Every Child is a gift!

I am real reluctant to write this blog. But I can't help but to be excited. My heart is semi guarded at this point because I know the pain a parent endures when saying good bye to a child they have their hopes set on. But at the same time I have to every day pray for these two children and every day my love for them grows deeper and deeper. Nicholas and I talk about them like crazy. We dream up what our life would become if they become ours. And we pray un-endlessly for these two children. Now we had given up any bit of hope of bringing these children home, because we knew when there final adoption was taking place. The 3rd of this month. And we knew we would not be done with our licensing process. So like I mentioned before we changed our prayers. We prayed that they would find a family that would suit them, that would love them, and continue to keep them smiling (you will know what i mean when you see their picture!) We were still happy for them, that they would have a permenant family to call their own. But then we got the phone call back saying there was no family that met the criteria...and yet again we began to hold out hope. We know any day now a family could come along, but we are getting SOOOOOO close to being done!! This week we begin our training hours and not much more to go after that!! I cannot say that these children will be a match for us for sure or not....I cannot even say that we will be granted our request, but I can share with you all a pciture of the two children that we are praying for on a numerous times a day basis....and we can ask for you all to join us in prayer. That if not us, a family be found! The smiles on their face, along with Ashalyn's, is what has brought us through many many scared, fearful and lonely days!!!

Hope you all can smile right along with us by looking at this picture!!!
http://wtol.images.worldnow.com/images/incoming/HomeForKeeps/jamiaantonio.pdf
Now tell me that didnt bring a smile to your face!!!

Dying to Post

I have been dying to write this post. I have wrote it over and over but been too afraid to hit "post". I keep saying to myself "if I do, then people can pray for me. If I don't they can't." But also...."if I do, then it's that much harder to undo it if things don't work out."
And with that comment, I admit. I am SCARED TO DEATH! Anytime I am feeling great I panic. Anytime I feel a chill or feverish I panic. Anytime I recall any little moment from the past, I Panic. And finally, anytime I think happy thoughts about this baby, you got it...I PANIC. I am living in fear in a sense.
My past pregnancy with Briley got me through some very tough times. It helped us handle seeing new babies. It gave us a hope in the future when we felt we could not go on. And it gave us a hope in having future children after the tramatic birth of Miranda. We were super excited. And then that was ripped from us as well.
With Briley we made a decision to do something that most would not do at that week in the pregnancy. We also buried Briley...right next to Miranda. (this is some info that not many might know about us) But when sitting in the hospital waiting for Briley to be delivered, we debated. We went back and forth with the nurse. We fulled out the birth certificate but then resistated with the death certificate. We were NOT sure we had the money for another funeral but as soon as that death certificate was signed it was something we had to do for the baby. So we went back and forth....do we want to go through that again??
Well, I hesistate in saying this...but having that private burial was the best thing we could of done for ourselves. We buried Briley at a point when we were physically more capable of "being there" if that makes any sense. Nicholas and I were able to go down there, free of pain (not completely, but compared to Miranda's funeral) and we were able to focus on our grief as a couple, as parents, and we were able to turn our emotions into something more healthy and positive. Not only then were we able to grieve the loss of Briley, we were able to grieve Miranda. All by ourselves, without other people telling us how we should feel, without sitting there in so much pain that it's unbearable (at her funeral we were still pretty drugged up), and without the harsh, unloving feelings of hurt, jealousy, hatred, you name it.
But all that didn't change the one thing we still fear! And that's having to do it all over again, for a third time. I never ever imagined in our 3 years of marriage that we would of had these struggles and emotions, but I believe it is something that will now always stick with us til death do us part. I don't want to do it again now, nor 60 years from now.
With that fear, we were afraid to go at this adventure again. We were afraid to announce again that we are expecting. And we will NOT stop holding our breath until the result is us bringing a real, living baby home in our arms!! But all that fear does NOT mean we are not excited. BECAUSE BELIEVE ME...ANNOUNCING THE OTHER DAY THAT WE HEARD A HEARTBEAT....was absolutely amazing. I have never felt so proud to say that yes, we saw a very active and full of life baby moving inside of my womb on September 15th!
That ultrasound was the most emotional but yet heartwarming moment we have experience since last September 7th, when we heard and saw our baby for the very last time. It brought back flashbacks, but it brought back so much of our hope as a family. We may be living in a little fear, but we couldnt be more thankful to our Lord above for giving us this opportunity to be mom and dad yet again, whether for the time being or for our lifetime, we will now be the proud parents of 4 children. 2 living and 2 in heaven. Our prayers are that the status of our children does not change, but no matter what we know who our God is and poop on Satan....literally!
So....NOW THAT WE HAVE SEEN AND HEARD A STRONG HEARTBEAT....PLEASE JOIN US ON THIS EXCITING JOURNEY!! JOin us in prayer and in the blogworld as we continue to defeat that nasty devil guy. WE ARE LIVING PROOF OF GOD'S AWESOMENESS AND UNFAILING, UNCONDITIONAL LOVE!!!
We honestly believe God has SOOOO much instore for our Earthly family that we CANNOT wait to share this journey and adventure as we grow and wait for our day to all be reunited! (that all being said, continue to check back on our adoption process as well...God still is calling us on that path...just has blessed us in the meantime in yet another way!)

what the h*** are we supposed to do today?

Okay, so first excuse my language in my title...but honestly today feels like a complete day of confusion and blah-fulness (is that a word?)
Yesterday was Labor day. Today is the day Miranda was born, a year ago. But our accident happened on Labor Day. So yesterday we honored her in many ways. Nicholas walked the bridge and then my father-in-law and step-mother-in-law paid for us to get over to the island. Once we got there we loaded a horse carriage and we toured the island as our small little family. The first actually stop happened to be Mackinac Islands butterfly house. Soft music was playing and butterflies floated so gracefully about. We sat there on a bench together, Nicholas, Ashalyn and I and we cried. And we smiled. And we cried some more. We even laughed some. We then went back on the carriage to the lookout rock and we saw miles and miles of the beautiful great lakes. We remembered Miranda in such a "healthy" way. We had so much fun together as our little family.
And then there is today......the day we should be celebrating as her first birthday! And we had all these plans for the day and this is what we ended up with. We drove to Saint Ignance. On the way we got a very emotional and heartfelt text from Nick's sister, Lindsay! It meant the world to us....but we cried and cried. As soon as the tears began we turned to the right and yet again a mile long opening that followed the great lake Michigan! And it was then a whirlwind of confusion! We want to cry for her, but yet we just had to smile because it was like a little glimpse of heaven from our sweet Miranda. We got into Saint Ignance and the life there seemed so fast paced that it just didnt feel right. We got out for a bit but felt very uncomfortable. So then we choose to leave that town. As we are heading out we find another nice quiet lookout point over Lake Huron this time with a secluded park right along the lake shore. We spent a few minutes where Nicholas and Ashalyn threw rocks into the lake and then found the park. Within the first 2 minutes of being there we ventured down a double slide and splashed right into a huge puddle of water, soaking Ashalyn and Nicholas. We laughed some, but then realized we had no more clothes....so time to head back an hour back to Nick's dad's house. On the way back the wind blew harder and the bad weather picked up. Lake Michigan waves were HUGE, so we pulled off the side of the road and enjoyed that together for a bit. And now we are back at the house where it is pouring down rain. Ashalyn napping, Nicholas sitting in the dark and me blogging.
We talked some and we both have that exact same feeling of...."what the H*** are we supposed to do today." It's been a day of so many mixed emotions, a day of hurt, a day of lonliness, a day of jealousy, a day of laughter (at times), a day of peacefulness, and a day of PURE EMPTINESS.
I think we anticipated this day sooo much, wondering how it was going to go, how we were going to feel, and how we were going to react...that now that it's here WE ARE JUST CONFUSED. It is far beyond our control of understand and comprehending. We are able to talk about our future with our future children, we are able to share memories and stories of our past. But as for today....we just feel....BLAH....CONFUSED....TORN BETWEEN THE EMOTIONS.....and EMPTY!!
WE JUST CANNOT EVEN BEGIN TO WRAP OURSELVES AROUND TODAY....YET ALONE TRY TO EXPLAIN!!!

Could it be so.....maybe???

So....a few posts back I wrote about our first disappointment in the adoption process. We had a lead to two children that INSTANTLY melted our hearts!!! Then we were told that this week would be where the team of professions would sit down and evaluate their case and find a family for them. So we just missed the date...we will not be licensed until Oct/early November! We were very disappointed that we just missed it but realized that as long as they have a loving family we were happy. They brought smiles and joy to our life for the time being!! They meant sooo much to me, that I never once stopped praying!! My ways of prayer changed though...that the right family was found!!! Well, I received a call today. There has been no match yet so they are still available for adoption!!!! Now, we still have time to wait because our home study is still in the works but...could it be? That maybe they still could be our children?? I'm trying not to get my hopes up....but I can pray again in other ways!!!! I can honestly say, whether they will be our children or not, I LOVE THOSE TWO KIDS!!!! Something about praying for them just makes my day!!!!! :-)
SO....for those following our blog with the adoption process......KEEP PRAYING!!!! :)