Beautiful Visit!!

3 More Sleeps...

until my dear friend Rebecca and her family arrive. I don't think I have introduced Bec to all you blogging buddies. In the immortal words of Indigo Montoya; "Let me 'splain...no, is too much, let me sum up"

I first met Bec as I arrived at the Miami airport in March of 2005. We were to be roommates on our first trip to Haiti. She was going to meet her son, Jeff, who would later become Jeremiah, and I was in limbo. We had lost our first referral and I now had no idea WHO I was going to meet, but I knew God had a plan and I was leaning hard on him. As God began to reveal to me that D was our son Bec was my rock. Every night we prayed together after we layed in bed and looked over the pictures we had taken that day. The last day before we took Jer and D back to the O we prayed over them together. There is no greater bond than shared heartache combined with shared faith in the Lord. From that trip Bec has been permanently placed in my heart as one of those timeless and dear friends that can only be described as a gift from the Lord. We saw each other again in August of that year as she and Bryan were picking Jeremiah up to take him home and I was visiting with D. Since then we have only had phone and e-mail so the fact that I will soon SEE her and get to meet the rest of her kids and see how big Jer has gotten, well....it's just plain awesome and I can't wait!

Old roomies, soon to be reunited(:

Jesus Loves the Little Children

God has truly done a miracle in Berny's heart! Throughout his time here I have been showing him pictures of his parents and getting very little response from him. He would just nod at me as if I were explaining calculus. As the time got closer for him to leave I started praying for God to prepare his heart to go home. Recently I printed out some pics of his parents and really explained that he would be flying on the airplane to go home to them soon. The difference was night and day. You cannot fully appreciate it if you can't see it, but there is a light in his eyes when he talks about them now. He carries their picture and talks about going home to them all the time. He is joyful about it. I believe with all my heart that God blurred the memory of them while he needed to heal and now that it is time to go home God has put them back in his heart. I know this like I know the sky is blue. GOD did this! Thank you Lord for answered prayers and for the peace that has come over me knowing that Berny is happy!!

Though....Yet

"Though the fig tree should not blossom and there be no fruit on the vines, though the yield of the olive should fail and the fields produce no food, though the flock should be cut off from the fold and there be no cattle in the stalls, yet I will exalt in the Lord, I will rejoice in the God of my salvation. The Lord God is my strength, and He has made my feet like hinds' feet. And he makes me walk on my high places."

Habakkuk 3:17-19

Berny is leaving us this coming Tuesday. He has been a joy and a blessing to us in his time here. I am embarrassed to admit that I want him to stay. I firmly believe that a child should be with his biological parents. If they are loving and nurturing, then that is always always always the best scenario. And yet, selfishly I have fantasized about him staying with us. Every night for the past few weeks as I put him and D to bed we would read a book, sing a song and pray. For prayers I had been praying for God to prepare Berny's heart to go home to his Mom and Dad. So the other night when I asked for requests D said, 'Berny's hawt (heart)' and Berny pointed to his blanket and I said, 'you want to thank God for your blanky?' and he nodded his head. These are the kind of precious moments that God has blessed me with. Who wouldn't want that to continue?? I know without a doubt that God has HUGE plans for Berny. He is one of the most amazing people I have ever met. He has had multiple surgeries, multiple home transitions, multiple country transitions, complete paralysis and recovery, and through it ALL he has remained one of the most joyful, contented, beautiful souls I have ever known. I love him and I will miss him. God answered our prayers. Berny WILL walk off that plane to his parents!! Though Berny is not mine to keep, though my heart will break, yet I will praise the Lord for His grace on this little boys life.

Catching Up

Where to begin...

FIRST and MOST important - Berny is WALKING!!!!!! And not just barely toddling between us, he is actually walking everywhere and it is his preferred mode of transportation now! All glory has to go to God for this. His doctors and therapists are all just stunned and saying things like 'someone should do a case study on him' and 'I've never seen someone recover this fast' etc etc. We all just nod and grin and say that he has many people praying for him and God has had His hand on this boys life since the day he was born.

Another praise is that we met with a therapist concerning G last week and have a real hopefulness for him. If you have a mood swing/easily frustrated/highly irritable child I recommend "The Explosive Child" by Greene. It is truly helping us see his behaviour for what it is - a discrepancy in his brain wiring, and NOT an attitude problem. He is doing great and his teacher is a wonderful person who is so totally on board with helping him! What a praise. Thank you Lord! I really struggled with putting him in school, but now I can see that the structure of it is so good for him, and is something I could not provide - I'm a seat of your pants kind of girl! Plus, it was this huge, scary unknown for him and now he is doing it. What a confidence builder(:

The girls continue to do well. They love school and their friends. I told them the other day that they were young but they were already serving God. They are so mature and able to handle things that it gives me the time and energy to take care of the boys. Not every child could handle living in this house with such compassion and grace, but they do it beautifully. God has big plans for these girls! But for now, they are enabling me to fulfill the call on my life to be Mom to many. They truly are precious treasures to me!

And here are a few pics from our weekend in New York with Jay's sister. We came up and surprised her for her birthday and did the one night cruise out of Manhattan. It was a fun trip.

She was VERY surprised and broke into the ugly cry!
Ahh.... the beautiful Jersey Shore.
Heading under the Verrazano Narrows, and out to sea.
This is Jay's dramatic reenactment of the Exxon Valdeze accident.

Lindsay, these are for you(:
WOW, how stinkin' cute is my husband?!?!?!?




OK, back to nose and butt wiping....(: More later.