Shifted and Shepherded

Right off the bat, let me hit you with the disappointing news: we did not get matched today. I am not joyful. But I am still hopeful. And am working on being satisfied. The orphanage approved our dossier today. This is great news. It means they see no problems with our potential adoption of siblings. But that is all they had time to do in regards to our case. We are not the only family applying for kids at this particular orphanage. Our dossier is upwards of 50 pages long, maybe more. And, of course, in the best interest of the orphans in their care, they review every item on every page. So it is understandable that approving the dossier took up all the designated Brogan time on the agenda. Matching requires more than just giving a thumbs up or signing on a dotted line. This is not a rejection. It is an imagined delay. I say imagined because today was not guaranteed in any way. We had hoped to be matched, to talk with Lolo and Lala via the internet, and to share their sweet faces ...

I have been waiting to write this post and share this news with you for a couple of weeks. Read on and see that the Lord is GOOD, and we are blessed to take refuge in Him and call Him father. On June 14, I asked our Facebook adoption group to pray that God would gift us a vehicle. That's right, you heard me. I didn't ask for ours to be repaired or for us to find a good deal. [I asked that later when my faith faltered.] I asked for a vehicle to be all but plopped in our lap. Before you get the idea that Chad and I sit back these days and swim in dolla bills Scrooge McDuck style as donations and art sales roll in, I want to explain why I asked for such a prayer and why I prayed it myself.  First, I believe the Holy Spirit led me to pray for a vehicle, not from a place of greed or even comfort. I think He led me to that prayer (request) because God wanted to work His good pleasure for His glory. I believe He had a tremendous blessing waiting for us; we simply needed to ask...

I have a lot of "next things" these days. I could relive my pity party from this week with a minute-by-minute detailing of ALL THE THINGS. But that wouldn't do anybody any good. Suffice it to say that I set a very early alarm every day - which pained my summer-break heart - and from the moment I got up until I was in bed and blurry eyed, there was not a moment of rest. It felt like each time I sat down to do one thing, I added five next-things to my list.  I came home Thursday night from working my non-teaching job and wanted to cry. But I was too inadequate to even muster the tears. In our former, non-fundraising, paperwork-free life, Chad would have tried to 'fix' me by cuddling with me and putting on a cheesy movie. But there was no time for movie-watching. We had work to do, forms to fill out, letters to write, and budget spreadsheets to update. So, instead, he followed me to the porch (I had to water the flowers) with a glass of wine. He held it for me unti...

Friends... (See what I did there?)* Here is a picture of some pictures. I walk past this every morning, and it still feels surreal in the most incredibly blissful way. Then I look around at the work to be done. Commitments, deadlines, and to-do lists take over, shoving my joy into the back seat and peeling out to start the day in hectic busy-ness. Friends, I'm tired. I'm stressed.  We stayed up late to watch the fireworks then woke up early to get the oil changed, apply for passports - you know, life stuff. It's been a while since I slept well. I have a few things on my mind. I bet you do too. It's the nature of the world, to have a cluttered brain. The other day my friend asked, "What do you do all day?" This question was prompted by the fact that I am a teacher and, therefore, in theory I have summers off. It was an innocent question; I took no offense. And I could have listed the two errands it took me three hours to run because I had to drag...

The Late Late Show has a segment called Spill Your Guts OR Fill Your Guts wherein a celebrity has to answer a personal question or eat something gross. Well, I'm no celebrity, but this post is Late Late in coming. And I have some guts to spill plus a full heart (which in the Greek old testament was expressed by saying your bowels (gut) was full. I'm running with this analogous title all the way, baby). Thank you for your prayers and patience. I had a lot of poetic and profound ways I planned to organize this blog post. But so much has happened over the last couple of weeks, I'm going with the spill-my-guts plan. I'ma just tell you things as they come to mind. Big news first, right? We know who our kids are. We have seen their precious faces. We call them by name around our house. Joy upon joy upon joy. We cannot share pictures yet. Their initials are A and S. If you put our four children's initials in order from youngest to oldest, it spells SABE. Do you know...

That's right - I don't really know how to write an update at this point. There is so much at once and yet not much to show for it except a whole lot of mess. Huh...kind of sounds like my spiritual walk sometimes. Here is a picture of my morning. Thank goodness there is coffee. As my sweet friend Kristen said recently, "My everything is everywhere." --I am totally going to turn that phrase into an 8x10 print. I'm not kidding.-- See that multi-colored, three-columned list on the right? That is our home-study to do list. Good news - we are only missing the items in yellow. Below are some disorganized updates. Enjoy. 1. We recently completed two major events in our home study. They were the final two, actually. We met with a psychologist for an evaluation; Colombia, for some reason, does not want to place children with crazy people. Who knew? [More on this informative visit below.] Also, we had our final (FINAL!) home study interview with our social worker. ...