September 29th - Finish the Race

Monday has arrived again and I can not believe that October will be upon us this week. I am still wondering where the summer went? The weekend went by fast as well. We did complete our mileage on Saturday in very humid weather. It ended up being a good time of reflection for me and gave me a renewed sense of perserverance as we continue down the adoption path. After our run and several bagels (and candy corns - my favorite!) later, I met with a mother of three adopted children. She shared with me their adoption story and we discussed some of the "ins and outs" of adoption. Her family is a tapestry and she was sharing with me some of the questions she gets on a daily basis. It is funny what people think and ask or assumptions they make. Initially, we were very apprehensive about adoption and what people might think, but after time and prayer we realized that all children are gifts from God and we would be blessed to parent and love any child. I know it will take time for us to adjust to questions if our children do not "look" like us, but I also think it will open doors to make friends and reach out to people we might have never had the opportunity to prior to adoption - that is my prayer. We also want our child to draw strength from the fact that they are adopted rather than view it as a disadvantage.

I want to thank friends that have pasted along names of physicians that we could reach out to and send our family profile. We feel that this outreach is a worthy one and appreciate anyone you think might come across potential birthmothers/parents. We will simply send a letter explaining that we are wanting to adopt a child along with our profile telling them more about us. We have heard through others that this avenue can be very fruitful.

Additionally, we are trying to decide whether we are going to pursue some other agencies and would appreciate prayers that we make the right decisions. It is an expensive endeavor and we want to make sure we are making the best decision in this regard.

We hope that everyone is doing well! We plan on posting more pictures soon!

Thank you all for your continued support!

Love,
Christy and Malcolm
lovingparents@live.com

September 26th - Praise Him in the Rain

The title definitely describes how I feel today - to remember to praise HIM in the rain (as well as the sunshine). It has been rainy, windy and cold here (cold at least for my standards) for the past couple of days. It is so easy to complain about the yucky weather, but I try to make an effort to look at the positive side. The winter is my least favorite season. I love summers - bring on the heat any day! However, I have learned that seasons like winter have upsides too and help us to appreciate the other seasons even more. That is how I (we) try to look at our adoption/infertility journey. It has been/is a difficult season right now, but it will make us appreciate our bundle of joy even more some day. I do not think we will take any day with our child for granted and will cherish every moment. (I am realistic in that I know it will not always be easy, but I hope that when we are faced with the hard times in raising a child that I always remember the "season" we went through to get him/her.).

Last night, I had dinner with some dear friends of mine - running buddies. They are such an encouragement to me (us). We all became friends through a common goal - training for the Richmond Marathon. We have met some of the most wonderful people through our training team. ("Nutty L" - what would we do without you?!) Tomorrow, I am supposed to run 16 miles and Malcolm is running 20 miles. It is supposed to be raining tomorrow which will add to the "fun" and determination needed to finish this feat. During the long runs, I have ALOT of time to think, pray, think and pray some more. I am very slow so, there is a lot of time to cover a lot of territory in this regard. Recently, I have tried to really use this time to pray for our child. Now, I have to admit I start down this road and tend to drift off to thinking about how big of a cheeseburger I am going to have when I am done or what toppings I want on my pizza. However, I have used this physical goal of mine as a way to focus on our adoption prayers. (Did I mention how much time I have during these runs?). I also feel like a have a team of fellow runners who are supporting us along the way. There is a lot of time to "share" as we embark upon these longer runs. :) Tomorrow will be a feat for me, but I am hoping that I will finish the run with a renewed sense of hope and peace about the gift that God will provide us when the time is right.

Thank you all for your continued support and encouragement.

Love,
Christy and Malcolm
lovingparents@live.com

September 21st - Amazing Grace

The title fits the sermon and my sentiment today. I am so thankful for HIS amazing, unending grace. Also, I am thankful for my husband. He is so life giving to me and I know with all my heart that he will be an amazing father some day - hopefully, sooner rather than later. I think that is one of the more difficult aspects of infertility (whatever the reason) and long journey to adopt a child - watching your spouse (my husband) want to have a child more than anything and not being able to make it happen. However, this adoption journey has already brought about many reasons to be thankful. One of those being that it has drawn us closer together as a couple. It is amazing when I am discouraged and down, he is upbeat, positive and full of encouragement. Whereas, at times he is down (although, not very often), I am able to be the encourager and positive one.

To provide a little insight to the father my husband will be someday, I was talking with a friend earlier and she shared with me this story. We met her, her husband and daughter (and soon to arrive son) about a month or so ago. We have been over to their house and seen them a handful of times. One of the places we first saw them was at our favorite bagel shop - Einstein Brothers. Now, every time they go to the bagel shop on Saturday mornings, their daughter asks where we are and they have to explain that we don't live there (although, we practically do - coffee and bagels - that combination screams my name. :) ). This past Saturday, they went to get bagels and we weren't there, but they happened to see me running on the way back. Their daughter proceeded to ask "Where was Malcolm"? She then went on to say that while she really liked me (she is 3 1/2 years old), Malcolm was her favorite. She said that Malcolm was her best friend and she was really sad that she didn't get to see him. When my friend told me this story, my heart just melted. Malcolm has such a way with kids and they just love him. (It might be the fact that he is a kid at heart - just kidding, honey! :) ). Anyway, it reiterated to me once again that he is going to make an awesome father!! I can not wait for the day when he can call himself a "Dad".

On the marketing front (for lack of a better word), we are working to update our profile and are planning to send it out to physicians (OB-GYNs primarily). Ideally, we would like to send our profile out to physicians that are personally recommended by friends or family members. We have found that if there is some type of connection, the physician might feel more comfortable passing along our profile to a birthmother or birthparents that are choosing an adoption plan for their child. With that said, if anyone can recommend a physician(s) that we could send along our profile, please let us know. (You can contact us at lovingparents@live.com).

We can't thank you enough for your continued support throughout our adoption journey.

Love,
Christy (and Malcolm)
lovingparents@live.com

September 19th - Where does the time go?

Once again, this week has flown by and I am just sitting down to right a few words. It has been busy with work and I have not had the time to devote to some of our adoption endeavors and goals. Weeks like this tend to discourage me as I would like to be able to fully devote my time to the pursuit of finding our little one. However, I do think that balance and realizing that I can not control every aspect of the adoption process is important. To update, I mentioned in a previous posting that we had submitted our profile for a potential opportunity however, this opportunity did not pan out as many do not. There were several complications with the birthmother that would not have made it a good situation. Additionally, it was a very expensive situation. With domestic adoption, the costs can vary significantly so, unfortunately this aspect has to be taken into consideration. Nonetheless, we are still pressing toward the goal and staying encouraged.

I will write more in the day next or two, but for now, I wanted to at least provide a quick update.

Thank you for continued support along our journey!

Love,
Christy and Malcolm
lovingparents@live.com

September 14th - Pressing Toward The Goal

Phil 3:13: .....I am focusing all my energies on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead.

This verse really applies to all aspects of my life, but especially applies as we are looking forward to the day when we will be parents. Today, I have found solitude in this verse in more ways than one. Sundays tend to be a day of reflection for obvious reasons, but also because we all tend to slow down a bit and have time to reflect on the past week and the week ahead of us. I can tend to get weary and impatient about the thorns in my life right now - one of those being the adoption process not happening fast enough. Today, I came upon this verse and feel that it really speaks to me (both of us). We are making the decision to "Press Toward the Goal" - focus our energies not on the past, but what lies ahead. God has good things planned for us and we are choosing to focus on this promise.

We have posted a slideshow of sorts and/or our profile under the category named Favorite Websites and Pictures so, please feel free to take a look at it. The pictures are older so, we need to update them. (I wish my friends that are photographers lived closer so, they could help in this area. :) ). Also, I was remiss in mentioning earlier, but please feel free to pass along this blog to anyone that you may know that would be interested in our journey and/or could potentially come in contact with potential birthmothers or parents. We are hoping this blog will not only help us stay connected with family and friends, but also connect us with the birthmother/parents that will choose us to parent their child.

Thank you all for supporting us along our journey.

Love,
Christy and Malcolm
lovingparents@live.com
www.longingtobeparents.shutterfly.com

September 11th - A Day of Remembrance

Boy, this week has flown by as this is the first opportunity I have had to sit down and post. Once again, I had wanted to make more progress on the blog display this week than I have done. However, this project will happen in due time. We have definitely learned the art of patience in going through the adoption process. It is all in HIS time and we have had to learn to rest in that reassurance. We have heard from so many of you that have encouraged us and reminded us of that. Before I forget, we thank you all for your support, encouragement and prayers. It means more to us than words can express.

Typically, I do not have to travel for work, but today of all days I flew to Kansas City with a lay over in Detroit. I found myself reflecting on the horrific events that occurred 7 years ago today. I am so thankful to all those heros on that day. My prayer today has been for all those who were directly affected by the events of that sad day. Although, I know every one of us was affected, but I find myself grieving all over for the families and friends that lost loved ones. I also pray that God continues to watch over and protect our country. As we so want to start a family and raise a child or children in this world, I feel myself praying more and more for our country. I want our child/children to grow up in a country that provides a safe haven for them.

In the midst of my travels today, I spoke with a Christian agency about a potential opportunity. I know the word "opportunity" sounds so trivial or inappropriate to describe a baby. I stop myself many times when I use this term to describe a precious life. However, we have come to grips with the fact that each child that becomes available for adoption is not always meant for us. We have submitted our profile approximately a dozen or more times and each situation or "opportunity" do not always end up moving forward. Obviously, the situations that did move forward with a birthmother or parent choosing us did not end up in a child for us, but we know it is in God's time. Back to my point, there is an opportunity that has come up through an out-of-state agency. The next step is to submit our profile along with many other potential adoptive parents and the birthmother (in this case) will choose an adoptive couple that she feels would be best suited to parent her child. As you might guess, we do get our hopes up each time and say alot of prayers, but know it will work out when it is "our" child.

Again, many thanks to each of you for your support during our journey. It has been so wonderful to hear from friends and family we have not had the opportunity to speak with in some time.

I plan on posting our adoption profile soon (....once I figure out how to perform that function :) ). Please feel free to pass it along to anyone that may come in contact with birthmothers and/or parents who may choose an adoption plan for their child.

Love,
Christy (and Malcolm)

September 7th - Gratitude

It is a beautiful Sunday in Virginia and we find ourselves feeling so blessed to have such good friends and family supporting us as we venture down this unknown road in our lives. The days are mixed with feelings of hope, encouragement, anticipation, peace, frustration, impatience, prayers, praises, upsets and more prayers. However, at the end of the day, we do have a peace that God has a plan for us and is in control. We are so thankful to be able to rest in that fact. We are also thankful that we have such a supportive church family. Today, we were having some planning and prayer time together at our favorite coffee establishment. (You all know how much I love coffee! :) ). It ended up being such an uplifting time as we ran into friend after friend from church. (I must add that it was kind of humorous in a sense because we were participating in "bedside church" as Malcolm calls it. Our running group met this morning instead of yesterday due to the tropical storm that came through on Saturday.) After a good laugh with everyone about our church service at the coffee shop, we left with such gratitude that we have so many people supporting and praying for us.

Today, our prayer requests are for a speedy adoption process and a healthy child. I always felt selfish asking for a healthy child, but I have come to realize that it is okay to ask for the desires of our hearts. However, if he provides a child that has some health issues, we will feel just as blessed and know it is all in his plan. We cannot wait to be parents! I thought I would close with a note to our little one. I know that might sound weird, but we look forward to the day when he or she can read about how we longed for them to come into our lives.

Love, Christy (and Malcolm)

To our precious child,

We cannot wait to meet you and hold you for the first time. We dream about that day. I pray today for God's protection over you whether you are not yet conceived, in the womb or already in this world. We love you even though we have never met you. I already have a friend who said she would take a picture of us when we first lay eyes on you. I can't wait for that moment. It is going to be magical! Please know you were loved before we ever met you. We know you will be a light in this world.

All our love,
Your Mom and Dad

lovingparents@live.com

September 6th - Renewed Hope

Our intent was to "announce" or distribute our blog to our family and friends earlier this week, but I was determined to try and improve upon the appearance and features. I am coming to realize that it has to be a "work-in-progress" and it won't be perfect from the get go.

Since my last (and first) post, it has been a week of encouragement and renewed hope for us. We are continually reminded of God's love for us and his sustaining grace. Earlier this week, we reached out to our Pastor and asked him for guidance as to how we could reach the greater church family about our desire to adopt in our attempt to reach as many people as possible. He graciously connected us with a couple who just adopted a baby boy last week. They went through some trying and difficult times during their adoption journey, but now are blessed with a beautiful baby boy. I just got off the phone with her and she was such an encouragement to me/us. We feel so blessed that God has placed people like this couple and our Pastor in our lives. We are encouraged that it will happen for us as well. We just need to continue to perservere and pray for direction.

In closing, we hope this posting finds everyone well. Please know you all are in our thoughts often and we so wish we could spend time with each of you. Please feel free to email or call us anytime. Our adoption/family email is lovingparents@live.com.

Love,

Christy and Malcolm