How We're Doing...

I wanted to check in with everyone after my last post that shared our news of our failed adoption.  We're doing good! We've been SO encouraged by everyone who has sent cards of encouragement, flowers, and emails!  We've felt God's love through the body of believers. We feel so blessed to have such wonderful friends and family!!!  We know we will find our baby.  It may take a little longer, but that’s okay.  He or she will definitely be worth the wait!

I've been so encouraged by the psalms lately, and this verse really stuck out to me the other day in my reading, and it describes how we've felt during this trial.  Psalm 29:11  "The Lord will give strength unto his people; the Lord will bless his people with peace."  We've been given strength and peace from God, when it seems like we should have lost all hope in this adoption process.  It is that peace that passeth understanding!  I thank the Lord for that...

Also, I really felt a burden from the Lord to write a letter to the birthmother.  I really felt like she needed to know that Dan and I were not angry at her for changing her mind.  I wrote her a letter explaining that we didn't have any hard feeling toward her, and that we still cared about her and her son and were praying for them.  I sent a bunch of verses of encouragement as well. She responded right away, which I was surprised by.  She said she couldn't thank us enough for that email.  She said she thought for sure we hated her, and the fact that we didn't, proved to her that we really are who we say we are. Baby boy was born early, too!  He is already a month old, and he is adorable!  She is really struggling being a single mom and she is still trying to decide if parenting was the right choice for her.  Please pray for her.  She is in a tough spot right now. I know that the Lord brought her into our life for a reason, and if it is simply so I can be an encouragement to her, I want to be that.

We've been super BUSY!  We're trying to finish all of our remodeling projects, especially our exterior work before the snow starts falling!  We've been in our house for over 3 years, and have focused all of our attention on the interior, and haven't done a thing with the exterior.  (Sorry neighbors!)  But we tackled replacing siding and painting our house, and we went from the worst looking house in the neighborhood, to one of the best.  We're so happy with how it turned out!  It was a dramatic color change, but we're very happy with it!

Here is the before picture:

And here is the finished product!

Now we need to do some much needed landscaping!  We'll see if we get to that this year...

Thanks again for everyone's support.  It means so much to us.