A the Kitty Cat and M the Chef

M was originally going to be a lady bug (A was a lady bug 2 years ago) but I couldn't find the costume. She's been all about princesses lately so I thought she could just wear one of A's dress-up dresses but when I went to help her pick one out all she wanted to wear was her red winter coat and the pink's chefs hat. She's a girl that knows what she likes! Not at all like her older sister...oh no, JUST like her big sister! We took the girls to a church Fall Festival this year on Halloween. A played games, M got to pet a dog dressed up like a ballerina (the highlight of the day for her!) and we all went on a hayride. It was a fun family night out!

Sisters Nuzzling Noses

 This has become A and M's new way to show their love to each other.  :)

We are adopting!!!

It's official!  We are adopting a little boy or girl from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa!!  YAY!!!  Here is the story of how it all came about....

R has always wanted to adopt.  I can remember early on in our dating relationship walking through the college courtyard and hearing him tell me that he's going to adopt someday.  When we go married we knew that is what we would do.  The details were just always fuzzy and from time to time we would talk about it and pray about it.  Sometimes more than others but it was always something we knew we had the desire to do.  After M was born we began to pray and talk about it more often.  It seemed that the more we talked about it the less certain we became about the details.  After several months we decided that since we didn't feel drawn to anywhere in particular that I would start digging deeper in my internet hunt and start calling agencies.

The summer of 2012 was filled with lots of talks, lots of searching with not much direction.  The whole time R and I had one main criteria...that we would not have to travel much.  One trip.  Less than one week.  That was it.  So that was what we were searching for.  Any location that required a week or less to travel.  Around that time I changed my prayer from "Where is an agency/country that requires such little travel?" to "Where is our child God?  Lead us to him or her."  And so HE did.

My sister, H sent me a link to several different adoption agencies.  One of the links was to an adoption agency that adopted from Congo.  The travel requirements were 6-9 days!  Wahoo!  I was elated!  FINALLY we found a country to travel too that met each and every one of our requirements!  I emailed the agency for more info and waited.

While we waited R and I started researching the DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo).  It was in Africa but that's about all we knew.  The more we read, the more we saw, the more God shattered and tore out hearts for this impoverished and forgotten country and fell in love with the people.  There are times in my life that I wondered what Hell is really like.  The stories of what life is like for the Congolese people far exceeded anything I could have thought Hell to be.  Sparked by the Rwandan genocide, the DRC was at war from 1998-2003 and the repercussions of that war are felt every single day since then.  1,500 people continue to die every day because of the conflict, about half of them being under the age of five.  There are over 5 million orphans in the DRC and malaria kills 400 children every day.  I once read the cost of malaria medicine is $2.  $2 to save a life.  Unimaginable in the US.  The average annual income is about $280 but the cost of food can be just as high as the US.  The sexual violence against women and female children is the worst anywhere in the world.  The statistics and stories only get worse.

God made is clear beyond anything I've ever felt in my life that the DRC is where we were to adopt from.  I didn't tell R I felt that way and I didn't have to because as God worked on my heart He did the same in R's heart.  There was only one problem.  The agency that I had orginally contacted that would only require one trip about a week long was discovered (through research and talking to others) to be corrupt and completely unethical.  We knew we wouldn't go through them to adopt so the search for an agency continued.

I VERY randomly found out about an amazing avenue to adopt through.  It is a total God story of how it all came about and one that I hope to post about in the future.  As it stands now we will take two trips to the DRC probably in about a year but could be closer to two depending on a variety of different factors.  My love for this child is as strong as it is for my two beauties here with me now and at times I have physical pain in waiting and excitement to bring our third little monkey home.

There is so much more to this story and to Congo's story that I plan on sharing so keep on reading and praying in the coming weeks and months.  I'm excited you're joining us for this ride!