I miss him so much

His sweet little voice, "mama, dada, annie, KJ, lala, papa, uhno, uh oh, go, quack-quack, hi, up, buh bye."  

His amazing laugh. 

His little arms around my neck. 

His kisses. 

His middle of the night wake-up cuddles.

His excited smile when he would see me. 

Him running up and down the hallway. 

His excitement at the playground. 

His little voice singing to me from the bob.

His little arms reaching up to me. 

His excitement to open a new toy. 

Little Feet Like

GoodNight Moon

The thrill of watching him rip open a present and play with a new toy. 

The firsts, first smile, rolling over, sitting, crawling, first food, first tooth, first steps. 

Twenty one months filled with memories.

My son, Where ever You Are My Love Will Find You

I miss you so much. 

Hope

I wrote this on May 27: 

Being a foster parent when all you want is to be an adoptive parent...

 It is excruciating. 

I am trying to figure out which way is up and how to face each moment of sadness... But, Jonathan and I are finding comfort together and we have two hopes. 1. We could get him back. The Casa worker and our attorney are still keeping tabs on him. If something happens to show how untrustworthy the family is, they will know and we are still interveners so we would get him back... 

2. He will be ok and we will adopt another baby somehow... 

Either way, we know God is protecting him and we take lots of comfort in that. We also know that giving him almost two years of our love was worth it. For him and for us. The first two years of a child's life are supposed to form their personality. His birth family are low-class, depressed and satanic. We know that God rescued him from that and with us he was the happiest, most bonded and secure baby I've ever met. 

For us-we know more than ever before that we were meant to be parents. We will probably say yes to another cps baby. We love our agency. (They gave us incredible support even when cps turned on us) We know what to hold out for (a good attorney ad Litem, no family visitation, etc...). 

I fear that I will never see A again. 

I fear that we will have to wait for a long time before being given another baby. 

I fear never again experiencing the incredible joy that parenting brings to us.

But I trust God. He is loving. He is powerful and he has good things in store for us... 

Moments

Moments... Cherished or discarded.
This week CPS gave me a gift. A full day of moments to cherish. I never would have expected this gift to come from such a horrendous source. But, in this case; figuratively speaking; I thank God for the gift rather than the gift giver. Irreverent? To be sure, but He can take my honesty. I am fully aware that 'every good and perfect gift comes from my Father of lights'... And, for reasons unknown to me he sent the most awful organization in the world to be the delivery vehicle...
Nevertheless, Tuesday was a gift. The sweet little voice and his uninhibited laugh... They are forever cherished moments-to me.

Here is my raw unedited footage of a few of those moments:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B-D9-Jlk4oXHakpMd0p1M0piREU

Today was... Well. Different.
Still, I am grateful. My Father is still giving good gifts.

Laughter (with the tears):

 

Beauty: 

 

 Strength: 

 

A whisper of Grace:

 

 

A picture that's worth a thousand words:

 

Another one: 

 

I am a blessed woman. My heart is full. Thank you Father for your gifts. I cherish the moments. 

 

True

Be true to yourself. Live bravely and choose joy. Don't give in to the anticipation of trouble caused by vulnerability. 

These are a few tidbits of wisdom that were dropped on my heart today. Lord, let these take root and grow a tree of strength within me. I am exhausted fighting on my own strength... I need yours Father!  

"Trust In You"

Letting go of every single dream

I lay each one down at Your feet 

Every moment of my wandering

Never changes what You see

I’ve tried to win this war I confess

My hands are weary I need Your rest

Mighty Warrior, King of the fight

No matter what I face, You’re by my side

When You don’t move the mountains I’m needing You to move

When You don’t part the waters I wish I could walk through

When You don’t give the answers as I cry out to You

I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in You!

Truth is, You know what tomorrow brings 

There’s not a day ahead You have not seen

So, in all things be my life and breath

I want what You want Lord and nothing less

When You don’t move the mountains I’m needing You to move

When You don’t part the waters I wish I could walk through

When You don’t give the answers as I cry out to You

I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in You!

You are my strength and comfort

You are my steady hand

You are my firm foundation; the rock on which I stand

Your ways are always higher

Your plans are always good

There’s not a place where I’ll go, You’ve not already stood

When You don’t move the mountains I’m needing You to move

When You don’t part the waters I wish I could walk through

When You don’t give the answers as I cry out to You

I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in You!

I will trust in You!

I will trust in You!

I will trust in You!

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Worst Fears

It happened again. One of my worst fears came to pass. Jonathan was told that he doesn't have a job to go back to. This is terrible. We can't afford to make less money. Thankfully we know God has a plan even when we don't. We trust Him and that His plan is good. 

Tomorrow is a Valentine's Day race benefitting adoption. Last year I ran and they spectated. This year, both J and I are running but A is at a visit, so the stroller will be conspicuously missing.

We are so tired of these visits. 3 days a week he has visits because the court ordered one month of overnight visits back in December. Then the judge wasn't in the mood to hear us in January, so we had to maintain the status quo😩. Continued overnight visitation till next trial which is set for March 7. 

I read a CPS training about trauma, that stated children get traumatized by having multiple care-givers, or unfit care-givers, and that attachment problems happen when this type of trauma is experienced. That's exactly what we have been noticing. They are traumatizing and confusing our baby and they act like it doesn't matter. 

But

We are grateful for all the wonderful smiles and moments we share. He has been with us for 519 days, 5 hours, 19 minutes, 53 seconds and his little 17 month old voice is being heard. We are giving him a voice by fighting for him.  

Foam darts

Recently a friend told me she felt that we were being spiritually/emotionally attacked, but on closer inspection... The darts were foam-not capable of actual harm. I also had a dream about a building crumbling, but no harm coming to me... 

Today we got a message about baby A coming home late... For a variety of reasons, it got to us. We both found ourselves very frustrated and mad. 

After spending some time in prayer and listening, I opened my Bible App and look at this verse of the day! 

Validation

I had a meeting with A's CASA worker. We looked through documentation and she said, "I know you've told me all this when it happened, but looking at it all together like this... It's big."  

Validation for all the time spent documenting... 

We HOPE that the judge also thinks it is big if we call a special status hearing to lay out all the concerns... What we really need is for the attorney Ad Litem to personally see something that he considers a safety issue. Then we can go to the judge. 

Lord Jesus. Please make A's voice heard.  

Happy Sweet Sixteen

Last night we rang in the new year with Jesus at the Upper Room Watch Night with some dear friends. 

I went into the night with a heavy heart, too much on my shoulders and worried sick about our baby. This morning, I heard the voice of God... He told me that every little thing is gonna be alright. I hear Him and I choose to believe him. After all, it may be scary to trust, but it's a whole lot scarier not to trust God. When God tells me that every little thing is going to be alright, I know He means it because He has proven Hinself over and over. Recently there were two major events that spoke volumes to me about Jehovah-Jirah, our provider... The first was our very own Christmas magic which helped us believe in miracles again. The second was an actual Christmas miracle... 

A few weeks ago I mentioned to my teammate at work that I wanted to get photos with Santa for A's life-book, which we are preparing for use at the trial (when it is decided where his permanent home will be). On December 21, we got a knock on the door and 'Ho, Ho, Ho' it was Santa and Mrs. Claus!! We were delighted to see the wonder in A's eyes as Santa pulled developmentally appropriate toys out of his bag and handed them to him! He loved playing with his new V-tech track, soft fluffy teddy bear and Duplo fire-truck!

As the magical night continued, the joy in our hearts grew as we got to know the amazing couple whose calling it is to bring Joy to families at Christmas time. Sara and Glenn Westberry spend their time visiting children at TCH, families of infants in hospice care and they are the official Santa and Mrs. Claus for Santa's Wonderland in College Station! This amazing couple tirelessly serve others by bringing smiles, wonder and HOPE wherever they go. 

As we basked in the after-glow of the night we realized a few things... The best part of the night was watching the look of wonder on A's face. However, for us... the grown-ups who no longer believe in magic, there was a magical realization... Maybe if 'magic' is possible, so are miracles.Over the past 15 months of waiting to find out whether we get to be A's forever family, we have held on tight to hope and our belief that God has got this. Lately sometimes we have found ourselves feeling discouraged and wondering if it will ever happen. This Christmas we celebrate the fact that we get to spend it with our baby boy and we BELIEVE in the possibility of a Miracle. We know our God is bigger than the courts and we BELIEVE He will over-rule any trends or tendencies to accomplish the absolute best solution for our baby A!

The Christmas miracle was a message in the form of a very tangible gift. We opened the mail this week and there was a card. Inside the card was a message and a check. The message told us that people believed in our cause and wanted to help us. The check was for two thousand dollars! Our hearts exploded with gratitude to the senders but more importantly to Jehovah-Jirah, our provider. Now we have some money to pay our attorney for trial. That blessing alone spoke confirmation to us... 1. How incredibly our little boy is loved, not just by us, but by his community. 2. That our fight is not on our own... We were called by God to fight for him. Therefore...

Every little thing is going to be ok.