God is So Good!!!

We're sitting here in the 4th floor lobby of the beautiful Marriott Tyverskya in Moscow, Russia at 11:20 at night. God is so good. We've been reading your comments, and let me tell you we've been feeling your prayers. Yesterday was a very trying day for us. We had such an image in our minds of what meeting Jack would be like. We had envisioned the same experience when we saw Allie for the first time. It was different. We weren't sure what we were supposed to be feeling, and we were so afraid of making a mistake. We had such an idealized situation in our heads, and then we were so stressed out from the day, driven to a desolate orphanage with some unidentifiable odor coming from the kitchen, show a baby who looked so very sad and given a list of medical diagnoses that would scare the life out of you. After all of this, the officials then let you know that this baby is "perfect" and that there will be no other referrals as good as this one. That is the fear some of you were noticing on our blog yesterday. We asked for your prayers. You came through in spades, and God relieved our fears and calmed our hearts. For the last two days we've been spending our evenings with another couple from Georgia here in the lobby. As we came in last night, we were torn as to eat with them, but decided to go. We shared our fears and concerns and they shared that we had put into words what they were also feeling. We comforted each other and both left feeling refreshed. God sent these people into our lives. They were supposed to have gone home earlier, but were delayed. I believe they were delayed for us. Today, we met our son. It was everything we had hoped for and we knew it instantly. When he put his head on my shoulder, I told Vonda he's the one. He's not "perfect". No child can live for more than a day in this environment and be "perfect". But he's ours. He is so beautiful and has such a good personality that we got to see today. We've heard back from Vanderbilt with a fair report. We have also talked to Allie's pediatrician Dr. Mallard who we also thank God for. He was so kind and reassuring and asked us the question we already knew the answer to. He asked if any test results would change our mind about bringing Jack home. Of course they would not. God has chosen this child for us just as all of you have been praying for for so many months. We are so blessed with friends and family who love us so much. Thank you for your prayers and thoughts and leaving us notes of encouragement on this website. It means more than you will ever know. If you've made it to the end of this message, thanks for reading that far. I know this was a little bit deeper than what you normally expect from me, but this experience has been so Godful (is that a word?). So for those of you who've stuck with it and made it to the bottom of the blog there's a couple of treats. Here's a few more links (since I can't figure out how to post the pics to the site and sorry I can't figure out how to make them smaller either. When we let the picture load all the way, it shrinks in size). There's two more pictures of baby Jack and the long awaited picture of Vonda in the bathtub. For those who might be wondering, the green dots on his head are not our work. They're the work of Russian medicine treating a recent case of chicken pox. We love you, Steve and Vonda. PS. Allie - We know you're getting ready to go to Texas and hope you have the best time. This is a hard time for us to be away from your bright smiling face. We so wish you were here, but glad you're safe at home and can't wait to get home to you. You're going to love Jack, he can't wait to meet you. love Mommy and Daddy