I never want to forget the details  of my story of becoming a mom and becoming a parent with my husband. So, here I am, typing it out – to always have as a journal keepsake.

 

The story isn't over –this is just the beginning… 

 

We had always discussed, even before getting married, that we wanted 3-4 kids. We wanted to wait at least 2 years before trying to have children so that we could enjoy our time just as husband and wife for awhile.

Those two years passed, and we began to have a desire to grow our family. In my always planning and organizing head, I figured it would take us, at the most, 6 months to get pregnant and we would then have a sweet, little bundle of joy of our own.

 

Those 6 months passed, and then another 6 months passed – each month filled with disappointment with not being pregnant yet. Eventually 3 years had passed and we still did not have a baby.

Those three years were filled with two miscarriages, and tests for both myself and David, and no one could figure out why we couldn’t get pregnant and maintain pregnancy – making the situation even more frustrating.

In the midst of this, I continued to pray and seek the face of God knowing his timing is perfect, but having a hard time accepting that fact. There were times when I was angry with God because everyone else around me was having babies – they had what I wanted. Yet, I stood faithful – in the depths of me, I knew that God had a reason – I just wish I knew what it had been at that time.

 

Towards the end of 2012 – David and I began to explore the possibility of growing our family through adoption. The cost of adoption was very expensive, and certainly not in our budget. So, we considered pursuing foster care with the possibility of adoption. While in our training courses, they told us the average age of children in the foster care system is 8 years old. Well, I wasn’t very comfortable with the idea of having an 8 year old in my home to parent, when I had never even successfully parented a baby. So, I requested the age of children placed in our home to be between 0 – 3 years of age. We were told that this age doesn’t come into the system very often and that we should increase our range to eight if we want children in our home; so, we did, willing to help whatever child came our way.

We prepared our home, finished our training and received our foster care state license in February 2013.

 

In March of 2013, while at work, I received a call that there was a need for a home for an 18 month old baby girl. I was ecstatic- this is it – this is what I have been praying for –I’m going to be a mom!

When she was taken into custody, we also knew that the birth mom was pregnant and that baby girl was going to be born in just a few short months and need a home.

0- 3 years of age doesn’t happen very often – less than a month after we received our license? I think God had other plans…

In August of 2013 we went to our local hospital and picked up this sweet, tiny 5lb baby girl. It was interesting walking into the hospital, not even pregnant, and then walking out with a newborn baby.

In the midst of trying to rearrange my life to make sure I met the needs of these two sweet girls, I found myself completely exhausted. I chalked it up to new routines and the sleeping habits of a newborn baby.

But then, certain smells started making me feel nauseous and my husband convinced me to take a pregnancy test. 

 Positive.

So many thoughts were running through my head, one of which was "I just brought a baby home from the hospital two weeks ago – there is no way, after 4 years of trying – that I am pregnant right now."

Thankfully, I had a very easy pregnancy with no sickness, limited nauseousness, and after the 1^st trimester exhaustion – I felt great! It made it a lot easier to keep up with two girls at home.

In February 2014, we learned that our girls were available to adopt. We jumped on the opportunity to give them a forever home and began to complete the adoption process filled with interviews and home studies and lots and lots of waiting.

In May of 2014, I gave birth to a healthy baby girl and I became a mom of 3 girls under the age of 3 – two of those girls being less than 10 months apart. Crazy? Maybe. But I love every moment of it.

In early October of 2014, we learned that our family was chosen to be the adoptive home option for the girls. Right now, we are within a month of signing the paperwork to make our foster daughters officially ours.  

God certainly has a sense of humor- our family went from 0 kids to 3 kids in 14 months.

I often times get asked how I do it all and I often tell people that I have no clue how I do it all. But, at the end of the day, my children are happy and healthy and I have a husband that loves all of us unconditionally, and that’s a win in my book. There’s no magic to parenting small children. It’s all about routines and balance and whole lot of letting go of perfection (this is a whole other topic I have had to learn!).

Now that I reflect back on the struggles and the steps that God brought me through to make me a mom - I am reassured that his timing is truly, always perfect. If I got pregnant when "I"wanted to get pregnant - I would have never considered foster care and I would never have known the joy that these two princesses bring to our home. God knew these two girls needed a loving, forever home and that’s why I believe we didn’t get pregnant until they were both with us.

Learning to have Faith and learning to truly Rest and Reflect in the loving arms of God’s Grace is not always easy when life doesn’t go the way we planned, but it is always worth it.