Adoption update

It's been quite the weekend for us. On Thursday night we headed up to Grand Island to spend some time with Nate's brother Scott and his adorable little girl Alexis. While eating lunch on Friday with Scott, Alexis, Nate's mom (Linda), and my brother in-law (Pat), we got a phone call from the Adoption Intake Coordinator at Nebraska Children's Home wanting to schedule an interview with us. She listed off about 6-7 dates in November, one of them was this Wednesday. So, we checked our calendars and called the woman back to schedule the meeting. It looks like we will have our first intake interview tentatively scheduled for this Wednesday (we're waiting to hear back from the Intake Coordinator to confirm the date and time)!

Needless to say, we're excited...I'm a little nervous--I know God's hand is in all of this and that He is bigger than any of my fears and anxieties. It's just such a huge step---it doesn't even seem real. I mean, we've been waiting for, struggling with, and praying about starting a family for nearly three years. We've watched other couples close to us start families and have stood by, waiting for that same blessing...so, to actually take a step in the right direction seems...different. There are so many mixed feelings that I never thought would be present.

Nate and I woke up earlier than we wanted to this morning and as we carried on our usual Sunday morning routine of eating breakfast in bed while watching television shows on Hulu--Nate prayed and offered praise to God for bringing us this blessing of adoption...and at that moment my heart was filled with a joy and peace that I haven't experienced in a long time.

If you're a praying person--here are a few things to add to your prayer lists this week:

• Praise---offer praise to God for this blessing of adoption!
• Peace---Nate and I have missed and will be missing quite a lot of school this month. We took a personal day for Friday to spend some much needed time with Nate's brother, we'll take another personal day Wednesday for the adoption interview, and then the following week Nate will miss two days of school for All State and I will miss three days of school for a conference. The next week is Thanksgiving, so we'll only be in school for two and a half days---I'm stressed about preparing lesson plans for a sub, cramming in everything I need to get in during the remaning weeks of the first semester; Nate is equally stressed about missing so much school and still having his choirs be prepared for their Christmas concerts December 16th and 17th. Though family trumps school, we both love our students and our jobs, so being gone this much is difficult for us.
  
• Safe travels---we'll be doing a lot of traveling this week, so pray for safety.
  

Thanks again for reading my thoughts. It encourages me so much when I see that people are reading my blog and leaving comments; it shows that people truly care about our situation. And I know we have lots of prayer support---words can't express how much we appreciate this. Prayer is powerful!