as Thou shalt choose

Take my intellect, and use
Every power as Thou shalt choose

So runs part of one of the songs we sang in church Wednesday night this week. Anyone who knows the song knows that by the end, pretty much every part of myself has been offered up completely to God. We only sang three verses that night, but this was one of them, and it was suited to the work we have before us right now. Take my silver and my gold...[check! international adoption can do that!] followed by take my intellect...

Although we've been planning and acting on many things over the last months preparing to bring our girls home, we've had fresh input from many fronts this week, and I've found that every new person I talk to has new insights, a different slant, something new to think about and new challenges to decide how to handle.

All that to say, we are likely, by this time tomorrow, going to have a highly skilled, very experienced with "international travel with a medically fragile adopted child" nurse all set up to be joining us for the last few days of our trip to Bulgaria, and, most importantly, accompanying us on the flight home. It's important for me to candidly admit that this decision is not good for my pride. ;) It suggests that we had not planned completely enough, had not fully assessed the implications of our decisions, and for me, as someone who is, in the words of my husband, "always right," making a change of plans this late in the game smacks of not being "right." I have to clarify that: it smacks of me not being right! I'm delighted with the plans, and many little things, which I'll hopefully get to eventually, make it obvious that this is the right way to go.

Until this is all settled, that's probably all I'll put out there about that, but I will say the intensity of the trip that we'll begin two weeks from today continues to increase. 

This is a mission that will only succeed if the hand of God is closely upon it. We've known that from the start (and before the start!) but this week has driven it freshly home.

For those of you reading this who know God, would you please be deliberate about covering this endeavor with prayer? 

~~~

And while the intellectual work goes on, there's physical work happening, too.

A few steps have been taken in the boys' bedroom:

This is what remains of my sewing table. It's crazy seeing it come down - so many years I worked down there, making often half or more of our yearly family income with my hands, my scissors, and my sewing machines. Matt and I decided that rather than store the pieces in the garage attic, we would use them to finish building the room - making the frame for the platform for Owen's built-in bed, and the table top itself for the surface of the platform. Taking it down and repurposing it feels like the end of an era...even if it's an era that's been mostly over for a few years already now!

Matt and my Dad have been wiring today (my parents and sister's family are in town for a late Christmas). Here you can see the old box that had been mounted to the concrete block wall, and the new one moved into the stud framing.

This is how Owen's bed cubby is progressing. It extends further to the left than my camera can capture. He's got his own light up in the ceiling so he can read at night without disturbing Krassimir.

And I've been working away at Bogomila's quilt, too. Any time I'm down on the floor in the living room while the kids play or at night while we're visiting with our company, I can pin a little, or sew a little, and it keeps working forward. Today while Mom and I were out at a quilt shop looking for something she needed I brought the in process quilt along to scope for a backing. Not finding anything that seemed perfect, I decided today that I'll get the top finished, but wait to assemble and quilt it until Bogomila's here and she and I can go out together to pick a fabric for the back of the quilt. We can still spread the top itself on her bed for her to see when she comes home.