Look, I am doing a new thing

It has been a LONG time. A long time since I've posted, a long time since I've even had anything to post, and just a long time since we've started this adoption journey. 3 years to be exact. And what I'm about to say has been a long time coming. WE ARE HEADED TO UGANDA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 
In 6 days, we will be on a plane to Uganda and in 8 days, we will Lord willing be meeting our new daughter. 

I know this news is shocking to most of you that will be reading this. We have been super quiet about all of this, only telling our family and close friends what has been happening over the last few months (although this week I realized that even a few of my close friends didn't know what was going on and I thought they did, so that tells you how quiet we've been). Back in the fall we received a new referral for a little girl that was four years old. We were extremely hesitant, as you can imagine after what had just happened, but after much prayer and a few other measures that were taken to make sure she actually needed a family, we officially accepted her referral in early December. Since all of our paperwork was already in Uganda, we really didn't have to do anything on our end- we were just waiting for everything to be switched over to our agency's new (not crooked) lawyer and then after that we would wait to be assigned a court date. Although I am not typically a guarded person, I found myself taking on my husband's tendency (as far as adoption goes) of being very guarded with my feelings about all of this over the last few months. And I think that's okay. It's not that we weren't hopeful, but we had just gone through two really bad adoption scenarios, with the second being much worse than the first. We had faced the hard realities of international adoption. We were trying to be "cautiously optimistic", but I will tell you I was getting weary. But God...

Our small group family had been praying that Lulah and Jovia would come home by the end of 2014. When that was definitely not happening, we still kept praying for that timeline. Even though we got a new referral quickly, we knew that it was next to impossible to bring any child home by the end of 2014. But we all still kept praying. Mid-December came and nothing was happening and my prayer switched to "Lord, just let us hear something by December 31st. Something from our agency with an indication of when we might get a court date. Anything." I literally checked my email as I went to bed on New Year's Eve, and was so disappointed that there was nothing. No word from our agency. The next morning I slept in late and stayed in bed for a while, scrolling through instagram, and kind of lost it when I saw a couple meeting their son for the first time in Uganda. I was sad that this was all taking so long. And I was a little mad at God for not giving us just something, anything, by December 31st. Then Jonathan came in the room and noticed that I had been crying. He asked what was wrong, I told him, and then he said, "I had a dream that we adopted two girls." I perked up a bit. "You did?" I asked, "Tell me more." He gave me all the details he could, which was a lot. Unlike me, he's good at remembering lots of dream details. None of it made any sense, but I thought at least that was something that he had a dream that we had adopted two girls.  It had to mean something, right? We were staying at a lake house with some of our best friends, one of whom just happens to have a gift of dream interpretation (in my opinion). We came out for breakfast and after chatting for a while I brought up Jonathan's dream. She wanted to know all the details and even got more out of Jonathan than I had. There was a family in the dream, the Frist family, that were friends at the previous school where Jonathan worked, but not anyone we kept in touch with or saw on a regular basis. I thought it was really strange that they would have been in the dream. I could see Jen's wheels start turning as they always do and she asked, "Have you looked up the meaning of Frist?" Why don't I ever remember this?? She does it every time with people that are in dreams and for some reason I still don't think to do that. Even though so often that has proven really important in the interpretation of the dream. Anyway, even then, I still thought, "Frist? That doesn't mean anything, does it?" But it does. We looked it up and here is the meaning:

Old English frist, first "a space of time". As a verb, meaning "delay".

For real. I love that this was not just a conversation between me and Jen, discussing God and all His mysterious ways, as so often is the case, but that Jonathan was a part of it too. Sometimes me relaying things that we talk about don't really have the same impact as they do if he is actually in on the conversation. When she read that definition that she had googled on her phone, he stopped eating his pancake and said, "Seriously?" Yup. God just did that. I believe that God gave Jonathan that dream to let us both know that He was listening and had not forgotten about our adoption, but for whatever reason there was going to be a delay. He gave us our answer on December 31st. 

Fast forward to March. Things had been quiet. We had gotten some updated photos but no news on a court date. A couple of weeks before spring break, we were praying with the boys before bed and Jonathan specifically asked God that we would hear something by spring break. It makes me uncomfortable to put time limits on God (even after the previous story), and at the time I thought, "Well where did that come from?". He continued to pray that prayer, and I honestly can't even tell you if I joined in on praying that prayer. But the Friday before Spring Break, as we had both just gotten off a plane in Haiti, we got an email from our agency with our affidavit from the Ugandan court. It gave no indication of when we would be assigned a date still, but at least it was something. From an actual court in Uganda. Something was moving, and God gave us our answer before spring break. 
We were still cautiously optimistic, but moving a little more towards the optimistic side. 

Fast forward to early last week. Our agency emailed us just to let us know that she had emailed the lawyer in Uganda and that she hoped to hear an update on our case that week. I started praying that we would in deed hear something by the end of the week. Thursday afternoon I was sitting in Jonathan's office after school and saw that I had an email from our agency. My stomach did a flip, which is not normal at all when I see an email from them- because, 3 years. But somehow I knew. The email simply said,
Hi Shawna

I just got notice that you have a court date for June 2nd.  Can you make this?  I will ask how long you need to be in country and how many trips you will have to do.

Regards

Carol

This was May 14th. June 2nd was two and a half weeks away. We were supposed to be leaving for a mission trip to Malawi on June 13th. We have literally waited three years to get this email. I replied back, "Wow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes. We can make it." 

There are so many details that still need to be worked out and so many unknowns until we get there, but what we do know is that we are leaving next Saturday, May 30th. We arrive Sunday night and Monday we are supposed to be taken to meet our {hopeful} daughter. She is five and she is adorable and her name is Gift. (Yes, her given name is Gift. That's how God rolls.) We are planning on giving her a new name but won't decide on that until we meet her. I can't even. So I won't.

The rest of the plan is on Tuesday, we are supposed to go to court to declare our intent to adopt her. Then we spend a lot of time with her over the next week and a half, see all that we can see of Uganda, then fly out to Malawi to meet up with our team there on a mission trip that we've been planning for months. It's a lot. I know. 

So that's what we've been told "should" happen, but we know what "should" happen in Uganda doesn't work out like that a lot of the time. We really don't know what will happen. We don't know how the judge will rule. We've heard stories. We don't know how long we'll have to stay. We don't know when we'll go back and get her and bring her home.  We know we have no control over any of that. But God does. 

We ask for your prayers as we journey to Africa. This coming week will bring a lot of stress in getting everything prepared to leave for most of the month of June. Although I am very excited about the trip, I am not excited to leave my sweet boys for such a long time. They have been so encouraging to me though, telling me that they will be fine and that they still want me to go on to Malawi (because I was thinking of not). Eli said, "You've wanted to go to Malawi for so long and I just want you to have the experience and I want to see all the pictures you'll take. " :)  I can't really argue with that. Please pray that we will have a peace that passes all understanding no matter what happens. I will say since the New Year's Eve dream, we have both been more at peace with everything than we have ever been since we started this journey three years ago. We know that if she belongs in our family, God will put her in our family.  And if she doesn't belong in our family, that God will make this whole thing fail. That has been my prayer and I know He will answer it. And if a second daughter is in the grand plan, then He will show us when it's time. Because He is a good, good Father. 

In the first couple of weeks of the new year, God was speaking this verse over and over to me: 

For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland. -Isaiah 43:19

So I wrote it on our kitchen chalkboard, decided to keep it there all year, and believe that God will do what He has promised. 

A Hope That Will Not Disappoint

It's taken me two weeks to be able to sit down and write what I'm about to write.  Two really hard weeks.  We never think that we will be the ones to have to share the really hard things, but then the hard things happen to us, and we think, "Oh yeah.  God is writing this story, not me. And I need to tell it." I don't want these to be my words.  I've been praying that they will be His words, and that the hard things will bring Him glory.

Two weeks ago, on a Saturday afternoon, we got a call from our agency that we were never expecting or hoping for.  The girls that we fully believed were our daughters and haved loved and prayed over from afar for the last six+ months, will not be coming into our family.  After some red flags were raised and our agency did some investigating, it was discovered that the orphanage director and chief of a particular village were running a scam.  They had found children, told their families that they were finding them American families that they would go live with, send them to school, feed them, take good care of them, and then send them back to their actual families at some point.  When the people that our agency hired went out to the village to talk to the families and explain to them that the kids were being put up for adoption and would not be coming back, this is not what the families wanted.

So, there it is in a nutshell. Jonathan and I were together without the boys when we got the call that day and I know that was not an accident.  We were driving in pouring down rain, and I eventually pulled over to be able to hear what the lady from our agency was telling us.  I wasn't sure how to even respond to what we were hearing.  I had had a bad feeling for days, and now I knew why.  We asked some questions with what sense we could muster up, but we mostly just listened, trying to process.  I kept it together until after we got off the phone, and then after a quiet few minutes, totally lost it.  Where I lost it the most, honestly, was at the thought of having to tell the boys. These boys believed that Lulah and Jovia were their sisters.  They have prayed for them daily, they draw pictures of our family that include the girls in it, they have worked hard at helping us raise money to bring them home, they have loved them well.  The thought of telling them that they would not be coming to live with us and the parts of the story that exposed the evil behind the whole thing- I just couldn't even stomach it at the time.  I didn't want their faith that has grown so much during this two year journey to be shaken.  I didn't want them to think that God was not answering our prayers.  Because I knew in that moment, even through the sobs, that He was, and that our faith was going to be made even stronger through all of this.  But I didn't know if they would see it that way.  How could they?  When we got to where we had been driving to, thankfully I knew no one there, except one sweet friend that has become so dear in a short time.  She was the first person I saw when I walked through the doors, which again was not an accident, and I just fell apart.  She hugged me tight and said some beautiful things, but the one thing that I will remember most and gave me so much encouragement was this:
"Think of all the people that have been praying over those girls that never would have been before.  God is faithful and will answer those prayers.  Maybe not in the way that hoped, but He will answer them.  If the whole time we thought we were praying them into the Sheahen family, we were actually praying them back into their own families, then it was worth it."  And yes, we absolutely know that it was worth it.  All the heartbreak that we are feeling now, is worth it to expose what was going on and save these kids from being stolen from their families.  As much as we wanted them, we would have never wanted to take them from their families that wanted them.  We believe that is where they belong.  Although the families situations may be desperate enough to believe such lies, they are families nonetheless, and they want them.  Praise God for that.

A few hours after finding all of this out, we went to the wedding of two people that we love dearly.  We wanted to go and needed to go.  Most everyone there were people that we don't see that often, so as you can imagine pretty much every single person asked us about when the girls were coming home.  We absolutely know that everyone's questions were well intended, and we so appreciated everyone's interest and excitement, but boy, that was pretty torturous.  We really were not ready to talk about it, and we deflected a lot of questions and I'm sure acted pretty weird at times. I'll go ahead and apologize to those who might be reading this that wondered why we seemed like we didn't have much to say about that subject, but now you know why.

The next day we told the boys, and they took it better than I expected.  That's not to say they weren't sad and didn't quite understand, but I prayed that God would give us the right words to say to them to try to help explain it all, and I believe He did.  We stressed that this doesn't mean that we will stop praying for them and we fully trust that God is going to take care of them.  And we trust that He's got a greater plan for all of this that we just can't see right now, and He can take people's bad choices and evil intentions and use them for good.  I think simplifying it like that was just what we needed.

"We are pressed on every side by troubles, but we are not crushed. We are perplexed, but not driven to despair. We are hunted down, but never abandoned by God. We get knocked down, but we are not destroyed. Through suffering, our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies." 
2 Corinthians 4:8-12

So where do we go from here?  We are pressing on.  Not sure what that will look like, but moving forward with unwavering faith and hope in the promises of God.  We have been grieving, with some days being harder than others.  But, more than that, we are believing in a God that is bigger, trusting that He is working out everything for good and knowing that He will redeem this.  He will use this broken mess and heartache and turn it into something beautiful.  Let me just say that we absolutely believe that we were led to Lulah and Jovia for a reason.  It was no accident that I found Lulah on that waiting child list, with the same name that we had picked out for our future daughter a year before.  This outcome DOES NOT CHANGE THAT.  Why, you might ask? I may not know the exact answer to that on this side of eternity, but I do know that I don't have to, and that because we have an eternal hope, we will know one day. Right now, we have faith that He will show us what our next steps will be.

Just a few weeks after we started this adoption journey, we were able to hear Francis Chan speak at a Show Hope dinner, and his message centered around this one verse that I have "adopted" as our theme verse over the last two years.  I didn't realize at the time how much it would come to mean to me.

"I pray that God, the source of HOPE, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in Him. Then you will overflow with confident HOPE through the power of the Holy Spirit." Romans 15:13

Would you like to guess what the message at church was about last Sunday morning?

<<< HOPE >>>

And then Sunday night, a different speaker at a different church, told us that he had been praying Romans 15:13 over us all week leading up to that service.  Of course he had.

"We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident HOPE of salvation. And this HOPE will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because He has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with His love." Romans 5:3-5

If we had an earthly perspective of hope, then what has happened would be devastating.  When the world would ask why are we continuing on this journey after two years with nothing to show for it, we rejoice in the hope of God's glory.  We move on knowing that in the end, He will get all the glory for this story.  He is developing patience in us and He is strengthening our character, which is producing confident hope. Even when there is no reason for hope, we keep hoping.  Like Abraham did, never once wavering in believing God's promises to him.  In the face of insurmountable obstacles, Abraham believed.  In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God.  He was fully convinced that God is able to do whatever He promises.  Hope was real to him, and so it is to us.  Abraham's hope allowed him to see far and wide the innumerable amount of people that would come from that promised child.  And this is what we see. Our flesh cries out, "God, we can't get there from here! We can't keep this up much longer!" And that's right, we can't, without Him. But we have to hope against human hope; a hope that springs from God's perspective. The belief that God will do what He has promised.  God WILL DO what He has promised.

What you can do for us is continue to pray.  Pray for those precious girls that you have already been praying so hard for.  Don't stop.  We're not sure of exactly what is going on in their lives, but we know that God does, and He hears our prayers for them. Pray for Jesus to be in their hearts and evident in their lives. We may never know here the impact our fervent prayers will have on their lives and what kind of forces for the kingdom they might turn out to be, but we trust in a God that has already written their story, and we are honored to be a part of it. Pray for our family, that we will continue to follow Him wherever He leads us, no matter what.  We are still 100% planning to adopt children who actually need a family.  And we still feel strongly that those children are in Uganda, and that is where we are staying for now. Although part of me feels strange to be moving forward when our emotions are so raw, the other part of me knows that the door on adopting Lulah and Jovia has closed and moving forward is the only thing we can do.  Pray for our boys and their tender hearts.  Pray that this will only make their faith bigger, their trust stronger and their hope more confident.  And pray for those who intended all of this for evil.  Pray for their hearts to know the peace and joy and confident hope that only Jesus can bring.  Because He not only died for us, and for Lulah and Jovia, but He died for them too.  And praise God for that.

It's our week!! {Give1Save1}

This week we are so excited to be featured on the fundraising blog Give1Save1!!!  This is something we have been looking forward to for a long time and the initial reason we had lil Dragon Entertainment create our gorgeous video for us last year.  Things have changed a bit since we made the video and we are now getting two daughters instead of one!!! I think it just makes the story more beautiful though to see what God has been up to since then.  And the best part about the video is that we wrote our letters to Tallulah (or Lulah) before we even knew who or where she was, then God showed us exactly who and where she was.

If you are just visiting our blog for the first time, welcome!  We are so glad you found us!  You can find out more about our family's story here and follow us on facebook here.  There have been so many people who God has shown His love and shined His light through on this adoption journey. We know that we wouldn't be anywhere close to where we are now to bringing our girls home without so many of His people blessing us immeasurably more than all we could ask or imagine.  He has been so faithful to answer all His promises in ways that we could never have dreamed up, and to write an incredible story that we couldn't feel more blessed to be a part of.

We have a lot of fun things planned this week as part of our feature week on Give1Save1.  First of all, if you've never heard of G1S1, the whole idea is to have a whole lot of people give at least $1 to bring one orphan home- and this week you get to help bring TWO home!  Here's how you can help:

• WATCH our video.
• GIVE $1 or more. (see donate button on right column)
• SHARE our video on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, email, etc.
• COMMENT to tell me you donated AND shared to be entered in our giveaway (two winners will win either a small cross or a vintage map print!)
• REPEAT each day for one week.

It's that simple!! 

Love for Lulah from Shawna Sheahen on Vimeo.

Second, check out our new Love for Lulah Shop on StoreEnvy.  We are excited to finally have a site to sell our handmade crosses, vintage map prints and t-shirts that so many of you have been asking about. This is my first online shop experience- so if there are issues (as I'm sure there probably will be) then please just email me and we'll figure it out!

And lastly (for now), the sweet girls at @lilliesofthefield are hosting an instasale on Instagram for me this Tuesday and next Tuesday at 8pm CST. I've got LOTS of great clothes and some handmade goodies that I'll be selling at great prices and all to get our girls home!

Whew!!!  That's kind of an overload of stuff!  More to come soon!

{Check out the gorgeous photo story that our friend Nathan Morgan  shot for us of our family making crosses and prints to bring our girls home on our "hello" page.}

A Double Portion

It's been two months since I saw our sweet Lulah's face. Two months since God blew our socks off and answered my fervent prayer of "Please Lord, just let us see our daughter's face."  And boom- there she was.  If you are just joining our blog, you can get caught up here with how we found our daughter. I have so loved to tell others about Lulah's story, and now, God has given us a lot more of the strory to tell.

To get to the rest of the story, I first need to go back to the story I told in my last post about that morning that I felt God put Uganda heavy on my heart and in my head.  The part I left out because I wasn't quite ready to share was this: the night before that happened, I had a dream.  Although I wish I were different about this, I rarely remember my dreams.  I sometimes start to faintly remember a dream I had, but then usually everything gets fuzzy and I can't really remember any details.  Well, this time was similar, except that there was one distinct detail that I remembered as soon as I woke up.  And it kept playing in my head over and over that day.  I can still picture it in the corner of my mind's eye.  It was a big number 2.  It was black, like a house number.  At that point in our journey, this wasn't really that shocking to me.  I had begun to feel strongly that maybe we were supposed to be adopting more than one for several months.  Jonathan had been coming around to the idea too.  Just a couple of weeks before I had this dream, in the week leading up to our benefit concert, I prayed a lot that week for God to make it clear to us if He wanted us to get more than one.  I was feeling more and more like He did, but the only catch was that according to the adoption laws in Madagascar, they would not let us adopt more than one child since we already had three children living in the home.  This was something we hadn't realized until we were well under way with the process, because when we first started we were definitely not thinking about adopting two children.  He provided abundantly at Pickin' & Pies, and at that point we were pretty much fully funded for what we needed to adopt one child from Madagascar.  I wasn't fully convinced that this was an answer on my question of two, but with a couple more fundraisers that were already in the works, it seemed to me that He was telling us, "Do not worry about a thing.  I've got this totally covered." Then what we thought we knew about the Mada program started to fall apart, and in comes (after looking back on it now) some clear answers from God.  A dream with a big black "2" and then "Uganda" playing over and over in my head the next morning while I was praying for God to give us guidance.  I wasn't sure how He would work it all out, but I trusted that He would.  We just had to be open to whatever His plan was.

Fast forward to March.  About a week after we found Lulah and started switching everything over to Uganda, our new agency emailed me to let us know that there were some other kids at Lulah's orphanage that were available and to let them know if we were interested in getting more information about any of them.  I opened up all of their pictures and info; there were five little boys and one little girl.  When I saw her, I just had that feeling.  The feeling I had read about people having, but had not experienced myself. With Lulah, it happened differently, because her name is what made me know it was her first.  But this girl. Her name was Jovia, and her precious face just looked like she embodied joy.  I immediately looked up the meaning of her name and it means "happy" or "joy".  Of course it does.  I emailed our agency back and asked about her, but the reply I got back made me think that she had already taken by another family.  I emailed back again and said to please keep me updated.  Then later I got another email from the agency asking if we would please consider Jovia, since she was at the same orphanage and of similar age to Lulah. (we have since learned that Lulah is four and Jovia is five) Later that day, I showed Jonathan all the pictures and info of the kids that the agency had sent me.  The boys caught a glimpse of Jovia's picture on the computer and started yelling "Yes!!  We want her!!  We want two sisters!!!" All three of them were jumping up and down and getting so excited about the possibility of TWO sisters.  Jonathan needed some time to process it all, so we agreed to pray about it and see if God would confirm the same child for both of us.  In the next week we both prayed fervently- that God would make it clear to us which child He wanted us to bring home with Lulah. During that time, two of my closest friends, both very Holy Spirit-centered, told me without a doubt that they felt like Jovia was the one- and they had some hair-standing on your arm kind of stories of why they felt this way.  A week went by and I felt more and more confirmed that Jovia was the one. After a couple of days of trying to ask Jonathan how he was feeling about it all, I decided I needed to shut up about the whole thing.  This is not something that I wanted to convince him of.  God needed to help him come to a conclusion about it all on his own.  One of those same close friends suggested that I change my prayer and to start praying for God to soften Jonathan's heart.  Within two days I saw this happen and he started bringing her up to me and asking me questions and what I was thinking. Towards the end of the week we had a conversation with our agency, and we got more information on each of the girls.  The next day, we were in a cute little coffee shop that had a gift shop in it. Literally everywhere we turned, there was something that said JOY or HAPPY on it.  Later that day I discovered on my phone (I think I saw something on ig) that it was International Day of Happy. Seriously.  I don't make this stuff up. When we got home, Jonathan sat in the living room by himself with his computer and pulled up all the kids pictures again.  After a few minutes, he called me in the room and said, "Okay. It's her."  I squealed and thanked the Lord.

Lulah and Jovia.  Our two daughters that God has been weaving into the threads of our hearts for so long.  Oh, how He is faithful and so full of grace.

"Instead of your shame you will receive a double portion, 

 and instead of disgrace you will rejoice in your inheritance.

And so you will inherit a double portion in your land,

and everlasting JOY will be yours." Isaiah 61:7

So what now?  Paperwork, and lots of it.  Since finding Lulah, we have basically had to start everything over.  I actually can't think of one single piece of paper that we have been able to reuse for this new process for Uganda.  We are so thankful to have found a wonderful and quick case worker to do a new home study for us, and we received our new completed last week.  While waiting for that, I have been focused on gathering documents that we will need for our dossier to send to Uganda.  If Madagascar's dossier requirements seemed hard, Uganda's seem haaaaaaarrrrrrrd.  Four copies of everything, certified or notarized.  Bank statements, house deed, medical reports, employment letters, references, college diplomas, high school diplomas (I'm pretty sure if we have a college diploma, then that means we would have graduated high school?!!?), birth certificates, marriage certificates, fingerprinting... (oh there's lots more).  I'm pretty sure they could just say, "Every single piece of paper that you've ever touched in your entire life." and be done with it.  But, I am making progress.  I sent off our I-600a application to get approval from the USCIS yesterday (although I forgot to enclose a check. oops. I'm literally losing my mind) and once we get that back (hopefully in a few weeks) we can send off our dossier. After our dossier gets to Uganda, we have been told that we should travel soon for our first trip. We will meet the girls and apply for court, then travel back for our second trip whenever our court date is.  The way things are going, I am hopeful that we would be going on our first trip by the end of the summer.  We really have no idea, though.  After what we've already been through, we know not to expect anything quickly.  What we do know is that God is working it all out. And that's all that matters.

Mother's Day is tomorrow and I know it will feel different this year.  Besides relishing in the sweet hugs and kisses that my three precious sons will undoubtably give me, I will be looking at the pictures of my beautiful daughters and praying that the day will come quickly that I can be hugging and kissing on them.  I will be joyful and oh so thankful that God has entrusted me to mother these five little ones that are only mine because He is gracious.  But, in the midst of the joy I will also grieve for the mothers that my daughters have lost.  I will grieve that they are sitting in an orphanage, with no family- no mother to hug and kiss, no mother to make a handmade card for, no mother to give flowers to, no mother to call their own.  They need a mom.  They need love, and hope, and joy, and Jesus. Soon, sweet girls. Soon.

       //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Fear not, for I am with you;

I will bring your offspring from the east,

and from the west I will gather you.

I will say to the north, Give up,

and to the south, Do not withhold;

bring my sons from afar

and My daughters from the end of the earth,

everyone who is called by My name,

whom I created for My glory,

whom I formed and made.

       ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Thanks for sticking with us through this journey.  We are so incredibly appreciative of those who continually pray for us and our girls and want us to keep you updated on what's going on.  Later this week I'll give a fundraising status and be sharing about our upcoming feature week on the Give1Save1 blog- which starts Monday, May 19th!  We will have lots of opportunities that week to help, including lots of crosses and map scripture prints for sale here on the blog.  Stayed tuned!

xoxo,
shawna

God is in the business of being Awesome

So, we've got some news to share.  News that I've been dreaming of sharing for 18 months when we started this long journey.  News that I know many people have been waiting and waiting to hear.  (and waiting and waiting--I know.)   Now, it's time to spill a lot of stuff. The good, the bad and the awesome.  Did you know that God is in the business of being Awesome?  Of writing stories that only He could pen?  Of working out details that only He could know about?  Of giving answers that only He would even know of the question asked to get that answer?  Yeah, He's good like that.

First, you have to start with this post if you haven't already read it.  (g i v i n g   y o u   s o m e   t i m e   t o   r e a d   i t)   Now, let's go back to November.  The week after Pickin' & Pies, we found out some pretty discouraging stuff that led us to believe that the Madagascar program may not be the best program for us to continue with.  Without sharing too many details, it started looking as if adopting from Mada may not happen anytime soon, if ever.  We were pretty distraught and very unsure of what to do next.  We prayed a lot in that week (and ever since then) asking God to give us guidance, wisdom, discernment, and more trust.  One particular morning I had texted a friend to tell her what was going on and asked her to please pray specifically for guidance.  I sat down to eat breakfast and started to pray, asking God to just speak to me and let us know what He wanted us to do.  As I prayed, the word Uganda kept playing over and over in my head.  I can't really recall that this had ever happened to me before, so I wasn't really sure what to make of it except that I knew I couldn't get it out of my head the rest of the day.  Later I saw the same friend I had texted that morning and told her that I couldn't stop thinking about Uganda.  She asked me when that had started.  I told her it had been all day, but specifically had started at 8:15 when I was praying at breakfast.  She looked at me straight in the eye and said, "Shawna, I was on my knees praying for God to speak to you at that exact same time.  He's telling you Uganda."  When you aren't used to things like this happening, you aren't really sure how to take that.  But this friend in particular, through a crazy Africa story of her own, has taught me a lot about listening to God and those words that keep playing over and over in your head or have been put on your heart.  I shared about my breakfast experience with two other friends that day.  One (who has adopted from Uganda) said, "Looks like you're going to Uganda, sister!" and the other texted back, "He is speaking to you.  Keep listening."  I began to feel that this was a very clear answer He had given me.  So, over the next couple of weeks I started calling several agencies and inquiring about their Uganda programs.  All but one (who seemed very shady) told me that they were not recommending any families join that program.  It was just too unstable, wait times were getting really long and they didn't even know if it would be open in six months.  They were happy to tell me about some of their other programs in Africa, but discouraged any ideas I had of switching over to Uganda.  I started to think that maybe He hadn't been speaking Uganda to me or that it maybe didn't mean what I thought it had meant.  I know He is the God of making the impossible things possible, but I just kind of put those thoughts in a back corner of my mind.

The holidays came and I put off calling agencies for a while.  We were still holding on with Madagascar, but began working on writing a grievance letter to our agency with four other families in our program.  We felt like they had been negligent in a lot of areas and had not been forthright with some information that would have probably made us choose another program from the start.  We finally sent the letter at the end of January.  We waited three weeks for a reply from them and the reply we got was pretty much a whole lot of nothing. No answers to our questions and concerns.  No reason to gain back the trust that we had lost in them.  Three of the five families pulled out of the program at that time and the only reason we decided to still hold on was because the director of our program was actually traveling to Madagascar at the end of February.  We felt like we had invested too much time and money to pull out before we learned of what would come out of that trip.  I didn't want to wait any more, but it did seem to make sense to wait two more weeks after coming that far.  I wasn't expecting much, but we were hopeful that he might come back and say that they were about to start referring kids left and right.  We just didn't know.

That brings us up to last week.  There is a website called Rainbow Kids that has a composite list of waiting children all over the world.  "Waiting children" are kids who are considered harder to place with an adoptive family because they are older or because of some special need they have.  Several agencies have waiting children that are available at the orphanages they work with and they put up a picture with some general information about the child on this site.  They give you their approximate age, if they are considered healthy or not and what continent they are on.  I have looked at this sight just about every day for the last four months.  I have shown some of the children to Jonathan that I thought were cute and he has just smiled and said, "Yeah, they are cute." But ultimately (just like with the name) he couldn't "go there" until we knew for sure what was going to happen in Madagascar.  I understood, but I still looked anyway.  So last week we were in Oregon for my nephew's wedding.  Jonathan and the boys had left on Monday while I stayed with a dear friend for the rest of the week.  I realized it had been a few days since I had last looked on Rainbow Kids, so that night I decided to open up the site and see if any new children had been put up. There had been. One of them was a little girl.  And her name was...

Lullah.

Are.  you.  kidding.  me.   {just got chills all over again}  I kept staring at the name, at HER, making sure I was seeing this right.  Her name was Lullah!!!  Yes, yes, I could see that it wasn't the exact spelling that we have used, but COME ON PEOPLE!!!!!!!!  That is not exactly a common name, here or in Africa.  I don't care how it's spelled.  Her name was Lullah.  That was enough for me.  *And just a note about her name (if you didn't take the time to go back and read this post!)- I truly believe that God gave me that name.  It wasn't like we each had a long list of names that we liked and we narrowed it down to something that we both could live with.  That was the only name we could come up with and I had no idea where it had even come from.  It was just the name that had been put on my heart.*  I texted Jonathan in the middle of the night Nashville time and told him to look at Rainbow Kids when he had a chance.  I wasn't able to talk to him until late Tuesday and he hadn't had time to look.  He said, (kind of sarcastically) "What- is there a child on there that you want to bring home?"  I said, "Yeah.  There is one girl.  Her name is Lullah."  His response was almost a whisper- "What?"  I was thinking I was going to have to do a little convincing, but I didn't.  The name was enough for both of us to inquire about her and just see what happened.  I had already sent an email to inquire about her of course, but it wasn't until Thursday that I actually talked to someone at the agency that was representing her.  The girl told me that yes, she indeed was available, what the process would be like and what the next steps were should we chose to move forward.  We had been talking for a while when I finally asked, "Can you tell me where she is?" to which she quickly replied, "Oh yeah! She's in Uganda!  Did I not already say that?"  No, no you didn't.  I would have remembered that.  I was shaking uncontrollably at that point and my heart was beating something crazy.  Those three days that I had been waiting to talk to the agency about her, I kept feeling like Gideon.  Part of me was like, "Her name is Lullah.  The end." and another part of me was freaked out and like, "Well, I don't know...It does seem like it might be something..." I kept telling God (and my friend Kimmee that I was staying with) that it wasn't like I needed more confirmation, but if she happened to be in Uganda then  OH MY WORD.  And she was.  She is.  She's five years old and she is beautiful.  She has been put on hold for us and we are working to get her home.  She will hopefully be ours-- soon.

Yesterday we officially withdrew from the Madagascar program and from our agency.  We did get the report of the director's trip to Madagascar last week.  It was just more confirmation that we need to be doing something else.  So, we are.  And we are okay with that.  From the beginning of this journey we have always known that switching countries was a possibility.  We've just heard of it way too often.  So we tried to never get attached to Madagascar itself, just to the fact that we were adopting.  Of course the longer we were in the program, the more we began to love the country and get excited about bringing a child home from there, but I think after this many months of there being a strong possibility that we were going to switch that we had already grieved the change.  Now, once it has happened, we are fully at peace with it and ready to move on.  We are working on getting our home study updated and a new dossier put together.  Once we do that, we should be traveling *somewhat* quickly for our first trip to meet our girl.  Please pray that this new paperwork phase (ugh) will go super fast.

I still can't believe what I've just written.  My, how things can change in a week.  God has shown us where our daughter is and we couldn't be more grateful to Him for the way that He has revealed His steadfast love for our family.

(from December 2nd post)
We're not sure exactly what road we will be taking in the next few weeks, but we know that He will lead us down the right one because He already knows where we are headed, and I have a feeling that He's got something very special planned. 

Love for Lulah: the movie

We have a lot of talented friends.  Two of them are Gabe and Mandy McCauley.  Mandy, aka Mix Master Mandy, is a rocking guitar artist.  Gabe, aka lilDragon, is a rocking video artist.  Together they are a power couple of creativity and inspiration, aka Gandy.  We love Gandy.  Gandy brought the house down at Pickin' and Pies closing out the show with songs and video magic.  This blog post is about the video magic.  

About a year ago Shawna found this blog, Give1Save1, that features an adopting family's story every week.  Here is how they explain it, "Every Monday we are going to ask you for a dollar. We’re going to tell you who it’s going to and what it’s being used for. We’re mostly funding adoption for the people, by the people. The premise is for lots of people to give a little and let it all add up!....And your dollar will be saving and restoring lives in all kinds of ways. Removing a child from an orphanage gives that child a family and a future, something everyone needs. It also frees up a bed in an orphanage for another child."  Give one dollar, save one child.  A little bit of money, a big difference.  

This has been our approach to fundraising.  Share our story and hope that a lot of people would give a little. God had something else in mind.  A lot of people are giving a lot.  Over and over again they (you) give. Whatever we thought people might give God said, "Just wait.  I am going to take your small little dream and explode it."  They bought tickets to a basketball game, tickets to a concert, stuff at a garage sale, handmade crosses, t-shirts.  They just wrote a check or handed us cash.  Strangers sent us money in the mail with a note like, "I heard about your story and was touched by it."  And the gifts haven't been limited to money.  Several people have generously given their time and God-given talents, which brings us to lilDragon, Give1Save1 and the video magic.  

After finding the blog, we decided we wanted to share our adoption story through a video.  Maybe people far beyond our circles would be touched by what God is doing.  The problem is that we stink at making videos.  lilDragon doesn't (check out their 2013 Hype Reel ). Shawna made a phone call and a few minutes later we had a video in the works.  I don't think they really knew what they were getting into.  It took seven months and several takes to get something they could work with, because we are bad on camera.  Really bad.  We both freeze when we see the red light.  Somehow they took our mess and made it into a masterpiece.  I don't know how they did it, but they captured our story and turned it into something beautiful.  We can't say thank you enough to Nick Nichols, Gabe McCauley and Dave Boyd for logging countless hours filming and editing. 

We don't have any fundraising events planned for 2014, but we do have this video.  Here is some good news- the people at Give1Save1 liked our video and we have been chosen to be featured on their blog. The bad news is that this may not happen for six months (or even longer).  When you have been given something like this it is hard not to go ahead and share, so we're going ahead and sharing.  We think the New Year is the perfect time to do that.  Here is what you can do: 1. Watch the video  2. Share the video with lots of people  3. Pray that God will bring a little girl across the world home soon.  More than anything we want to bring God all glory and praise for how His hand is working in our lives and in the life of one orphan.  Praise to the One who gave One to save everyone.  

So here it is.  Be sure to watch in full screen mode.

You can share it with either of these links:  http://vimeo.com/83075957
or: http://youtu.be/FHU7Ru_JKFs

"Called Me Higher" song by All Sons and Daughters.

jonathan & shawna

The things I will remember

November was definitely a month to remember.  There have been some awesome highs and some discouraging lows, but what I want to remember out of November are all the mighty works of the Lord.

First of all, I turned 40 on the 5th and my sweet husband threw me a surprise party!   Although I had been a little suspicious that he was up to some kind of planning, he got me good when it actually came party time.  With the help of some family and friends, it was a lovely night and I'm so thankful that I got to spend it with so many people that mean so much to me.  The Lord has blessed me far greater than I deserve in my 40 years on this earth, and I am so thankful to Him for every good gift that He has given me.  My prayer for my birthday was that this will be the last birthday I spend without Tallulah home with our family!  

{me, Jonathan and my sweet parents who drove up for my birthday and then drove back the 

next weekend for Pickin' & Pies!}

 {some dear friends wrote a song for me (and about me) and sang it at the party.  most of it was nice. :) }

A week after my birthday party was our benefit concert, Pickin' & Pies, and what a high that was!  It really was an incredible, God-glorifying day.  I can't even put into words how much it meant to us that so many people were there and shared in such a special day with us.  We had a crew of friends that were there helping set up starting at 8:30 am and didn't leave until 6 pm.  Several hours were put into it before the day even arrived- not just by us, but by several of our friends.  Anyone that was involved with the event went above and beyond what we asked of them, and we can not thank them enough for what they did for us.  For what they did for our daughter that they've never even met.  So much love was poured into that event and into our family- not just by our friends who were there helping, but also by the people who came to support us.  People drove from near and far, some as far as 4 hours away.  They came and they gave generously.  They brought pies.  They bought t-shirts and our handmade crosses. They pooled their money for auction items.   They ate, they visited, they played, they listened and they watched (we watched) as God made a small fleeting thought about a concert to help bring Lulah home into something bigger than we ever thought it could be.  But no surprise there.  He's really good at doing that.   Through so many generous, loving people, we raised around $5,000 that day. Praise the Lord for He is good!!!!!  

There are so many ways that we saw Him at work in the details over the last several months.  I don't have room or time to tell them all, but I will remember them all.  I'll remember Farmer Paul telling me about why he said yes to us having the event on his beautiful farm when he didn't know us at all and had never let anyone do that before: "Well, I don't know.  It just seemed like the right thing to do." I'll remember how DJ at Just Love Coffee Roasters responded to my email asking him if they would be willing to donate coffee for the event: "We don't normally do this, but I read your story and I'd like to see what I can do for you."  I'll remember the man who owned the Cane Ery Antiques on 8th Avenue, when I went to his shop to buy a few pieces of vintage hardware and decorative wood pieces for the 50+ crosses we were working on.  I told him that my husband and I make and sell the crosses to raise money for our adoption and he told me to pick whatever I wanted from two huge boxes full of stuff that hadn't been put out yet.  Then he gave it all to me.  Over $300 worth.  I'll remember Lindell, the lady that I met at Chick-Fil-A a few days before the concert- a day when I was pretty anxious about some details that were not really coming together out at the farm- that spoke scripture over me and spoke exactly what I had asked God for in prayer just an hour before I met her.   I'll remember Ray, the precious 90 year old man at church who couldn't make it to the concert, but spent his Thursday making six delicious pies to send with us.  I'll remember Chris and Steph, who I don't think had any idea who I was when I emailed them about playing at the concert, but without hesitation said, "Adoption is near and dear to our hearts...we would love to be a part of it...we're here to serve."  I'll remember how I had prayed for the Lord to provide us with a photographer that would be willing to just be there that day and document the event for us (at no charge), and instead of providing one, He provided two- sweet Dolly and Lindsay- who again, even though they had never met us, were so happy and excited to be there and serve in whatever way we wanted them to.   I'll remember what someone wrote me after the concert when I had thanked him for his gracious help: 
"...it was one of those things that was just a huge blessing to me to be a part of. There were so many people there that I love. It was just awesome to be able to be with those people, all joined around your family and your sweet girl. Also, since the event, I've found myself so much more mindful of the Lord around me. Through your journey, there are no telling how many people who are understanding more fully the beauty of adoption and it's parallel to us as orphans. We're praying daily for God's blessings on your family and on your daughter." 

I could go on, but you get the picture.  These are the things I constantly pray that others who are following our story will remember, so that He will be glorified. These things are not about us, but they are about Him.  In no way should they lift us up, but they should in every way lift Him up, because this is who He is.   These are the things I will remember.

But then I will remember all you have done, O Lord;
    I remember Your wonderful deeds of long ago.
12 They are constantly in my thoughts.
    I cannot stop thinking about Your mighty works. 
{Psalm 77:11-12}

{For more gorgeous photos from the day, click on this link.}

Two days after the concert, we were hit with a low.  The enemy started messing with us and made it clear how much he doesn't want this adoption to happen.  We were reminded that this is a battle that we are fighting against one who doesn't want the lonely to be set in families- against a whole army of darkness.

For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.
{Ephesians 6:12}

But we will not lose hope.  We know God has already won the victory.  After that low came, a wise friend gave me much needed encouragement that I believe came straight from God, reminding me to TRUST.  She said, "The concert was a mountain-top moment for you all as you draw closer to the reality of welcoming another child into your home with loving arms.  With that, I want you to understand that moments like that set up conditions for the perfect storm.  TRUST that when you asked Jesus into your boat, storms would come and come quickly.  Our peace in that storm comes from our faith that we TRUST that He desires what is best for you even more than you do."  I know He does, but it was nice to have the reminder.  Although I can't go into all the details of this particular low we are facing right now, we ask for your prayers during this time of uncertainty.  We're not sure exactly what road we will be taking in the next few weeks, but we know that He will lead us down the right one because He already knows where we are headed, and I have a feeling that He's got something very special planned.  Please pray for our peace in His leading. Pray for greater trust. Pray for our willingness to be led into even greater depths with Him, even when we cannot see.  

Once again, He encouraged me with scripture just when I needed it most- this time coming through a friend of a friend.  That scripture also comes from Psalm 77:

Your road led through the sea,

   Your pathway through the mighty waters-

  a pathway no one knew was there! 
 {Psalm 77:19}

He will make a way when it seems there is no way.  He will make a pathway through the waters to our sweet Tallulah.   

Even through the hard days, November reminded us of how much we have to be thankful for.  Thank you so much to those who have continually lifted our names up before the Father.  You are a blessing to our family.  We ask that you boldly continue to do so, and if you aren't already, we would especially love for you to join us Sunday nights at 9pm CST.  

xoxo

Concert update and auction item

Pickin' & Pies is less than two weeks away!  Aaaahhhh!!!!!  We have been super busy making final preparations and every day more and more things are falling into place that I can only attribute to God working out every detail for us.  I went out to Roaring Creek Farm last week and took Jonathan and the boys with me for the first time.  It was a gorgeous fall day, and I was just imagining how beautiful everything will be out there in the next two weeks as the leaves start changing.  

We are so SO excited!  (I know I keep saying that, but we just are!)  Remember to bring a pie (or two) and some blankets, chairs, whatever you want to make yourself comfortable for the afternoon.  In addition to the music, Joseph Kirkpatrick will be doing a live auction of a few items as well as some entertainment that I'm sure will not disappoint.  :)  Annnnd... we have two sweet, talented photographers that have generously donated their time who will be documenting the day for us as well as taking some family photos on the farm with your choice of some vintage props!  At the end of the concert, we will hopefully be showing a very special short film that some great and talented friends have been working on for us.  So we hope you will come prepared to stay for a whole afternoon of fun and fellowship!  We will have t-shirts for sale- our adoption shirts and some limited edition Pickin' & Pies shirts- and Jonathan has been spending many many precious weekend hours building crosses that we will have there to sell.  They are beautiful.  

In addition to what's going on at the concert, we have some seriously exciting auction items that have been donated to help bring Lulah home. Our dear friend, Hall of Fame Songwriter and Producer Roger Murrah, has generously donated the following items that we are offering as an online auction:

************

Hall of Fame Songwriter Roger Murrah
To Offer Services At Auction

Nashville, TN For songwriters wanting to become more professional, this may be an opportunity for you. Hall of Fame songwriter, Roger Murrah, will be offering-at-auction 3 Two-Hour Consulting Sessions (with the bid starting at $250 per session), as well as 2 Six-Hour Co-Writing Sessions (with the bid starting at $2,500 per session). All proceeds will be going to benefit the Jonathan and Shawna Sheahen family, for expenses incurred in the adoption of thier new little daughter, Tallulah, who will be coming home soon to Nashville from Madagascar. For complete information, please call Shawna at 615-513-4168.

About Roger Murrah: http://www.nashvillesongwritersfoundation.com/l-o/roger-murrah.aspx
**************

Roger with Al Jarreau

This man is a precious and gifted man, and we are so grateful to him for such an incredible donation. But, we need your help to get the word out to the right people that will be interested in this.  I figure that everybody knows somebody that is trying to get in the music business or already is but would greatly benefit from either the consulting session or songwriting session. Just look up Roger's bio and see all the amazing things he has done and awards he's received!  He wrote Don't Rock the Jukebox and High Cotton, for cryin' out loud!  Please share this on your blog, facebook page, copy it and email it to people you know, tweet about it, whatever. This doesn't just apply to Nashville people!  

We would so much appreciate your help in letting people know about it. Bids can be placed either by commenting on this post on our facebook page, sending me an email or calling me.  The auction will be open until November 13th. Let me know if you have questions or need more information.

Thank you for your help.  Every day, every act of kindness, every donation made, every prayer lifted up, brings us one day closer to bringing one orphan home.  To God be the glory.