miracles

today we heard probably the second most exciting news ever... our friends, jesse and leslie, who have been just a few steps ahead of us in the adoption process, well, found out they are PREGNANT!!!!!!!!

words cannot express how joyful chris and i both are for the two of them. without their love, support and friendship i don't know how chris and i would have gotten through the loss of kya, the frustrations of infertility, and the beginning stages of this adoption.

as i sit here typing i am just crying uncontrollably because when i think about the mighty work of God in their life and this miracle i am just overcome by how awesome He is. He is still the God of miracles and i am so fortunate and blessed to have gotten to experience this miracle through our friends.

jesse and les, we cannot wait to meet your sweet, sweet miracle and see what else God has up His sleeve for the three of you.

one step at a time

since we have been trying to add to our family the mantra "one step at a time" was one that we heard from numerous people and we felt as though we were doing things in a certain sequence. but as our steps began to labor and our feet began to drag that little saying really began to get annoying; however, we have really fallen in love with jordin spark's song, "one step at a time". i actually have started listening to it almost every single day. why? let me elaborate.

"we live and we learn to take one step at a time, there's no need to rush. it's like learning to fly or falling in love. it's gonna happen when it's supposed to happen and we find the reasons why one step at a time." adding to our family has been one step after another, some easier than others, but as we are embarking on this new adventure with our brand new tennis shoes on, we know that those brand new shoes are going to have to get broken in before the journey is over. and that is why it's important that we keep our eyes focused, our spirits ready, and our feet moving in the right direction, one step at a time.
be blessed. cassie

preliminary application- check

as you can probably gander from the title, we have officially turned in our prelim application for adoption through bethany christian services. chris and i are stoked and anxious to get the big application to trudge through. there are a lot of things we have to get taken care of in that application like financials, fingerprinting, background checks, physicals, etc. thankfully our great friends jesse and leslie have already been through this part and kind of gave us a heads up on some of the things we would need so we have a little bit of a head start. our adoption counselor told us to plan to receive a child 2 years from today. obviously, we are hoping quicker, but at least we know that in two years it is highly likely we will have an addition to our family- and that is exciting!

please pray with us as we try to get all these little things taken care of. it is a very tedious and extensive application and our desire is to fly through it and move along to our homestudy. we were told that if we stay on top of this, it is possible we can have our profile available for viewing as early as january! so we beg and covet your prayers!

on a side note, in my previous blog i wrote about this blog being a testament and hard copy of our child's journey to his or her life with chris and me. well as we were in our meeting at bethany tonight and they kept encouraging us to pray for the birth parents i felt compelled to start keeping another type of journal- a prayer journal to give the birth mom/parents when the placement has occurred. she may not want it, but since i am feeling compelled to do it, i think she probably will. i want to write down every single date, time, and request that i prayed for this birthmom so that i can go back and see how God was preparing her heart and mine, but also so she can see that i was praying for her, before she even knew me. perhaps this birthmom will be someone who is unsure of their faith or their decision and that is why i feel the need to do this for her. or perhaps she is just overwhelmed with the adoption- i want her to see how God orchestrated the entire process in order to bring redemption, healing, and life. or maybe this will just be another way for me to chronicle this very very special experience we are going through. i don't know. all i know is that i am bursting at the seams with overwhelming excitement, anticipation and joy for what is to come. so much of this can seem overwhelming, but God really confirmed to us tonight at our meeting that this is the path He has chosen for us and we are going to take every step in stride, seeking to find the lesson in every situation.

so again, please keep us in your prayers and while you pray for us, please pray for the birth mother. what a gift this woman will be giving us and if she is lost what a gift she could receive if her heart is ready for the seed to be harvested. and even if she is a christian, what encouragement it will be for her, knowing that she is being prayed for. it's really overwhelming and exciting to know that God already knows her name, knows when she will conceive the baby,what sex that baby will be, and when we will get the life changing news that our family will be expanding. and who knows? if things go as quickly as i hope they will (unlikely but hopefully!) she could be carrying our child right now! (of course she could be getting knocked up right now too! ahh!) thank you all again, i promise your words of encouragement are not going unnoticed, and they are making a world of difference to us as this can be intimidating and frightening. but we love you all and cannot wait to introduce baby lawson to all of you!

be blessed. cass

change is a comin'

this has been quite the week in the lawson household. we got back from vacation and i had managed to catch "the pig" aka swine flu somewhere alongst our trip. awesome. so that is not really good news, but what is good is that on chris' first day back he had a review with his manager and she gave him a promotion to another level in the credit union, AND a nice raise. so we were stoked about that. then today i got a call from the head of hr offering me a full-time position at the north knoxville branch where, if you recall, chris' started out.

it's so amazing to me to see the hand of God really and truly working in our lives as we are preparing to add to our family. when i was approached, out of the clear blue skies, concerning the full time job, i was very unsure of what to do and my dad asked me if i was just wanting to take this job so we could afford to adopt and i said absolutely not. i mean, sure the financial burden of adoption is overwhelming sometimes, but i have had complete peace that God was going to work out all the finer details. these two promotions this week, are the finer details.

before chris and i had even decided to start the adoption process God knew what we were going to need. He knew before we even worked at y-12 that on this day i would recieve a call to be offered this job. because He has orchestrated every movement under heaven nothing suprises Him. how cool is that?

i had a coworker ask me today why it is that i am blogging about the adoption and i told her plain and simple that in a way this is something that i want to be able to give to our child. one day when that baby of ours is old enough to understand adoption and perhaps is feeling abandonded or unloved i want to be able to pull out a scrapbook or a binder of some sort and allow that child of mine to read his or her story. i want that child to see how the hand of God orchestrated every step of his or her "forever family" even before that child was a thought. i want this child to read the agony and heartbreak we felt over kya and not having success conceiving a biological child, but more importantly i want our child to see how much we loved them before we even had them. and i want to show him or her to see what a true miracle they are to us, regardless of the circumstances of how they came into this world, or to who they were borne from. so that is why i am logging all of this, because what greater gift could i possibly give my child than their story, before they even knew they had a story?

chris and i have truly been overwhelmed this week by all the encouraging words and
comments we have received concerning the prior post. we sat on the couch last night reading all comments with tears running down our faces thankful to have so many people who are supporting us, even from a far. so thank you to all of you and please don't stop reading or praying for us. until next time, be blessed.

adoption diary

there is a new series on tv called, "adoption diaries", that has come at a really great point in my life. for those of you who don't know, chris and i will be starting the adoption process this month. in just two weeks we will be submitting our preliminary application for adoption and will begin this new, exciting, and definitely challenging road. while we are not giving up hope that one day we might be able to have a biological child, we are anxious to add to our family and begin a new chapter full of sleepless nights, dirty diapers and all the challenges that we will face as parents.

but back to the tv show. this show is a reality show about open adoptions and it has bee an eye opener for sure for me. i see these adoptive parents who are much like chris and myself, who have struggled to have a biological child unsuccessfully and my heart breaks for them and then rejoices when they walk away with their new addition. but then i see this birthmother who through whatever circumstances has decided to make quite possibly the most difficult decision of her life. you can see the raw emotion of her face as she sees and holds her child, knowing that in a matter of hours that child she has grown and loved and carried for 9 months is going to be gone. it's heartbreaking to watch but gives me an entirely new perspective.

birthmothers have 3 choices to make when they find out they are pregnant. they have the choice to abort, the choice to keep the child and struggle, or the choice to sacrificially give their child up in the chance they will have a better life. as i have thought about these choices and the impact on the mother and the child i have realized that adoption is the most selfless and sacrificial choice a mother can make. i cannot imagine carrying a living child in my body and loving that child for 9 months only to turn that child over to a family that i have limited knowledge of. so to any of you out there who are birthmoms, i applaud you.

please be in prayer with us as we travel this road less traveled. we've heard plenty of adoption stories, but not a single one comes without the warning that it is an extremely difficult and emotionally and financially draining. we can't do this without a support system and seeing as how my family is in texas and chris' is in north carolina we desperately need all the prayers and encouragement from everyone. and of course $20k if you just happen to have it laying around. i'll do my best to keep this updated with our journey. until next time, be blessed.

the right decision

earlier tonight i tweeted this message "just because it's the right decision does not mean that sometimes it's not going to be difficult to make". hopefully the point is coming across because i am way emotional and tired right now. so here is the deal... chris and i are no longer attending the gathering.

when we first started going to the gathering we always said we would never allow the distance to be an issue and truth be told while it was frustrating at times we stuck it out. after the move to the new building it became more and more challenging to get there and to do it with a good attitude. my dad said to me, "you guys have so much to offer a church and there is no reason God can't use you at a church closer to home" and while we agreed we also knew the gathering was the place for us; for a season.

a few months ago i stepped down from creative arts and chris stepped down from kidsplayce because our hearts were not in the right place and there were some unresolved issues that needed to be dealt with. when they were finally "fixed" and chris and i were preparing to start serving again it was difficult partially because we, predominately me, were feeling wounded and a little overwhelmed. in the time we were away much had changed and we didn't really feel as though it was our church any more. god was preparing us months before we realized it, for a move.

i was more willing to take the leave than chris was, but i began asking God that if this was His will for Him to show us and allow chris to lead our family where God wanted us instead of where we wanted us. and like we anticipated it has been a very bittersweet few weeks. we have since found our place back somewhere that chris once stated he would never return to. that God, i tell you, He has a sense of humor! but the relationships we leave behind in sevierville make it hard to leave. even in the last few months we just haven't seen our "family" hardly at all. the distance makes it hard and not serving together at the same church makes it harder. the sweetness of all this is we are reconnecting with those people whom we were very tightly knit with when we were first married.

a lot can change in two years and chris and i believe that God had us at the gathering in order to change us for the better. we also believe that God moved us away from where we were orignally in order to allow changes to take place at that church so we could come back and serve together with them again. so we have made the right decision, we believe, but there are times when it's hard and hurts. but that is ok because God is going to do mighty things with us as long as we continue to walk in His will and plan.

hopeful storytelling

a few years ago i attended the national storytelling festival in jonesborough, tennessee, where i had the privilege to listen to some of the most honest, refreshing and talented storytellers. i can remember sitting under a tent at dusk, rain pounding the top of the tent, people crammed into incredibly uncomfortable seats just to hear some of the best spinners weave their tales. it was a truly memorable experience and as i pondered that weekend i started contemplating the beauty of a story.

everyone has a story which is their life. we can all sit around and share funny stories of our childhood, stories of pain and suffering, humiliation stories, and stories of events that shaped our lives and made us who we are. we all share that common thread. what everyone does not share is the belief that there is an ultimate storyteller, who can weave the most wonderfully crafted tale ever known to man, when man steps aside and agrees to put down the writing pen.

i connected to a blog this week through a friend's blog and was profoundly and utterly touched and blessed by something that was posted. it was said in a prayer format "Your story is much better than mine. Your story is far more beautiful. Your story gives you all the glory. Your story is one of Hope. Your "no" is filled with hope and your "yes" is full of hope. Thank you for being a God of Hope through it all."

hope: to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence

above is one of the definitions used by webster to describe what hope truly is, and i am so thankful today to stand here and say that i am beyond hopeful for many things. one of those is to be a mother to children who are on this earth. another is to continue to be fashioned into the woman God created me to be. beyond stereotypes, beyond what others perceive, beyond what my mind can fathom, God has a plan to shape and mold me into who he wants me to be. sometimes it's painful and we are told to wait. sometimes we think that our storytelling capabilities are much better than God's, but as the blogger above writes, "Your story is better than mine."

i love a good story, and i am humbled that a great story has been written about me. selfish, ungrateful, unworthy, me has the most amazing storyteller writing my story. and my story is one of hope. hope that all of my dreams, realized and unrealized will come to fruition in His timing. hope that whatever life throws at me, and wherever my story may go that i needn't worry because the Master Storyteller knows what my ending will be. and i can promise you, promise you that my story will not end in heartache, but in joy, if for no other reason that i am a precious child of the living God.

be blessed.
cass