feeling loved

thank you.

Thank you for all the emails, texts, gifts at my door, thoughts, prayers, and more that I have received after our announcement of our sweet addition to our lil family. I cannot say thank you enough to show the gratitude in my heart.

God truly is answering our prayers and meeting our needs daily. Thanks, God. Thanks to you too for being His hands and feet.

Tomorrow is Lucy's last day as an only child. What shall we do to celebrate that little peanut and let her know how much we have loved these almost-six months with only her? Any ideas?

big announcement

Lucy is going to be a....

You read it right. Our little girl is going to be a little sister.

Cameron and I have been working on our next addition to our family. We are adopting the sweetest, most beautiful, energetic, talented, smart, wonderful little girl. She is 6 years old and her name is Emily. She comes from the same birth family as Lucy, so we have an amazing connection with everyone already.

This has been in the works since November. We started seeing her for little day visits in December and we've seen every 1-2 weeks since then. We had our first overnight last weekend and are having another one right now. (I have both my little girls asleep in my house right now- yay!) We originally thought we'd be officially moving her into our house in June. Things have changed and she's moving in this week! I know, it sounds crazy. Maybe it is.

I can't begin to explain the many, many ways the Lord has gone before us in this adoption. He has laid the path. We have been presented with many options to run from this or embrace it. We asked the Lord what His will for our family was and when He spoke, we moved.

I am, to say the least, overwhelmed.
My life is changing again. Our little family of two is doubling in a six month time span. I will be enrolling my daughter in school soon. I have bath toys all over the bathroom right now from a 40 minute bath (lucy's baths are 5 minutes). I am still working, which we thought would be different getting her in the summer. I have a daughter with opinions about her room (Lucy thinks anything I hang up is just fabulous). I have to know how to answer her many questions about life. I have to be prepared for many unknowns. We are obviously new to parenting.

God is good. He has created me for this. He will equip me.

I am so excited. Praise God for Emily!

what's in a name?

I was asked often about Lucy's name before she was born and immediately after. People wondered how an adopting family goes about naming the baby. I always meant to explain Lucy's name and the process of choosing it and I don't think I ever did. So, here it goes.

People always wondered things like:

• Who chooses the name in an adoption situation?
• If the birth family chooses something you don't like, you can just change it legally, right?

My answer is: it all depends! 

The name of the game in adoption is always to be flexible. You never know how things will work out until it is. You can't accurately predict adoption. It's challenging for those of us that like to control and direct and be in charge. God taught me a lot during our adoption of Lucy. 

A birthmom can absolutely name her baby. She may or may not include an adoptive parent in the decision. An adoptive parent has every right to change the baby's name legally when you finalize the adoption and get the new birth certificate. An adoptive parent must always consider the relationship that is being formed in an open adoption. 

Lucy's name is very special to us. I think it took our crazy little village to name her. I probably won't be able to explain every piece that went into naming her, but I'll try. Cameron and I had a list of little girl names that we mulled over for months and months. There were a good handful on the list that lasted the test of time. One of those names was Lucy. 

After Lucy's birthmom "chose" us and wanted to be matched with us, the girls went and had a fun day of pedicures and lunch to get better acquainted. She was getting ready to entrust her daughter to us, after all, so a girl day was in order. While sitting and getting our toes done she asked me what names we were considering for the baby. My heart began pounding and I got really nervous to share any of them with her. What if she hated them? What if this would be the deal breaker that made her not want to place her daughter with us? Nervously, I began to explain something. I explained to her that she and I must have similar taste in names because there is a little one in their family by the name of Emily, which was our first choice for a name for a long time. There is also a little one in their family with a name that has "lu" in it and we love the name Lucy. I couldn't even remember all the other names on our list at that time because I was just so nervous. I felt like I really didn't even answer her question because I just told her 2 names that wouldn't work because there are already family members with very similar or same names. 

She said, "oh, that's nice." (she said it really nicely. Lucy's birthmom was really shy with us at first.) I sat in my chair while the lady was going to town on my feet and I just wanted to die. I thought I blew it by rambling and mentioning Lucy and she probably hated that name. Well, a little bit later we went to lunch. After arriving at lunch she said, "I've been thinking about it since you said it and I like that name. Lucy. I like it." 

I sat in my chair at lunch and thought, "Did Cameron really like that name or was that one that I just liked? I hope he liked it because that's going to be her name." We got the seal of approval from the one who would be birthing her. We all agreed.  Her name would be Lucy. It was really important to us that we collaborated on a name with the birthfamily if they wanted to. 

Then they shared that Lucy's birthfather wanted her to have the middle name Wisdom. He wanted her to have that name to be a blessing over her life. He hopes and prays for her to wise. Wow, what an honor to have Lu carry a name given to her by her birthfather with such meaning. Of course we would use that name. 

I have always loved the name Jane. It's a family name on my mom's side. My great grandmother was Lettie Jane (sounds a lot like Lucy Jane). 

Cam has 4 names. The birth family all uses 2 middle names. So, Lucy has 4 names. Match made in heaven! 

Her name is Lucy Jane Wisdom. It's a good name. All the people that love her most contributed to her name. She carries with her a part of all of us. We were blessed with an opportunity to all name her together. I'm sure there are many people with much harder stories about disagreeing. We are thankful for our experience that we were able to have. 

Soon she will officially share our last name too. Our final court date is set for March. Yay! 

sweet day

We had a wonderful first valentines day with our little sweetie. Hope yours was just as sweet.

It cracks me up how fast she goes from this: 

To this:

Two seconds is all she needs. 

missing in action.

Things have been crazy lately. I feel like I write that on every post. I guess life with a baby tends to be...

crazy
chaotic
sweet
busy
amazing
time-consuming
the best way you ever spent your time. 

It's true. It is all of those things. I have not been blogging lately and I'm not entirely sure why. I do believe busyness has been a factor since work has been crazy too lately. I think it's hard for me to share on here at times. There is a lot going on with us (great things!) and it's hard to isolate things without sharing everything. So, I guess I was taking a little break while our family sorts through some stuff and gets situated.

We have had a sick baby around here. A sick baby with a giant bandaid on her head. She has medicine on a boo boo. The result is a bandaid on her head to make sure she doesn't rub her medicine in her eyes. Let me tell you, it's really fun answering the same question over and over again. Did I say fun? I meant annoying. Do you really need to know why my tiny daughter has a bandaid on her head? Why do you think she does? These thoughts go through my head as strangers stop me in Target to inquire.

I bet you never thought a bandaid on your forehead could look so cute.

She is finally in great health again. This poor girl had to be born right before cold/flu season. She has been sick three times in 5 months. I'm ready for some steady health for her.

Have a great day. I promise I'll be back to blogging soon. I know you missed me.

Oh, some exciting news before I go. Our final court date is set for February 16th to finalize our adoption. There is a chance that it's too quick and we'll have to move it back a bit, but for now we are excited for that quick date. We will keep you posted on it and explain the process a bit more too.