Sunday, April 16, 2017

Growing and thriving


Our sweet Michael is now well past the 7 month mark and quickly approaching 8 months. His sisters love him like crazy! He is trying many new foods, sitting up on his own, and making us all laugh with his many fun noises, babbling, and grunting. We love him so!


Below are some pictures from today, Easter Sunday. I feel so very blessed today for this family of mine, for God's faithfulness in bringing Michael into our family after stepping out in faith over 2 years ago and the wait that followed. And most of all, so deeply thankful for the death and resurrection of Jesus and that I get to teach my kids about Him!




Our official court date to finalize Michael's adoption is in just over 3 weeks, on May 8th! 
We are so excited for this day when he will officially become a Sportel. :)




Wednesday, March 8, 2017

Michael James!

I have a long overdue update!

It's time to introduce our son Michael James!

This past week marked 3 months that our sweet boy has been home with us! While his adoption is not finalized and may not be yet for several months, we have had "legal placement" of him since January 26 when his birthmom had her court date and legally relinquished her parenting rights. We have an open relationship with her and have seen her twice since we took Michael home and also communicate regularly. We will not put anything on social media such as Facebook until after his adoption is finalized, but felt like we could update this blog for those following.

Michael so quickly became a normal part of our family. Watching Alena and Nora love on him and adore him has been such a beautiful blessing. While the nights can be exhausting (still) and being in the baby phase again is an adjustment, the transition to being a family of 5 has been smooth overall.

Michael is so social and just loves to be around people, always with big smiles. We love him so much and have often reflected in the last few months how God's timing and plan really IS perfect, despite the many hard times in the waiting process.

Thank you so much to many of you who have journeyed with us in this. Please continue to pray our family, Michael, and his birthmom. We appreciate your support and will continue to appreciate it as we raise Michael!

Here are a few pictures from the past 3 months.


The above 2 are the day we brought Michael home, right after he met the girls.




Above 3: first week with us.

Christmas time- We have 3 kids!

That face... those eyes!

First family winter hike with Michael.


He adores his daddy. :)






He slept through Alena's birthday party, but we grabbed a picture of the 5 of us before bedtime.

He keeps growing and we are excited to continue to see who he will grow to be!