I spent some time today going back in my blog and reading posts from February of last year – the month after everything happened with Tracy and the month before things started happening with Sweet Pea.

It was so interesting to me to read what I wrote in February because most of my posts centered around acknowledging that God is in control of our second adoption journey and the realization that I just needed to sit back and wait in great expectation for God to do another miracle.

I had no idea of knowing what God was going to start doing on March 8th when my friend Jennifer text me about an adoption situation, wondering if we would be interested.

During the months of waiting to see if we would be matched with this birth mother, the lessons God desired to teach me were all about the fact that GOD was in control of everything and nothing I did or didn’t do would change the outcome.

God had it all under control, even though at the time, there was a lot of waiting involved and a lot of uncertainty on my end.

It just amazes me how God prepares our hearts for what is to come. He planted these seeds in my heart in February knowing in March and until I had Sweet Pea in my arms in August, I would need to hang on knowing that God was in control.

If you have some time, go back and read my posts from February of last year. The words I wrote astound me because I had no idea what God was about to do.

When we find ourselves in a situation where we can’t see the big picture and we don’t have access to all the details, we must remember that God sees it all. He has planned it all. And not only that, He has something good in store, even if it looks like you’ve been deserted in left field.

He is there. Right beside you. And when the right time comes, He will start to reveal the big picture and you too will one day be able to look back on these days of only having just a fraction of the puzzle pieces and you will be able to see the big picture and know that God was in control of every single detail even when it seemed like everything was so uncertain.

It is strange to me that six months have already passed since Sweet Pea’s birth. On the day she turned 6 months old, around noon on that day, I remembered what happened at that exact moment. I believe it was actually a minute until noon and Emily called to tell me Sweet Pea had been born at 7:55am that morning.

The journey that had begun on March 8th – and, really, I guess you could say our official second adoption journey began on December 13, 2010, with Emily’s phone call that Tracy was pregnant – came to a close on August 4th when we jumped in the car and drove the 1.5 hours to go meet our second daughter after the TPR had been signed.

I guess reaching this point – 6 months after our second adoption in 2 years – makes me want to sit back and reflect upon the faithfulness of God through both of our adoptions.

It also takes me way back to September of 2008, the month I saw my first of countless negative pregnancy tests.

Those were my days of having only a fraction of the puzzle pieces. I couldn’t see the big picture which means there were many very hard days as I saw my dream slip away and I was powerless to do anything to change the circumstances I found myself in.

It sounds so cliché, I know, but God was in control. He had a beautiful journey laid out before me.

I am just standing in awe of all this today – and every day.

And thanking God, once again, that His plans were not mine.

Another thing that really helps me keep things into perspective during this challenging time of two 2 and under is remembering the miracles God has performed in my life in just the span of two years!

I went from infertility treatments to mother-to-two in just two years! And all through the miracle of adoption.

Some people are on a waiting list to adopt for two years.

When I think about that I am overwhelmed in God’s goodness to bless me with Little Bug and Sweet Pea.

This is something I wrote the morning after meeting Sweet Pea, but I am just now getting around to publishing it.

Sleep must be overrated these days because you would think I would still be asleep right now considering how little of it I have had over the past 24 hours.

But, I am sitting here, with tears clouding my vision, marveling again at the goodness and faithfulness of our God.

I feel so unworthy of my blessings but then I remember none of this has ever been about just ME. It is ALL about GOD and Him receiving glory through me.

And God has received glory through the events that have been my life for the past four years.

It’s overwhelming to think of where I was on this journey as a newlywed just desiring to have a baby and to think about where God has brought me today.

God has certainly walked me through the fire and strengthened and grown my faith in Him in ways I never imagined possible. There is no limit to the kinds of miracles God can perform.

All He needed from me was my heart – my surrendered heart that truly said not my Will, Father, but Yours.

And then, He unleashed His richest blessings on me.

My precious daughters.

Another day in the NICU.

Sweet Pea is sleeping, Dave has gone to Panera to use their internet to work and it’s just Sweet Pea and me in the NICU.

As I look at her sweet face I think, This is the baby that my friend Jennifer text me about on March 8th!! This is the baby that I started praying for not knowing if she was my child, or not. This is the baby that Emily told me about on May 2nd, three months to the day before Sweet Pea was born.

And this is the baby that I first laid eyes on not even a week ago now and she was already completely mine.

I can hardly begin to describe what that was like.

I have mentioned before that Little Bug and Sweet Pea’s adoptions have been totally different. I can’t go into great detail about all that at this time but I will say that being there for Little Bug’s birth was a moment in my lifetime that I will never forget.

Seeing her enter this world, especially after all I had just been through with infertility was like I was reborn myself. Her birth signaled a new beginning for me.

The beginning of motherhood.

As euphoric as those moments were surrounding Little Bug’s birth, I can hardly begin to describe what it felt like to hold a baby not knowing if she was really going to be mine or not.

Holding Little Bug on the night of her birth before TPR had been signed.

I was not there for Sweet Pea’s birth. In fact, I have never met her birth mother. I would not change anything about being there for Little Bug’s birth and God carried me through those 81 hours I had to wait to know Little Bug was in fact my daughter.

Just like I will never forget how I felt seeing my firstborn enter this world, I will never forget when I realized what was going to happen with Sweet Pea.

I was going to lay eyes on her for the very first time and she was already going to be mine!

That thought alone kept me from being able to go to sleep last Tuesday and Wednesday night right after Sweet Pea’s birth. I would lay in bed imagining what that was going to be like and my heart literally felt like it was going to bust out of my chest from excitement!

My eyes would tear up and I would have to stop myself from even thinking about it because I knew I was jumping the gun in even entertaining these thoughts because Melody had not yet signed and I knew if I didn’t stop thinking about it I would never go to sleep.

But about 5 seconds after Emily’s text on Thursday at 12:31pm, my mind was consumed with the thought that I was about to meet my baby girl for the first time and she was already mine.

We arrived at the hospital and were lead to Sweet Pea’s bedside where Emily and two others from the agency were there waiting for us.

I rounded the corner and there she was.

My first glimpse at my baby girl.

She was already on the triple light therapy with her “sunglasses” on to protect her eyes. She was very jittery and I remember turning to Dave and saying, “She is already going through withdrawals.” I wanted to scoop her up right there and hold her but I just leaned in as far as I could and took in the sight of my glowing second born “sunbathing” on her lights.

While I know that isn’t how “normal” moms meet their babies after giving birth, that was one of the sweetest moments ever of my entire life.

I was looking at my baby and she was mine and, in that moment, that was all that mattered.

And then Dr. Marvelous made her first appearance and whispered to me, “Have you held her yet?”. When I told her I had not, she told the nurses, “She needs to hold her baby.”

Two minutes later, I was holding Sweet Pea for the first time.

Even though I can’t go into specifics right now about certain things, it is amazing to me that everything I worried about concerning going through the adoption process again, God took care of.

One example is that I dreaded having to go through the 48 hour wait for TPR to be signed after holding and falling in love with a baby that wasn’t mine yet.

God spared me from having to go through that again.

He has blessed abundantly by giving me unique, special moments with both of my daughters in the hours and days after their births.

God is so good and so faithful.

I’m tired.

Tonight my thoughts keep going to people who have babies in the NICU for weeks at a time. I’ve just been living the NICU life for less than a week now and I’m drained (because I need a good nights sleep which I hope to get tonight).

Sometimes the easiest way to take your mind off your own sorrows is to focus on someone else’s.

Next to Sweet Pea is a 2lb baby girl that was born on May 27th (Little Bug’s birthday!) at 24 weeks gestation. She entered this world weighing only 1lb. 5oz. Her parents have been living NICU life for over two months now, and today they said they have about another month to go.

Two beds down from Sweet Pea is a baby boy who has been in the NICU for about two months and has about another three weeks to go. But when he is released he will soon be back for his first open heart surgery.

Yes, I hate seeing my baby going through what she is going through, but if I take my eyes off my own little area of the NICU, there are WAY worse situations going on all around me.

My child has not be diagnosed with anything that she will carry with her for the rest of her life. She’s had a rough entry into this world but ultimately, she is going to be absolutely fine given some time.

That really helps me keep my perspective…and it makes my heart go out to the parents that are sitting in the NICU one or two beds away and their child is dealing with issues that may be there for the duration of their child’s life.

And while it is hard to believe it has only been five days since that text from Emily that told us Melody had signed and Sweet Pea was ours, it has only been five days and most likely, within five more days we will all be home where we belong.

Safe in Daddy’s hands

Holding my TWO miracles for the first time!

I am still in complete amazement that the girl who three years ago wondered if she would EVER become a mother, is now the mother of not one but TWO sweet girls through the miracle of adoption.

To God be the Glory!!

My life is about to change.

I will be the mother to two little girls. Just allowing myself to type that is a step of faith because I keep myself so guarded during the adoption process, that I don’t really even allow myself to think about what will be. I live in the present, taking one day at a time.

But on this morning, God woke me up (on my sleep in morning when I should be sleeping until Dave and Little Bug come in here to wake me up!) so I figured He must have something to tell me. So I grabbed my journal and started writing and this is what God laid on my heart:

To think of where I was just three years ago…we were starting infertility treatments, had just done our first IUI and August 4th, 2008 was blood test day.

There was so much HOPE that finally my dream was going to come true.

Finally, I would see those TWO pink lines, and the pain of all the months that had passed with no pregnancy suddenly wouldn’t matter as I looked at that pregnancy test and realized I was finally pregnant.

But August 4th came and we went to the clinic for my blood draw, came back home and began the wait until my cell phone would ring giving us news that our dream had come true.

That day we had planned to work on a project outside. We replaced all the wood mulch with red lava rocks in the front flower bed. I knew I needed a distractor as we waited for the phone to ring.

We had finished the project and we were inside when the phone call finally came.

I answered immediately shaking and holding my breath to hear the words my nurse, Holly, had to tell me.

I’m sorry, you are not pregnant, is NOT what I wanted to hear that day, but those are the words that came out of her mouth.

As soon as I hung up, I started crying. It wasn’t the trickle-of-tears-running-slowly-down-my-face kind of crying. It was uncontrollable, gut-wrenching sobs. Screams of why? and a feeling as though the weight of the whole world was on my shoulders.

One of the lowest points of my journey through infertility, for sure.

But GOD had a plan! Even as I sobbed uncontrollably and screamed at God asking why He couldn’t have just let it work, God had a plan.

In a way only God would orchestrate, He picked up the pieces of my broken heart that day and became my Strength as I pressed on to what was next.

God used August 4th and all the months that were still ahead and full of more disappointments and heartbreak to grow my faith in Him and teach me about His Plan being absolutely perfect and bigger and better than my wildest dreams.

Almost three years to the day of August 4th, 2008, I stand in complete awe and amazement at what God has done in and through my life.

If my life doesn’t proclaim the truth of Jeremiah 29:11, I don’t know what does.

If my life doesn’t proclaim that GOD IS FAITHFUL THROUGH IT ALL, I don’t know what does.

And so in these final days/weeks of our journey to #2, I press on, walking in faith.

Sometimes during my time with the Lord, I like to go back and read my journals.

Today I found something I wrote on April 28th, 2011 – a week after we learned that the woman working with Susan had decided not to place through her and about a week before I called Emily and figured out this woman had left Susan and called Emily!

Here is what I wrote:

God is sovereign.

That statement alone is the foundation of my complete trust in Him.

He created everything, He controls everything. And His Plans for my life are beautiful.

There was a day that I did not know of the work God was doing to bring me a little miracle.

Any day before April 9th, 2009, I did not know what God was going to do.

By my faith in God I was able to say things like…”God must have Something More” (in reference to all our failed infertility treatments), “I wait in great expectation of what God is going to do.” and “God is faithful still.”

And on April 9th, 2009, God started letting me in on His miracle and it WAS better than anything I had imagined.

As we now have really started our journey to #2, I am at that same place again …

Trusting God and expecting something better than my wildest dreams.

Because that is just how the God I serve works!

His ways are higher, His love is deeper.

And He is Sovereign.

I received an email from a reader asking me how I can believe in God since it can not be proven that He really does exist.

I am no Bible scholar and honestly, when I read this email, my first thought was that this email would be better suited for a pastor, not me!

But then I just poured the contents of my heart out to this reader because God IS very alive in my life. He is the reason I walked through the fire of infertility unscathed. He is my Rock, my fortress, my strength, my joy in troubled times.

And HE is the one who orchestrated the Miracle of Little Bug and He is going to do it again as we are now on our journey to #2.

No, I’ve never seen Jesus, but I have witnessed Him at work in my life numerous times and that gives me a voice to answer this reader.

This was my response:

Thank you for your email. I love to hear from readers, especially ones like you that are questioning everything about God. First, I want to say that questioning God is totally normal. Wondering if He exists? Totally normal.

No, we cannot see, touch and literally SEE God. But I know He is real because of what He has done in and through my life. I KNOW sometimes it is terribly hard to trust that He is real and alive and present in our lives everyday, even when we are in a dark tunnel and cannot see the light. HE IS THERE. You just have to learn to look for Him.
 
And really, this is what faith is all about…believing in the unseen. Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. Hebrews 11:1 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. Hebrews 11:6
 
I can only speak from my personal experience of walking daily with the Lord. God is a very personal God and He speaks to us in very personal ways. I guess on the outside looking in you could say that my faith is so strong because I come from a family where generation after generation has walked with God and had personal relationships with Him. But I know that is simply not the case. Yes, I come from generations of Christian family members BUT their faith does not give me any more or less faith. It is totally the individual’s choice to believe in God to to not believe.
 
I put my faith in the Lord when I was 8 years old. As a teenager God started working on my life. And by working on my life I mean that He starting building my faith in Him and teaching me truths about Who He is and what He desires from me. It was during my walk through infertility that God really started to do major work in my life to build my character and my faith in Him.
 
I found myself in a situation that I had NO CONTROL OF WHATSOEVER! As much as I desired to be pregnant, I couldn’t MAKE it happen. Then on March 8th, 2009, when we learned our chances of conceiving, even with IVF, were extremely slim, I found myself in the darkest, lowest, most hopeless place I had ever been in in my entire life. Here I was, a girl who had always dreamed of pregnancy and giving birth to four children, and now I was being told that was never going to happen? You better believe I questioned what God was doing in my life. I mean, hello God!, YOU put this desire in my heart, right??? And now you are NOT going to allow me to conceive…ever?!?!? It made NO SENSE whatsoever to me.
 
But I also knew something else. I HAD TO CONTINUE TO TRUST GOD. I HAD TOO. WITHOUT FAITH, I had nothing, no hope. So I choose again to put my faith in the Lord and surrender.
 
As I look back on my journey, I think we don’t realize just how important surrender is in our walk with the Lord. God requires faith, but in order for us to experience the good plans God has for us (Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”) I believe that we must first come to the place of total surrender to GOD’S WILL for our lives. What this means is that we relinquish our need to control, to "fix" things to the way we think God wants.
 
Since March 8th, 2009, God has really been working on my life and teaching me so much about surrender. I believe it is paramount to discovering God’s Will for our life. I had to totally LET GO of my desire for pregnancy. Instead of feeling deserted and forgotten by God, I surrendered to HIS WILL, not having any clue what His will was, and it was THEN that God did a miracle in my life.
 
God had opened our hearts to adoption in Dec. 2008. After the cancelled IVF cycle, I knew God was saying no to more treatments and yes to adoption! In obedience to God, I started filling out adoption paperwork and working on a family profile to be shown to prospective birth mothers. If you’ve read my blog, you know the miracle God performed. A little over 2 months after learning I would never conceive, I was holding my baby girl in my arms through the miracle of adoption. The circumstances that brought Little Bug into my life are nothing short of a miracle. Something ONLY God could have orchestrated and done.
 
And you know what? That was His plan all along! And it was BIGGER and BETTER than my wildest dreams!!! So why did God put that desire in my heart for pregnancy and then not fulfill it? Because He knew He had SOMETHING MORE than even pregnancy to bless me with!
 
My heart is so full and so content. It is overflowing! God is sooooooo good. You have to choose to trust Him, choose to surrender and then….the rest is totally GOD. Obey where you feel God is leading you to go and then stand back in amazement at what God is going to do through your life because your faith is in Him!
 
As we are starting our journey to #2, God is already teaching me more about faith and surrender to Him. When the time is right, I will be sharing more on the blog.
 
I hope what I have shared here has encouraged you in some way. PLEASE write me back with any more questions you may have. I seriously would love to help you figure all this out. Our walks with God are a continuous journey of growth and learning more about God and the truths found in His Word. I would love to help you find your way through this dark tunnel you are in right now. There is HOPE and there is LIGHT, but it is only found in Jesus Christ.
 
Take care and I hope to hear from you again,
Elaine

It doesn’t take DNA to be a mother.

It takes sacrificial love.

Today I am thankful that I am a mother through the miracle of adoption.

I knew there would come a day that God would ask me to publically share about my journey through infertility.

That day was today.

I’ve been sharing my testimony on this blog for years, but if you give me a computer and keyboard, I can easily pour out my heart for the world to read.

I knew being asked to share publically, in a live setting, with many eyeballs staring right at me would be a greater challenge.

But I’ve told God I am willing because I will not keep quiet the work God has done through my infertility.

God went easy on me today, though.

All I had to do was walk up on stage and hold up my “Cardboard Testimony”. There were about 30 people who participated in this during all three Easter services at my church today and it was POWERFUL.

Some people walked up as a family, proclaiming the work God had done in and through their family. During the second service Dave, Little Bug and I walked up on the stage holding this poster:

After a few seconds, I flipped the poster and this is what was on the other side (Little Bug also held up a little sign):

Walking onto that stage, holding a sign that proclaimed to every person seated in that audience that I am infertile, was an ugly reminder of all that title had put me through in life.

But that wasn’t the end of the story I had to tell.

It reminded me of the story of Easter.

The first half is very ugly, very heartbreaking. Jesus died to make payment for the sins of the world and He was buried in a tomb.

But that wasn’t the end of the story.

Three days later, Jesus arose! He did not stay dead! He is alive!

The other side of my cardboard told the rest of the story …

God turned the ugliness of infertility into a miracle.

The miracle adoption of Little Bug into our family.

Here is the video from the first service. It is 7 minutes (I’m at about the 3 minute mark), but I encourage you to watch it all. So many incredible testimonies of GOD at work in the life of His people!

Happy Easter!

It’s here again.

The anniversary of 3/8/09.

It’s a date that won’t ever go by without me remembering the events of that day.

It was the turning point of my journey through infertility.

It was the day that separated infertility treatments and adoption.

It was a devastating day for me.

It was the platform God used to perform a miracle …

The Miracle of Little Bug.

On that day, March 8, 2009, I didn’t know how I was going to make it past that day, but now, two years later, I look back on that day with thanksgiving in my heart.

If God had allowed that IVF cycle to produce more than just The Lone Ranger, or if God had prompted us to give IVF another try instead of turning in adoption paperwork a month and day later, I wouldn’t be the mother of this precious little girl.

God knows what He is doing! I will be the first to admit that I questioned God on that day. Nothing made sense on March 8, 2009. Nothing.

There were tons of people praying during that IVF cycle. We had already gone through three failed IUIs. Four months prior, I had undergone surgery to remove endometriosis. My doctor had given me high hopes of finally achieving a pregnancy with this IVF cycle.

And then everything that could possibly have gone wrong, went wrong! I left the doctor’s office a total mess, totally clueless what God was doing and with my head filled with a million and one Why? questions.

And then, just when things couldn’t get any worse God was asking me to lay my desire for pregnancy at His feet and pursue adoption immediately.

What? Are you crazy, God? Don’t you know this has been my desire since I was a little girl? Surely, you are not serious about this?!?!

Oh, He was serious alright. I knew there was not going to be another try at IVF.

I praise God that He didn’t make me wait long to find out just what He was up too.

Twelve weeks later, instead of staring at a tiny, flickering heartbeat on an ultrasound screen, I was staring at this:

Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails. Proverbs 19:21

Staring at Little Bug’s tiny little face almost two years ago allowed me to see why I had to live 3/8/09.

Oh, God’s love for us is deeper and wider than our human minds will ever be able to fully comprehend!

I praise Him for this journey!