How you can pray...

We have been so blessed by the number of people that tell us how much they have been praying for our little girl! I wanted to share something that you can pray for over the next few months. I know we have said that we expect to go to court in Ethiopia in July. That is our HOPE and our PRAYER! Late July is the projected time we SHOULD go. As I have said numerous times, we have learned to expect hangups...things don't always go as planned with adoptions. Courts close in Ethiopia for around 2 months for the rainy season. People there just don't leave their homes much during the months of August and September and the electricity is off and on, so there are no court cases seen during these months. The dates that the courts close and open vary due to the weather. But we can expect it to be early to mid August that they close. So we are praying that we get a court date before the courts close! Yes, that means if we don't get a court date before then, we are looking at not going until late september or early October. Which pushes everything back! If everything goes as planned, we SHOULD get a court date before the courts close....but like I said, you never know what will happen. Worrying about this will not help anything...I know that. But anytime the thought of not going to see her until October crosses my mind, I freak out a little. I am reminding myself DAILY of the sovereignty of GOD and that He loves Baby "A" more than we do! And He wants her to be with her family! Does that mean she will certainly be in our arms and HOME by December....No. But it does mean the Lord is SOVEREIGN in this, and He can make that happen, or He may choose not to. If we have to wait longer than expected, we can TRUST that it is in His GOOD plan for her and for us.

SO here's the deal....this is no longer about us adopting an orphan. This is about us adopting HER! Our baby girl that we are head over heals in love with already. If it took YEARS to get her home, I would do it! I remember the moment I laid eyes on Brody and Levi for the first time. My heart was immediately knit to theirs. I loved them and I knew I would do anything for them. Even though we haven't even held our sweet baby girl yet, the moment I laid eyes on her, I knew in my heart she was our daughter.

Please pray for us as we trust the Lord in this and wait for a court date. Pray that we will be able to get a court date before rainy season! GOD IS GOOD!

Baby "Aven"

It has been an exciting week and a half! We have been getting TONS of pictures of our baby girl. I know it won't be like this the whole time we are waiting to bring her home, but I am cherishing every picture that we get. It is a whole new world watching your child grow up over pictures. Its amazing how much she changes in just a week or 2. I have gathered around 45 pictures of her from the time she came into our agency's care at a month old!

We named our baby girl probably just a few hours after we saw her pictures for the first time. We had 3 names picked out and were waiting to see which one fit that sweet face. As soon as the squealing stopped around the house (from me, not Brian), I asked Brian what he thought he name should be. We immediately agreed that she looked like an "Aven"!

A girl I have gotten to know is adopting 4 kids through our agency and she was in Ethiopia this week. I contacted her as soon as we found out about our baby girl, to ask if she could bring a few things to her and take some pictures of her. I put an outfit in the mail the next day, and had some pictures of our family sent to her local walmart. She picked up the pictures and put them in a baby photo album for our girl:) She was so sweet on her first day in Ethiopia, to take pictures of our baby girl in the outfit we sent her and with our photos!

Have I mentioned she's beautiful?! I cannot wait to post her pictures all over this blog when she legally becomes ours!

Oh, and have I mentioned she has a pacifier? I know, not a big deal for a baby. But, seriously, she's the only baby I have seen in the Care Center with one. In fact, I saw her picture a couple months ago (when I was scouring our agency's pictures looking for baby girls that may end up being ours) and said to myself, "She is probably our baby, since she has a paci." Kohout babies love their pacis! Our boys were(Brody) and are (Levi) very attached to theirs!

Cloud Nine

We got the call about our baby girl one week ago. And I am STILL on cloud nine! I haven't been to bed at a decent time in the past week. There are just so many thoughts swirling through my head and just so much EXCITEMENT! The type of excitement you felt when you were little and the next day was Christmas:) I can't stop looking at her pictures. I now have around 30 pictures of her from the time she entered our agency's care at one month old, until now. Its so neat to see how much she has grown and changed over the past few months! In fact,  I hardly recognized her when I received new pictures of her this week! She is smiling in one of the newest pictures....I can't even begin to describe how sweet that little smile is. She has so much hair now! And I just want to squeeze her cheeks!

 Thank you again to everyone for your squeals of excitement and the support we have been given. This little girl is SO LOVED...and she has no idea! These next 8 months or so, are going to be hard waiting for her to be HOME....but SO worth it! We covet your prayers for her and for us as we wait!

For now, I will leave you with some precious hands and feet:)

In. Love.

We are smitten, in love, and head over heals! We have an almost 4 month old baby girl waiting for us in Ethiopia!! She is absolutely beautiful and perfect in every way!

We have been expecting our referral....for the past few weeks I knew it would be "any day". BUT I also knew it could be a month or more away. Our dossier (paperwork) has been in Ethiopia since January 27th. Referral wait times range from 2-4 months. So we had been waiting 2 1/2 months. Every day at 5:00 pm, I would get a little sad. I knew that our agency is closed for the day and we would not be getting a call. For the first time in my life, I didn't like the weekends because I knew we would not get a call on Saturday or Sunday. Wednesday night, while I was cooking dinner, my phone rang and when I saw the number I knew it was our agency! BUT it was 5:30 so I was a little confused as to why they would call after hours. Still hoping for the best, I answered the phone and heard my adoption coordinator (Temple) on the other line saying "I am sorry to call so late, but we have a baby we want you to look at!" I ran upstairs where Brian was giving Levi a bath and all I had to say was, "Brian! Its Temple!".  Brian whipped Levi out of that bathtub so fast (I still don't know if Levi ever got clean that night)! She told us that if we were ready to see our baby girl then she would press "send" on the email. Of course! YES! I am sure her ears were hurting from all of the squealing going on. 

We opened our email and there she was....our daughter....she is absolutely beautiful! She will be 4 months old next week:) Our agency has a website where all of the parents that go to visit their children can post pictures of everyone else's children. Such a blessing! So I instantly recognized her from some of the pictures. There are so many babies, its hard to know which ones belong to what family, but I had seen her picture very shortly after our agency started taking care of her at only a month old. 

We will HOPEFULLY be traveling in July to see her, go to court, and officially adopt her as our daughter. But we will be coming home without her, until the US Embassy clears us to bring her home which will HOPEFULLY by November or December. We would of course, love to have her home before her first birthday and Christmas. :) So thats something you can pray with us about. We are working with another country so there are so many variables.

I know the next question you all have is "where are all of the pictures of her?!" Well, we are not allowed to post any pictures on the internet of her until we officially adopt her:( But take my word for it....She. Is. CUTE!

Thank you to EVERYONE who has given and supported our adoption! We are blown away at the Lord's goodness to us and how He has shown His love to us through our friends and family. We have had 85 different families give to us over the past few months! Thats a lot of people loving on our baby girl! I cannot wait to show her the list of people that followed the Lords command in caring for orphans and made it possible for her to have a HOME!

Here are some pictures of us when we saw pictures of our baby girl for the first time.....

Primland

I love my family:) I love all being under one roof and spending every waking moment together. My parents took all of us to Primland mountain resort for 3 nights. It was wonderful! The views were breathtaking, the time spent together was priceless, and the fun we had made many memories! 

The first day the "kids" (Brian, Parker, Lindsay, and I) took ATVs all through the mountains and had such a great time being "kids" again:) The second day, Lindsay and I enjoyed the spa for 3 glorious hours and the boys played golf while mom took care of all 3 kiddos. Pretty sure mom got the raw end of that deal, but she would say otherwise! The house we stayed in had a huge back deck with one of the most amazing views I've ever seen. And the Lodge was amazing in itself! We spent nights in the pool and by the fire pit...and eating s'mores:). 

We went geocaching on our second day and Brody 

thought it was one big treasure hunt! He loved it! It was quite a hike with 3 littles but we all made it and were glad we did it!

Thank You, Mom and Dad for such a wonderful vacation! 

Provision

The Lord has continuously provided in every way for us in the adoption of our daughter. We have been blown away at how friends and family have given sacrificially to help in the cost of bringing our daughter home.  My sister-in-law sent out letters asking those closest to us to save their change and send it to us at the end of 3 months, and challenging 100 people to try to save/give $100. Each time we received a check in the mail from a dear friend or family member, it was truly humbling. God was providing for us in huge ways. From this letter alone,  $6,605 was given to us.

Then, one night my mom called and said that a lifelong friend of hers wanted to call me. I was very curious, as to why she would want my number. When she called, she asked about our adoption, told me that she and her husband are always looking for ways to give, shared that her husband had just returned from Ethiopia on a medical missions trip, and then asked me how much money we were lacking in funds for our adoption. I told her that at this point everything but our final travel costs were paid for and it would be somewhere around $5,000.  Then she left me speechless......"We would like to give you the remaining $5,000 that you need." What?! Thankful does not even describe it! God has provided every. single. penny for this adoption. He has shown Himself to us in ways we never imagined!