My Jeep

When Heath and I got married, I purchased my first car on my own. A 2002 Honda Civic and paid it off within a few years. So when Ella was born that is what I drove. Very inconvenient because it was only 2 doors, but it was adorable and I loved it. This was the car that we brought her home from the hospitable in. I was attached.

But after about 9 months of putting the passenger seat up to crawl in the back seat to get her in her carseat and whatever else needed to be done, it was time for something else.

So Heath found me this really awesome Jeep! It was perfect! However, I thought it was cursed because the night Heath and I drove to pick it up we got stuck in terrible traffic which led to us fighting the entire way there. Two hours later, when we finally arrived at the dealership, I was just ready to get the keys and be done. Then that same night, Heath took the car to his guy's night out to show it off and barely avoided a terrible accident just by inches.

Turns out it was not cursed, and I had a great 3 1/2 years with it! I've watched Ella grow from a baby to a little girl in the carseat of that car.

We sold my Jeep this past weekend to a very sweet family. A dad bought it for his son who is going away to college. I think she will be in good hands.

We decided to get rid of the Jeep because we can only fit 2 kids comfortably, 3 tightly. With starting the fostering process, we just want the door to be open to getting more than one or even two children at a time. So with that, we need something with a 3rd row.

I don't know what that is going to be yet. But hopefully by the end of this week I will have myself a new (very old car). We want to get something cheep that we can buy with the money we made on the Jeep and therefore not have a car payment. My husband is looking at VERY old suburbans so y'all will be just as surprised as I am what I am driving this time next week.

These pictures were taken the week we got the Jeep. Heath, Ella & I took a roadtrip to Arkansas to see Heath's dad. I remember how excited and giddy we were to be taking our first roadtrip in our fun new car.

The Connected Child

There is an awesome ministry at Irving Bible Church called Tapestry. It's an adoption and foster care ministry. I've been kind of a stalker of this ministry for the past few months. Not wanting to get involved but wanting to see how their ministry works. I even signed up to be in their yahoo group so I could get a deeper look.

Well, what I have read and seen has been amazing. I think I am done being a stalker and ready to get involved with their ministry. There are several outlets to their ministry. One is they have support groups that meet once a month specifically split up into categories of what type of fostering/adoption you are doing. This is going to be my first step. The category I fall under meets in a couple of weeks and I can not wait to check it out.

They do so many other things to minister and support families that are considering or have already started the process of foster care/adoption. One thing that has really touched me is their yahoo group I mentioned. Anytime somebody posts on it, I get an email. Even though I have just been a stalker of this group, I have been so touched by the encouragement these families show each other. I want that and I want to be that for others!

Here is the link to their website. http://tapestry.irvingbible.org/ You can find a plethora of information and here testimonies that will knock your socks off.

One email I received recently from their yahoo group was a link to listen to a doctor named Dr. Purvis who had just done an interview with Family Life Today. So I clicked on it and was blown away. If you are at all considering fostering/adoption or just want a lot of information about these children and what they've been through and how we can help them, please listen to this interview. It's really difficult to hear some of what she has to say, it will absolutely break your heart, but at the same time she offers so much hope.

It's broken up into 3 parts.

Part 1: Dr. Purvis talks about the realities for children from hard places and encourages parents to "count the cost".
http://familylife.edgeboss.net/download/familylife/flpod/fl20100322.mp3

Part 2: Dr. Purvis talks about the importance of parents having realistic expectations as they begin and travel the adoption or foster care journey.
http://familylife.edgeboss.net/download/familylife/flpod/fl20100323.mp3

Part 3: Dr. Purvis offers tools and strategies for parents to help them connect with their children to help them heal and become all that God intends.
http://familylife.edgeboss.net/download/familylife/flpod/fl20100324.mp3

One of the awesome things about this is we just got a list of books that Covenant Kids considers required reading. It's part of the training they do there. (Another thing I love about CK.) One of the books is called The Connected Child, by Dr. Purvis! So I was so thrilled by this and can't wait to start it.

4th of July!

We had a great 3rd and 4th of July.

Heath had to work Saturday night, the 3rd, so Ella and I had plans to go to dinner with my parents and then catch the fireworks at Southlake. Unfortunately, I came down with some crazy summer cold. It had me down for almost 7 days. I could barely talk, was coughing like crazy...the whole nine yards.

So we had to cancel on them.

But Heath got home earlier than expected from work and we decided to try to get to the fireworks last minute. I was feeling pretty crummy but really wanted to see fireworks with Ella this year.

So we packed a blanket and hurried off. We got to the fireworks location in perfect time and got some really great seats right across from where they were shooting them off.


Once the fireworks started though we realized maybe being close wasn't the best idea with a punkin. But she did well. Her hands never left her ears though.

After church Sunday, I had a little photo session with Ella.








Ella spent the evening of the 4th with my parents because our friends Shellie and Kelly asked us to go to the Rangers game with them. They had two extra tickets with really fabulous seats. We were so pumped. We had never been the Rangers game on the 4th.

These friends of ours are steps ahead of us in the fostering process and also going through Covenant Kids! So we have definitely formed a bond with them and I will be soliciting much help from them once I start filling out the novel of paperwork that they gave us at our first training the other night. Yikes!

Heath and I at the game. Still feeling crummy, but on meds.




Before the game, we did get to stop in for about an hour at Kristin's annual 4th of July party, which is always a lot of fun!

Foster Care | Part 6 First Training

Last night was great!! Thank you SO MUCH for praying.

I was feeling very anxious leading up to it. You know that feeling you get when you are about to go in for a job interview? It was that kind of feeling.

But as most things in my life that I feel anxious about, I had absolutely no reason to feel that way. It was a great environment with the nicest people.

The training started at 6:00. So from 6:00 to 7:00, the founders of the agency spoke and gave the history on Covenant Kids. The couple are very strong Christians with this incredible vision to help these children. It was one of those couples where you can tell their faith is genuine. So immediately I was drawn in and so thankful that we get to go through this process with this agency.

One of the neat things the founders always do on the 1st night of training is go around the room and talk to each couple. They asked each couple several questions, like what they do for a living, where do they go to church, what type of foster care are they interested in, how they heard about Covenant Kids, etc. They spent several minutes with each couple wanting to get to know each one. There were 30 couples so this took a LONG time. It took almost 2 hours to go around the entire room.

Even though it was long, I so enjoyed getting to hear everyone's stories, where everyone is in life and why they want to do foster care. There were couples that were our age and some older. From all over the metroplex, with all sorts of vocations. It was a really neat time for me. Very inspiring and encouraging to know that even though I may never see these couples again, we are all in this together.

When it came to our turn, the founders had a little side note next to our names that I guess my friends Kallie or Travis, who work for them, put on there. So the founder told everyone that we have a unique story on how we discovered Covenant Kids. So I got to share the amazing testimony of how God pointed me to CK before I even knew that my two friends worked for that specific agency. It's the story I share with y'all a few posts ago. It was a neat moment for us and once again confirmed this path we are on.

By the time all the intros were over, Travis, my friend and the trainer only had about 30 minutes to wrap things up. He went over some very basic things and then we were done.

The next few trainings will probably be the ones that are going to be the most difficult as we dive into specific kids' stories and what they've been through as they try to help equip us to be parents for these children that come from such tragic situations.

But this 1st training was a great firing up for us! We left with new hope and new motivation for this adventure.

Infertility: Part 5 | Application Turned In!

Today begins our journey! Officially!

We have turned in our initial application and tonight at 6:00, we will attend our first of six trainings to become licensed foster care parents!

I would be lying if I said I was full of only joy and excitement. Whereas I have both of those things, I have also felt a great deal of fear and anxiety creep up since we signed up for our first class. (Which was only 2 days ago. It happened a lot faster than I was thinking.) We were originally not going to be able to start training until August because of scheduling conflicts, but this night opened up for us and we jumped on it. If we can get one done in July, that's less we have to do in August. Which gets us closer to getting our children!

Please pray for us tonight. Please pray that God will give us peace, that He will give Heath and I continued unity. (Heath is really excited about this. It's so cute.) Don't tell him I said that. We both have such a huge desire for more children now more than ever. It is a really sweet thing for me to watch that twinkle in my husband's eyes as he looks at random people with itty bitty precious babies.

Please pray that the stories of the trauma that foster children have been through will not overwhelm my spirit to the point of my body giving in to that fear and anxiety that is knocking at my mind's door. This is my #1 fear at this point.

We are so thankful for y'all! And for your prayers. I will let you know how it goes.

If you are new to our story, you can click on the links to the right titled "Infertility Journey" to read our story of dealing with infertility for the past 2 years and how God has led us to this point.

Sing to God, sing praise to His name, extol Him who rides on the clouds, His name is the LORD—and rejoice before Him. A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in His holy dwelling. God sets the lonely in families!
Psalm 68:4-6

Hanging with the Billups

A couple of weeks ago, the Billups came over for some much needed hang out time! Ella loves their girls! Ella loves to run around like crazy with Karoline and she loves to help take care of Klaire.

So while the kids played, the adults got to talk and eat.






How sweet is this? A little foreshadowing.










This is after they all had a shower.


Thank you so much for coming over!! We love getting to spend time with y'all!