By His Grace

I am so excited!

I've been saying that quite a bit lately and I am not even going to apologize if I start overusing that sentence. I just am so excited and am so eager!

We've had to go ahead and purchase some of the big items for Caroline already. This past weekend we purchased a travel system stroller (stroller with a car seat and base), a bunch of special bottles along with a microwave sterilization kit (since we will be living out of a hotel for five days to two weeks), diapers, wipes, bath items, etc. I've also bought little odds and ends on clearance such as pacifiers and a car seat head and neck rest since our baby will be riding in the car for about nine hours while we bring her home. My sister has let me borrow one of her diaper bags to use while I am in Florida so that was nice. Tonight my sister helped us put the carseat base in the car along with the carseat (the carseat is a piece of cake...it was the base that tripped me up!). I was going to go ahead and put the stroller together but after we assembled most of it we realized a part was missing and one of the wheels does not work correctly so we will be taking it back to the store this week and exchanging it for the same one. After I talk to Caroline's birthmother later this week I will hopefully have a better idea about what what size clothes to pack. I'm going to guess that I need mostly preemie size but I could be wrong. I may take some preemie and newborn size just to be on the safe side.

We are so fortunate because my beautiful niece, who just turned two years old yesterday, was born in January and so my sister saved most of her clothes in case I had a daughter born around the same time. That was very smart thinking of my sister (actually, my mom made her save it all)! We are all set for the most part clothes-wise in case Caroline is a preemie...which we are so blessed to have all of those preemie clothes passed down from my niece since preemie clothes are very expensive. We are actually all set with pretty much every size of clothing for our little girl. We have tons of newborn clothes, not to mention 3-6 months, etc. I received some adorable and beautiful onesies this past weekend and I cannot wait to dress Caroline in them.

I keep thinking about and imagining the day of birth of our daughter. I know I won't have to imagine it for much longer. I have been doing a pretty good job of keeping my emotions in check in front of everyone but I will tell you that I almost cried at church this past Sunday. Remember me writing about how Christmas music made me emotional? It's definitely the same if not more with worship songs. I am so thankful that my God has a plan for me...a plan much greater than any plan or idea I could ever come up with. The gift and whole experience and process of adoption is just so powerful and true of God's promises to us in the Bible. God also tells us to adopt in the Bible and I really love that. I hope we can be a witness to our birthmom and show her the lovingness of Jesus Christ. We will forever be connected to this courageous woman and I cannot even begin to fathom what her thoughts may be or what she is experiencing. I am so just so grateful that, by the grace of God, she has chosen us to be the parents of Caroline. This baby girl already has such a huge place in our hearts and lives. She's all I think about and I feel confident when I say that we are prepared for her.

I cannot wait to sing to her and one day sing with her.