Welcome Home Evan!

I can't believe it has been so long since I have blogged...now it seems I have a great deal to share!

***Note- due to the closed adoption agreement, I am keeping certain details about Evan and his biological family and foster family quiet. Thank you for understanding and helping us to keep Evan's identity private, as his biological family requested***

David and I recently traveled out of state to take custody of a baby boy named Evan. We have begun the process to adopt him and we should have the completed paperwork in our hands in less than 8 months! For now, we are home and adjusting to this new life together. Evan is A.MAZ.ING and we can't imagine our lives without him now!

Evan was cared for by two extraordinary people from the day he came home from the hospital. His biological parents chose not to parent, and he was blessed to be placed in the care of these two angels who loved him from day one until we could get him to love him ourselves.

We received a call about Evan on Tuesday, June 1. We were texted this photo of him and we loved him IMMEDIATELY!!!

On Wednesday were told "you may want to come on down". On Thursday we secured an attorney (THANK YOU FRANK FOR YOUR HELP!!!), and by the time Saturday rolled around, we were in the car! This is what our house looked like before we left! The girls at work (Kristie, Sara, Amy, and Jennifer) had us ready for a baby before we knew it! Thanks to Bethany and Anderson, we had a car seat and stroller too!!!

I felt like I had to cover nine months of preparation in four days, so we needed HELP! Our dear, dear friends, Shepard and Chris, came from Rocky Mount to help us with the last minute preparations and they spent the night with us before we left on Saturday. This was perfect, because these two seem to have been with us during every "BIG" moment of our lives. They were with us non-stop the week before our wedding, running errands, preparing the church and reading the intentions at our wedding mass. They also came to sit with me when David had his cryo procedure, and I don't know what we would do without them. As a matter of fact, while Shep and I did laundry and packed, Chris and David were sterilizing 10,392 bottles using BBQ tongs. Evan- your Daddy and Uncle Chris are good to have in a pinch- they can make anything work!

This is our last picture as a family of two. We headed out Saturday afternoon and drove as far as Atlanta. We spent the night with my Aunt Ann and Uncle Mike.

We woke Sunday morning and had a FANTASTIC breakfast (courtesy of Mike) and headed to Mass. This is the same church that David and I attended the week we got engaged. It was our first mass together as a married couple to be. How fitting that this is the same place where we attended Mass the day that we got to meet our son.

We drove the rest of the way to meet our son and headed for the hotel to drop off our things before heading to meet Evan. This is the view from the balcony of our room. Not too shabby :) Thanks dad for the accommodations!

Needless to say, the first minutes with Evan were PRICELESS. I couldn't take it all in fast enough. I wanted to remember how he looked, smelled and felt in my arms. Thank goodness were were surrounded by such good photographers. Here are our first few minutes as a family.....

And our lives will never be the same. God has been so faithful to us throughout our lives. The only way we can explain this unbelievable blessing is to say God is good. He brought us to each other under the most unique circumstances (hello...SEMINARIAN???) and has brought us through some of the hardest times of our lives together. We believe in our hearts that he created Evan for us and brought him to us to complete our family. Thanks be to God.