Signs of Life : The Brownie Chronicles

For the past 3 days, I've been composing a blog about how Ken and I got in, out, back in, then back out of debt again during our marriage.  Due to some issues with the new formatting I tried on this blog, I managed to lose one entire entry!  One of these days, I'll work on it again, but for now, I'll share with you a miracle story (one of the many) from our adoption.  It's a story we didn't share at the time because it wasn't the appropriate time and we wanted (and still want) to protect identities. Just weeks before we got travel approval, Ken came to me in the evening and said, "We can't take our bio kids with us to China. We just don't have the money."  My heart sank into my stomach.  We had been counting down for one year , planning and talking with our kids about traveling to China to meet their brothers.  They had given up an amazing cruise vacation for us to adopt.  My middle child didn't even like being away from us for one night...

Posing with their books 2 years ago. They've been viewed hundreds of times since then! We have a lot of conversations about adoption in this family.  One of the best tools that has sparked conversation are the boys' Lifebooks . I made these on the recommendation of older adoptees and adoptive families.  We learned that, in the past, many adoptive families would only tell their adopted child's story from the time they were "found" or "matched," neglecting the fact that they had a life before adoption.  It can be difficult to put together, because there are always unknowns and the events leading up to adoption are tragic.  Making a book can be challenging, but for us, it was worth it!  I took the advice I received from the Internet and from our social worker and included "possibility scenarios" in the book.  I included photos I grabbed from the 'net: photos of their hometowns, of houses and apartment complexes, of people and scenes, w...

Happy 2016!  While I still don't see flying cars racing in the sky above my house, I DO use a video phone on a daily basis, do most of my shopping via the internet, see where my husband is on my very own little "Marauder's Map," and can ask my computer just about any question (using voice commands) and get an instant answer.  Pretty cool, 2016!  We're not yet the Jetsons, but we're getting there. 2015 was a lean blogging year. I only posted 5 times!  I will tell you, I have at least that many more in my drafts, but it just never got finished. For the first time in a few years, I'm truly excited about the upcoming year.  The past two-and-a-half years have been rough.  We've had much to be grateful for, but I'm not going to lie, much of time, we were barely treading water.  The past 6 months have been a breath of fresh air and a chance for renewed hope.  It's a season we can look back on, anchoring our hope in God and His plan for us, even wh...