“Now glory be to God, who by His mighty power within us, is able to do far more than we would ever dare to ask or even dream of; Infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts or hopes.” Ephesians 3:20
This scripture from Ephesians describes our unique love story, our beautiful adoption journey, and the precious baby girl God chose for our family. Always inspiring, this scripture hangs on the wall in the kitchen of our home where we spend most of our time.
Life is all about timing! Our adoption journey is proof that God’s timing is perfect! We waited a long time to find each other and get married, but it was worth the wait. After a long time of being on our own and praying for each other, God brought us together. Unlike most couples, we found true love later in life. Waiting is difficult, but when we wait on God, He always provides! We were meant to find each other at the right time.
Greg had been blessed with a daughter from a previous marriage, but I did not have any children. Although I enjoyed my career, I always knew I wanted to be a mother and have a family of my own. Our decision to expand our family through the gift of adoption didn’t happen right away. It took time.
After our wedding, we moved into our home and began our new life together. We worked hard to make sure our home would always be warm and inviting. In our family, we celebrate everything! We celebrate big wins, small victories, and everything in between! Usually, we’re celebrating in our kitchen! Our kitchen is not only our “command center” where we create our list of goals for the day, it’s where important family decisions are made, where we share meals, cheer on our football teams, and pray together every day.
One morning, while eating breakfast together in our kitchen, we discussed how quiet it was in our house. There were empty seats at our kitchen table. We talked about the joy and laughter that children bring to life! We wanted that in our home! In that very moment, God was calling us to give a child a loving home. We knew we had been blessed in many ways and decided we wanted to share our blessings with a child who needed a forever family.
We quickly became certified foster parents and thought that would be the way God would expand our family, but we both kept hearing the word “adoption” everywhere. On television, on the radio in the car, at church, even at work…the word “adoption” was being spoken to us and it couldn’t be ignored! Eventually, we understood that God had a different plan outside of the foster care system; a perfect plan to bless us with an adopted child chosen especially for our family.
While sitting at our kitchen table, we found Small World through an internet search. We met with three different adoption agencies before choosing Small World. Some were too large, and some were too small. Fortunately, when we found Small World, we felt like Goldilocks…it was just right for us!
We decided it was time for us to open our hearts and our home to a baby through the gift of adoption. Adoption is a leap of faith but falling in love always is!
We first spoke with Christian Graham at our kitchen table too. It’s also where we met with the Small World staff to complete our Home Study and our adoption training. With Christian’s help, we decided to pursue an open, domestic adoption.
After three years of hopeful prayer and waiting, we were matched with a birth mother. We learned to trust in God’s perfect timing! Throughout the pregnancy, we had opportunities to attend doctors’ appointments and watch our baby girl grow in ultrasound pictures. We hung her ultrasound pictures up in our kitchen and waited to meet our beautiful daughter! From the very beginning, we could see her pretty lips on the ultrasounds pictures and now we see those same pretty lips everyday smiling and laughing and covered with carrots or peas!
We’ve always been prayerful people, but when you wait on an adopted child, you learn to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). Whenever we prayed together in our kitchen, we would see bluebirds in our backyard! We felt like God was speaking to us through those bluebirds telling us that our prayers for a healthy baby were being answered! Thankfully, the Small World staff was alw
ays there for us every step of the way! They encouraged and supported us throughout the entire process. We made many wonderful friends with the Small World staff, and we consider each one of them an important part of our daughter’s life story. They continue to cheer us on and lift us up in prayer as we travel this adoption journey as a family.
Today, we have a good relationship with our daughter’s birth mother and her son. They are also important parts of our family. We believe there is always room in our hearts for more love!
As we enter the holiday season, we look forward to all of our daughter’s “firsts” in our kitchen…her first Thanksgiving meal, setting out Christmas cookies for Santa Claus, and sharing her first pancakes with the whole family on Christmas morning!
We are also excited to share the beautiful story of the nativity with her and the details of the birth of Jesus. As she grows, we will teach our daughter about the greatest adoption story of all, the story of Jesus Christ. Since Jesus was the Son of God, both Mary and Joseph adopted and raised Jesus as their son. The true blessing of this ultimate adoption story is that He adopts us all as His own brothers and sisters! He graciously invites us to be important members of His family. As adoptive parents, we want to live out this example for our child and her birth mother too. We believe God is using our lives for His glory through our wonderful adoption journey.
We now share our life and our kitchen table with a beautiful baby girl! Her highchair sits directly underneath our favorite scripture that still hangs on the wall in our kitchen. In just three years, our lives have completely changed, but God remains the same. He is always good and always faithful! Now the three of us sit together at our kitchen table and enjoy watching the bluebirds in our backyard!
Our daughter is more than we could have ever dreamed or hoped for! She is the fulfillment of our favorite scripture! When people look at her, we hope they see more than just a sweet baby girl, we hope they see an answer to our prayers and God’s promises fulfilled!
We believe God has awesome things planned for our daughter’s life and the life of her birth mother too. We believe the gift of adoption is working to fulfill God’s purposes in all our lives.
Our adoption journey has given us a unique perspective and allows us to remain grateful for the honor of being chosen to be her parents. Even when we get weary from sleepless nights or our days don’t go as planned, we step back and remember to be grateful for the gift of our adopted child…and all her diapers! Our job is to love her unconditionally and give her every opportunity in the world to become the very best person God is calling her to be!
We are thankful to God and to the entire Small World staff for answering our prayers for a baby and for blessing us “infinitely beyond our highest prayers”! Our adopted daughter was always ours, we simply had to bring her home. Small World helped us bring her home!