King or Queen?

It's on my mind today...will we have the privilege of raising a king or another queen?  We are excited and anxious to find out!

BAM!

So, the system in Ind*a for adoption registration did NOT open as anticipated :-(  We pray continuously that April 1st will be day...please pray with us!

BUT, today our agency received our dossier AND our completed service plan.  It feels so good to have these things done.

In other adoption news, the Koegles should have their boys HOME by the end of March!  Three years of waiting to meet these boys and it is finally going to happen.  So exciting!

Have a happy Tuesday!

Big Day

Today, this man right here turns 45.  He is an amazing husband, father, son, friend, child of God.  I am so thankful that I am the woman who gets to share this life with him.

Today, well tonight, our adoption agency will attempt to register us in the adoption database in Ind*a.  Please say a prayer that we will successfully be in the system come tomorrow morning.  While you are at it, will you please say prayers for my friends Mer and  Colista to receive news soon that they can move forward in bringing their daughters home?

Today, I am going to try, try, try to finish up our service plan.  I sent our dossier by Fed Ex yesterday and would love to have all adoption work (for our end) done by March 1st.

Along the lines of adoption, might I suggest a sermon series titled "Adopted" by The Austin Stone church?  Powerful stuff!  You can even get The Austin Stone app and listen from your smartphone or iPad.

"I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you." John 14:18

What About The Other 364 Days?

"Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are My disciples."   John 13:35

On this day of love, hearts, flowers and loads of chocolate, my heart has been contemplating this verse.  How do my actions and love for others reflect His heart?  Will I love others tomorrow (and the next day and the next) as much as I do today?

I'm thankful that the best gift of love I have ever received was a Savior on a cross.  Amen.

In adoption news, there is so much going on!  The good news is not with our adoption, but with our best friends the Koegles!  They should be bringing their boys home by the beginning of March!  We have prayed and traveled this journey with them for three years and it is a bit surreal to think that their family is about to expand.  God is good and His plans are always best!

I have also had the joy of becoming cyber friends with an amazing woman, Kristen, who is in India to bring home her daughter FOREVER!

The Rich family was also blessed with their new addition, Olivia, through adoption last week.  Again, He is good and His love endures (even through the really tough times!)

All of these exciting things happening with others' adoptions have been a great distraction for me.  While we are in this waiting period, He reminds me that He has it all under control.  He loves our child more than we ever could and He works all things in His timing.

I'm off to devour another piece of chocolate :-)

Thankful

There have been so many blog posts the last few days titled Thankful, but I could honestly think of nothing else to title this post, so here it goes....

We had a whirlwind of a week starting with the celebration of my oldest daughters' 11th birthday!  To say that we are Thankful for Evie Jo and Lucy would be the biggest understatement.  Their humble beginning came on Tuesday, November 20, 2001.  They weighed a COMBINED 2 lbs. 6.5 oz. and were the tiniest things we had ever seen.  Why God chose to allow them to live, thrive, grow to love Him and allow us to have the privilege to raise them, we will likely never know.  But we are Thankful!  We started the day horseback riding with Evie Jo's amazing violin instruction, Ms. Emmie.  They decided on Melting Pot for their birthday dessert and ice skating for their activity the following day.  We all had a blast!  Happy Birthday my precious Evie Jo and Lucy!

We are also Thankful for all of the donations that were given for our "Garage Sale for Orphans."  But, what good are donations if no one comes to shop?  Which leads me to yet another reason to be Thankful...garage sale shoppers!  Between the generous donations and the shoppers, we were able to raise more than $1000 (wowzers!) to go towards bringing 3 orphans home to their forever families.  THANKFUL!

Our life is going to be CRAZY the next couple of weeks!  The oldest girls are in their first theater production, The Little Mermaid Jr., and we have many nights of rehearsals and early calls on show nights.  But as this Christmas season approaches, I pray that I can take time to reflect on the true reason for my Thankfulness, my Savior Jesus!

Team Melott

Today was the 3rd annual Chosen Marathon for Adoption.  This was my third year to run the race, but our first year to have a team of our own.  Although I LOVE the family that I have run for in the past, there is something different, amazing, indescribable, priceless when you are running to bring your own child home!  When I crossed the finish line and saw Scott, I burst into tears.  The emotion was too much to hold inside.  Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce you to Team Melott (minus a few who had already left or were still out on the course):

These fine, fine friends and family all ran in support of our family.  Isn't that amazing?  We serve a mighty God who places the desire on people's hearts to defend the orphans of the world and help them find their forever families.  The proceeds from this race will go straight towards our adoption costs.

And, since the national bird of Ind*a is a peacock and since I love an excuse to "dress up" a little, a few of us wore these fun little tutus for the race..we couldn't resist.

Fun, right?

So, next time you think you CAN'T run/walk 13.1 miles, just remember the orphans of the world and I'm willing to bet that HE can get you through it.

Blessings,
Jessica

Distracted

I need to get this out because I DON'T want to forget HIS goodness!

I know it has been way too long since the last post.  I hardly know where to begin.  It is no fun blogging when I have nothing new on the adoption home front to report.

BUT, we FINALLY have something to report.  OUR HOME STUDY HAS BEEN APPROVED BY Journeys of the Heart!!!  I was honestly beginning to wonder if I was ever going to be able to say that.

I must confess though, that we have gotten distracted during this long wait for home study approval.  We know God called us to this adoption and we know that He is in control, but we had gotten a little off path.  He is so faithful though to nudge us back onto the right track.

A couple of weeks ago we had an adoption fundraiser (Applebee's Flapjack Fundraiser) that was an overwhelming success.  And by overwhelming, I mean that my emotions were so fragile by the end of the weekend by all of the generosity from family and friends that all I could do on the Monday after was cry.  EVERYTHING had me in tears.  I was overwhelmed by His goodness and by the goodness of His people!

But, aren't we so easily distracted?!?  Why is that?  Why are we on such a high with HIM one day and the next day we forget where He is leading us?  I have read time and time again His directives in Deuteronomy about not getting forgetting the Lord Your God and then I go and do it...ugh!

We found a house, "the house" as it were.  I mean I found it THE DAY that we had reached a financial milestone that we had set concerning adoption funds.  I showed Scott, he agreed that it could be the house, and we asked our realtor to set up a showing.  We fell in love with the views, the deck, and the adorable guest cottage.  It had everything that we "wanted."  We made an offer, went back and forth in negotiations, couldn't agree on a price and had to walk away.  We were OK with having to walk away but the seller called back the next day with another offer and we said YES.  How exciting, right?  Our prayer the whole time though was for God to SHUT THE DOOR on this if we were not suppose to do it.  We were distracted for sure, but we didn't want to flat out get in God's way.  After the inspection revealed that this would be a high maintenance house (and if you know Scott and I, you know this is laughable) we felt that God was whispering to us that this was not the time.  We needed to be concentrating on bringing our child home.  So, we backed out of the house.  We called our realtor around 1:30pm on Friday and let her know.  Y'all, it was not 4 hours later that we got the call that our home study had been approved!!!  We had been waiting since July 26th for this approval.  We are so grateful to HIM and we don't want to miss His hand in this!

I pray that we can stay the course without too many more distractions.  Now, on to the next adoption phase...US government approval.

"Take care lest you forget the Lord your God....." Deuteronomy 8:11a