This Adoption journey just keeps getting better

For those of you just joining us. Let me tell you our story rather quickly. We are a family of 5 almost 6 that God set us on this journey called adoption 11 years ago now! We watched and waited and prayed and watched some more as we began to fall more in love with those sweet Asian faces with the almond shaped eyes. There is a lot to all those years of waiting but just know God prepared us in every single way possible to begin the journey we are on now. He built up our faith SO strong that when He finally said "GO" this past summer we did not hesitate one bit! There have been some road blocks along the way even since He said "GO" but we just kept trusting Him to get us through. Some were to the point of "this journey may not be seen till through the end" BUT GOD! Oh when those words appear in scripture you know big things are going to happen!! 

We trusted and we watched Him show off time and time again!! When others said: 

"you aren't worthy enough,"

"this will not happen,"

"be prepared for a no"

"are you sure you really want to do this?"

"I just don't understand why you are doing this."

"aren't you too old?"

"it's really expensive."

"you already have kids"

and the list goes on.... we said God called us to this! Told us with His own voice and reaffirmed it over and over again for 10 years, THIS is exactly what we are supposed to be doing! But still the hurdles came and the mountains looked steep from where we were. We just kept knocking on those doors and jumping hurdles and asking God to move the mountains if this was His Will. Time after time He did just that!! Do we still have a ways to go? Why Yes! But do we trust Him with everything He has called us too? ABSOLUTELY! This journey was never about us or even or sweetheart waiting for her family. Oh we like to think it is, but it is NOT! It is about our faith and our walk and the greatness and powerfulness of a call on our lives. IT is and always will BE about HIM!!! So as another No gets put into a YES in His book we praise Him once again!!

Today after waiting a mere 30 days, others just prior to us have waited 60-90+ days we were told YES!! All of our paperwork went to USCIS (United States Citizen and Immigration Services) to see whether we were a worthy family to adopt an international child. Let me tell you, our past is not perfect in the worlds eyes. We fought tooth and nail to be honest and try and divulge everything we could. There was one thing forgotten and finding that out before we got all the way to immigration both freed us and frightened us. Because that forgetting could have been our NO! And that NO could have been the end to our journey. Sounds simple to fix but it is NOT when you are looked at with a fine tooth comb through a looking glass. Again we are SO thankful that God's answer continues to be YES!

There is always extra paperwork to send to backup what the mistake was. I was tired of paperwork, tired of being exposed, tired of all the judgement. BUT I would do whatever it took to bring our daughter home. So we asked God that if it was His will, that this process go fast and we would loved to be approved and would LOVE not to have to send MORE paperwork in to explain even more of what they already had in our packet. My Spirit was calm as I prayed but as the wait got closer to a possible time that our file would be assigned to an officer I began to doubt. I became afraid and began to worry. Just this morning I asked God to forgive me for all that and He reassured me with one of my favorite bible verses! Jeremiah 29:11 our adoption verse I like to call it!

I had peace after that. It was like He just smiled GREAT BIG at me! I finished up my quiet time and went about my day. Bud had just got home from work and we were talking. I got a ping on my phone that I had an email. Earlier in the morning every ping made me nervous, but this one I didn't think anything about. I hit the button and there in my inbox was the words NBC HAGUE (the dept that handles adoptions for immigration) I clicked on it without even thinking and these words appeared.....Good morning. Your file was approved yesterday!! Have a great day!!! YESTERDAY!! WHAT!!! I expected, "Your file has not been assigned an officer yet, or we need more paperwork or blah blah blah blah blah, but the words APPROVED totally did not register. It took me a whole second to start screaming my husbands name!! He was 5 feet away from me not even kidding! I just kept repeating his name in this sing son voice over and over again!! Ok maybe I was screaming with excitement! He comes over and says what? I said LOOK!!!! And began to JUMP up and DOWN laughing and praising Our GOOD GOD who always has a YES when we follow His plans!! I have been on cloud 9 all day long! It was not just a, "this MIGHT be something you will have a yes on in the FUTURE." It was an ABSOLUTE YES you ARE qualified and you ARE worthy to be a parent to an international adopted child! We just kept praying that their Yes would line up with God's YES and the two collided today!!!! 

We are so thankful that His plans are far greater than our plans! We know what Satan intended for evil, God intended for good!! We will trust Him on this journey as we are one step closer to our baby girl!! This is a huge leap forward and in a matter of weeks our dossier will be ready to send to Ch*na! But that my friends is another blog!! Please continue to pray for our family and for our little girl. She has had a few of her friends adopted in the last few months and I am sure she might be wondering where her family is. We still have tons of funds to raise so stay tuned for fundraisers and ways you can help us bring her home! We are so thankful for each of you following along and praying for us on this journey and for those who have truly stepped up and are walking this journey with us!! It is not easy but it'll all be worth it when we get to hold our sweetheart in our arms and tell her how Jesus got her home!! We love you Ladybug!! Momma and Daddy are coming just hold on!! Please continue to follow along as we give God all the praise and glory and watch this journey unfold. All for Your Glory Lord!! All for Your Glory!!

Lots of love and Ladybugs :)

Updates galore!

Hello friends!
Thanks for sticking with us. Is there maybe 2 or 3 out there still following along? If not I will just keep this going to document our journey. First and foremost so thankful God is in control of this crazy journey of life. He sure knows how to throw in the twists and turns. We just hang on for dear life and watch Him work!

We have gotten 2 updates on our little Ladybug since last time I blogged. One right before Valentines day saying she was doing well and has only grown a smidgen. She is definitely our littlest so far!

We finished up our Home study and began working on some fundraisers and then it was time to ask for a cake to be sent to Abby for her 2nd birthday! Now for those of you who do not know, when you ask for a cake to be sent you do not get to choose the cake. You are just very grateful that they get them a cake. We have an amazing contact lady through our agency that does a beautiful job getting packages to our sweetheart. This is our first one sent. We simply just asked for a cake. They send normally 5 pics back to you from the party, we got 15! Yes we were in heaven watching our youngest enjoy cake! And she LOVED it! Not even exaggerating! We giggled at the size of the cake compared to her!

 It is so very pretty. They have a way of making cakes there that just stun you! I think it is the prettiest toddler birthday cake I have ever seen! I do not know what it says on top. Maybe Happy birthday and her Ch*nese name. But here is the picture we just giggled at....

It is bigger than she is! Not even kidding! But the girl loves that cake and put it away! Course she shared with her friends too!

Love how she is licking her fork. Take a look at that plate. She had a pretty good size piece when she started. I think Vickie might have to have her as her taste tester when she gets home! We truly enjoyed celebrating in this manner. We also celebrated here at home, praying that she knew she was loved!

We cannot wait for her next birthday to celebrate all together! We are crazy about our little sweetheart! We have been asking God to protect her and prepare her for our family and also asking for a little bit of joy in these updates. 

Our family has been through some tough changes the last few months. One son is off to start his career and calling on his life. It has been a very tough few months but we are so proud of him!!! Very thankful that God is protecting him in this endeavor. I would love to share with all of you about this but for his safety I cannot do that here. Just please pray for our youngest and his new journey. If you knew what he was doing you would be just as proud of him as we are! 

So as our family adjusts to changes we began more paperwork for the adoption. We have sent off our I800A which is asking our government for permission to find our family suitable to adopt our sweetheart. We would love your prayers in this part of the journey. This is a lot of waiting and praying in this stage on our part. We want them to approve us and we want them to do it quickly because there are always deadlines looming. An important one is coming up for us. Please keep our family in your prayers. In the mean time we are gathering our last bit of paperwork (Thank you JESUS! Feels as if we have been paper pregnant FOREVER.) to complete our Dossier (the 13 pieces of very important paper that will be sent to Ch*na to capture exactly what our family looks like) as we wait on the I800A approval. Stay tuned this ride just keeps going! 

While we wait, it was time to ask for another update on our sweetheart since that one back in February. So while sending off our I800A we also asked our agency to update us on how our Ladybug was doing! They are great about doing this. They got in touch with her SWI (Social Welfare Institution) or you would call it her orphanage, to answer another round of questions from her family! I love asking these questions because they give us insight into her daily life and her personality. So we began the wait for a response. YES more than half of the adoption you spend waiting on one thing our another. These waits are normally pretty good. They did not disappoint! This time 2 more pics and a video!!! We were so excited about the video! But the pics stole our heart!

Here she is working a puzzle. We got video of this and let me tell you what. this girl is SO smart!! They keep telling us she is just the sweetest little thing. I see glimpses of that here and there. But this, this right here did me in!

This is the first time we have seen her smile! Oh how it melts my heart! I just get giddy every time I look at it! Our prayers have been answered in this one single picture of our little Ladybug! She is still the tiniest thing but oh how we are crazy about her!! Asking God to do mighty things to get her home and then through her life! Praying we are worthy enough to be her parents! 

List of prayer requests for us:

Please pray for our family if we come to mind. 

Pray for Abby and her heart to be prepared for us. 

Pray for Tommy and his safety on the journey God has him on. 

Pray that the I800A approval goes smooth and quickly

Pray that God will continue to show up and show off in every area of this adoption and our lives!!

Pray for His continued provision through out this journey. (there is a link to our gofundme page on the side of this blog if you feel led to share with anyone)

Pray that we will not loose sight of His face during all of this.

Thank you for following along with us on this journey (if you are still with us thank you SO much). I promise to update more often! We love that you are watching God unfold His plan for us. His ways are not our ways and His ways are better than we could every hope for our imagine!

Trusting the One who is writing this story!

Lots of love and Ladybugs :)

The Journey Begins!!!!!!!

Boy have I been waiting to say that for a LONG time!

I can announce with such joy and happiness that our adoption journey has begun! I have been praying and asking God for a long time to open doors and show us His Will to lead us down His path! He never ceases to amaze me! Things didn't go as we thought they should in the beginning because...well God didn't want us to go that way. So after prayer and much investigation we have followed His path and are moving full steam ahead with this adoption!!

I love that after 10 years of waiting and praying and watching. God picks the perfect time to say "Go"! This journey will not be without turmoil or frustration. But I know that the end will far outweigh everything we will face in the journey! We literally will hold His promises in our arms! To say we are excited is an understatement! We are over the moon!!

Our application has been sent in, a few fee's have been paid. We have done some preliminary paperwork and it gives us great joy to share with you an adoption term we have learned over the years because now our Homestudy begins! We are.....

which simply means we will begin gathering all the paperwork necessary (and its a LOT) to bring our daughter home to her forever family! God has not revealed who she is to us yet but we will be sure to share that with you as soon as we are able to. There are rules and all! But we are so giddy rules aren't bothering us at all! So come along with us on our journey to bring home our Ladybug!! We are in love with her already and do not even know her yet!! So thankful again for God's timing! Pay attention you never know what He may be asking you to do! No matter what it is just "Do Something!"

Join us on our journey as "baby" makes 6!

Lots of Love and Ladybugs!! :)

The Tarter Family! 

While In The Waiting

I guess I have been absent for awhile! Well I am back and instead of catching you up I am just going to go forward. I have decided that I need to put down what God has been telling my heart before I forget. Because we are a very forgetful people. He blesses us, we praise Him, then we forget! We have this awesome God who takes care of all our needs but when we get into this mess of "life", we forget what He has brought us through. So I am going to try and blog as much as possible because I do NOT want to forget His goodness!

The hubby and I are moving in a direction that we truly see God's hand in. He has brought us through some things these past few months that we have been fighting our whole marriage. Just junk, you know the kind, the stuff you THINK you are stuck with. He just got a hold of us and said, it's time to let me have it and move forward in a positive way. Oh how HE loves us!! It's not an easy journey but its one that needed to be done. Is any journey worth doing, easy? It is preparing us for MUCH bigger things!! :)

As you all know we sponsor this sweet little girl Hope at An Orphan's Wish that we are just crazy about. Every time we get an update our hearts soar. We continue to pray that she will find her forever family and that her life in the orphanage will end with a beautiful family to love her. That has been our prayer through everything she has gone through. She is sure growing beautiful!

I had just read an update to my hubby and showed him her updated photo's late one Saturday night and he smiled sweetly at her in that fatherly kind of way, and said she is adorable. The next morning while standing in church our pastor had mentioned that if anyone felt a burden or needed to pray about something to just come down front to one of our pastors. We began to sing our worship music and my family really loves to worship, but something wasn't right with the hubby. He just stood there kind of still and wasn't singing a word. He whispered something in my ear that I could barely hear. He said I think we need to pray for Hope. I said sure but we always pray for Hope. He said "I know just pray with me." Which he is pretty quiet about his prayer life, not one to just bust that out. So him, our daughter and I stood right there by our seats and prayed. But the words he prayed were not just any words. They were direct words from God. Now we are continuing to pray to see where this leads. But the hubby didn't even remember praying these words. Our daughter and I heard them clearly. He prayed, "Lord, I want to pray for Hope, that you would find her family and bring her home to them, I know in my heart that she is our daughter ( my ears perked WAY up and I began to weep) Lord we ask that you move whatever obstacles that may be in the way so that one day we may adopt her...and his prayer went on, he asked in the mighty name of Jesus and we closed the prayer. But he was NOT done! He felt such a burden that he went down front and prayed with one of our pastors. Now you have to know something. He is a quiet man about these sort of things, we talk privately and when he needs to share in Sunday School he does, but he is not one to share something like this unless he is sure! I was so emotionally excited that he got a word from God. He went down front and the pastor he prayed with actually is an adoptive dad himself. Only God friends only God!! They prayed for Hope and all that may entail. God is SO good! We do not know God's plan, but we don't have too. We just have to listen and follow it when he reveals each step.

Adoption has been burdening me a lot lately. The horrible news that came out of Russia broke my heart! So I have felt this urgency, about so many things about adoption. Ever since my hubby heard from God, I have been bombarded once again with things about adoption and so has he. This time feels different. After the storm we have been through and coming out with God's help this feels different. I am praying daily for wisdom to seek His will. That is what we want HIS will. It has been HUGE things everyday for the past two weeks. From people that you would not expect the word "adoption" to come out of their mouths. It makes my laugh out loud at God, going look I can use those people too! He is SO good. Now we have not began anything and Hope is not even up for adoption. But I know my God can and will do what it takes to fulfill His plans. So would you pray for us? That we would just be open to His voice, that He would make things crystal clear as to what we are supposed to do. That whatever He asks, we will step out in faith without hesitation? We will be praying these things as well. I don't know where we are headed, I do know if God is going, we are going with Him!! One step at a time, one foot in front of the other!

Please pray for us and as our story unfolds, we will share what God is doing!

Lots of love and Ladybugs! :)

The Graduate...Tommy's Story

Ok I know I have not updated in awhile what the family has been up to so I thought I would start with our soon to be graduate!! Wait didn't I do this last year..oh yes we did! :) So in order to catch you up I must share a little bit of back ground about our youngest child...(so far ;) )

Tommy was born July 4th 1994 a beautiful healthy baby boy 9lbs 12 oz! Or so we thought. Delivery went well the day following went well, then the doctor came in with bad news. Tommy had not had his first movement. (Sorry not trying to be graphic but this is a huge part of his story, there is more of this to follow so bear with me please?) Being a mom for the 3rd time I was not to awful concerned until the Dr explained that this was not normal and that they needed to rush him to our nearest children's hospital 45 minutes away. I panicked! My hubby had went home to pick up our other 2 kiddo's so we could take pictures and then take Tommy home. That was not in the plan. As soon as he arrived with the kids and two other family members. I had to tell them they had sent Tommy by ambulance to the children's hospital (Thank You Lord for one being so close!) We were heartbroken.

When we arrived at C*H they quickly took us up to the NICU to see our son. He was all hooked up with wires and we had to scrub up to see him. This would not be the last time that happened. We spoke with the Dr's to see what the plan would be. They said they would do a procedure and he should be fine, nothing to bad but it would cause him to be able to get the meconium out and he would be great! We were so relieved! So everything was going good after that. We took him home and he did fine for a few days then it all happened again. We went back and forth to the dr but they couldn't figure it out. So we took him back to C*H to see what they thought. They ran some tests. One for CF the other for Hirschsprungs Disease. We waited for days to get results back but no one knew anything. Meanwhile my baby boy was suffering tremendously.

After Dr regiments for moving his bowels that didn't really seem to work we were just worried. Finally through a friend and we know by God's hand we found a pediatric surgeon. We went in to the office distraught and tired and confused and explained to him the situation. He immediately got on the phone and got the test results which were inconclusive. So he scheduled the 1st surgery for Tommy. A simple same day surgery to do a more invasive test. Keep in mind he is about 6 weeks old by this time. You don't really wanna hear the word invasive when it comes to a 1 1/2 month old. It took a week to get those results back. The Dr called in the middle of the day in the middle of the week and said words I will never forget, "You need to bring him in right now for surgery! If we wait any longer he may not make it."  Not to be graphic but by this time Tommy could not have a movement at all and when he did eat he would regurgitate it from his upper intestines. That day we found out Tommy indeed has Hirschsprungs Disease. It is a hereditary disorder of the intestines. I called my hubby who was at work 1 1/2 hrs away and he met us at the hospital. The surgery lasted 4 hours. Numbers I remember 4 hr surgery 7 week old, 3rd child. I did not understand why we were all going through this. IT was heart breaking sitting there waiting. They took out 8 inches of his Large Intestines and made a colostomy on the left side of his tummy, so tiny but so lifesaving! God was in the details let me tell you!!

 He would require an additional surgery that lasted 5 hours to reconnect his intestines  later on when he got bigger! That happened when he was 7 months old. God truly saved our sons life. There have been side effects to all this. Potty training was very hard and he has some other issues that can sometimes be funny or embarrassing. But if you know Tommy at all you know he makes those "issues" funny and just lets them roll off of him like they don't matter!

Next Post: Growing up with our Boy...now the graduate

Wait

I ran across this about 2 years ago, 6 years after God prompted us to adopt. It still fits to this day. Still Waiting on Your direction Lord. Through the years I have been watching His plans unfold. Things that weren't possible at the start of this calling are now become clearly possible now. So I wait on His timing, most of the time very painfully I wait, but none the less, it is after all HIS plan! This fits anyone but it spoke volumes to my heart about our adoption journey. For you though, it could be about whatever struggle He is taking you through, just remember He see's the WHOLE picture. This is by Russell Kelfer.

Wait

Desperately, helplessly, longly I cried,

Quietly, patiently, lovingly, God replied.

I plead and I wept for a clue to my fate...

and the Master so gently said, "Wait."

"Wait?, You say Wait?" my indignant reply,

"Lord, I need answers, I need to know, why!

Is your hand shortened? Or have you not heard?

By faith I have asked, and am claiming Your Word.

My future and all to which I relate,

hangs in the balance and you ask me to wait?

I'm needing a 'yes', a go-ahead sign,

Or even a 'no', to which I'll resign.

"You promise, dear Lord, that if I believe,

We need, but ask, and we shall receive.

Lord, I've been asking! I need a reply."

Then quietly, softly I learned of my fate,

as my Master replied again, "Wait."

So I slumped in my chair, defeated and taut,

and grumbled to God, "So I'm waiting.....for what?"

He seemed then to kneel and His eyes met with mine....

And He tenderly said, "I could give you a sign.

I could shake the heavens and darken the sun,

I could raise the dead and cause mountains to run.

I could give all you see and pleased you would be,

You'd have what you want, but you wouldn't know me.

You'd not know the depth of My love for each saint,

You'd not know the power I give to the faint.

You'd not learn to see through clouds of despair;

You'd not learn to trust by knowing I'm there.

You'd not know the joy of resting in me, 

When darkness and silence are all that you see.

You'd never experience the fullness of love,

When the peace of My Spirit descends like a dove.

You would know that I give and I save, as a start,

But you'd not know the depth of the beat of my heart.

The glow of my comfort late into the night,

The faith that I give when you walk without sight.

The depth that's beyond getting just what you ask,

From an Infinite God who makes what you have last.

You'd never know, should your pain quickly flee,

What it means that My Grace is sufficient for thee.

Yes, your dearest dreams overnight would come true,

But, oh, the loss, if I lost what I'm doing in you.

So, be silent my child, and in time you will see,

That the greatest of gifts is to truly know Me.

And though oft My answers seem terribly late,

My most precious answer of all is still, Wait."

Blessings and Ladybugs :)