Surreal

Here is one of my favorite pictures. It was taken when our daughter went swimming for the first time ever. We went from about 30 degrees in Murmansk to 100 degrees when we arrived home. However, the weather was nice enough to cool down a bit for us shortly after our arrival. Despite the cool down, we couldn't help but introduce our "way of life during the summer" to our new daughter right away. She absolutely loves to bathe so it was no surprise when her face lit up when she saw my friend's pool and realized she was going to get to go in that big huge thing of water!

In this picture is my closest friend's little girl from China. It is priceless to see her sitting with my daughter from Russia. Two little peanuts from the other side of the world sittin' together and enjoying the water together. It was slightly surreal because we began the process of adopting our daughter before my friend began hers. When our adoption began to look hopeless because of all of the re-accreditations in Russia and my friend's adoption was moving along smoothly and was even completed before ours, I don't think either of us thought we'd ever see this day--our two girls together sitting by the poolside. But God used that circumstance.

When we began our adoption, we were looking for a girl that was "healthy with normal institutional delays." When we began, we could've never guessed that God would bless our family with a little girl with special needs. Had my friend not adopted a little girl with special needs, I'm not sure that we would've been open to God's leading down the "special needs" path. Good thing God knows what He's doing or we would've missed out on the gift of our new daughter. I just look at her and think, "It's hard to imagine that our daughter would've been (or was) passed over simply because one of her legs is shorter than the other. Whoever passed her over sure is missing out! To think that had we not chosen her, such a smart girl with such delight in her eyes would've probably been left to live in an institution for children with special needs for the rest of her life--basically with no future. Such a simple thing and yet she was viewed as not perfect."

Well, we think she's just perfect and know that God definitely has a future in mind for her. I just can't wait to find out what He has in mind for her! Here is a prayer lifted off for these two special little girls. May God, who lifted them out of a hopeless situation and gave them hope, use these two to bring Him glory and hope to others!

1 Samuel 1:27 "I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him."

For more info on children that need to be adopted, but have "special needs", please see: www.untilallhavehomes.org