Still in the NICU...

UPDATE: When I went to the NICU this morning, there was NO Emma in her bed. The nurses had her down the hall...are you ready? WITH NO FEEDING TUBE!!! WOOHOO!!! No more tube...only bottle feeds! We could take her home tomorrow, but since it's Easter, there will not be anyone to discharge her. (Remember...we are still working with DHS.) So, because the nurses are SO great, they have reserved us a room for the day! We get to stay and spend the day, the kids and family get to come up, etc. We are SO excited. Then, we will bring her home on Monday as long as everything goes as planned!

But we are very close to bringing Emma home. She is eating a little better every day. When she doesn't finish and entire bottle, she comes close. If we could get her to burp better, it would help. Also, if she get the hiccups, well, it's over. Emma does NOT multi-task! We are hoping to bring her home the first of the week.

As I have pondered this week over how long it seems to be taking to get Emma to come home, God reminded me that this is STILL all in HIS timing. I realized that when His work in the NICU is finished for us, then it will be time to come home. So my prayer has been that we would be a witness to whomever we come in contact while in the NICU.

Jacob and his story has come up many times in the past two weeks. The nurses are very interested in knowing how many children we have, how many we have fostered, etc. I don't make it a habit of going around and telling strangers about Jacob, but it has come up on a daily basis lately. Even now, Jacob is touching lives in the NICU. Amazing.

I met a nurse who experienced something similar to us with the loss of her baby. It was such a blessing to hear from her and get to visit. She is the first person I have talked to who lost a child to a "freak accident" like us. It's different than losing a baby from illness or at birth. Don't get me wrong...the LOSS is NO different. It's the pictures you can't get out of your head that are different. I have no doubt that God put her in my life that day. We spoke for a long time and hopefully, she walked away, as I did, feeling better.

I am going to post a picture of Emma so that you can get an idea of how "big" she is. Please forgive the picture of me...I am exhausted!

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This past week I received an update on the baby we were going to adopt from Texas. "T" was captured by police and is in the witness protection program. We have been told that she lost the baby. Now, we do not know if that means the baby died or just that she lost it to DHS, but God closed the door on that situation for us and I am grateful. God's timing is perfect and precious. I did not ask for that confirmation, but it sure did feel good to get it!

I have also realized something else about our Savior. It's all in the details. God promised to give me the desires of my heart. I trusted Him to do just that. What I did not realize was that God wanted to give me DETAILED desires. The little thoughts that you have like "you know, I would love a tiny chocolate baby girl, but I will take whatever you want me to have." God hears those thoughts. Would I have been disappointed with a vanilla baby?? Of course not! BUT...my God loves me SO much, He worked out every little detail. Not only has He provided the desire of my heart, but it's like He added His own personal touches knowing how much I would love them. He loves me, He knows me, He hears me.

Hallelujah, what a Savior! Praying you have a blessed Easter weekend praising the Father for loving us SO much that He sent His precious Son into our world so that we might have life.

How Great Is Our God!!

“The Lord replied, ‘Look at the nations and be amazed! Watch and be astounded at what I will do! For I am doing something in your own day, something you wouldn’t believe even if someone told you about it.’” (Habakkuk 1:5)

And with that, my jaw is still on the floor as I have watched and am astounded! This was a verse that God gave me some time ago. Almost 4 years ago, I started praying for my heart’s desire: A baby girl…not only that, but a TINY baby girl. I don’t know why, I just wanted a tiny one. As I prayed for about 6 months, God gave me the promise, and also the name. As God led us to foster care, I knew that He would answer this prayer, but also knew that it would not be right away.

Five different foster babies have lived with us; three of them are our forever children. Not one of them was a tiny baby girl. Not one of them was our “Emma Claire”. But that was okay because I knew she would come.

Emma Claire is here. She was born on March 29, 2009 at 35 weeks, weighing 4lbs 14oz, 18 ½ inches long and was addicted to cocaine at birth. She is chocolate and has the chubbiest cheeks to be so small!

To put this all in perspective and so you will know as I do that this entire event was TOTALLY orchestrated by God, let me tell you the events of the past 3 weeks.

Remember, according to DHS, our home is full and they would not ever place any more children with us.

On March 11, I called my licensing worker to ask her something about our adoption stuff. Somehow the topic of us leaving our home open came up…I honestly don’t remember. On March 18, I get an email from the supervisor telling me they would like us to stay open to do emergency care. (This would be keeping babies from 1-30 days only.) We agreed and received a call the next day. It did not work out, but at least I knew we were on the list!

By March 26, I have not had any calls, or heard from anybody. My worker was coming to reassess our home on the 27th (since our adoption has not been completed) and happened to call to change the time. She asked how the baby was doing and I told her we did not have one. Well, evidently, nobody notified her that we had not been placed with. When she came to my home on the 27th, one of the first things she said was “We are going to open your home to OK county.” WHAT??? We are not in OK county and our county is VERY stingy with their homes. It happens, but NEVER this easily and only after a week and a half. I finally (still in shock) ask her why the change of heart and she said, “Because we want you to have a baby.” WOW!!!

I cannot even stress to you what a miracle this was. Only if you have been involved in foster care in my county would you really understand, so just trust me. THIS IS A MIRACLE! God totally changed the hearts of these people.

Monday, March 30, our home is opened to OK county. (Even they were in complete shock!) I was told that they would give me an emergency placement first because they didn’t want to “rock the boat” with a long term placement. No babies that day.

Tuesday, March 31, at 9:36am, I get a call. 35 week cocaine baby (which happens to be my drug baby of choice), etc, with all the details. I ask, “How long do you think she will need our home?” I was told “Oh…this one is heading for termination…you will have her a LONG time and she will be adoptable.” WHAT???

Now…with that being said, let me assure you that this is not a done deal. We are VERY early in the game (she isn’t even home yet) and nobody from DHS has promised us this baby, but God is a faithful God and I am believing in Him that this is our Emma Claire. God promised me a tiny baby girl and I could not have asked for the details to be any more perfect!

God has answered my prayer. I have been contemplating and praying about what to call this baby girl. Her birth name is almost unpronounceable so at first we thought “nickname”. But today, God reminded me that I have been praying for “Emma Claire” and He gave me “Emma Claire”. God promised me Emma, there were no other guarantees, so I am just going to trust in His goodness and His mercy and watch this miracle continue to unfold.

Please pray for Emma as she is one week old today and still in the NICU. She is perfectly healthy, but she is not eating like she should. She is making progress daily, but she needs to be taking 40 ml at each feed. She is only up to 15 ml today. As soon as she feeds 40 ml for 24 hours, we can bring her home. Right now I am trying to make it up there at least twice a day. It’s much harder to do than it sounded like.

I had to go to a “discharge” class on Friday. It’s a class on how to care for preemies. We had to watch a video on CPR. Okay…I can do this. In the first scene, a grandmother goes in to find her baby, CHOCOLATE BABY, not breathing. SERIOUSLY???? And then they proceed to do CPR on this chocolate baby. Can you say “way too close to home”? Fortunately she didn’t make a big deal out of it when I declined to “try it out” on the “fake” chocolate baby she had for us. It was really hard, but I made it through.

How great is our God?? That’s all for now…off to bed so I can be rested for the NICU tomorrow!! Thanks for all the prayers!!

Just a teaser....

I don't have the time or energy to post all the details, but here is a peek at our newest addition! God has His hand all over this and I am so eager to share everything, but the 2-4 trips a day to the NICU have me a little tired...I will ask that you pray for baby girl to start eating...that's the only thing keeping our 4lb 10oz chocolate foster baby in the hospital!!!

Night of Beauty

I read a lot of funny blogs. Mine has never really seemed to meet the criteria for "funny", but tonight, something has happened at our house that I just can't stop laughing about , so I thought I would share.

I grew up with one sister. I had mostly girl cousins. Boys are totally weird to me. (And smelly...not sure why, but they are. Oh...and loud...that too!) So I never had the experience of a bratty little brother like my daughter, Ashlee, has had. Ashlee had a friend over tonight. They decided to make some "natural" beauty products and try them out.

The first product was a hair conditioner made with olive oil and egg whites. (BTW...it STUNK!) I am really not sure how this happened, but as they were applying the product, and I walked into the kitchen, this is what I saw:

Yep...my oldest BOY was having his hair "shined and conditioned"! Patrick wasn't home at the time...this is what happens when Daddy leaves! I swear they were sitting around the island chatting like old women at the beauty shop! And then the twenty minutes was up...time to rinse!!!

And after he was "almost drowned" as he put it!

He looks like he is frowning, but he then begged for the oatmeal face mask!!! By the way...he is 11!

I will give you just a brief update. We are back online with Christian Adoption. This means that our profile is back where mother's choosing adoption can see us. This is kind of exciting. We are moving on. There is also a situation that would involve DHS...God would have to do a mighty work, there. I am not sure, so would like to ask for your prayers for clarity, guidance and wisdom.

We are in a good place right now. Samara will turn 5 on Sunday and we will have a Princess party on Friday. I planned it all by myself! That is HUGE considering in November I didn't even care if Josiah HAD a party. There has been a lot of healing going on, praise God. I will post pictures of the party when I can...we have all sorts of princess things planned...our only problem was the first 5 people on her guest list were BOYS!!!

In closing, I would like to share my verse of the day, which was actually on my blog up there on the side!

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 15:13)

We have a date!!!!

Just wanted to let you know that we have an official date for our adoption finalization of Samara Grace and Josiah Nathan. Friday, May 8, 2009, they will officially become "Phillips"! We are very excited...it's Mother's Day weekend, so we will plan on dedicating them at church on Mother's Day! Just wanted to share....God is SO good!

Sorry for the delay...

This is an exerpt from "Power of a Praying Woman":

"Why do you think it's important to God that patience be growing in us? It's because God's timing is not our timing. He is always doing more than we see or know, so we have to trust Him on how long He takes to bring things to pass. God perfects us and refines us before He brings us into all He has for us, and that takes time." "Do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises" (Hebrews 6:12).

This morning, I posted on my facebook that I had some exciting news. It's not about Emma Claire. We are still waiting patiently on that situation. We have heard that the private investigators are closing in on "T". I am praying for protection for all involved.

I recieved an email from DHS telling me that they would like to use our home for emergency care for infants. Evidently, they are desperate and the hospitals are not allowing them to leave the babies for more than a couple of days now. Normally, emergency foster care involves you taking whatever age they need you to, whenever they need you to. I am not interested in that at all. That would not work with our family. DHS has said that our home will be different...we will only take babies 1 year or younger. It may be just for one night, or maybe up to a month. This will give them time to find family/kinship to take the baby. We are very excited about this. This was not something we pursued, but a door that God has opened for us. (We only learned of this yesterday and I already received a call!)

Now. Let me be VERY clear. This in NO way changes my feelings regarding DHS. This does not change the way they treated us with Jacob or the way things are going now with our adoption. But, you know what?? It really isn't about that. It's about the babies that need a warm bath and bottle. It's about rocking a scared 8 month old whose mom and dad were just arrested for drugs. It's about swaddling a cocaine addicted newborn while he is detoxing. It's about being thrown up on after every bottle because the drugs have messed up the baby's tummy. THAT is what it is about. Showing these babies the love of Jesus, even if only for a day.

So...if we have a different baby every time you see us, this is why. We are still holding onto the promise that we were given regarding Emma. But as the song I posted a couple of weeks ago says, "I will worship while I'm waiting, I will serve You while I'm waiting"....that's what we are doing.

When Emma comes, we will be finished. Until then, whether we have one baby or twelve, we are willing to help and walk through this door God has opened. When we suggested doing this many months ago, we were told absolutely not! So we waited on the Lord, and here we are.

We have court for Samara and Josiah tomorrow. It's just to update the judge on how our case is progressing. I was told that our packet had been sent to the state for authorization. Once authorized, they only have 3 weeks to complete it. That doesn't mean finalization at the court necessarily, but our date will be very close to that. They did tell me that as long as we have been sent for authorization by April, we will not have to redo our home study. I hope they are right. I may ask the judge this tomorrow.

Oh...we are also closing on our house tomorrow! PRAISE THE LORD!!! We ended up having to have a second inspection. For some reason, the underwriter didn't like the first one. Long story short, the second appraiser was $15,000 higher than the first! I laughed out loud on that one!!!! He seemed a little miffed that he had to do it at all! I really liked him!

Finally, God is bringing about closure to many loose ends. I hope and pray that I have learned everything He has had to teach me through it all.

Swirls in the darkness...

I have new hope today. Nothing has changed in our status. We are still the parents of 4 bio children, 2 almost adopted children, and 1 adopted baby who sits at the feet of Jesus. (Or is it "whom" sits at the feet of Jesus...my LIGHT friends will get that!) We still don't have our mortgage, still don't have our adoption final (although I was told it HAD BEEN SENT to the state...I will be checking up on that tomorrow) and still have not heard a word from "T" regarding our "March" baby.

Do you know what else hasn't changed??? God's promises to me.

August 2005 "May He give you the desires of your heart and make all your plans succeed." Ps 20:4
"I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." Ps 27:13
My promise of more children: "He settles the barren woman in her home as a happy mother of children. Praise the Lord." Ps 113:9 (July 2005)
November 2005 "God sets the lonely in families..." Ps 68:6
"He blessed them and their numbers increased greatly." Ps 107:38
"I wait quietly before God, for my hope is in Him." Ps 62:5
October 2008 "Her children will be nursed at her breasts, carried in her arms, and treated with love..." Is 66:12
"I am the Lord, the God of all the peoples of the world. Is anything too hard for me?" Jer. 32:27
"Without wavering, let us hold tightly to the hope we say we have, for God can be trusted to keep His promise." Heb 10:23
"So be truly glad! There is wonderful joy ahead, even though it is necessary for you to endure many trials for a while." 1 Peter 1:6

And SO many more...I just shared a few that popped out as I flipped through my Bible. Today, I received this verse:
"Then the Lord said to Moses, 'Is there any limit to my power? Now you will see whether or not my word comes true!" Num 11:23

He is the same today as He was yesterday and as He will be tomorrow. He has a glorious plan for our baby. Please continue to pray for "T" as she gets close to having this baby. (We still are not sure when she is due...possibly even into April.)

Something strange happened to me this past week. Well, for the past few weeks, I have really been in a funk. I chalked it up to the fact that we were hitting the 6 month mark since losing Jacob, but now I think it was something altogether different. I really was ready to pack up all the baby stuff and just forget it. I thought I was hearing from God, but I just wasn't getting excited like I had been in the past. I couldn't figure it out, but I couldn't shake it, either. It just wasn't like me.

Last Sunday, I saw a terrible accident on my way home. It involved a bicycler and a vehicle and while I do not know the outcome, it left an image in my mind that I had rather not seen. I am not a dreamer...my dreams when I do have them are ridiculous. But that night, I dreamt that Samara was hit by a car. I turned to whomever was standing next to me (I know it was a close friend, but don't know who) and said, "I cannot do this again." Then Samara popped up and said, "I'm okay!" And I woke up.

When I awoke, I sensed a darkness around me. I could actually see a dark cloud looking presence. I immediately started praying all of the "in the name of Jesus Christ" prayers I knew, and started to get REALLY irritated when I figured out this was Satan...again! I was pretty persistant with my prayers and started to see white swirls within the darkness. As I kept praying, the cloud slowly disappeared. And then I felt God's peace and presence. I was under attack. I had been for the past few weeks. As soon as the battle had been won, my entire demeanor has been different.

The only other time I have experienced this was just after Jacob died. I was having thoughts that were not the truth about Jacob's death. I couldn't even tell you what they were, but I remember I started praying right away and could literally FEEL God fighting for me. I could feel the struggle and then all of a sudden, I felt a peace flow down my body that could only be of the Lord.

We are in a battle. A daily battle that we cannot even see most days. I praise God for all of my prayer warriors praying for me on a daily basis.

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I would like for you all to keep us in prayer for another situation that has presented itself. There is a teenage mother we know about who is leaning toward placing her baby boy for adoption. She is due soon, but we don't know many other details. I am praying for God's will for her and her baby. I will keep you posted on that.

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To close, I would like to share something my dear sister in Christ sent to me last week. She recently almost died during an emergency surgery...I believe God allowed her that experience in order to share this with me:

"Anyway you may be asking why do I tell you this and the only thing God has said to me is that Tracy needs to know that even though you think Jacob suffered before dying he was okay because it was in an instant, and he had peace, there is no worries, Jacob didn't think aobut anything only about Jesus, Jesus was there to greet His child. He did not suffer long and you can take joy in the fact that God was there with him through the whole thing. God was with me the entire time and I know He was with Jacob too, I could feel God's presence and it gave me peace and Jacob could feel God's presence and felt His peace."

Praise God for the people He surrounds me with. Tracy