A Day of Blessings!

Last Sunday was a day of blessings.  It began during praise & worship at church when I was completely overwhelmed with God's goodness in allowing us to be actively involved in His plan for taking care of orphans.  I never thought we'd be going halfway across the world to bring home a little Ukranian girl to be part of our family--it just blows my mind that God ordained from the beginning of time for Nadia to be part of our family! 


Once home from church, we travelled down to Apex for a cookout with our friends Randy, Lisa, and their daughters Hunter, Logan, Olivia (adopted from China), and Kate (adopted from Guatemala).  They also invited their friends Thomas (who is graduating from Seminary) and Leslie, his wife.




Thomas shared his perspective on adoption and how it is such a parallel to how God adopted us into His family. I was blessed by this heart-felt observation and especially blessed when I found out that this "cookout" was really...

                A Surprise Shower to celebrate our newest daughter!!!


I'm hoping the white dress fits Nadia so she can wear that on "Gotcha Day!"


Then it was off to our weekly small group meeting.   OK, so we're not really that small of a group anymore but we still call it that.  These guys are the best "family" to have around when most of your family lives out of town. 

     They blessed us with the all-important car seat for Miss Nadia!




    They also spent  time covering us in prayer as we get ready to take this awesome journey to Nadia.

Beckie, who is the one with her hand on my arm, prayed about the fact that God has been preparing our hearts and our family for this journey WAY before we even knew we would be on this journey.  That was really insightful of her and blessed me tremendously to be reminded of that.  (Who says the "youth" of today are going downhill--this young lady , who just graduated from college, is going to make a huge impact for the Kingdom here on earth!)

I look back on Sunday as an anchor to this completely crazy week that has been filled with travel arrangements, finishing school, house renovations, and tons of nesting (that's for another post). :)

Yes, we are very blessed to be able to bring Nadia into such a community of love and encouragement. (And that's not even to mention the amazing grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins who she gets to be related to as well!!!)