At-Home Christmas Love

I love being home for this holiday.  I just do.  It goes slow and that is just my speed. Josh is off work and we savor the time all home and free with NOTHING requiring our time or busyness.  Myself, I did a lot of reading so far this break.  Josh and the kids did a lot of playing. 

 

Christmas Eve eve, we drove around to see lights on houses.  We enjoyed milkshakes along that ride.

 

 

 

 

We'll have to beef up our Scavenger Hunt next year. 

More Christmas mail! 

Enjoying the tradition of having all our years of Christmas cards all up in our tree.

Our neighbors brought over a bag of so many fun surprises for the kids - this wall decal tree (and a snowman) being the fave.  A tree I let the kids actually decorate - HA! Adorable.

Christmas Eve, we read and played and prepped for our upcoming trip.  And we opened one gift of each of the kids'.  Anna loved her boogie board (drawing tablet), Noah loved his virtual reality headset, and Lasa loved the play doh ice cream set Noah got her.  So fun!

Josh did NOT love realizing how much assembly was required for Noah's foosball set that night after the kids went to bed.  Rookie mistake!

 

Noah and I were up first Christmas morning, which was funny because I told them don't wake me up til 8.  But there I was at 6 with a migraine and tossing and turning anyway.  When I heard Noah creep downstairs, I figured, What the heck?  He and I played some rounds on his new table til everyone else got up an hour later. ;)

 

I kid you not, these silly coupons I made AT THE LAST MINUTE ended up being the kids' favorites.

All I asked for this year was for Josh to DEEEEEEP clean our bathroom.  He delivered and I love it!  He also surprised me with some pistachios that I have been craving here lately.  Josh got a nice new giant TV for Christmas. ;)

Selfie before Lasa got up.

Then cuteness woke up and the fun started all over again.

 

 

After stockings and Santa items, it was time to dig into presents.  Anna raved about the things they got this year.  Best year yet, she said.  Everything was so perfect for them. You know me so well, she said. 😍  Me, I am just stoked we didn't overbuy and we also didn't get a single video game or movie. Ha!

 

 

 

 

Selfie of all five of us.

This karaoke microphone Anna got is TOO MUCH FUN, y'all.  It just takes you over.  So fun.  And funny.

 

Christmas morning blessing - Angelique texted a really nice greeting.  It was fun to not bristle at her tone or content. We texted back with Lasa's "Mewwy Cwissmas" response and this hello. 

Lasa wore this gown alllllll the way to bedtime.  Only taking it off when she had to go potty. ;)

Speaking of birthparents, Noah bought Tania and Justin a gift this year of his own volition, paid for it with his own money and all.  We went back and forth about what sort of gift he should get them ... his first idea was a bible, we considered movie tickets for them all to see together.  In the end, we settled on something they could hang in their home to remember him with all year, something that would be encouraging, because we know how badly Tania misses Noah all the time.  Hobby Lobby gave us so many good options.  Noah landed on this as his favorite.  

His precious note on the back for them.  (I helped him edit and draft, but the heart and the message were his. I'm not crying, you're crying!)  I just know they will love it.  

The car got packed tonight, we let the kids watch their first ever "scary" movie (The Village) which was so random but so fun, Josh is already asleep, and I am headed that way now too.  The plan is for him to get us up at 3 or 4 a.m. and get ourselves on down to FL as fast as we can.  That means the kids have asked ME to drive instead of Josh.  HA!  Please Lord let us not get stuck in traffic.  Thank you, Lord, for a sweet at-home Christmas again this year.  

Make way, Memaw and Papa John.  The TN Browns are on the way!

Our Own Private Psalm 118

From Psalm 118

"This is from the LORD,  and it is marvelous in our eyes."

As this really amazing, yet exhausting, year/chapter draws to a close, I just have to stop and testify one more time to what the Lord did right in front of our eyes, what he allowed us to see be accomplished from start to finish.  Which I realize isn't always the case; we don't always get to see the finish/purpose of a thing in this lifetime.  For the gift of getting to see the finish, and for everything it revealed to us about the hardships that came in front of it, we thank the Lord over and over and over again.  Every tear, every seeming set back, random timing, every delay, every detail was in His hands, and when we face trials after this, we will have this rich, intense, hard, and beautiful experience to draw upon and encourage us to not waver in faith - we will always know that the hardship, the trial, is accomplishing something that serves His purposes and, in so doing, are for our best, ultimately.  And in case we do forget, I will have this blog as a type of stone-of-remembrance to remind us again.  Thank you, Lord, over and over again and again for the closure, favor, and peace You delivered this year in the form of Lasa's adoption at the end of this JJ road we've walked with You.

Some really cool specifics that are amazing in our eyes:

• The fact that Lasa came back to us 10 days after reunifying with Angelique at rehab in the fall of 2015. We thought that was a closed case when we drove away that day.  And then the fact that Josh heard the phone at 2 in the morning on my side of the bed when DCS called.  The phone that was on silent.  Josh, who hears nothing while he sleeps, woke up to the quiet vibration of my phone and actually got up to check it while we were not expecting any calls, when his sleep personality is normally to roll over and go back to sleep when woken up.  Amazing!
• How stunned and frustrated we were when Angelique changed plans on the spot and contested  DCS's proposition for temporary custody in Jan. 2016. It wasn't a big deal to us because we had no intention of this going permanent, it was just a shock because that wasn't the agreement going into the courtroom that day, and her doing that on the spot really delayed progress by requiring a whole other trial between her and DCS, which meant we had to wait til April to know what came next as far as our involvement would go.  It felt like SUCH a waste of time and we were so frustrated.  In the end, that three month wait for trial was the exact window in which she was arrested THREE times for aggravated assault against her new husband and violating protective orders.  She was back in jail again by the time the trial for temp custody got here, which meant the temporary custody case was EASILY won by DCS and, before we knew it, she was in our full custody til August's next legal date arrived.  So that frustrating delay caused by Angelique's aimlessness and combativeness ended up being the VERY THING that protected Lasa in that end and ensured she remained in a safe place. Amazing!
• When custody turned permanent in August 2016 and we realized her placement was going to end up in an adoption after all, I began giving it to the Lord and asking expectantly that he would provide for a lawyer because I knew our savings was basically empty at the moment.  I absolutely thought I was praying for how the money would all come together, but He did a cooler thing.  Out of nowhere, after 18 mos of working together, Lasa's guardian ad litem mentioned that she would be able to provide her legal services for the TPR and bill the state for her work since she was involved in that capacity by them to begin with. WHAT?  Amazing! An attorney OFFERS her services free of charge out of nowhere?  Amazing.
• The legal timeline that transpired from filing TPR in January 2017 to completing it in April 2018 was especially grueling for me emotionally.  There were new Angelique antics and deceit and disrespect.  There was the slow movement of time.  There were relational tensions as a result that we all suffered through while legalities continued their tedious roll.  There were two separate continuances that popped up at the last minute before two different court dates.  An April 2017 hearing finally scheduled an August TPR trial date.  Then August's date got continued to December 2017.  And most unbelievable of all, because of Lasa's atty's scheduling snafu, December's court date had to be continued AGAIN ... for April 2018.  That last continuance about killed me ... except for how the Lord sustains, and for how Josh had SUCH a clear vision that even this delay was orchestrated by the Lord and something he was doing.  And He did! It was amazing.  By the time the TPR trial came around in April 2018, Angelique had had enough time to hang herself yet again ... giving birth to another drug-exposed baby.  That fact alone ushered in such favor for our case with the judge, who along with evidence and history of the case, granted TPR on the spot with adoption being the goal right after.  Amazing! Just amazing. 
• That day of TPR trial, we came with our ducks in a row full of notes and timelines and dates of visits and missed visits and on and on.  We were ready to plead our case.  And you know what the Lord allowed instead?  He flexed his muscles so we wouldn't rely on our own and had it turn out that Angelique, combative and unreasonable and unrealistic Angelique, showed up and moved to NOT EVEN CONTEST those grounds (abandonment) we had prepared to present and explain.  So like, she virtually walked in and just ... agreed with us.  She conceded those points without those points ever having to be presented!  Amazing.  My mind was blown. 
• Also amazing ... when all the common sense in the world said we should hire our own atty (remember that Lasa's ad litem/atty represents HER, not us), when all the delays and crappy, dismissive, sloppy treatment we received from Lasa's atty along the way said we needed an atty to fight for US in OUR corner for a change, when our weakness and waivering actually did push us to interview some atty's to help with the TPR, in the end we returned to something the Lord had gently put in our hearts from the get go - the fact that we only ever got into foster care for service to Him and for His glory however he would see it displayed in our foster care walk.  So we determined (again) that however TPR went, it was in His hands and we wanted nothing else.  Be we are human - we (more me than Josh - ha!) really had to stare down fear and frustration and LEAVE. IT. IN. HIS. Hands.  That meant walking into a TPR courtroom without our own representation because we know WHO REALLY REPRESENTS US and WHO REALLY DOES THE JUDGING.  And man oh man, did His justice prevail in that room that day.  It was so freaking intense, I tear up just remembering it, but man! the Lord did it all.  Alllll.  He proved true all the tender verses I was clinging to for peace the past two years.  It was Amazing to behold!  Even more so when I recall how Lasa's atty always reminded us that this was only a 50/50 shot, not a slam dunk, this judge doesn't grant TPR easily, and how she would be even less inclined to grant it because Lasa would be in a white family. I heard all those facts stacked against us and just knew that if we were granted TPR anyway, it would be all the more glory to God! Winning in the face of odds being not in our favor. Amazing.
• After the TPR, we did have to actually hire an atty finally to file the adoption paperwork as an adoption is entirely separate from TPR.  We interviewed three different recommended attorneys and the one we liked most ended up being the most affordable.  $1000 was her fee for all that it would involve.  Having just forked over a bunch for a homestudy, we were prepared to put it on credit or borrow from retirement savings to get it done.  And then one day out of nowhere, we  found a card from Josh's parents in the mail with a check for that EXACT AMOUNT enclosed with a note saying they wished for us to put the money toward Lasa's adoption however it would help.  They had no idea what amount or what costs we were working with ... yet it was the exact amount we needed.  Exact!  That, my friends, was from the Lord.  It was from my dear, generous, caring in-laws, but it was so tenderly from the Lord. So, so amazing!
• From there there was blessing upon blessing from the Lord. We lined up a photographer for adoption day, who in the end would not allow us to pay her for her services. She said it was her honor to be there with us that day.  Cue the tears.  Amazing!
• Another dear friend made a precious adoption day pull-apart cupcake cake as a surprise.  More tears.  Amazing!
• We were told we would be charged when we canceled the child support case we had open from 2017. Fine, whatever, it would be a couple hundred dollars.  But it would never come to be.  Perhaps we were mistold?  No bill for the cancellation ever came.  That - is from the Lord.  Amazing providence continued.
• The December in 2017 when we were fresh off the latest continuance that brought me so low personally ... we went to a Jonah's Journey Christmas party.  The speaker spoke from the story of Ruth and Naomi, talking about how the very trial that Naomi lamented and renamed herself Mara for - meaning bitterness! - ended up being the means through which the line of Jesse would come ... through which would come the Savior of the world!  This man spoke about entrusting our heartbreak and disappointments to Him who redeems all things.  "What is the Naomi in your life right now?" he asked us.  "What bitterness are you dwelling on?"  I was so moved - it was such a word to my heart from the Lord - I leaned over and told Josh if we were able to adopt Lasa that I wanted her middle name to be Naomi for sure.  Naomi was already on our short list, but that message, that perfectly timed word to my heart, challenging me to keep pressing in and trusting the Lord when I couldn't see why bad stuff was happening, that word was from the Lord.  And it was an amazing balm to my soul!
• I cannot even being to recount the specific, intimate, timely, perfect, piercing Scripture verses the Lord had come across my path in this JJ season in my reading or from sermons or from very apt words from friends who had no idea how encouraging their words were.  It. Was. Amazing. And the Lord carried me along with it all.  Many of them were blogged along the way from 2015-2018.  So glad I can pull those up and remember them there.

I would be strong in faith one day and weak and wobbly another.  I poured myself into fasting there in the last few months leading up to TPR,  I had reached such a point of desperation in the wait and anticipation.  The Lord was so near through the peaceful parts and the jagged edges.  This whole JJ chapter was such a refining fire - I testified to the burn all along as I clung to his promises for peace!  The Lord was so near as He always promises to be.  I FB'd a verse that sums it all up so well ... Psalm 73:28  which says, "But as for me, God’s presence is my good.  I have made the Lord God my refuge, so I can tell about all you do."

And that is what I wanted to make sure and do here again before this year closed once and for all.  Tell about all that He did that is amazing in our eyes and to declare that through high and low in this life, His presence is my good.  Amen!  Thank you, Lord. 

From Psalm 118

This is from the LORD,  and it is marvelous in our eyes.

Just Amazing.

Points I've Been Pondering

 

Cornrow Cutie

The last time we had Lasa's hair done in cornrows was her first time ever and that was October of last year.  I have been meaning to try them again this year and we just barely squeezed it in here in December.  The timing is perfect - right before a road trip.  Hopefully they will hold up long enough that I don't have to do her hair the entire time we are away - this will all depend on how easy she goes on her head while traveling and playing.  😬 Fingers crossed!  The stylist told us we should expect 2 weeks, mayyyybe 3.  That would be awesome.  Last year, when she was only two and we did a beach trip on her braids, we only got a week out of it before I couldn't stand how fuzzy it had gotten.  Excited to have a year older baby and a fresh set of braids to see how we fare.

Random hair note - this salon, Blown Away, is full of angels if you ask me.  They saved us while I was in TEARS from how another salon botched our appt earlier in the day and left us scrambling right here before Christmas.  I was furious at the mismanagement and the excuses the kids salon, Giggles and Glam, gave us.  So when the contact at Blown Away was able to squeeze us in on the spur of the moment, well ... it was a gift from the Lord and I told her so!  Doretha has our faithful business after today and we will henceforth sing her praises every chance we get!  

Before starting, she blow-dried Lasa's hair (a first!) and then trimmed it (eek - also a first!). 

Can you even stand the coifed cuteness???

 

 

 

Noah went with me to this appt and when he looked up to see the finished work, he said, "Wow! It doesn't even look like my Lasa anymore!  But you look SO pretty!"  Doretha thought he was just the most precious big brother.    

Other fun fact, I did the beads myself when we got home - first time for me!