"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and proclaiming, "Wow, what a ride!!!"

Steve and I were married for 13 wonderful years when we were blessed with our first son Zachary (after a slightly difficult pregnancy).  Two years later after a much more difficult pregnancy, God blessed us with Grayson.  When Grayson was born we began praying and asking God to show us His will for our family - were we to bring more children into our family or stop with two?  Two seemed like a comfortable number for us - we were happy. 

After many months of prayer God laid it on our hearts to have another child.  Again, we began praying - were we to give birth to another child or to adopt?  This was a difficult and painful decision.  I wanted very much to be pregnant and to give birth to another baby, but with my history of difficult pregnancies we were concerned with risking the baby's health and my health, and the tremendous toll it would take on us, especially the boys.  The thought of adoption made me a little uneasy (just because I didn't know anything about it), but the more we prayed the more we felt Him leading us towards adoption.  We kept asking God to show us - to blatantly put something in front of our faces so that we could clearly understand His desire. 

One day I was messing around on the computer and was looking at a family's website who had adopted a little girl from China.  When her parents went to the orphanage to pick her up they made a home video of the orphanage.  The video showed 47 cribs in one room, connected together.  These were metal cribs with wooden slats for the babies to sleep on.  The babies could reach into the crib connected to theirs and grab the babies next to them.  They had no blankets, no pillows, no toys.  As the mother of an infant about the same age of those little babies on the video, I felt a pain in my heart that I had never felt before.  As I sat crying I showed Steve the video and we knew that this was what we had prayed for - He had put it right in front of us.  Once we saw that video there was no way we could give birth to another child, knowing that we could bring a child out of one of these orphanages and into our lives and give her everything she would ever need.  We had no idea where we would come up with the large sum of money it would require to bring our daughter home, but we know that when God calls you to something, He will provide.   

Ge Ge (Big Brothers) 

Mei Mei (Little Sister) 

Furry Babies