Happy Birthday Darren!

Yesterday was Darren's 38th birthday.  I will be 35 on Monday.  It's hard to believe we are so close to 40. 

Adoption on Hold

I have a distant family member who is currently unable to care for her two daughters.  When Darren and I heard that they might be going into foster care, we agreed to let them stay with us.  As of last Wednesday, February 22 we are (temporarily) a family of five.  The girls are 18 months and 5.  Right now they are with us for the next 30 days.  They may be with us longer, they may not.  I cannot list any specifics, but God knows exactly what everyone involved in this situation needs.  Please pray for us, the girls and their parents.  Until we know more about how long the girls will be with us our adoption is on hold.  We are perfectly fine with that because these girls and their family is our main priority right now.  Thank you for your prayers!

Happy Valentine's Day - He First Loved Us

I received a Valentine email from Lifeline (our adoption agency) today and wanted to share it with you.  It is a great reminder of the perfect love we receive from God...better than any earthly Valentine we could ever receive or even imagine.

Happy Valentine's Day!

As followers of Christ, we love with a love that is not of this world. It goes beyond emotion, outward beauty, and "success." This love comes from God, so we are free to give it without hesitation or fear of not having enough or giving too much. We enjoy a love that is everlasting - always enough. One song exclaims:

"Oh, I'm running to Your arms

I'm running to Your arms

The riches of Your love

Will always be enough

Nothing compares to Your embrace

Light of the world forever reign."

"Forever Reign" - Hillsong

1 John 4:7-12

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.

Nate's Valentine Party

Class Valentines

I apologize for disappointing you if you were hoping to see a super cute crafty Valentine from Pinterest.  I actually looked at some several weeks ago and planned to do something crafty, but by the time Valentine's rolled around I wasn't in the mood to be crafty any more.  I guess that's normal...it's my normal anyway. 

So, Nate and I headed to Wal-Mart to pick out some not so crafty Valentines, which I am 100% positive he likes better than anything crafty I would have made.  Of course, he chose Cars valentines.  That was great with me and they came with pencils instead of candy. :)

Practicing writing, which is not one of Nate's favorite things. 

This one is my favorite.  It's to my dad.  We thought he would like to have a pencil also.  Nate sure does love his Pops.  We met my parents for lunch the other day and Nate totally bypassed my mom to see Pops first.  For the record, we will be giving Nan (my mom) a little something also.

The other day Nate was watching Cars 2 and I walked in the living room and found this.  He told me all of his cars were on "boats" (one actual boat, three sofa pillows and one dog toy) like the first part of the movie.     

I love this little boy and his imagination so very much.  

Gadgets Disappeared

Last night I was trying to add a button for The Cupcake Kids and my gadgets (blogroll, archive, other buttons) disappeared.  I've been to the blogger help forum, but there isn't a lot of info there.  If you have any suggestions, please let me know!