Surrender

I really am going to do better about writing, I promise. It has been a frustrating few weeks and I have struggled to successfully articulate what I have been feeling. 

Waiting well is hard. It is hard not to be frustrated. It is hard not to be discouraged. It is hard not to dream about the future. Its hard not to answer all of the numbers that you don't recognize and get angry when its a political campaign.  I am a dreamer and Josh is too---in different ways, but we are both prone to dream about the future (hence the name of the blog). I am slowly learning to let the Lord transform my dreams into his, but in the past few weeks I have been guilty of "dwelling on dreams and forgetting to live." Wise words from the mouth of Dumbledore. 

 After talking with our agency at the end of last week, it is looking like we are going to be waiting a lot longer---for the next several months. And I find myself really discouraged. I knew this could happen, but I guess I just didn't let myself believe that we would be waiting more than two months. 

Josh and I have often told people that adoption is our plan A. This is our first choice for starting our family. I was talking my frustrations out with my mom and she wisely reminded me that when we have no plan B, we have no other choice but to put our trust in our Savior. Surrendering our plan A is our only option. 

Surrender is hard because it means giving up the control. I'm not there yet, but I am working on it. Surrendering to the God who was and is and is to come. Surrendering to the God who created the son and the moon and the stars. Surrendering to the God who throughout scripture shows us how His heart is drawn to the plight of the orphan, how he intervenes for the orphan. 

Kristin Wong talkes about this in her book on adoption, Carried Safely Home, where she says, " In [Jesus], we have the ultimate picture of God entering into the vulnerability and poverty of his people. God is glorious. He created and sustains the outer reaches of the universe; made millions of stars...and holds them all in place. He also made and watches each fatherless or motherless child in each hidden corner. He counts the hairs on their heads." 

This week, Psalm 146, has reminded me of this truth:

Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul! I will praise the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.

Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no salvation.

When his breath departs, he returns to the earth; on that very day his plans perish.

Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God,
who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, who keeps faith forever;
who executes justice for the oppressed, who gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets the prisoners free; the Lord opens the eyes of the blind. The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down; the Lord loves the righteous. The Lord watches over the sojourners;  he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin. The Lord will reign forever, your God, O Zion, to all generations.

Praise the Lord!

God has given me the opportunity to surrender my plan A to him. The God who created me and created my child. The God who holds me as my heart longs for a child and my baby as he or she longs to be loved. This God lets me join in his story. 

"God, unfathomable in his power and glory, is also the caretake for the weak...God could care for the orphans by his unilateral action alone. But he invites us to participate in his work of mercy. When we love fatherless children, we are doing the work of God--not on the work that he commands us to do, but the wrok that he, majestic Creator of the universe, promises to do himself. Through adoption, we are drawn into awe and love for God. We glimpse reflections of who he is and what he has done, and we marvel and rejoice....Through adoption I follow him. Through adoption, I worship."

And as I worship. I surrender. May this story be for His glory alone. 

Courtney Leigh 

Trust

One of my best friends, Autumn, once shared this quote with me and I have been thinking about it a lot lately:

"It is a safe thing to trust Him to fulfill the desires which He creates." Amy Carmichael

Ask my mother and she would tell you that I have wanted to be a mother my whole life. Besides being Josh's wife and a follower of Christ, there is nothing in life that I want more. My heart longs to hold my baby, to see his face, or know that she is safe and being cared for.

This week has been a hard one for us. All of our paperwork is in Russ*a and submitted to the right office in our region. We are just waiting. We have found out that we are 4th on the waiting list. I know that seems short, but it is still hard, waiting, but yet not knowing, hoping and praying. We are being forced to trust our God with our desires--desires that come from Him. We firmly believe that our Father gave us these desires and we know that he will see them to fulfillment.

Our hearts are burdened, not just for our own child, but for the millions around the world who do not know unconditional love. Our hearts break for the hundreds of thousands of Russ*an orphans--who when they age out of the orphanage at 16, 60% of the girls will end up in prostitution and 70% of the boys will end up in prison. It is our prayer that we won't just be adopting a child, but allowing the power of the Gospel to transform their life.

We are very grateful for your prayers and support. I know that we say it a lot, but your messages, prayers, questions about the process they get us through. Thank you for continuing to ask--and for letting us be honest in the days where we hurt. Thank you for emotionally and financially supporting us. 

On the fundraiser front, we have raised over $600 with our bracelet sales! We have lots of people helping us sell bracelets, so if you are interested in one or more, please message me. And just in time for the Olympics, we have plenty of new Red, White, and Blue bracelets! You can support both Team USA and Team Russ*a! :)

Fundraiser

We have been very blown away by the way the Lord is working through this process. We have known that June would be a very crazy month for us with work and the chance to celebrate with several of our friends as they get married. We got out USCIS appointment for fingerprints and it is on one of the two days that we could actually go, which is such a blessing. I was very worried about trying to change the appointment and still be on a fast timeline, but the Lord gave us a date that we did not need to change. He is faithful even in the tiny details.

Our families have been so supportive of us during this process and we are so grateful! They are always so excited with the minor steps that we make and have been so encouraging as we have fundraised. My mom and sister have been a huge part of a new fundraiser.....

We have been making bracelets! We will be selling them for $5 each or 3 for $12. We are selling children's bracelets for $4. My mom has some in Birmingham that she will be selling and I will be selling them in Jackson and Savannah. There are pictures of the bracelets posted in the bracelets page and we will be adding more colors as we get them made.

Thank you for your willingness to support us and our child! We love you all!

One Step Closer

This has been a great and exciting week for us! My family was here for graduation and my brother Hunter proposed to his girl friend Mary Beth! We are so very excited for them and had a wonderful time getting to meet and celebrate with her sweet family. We also got to see a lot of good friends over graduation weekend and watch a lot of others graduate!

It has also been an exciting week on the adoption front. We turned all of our paperwork into our agency, it has been approved and is being translated now. We got an email on Thursday asking us to pick between two regions--one that has a normal wait time and one that will move a lot faster! We chose the latter and have been working hard to get everything in order in case this process goes very quickly.

It is crazy for us to imagine that we could have this child home soon. We know that anything can happen or change along the way, but we are definitely getting excited about moving ahead with this journey. We aren't really sure a specific timeline, but as our paperwork gets to Russ*a we should get a little bit more information as we go.

This has been such an incredible journey for us so far and one of the biggest blessings has been having it documented by one of the students at the University where we work. Kathryn did this in several different ways but one of them was a video that tells our story up until about a week ago.

I hope that you enjoy this little piece of our lives!

Happy Birthday!

Today is Josh's 26th Birthday!

I am so very thankful for a husband who
                ....loves the Lord and puts him first in our marriage
                ...is my best friend
                ...puts his family first
                ...loves his friends and investing in them
                ...lets me serve alongside him in ministry
                ...works tirelessly on all of our adoption paperwork
                ...gets my heart for the least of these
                ...is passionate about fighting for marriage and families
                ...loves Alabama football as much as I do

I love you baby!

In honor of Josh's birthday, we have set up our first fundraiser! We are hoping that we will be able to bring our child home during Josh's 26th year and so we are asking for a one time gift of $26 to be able to do that. The link below will direct you to the fundraiser:

Help Us Bring Our Baby Home

Many of you have already given and we are very grateful! You have no idea how much your support means to us, both through prayer and financial support!