Price Check!!

We received some news last night.

This pretty much changes everything we had in

mind as far as travel plans

to pick up Tobias.

Apparently, sometime in the last several

months,

Congo changed one of their adoption laws.

They now require BOTH parents to travel!

I don't know how we missed this change, but we didn't know about it until last night.

Our plan all along has been for Chris to travel by himself.

This was mainly because we THOUGHT that

Tobi would be ready either

while I was pregnant, or soon after having the baby.

Now, we are looking at September.

Jackson will be 5-6 months old when we're ready to travel.

I don't look forward to leaving a baby that young

for a week,

but it looks like God just might have orchestrated ALL

this together!!!

Imagine that!

If Tobias WAS ready to come home earlier, he would

have had to wait until I was able to travel.

But instead, God planned it to where WE have to wait

a bit longer,

but all for the better :)

His ways are much higher than ours.

This will change a lot for us.

I need to get my passport renewed.

Our cost will go up about $3,000 or so.

We will have to leave baby Jackson with someone while we're

gone for 7-10 days.

We have to address the fact that he will probably

need to be weaned by then as I do not know how

keeping up a milk supply would even be

possible in Congo (sorry for all those who think that's TMI).

But I get to meet Tobias WITH my husband!!

I've daydreamed about meeting him as they arrive at the

airport dozens of times.

Now I get to anticipate going through the entire

experience with Chris.

We're very excited!

So pray for us as we plan accordingly.

We'll definitely need to prepare Jackson for

being separated from us for that long.

And I'll need to prepare myself for leaving all

three kids as well :)

We know it will work though,

as HE has planned it out for us already!

So that's our big news!

Thanks again for being in this journey with us!

 

Progress!

So we have some news regarding our

other little guy, Tobias!

As we shared before,

we are waiting longer than we expected to.

We were hoping to have him home by May!

But obviously, the Lord has different plans.

Alot has happened recently in regards to

the law and adoptions.

The president has passed a law that will change

the way Compassion for Congo operates.

If you'd like to read about it,

you can here.

But essentially, it will prevent organizations

or people from assisting in

adoptions unless they are "accredited."

C4C is not "accredited" and therefore will not

be able to act as they have been

in placing children with their new parents.

Thankfully for us,

this does not take effect until summer of 2014.

This WILL affect the families behind us

waiting for their children, however.

So we really need to be praying for

Compassion for Congo

and the families that are waiting for children

to arrive to adopt.

We're not exactly sure how things will move forward

in 2014.

HOWEVER,

things are now starting to move for Tobias :)

We received a call today that Didier

will be working full force starting this week

on Tobi's adoption in the DRC.

Their goal is to get as much done as possible

before Didier makes his trip up

to California in June.

Our prayer is that he can pretty much complete

the adoption on the Congo side.

Once that is done, we apply for an I600

with the Embassy.

We then have to wait for it to be approved

and after, can move forward with getting

Tobias an appointment with the Embassy

in Kinshasa.

After the Embassy appointment in Kinshasa...

he's ready for Chris to come get him :)

SO,

our hope and prayer is now that we can

get this done,

and get Tobias HOME

in September.

My birthday is in September...

sounds like a great b-day present!!!

Please be in prayer for this!

We are super excited for things to actually

be put in MOTION!

We've been waiting for this

and it looks like this week, next week

at the latest,

our process will really start.

There's also another little guy that Didier

will be helping.

He's a baby and he will be working on

getting both of our adoptions done at the same time.

We are so very thankful to get this news

and to know that our little guy

really WILL be coming home.

When we wait for something with not much progress,

we're tempted to get discouraged

and think that it's just not real!

But it IS real and our son has been waiting

just as long as we have been....actually longer.

But we also really need to remember

Compassion for Congo

and all the decisions that will need to be made

in the very near future.

God is in control

ALL THE TIME.

This is no surprise to Him.

He has it planned out already!

So if any of you moms or dads are reading this

that are waiting to see the faces of your

precious little ones

in the care of this loving orphanage,

we're praying for you.

Try not to be discouraged

and never lose sight of the fact that

Jesus is LORD!

He cares for the orphan!

He has a plan!

And in hindsight...whenever that may be,

we'll all look back and again,

see His faithfulness.

 

He's HERE!

Our youngest son is here!

He's home!

He's healthy!

He's beautiful!

WE are blessed!

Two weeks ago, I delivered Jackson Porter Teagle

at 9:58a.m.

He weighed 8lbz 6oz

and was 19inches long.

We tried to keep his name just between our

close family and friends until he was born.

No particular reason except that we share pretty much

everything online and wanted to keep

something special :)

So his name has alot of meaning to us.

My dad's last name is Jackson.

I never had my dad's last name.

I wish I had, but we never made it legal or official.

My dad is 100% my dad,

however we do not share the same blood.

We have a very special relationship that started

when I was 4 and he married my mom.

So the fact that our son can carry my dad's name

when I never did is precious to me!

His middle name is from Chris's side.

Chris's dad's middle name is also Porter!

So we named our son after both our dads.

We love keeping it "in the family"!!

 

For those of you (mainly ladies)

that enjoy reading birth stories, I'll just give you a

quick run-down.

Friday the 22nd I started having consistent contractions

that were 10 minutes apart.

They started at about 2:00 and hadn't stopped by that evening.

We were at my parents' house for dinner, 

so I gave a quick call to the Dr. since we were in town.

They recommended I come to get checked and we

decided to do so before we drove back home

and put the girls to bed.

I had a scheduled c-section for March 26th already.

If I was in labor, the Doctor would obviously

perform the c-section earlier.

I hadn't dilated anymore than earlier in the week

when I saw my doctor, but my

cervix was definitely "thinning" more.

So he had us stay overnight to get plenty of fluids and see

if there was change in the morning.

There was, I had dilated another centimeter,

so my doctor knew that it would only

be a matter of time that day that I would

go into full hard labor.

So we got ready!

My last picture being pregnant!

The girls were still at my parents' house

and we let the family know

that our little guy would be sharing his sister's birthday!

(Noelle turned 2 that day!)

Everything went very smooth.

This time Chris watched a little of the surgery.

He actually saw the baby's head come out!!

We heard his first cry

and I felt the huge relief of him

being lifted out of me!

Over the next several hours, Chris and I

were again overwhelmed by God's grace.

It never gets old.

The miracle of a life that started inside me

and ended up in our arms

is truly amazing.

Can't get enough of him!

Daddy's first little man!

I forgot how cuddly a newborn is!

Joy, getting ready to take her new brother home!

My recovery from surgery was the easiest of the three so far.

However, I did have a spinal headache from the

spinal given to me before the surgery.

That lasted from Sunday through Wednesday

 and thankfully it slowly subsided by then.

We had some other struggles throughout the week

but the baby was NOT one of them.

He has been beautiful.

He sleeps really well when he's supposed to.

He goes down by himself without rocking.

He eats like a champ.

And he's so darn cute!!!!!

So now we're here two weeks after we met him

and things are feeling almost normal!

Today my brother, Joe came over and took some newborn pics.

I'll share a few here, but there are more on his Facebook page

here.

 

He did a great job and we're super happy with how they came out!

So that's where our family is right now.

I'll definitely post more about our other son very soon :)

For right now, we are getting used to being a family of 5 before we get the next one!