Two year old Christmas

Christmas is hilarious with Alan. After seeing our little town turn all their Christmas lights on he thinks that all lights are Christmas. "Look, Christmas is outside!"  He can't say the word stocking so he calls our stockings "clothes" and asks everyday if there is candy in his "clothes".  He has an elf hat and goes around saying that he is "wearing Christmas." It cracks us up!  So happy that both of my precious babes are so joyful!

I can't help myself....they make my heart melt!

Transparency...lets get real

As I look back over the year I have to tell you that life has been slightly rough. Paul has had two different jobs in the past 18 months. God has now provided a job he loves but it's also a job that is 80% commission based. Every month is the question "will there be enough?" To be honest, the last few months the answer to that question has been no. The long discussions of what the next step is. The time spent pouring over our bills trying to figure out how we can cut back even more.  It's been hard to wake up some days and not be sure if my kids will have enough to eat that day. It's been hard to swallow our pride and sell possessions so we will have gas money and food. I'm not sure what Christmas is going to look like this year. I do know that we still have our house, we still have transportation and that God has ALWAYS provided even when we didn't think it would enough. I'm not sharing this to complain or beg for anything. I'm just being real about what life has been like. In the midst of it I can still say God is good. It;s been a lesson in letting go of my selfishness and my desires. I have had to let go of appearances. I thank God for showing me humbleness. I thank God for the lessons we have had to teach our daughter about materialism and not always needing to buy something or go out. God has taught me so much in these past months. I am finally learning that HE has to be my everything. I have learned that relying on yourself gets you nowhere. I am coming into this season of celebration with such a different heart attitude.. "Let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord our God, our maker...."

Life

I'm back! Oh, my goodness...life has changed so much. On June 24th at 9:05am this little guy officially became Jacob Alan Arthur! Twenty two months to the day that he was placed in our home on a Wednesday afternoon he became ours forever! God is good. Paul and I look back at the months of turmoil and the wondering of what God's plan was and never would we have thought that the end result would be this precious gift!

So, now that he is officially ours and has turned two he has decided to show us his true colors! He is called our wonderful ball of crazy! Due to some of his drug exposure he has displayed some ADD behaviors. I know he is a two year old boy, but even the doctors say that some of it goes a little beyond. It's been an adjustment to see how he learns and to find ways to channel the behavior. Don't get me wrong, he is the sweetest little boy but he is BUSY and DOES NOT STOP! I am excited to see how God will use him as he grows! 

Closer!

Sunday was the final day for the termination. It is done. Finished. A has no legal parents anymore. That sounds like bad thing, but it's what we have been waiting for. The State of Indiana is his official parent until adoption day. Today we were told that we should have an adoption date in the next few weeks.

Countdown....

Three days! Three days until A's termination is final! This means that no one can contest his adoption and we have no legal obligations to his "family."  He will be exactly 21 months old on Sunday, the day that he will be official.  Twenty months ago I never thought we would be here. I am having a hard time sleeping night because I am so excited to finally be able to call this precious boy ours!

A sneak peek....

 

Getting closer!

Twenty Days! Twenty Days! That is how many days it is until we can file for adoption on Little A. I'm  finally letting myself design an adoption announcement and am starting to plan his adoption open house.  We were originally planning on waiting until he turned two to adopt him so he would be eligible for some state benefits. It would have only been a few more months but due to some drama going on with some of his family we decided it would be best to just get it done. Hopefully sometime in the middle to the end of May we should be official.

It's over! (Almost)

The court hearing went well...or I guess I should say it went how we needed it to. Now we wait. You have to wait for 30 days after the hearing for it to be official. We had a difficult defense attorney who added ten days onto that so we have 40 days to wait. This is 40 BUSINESS days. Nice, right? Mid April we should be official. I feel like I can finally breathe again!

Almost there!

Tomorrow, March 7th, is the last court hearing for Little A. They will be terminating his "dads" rights. We wait for thirty days for it to become official and then we get to file for adoption. I never thought this date would get here! I am usually a basket case right before every court date but I have great peace about this hearing and the truth will come to light about the interaction that A has had with his dad. God  has been so gracious to us!

Answered Prayers!

No matter how hard I try to be more consistent with posting on here I keep failing. Not that any of you are waiting anxiously for my updates. :)
We have some good news! We are halfway to being able to call little A ours forever. Please don't stop praying! We have a few more things to get through in the beginning to March and then hopefully if all goes well we can make the big announcement.

Lauren

For once I am not blogging about the drama of foster care! I just wanted to give you all an update on Lauren and her Epilepsy.
We had noticed that this past school year has been a bit more challenging and that she was having some focus/concentration issues. She seemed to be distracted a lot. We met with her neurologist at the beginning of January and he seemed to think that she might have ADD. Of course he wanted to put her on medication right then. I said no way! We decided to wait and see what her EEG said. If her EEG came back that she was having "breakthrough" seizures throughout the day that could have more to do with her focus problems.Even though she doesn't know that she is having a seizure she will tend to lose her place if she is reading or concentrating.She can't tell you why she is distracted because she doesn't know she just had a seizure.   If it came back that she wasn't having any seizure activity then ADD was probably to blame. Well, yesterday we got the results and it showed that she was definitely having some abnormal seizure activity which means that she is having breakthrough seizures even though she is on a medication to control them. They don't want to adjust her medication at this point because there is a limit to how much of the medication she can have in her system. We just have to deal with it for the time being.  ADD would be so much easier to treat! The hard part is trying be a good teacher and for both of us to be good parents to her through something that she has no control over and that effects everything she does. God has given this to her for a reason and we have to accept that and know that He knows best!

It continues

So, neither parent showed up for their conference today so now we wait until March to have their rights terminated. So tired of waiting....

Thoughts:

This is from another blog that I subscribe to.  Paul and I have struggled with this too many times and it was comforting to read someone else's perspective: 

I write this with incredible sensitivity in my heart.

In London in 2008, while I was going to school, my wife and I lost our first child, our son Adam, through miscarriage. This experience was devastating—our faith was rocked. It sent us into a season of asking innumerable questions of God: Could we go on? Is God good? Can he be trusted with our lives being that Adam’s was lost? Does he even care?

Even today, we are affected by our loss. Today, Adam would be five years old. Many of you know what this is like. There is an empty chair at our dinner table every night, birthdays that go by, and imagined holidays and experiences that are left only to the imagination of what could have been.

We are left to speculation, but our speculation doesn’t go unenlightened.

As a pastor, I am often asked what happens to babies like ours who are lost in miscarriage or to children who are killed through abortion. The one thing we do know is that they, like all of us, are image bearers of God who came into existence, even though they never had the joy of being loved, kissed, and cherished by their earthly mom and dad. 

Where do the unborn babies go? Some would argue that they don’t go to heaven because we are sinful beings and the only way to be reconciled to God is through faith and repentance. Since these babies didn’t repent or have faith, they are forever separated from God in hell. Others argue that Jesus died for the world and therefore those children who are born in Adamic guilt have their sins atoned for because they haven’t committed personal sin. 

The reality is that Scripture never speaks directly to this situation. At this point we are left to speculation, but our speculation doesn’t go unenlightened. We have a perfect Bible that reveals ultimately what God desires for us to know. Since there is not a verse (much less a systematic theology) on this subject, it seems only right to appeal to the character and nature of the God in whose image humans are created.

I abide in the great comforter, the Holy Spirit.

God has revealed himself as holy, just, and righteous—but that’s not all. He’s revealed himself as the definition of love (1 John 4:8), whose grace is scandalous, (Luke 15:11–32), and whose mercy leads to our justification (Rom. 2:4). In fact, Jesus teaches us that he is our heavenly Father (Matt. 6:7–15) and Paul goes as far as to tell us on two occasions that God prefers his kids use a familial name like “Abba” when talking to him in prayer (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:16).

Though I don’t have a verse that says definitively that our boy Adam is in heaven with Jesus along with millions of other children, when I look at the nature and character of our God, who was born in a barn (Luke 2:1–20) washed the feet of his betrayer (John 13:1–17), unashamedly befriended outcasts of society (Matt. 11:19), forgave and restored dignity to a woman caught in adultery (John 8:1–11), and suffered so that he might end our suffering (Isa. 53:5), was raised to give us justification (Rom. 4:25), is building a home for us in heaven (John 14:3), is praying for us even now (Rom. 8:34), and is coming to take us to be with him forever (John 14:3), where he is the hero who wipes away every tear from every eye (Rev. 21:4).

I abide in the great comforter, the Holy Spirit, knowing that my baby met this God face to face, and therefore, I have great hope of one day worshiping Jesus at Adam’s side.

Procrastination.

So, our computer was down for awhile, but, yes, procrastination is my main excuse here! Here is the Little A update: We are closer to being able to call him ours forever. There is a conference this week on Thursday with bio parents attorney's and our caseworker. They are going to ask the parents to sign over their parental rights and if they don't sign over then the final termination hearing is in the beginning of March. Every thing is always slow going when you are dealing with the state. Praying that this really will be over soon! I will update you all again when I find out what happens later this week.

Holding Steady...

It's been almost a month so I suppose you all might want to know what's been goin' on! Well, from the last post you knew that Baby K was most likely going to live with her biological father. This took place Sept. 6th. I think that God prepared my heart by giving me a few weeks to get used it. Now it's just a matter of trust that God will protect and His plan is perfect. Little A is still with us. He is having visits with his "dad." My prayer is that this man would just volunteer his rights and sign A over to us. We'll see what God has in store...
This week has been a bit rough. We are trying to get back into the routine after Lauren had her tonsils out two weeks ago. It was not fun! The excitement for her was that she turned seven last week and that made up for the week and half of not being able to eat very much.I wish that I could post pictures up but I am not sure how to get them off my phone and onto here.
Anyway, Monday a client of mine ended up with a c-section due to some difficult circumstances. It's always hard when things like this happen because my job is to make sure that they feel positive about their birth experience. It was a bummer of a day.
Then Tuesday night someone form Lauren's ballet school backed into the side of our van. Thankfully, they have insurance. It's only Wednesday and I feel like we need to just lock ourselves in the house for the rest of the week!

Hangin' on...

I hadn't realized that it had been so long. I feel as if we have lived a whole life time with all that has been going on this summer.
Let me start with Lauren: She is amazing! We are in our third week of third grade. She is working really hard and is having fun. I switched home schooling material this year and I am so glad that I did. Her learning style is much different now since we have all the basics (reading, writing, addition, etc..) down now. She has started ballet again. Both of us are involved in a Thursday morning Bible Study. We both have teaching sessions and our homework to get done during the week.. She loves meeting all the kids in her class and having some social time.
Baby A: Well, on July 12th we ended up having his baby sister, Baby K, placed in our home. She is beautiful and sweet. This past week we found out that she will be going to live with her biological father. All we can do is pray God's protection over her and her future. This is the hardest part about foster care is sending them back into what you know are less than ideal situations.
The day after we found out about Baby K we received news that Baby A has a dad and that dad would like custody of him. The dad has not been involved in the year since he has been born and has now decided that he would like a chance. According to the rules of child protective services they have to give him a chance to prove himself. So long story short, we are in a holding pattern of sorts to see if Baby A's future is with us or with his dad. This is another situation where we pray for God's will and protection and try not to be selfish in our own heart's desires.

Chuggin' along

A friend of my posted this earlier: "Whatever is in front of me let me sing Hallelujah."  I feel as if I have been thinking this for the past ten months...

Life is normal. Nothing major going on. I love it! Enjoying reading programs at the library, art classes for Lauren and lot's of playing. We have to be so scheduled during the school year that it's nice to just be able to sit back and let the day go where it wants.
Little A is walking and has proven himself to be very busy and very active from the moment he wakes to the moment he closes his eyes. I have forgotten how busy this age is. He will be a year old next month. Praying for the day that I can plaster his little face on here for you all to see!

Praises!

Ellie turns a year old today! Thank you to all who have been praying. She came through surgery really well. They went in thinking that the cancer had spread from the bladder to her uterus and surrounding girl parts. Praise God that when they biopsied the tissue from those areas they came out tumor free. So no hysterectomy! She has a long road of healing, but seems to be doing really well my sister in law has said. She will have to start the chemo back up soon and finish it  before they go back to rebuild the bladder, Please don't stop praying!

We are getting ready to go to Branson to see my parents for the weekend. I am very glad to be able to catch my breath even if it is only for a few days. When we are home all of the issues that we are facing with foster care are right there in front of our faces. When we get to go away for a few days we can just forget about it for a little while. I hope you all have a great Memorial Day weekend!

Bittersweetness

Is bittersweetness even a word? Well, it is now! It completely describes our feelings of the week. We had  to go to court for little A on Thursday morning. I can't share a whole lot except that the judge made a really good ruling in our favor. The hard part in this is that the battle is just now starting. There is another person that wants to have guardianship and the state is also still trying to figure out paternity and rule out the many different potential fathers. It's a mess and it could take a long time to sort this out. Paul and I are clinging to the fact the judge saw through birth moms lies. We pray that the judge continues to see through them. We still have little A and that means something.

Please pray for little Ellie tomorrow. She is having her bladder removed and they are going to explore to see if anything else needs to be removed. My brother is having to go on a business trip this week and can't be there for the surgery. Please pray for my sister in law as she goes through this week without her husband.