Warning: Use of undefined constant MSW_WPFM_FILE - assumed 'MSW_WPFM_FILE' (this will throw an Error in a future version of PHP) in /nfs/ank/home1/a/awa/public_html/news/wp-content/plugins/wordpress-file-monitor/wordpress-file-monitor.php on line 39 {"id":3431,"date":"2016-10-06T20:10:27","date_gmt":"2016-10-07T04:10:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aforgetmenotmoment.com\/news\/?p=3431"},"modified":"2016-09-22T20:12:49","modified_gmt":"2016-09-23T04:12:49","slug":"3431","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.aforgetmenotmoment.com\/news\/adoption-across-america\/3431","title":{"rendered":"Blessings – Adoption Across America Photography Project"},"content":{"rendered":"

Not quite a year after we were married, we found out we were expecting our first child and we couldn\u2019t have been more excited. \u00a0Maryn joined our family in March and when she was 9 months old, we were surprised to find out that our next little bundle was on the way! \u00a0When Brynlee arrived, being parents to an 18 month old firecracker as well as a precious but colicky newborn sent us into an overwhelmed period of our lives during which we questioned whether the dream of someday adopting was actually going to come true. \u00a0We both felt DONE. \u00a0Two beautiful girls… \u00a0Our family was complete\u2026 \u00a0Right?<\/p>\n

When Brynlee was about a year old, we felt like we had come up for air. \u00a0And\u2026 we had started to consider that maybe we weren\u2019t DONE\u2026 \u00a0We had a conversation around the fact that maybe now we should start to consider that adoption we had discussed a few years back before we got married. \u00a0Jeremy was on board but then the fear set in on my end of all the unknowns that come with adoption. \u00a0The financial aspect, especially, just felt like an insurmountable obstacle for our family. Would I feel different about a child I had adopted than a child I had given birth to? \u00a0I told Jeremy I just didn\u2019t know if I could say, \u201cYes\u201d.<\/p>\n

But, God knew the plans he had for our family and He didn\u2019t let up. \u00a0I worried and fought with Him for months \u2013 just so afraid and unsure of how we would make it happen and whether I would be a good adoptive parent. \u00a0Meanwhile, the Lord found a way to bring adoption to the forefront in so many different ways. \u00a0Nearly every Sunday at church had me in tears because it ALL was about adoption (whether it really was or not). \u00a0Jeremy, through all this, was patient and chill (ever the laid back and go-with-the-flow guy that he is). \u00a0One night, about 6 months after we first felt the nudge from God to reconsider adoption, I was up late, late into the night working on a birthday cake for my daughter. \u00a0I felt God tell me that I needed to, right then, send an email to a friend who had adopted from China and ask her if her family could meet with our family and help us answer some questions and some fears. \u00a0I went to bed that night still nervous as heck but, knowing that this. was. happening. \u00a0I told Jeremy the next morning that I felt ready to go forward and he said, \u201cLet\u2019s do it\u201d.<\/p>\n

God showed up big time throughout our process in so many ways. \u00a0He showed us again and again that if we trusted in Him, we had nothing to fear. \u00a0We had family and friends, classmates we hadn\u2019t spoken to since high school, and strangers we had never met come alongside us to support us and to help us emotionally, spiritually, and financially. \u00a0About 10 months after the day we decided to begin the adoption process, we were matched with a precious 13 month old little boy who had a heart condition for which he had had surgery in China as a tiny baby. \u00a0We decided to name him Kai which means \u201cTriumphant\u201d in Chinese. \u00a0We knew that God had already begun the process of allowing him to triumph over the circumstances of his birth as a very tiny, very sickly baby whose family was forced to leave him an orphan in order to get him the surgery he needed to live.<\/p>\n

The day we met Kai in China, he came to us sound asleep. \u00a0He slept through being handed over to us, slept through the paperwork, and finally, he slept through the only familiar face he had left in the world leaving to head back to the orphanage. \u00a0As we sat looking at the little boy lying in the little white crib in our hotel room, we worried about how terrified he was going to feel when he woke up in a strange place looking at two strangers that looked so different from the people he was used to. \u00a0God used this moment as one more way to reassure us in our fears. When our Kai-Kai finally stirred and blinked his eyes open at us from the fluffy pink Winnie the Pooh bedding, he took one look at us and shot us one of his prize-winning smiles. \u00a0He then began to giggle and play peek-a-boo with us with his blanket. \u00a0He has been a perfect fit for our family. \u00a0His sisters just love their wild and crazy little brother and we can\u2019t imagine life without him. \u00a0We hope to make Kai a big brother sometime soon to another little boy waiting in China for a family to love him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"