Saturday Snapshots from Snapbucket

My computer has been running terribly slowly and it takes forever to upload pics from my camera, so here is our week in review from the view of my snap.bucket app on my i.pod...

Made puppy chow on Monday.  Yum!

One very cute little guy was found hiding with his friends!

I got these little sweeties in the mail!  The larger one weighs what our daughter, Shyla Joy weighed at birth (1 pound 11 ounces and the little one weighs what Jakin weighed (8.4 ounces).  These are a product of the amazing work that Molly Bears does completely free for bereaved parents!

Finally used my jewelry stamps and LOVE them!  I definitely see doing some jewelry making in my future!

Went to see my younger brother/Ethan's favorite person in the whole world (and took this o-so-flattering pic of both of them...um...yea...its the only one I could find...)

Our doll from Baby be Blessed made it's way home to us!  Yay!  We won this beautiful custom doll in a giveaway from their blog.  I love it!  It even has a special scripture for our little Hope...

*LOVE*

I found some interesting things in our washing machine...

At least Hand.y Manny has some really clean tools now!
I absolutely LOVE finding little things like this.  It literally made me smile for at least five minutes.  I know how extremely blessed we are to have Ethan in our lives and I know how easily he could have not been here. We are undoubtedly aware of the fragility of life and both Ben and myself love finding little reminders that we are blessed to be Ethan's parents.  WE get the opportunity to reach into his heart and show him the love of God and raise up a Godly man.  We get to teach him scripture and sing songs with him.  We get to fix his supper, read to him, wash his clothes and find little jack hammers with big happy eyes in the machine.  We get to trip over shoes and talk about Heaven and laugh at the Lion King for the 5th time in a week...oh boy, feeling extremely grateful right now...I could go on forever...but, I will continue with this weekly review from my i.Pod camera...

I spent some quality time with my singer and got crafty...

I made this beautiful camera strap for my camera!  I love it!  The minky fabric makes it so cozy on the back of my neck...I will be making more of these!

I also worked on this.  I had the squares cut for a while and just got to piecing them today.  The material is from two of my maternity shirts I have worn in my previous pregnancies and the quilt (when I finish it) is going to be a cuddly quilt for Hope.

Lit candles for my babies.  Today, October 15th, is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness and Remembrance Day and there is a wave of light for all the little ones gone very early in life.

Bringing all kinds of Hope home...

This blog is going to be undergoing some changes over the next little bit.  Not only will it document our adoption journey, but it will be our family blog and chronicling our new adventures in homeschooling.

I thought about starting another blog...but I just don't have it in me!

And I figured...there is more than one way to bring HOPE home.  "Hope" not as a person, but as what God gives us.  The new header kind of sums it up.  We are wanting to bring Hope home from Korea.  We want to bring HOPE into our home through the word of God and we are bringing hope back to our home by homeschooling our son and me being home more than not now.

SO...you might start getting homeschool posts in your reader, along with just regular family posts and (of course) posts about the adoption.  So, I hope you hang around as we go through these changes!

Much hope...

Mattie

H.O.P.E.

(via)


I know I have mentioned how I feel like my life is separated into Acts.  Act I was my life before September 2, 2009.  Act 2 is after.  During the first act of my life, HOPE was not something I really thought about all that much.  There are some really beautiful songs about HOPE.  "My Hope is in You" by Third Day and "Only Hope" by Switchfoot come to mind.  I knew some scriptures about hope.  "...faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love" and "hope deferred makes the heart sick". And I heard people use it as a word to describe something that might not happen.  "I hope we can make it to the gas station without running out of gas."

In the "Act 2" of my life, HOPE has taken on a completely new meaning.  It's no longer a word to throw out like "maybe" or just a pretty sounding word.  HOPE is everything.  God is my only HOPE.  God is my everything.  He alone provides the strength, joy and laughter to get through the good and bad days alike.  He alone sends me glimpses of my babies.  Assuring me they are safe and happy and experiencing Him like I can only dream.  Sometimes the dreams so real that I swear He has wisked me away to some secret place.  Not just dreams while I sleep, but when I see them in my minds eye...when I visit their graves...when Ethan speaks of them...when I hold their blankets and say their sweet names.  Act 2 gives me the strength to say as Job did, "Though he slay me, yet I will hope in Him" (Job 13:15)

And now, it seems like I am entering a new time in my life yet again.  Act 2, Scene 2 is all about HOPE.  As we began this adoption journey (actually long before) we decided our little girl's middle name would be Hope.  Because God is faithful. This time in our lives we say, "We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield.  In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name.  May your unfailing love rest upin us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in you." Psalm 33:20-22

What a gift HOPE is.  What  a gift Hope will be!

I've decided as a part of the little miracles blog hop, I will start listing the things that give me HOPE.  Since today is the first installment of this blog hop...let's just start with the number 1....

Things that bring me HOPE...
1. a sunrise
2. the smile of a child
3. Hearing the sweetest little boy I know learn to spell his first word..."H.O.P.E. Hope!" he screams from the other room.  Yes, son, Hope!
4. seeing a baptism
5. a fresh rain
6. Zephaniah 3:17 "The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save.  He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."
7. my husband's embrace.
8. Rainbows
9. Strong mama's
10. innocent eyes

Hope - The Anticipation of God

Last Sunday, my pastor started a new series called "Hope - The Anticipation of God."

If you haven't caught on by my first post of the year.  Hope is my one word for this year.  It is also the middle name we want to give our little girl.  It amazes me all the God winks we have been getting about the adoption process, South Korea and HOPE.

I wanted to share some of the notes from church last Sunday and hopefully the next 5 Sundays as well.


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What is Hope?

Hope - desire accompanied by expectation.  An anticipation of fullfillment.  NOT wishful thinking.

A CHOSEN DESIRE.  {She is chosen.}

Hope is an anticipation for good in God.  Hope is not about striving, but resting and allowing His grace and His strength to take us through a "door of hope".

Hope is a perspective of an abundant life.

Hope must go from a concept, to a specific powerful virtue in your life.

Hope redefines our past.

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Hope is a lifestyle. It's where you grow to the place where you daily focus on "answers of hope, solutions of hope".

With hope- we see more with our eyes closed than we do with our eyes open.

Hope is an anticipation and belief in good from God, now and in the future.

Psalm 27:13 I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.

Hope gives us the ability to look out a very long way.

And my favorite...

Hope can become part of your fiber when the unseen world becomes more real than the seen.

How many times have I said that Heaven is so real now.  The unseen world (Heaven) and the seen world (Earth) are just separated by a thin veil when you have held the babies I have held and have been talking to Jesus as he ushered them into the presence of the Father.  Heaven is so real. 

Lamentations 3:22-24 says, "Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”

Tomorrow morning, we will learn more about HOPE.  This sermon couldn't have come at a better time for me.  God truely knows what we need and when we need it!

Year of Hope

"I will never forget this awful time, as I grieve over my loss.  Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this:  The faithful love of the Lord never ends!  His mercies never cease.  Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning.  I say to myself, "The Lord is my inheritance; therefore, I will hope in him!"  The Lord is good to those who depend on him, to those who search for him."

Lamentations 3:20-25

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Hope.

2011 is a year of hope. 

Hope like I've never known. 

2009 was Shyla's year.  It was the year of blessings and my first year of true grief and Creative Joy. 

2010 was Jakin's year.  The year of our rainbow.  It was our year of new beginnings and then new grief. 

2011 is our year of hope.  I'm standing in faith and believing that.  God is going to show me things this year like I have never seen before. 

My hope is in him.

There is something God laid on my heart a long time ago.  I shared it with Ben before we were married.  We have talked about it off and on through out our marriage, but we really became serious about it this summer and agreed we would move forward after Jakin was born in the spring.  Well, Jakin wasn't born in the spring, but made his journey to his Heavenly home much sooner.  I've been praying when the time was right, Ben and I would both be on the same page about what had been on our hearts...and I think we are. 

Ben gave me these for Christmas...

(Let me first clarify that the first one he says is mostly for him...he didn't want me to think he was calling me a name!)

We are hoping to adopt!  We had requested some info from an agency in our state and have began sorting through the information.  Right now, we are still praying and seeking God on what path to take, but as we were talking about it tonight and discussing when to share the news, we decided to go ahead and have people praying for us and with us every step of the way!  Also, it's not like I don't share pretty much everything anyway...I used to be such a private person!   

We are going to meet with the agency in a few weeks and get some of our major questions answered and ware still praying for God's direction and leading.  We understand we are about to be bombarded with questions, so let me just say one huge...

"We don't know"

We don't know exactly how we are going to completely pay for this yet...BUT God knows.

We don't know if God is preparing our baby through domestic or international adoption (although we are feeling pulled in one particular direction at the moment)...BUT God knows.

We don't know how long the process will take...BUT God knows.

We don't know...BUT God knows! 

He is forming our child in the secret places that are truely secret to us.  And that is AMAZING! 

We DO know...

How God feels about adoption.  He adopted us.  And it pleased him.

"God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.  This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him much pleasure."

Ephesians 1: 5

So now, won't you join us in praying about all the things we don't know?  God will be holding our hand through every step.  We know it.  He has never left our sides in any other joy or grief we have ever experienced (but I can say He has been awfully quiet at times...or maybe I was just too loud to hear him...hmmmm).  I can almost see him in Heaven now cradling our babies and preparing the heart of another little one to be a part of our forever family!

(One more thing!  Happy New Year!  I pray much hope, peace, joy, and laughter fill your hearts and homes this year!)

HOPE for the New Year Giveaway!

(Edited to add...this is my 200th post!)

2011 is upon us and to spread a little hope and joy, I wanted to giveaway this beautiful leather debossed planner from Christ.ian Art Gifts. 

I know HOPE means a lot to me.  The very word is inspiring and encouraging. 

This giveaway will only be open until Thursday, December 30 at around 9 am est.  I will get it out in the mail that day to the winner so they can get it as close to the first of the year and get the full use out of it!  I love this daily planner!  There is daily scriptures and monthly inspirations. 

To be entered to win this giveaway, just leave a comment about HOPE. What that word means to you.  What is your favorite HOPE-filled scripture or quote?  What do you HOPE for in 2011?  Anything HOPEful!

You can also get extra entries by  (1) following my blog and (2) "like" Beauty will Rise on Face.book. Just leave separate comments for each.

I'm hoping you all had a peaceful Christmas and I can't wait to share photos from ours!

Happy New Year!