It's Raining Cats and Frogs

Friday night it "rained cats and dogs" (and some frogs...yuck), but all our belongings were moved to our new home on Miner Rd in Parma, MI.  THANK YOU...THANK YOU to all who have helped us in some form or fashion to get this accomplished.  It has been a hectic week since we are not only moving, but also renovating the home.  On the day the keys were handed to me...we tore out all the flooring.  Then, over the weekend we (not just Brad and I....friends too) tore out a couple walls...tore down wallpaper and border...my dad worked on electrical issues/ additions...we're building extra closets and one and a half more bathrooms.   And, we moved an ISLAND...in the kitchen...Fun times!   I thought I would give you a couple before pics...these were the ones on the real estate listing.  I will be much more excited to post pictures in about a month of what we will be doing with it...but, you have to see the before for the after to be shockingly terrific...right?

It will be a lot of work, but I think we will be very happy with it when it is finished.  I love to choose the colors, the lights...etc....I love the smell of Lowes :-)  I will be starting to paint trim soon and I will be painting a lot of it, so I chose a color called Simply Irresistible....I think I will be singing that song a lot for a few weeks.

We had some disappointing and sad news Monday afternoon.  Our adoption worker let us know that they have decided to approach the other family for the two girls we were hoping to adopt.  I knew it could go this way and although I am happy for the other family and for the girls for this exciting time in their lives...it does hurt that we were not chosen.  Some people have asked me if the emotion is like a miscarriage and I honestly don't know...I never experienced that pain, so I can't compare, but I don't think it is that intense because there was no loss of life and I did not carry them for months and have time to bond physically and emotionally with them.  I did create "future" memories with them...that sounds really weird, I know, but in my mind I imagined them as a part of our family and it all made sense to me...it felt complete.  I was also bonded in that I felt so proud of them as I was able to know their story and how they have handled their past...they have had to make decisions that no 5 or 11 year old should have had to make and, to me, their actions have been pretty heroic.  I would have loved to know them.

Our girls are handling the loss very well.  They made sad faces when we told them the news, but there were no tears.  Kassi (leave it to my middle child, right :-) was actually a little relieved...she really wants a brother to play Star Wars with...we'll see.  I know God has a plan for us and I know that going through this disappointment was a part of His plan.  He is Good.  We will still be working with our adoption worker to identify a sibling group that will make us a bit more Fosterrific :-)