all trying to carrry on her dream of finding a cure and getting Aidric all the therapy and help he needs. If you have an extra buck to give, please do so.

Thank you.

http://www.hope4aidric.org/

Autumn Fun

This picture above is from Election Day. We made it a family affair and dressed up.

The streets were safe on Halloween with this Super group!!

Our Incredible Hulk!!


Well, the weather has finally cooled and it finally feels like Fall....too bad we had to sweat through our Fall festivities. It's been a life changing couple of weeks.

We had a packed calendar full of Fall festivities, weddings, and family fun.....but life had other plans. We did get to go to our local Pumpkin Festival, which is where some of the above pics are from. We went with friends who are adoptive parents as well and my two sister-in-laws and mother-in-law came too. The Festival was huge and we only covered a third of it---due to the heat and the realities of having a 7 month old. But I look forward to making this a family tradition and going through the corn maze and hay maze with J and his siblings. J got to go to his first circus that was there and he seemed to really enjoy it. After the festival, the family went to Cracker Barrel and basked in the air conditioning and comfort food.

We had a Trunk or Treat and a kids Halloween party also on the calendar but due to sickness and a tragedy (that I will get into in my next blog) we had to miss both of those things. We did get to go Trick or Treating. We met in a park with friends and had a picnic and then went trick or treating to the nearby houses. It was so much fun and J was wonderful. He's such a great kid. He was the Incredible Hulk and you will see him pictured with Batman, Ironman, and Supergirl. It was a Superhero Halloween.

With each "kid event" that we get to be a part of as parents, it starts to sink in that we are finally parents. I still can't believe it at times. But I am so grateful that we are no longer that "childless couple" at family events making sure everyone else's child is having a good time. My heart breaks for those who are still waiting desperately to have a child of there own and as the Holiday season bulldozes ahead, I pray you will find joy and peace.....and embrace sleeping in.

baby love

Ok, so here's some new pics. He makes my heart explode with love, joy, and peace.