7...an experimental mutiny against excess=must read

  After reading this book I said to Jeremiah, "I want to be best friends with Jen." I'm sure she would feel the same way after reading my blog, right? Ha! She is sarcastic, motivating, challenging, and hilarious. I think anyone who reads this book will feel the exact same way. She's real. From the first moment I picked up her book I couldn't put it down. I was constantly thinking about how she simplified her life to get rid of the excess and to glorify God's Kingdom.
  It was so sweet of Jeremiah to listen to me talk about every chapter of the book. Every day he would come home and say, "What did she do today?" I think he understood that I was energized and motivated after reading her words...this book has definitely changed me. I can't wait to share with you some very real and great changes that I have made. However, I'm not going to do that now.:)
 Let me know if you are reading this book. I would love to get together and talk with you about it.
 Jen's blog-jenhatmaker.com. If you want to be best friends with her, just let me know..maybe you live closer to me and we can become best friends. That would be the next best thing, right?:)

God Found Us You

Before Olivia was born we were given the book called God Gave Us You and since then I have given this book as a gift to other people. I cry every time I read it for two reasons-1. I'm a dork and cry all the time and 2. I just like the author's word choice.

 I was reading a blog and come across a book I've never seen before today. It's called God Found Us You. We are definitely going to get this book for our little boy. I can't wait to read it to him!


This morning we took Olivia to the store to do something special. I know it may sound silly to you, but we were excited to take Olivia to the store to pick out a blanket for her baby brother. When we receive our referral (match) we want to send a care package to him immediately. We are going to include his blanket and a picture album of our family. Olivia has been talking about picking out a blanket for her brother, so we decided to go as a family today. On the way home she was snuggling with it and then asked to sleep with "my baby brother's blanket." We also had a great conversation on the way home which started with Olivia asking us, "Is God in Ethiopia?" I've mentioned numerous times before that we tell Olivia that God is going to bring baby brother to us. So, of course it makes sense for her to ask us if God is there right now. My sweet little girl can't stop talking about her brother. She keeps asking us where he is right now and why he isn't with us. I can't help but to wonder those things too!:)

Fantastic 4

4 seems to be the magic number this week.  Jeremiah, Olivia, and I spent the 4th of July in St. Louis with my family. We had an amazing time hanging out with everyone for almost 4 days.

Jeremiah and I will celebrate our 8th anniversary on July 17. We have heard people talking about The Melting Pot and wanted to try it out while we were in St. Louis. It was nice because my family watched Olivia so we could go out for a bit. We had the cheese and chocolate fondue there and both were delicious!

On the 4th my parents took us to the Cardinal's Game. It was Olivia's first game and she was pumped! She really watched the game and even got upset when she didn't see "Adam Wainwright on the field."

The best thing about being gone for 4 days was that I didn't really check my e-mail while we were gone. I received an e-mail from our case worker this afternoon stating that we are now number 4 on the waiting list.

BUT.....the most fabulous news is that by next week we will be............

 We are celebrating at the Cox house tonight. I know my last post was about this, but now it seems real. Only three more spots to move on the list and then we will see our sweet little boy's face.

Almost 3...

Our case worker told us that she thinks we will move 2 or 3 spots on the waiting list by the end of this week. This news makes my heart so happy!:) We will most likely be at number 3 on the waiting list!!! It didn't take us too long to jump from number 6 to number 3 on the waiting list. My hope is that the next jump will be from number 3 to number 1. Can you believe how close we are getting to this being a reality!?

We are ready to meet our little boy. Olivia is constantly thinking about her baby brother. Below I have listed a few conversations that I've had with Olivia this summer. -We were talking about one of my friends having a baby the next day and she said, "Mommy..is God bringing her baby to her right now?" I told her yes. Then she said, "Mommy..I really wish God would bring me my baby brother now too." I almost lost it. I told her that God is going to bring her baby brother at the perfect time (we constantly talk about how God is going to bring her brother to us).

We talked about how Olivia grew in my tummy, but her baby brother isn't growing in my tummy. I told her that sometimes a baby grows in his mommy's tummy and then he goes home with his family from the hospital. I went on to tell her that a baby may grow in his mommy's tummy, but then his mommy has to make a plan for someone else to take care of him. I said that sometimes this plan means that a family will adopt this baby and that's what we are going to do. We are so lucky because we get to hug and kiss him forever. He will be so lucky because you will be his big sister. After thinking for a minutes, Olivia's eyes filled up with tears. Then I saw one tear fall onto her cheek and she said, "But...mommy...I don't want another mommy to carry my brother inside her tummy. I want my baby brother to be in your tummy." Another tear jerker people!

-Before we went to church today Olivia said, "Mommy..I really wish I could have a baby brother like Ava has." We weren't talking about her brother when this thought popped into her mind.

 -One day she said, "When baby brother comes I will share my toys with him. I'm going to give him a lot of my toys. I will still have some and then he will have some too."

 -We took a quick trip to Indy to take Olivia to the zoo. While we were waiting for a show to begin I pointed out all of the babies by us. Olivia adores little babies. She had a sad look on her face and said, "I really want a baby." I said, "Oh Liv..I really want our baby too!" She looked up at me with an enormous smile (and full of confidence) and said, "Mommy..you will have a baby soon. God is bringing him to you." I couldn't believe she said that. Oh..to have faith like a child!:)

-Olivia tells me all that time that when she grows up she wants to be a sister. Then she goes on to tell me that she wants to be a mommy and a teacher.

*I will stop with the Olivia stories because I'm sure you can only read so many of them before you are extremely bored.:) Can you please do me a favor? Can you please pray for my little boy's mom? The closer our journey becomes a reality, the more my heart breaks for his real mom. I can't imagine what she is going through (or already went through) and the loss she will feel once she places my boy in an orphanage. I can't imagine being in a position in which I felt I had to make a different plan for my child and not raise him in my home.