Dear Friends,
We are so blessed to be surrounded by so much love and prayers during this time. I am encouraged daily by your sweet comments, cards and messages. We do check our e-mail daily and our blog. This has been the best way to communicate for us. We have also heard all of your phone messages and we thank you for those. We apologize for not returning all the calls. We have to return to some state of "normalcy", so we have been letting our answering machine collect messages as we spend time as a family.
Carlton has been very busy painting the new room upstairs where his office will be for the next several months. He put up some bookshelves and a friend gave him a desk. It looks really nice and its very quiet up there. Noah has been getting ready for a big boy bed. We ordered it while we were visiting family in Columbus and it should be here in a couple weeks. Hannah Grace has been busy with her school work. She is usually all finished by 10:30. She is starting to get interested in American Girl chapter books. I am hoping that this is good reading, I have yet to sit down and read one! We make several trips to the library during the week. She is also enjoying her piano lessons from Ms. Debbie and her dance classes. I have returned to tutoring, and it has been wonderful. It forces my brain to think and I need that! It also gives me routine and that is helpful.
I still have good days and not so good days. Some days, I feel like I am in some kind of time-warp, hours seem like days... With every kick from Sophie's little foot, I am reminded of our situation. I am learning to cherish the moments I have with her, but it can be hard. I know that the more I bond with her, the harder the loss will be. I am reminded of what Christ did for us. God knew His son would die. He knew it. He suffered for us, for me. What a small price for me to pay, especially when He is using my baby to bring others to HIM! And He has been so gracious to see me through this, from the beginning, He has not forsaken me.... He has done everything but call me on the telephone to say "Aimee, I am right here with you, You are not alone!." He knows I am so hard-headed. He knows my faith is small. He knows he has to go out of His way to make me believe. Well, He has.
I also thank God for loving me enough to allow me to go through this trial. I am learning so much at such a young age. He cares enough about me to change me now! I thank Him that I am not learning these great lessons 30 years down the road. Somehow, I might look back on a wasted life. I can't imagine. I know He has great plans. I trust Him and know His plans are much better than Aimee' s plans. Knowing God is soveriegn over all things is what gets me out of the bed. Knowing God is soveriegn over all things is what gets me through the day. Knowing God is soveriegn over all things is what allows me to sleep at night.
I wanted to share with you a short section of the book that I have been reading. Just this past weekend, I had time to sit and read the last chapter. God had been saving it just for me. Its from Noel Piper's, "Faithful Women & Their Extraordinary God." Helen Roseveare was a missionary who gave her whole life to serving Christ in the Congo. She suffered much persecution, but had an amazing ministry. Her ministry is still running strong today.
"In 1989, 120 young people sat cross-legged in the Piper living room and dining room, covering nearly every square inch of the floor space. They had accepted our open invitation to anyone who thought missions might be in his or her future.
As Helen Roseveare stood by our fireplace and looked into thier faces, she reached backward toward the mantel and eased a long-stemmed rosebud from a tall vase. As she spoke, she broke off the thorns, the leaves, the petals, the green outer layer of the stem-every element that makes a rose a rose. All that was left was a a lithe, straight shaft. The peices that lay on the floor were not bad things. But, she explained, they had to be removed if she were going to make an arrow. God does this to us, she says. He removes everything, even innocent, good things-that hinders us from being the arrows that he will shoot for his purposes at his intended target."

I will write again soon.
Love, Aimee and Family


LILY UPDATE: Our homestudy is going to immigration in the next 4 weeks. We have a home walk-through on Oct. 17th, that is the last section of the homestudy. Medicals are complete!!!!!!! We passed with flying colors! Karla is expecting to mail our Dossier on our original set date, Dec 9th. We are pretty confident that Lily will be here by Christmas 2008, and possible sooner, depending on the referral lists. Continue to pray that everything will go smoothly.