Meet Maddox...

Our hearts are overflowing with joy to announce.....

Okay, I'm getting ahead of myself.

Let's start at the beginning.

It's been a long, crazy, exciting, emotional, HAPPY day!  It started during the night, actually.  I was up LATE filling orders for my shop.  We're supposed to go see John and Cheryl next week and I wanted to make something to take Cheryl.  So, I messaged Holly and Trena both on FB to see if they knew of something that I make that Cheryl might like.  Trena responded.  We talked for a bit about what I could make for her.  Then I hesitantly asked about the birthmom that is at HH.  How she's doing.  Has she gone into labor yet?  No, not yet--Trena said.  But she went to the doctor today and all is well.  Then Trena started saying other things.  Something about another baby *might* be coming to the HoH.  She wouldn't say more than that.  Yesterday, I was chatting with Holly and she asked me about whether I thought we'd have a boy or a girl.  I told her we'd be thrilled with either one and told her the names we had picked out.  So, when Trena mentioned another baby, I thought it must be a girl, since I knew the birthmom at the HoH was pregnant with a boy.  And for some reason, I felt like we'd have a boy.  So, I pretty much disregarded this "maybe baby" that "might" be coming.  I was excited that it looked like there were TWO more babies coming--since that's how many HH needs right now.  Anyway, after that, Trena started talking about how she wanted us and the Elders to go ahead and process some of our paperwork.  I still didn't suspect a thing, because she wanted us AND the Elders to do it.  Trena and I Skyped at 1 am so she could explain to me what I needed to do.  I stayed up until 2:30am working on the paperwork.  Finally, I went to bed.  I woke up at around 7:45 am--too excited to sleep.  Then I woke Jason up and {excitedly} told him about the talk with Trena.  We were both pretty excited by then.  Two more babies were likely coming!  And I had paperwork that I could go ahead and do to cut out some of the time after we got our referral.  I'm all about some paperwork to give me something to do during this torturous wait!  Then Jason got up and checked his phone.  There was a message from Holly.  That's weird.  She and I usually talk.  Not her and Jason.  She wanted him to message her back.  Then, as I'm going downstairs, Jason tells me to get on Skype.  I get VERY excited!  Then, as he comes downstairs, he says that Holly wants to show us a book.  Holly had messaged me about ordering some books and having them shipped to my house to then ship to her.  So, I assumed that's what it was about.  My heart stopped racing.  It was another false alarm.  Nothing to get excited about.  Keep calm, Kate.  It's just a book, not a baby.  But, regardless. I was glad to Skype!  I love everyone at HH, and was thrilled to talk to them!  We sign on.  Call Holly.  No one answers.  So, Jason says that Holly was with Ashleigh.  So, we try Ashleigh.  Holly is there.  She holds up a book.  Asks if we like the book?  I'm slightly confused.  Sure.  I like the book.  It has cute cartoony Taiwanese little people and Chinese writing on it.  I think that I say that it's cute.  Then Holly swings the computer around and I see Ashleigh holding a baby.  An adorable little boy!  Is is Beckett?  Nope.  Not Beckett.  Surely that's not OUR baby!  I thought the one that the birthmom was having was going to be our baby?  I'm stunned!  This is so unexpected!  And I'm usually not this easy.  I'm very suspicious and guess things easily.  I think after talking to Trena the night before, I had reconciled myself to at least another week waiting.  I didn't suspect a thing!!  Wow!  So, this precious boy was.....ours!!!!!  So, I'm not really sure what all I said.  No doubt some really dumb stuff.  And my expression must've looked shocked/stunned!

After we got off, I couldn't remember even the most basic facts about Maddox--when he was born, how much he weighed.  I had to ask Holly again later to verify!!  Ashleigh sent us pictures of Maddox.  He. Is. PRECIOUS!  I quickly adjust the colors of the birth announcement I made up 2 weeks ago to match the clothes he's wearing and text the announcement to our parents.  Then to my brother and sisters.  Then post it on FB.  Comments start pouring in.  "Congratulations."  "He is beautiful." they say.  I am over the moon.  Giddy {for lack of a better word}.  I still can't believe it!  I have another son!  We get ready and go to get a big stack of papers notarized.  The woman is super nice.  She remembers us from when she notarized a big stack of papers from Mia's adoption!  She loves seeing Mia.  We go eat lunch.  Go back home.  Jason needs to go to St. Jo.  I need to go to Kansas City.  We run in the house for a minute.  After TWO tries on the UPS website, we finally print an overnight FEDEX shipping label for TECO.  I'm not sure what the kids are doing during this time.  Climbing on furniture or something.  Luckily, no one gets hurt, since we're frantically trying to print this silly label.  After starting to leave town and remembering just in time that I need money and copies of passports, I go back for them.  We finally make it to the Secretary of State.  We have SEVENTEEN documents for them to certify.  It will take an hour--they say.  We wait.  I make Mia lay her head down on my shoulder and take a short nap.  After an hour, and 2 tootsie roll pops, we're ready to go.  We find a Kinko's to make copies.  The kids and I go in.  We need a bazillion copies.  I sit Mia on the table thing to look out the window.  That lasts 2 seconds.  She's much rather shuffle the meticulously sorted piles of paper together.  I make her sit.  She cries.  Mason is all over the place too.  Madison is an angel and helps me.  It's pretty much a zoo.  People stare.  It's a good thing they don't know I'm there copying adoption paperwork.  They'd think "This woman doesn't need more kids!"  :)

We FINALLY get them all copied.  We load up in the car {again} and go to TECO.

I remember it well from last time and immediately feel at home.  The 2 Taiwanese women exclaim over Mia.  They talk to all the kids and ask them how old they are.  Ask them if they're excited to have a new brother.  They are so nice and friendly.  They hug us when we leave.  We drive through traffic and stop at Kohl's.  Our day is not complete without buying something for Maddox!  We find a 'little brother' onesie and a hat.  We eat a celebration dinner with my sister, brother-in-law and their daughter {she's having her baby boy, Bowen, next week}.  We finally get back home and put the kids to bed.  My phone has died twice today from overuse.  :)  I remember Ashleigh's journal.  Now...I finally have a quiet moment.  I didn't want to read it before--and just skim over it.  So, I read.  I cry.  I am incredibly humbled by how much everyone has invested in us.  That everyone's hearts were heave for...US....for me and my family.  It's hard for me to comprehend.  I am humbled.  I am grateful.  I cry for Maddox's precious birthmom.  Such an amazing, wonderful day for us.  Such a heartbreaking day for her.  I pray for peace for her.  I pray that somehow she knows how MUCH we love him already.  I still can't believe this has all happened!  I expected it every day.  But somehow, it seemed like it would never happen!!  Thank you, God, for my precious family.

I am blessed.

Oh, how He loves us...

Adoption is close to God's heart.

He adopted you and I, after all!

We are Jesus' brothers and sisters!

God is our Dad!

I never realized before,

never fully comprehended--

until we brought Mia home.

Until I held her in my arms.

There is no difference

in the love I feel for her

and the love I feel for the children

I gave birth to--

the children that have my genes,

my DNA.

So, I realize now,

that there's no difference

in the love that God feels

for me and for you

and the love that He feels

for His Son, Jesus.

If we could all comprehend that,

this world would be a better place.

I'm still here....

....waiting.

A friend of mine wrote this on FB this morning:

"I'm not a fan of how the adoption wait can zap away days, weeks of your life.

I guess only if/when you let it but I have a very hard time balancing the here and now..."

That's exactly where I am right now.

Struggling to not let this adoption wait

zap away the here and now.

How we got here.....

Jason and I got married when we were both 19.  We had dated for a couple of years and had been engaged for almost a year.  So, we got married.  Jason was going to school to be a respiratory therapist, and I worked at a bank.  Jason finished school after we'd been married for about a year.  We bought our first house and talked about having kids.  After we'd been married a year and a half, we decided to start trying.  We got pregnant the first month.  My pregnancy was pretty normal.  Morning sickness for the first trimester.  I craved milk and eggs.  Jason was amazing.  He started vacuuming the house when I first got pregnant (and now--almost 13 years later--he's still vacuuming!).  He went to ALL of the doctor's appointments.  At 23 weeks, we had a special doctor's appointment.  We were going to have a sonogram!.  We were going to find out if the baby was a boy or a girl!  WhooHoo!!  How exciting!  But when they did the ultrasound, the technician saw things that shouldn’t be there.  We were sent to a neonatologist, who told us the baby had severe problems and could not live outside my body.  Our baby boy was stillborn a few days later.  We named him Jay and buried him.

The doctor said he didn’t know what had caused the problems, but statistically speaking, we should have no more problems.  He said to wait 3 months before trying to get pregnant again.  So, we waited the 3 months.  We tried again after 3 months and again got pregnant immediately.  This pregnancy also went well.  I wasn’t particularly worried.  Statistics were on my side!  However, when I was 24 weeks, I was at work, and realized that I hadn’t felt the baby move in several hours.  I called my doctor and spoke to the nurse.  She said to drink a coke, lay down, and concentrate on feeling the baby's kicks.  So, I did that.  But there was still no movement.  We went in to the doctor, and he found the baby’s heartbeat.  He said everything was fine and not to worry (I know he thought we were just overreacting).  But we were worried.  He finally sent us on to the same neonatologist that we had seen before with my first pregnancy.  The neonatologist saw us immediately--the same day.  He did a Level 2 sonogram to look at the baby.  This time the baby looked fine.  I was so relieved.  But the doctor still looked concerned.  Surely there couldn't possibly be anything wrong--the baby looked fine.  But the problem was with me this time--not the baby.  I was in labor and didn’t know it.  My body was pushing the baby out before it was time.  (I was later diagnosed with an incompetent cervix.)  The neonatologist's office was in a hospital, so they rushed me to labor and delivery.  I was thankful that Jason always came to the doctors appointments--so he was there.  They gave my baby steroids for his lungs, but there wasn’t enough time for them to work.  My doctor had to do an emergency c-section.  Jayden lived 10 hours.  Jason stayed with our son most of that time.  I slept--trying to block out this nightmare we were living for the second time.  We buried Jayden beside his brother.

The next days, months were a blur.  I looked around me in intense anger at THEM.  You know the ones.  The ones that pop babies out like crazy.  The ones that can't stand the children they have, and yet they're having more.  The ones that are on drugs--that leave their children to fend for themselves--or worse.  I felt so isolated and alone.  I'd be lying if I said that I was an amazing Christian during this time. That I completely trusted Him and His plan for my life.  I didn't.  I screamed in anger at God about the unfairness of it all.  It was a dark time.  After a while, we we found a support group for people who had lost babies.  We went to several meetings and found that being with others who have been through the same thing helps a lot.  We read books on grief and loss.  We prayed a lot and and lots of prayers were offered up on our behalf.  We tried again three months later and got pregnant with Madison.  We went to the same neonatologist weekly for the whole pregnancy this time.  I was scared to death the entire time.  My doctor put a cerclage in and our sweet Madison was born by c-section at 36 weeks.

Two years later, we decided to have another baby.  Precious Mason was born by c-section 5 weeks early but (thank God) had no health problems.

However, when the doctor was doing the c-section, he said we could not have any more children.  He said my uterus was "tissue paper thin" and after 3 c-sections (one of them an emergency c-section) would not withstand another pregnancy.  If I did get pregnant again, my uterus would split and kill the baby and me.  And honestly, having no more children was fine with us.  We had 2 precious children.  A girl and a boy.  That's the American dream, right?  And it was fine--for a while.  But after a couple of years went by, we knew we still had love in our hearts for more children.  But we couldn't have any more.  I was convinced (for a while) that God would miraculously heal my body and we'd have more children.  That was not His plan.  And I am so grateful it wasn't.
We decided to look into adoption.  I didn't really know anyone that had adopted.  Where/How do you start?  I started looking at agencies and was soon overwhelmed--by the burden of choosing the right one and by the cost.  How could we afford it?  Jason is an evangelist/church planter.  We don't have $20,000 to $40,000 just hanging out in the bank.  We didn't even have a tiny fraction of that!  We pretty much had NO money.  But I knew in my heart that God had called us to do this.  To adopt a precious child.  HE would make a way (not me).  After doing lots of research and getting pretty much nowhere, I was discouraged.  Then, at a wedding, a friend told me that her sister-in-law was adopting from a mission group in Taiwan.  Since it was a mission group, there were no agencies--so no agency fees.  I must admit that's the main thing that made us see about adopting from His Hands.  Less money (since we had no money to adopt).  I didn't know then what I know now--that if God gives you a heart to adopt, He WILL make a way.  So, we applied to adopt through His Hands Taiwan.  After nine long months of waiting, we saw our daughter's face.

Five months later, we traveled to Taiwan to get her.

We are truly blessed.
We knew even before we brought her home that we wanted to adopt again.  The amazing experiences we had in Taiwan and with the wonderful people at His Hands only affirmed what we already knew.  If they would allow us to, we would adopt from His Hands again.  They said we could, so we submitted our application in January 2011--before Mia was even a year old.  We knew that the adoption process is a long one, so we applied before we were really ready.  And now, we've been waiting a little over a year this second time.  Mia is 2 now.  I am ready to see our next son or daughter's face!!  Thanks for traveling along on this long, twisty, amazing journey with us!!

TWO {mia}

Our sweet Mia is two today!

It's hard to believe.

Time goes by so quickly.

Here's a little bit about what she's doing lately:

-18-24 months clothes

-Size 5 to 6 shoes

-loves Elmo

-sings along to music

-holds a pencil/pen correctly

-potty-trained {except for sleeping}

-still doesn't eat much--kinda picky

-ADORES her "Bubby" and "Sissy"

-asks "Where's Dad" a MILLION times a day

-calls dogs "Ruff-Ruffs"

-into EVERYTHING

-pretty sure she could scale Mt. Everest with ease

We love you, sweet girl!!

another mother

On this day two years ago {it's March 1st in Taiwan now}, a woman across the world chose LIFE for her daughter.  Well, she actually chose life for her much before that.  This amazing woman went against friends and family to give the most precious gift to her daughter.  She chose not to abort her.  Even though she could not raise this baby herself, she made the ultimate selfless decision to let her daughter live--even if it meant that she had to give her up.  I have so much respect for this amazing woman.  She loved her daughter so much that she chose what was best for this baby--even though I know it broke her heart.  I know she must think about Mia on this day.  I pray that she knows how much we love Mia.  I pray that she feels peace in knowing that she made the right decision.  We cannot imagine life without our sweet Mia.

How it all began...

In May of 2010, I made my first Scrabble tile necklaces.

It was really just a trial thing--to see how hard it was to make them.
I had ordered a little "kit".
There was enough to make 10 Scrabble tile pendants.
What to put on them?
We were in the process of adopting from Taiwan,
so why not do a map pendant?

They seemed easy enough, and I thought they were cute.

I thought maybe others that were adopting would be interested in them.

I sold ONE.

Then, at a church meeting, a good friend 
asked me to make a map necklace for her.
She wasn't adopting or anything.
She wanted it of the town she lived in.
She said she'd hang it on her rearview mirror.
Well, I may not be a genius or anything,
but I could tell she was just trying to help us out
{by purchasing something she really had no use for}. 
She's sweet.

Then I got to thinking about what else I could put on these Scrabble necklaces.

God gave me the idea to put Scripture on them.

So, I did.

And everyone loved them!

I sold more of them than I ever {in my wildest dreams} imagined that I would.

Soon, I started customizing them--putting names on them.

I did photos.

 I figured out that I could design these necklaces with pretty much anything on them!

At this time I had started an Etsy shop, but had photos of all the necklaces that I had available in a personal Facebook album.  I started getting friend requests from people I didn't know.  They wanted to see my necklaces.  I decided it was time to start a Facebook page specifically for

The Adopt Shoppe.

My brain seemed to always be thinking of more things that I could make.

More ways to raise money for our adoption.

I made some braided fabric bracelets with hand stamped tags.

Again, everyone loved them.

I never dreamed how much people would love them!

These turned out to be too hard on my sewing machine to make.

So, I redesigned them.

Now I sell these:

I sell a variety of things now.

Word/Number Art Prints.

Leather Bangles:

Stamped Leather Cuffs:

Uganda Bead Necklaces:
The beautiful beads in these necklaces are hand made by Ugandan women.  The women carefully roll strips of magazines by hand into lovely, unique and earthy looking beads. Prior to learning how to make these beads, most of the women "picked trash" or turned to prostitution to provide for their children.

I absolutely LOVE these His Eye is on the Sparrow Necklaces:

I recently started making some hand-stamped sterling silver jewelry:

 And, of course, I still make the Wooden Tile Necklaces:

Since I opened my Etsy Shop in May 2010,

I have sold 2,286 items through my little shop.
I have 1,000+ people following my
little Facebook page.
We paid for our first adoption and
we're now raising funds for our 2nd adoption.
How did I do this?
I didn't.
God did.

I've never done anything like this before.

I've never made jewelry.

I've never started or owned a business.

I'm simply a stay-at-home mom of 3

{soon to be 4},

who homeschools her kids,

has a never-ending pile of dirty laundry,

who struggles with doubts and failures

just like you.

But God loves me.

He loves you.

He sees my pathetic attempts

and He uses them for good.

Maybe you are on your own adoption journey

to your child.

Maybe you are discouraged.

It costs so much.

Satan hates adoption.

So he attacks you,

your marriage,

everything.

Your friends don't understand

why you're doing this.

They quietly drift away.

You have doubts and

wonder if you are really

supposed to be on this adoption journey at all.

You feel alone.

But you're not.

God is there.

He will stay by your side.

He will help.

He is there when it feels like no one else is.

God is big.

Bigger than you and I.

Bigger even than our perception of Him.

He will help you do things.

Big things.

Things you never imagined.

Just trust.