His path...

may not always be straight and smooth but oh my goodness, the journey He takes you on and the blessings along the way are simply incredible.

You just have to take that first step and then just keep stepping and if you ever veer off...

Guess what?

All you have to do is just get back on!

The journey we have been on the past few years has been remarkable.

It has not been easy and has at times been quite full of potholes but the blessings that have come out of this journey have been amazing.

The growth of spirit that I have witnessed in our children, my hubby and myself has been SO worth all the bumps and bruises.

We learned to have joy while we waited on Him

Every now and again we would begin to veer off but He would always find a way to bring us back.

We quickly learned that He is always working for us, even when we don't see it or feel it and that we just have to trust and have that wonderful joy while we wait.

Now, as we look back, we see some of the things that He was doing and even though it is still not always easy, we know to trust and wait and have faith that He is still working for us!

When I think about our newest daughter and all that the Lord orchestrated to bring us to her, I have such a great peace.  Even though we know her needs may be greater than we had ever considered, it does not matter because we know that He will equip us for HER.

Now even though my heart knows all of this, I am still a bit of a control freak planner and I like asking questions and finding the answers.  I like being prepared or at least thinking that I am prepared!

So the other day an opportunity presented itself to us.  Someone was contacting our daughter's hospital and offered to ask a few questions that had not ever been answered.  The most important question to me was if our precious daughter's mouth muscles were tight as I had learned (after asking questions - hehe) that kiddos with CP could have tight mouth muscles making it difficult to feed them.  Now our daughter is TINY and at 8 years old, she is not even on the Chinese charts for a 5 year old, so...

Maybe this was the reason and I wanted to know...

so I asked and guess what?

They did not answer!

Bummer!

However, they did send another video!!!

Oh how I love to see our beautiful girl's determined face and it looks like we may have another stuffed animal lover in the fam!

However (and I am SO not complaining cause I do LOVE getting video), I still did not have the answer that I wanted.  I tried to let it go but that was the one question that kept nagging at me.

A couple of days went by and I watched that priceless video, oh about 100 times - hehe - and I went on with work and advocating and the end of the school year and and and!

Until, last night when a wonderful friend asked me to post some of my kiddos in a yahoo group that she belonged to and as it turned out I belonged to as well, thanks to another sweet friend!

So off I went to post.

I introduced myself and our newest daughter and found 2 other families whose waiting children happen to be in the same hospital as our little XM (gotta get a name soon - help).

I found out a bit more about the place that our daughter had spent the last 2 years of her life and as one mom and I continued to talk, she mentioned that she had sent her son a "fruit party" and that she had some video.  She sent me the video so that I could see her sweet child and to see exactly what a "fruit party" looks like:)

So, she sent one of the videos and I played it...

AND I SCREAMED

LOUDLY

There at the fruit party, out of about 180 children, was OUR DAUGHTER and while this was enough of a reason to praise Him, He was not done yet, cause not only was our sweet little girl in this video that this wonderful mom had just happened to send me but...

SHE WAS EATING!!!!

There she sat, one of 3 other children, who were facing the camera and feeding themselves fruit!

She was using a spoon and using it well!!

She was eating and eating with ease!!!

Y'all, think about that for a moment...

There are over a hundred kiddos being cared for there and our little girl ended up in the video that just "happen" to come to me because I just "happen" to post on a group and XM just "happen" to be eating and that just "happen" to answer the one question that never got answered, the one question that continued to nag at me and I just "happen" to, once again, be completely blown away by how much He is in the details and how much He is working for us and how much He loves us!!

WOW