Blog

Last week Kellie shared the first part of their adoption journey. Here is the rest of the story...

About four weeks later, I got a call from a caseworker I’d never met. She said, “I’ve read your home study and I think I’ve found a really good match for you and your husband.” I was so excited… tell me more! She began talking and I was immediately floored! She began, “It’s a sibling pair, a girl and a boy. The boy is 16 and the girl is 10.” I stopped her there and said, “I know exactly who you are talking about.” She was speechless when I said, “Is it Felix and Ashley?” She hadn’t even realized that Sean and I had been at the slide show night. She had no idea that we’d been discussing them.

It was absolutely clear in that moment that God was opening a door for us and making it crystal clear that this was His plan for us and for these kiddos. Every fear I had of adopting, of their age, of the unknown, completely vanished. I told her, “YES!” She tried to tell me more, making it clear to me that if we said yes we had to mean it because these kids had just been through an adoption that had fallen through and they didn’t want to take a chance that it would happen again. I continued to just tell her, “Yes, yes yes!” I couldn’t wait to go home and tell Sean.

When I got home, Sean was in the garage working on his motorcycle. I told him the news and he got immediately choked up and was in complete agreement. It was completely evident to us that God had heard our prayers.

Our next step was to put together a family book that CYFD could share with Felix. Because he was 16, he had a say in his adoption. I quickly gathered photos, bought a DIY scrapbook at Hobby Lobby, and whipped up that family book! When they presented it to Felix and he said, “Yes!”, we were thrilled.

At that point, we were given full disclosure of their past, CYFD reports, police reports, medical records, school records, etc. AND, we got pictures of them! Big 11 x 16 photos! I loved them immediately! We hung them proudly in the kitchen and shared them with our family and closest friends.

This was late October. We found out soon after that we would meet them for the first time on January 1.

We went home to Washington for Christmas that year and flew back to New Mexico a few days before the New Year. While we were in the Seattle-Tacoma airport, heading back to New Mexico, we got a call from the social worker telling us that Felix had run away. She told us that he had a pregnant girlfriend who had recently moved out of state and that they believed that was where he had gone. I felt like I had been hit by a semi-truck! I literally almost threw up. They still wanted us to come and meet Ashley and move forward. We were grateful for that and more than willing… but, it was such a shock! Sean was really looking forward to a teenage son and a boy he could mentor and help grow. A boy who wanted to fly in the Air Force. A boy who wanted a motorcycle. It seemed too perfect.

On New Years Day, the drive three hours south was long and silent. Each of us wrapped up in so many thoughts and emotions. We arrived at the foster home, knocked on the door, and that little girl answered. She was hiding behind the door so we couldn’t see her. She slowly came out from behind the door and the love I immediately felt was beyond anything I can truly explain. I have no doubt that God gave me the love for Ashley Nicole days, weeks, months, years before I actually got to meet her! She was part of me. She was mine. It was something I thought a woman could only feel/have by giving birth to her own child. I was SO wrong. Though I’ve never experienced that, I can only imagine it was exactly the same. God is so gracious. God is so faithful.

These last four years have been nothing short of a tremendously rich and blessed experience. We feel so extremely fortunate to have this amazing little girl join our family. She is a light and so amazingly full of joy. She is funny and gracious and beautiful and sweet and loving and awesome! She is the perfect addition to our family.   

(P.S. This was written in 2014- most of you know Ashley now and have witnessed our blessed journey! She is our absolute pride and joy! We continue to feel like the luckiest parents there are- though we know there was really no luck involved. God had a plan and we are so thankful we listened.)