A Year's Worth of Thankfullness

I'm sitting here getting ready to write a reflection of 2014 with one day left in the year. I am shocked to think that the year of 2014 is almost over.

We rang in the new year last year driving home from a ski trip to Colorado with the gang (see below). 

Mkini, Adam, me, Maggie, Casey in Keystone, CO

It was so shortly after returning home, that that little voice—the holy spirit—began whispering ideas of adoption in our ears. My first thought was no, no, we'll adopt after we have our own kids (I was so naive back then). My plan (of course) was to get pregnant in a couple months and we'd be starting our family. 

First of all, LOL. I'm laughing out loud just thinking about it. This is why I shouldn't try to make plans. But yet I always do.

We spent most of January 2014 researching and talking to everyone we knew that was currently adopting, or had adopted. We met with a few couples from church. And sent in our application on the last day of January with an agency that I had heard rave reviews from. You know how that turned out...see next paragraph. 

We withdrew our application with our first agency in February and began working on starting over and finding a new agency. Though there were hardships, (like thinking maybe we weren't supposed to be adopting?!), I'm extremely thankful that everything with our first agency happened when it did. No clue what I'm talking about? Refer back to the February posts.

We finally submitted our application to Bethany in April, after numerous meetings folks there (we were making sure this was our agency this time). 

May through August was all about the home study Meetings and meetings and meetings (and meetings!). It's still weird to think about that time being past us, since it was such important step at the time. 

August to now has been spent on getting our fees together and the dossier, which is still moving along, slowly but surely. 

It's crazy to think that a year ago we weren't on this journey, and then one day, poof, God says "go."

Each and every day, I thank God that he put this adoption on our hearts. Because I know, know, that our son or daughter is on this earth already. And just knowing that I get to be his or her mother is just amazing to me. Like, it's planned out. God already knows. That is just so cool to me.

In those same moments of thankfulness, I pray that he continues to give us patience and trust in Him. Because we know that this is our plan. No matter how long it takes or how hard it is. This is the plan that was created for us.

Our God is such an awesome God. And answering to him is also awesome.

Cheers to 2015. What an amazing adventure we've started out on. I can't wait to see how it turns out.