On To Plan A

Growing up, I somehow organized the gospel in my head a little something like this: God loved His people and wanted them to live in righteousness. They kept messing up and kept messing up and things were not going right. God tried this and that with them but nothing was working. He ended up having to sacrifice His own Son to pay the price for the world's sin and save His people.

Now while there are partial truths to this line of thinking, its by no means the full gospel. It wasn't until I was entering my young adult years that I learned (or actually began to understand) that Jesus was there from the beginning. He was the plan. God was not shocked and dumbfounded by what was going on with His people. There was sin and brokenness and evil that they could never overcome. He knew they would never get it together. But He had a plan for all the hurt and brokenness. Jesus. Jesus was Plan A. It appeared on the surface that Jesus was a last resort. Like he was plan B or C or Z. But He was Plan A.

That was a game-changer for me. It transformed my entire outlook on life. It brings an eternal perspective that was never there in my previous thinking. An eternal perspective that resounds no matter what the world throws at me. God didn't just throw His hands up and give in. He knows what He's doing. Even through the struggle and hurt, He's always got Plan A.

So God is moving Scott, Hudson, Harper and me on to our Plan A. We have started the adoption process!! Hooray! From the surface (like from this view or this) it seems like adoption might be Plan B or C. But we know God has used everything we've been through to bring us to this place and has always had the exact child in mind for our family, even way before we conceived the thought of adopting. It was a long road to get here, and surely a long road ahead, but we are grateful for what God has brought us through and the plan He has for us.

The Lord has comforted us and mourned with us over our losses. We know that it was never His perfect plan for us to go through that. So much of life we will never understand. But I am seeing so clearly how God loves creating goodness out of heartache. Joy out of sadness. How He brings beauty from ashes.

So yes! Adoption! We are so excited, anxious, overwhelmed...it's a whole new beast to explore. I'll post soon with more details, how we got to this decision, what the kids think, and hopefully keep this updated with where we are. And we covet your prayers for us, for our baby, for the birth parents, and join us in praising God that He's always got Plan A. Even in our times of uncertainty and chaos.

People Say We Monkey Around

I'm back! The little blog has definitely been suffering from major neglect. But I'm hoping to kick it back up and give some more updates on what's going on in our little spot in the world.

Big News: H&H are now FOUR years old!! We celebrated with a monkey party held at one of our faves, My Gym. It was a blast because so many of the kids' (and my) favorite people were there.

With our two four year olds. I think that equals eight years of parenting.

Here are some of the details of the party:

I always love to include pictures at the kids' parties of them growing up. It reminds me of how far we've come! So we had pictures of them as newborns, and at one, two, and three years old.  We served Monkey Vines (twizzlers), Money Mix (trail mix), Barrels for Monkeys (root beer barrels), Banana-Os (Banana Nut Cheerios), and of course Bananas! With a little Jungle Juice to wash it down. (I hadn't added the Sprite to the Jungle Juice yet, so that's why it looks weird. I know you were wondering.)

Monkey cupcakes!

This picture is just to show Harper's dress THAT I MADE. I know, I'm kind of proud of me too. If you can't tell, it actually has a ruffle, bodice trim, a sash, and sleeves, all of which were new to me. Sleeves are harder than you think.

And here are some shots of the fun we had!

Ball Pit!

Buddies from school at circle time

Waiting for the Roller Coaster. I love Harper's little hands on her brother.

Bubbles!

 Zipline!

 Dress-up Birthday Parade

 You probably can't notice in the picture, but I found these super cute monkey cupcake wrappers the day before the party. In perfect colors for our theme. Scott was so thrilled he could hardly stand it.

Yes, she had that look on her face for the entire song. She must not have noticed the wrapper.

Chowing down!

All the monkeys seemed to have a great time! And a special thanks to my friend Kristin for taking the pics!

Here's to a ton of fun being four!