Journey to bring our boy home!

Well, most of you know that we were matched late last night! God is so good!! I'm sure some of you want to know how it all happened, so here is God's hand moving in one full swoop!

This past week, we were really struggling with a couple of different birthmom situations and were shown to a birthmom on Monday after deciding, painfully, not to be shown to another. In the meantime, we noticed on one of the websites of a situation that became available, but were unable to call on it, since we were being shown to another birthmom. We found out on Tuesday that the birthmom did not choose us, so proceeded to look for the other situation we saw. It was gone. We assumed that it wasn't our baby and moved on. Well, late Friday afternoon, June 24th, a case worker from A Guardian Angel Adoptions called and asked if we would want to be shown to a birthmom that night! I called Jon, telling him the details and then mentioning the most shocking part, "and by the way, she is going to be induced in a week!" Hmmm....what do we do? We felt that we had nothing to lose, since we would be 1 of 6 families shown to this mom, Taneka. We released it into God's hands and went ahead with our plans for Lane's wedding!!

We had a fabulous time at Lane and Andrew's wedding on Saturday evening and headed back home about 10:30pm or so. I decided to check my phone to see if anyone had called and sure enough I had a voicemail. The caseworker that presented our profile to Taneka called and said, "I will be up late this evening, please give me a call when you get this." Well, I hated to call at 11pm at night, so I sent her a text message saying, "Sorry this is so late. This is Tiffany Stewart. Just getting home from cousin's wedding. Can call tomorrow?" Her response, "If you call me tonight I'll tell you some really good news ;)" We all know what I did, immediately! I called her! She said, Taneka has chosen you guys for her baby boy! We were so excited, words cannot express the emotions that filled the car up! Nick was super excited and immediately named our little boy! Nick says, "it's a boy! We are going to call him, Elijah! We can call him Eli!" Well, okay then! We looked up the name, Elijah, and it's meaning is, "Lord is my God." Perfect! Elijah, it will be. When we got off the phone with the caseworker, of course we called as many as we could at midnight and text others. We had the cousins screaming with excitement, Mimi and Aunt Kristi in near tears with joy, and my little brother dumbfounded at what just happened. Needless to say, Jon and I could not sleep last night due to excitement and a little anxiety about the fast approaching due date. We had so much to do in so little time.

I think we finally fell asleep about 2:30am. I popped out of bed at 8am by the sound of my phone going nuts with texts and facebook congrats! I immediately started the task of lists of what to do and questions to ask. Called me dear friend, Mandy, for advice and comfort in this crazy time. Jon got up and we started the grueling process of booking flights, hotels, and other things. It has taken us all day to get things situated, but it has been done! We weren't sure where some of the financing was going to come from for some of this, so we gave it over to the Lord, asking, "Lord we know this is your timing and we know you will provide." Sure enough...He is faithful! Jon's dad gifted us with airline miles to fly us into Utah! Our bank cards had enough points saved up to help pay over half of our hotel costs, and USAA pulled through on the car rental. Okay....what about the baby...he has nothing to wear, drink from, or come home safely in! Jon's best friend, Matt Resers' mom...pulled through on behalf of our God! They called saying, "we want to take you, today, to get a car seat for your baby." So off to Babies R Us we went! Wow, what a blessing! So grateful and overwhelmed by the love of our friends!! While we were there we got the essentials for Elijah while we are in Utah, some onsies, a few bottles, some pacifiers, blankets, etc. As we were walking around the store, Jon's mom called, "Jon, my Bible study group would like to get your pack N play for you! Pick it out while you are there and we will get it while you are gone!" Really!? So blessed!

Now, our sweet little Nicholas...what to do. We planned on having him stay with his Mimi and Pop, but knew they were under a lot of stress and really busy with their moving. My sister and husband were planning on coming through Dallas on Thursday and Friday on their way to our annual 4th of July at our dad's (which we will miss this year) and offered to take Nick with them so he could spend time up there! Great! Nick was pumped! Then my dad calls and says, "Let Nick stay here the rest of the time you are gone." Nick flew through the roof! The idea of spending time with his Uncle Brett and Papa made his day!! My dad is going to bring Nick back home when we get home and then get to see his new grandbaby! God is so good!

Okay, during all of this Jon was a little stressed, well, a lot stressed, because we are still a bit short some of our funds. We have had some wonderful friends add funds. $200 here and $500 there and our precious family to help and we are so blessed by them and their support for us. Every little bit helps in these emergency situations and we are so grateful for family and friends that are stepping in to fill in our financial gaps. We know we are still in need of funding for the medical bills, but we are trusting in God's provision and know He will provide!

Please pray for Jon, Nick, Elijah, and Taneka during this extremely exciting, stressful, and emotional time for a family.

Here are some specific ways you can pray:

Please pray for:

*Safety in Travel to Utah
*The birth of our little boy
*For Taneka's heart and willingness to give her child life
*All paperwork to go smoothly and without a glitch
*For our ICPC to go to and from Texas easily and quicky so we can return home with Elijah
*Preparing Nicholas for the time apart from him
*Continued provision of finances for our adoption
*Peace, wisdom, guidance, and patience for Jon and I as we encounter new and stressful situations

Thank you so much for all of your prayers and support! We are so extremely blessed and did I mention, God is so good!

We will keep you posted as we continue to bring our little boy home!